Still struggling this year... things started clicking a little more last 5 days.. still running into some sick beats... cant avoid AA all in vs QQ and JJ and Q on flop.. ugh.

Comment (1) Read More...

Well.. its been awhile.. had a rough january, after a huge december it was like i forgot how to play. Few wins.. and if it wasnt for the last day of the month I wouldve barely made enough to pay my car payment. Things are looking up in Feb so far.. playing much better, and started focusing.

My Status update on my facebook acct today is  (www.facebook/wizardmickey)

Comment (0) Read More...

I've gotten off to a slow start with my writing in 2010 and I'm planning on picking that up soon. Just wanted to drop a quick note in today just to check in and see if you've made your goals for this year. I have been focusing on developing a plan for the year, i've had a profitable but not quite as great of a start to the year as I've wanted so far for myself but I think that will pickup in the next few days.

I was doing some coaching yesterday, and I noticed something that my student was doing over and over that hurting his game so I wanted to write a quick tutorial..

Comment (0) Read More...

I wanted to introduce a site i just using called www.chipmeup.com

This is a poker staking site, you can go in, drop some$ in through paypal or other methods and stake small shares of players. From our site, Me, (WIZRDMICKEY) and LTUFlawless are both listed in there and have tourneys posted. I started posting some of the 3750 guarantees I play at 5pm a few days a week and also I will be posting some LIVE larger buyin events I will be playing in.

Comment (0) Read More...

My month/year is starting off a little slow so ive been trying to get back to the basics, one of the ways that I do this is analyze hands that im in with versus the range of my opponents. Some free software you should have and should download if dont have it is www.pokerstove.com.

At first glance, this looks basic and youll be like, well, how could I use this in a real world situation. Granted, alot of what this software does is give you detailed information, in hindsite. Well... that doesnt do you any good in the middle of a tourney. But.. what it can do is teach you, you also can make some charts to help yourself know the strength of your hand in real-time or use the model I designed below.

I use 4 different models of ranges, you should goto pokerstove and type in these percentages to see the hand ranges I am discussing.

A This is general range of player either limping or opening a pot, in pokerstove, it consists of approx the top 32.9% of all hands

B Loose raising range -- this could be used by first player entering pot from mid- late position in a 8-10 handed game, this range consists of approx the top 20.4% of all hands

C Early position raising hands, this range is for an early position raise in a 8-10 man game, primarily I am talking about tournaments with approx 20-30x blind structure, this range consists of approx  the top 12.4% of all hands

D Lastly is your tight range, this range will usually be a reraise, all in shove, or bubble playable hand vs a raise, this range consists of approx the top  4.2% of all hands.

Now.. what you should do is start to look at hands that you could have and how would they play against these ranges. Your next step in a tourney when entering a pot, raising into a pot, reraising or moving all in versus an opponent is trying to put them on one of these 4 ranges of hands. You then should be analyzing how they play to give you a better idea of what ranges they already play and then determine the situation in the game and which they might be on. Then, you analyze your hand strength based on that range.  The idea is to try to get your money in with the best of most times.. You cant always win, but if you're consistently getting your money in with the best of it, youll win alot more.  Ill give some samples below and then you can go on and do your own.


opponents projected range->    A   32.9%          B 20.4%                C 12.4%            D 4.2%

My hand - percent equity 
       78suited *                                      37.9%                       36.7%                  34.8%                  27.7%
55                                                      49.1%                       45.7%                    42.7%                31.5%
1010                                                 64.4%                     55.2%                     54.2%                 41.2%
A6 **                                                47.3%                     42.7%                     37.2%                 27.1%
AJ                                                      59.6%                      55.57                      48.7%                 31.2%
KQ                                                     52.9%                     49.4%                     43.1%                  31.2%
AQ                                                     61.9%                      58.9%                     54.1%                  34.2%
AK                                                    64.7%                      62.5%                     59.9%                  43.8%
AA                                                    84.9%                      84.5%                     84.6%                  82.8%

* includes other suited connectors from 2-3s to 9-10suited
** would also include other A-rag hands like A2-A8


Try to put this to use when you're looking at your hand in different areas of the tourney and wondering where you are vs other players in the hand. This will help you play "theoretically" better poker, what I mean by that is playing your hand perfectly as if you knew what the other player was holding. PART 2 ---------------------------------------------------

HAving a conversation about this with a buddy and I came up with some more scenarios...
Lets say youre in a tourney... youre either huge stacked or maybe pretty shortacked and you need to gamble to tripleup to get back in for a run... So a mid position raisers goes all in, we will give him the B range of 20.4% of the best hands.. so youre on the small blind, all of the sudden the button goes all in also for the same chips.. We assume he has a better hand range and we will give him a range of  C the top 12.4% of hands. You could either have a small, stack wanting to triple, medium stack in which case youre going to have to consider this calling option alot more carefully, or possibly have them both covered by 3-1, in which case you might consider calling to knock them both out. S0.. we will run the same hands above, but we will check our equity vs both of these opponents with the same group of hands.



Your pot equity in a 3 handed all-in vs a B level estimated range and a C level estimated range with the following hands...

So youre over 50% chance to lose the hand in the sitation with all of these but AA, but youre also 26% to win the hand with even a suited connector.. worth the consideration  in some situations. 78s 26.9%
55   29.5%
1010 38.4%
A6   23.7%
AJ  32.2% AQ  36.8%
AK  41.9%
AA 73.6%

Knowledge is power, odds and what you know and how you use them are a huge part of this game, consider them carefully in your decision making.


wizrdmickey
Yahoo IM wizardmickey33
twitter @wizardmickey

Comment (0)

If you have read part1 and especially part deuce yet.. read those first.. some very important precursor information and an outline to the next few chapters listed there.

So, you got your warpaint, you got your background changed to camouflage, you're psyched.. Guess what, that doesn't make you a bad ass. You have to train and qualify to be classified a  Poker commando.

Comment (0) Read More...

I had a conversation with one of my buddies today who also plays here and we were discussing note taking. i thought I would put my thought out here because I dont know if everyone understand what  type of notes that should be taking on other players. This site is small enough where good notetaking is a valuable piece of information that you shouldnt be avoiding.

When you take notes, you want to put information in there that will help you everytime you see them. If you just say, well "this guy is a bluffer" that doesnt really help you because next time you play him, he might not be bluffing. You need to take the time to give yourself more context of the situation, when does he bluff? Was it a continuation bet? Did he fire 2-3 bullets? or did he stop betting when he got called. This is much more valuable information.

Comment (0) Read More...

For anyone interested, rooting for/against me, I figured i'd start an update blog for the Mtt leaderboard on the network that I am trying to grind out and win this month. Hitting about 8-12 trneys a day. My strategy is to hit a couple of 1000-1250 guars and play fast to get a chipstack or bust out since I need 1st-2nd in those to get any sustainable points. Then, I focus harder on the noon 33.00 1250guar freeze , 2pm 22.00 1000guar with rebuys, 5pm 50.00 3750 guar with rebuys, 830 33.00 2250 guar, 930 50.00 1500 guar with rebuys, and 1030 15.00 1500 guar with rebuys. They take the top 25 points totals of the month, which means the later in the month, the less you can make per tourney because even if you score 25-30 points, you still have to offset your lowest total of 25 best scores.  My GOAL for the month is to hit 1313 pts and break the record of 1312 for a month at least as far back as a year set by one of my nemesis's "yamutta".  I think I can hit 1200 at least which should be a leaderboard winner.   My daily updates will be below. 

On a personal note, I am having fun with this and and committing myself to this goal this month. I t might be a long time before I play this hard/long every day and ill prob take a break in Jan. I'm sure I'll remember this month for the rest of my life because its going to be a grind. As of today, the 11th,  I haven't shaved for 4 days, its friday and i've left my house once this week, and showered like twice... i think. Literally start at 10am and play till after 1am most days with almost no breaks in between tourneys if I am running well. Saturday, Tomorrow night after the 3750 is going to be a night out for UFC107 so ill give them a shot at gaining some ground!

Comment (0) Read More...

This is from a coaching session I did with an online player today after reviewing some of his hand histories so I thought I would share with everyone what I was telling him. Soon.. i will get back to the articles.. just trying to finish out this monthly MTT leaderboard victory.

If you want some coaching.. hit me up on the Yahoo IM below: wizardmickey33 and we will discuss fees and what youre looking for. I work pretty cheap because I like it.

Comment (0) Read More...

In the next article I want to write about training and preparing for battle in Heads-up matches and No limit tourneys from the eyes of a rogue special forces commando.

I will look at some of the actual preparations that are taken by the special forces and try to apply them to my poker game.  The reason I say I, is because as I am writing this, and gathering information I am trying to implement some of these new ideas into my game as well.  I am preparing to put together a book with some of this information and ideas so you will be the first to read and share your feedback to me here.

Comment (0) Read More...