A few things on PocketFives

PocketFives is an online community for tournament poker players, their big feature is their ranking of the top 100 online tournament players. As I mentioned in a post some time last year when I was ranked for a couple weeks, there are lots of good reasons not to read too much into those rankings (the ranking criteria are explained on the site), but nonetheless it is kind of nice to be recognized as a top player. I re-entered the rankings last week in the 100 spot, and after my performace on Saturday I jumped up 21 spots to 79. Also, there's an article on the front page now about members of the P5s community that have been doing well in the first few FTOPS events. There's a paragraph about me in there for my 2nd place finish in Event #2.

PocketFivers dominating the FTOPS

I didn't write anything about Sunday because it was pretty unevenful. I made a bunch playing cash and lost some of it back at tournaments. In particular I've moved back to shortstacking 25/50 full ring games and taking shots in those games with a full stack when I happen to have position on a big fish while shortstacking. My results so far have been very positive taking these shots, here's a few hands.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1103117

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1103118

And one from Party. It turned out the guy I didn't recognize at this table wasn't bad, but in the time it took me to figure that out I played this hand against another guy. Pretty easy call for me on the river I guess, though I took my time making it since it was for a lot of money. He's trying to represent a big hand on the river, but on a draw heavy board like this there's no way he ever checks behind a big hand on the turn, and no draws got there on the river obviously. The only thing that makes any sense is if he rivered a set of twos, but that's very unlikely compared to the chances he's bluffing, especially since it doesn't look like I have much of a hand either the way I played it.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?1103139

Oh yeah I checked the flop because it's a connected board that may have hit someone hard, and getting a continuation bet raised there is awful when I have such a big draw. Often with such a big draw I would lead out and move all-in over a raise, but if I get raised on this board it's way too likely that pairing my K or J won't be enough to win me the pot so I don't just want to get all-in on the flop as a big underdog. I wasn't sure about the turn but I think I'd have taken my chances and checkraised all-in over a decent sized bet since there's a good chance I have the best hand but he has a ton of outs. Against some really tight players I might call and fold if he follows through with a big river bet, but I like the checkraise against a more aggressive player, though I didn't have much of a read here.

Mike