Well, I’m home in Florida. I am missing Vegas a little bit. Just the fact of being able to wake up and play in a big tournament everyday is pretty exciting. Now It’s back to the grind of online poker and the Hard Rock Casino Crap. I’m going to take everything in a more professional way in the next couple of months. I think I learned a lot in Vegas from other people and just different ways of thinking about the game. I learned a lot out in Vegas in general about poker and life. Hopefully I can implement everything I have been thinking about and learned.

My sleeping schedule is pretty messed up. I woke up at 5:45am this morning and went and worked out at 7am til about 9:30am with my buddy Brian. Brian is one of my best friends and has been living with me and my family since about December. He’s about to go overseas and play professional basketball which will be good for him. We played ball together in high school and that’s how our friendship started. It’s good to workout with him. He works out hard. He probably goes to the gym three times a day to lift and work on basketball drills.

About eight months ago I had ACL surgery. I completely shattered my ACL and tore both my meniscus’s. This happened last September, and I had surgery November 14th. I am still rehabbing my knee and it is still not 100%. I think one of the rehabbing places I went to down in South Florida (when I moved home from college) messed up my rehab. When I was rehabbing in Orlando for a month they were doing a lot more with me. Then I came back home and went to this rehab place here and I think they just treated me like a normal person instead of an athlete trying to get back in the game. I am going to go to the doctor soon and get it checked out again and then go to a different rehab place. I am dying to get back on the basketball court and be 100% healthy again. This injury has really taken its toll on me since the basketball court is the one place I am genuinely happy at. It is definitely my sanctuary when everything else is going wrong.

I just woke up about two hours ago. I started taking a nap around 3pm and woke up at about 10:30pm. Hopefully I can get out of the funk and start having a normal cycle which involves me waking up around 8am and going to bed around 1-2am.

I talked to Stu a little while ago and he is in Pensacola. He drove out to Vegas and is almost home from driving back from Vegas. I cant imagine driving to and from Vegas but somehow he is managing to do it. We have some work to do with poker and some other things we need to figure out when he gets back, so I’m excited to be back at home with all my friends around too.

Good luck to some of my friends that are still in the main event. Specifically Adam Levy (Roothlus online) and David Rheem (Chino). I hope they both make the final table. Adam is probably one of my best friends through online poker. I never really talked to many people from online poker but he was the first one really. I always thought trying to make friends in the online poker community would be a tough process. When you are a winning player, or winning at the time, everyone wants to be your friend and know the key to success. I have never really tried to become friends with people because I didn’t want them to think I was just after their winning poker information. I have never really been a big winner myself and a big known player in my opinion, so it’s tough to try to make friends (and just friends — not wanting anything) in the online poker community when most of the time people want something from you. I hope that wasn’t too confusing.

Anyways, I haven’t played poker in the last couple of days and will probably play tomorrow (Sunday) but I’m not sure about that either. I’ll keep you guys updated.

I guess I will introduce this hand I played over the summer with Krantz (pr1nnyraid) in the $1500 6max event. My table started with Mimi Tran and Krantz was moved to the table and HoosierAlum was there as well. Pretty tough table. Krantz had shown some bluffs when I thought it was pretty obvious he was bluffing in certain hands. I felt I had a good read on him and I didn’t know who he was at the time. He was super aggressive and I knew I had to relax since he had position on me. I had about 12k (from 3k) and he had about 15k in chips when the hand took place. I was playing tight at this point because he was squeezing often and reraising. I raised to 300 at 50/100 on the cutoff with QQ and he called on the button. The big blind called also. The flop Came Jh8c3d This flop was a good flop for me and I continuation bet 450. Krantz called and the big blind folded. The turn came the Qh and I checked to Krantz. At this point I have the second nuts. Only 9T (open ended flopped straight draw) beats me and I have no clue what he has at this point, although I know his range is huge for floating the flop. He bet 1400 into me on the turn and I decided to just call to see what he did on the river. The turn brought a flush draw as well which I knew Krantz was able to have backdoor hearts, but I wanted to see a river. The river came 2s and I was left with the absolute 2nd nuts. I checked to Krantz and he thought for a minute before saying “I guess I’m all in.” Wow. He had moved in a couple orbits before on a bluff and I went into the tank for about 30 seconds. I still had 9k behind and I know Krantz was definitely capable of having the nuts here. I wasn’t slowrolling here, but I am never folding vs this player. I just wanted to let everything sink in. I didn’t think he would fire another huge bluff into me so I thought he could definitely have it here. I figured he might play a set or two pair the same way for value, and my hand is completely disguised at this point checking the turn and the river. I decided no matter what I can never fold this and if he has it, he has it. I called and he said nice call. I turned over my top set and he mucked, saying he had outs going into the river. He commented how it was pretty advanced me checking top set twice and so forth, but I honestly don’t think there is any other way to play this hand.

Given he is capable of floating the flop with any two cards I think I have to give him the option of bluffing the turn. I could check raise the turn but I don’t necessarily want to kill my action and I don’t have the nuts. The river I was going to decide if putting in a raise for value (if he just bet) was worth it or not, but he moved in, so that killed that thought process. I didn’t think this player would run another huge bluff after he already showed a pretty big bluff, so that is why I decided to check the river. I guess in his eyes I looked like I had a very weak hand and he thought he could put me to the test with an all in bet. Given the way he had been playing I doubt I fold any sets here or two pair. He probably gets me off hands like AJ or AQ. Like I said, his all in on the river seemed very strong given he had shown a bluff earlier and we were both over 100bbs deep. It’s a pretty interesting hand and if anyone has any questions or comments just add them and I will respond. I have another sick interesting hand I have been meaning to discuss that I will post in the future too.