tilted behaviour

Late last night, Heath and I decided to play the $200 Teams Event at the Victorian Poker Championships, and consequently I made the boring drive up the highway to donk off.

I arrived early to take care of some things before Heath and I decided to grab a few drinks and some food at Lagerfield. We discussed work, poker and all of the above before being joined by Kirsty, Landon and a few of his mates.

Eventually we decided to make our way downstairs to tackle the gauntlet of the teams event, with me taking the first rotation. Unfortunately the 2,500 starting stack I had received was soon chopped into half as Heath took his seat and topped up another 2,500. I would lose us some chips, he would get us a double; that was the order for the night, which funnily enough was the opposite to the way it happened when we first played a teams event together back in 2008. Nothing went right for me, and inevitably it would be Heath that would bust us when he shoved over Aces with Ace-Jack – and although flopping a Jack – failed to improve to see us bust in about 60th place of the 214 starters.

However, I spent the majority of the night when not playing discussing the upcoming State of Origin, and how it should be fixed for 2011. Consequently, here are my suggestions for how the 2011 State of Origin at the Victorian Poker Championships should be conducted.

State of Origin Committee
Over the past few years, there has always been an issue with the exact formation of each side. Justification for an inclusion or exclusion is always the biggest talking point, followed by the selection of the captain.

To make the State of Origin a premier feature event on the local poker calendar, something has to be done to ensure that the teams selected are not only fair, but also a true justification of the best in the state.

Consequently I believe a Committee should be formed that will pick the squad through mutual decision by sorting through live and online tournament results both in Australia and overseas.

The next point is exactly who should be on the Committee? Well firstly, the members that form the Committee must be unbiased and impartial to the event, and have no chance of being selected themselves. They must also have a sound knowledge of the game, and possess an even greater knowledge of the Australian pool of poker players. I don’t believe that the Committee should be too large either as this will create even more difficulty when coming to a conclusion on final teams.

My vote for who should head up this Committee? Firstly – although I may be a little bias – I would cast a vote for myself. I have yet to meet anyone with a greater knowledge of players in the country, am also independent to the event, and am at nearly every tournament around the world that would influence the team selection; whether it be an Aussie Millions, APPT, ANZPT or WSOP.

My next vote would be for Jonno Pittock who has the influence in the event, as it is in his poker room where the event is run. Finally I believe that Tony Hachem should stay involved in the Committee by the pure fact that it is his creation, but by doing so, he would have to rule himself out of possible selection to remain fair.

Selection Criteria
Obviously the toughest part of the event, I believe I have come up with a simple solution that should please everyone.

First of all Captains will pretty much remain as they are from this year, as most of them are true figureheads in their states. However it is a question of how the seven other spots should be filled, that gets everyone scratching their heads. With a Committee in place, they organise a few hours where they can sit down and discuss the teams. With the State of Origin concept being pitting the best in the state against the best in other states, then that is simply what you do. Taking live results both at home and abroad, online rankings and past form from the period of the 2010 Victorian Poker Championships to before the 2011 Victorian Poker Championships, you should be able to pick the best team.

The Committee will firstly select the six players they believe are the best in the state over the past twelve months and then provide a further four alternates. This list is then handed to the Captain who must contact each of the six players to see if they are available. If not, the first alternate will take his/her place and so on until six available members have been chosen.

As for the final spot, well that will be the Captain’s Exemption. If the captain believes that a player who missed out on the team should have actually made it, then they can be called up for that final eighth spot. They believe that they are a great player for the format of the event or were unfairly passed over, but either way, they have a chance to influence the team in a possibly winning way.

Although New South Wales have persisted with it, I believe that satellite winners shouldn’t be allowed in the State of Origin. I have no major argument for it, apart from saying that the event should be the best of the best from each state, therefore meaning that a satellite winner – regardless of how well they ran in the satellite or in the State of Origin – wouldn’t be in the best otherwise they would have already been selected. The only way this concept would work is if every team decided to have one satellite winner, but in all honesty, I don’t think this would happen.

Event Format
The Shootout format is a perfect way to run the State of Origin, but some tinkering needs to be done so that when the final table starts, it isn’t already game, set, match for a particular side.

Keeping the Shootout format points system of:

1st – 60

2nd – 50

3rd – 40

4th – 30

5th – 20

6th – 10

7th – 0

8th – 0

Like normal, you play down until there is a winner as each team is allocated the appropriate points for where they finished on each table. Each set of 10 points earns your side 10,000 tournament chips, and when you return the following day for the final table, each state will sit down with the equivalent amount of tournament chips in relation to their accrued points (ie 240 points equates to 240,000 in chips) plus the day one starting stack of 20,000 (in case a team fails to accrue any points during the shootout). Consequently when the final table begins, everybody still has a realistic chance of winning the title.

Now for the next twist. The final table will begin with the Captain playing, but at four separate occasions they will be allowed to make four substitutions. Any team member can be subbed in, and team member can play multiple times, and the subs do not have to be used if the Captain wishes so.

Not only will this format make it a little more exciting, but will also mean that for both days of the State of Origin, there is not only a crowd smothering the rail, but also every team member in attendance as they all still have an equal chance of winning.

In all honesty, none, one or all of these ideas that I’ve come up with could be utilised in the 2011 State of Origin, but only time will tell.

So many people have already contributed thoughts and ideas in relation to selection, format etc, and some are good, and some are bad. Heck, I would love to see a Stanley Cup-esque trophy with the winning team and their members engraved on it created so that the pride of crushing your opposition is more rewarding!

We will have to wait quite a while until we hear changes to the State of Origin, but hopefully those with the power to do so, take in what others have had to say on the issue that is obviously very important in our small and close-knit poker community.

Waking up well after midday, I sat around the PokerNews Mansion doing absolutely nothing before Heath and I decided to continue our table tennis battle from the other day.

Although he proved victorious 3-2 on the last occasion, I finally hit my straps on this one and crushed his soul fairly easy before both of us, along with Kirsty, decided to make our way to the Premium Factory Outlets for some retail therapy.

My plan was to buy a few pairs of shoes and a nice jacket, but failed miserably at the shoes while finding two half-decent jackets at Calvin Klein. I decided to hold off on the purchases until after the series as Heath was the only one to buy anything as we all returned home; and me to the Hard Rock.

With it being Chad’s last night in Las Vegas, we decided that we should go and hit the strip and do some gambling and drinking.

Our first stop was at Casino Royale to play some $3 Craps and drink some fruity margaritas. This was bad choice numero uno . . . not for the margaritas, but for the choice of playing Craps as we both lost; mine hitting the wallet a little heavier for three bills!

What!?! How could you lose $300 on $3 Craps you may be asking . . . well the reason is I was playing it more like $30 Craps than $3 and the fact that the luck of the dice wasn’t rolling our way didn’t help either. While Chad tried to run up his last few dollars, I found my way to a $1 Roulette table where I was betting at a minimum $60 a hand. Only buying in for $100, it lasted me a dozen spins or so before I punted it off and we made our way to O’Shaes to play the midnight $45 tournament.

It was a turbo structure with only a 2,000-starting bank, and after check-raising all in with top pair in the third level and getting snapped off with a flush draw, I was out before Chad when he spiked another club on the river. I dumped another $100 on Craps there, before Chad bite the dust and we made our way back to the Hard Rock.

Chad decided to call it a night as he had an early flight the next day, but I decided to kick on and play some $1-2 NLH in the poker room.

I chipped up quickly when a guy limp-shoved over my three-bet (raise to $7, then to $18) with deuces and I called off his $104 with Queens as the board blanked out.

A few orbits later I made it $7 to go with A♠ Q♠ and found three callers before firing out $16 on a A♦ 10♠ 2♥ flop. It was called round before the big blind led for $60 when the turn landed the 2♠ with only me calling before the 5♥ on the river went check, check. He tabled his Q♣ 10♦ and I collected the pot to move to $428 before chipping up to $486 after cracking Queens with King-Jack when I flopped two-pair.

The switch was then flicked as I proceeded to lose every hand thereafter. I was two-outered twice, and rivered three-times by the same guy in virtual back-to-back-to-back hands before losing my last $85 in a straddle pot with Queens against the straddler’s Aces to finish down a buy-in at the Hard Rock and $900 overall for the day!

I wish I had worked today!

I managed only a couple of hours of sleep last night before having to wake up nice and early to make my way to the airport.

Heath and Kirsty were arriving into town to prepare for their upcoming weekend wedding and consequently needed my car to get round. I was happy to lend it to him and as I arrived at the airport we did a straight stop as they took the keys and I made my way to check-in.

After I made my way through immigration I stopped by Duty Free and pondered buying a DSLR since we wouldn’t have one for New Zealand and the fact that I would definitely be putting it to use. I was looking at the Nikon D3000 ($899), Canon EOS1000d ($999) and the Canon EOS450d ($1,199) which all came with twin lenses as well as the fact that the salesman was willing to take some more off the price.

I tried contacting some of my in-the-know photography friends before boarding, but was unable to get hold of them and consequently decided against buying one.

The three-hour plane ride was spent with me mostly wriggling round in my seat trying to get comfortable while occasionally nodding off. We experienced some heavy turbulence over the last few minutes of the flight, but still managed to land safely in Christchurch as the driver greeted me a little on the late side that dropped me off at the Millennium hotel in town. Unfortunately my hotel reservations had been stuffed up and they had moved me over to their sister hotel called the Copthorne Durham which was located just across the road from the casino.

Once there I was checking in and was told that they had upgraded me to a suite. I grabbed my key and headed to my room.

Walking in my first reaction was, “this ain’t no f**king suite” as I looked into a normal room featuring two double beds and a standard bathroom. That was until I opened the door next to the bathroom and found a huge master bedroom featuring a king-size bed. I settled in and had a hot shower before deciding to make my way to the casino.

The casino was probably smaller than the whole Crown Poker Room combined!

Nine poker tables, a dozen or so table games but plenty of slots were spread room a fairly un-organised and confusing floor, but I headed straight to the cash game registration to see what was on offer.

$1-2 NLH (buy-in $75-$200), $1-2 NLH/PLO ($100-$200), $5-5 NLH ($200-$500) and $5-5 NLH/PLO ($200-$500) seemed to be the major games on offer with a few interest lists for 3-Card Manila and satellites.

With a tournament running it seemed like I wouldn’t get on a table for a little while and decided to sit on a $5 Blackjack table with $100 – which with the exchange rate worked out to be like $80 or so.

I played for around an hour and won a total of six hands. I wasn’t hitting on 20 or standing on 5, I was just playing basic sound strategy but getting owned by the dealer. For some reason however I managed to increase my bets at the right amount and finished only down $50 bored as all hell. Over to the Baccarat table I went and after losing $25, then winning $25, then losing $50 I went and grabbed a steak before my cash game opened up.

Yann decided to take half my action in the $1-2 NLH game as I sat down on a new table with $150 (weird set buy-in amounts of $80 – $150).

Without going through all the boring details of my session, I was extremely card dead but still managed to profit $90 (well really only $45) on a table full of fish who had no real idea what they were doing. The only upside was sitting on the right of a cute Asian girl called Mina. Although her boyfriend was sitting at the other end of the table – and paid her no attention at all – we spent the whole session chatting, and after she went busto, we decided to play one card each in a hope to get out of the run of cold cards that I was having. It didn’t work and I cashed out at around 3am after paying Yann his share of the stake.

I made my way back to the hotel and called it a night with a plan of getting out and exploring Christchurch the following day.

But in the meantime, check out this video that makes me el oh el about New Zealand . . . gotta feeling I’ll be watching it countless of times while here!

With the Aussie Millions over, it now leaves me more time to play, and consequently I decided to stay down in Melbourne for a few extra days to hit the felt.

By the time I had fully recovered from the copious amount of alcohol I had drunk the previous night I eventually found my way into the Crown Poker Room and on a $2-3 NLH table.

It was fairly uneventful as I grinded away for over two hours for $39 in profit before being convinced by friend / ex-PokerNews colleague / Crown’s best dealer / (potentially) Crown’s best tournament director Anthony ‘Slippers’ Molinaro to play the $65 Melbourne Championships.

Just like a typical Crown Step One satellite the structure was fairly fast and I just played a solid game to see the starting 17 quickly chomped down to just a final table. From then on I picked up the aggression and slowly accumulated a stack to see me capture one of the $250 Step Two seats.

I jumped back on a $2-3 NLH table, but started to get a little tired and decided to take my $11 profit and head home for the night.

Heading in early to play the $50 plus single $25 rebuy tournament at 10am I was surprised to see a further 54 players also get out of bed early to make the trip down to Crown.

I chipped up to around 4k from my 1,500 starting stack when I virtually doubled without a showdown holding Kings and took a few pots down on the flop in a raised pot. Just before the first break I opened 425 with blinds at 100-200 holding A♦ J♦ and was flatted by someone a few seats along before the big blind moved all in for 725. I decided to ship it all in and was quickly snapped off after being trapped with Aces.

Left with around 1,000 it was folded right round when I was in the big blind before I kept shoving from the small blind thereafter as the blinds kicked up to 200-400. Unfortunately my 10♥ 9♥ from middle position ran into the Ace-Queen and Ace-King of the blinds and I was out in 32nd place.

While waiting for a cash game I got in touch with Heath and we decided that we would have a hit of tennis or play online from his apartment across the road.

Kirsty needed to head into the city, so we decided to join her as we lugged round the CBD in the sweltering hot Melbourne sun.

Returning to their apartment I eventually convinced Heath to play the nightly $60 Turbo tournament at Crown and we made our way down to the poker room to find fellow PokerNetwork / PokerNews blogger Landon Blackhall and his dad also participating in the donkament.

Heath busted in about three hands while I grinded away before the blinds picked up and I shoved 8 bb’s with pocket fives only to run into Aces to bust out in 70th/98 place.

With Heath tying a noose somewhere, I sat down on a $1-2 NLH table but over the course of two hours ran into Aces, set into overset and a few other disgusting hands to finish down $200 and on my way out the door.

My final session for the first half of the week saw me venture into the poker room in the afternoon.

Sitting down at a $2-3 NLH table full of regular mid-week players, I was fairly card dead before getting involved in the wrong side of a pot to force myself to top-up an additional $150.

It would be a very wise decision because I few hands later I called a $15 raise from out of the big blind with A♦ 8♦ to see a flop of 7♦ 5♦ 4♦ flop fall with a pot of $90 in the middle. I checked, the player in middle position bet out $25 and only the original raiser called before I check-raised to $65. The flop aggressor moved all in, the original raiser folded and I called.

He rolled over his Q♦ 9♦ and that was that as I cashed out $467 after another orbit to register just over $115 in profit for the session before heading to Heath and Kirsty’s to play some tennis.

We played a best of three round robin series, and after nearly pulling a hammy when chasing down one of my drop shots, Heath never stood a chance against either Kirsty or me.

Heath didn’t any of his four matches, while Kirsty went 2-2 and me 4-0 before we called it a night as I made my way back to Geelong.

Heath was still in bed and now GG began to develop something . . . going to be a fun Day 1c!
While the Main Event players were slogging it out, the ladies had their chance to be in the spotlight with a Ladies HK$1,500 No Limit Holdem tournament kicking off as the day began to wind down.

Kirsty Brew and Lynn Gilmartin in action

Playing her first tournament, Lynn managed to make it all the way to just two places from the final table – and she detailed it all on her PokerNews blog.

Kirsty however made the final table with a medium stack to make it two from three at making final tables in ladies events. Unfortunately she would be first to go when her over aggressive approach holding J♦ 9♦ was no match against Queens.

Unlike some other places around the world, the shops in Macau close around 10pm, and with tonight being the last night that we would finish early, Kirsty and I decided to make our way to Xin Ma Lou to shop away!

We had been there the night before, but neither of us purchased anything.

With eyes only searching for shoes, I found this pair of Gola’s for HK$400 or AU$70ish, and am so happy I bought them – with their bright red and ballaness gold . . . easily the best pair of shoes I’ve bought in years! Oh, they’re comfy too!

I choose to stay away from poker today and instead hit the Galaxy Starworld Baccarat tables.

The lowest limits I found were HK$300, and consequently bought in for HK$3,000. It was a pretty standard session, no big runs, just grinded a profit of HK$2,000 out before heading upstairs to catch up with everyone.

Both Lynn and GG arrived already dressed for the APT Party, but being just a tad early, combined with the fact that the Main event hadn’t reached the final table yet, lead them to occupy themselves for a while

Once the final nine was set, Heath, Kirsty and I headed back to their hotel to get changed before we made our way to the highly anticipated Asian Poker Tour Invite Only Private Party!

We found Lynn and GG chilling at the hotel’s whisky bar, and once they sipped down the last of their drinks and polished off the last few satay sticks, we were all heading upstairs.

Greeted by plenty of gorgeous woman, poker players and most importantly and open bar, we were most surprised by the two Baccarat tables that had replaced the bed from last year since the Presidential Suite had now been transformed into a junket room.

JC Tran, John Juanda and many others occupied the two tables, while the majority of the crowd sipped on a Corona and ogled the beautiful models . . . along with Melyssa Grace and Marie Kim providing everyone with a great photo and drool opportunity.

As the night slowed up, GG somehow cracked the shits (must have been the fact that the models above were starting to put clothes on) and left. We didn’t care, and headed to D2 to continue the party without him.

Lynn best summed up the way we were all feeling about him.

“We don’t need him to have fun . . . he’s just a sook!”

Once we worked our way to the dancefloor, we bumped into the rest of the Australian contingent and partied with them a little before heading upstairs to find David Saab and Jeffrey Haas hailing us over to join them in their private booth.

Test-tube and chocolate shots along with Johnnie Black and Heineken were on Saaby, and following a few drinks and a dance, we vacated D2 for the night . . . well early morning!

After a good night’s sleep I made my way over to Galaxy Starworld to catch up with Heath, Kirsty and F-Train.

Once there, I grabbed some food and made use of the free water and soft drinks after barely having any liquids over the past 30 hours or so.

Then I got the phone call that I had prepared myself for, but had been dreaded for many weeks and months . . . it was my Mum calling to inform me of the bad news that my dog Goldie had passed away.

Goldie had been through lots since I got him for my tenth birthday – from knee reconstructions to hip replacements to blindness and a bad case of arthritis – but after all of that he still fought through.

When I returned home from Las Vegas he was getting worse. He couldn’t walk too far otherwise his back legs would give way and he would fall into a half sitting, half lying down position. Although this may sound cruel, I had began preparing myself mentally for the worse, and the fact that he had reached the expected life span of a Beagle didn’t help too much either.

While in Queensland and then at the Vic Champs, Goldie had a cyst removed from his right back leg, and when I was home for a few days he was a billion times better then he has been in years – no falling, no visible pain and no discomfort.

The night before I left, we sat watching TV together for a few hours before I had to drive to the airport – this would be the last time I ever saw him.

The night he passed, Goldie lapped up every bit of his favourite dinner – chicken and rice (unusual for a dog I know) before walking over to his favourite patch of lawn to lie down. With Dad cooking a barbeque, Mum was wondering where Goldie was as his usual routine saw him inside by now. Dad confirmed the bad news to Mum and then to me, and our family dog of thirteen years had moved onto a better place.

I will always love you Goldie.

R.I.P Goldie (October 23, 1995 – August 21, 2009)

After ten days straight of blogging and writing, I finally had my first day off . . . and boy did I need it!

I slept in till only 2p, and thanks to the $1,000 food and beverage allowance that we had, both me and Kirsty tucked into some room service for lunch before I headed down to the Poker Room.

Having no internet in the room, and not wanting to pay the $25 or whatever it was, I set up at the back and got to answering emails and doing random odds and ends on my laptop before deciding to hit the cash games.

With no $1-2 NLH tables open, I hit a newly opened $2-3 NLH with my $200 that I was assuming was going to be gifted out to the table.

A few hands in I opened to $11 with 2♦ 6♦ to $11 and found a few callers to see a A♦ J♦ 3♣ flop and a continuation bet of $23 follow. After telling my opponent his Jack was no good, he was stubborn enough to make the call leaving himself $60-odd behind. The 2♠ fell on the turn and I fired out $45, only to have him move all in with A♠ 8♠. I made the call dinged the river with the 9♦ to see me climb to just over $300.

Only played one major hand when I flopped two-pair out of the small blind in a raised pot holding A♦ 10♦. I played the hand terribly from the turn onwards, and when I improved to a full house on the river I raked in a pot to put me over $440.

I cashed out soon after with a $215 profit in my pocket, and called it a day.

Pretty boring day, but here are some of the photos I took yesterday during the dinner break of some chip stacks. I’m trying to get into photography in a bag way at the moment (kinda obvious yeah?) and looking to maybe even purchase some gear of my own . . . feedback would be well appreciated!