The Poker Lab Rat

Ever dreamed of going to the Super Bowl? How about the World Series, Stanley Cup, or NBA Finals? Win it All!

The crew at popular online poker site Bodog Poker are sure that you’ll think that he opportunity to see these four ‘must-see-before-you-die’ sporting events in one year is just crazy talk. But here it is… 

The Ultimate Sports Fan Prize Package: Bodog Poker is giving one lucky person 2 tickets to the NBA Finals, Stanley Cup Finals, Super Bowl, AND World Series, including airfare, accommodations, and $500 in spending money to each event. 

Players can earn their entry into the draw by playing in eligible Sit and Go Tournaments between February 15th and March 14th 2010. Easy!

Hungry for more action?  Bodog Poker is also giving away weekly trips and tickets to an NCAA March Madness Game, UFC event, U.S. Open (Golf), or NASCAR event. Plus players can earn a seat at 1 of 2 $5,000 freeroll tournaments. 

It’s easy, just play and cash in the qualifying “Sit and Go” tournaments. 

OK, so what’s the catch? ….

Qualifying for the Grand Prize: Players must cash (receive a payout), in 3 eligible real money “Sit and Go” Tournaments between February 15th and March 14th 2010.  That’s it! And with players only able to earn one entry person, everyone has an equal chance of winning! (Yes, even total poker mutts like me!)

Qualifying for the Weekly Prizes: Players must play in 5 eligible “Sit and Go” Tournaments that week.  There is a new prize each week of the promotion, so players who want to get in on all 4 draws, can come back every week and earn their entry.

Qualifying for the Freeroll Tournament: Getting into one of the two $5,000 freeroll tournaments, players must cash (receive a payout), in 3 eligible real money “Sit and Go” Tournaments between February 15th and March 14th 2010.  Qualifying players will be notified by Email with registration details.

Good luck! 

Mike

PS: Pity finals tickets to the World Cup Football aren’t included too …but that’s just me being picky!

PPS: New to Bodog Poker? Bodog Poker is easy to play and easy to download. There’s even a great 110% to $1100 welcome bonus running for new players in February) The links on this blog post are geotargeted so if you click through you’ll get your local version of this promotional offer. USA residents, Canadians and UK players are eligible to enter.

For more on Bodog Poker check out these player reviews:

>>Bodog Poker Review at GoonersGuide.com
>>PokerLabRat.com Bodog Poker Review

Full Tilt Poker, one of the world’s largest online poker sites, suffered a server crash during the busy Sunday night period.

The crash occurred at 7:45pm ET and players were dropped from the website and unable to log back in. When attempting to open the Full Tilt client, players received a message saying, “Unable to connect to server.” This went on for 3.5 hours.

The server crash affected everyone playing on the site, including those still alive in Full Tilt’s flagship Sunday tournament, the big $216 buy-in with $750,000 Guaranteed.

Full Tilt Poker cancelled all running tournaments at 9:41pm ET. Then, at approximately 11:15pm, ET, the site’s support staff sent the following e-mail to players who were still playing in tournaments:

When a tournament is cancelled before it reaches the money, according to tournament rule 31.2 :

-All players still in the tournament at the time of the cancellation will be refunded their tournament buy-in and tournament fee. Players will have their initial buy-ins refunded in the tournament prize pool currency.

-In addition, the remaining prize pool will be divided and distributed according to chip count - (Remaining Prize Pool)*(Your Chip Count)/(Total Chips in Play) = Your Share of Remaining Prize Pool.

Full Tilt Poker was back on Monday morning and has been running normally since.

Hiya
Here’s a nice little Texas Hold’em tournament for players who’d like to try Backgammon…

Huh? Backgammon you say…

Stake £20 (or currency equivalent) between now and the 21st of August on ANY multiplayer game at Betfred Skill and you will get FREE entry into an Exclusive $1000 Poker Tournament taking place on Sunday the 23rd of August at 7pm BST.

We’ll be there, wanna join us?

(NOTE: If you are playing Skill for the first time and stake £20 within 48 hours of your first multiplayer game on Skill, you will also receive a £20 Skill Welcome Bonus)

What’s at BetFred Skill? Choose from Backgammon, Gin Rummy, Blackjack, Poker Dice, Domino Duel

BetFred Poker plays on the popular and busy Playtech iPoker Network. For more on BetFred Poker check out the latest reviews here:
>>BetFred Rating at PokerLabRat.com
>>Review of Bet Fred Poker at GoonersGuide.com

The Main Event of the World Series of Poker has found the “November Nine” who will play the final table in four months time.

Leading the way is poker legend Phil Ivey, holder of seven WSOP bracelets, including two bracelets won in minor events of the 2009 WSOP series.

Veteran Jeff Shulman is another familiar face that will play at the Final Table which will contain seven American players, one Brit, and a Frenchman.

The chip leader is Darvin Moon, who owns a small logging company and describes himself as a recreational player. Moon holds 58,930,000 chips, approximately 30% of the total chips in play.

Here is the complete WSOP Final Table with a chip count :

Darvin Moon (58.9m chips),
Eric Buchman (34.8m),
Steven Begleiter (29.8m),
Jeff Shulman (19.5m),
Joseph Cada (13.2m),
Kevin Schaffel (12.3m),
Phil Ivey (9.7m),
Antoine Saout (9.5m),
James Akenhead (6.8m)

The final table will sit down on November 7th 2009 - after ESPN have aired all the shows of the preliminary days leading to the final table.

Most of the time when you’re engaged in a poker hand, you’ll be thinking about what decisions you will make before you have to make them. For example, if you call a raise with K-Q, you’ll think to yourself: Okay, if I hit top pair, I’m going to play this hand. If I have a gut-shot and two over-cards, I’m going to play this hand. If I have an open-ender and two over-cards, I’m going to play this hand. Otherwise, I’m going to let it go.

However, there will often be times when something happens that causes you to change your strategy mid-hand. Maybe your opponent makes a weak bet that gives you information worth using to your advantage. Or maybe he makes a bet on the river that looks like a value bet and convinces you to fold a hand you were planning on calling with.

It’s always good to enter a hand with a plan, but it’s essential that you be willing to deviate from the plan if the situation calls for it. Every hand requires that you react to your cards and the cards on the board, but it’s equally important that you factor in your opponent and his tendencies.

Here’s a hand that I played recently at the 2009 EPT German Open in Dortmund, where I went on to finish in fourth place. It was late in Day Two, I had been fairly short-stacked for a while and occasionally shoving with decent hands, but I hadn’t yet made a serious bluff in the tournament. We were eight-handed, the player in second position made a very small raise to 8,500 with blinds at 2,000/4,000 and a 500-chip ante, and it folded around to me in the small blind with pocket fives. I had about 70,000 in chips, and all I knew for sure was that I wasn’t going to fold a pocket pair in this situation.

I decided to call rather than raise, knowing the big blind would certainly be priced in to call as well, and he did. The flop came A-8-3. I was obviously looking to flop a set, or maybe something like 2-3-4 or 3-4-6, and this flop was not at all good for my hand, so I checked. The big blind also checked. And the initial raiser made what looked to me like a very weak bet, 12,000 into a 29,500 pot.

I was quite sure from the bet that he didn’t have an Ace, and probably he didn’t have a pair of any kind. It seemed to me that he had a hand like K-J, something in that range. So when he bet 12,000, I considered all of the factors – my read on him, my tight image, and my stack size. I decided to raise 21,000 more, representing that I had perhaps a weak Ace and had committed myself to the pot (even though, in reality, I wasn’t committed and would be willing to fold to a re-raise, leaving myself with about 30,000 in chips).

The big blind folded, and after thinking for a long time, the initial raiser folded also. He simply had to give me credit for a real hand that I wasn’t going to lay down to a re-raise.

This was a situation where I didn’t really intend to commit many chips if I didn’t hit a favorable flop, but I adjusted my decision making based on my opponent’s post-flop action, believing the stage had been set for me to make a move. Always be willing to adjust your plan, and every once in a while you’ll find yourself winning chips that otherwise would have been pushed toward someone else.

ABOUT JOHAN STORAKERS: Swedish player Johan Storakers is based in Stockholm and has won more than $2.4 Million in career tournament earnings… and like many pros and wanna be pros, plays poker online at Full Tilt Poker.

ABOUT FULLTILTPOKER.com: For the latest views and reviews of Full Tilt Poker site check out
>> Full Tilt Poker Review (PokerLabRat.com)
>> FullTiltPoker.com Poker Room Review (GoonersGuide.com)

WHAT’S ON AT FULLTILTPOKER.COM?

Hosts announced for FTOPS XII: Erick Lindgren opens FTOPS XII with a $1 million NL Hold ‘em event on May 6th. WPT Bay 101 winner Steve Brecher hosts Event #12, the $1.5 million 6-max tournament with antes from the start. Howard Lederer’s HEROS Event #14 has a new format, Patrik Antonius hosts the $2 million Two Day Event and Jennifer Harman ends FTOPS XII with the $2.5 million Main Event. Choose your event from the full schedule.

Each pro hosts a matching MiniFTOPS XII event, where you can play for just 1/10th the regular FTOPS buy-in.

Play the 200K Stimulus Qualifier: At least 80 players in the 200K Stimulus Qualifier will win a $2,500 prize package to WSOP’s* Event #4, including the $1,000 entry fee and $1,500 for expenses. Event #4, the Stimulus Special, is likely to have the largest starting field outside of the Main Event and a prize pool of $5 million.

Buy your way in for $30 + $3 or satellite your way in for as little as $1 or 50 Full Tilt Points.
* World Series of Poker and WSOP are trademarks of Harrah’s License Company, LLC (”Harrahs”). Harrah’s does not sponsor or endorse, and is not associated or affiliated with Full Tilt Poker or its products, services, promotions or tournaments …(or for that matter PokerLabRat.com and Red Card Media Limited)

AFTER A tough Budget and a difficult year for the Irish economy, you couldn’t blame the organisers of the €3,500 entry Irish Open poker championships for feeling tetchy in the run-up to the event.

Since last year’s tournament, which 667 people entered, consumer spending has dropped, the dole queues have extended and the tide of disposable income which brought about the worldwide poker boom has slowed to a trickle.

However, despite the prevailing economic wind, 701 players turned up at the Citywest Hotel in Dublin Friday afternoon to take their seat in the event, more eager than ever to compete for a prize pool of more than €2.2 million.

The eventual winner of the Texas Hold’em event, which runs until Easter Monday (13th April), will take home some €600,000.

“We had to work much harder to get the numbers this year,” said Paul Burke of tournament host Paddy Power. “A lot of poker players don’t have the same disposable income they had this time last year. If we had got 600 players we would have been very happy.”

The $10,000 buy-in World Series of Poker Main Event is either one of the most prestigious tournaments in poker or an insufferable donkfest, depending on who’s doing the talking.

No matter which way you think, the speculation over who could take down the largest prize in poker or what kind of player might win runs rampant for months before the event kicks off. To this end, Bodog has released a series of prop bets covering this subject, giving action junkies the chance to put their money where their mouths are and wager on how different types of poker players will fare in the 2009 WSOP, which kicks off on July 3.

One of the biggest areas of speculation surrounding the Main Event always involves the performance of previous Main Event champions.

Will one of them repeat their feat and win again (Yes +2500)?
Or will one of them reach the final table (Yes +900)?

The champions listed as the favorites to last the longest this year are Phil Hellmuth, Chris “Jesus” Ferguson and Peter Eastgate at 9 to 2 with Chris Moneymaker and Jerry Yang not getting much respect at 16 to 1.

The performance of any poker pro is always of considerable interest and this year the Bodog oddsmakers have pegged Phil Ivey as the favorite to last the longest at 5 to 1. He is followed by Phil Hellmuth and Bodog poker pros David Williams and Justin Bonomo all at 6 to 1.

Female poker pros also get a lot of attention (as they should) and Bodog is asking if a woman will win the Main Event (Yes +1800), reach the final table (Yes +400, No -800) and which will last longer, the favorites being Jennifer Harman and Kathy Liebert at 5/1.

To view the full list of 2009 WSOP prop bets, head over to the Bodog Sportsbook and place your wagers now.

Here’s the latest item from the team at Bodog Poker… it’s aimed at rookie poker players. 

Playing in your first couple of poker tournaments can be an intimidating experience. Many new players get wrapped up in the action and make basic mistakes that they should never make. We all have to start somewhere and learn the game along the way, but here’s a list of basic mistakes that no one should be making at the tables . . .

Playing too many hands is the most common of rookie mistakes. Novice players don’t understand that rag hands have a lower winning percentage than premium ones. They’ll play anything hoping to hit two pair or trips. This mistake just bleeds their chip stack quickly until they get knocked out of the tournament. They need to learn some starting hand strategy and tighten up their game.

Pricing in their opponents is the most common mistake a rookie will make when they have the lead in a hand. Instead of knowing to bet their hand for value, rookie players often bet too small of an amount when they’re leading early on. Doing this allows their opponents to call the bet with drawing hands because the pot odds are low enough to justify the call. If enough players are still in the hand, the rookie player’s lead will often get out-drawn and they’ll lose the hand.

Chasing a straight with the sucker end is another situation where rookies get into big trouble. If a board is 6-J-10 and they hold 9-8, even if the queen comes on a later street they could still be way behind. It’s a good move to only call bets if you do hit the queen, and not to raise in that situation. A big bet from an opponent will usually tell them that someone has the bigger straight. This can also apply to a small flush when the hand has some other callers in it.

Going all-in pre-flop is another mistake that rookies often make. This move is dangerous at the best of times, even with pocket aces. Most times the rookie will not get any action on their hand, and if they do it’s from a big hand. The only time you’ll want to go all-in pre-flop is if a short-stack player has tried to force the action. Then you can go all-in to isolate them from other callers with your dominant hand.

Bluffing too often is a common rookie mistake for the aggressive type of rookie. These players use the all-in bet as a way to steal pots, but this play will eventually backfire on them and cost them a big amount of chips in a hand they shouldn’t even have even been in. They should limit their bluffs so they can be hidden, and it looks like they have the goods every time they have to show their cards at showdown.

Getting emotional is another one you’ll see. Novice players don’t understand that poker has a lot of losing for every player, and they give up, or tilt out, when things go wrong for a while. They will give up after a bad beat, and essentially throw away their final chips because they figure they can’t come back. They let frustration take over and dump chips for no reason - other than they’re not strong-minded enough to accept that they can’t win them all.

Ready for some tournament poker? Take off with Bodog Flight Club to some of the world’s most exotic locations to play in the world’s finest poker events!

NEWS: Bodog Poker is now available to Mac users via a brand new flash based poker client.

For more on Bodog Poker check out the following:
>>Bodog Poker Review at PokerLabRat.com
>>Review & Rating of Bodog Poker at GoonersGuide.com

Going into any rebuy tournament, you should know before the first cards are dealt how much money you’re willing to invest. Whether you’re playing with a single bullet (not planning to rebuy at all), enough money to rebuy 50 times, or somewhere in between, you should have a number in your mind. You need to know from the start how many risks you can afford to take, and play accordingly.

For me personally, I don’t believe in playing with a single bullet or with unlimited ammo. If you’re only planning on making one buy-in, then why not play a regular No-Limit Hold ’em tournament? Playing a rebuy tournament with only one bullet, you have no safety net and you’re giving the other players a significant edge over you because they’re able to exploit your reluctance to gamble.

If you’re pushing your stack in over and over, looking to accumulate chips and willing to go broke repeatedly, there’s a certain amount of upside to that, but I don’t believe it’s the best expected value play. Yes, that maniacal approach can sometimes get you into the post-rebuy period with a large chip stack, which of course provides an edge for the rest of the tournament. The problem is that if you’ve spent something like $25,000 in a $1,000 buy-in tournament, you have to finish that much higher in the money to come out ahead. A lot of times when you’re rebuying that many times, just making the money doesn’t cover how much you’ve invested into the tournament.

My personal rule of thumb is that I like to be willing to invest in the tournament in accordance to the payout amounts. I don’t ever want to get to the point where I’m investing significantly more money than the lowest money place pays. So in a $1,000 rebuy tournament, I’m willing to put about $8,000 into it. Some days, it’s just not your day, the cards aren’t falling your way and you have to leave and come back and play another day. It’s foolish to sit there and keep putting your stack in the middle when you have no edge and often times you’re up against a better hand.

When you’re playing this middle-of-the-road strategy, it’s important to identify the maniacal players from the outset because they’re going to be very dangerous, but they’re also going to provide you with your best opportunities to chip up. These players are actually the prime reason to play in a rebuy tournament, because you can feast on them. They’re going to open with all types of hands from all different positions, so you can call with marginal hands in position such as 10-9 suited, 8-7 suited, 3-4 suited, even one-gappers such as 6-8 suited. I also want to put a lot of pressure on this type of player before the flop if I have a big hand like Aces, Kings, or Queens, simply because this is the type of player who’s really willing to gamble and might just go ahead and ship the rest of his stack in right there.

In the last 10 to 15 minutes of the rebuy period, if you’ve been able to acquire a stack, this is a critical time in the tournament to play smart. If the hyper-aggressive players don’t have a lot of chips, they’re going to be pushing it all in almost every hand to give themselves a shot at a big stack heading into the post-rebuy period. If you have an edge in a given hand against these guys, use it, but you don’t want to gamble too much. Remember that you’ve acquired a stack now and it’s your goal to maintain that stack in and after the rebuy period.

Michael Gracz plays online at Full Tilt Poker. Polish-born, Gracz has one WPT Championship, one WSOP bracelet and was named CardPlayer’s 2005 “Breakthrough Player of the Year” Gracz was born in Poland in 1980

Compare FullTilt Poker to other poker sites that accept USA players.

Here’s a short but sweet item from the team at Bodog Poker with their picks for the top 5 Poker Tournaments of the 2008 poker calendar.

In 2008, Peter Eastgate became the youngest WSOP Main Event champion in history. (Image courtesy of Bodog Poker)

1. WSOP Main Event is still the premier tournament of the year. It was the biggest prize pool of the year, and second biggest of all time. The final eight players all became millionaires, with a first-place prize of $9 million.

2. WSOP $50,000 HORSE Event should be the most highly regarded tournament because it’s the best professionals playing five different forms of poker. This year first place winner Scotty Nguyen won almost $2 million.

3. WPT World Championship $25,000 event at the Bellagio is the final event of the season. First place money of $3.3 million went to professional David Chiu.

4. The Aussie Millions main event is always a popular tournament. First-prize money of $1,250,000 AUS went to Howard Lederer.

5. The WSOP Europe has to make the list after the popularity it showed this year. John Juanda took home the £868,800 first-place prize.

>>For more on Bodog Poker and how they compare to otehr top ranking poker sites, check out the latest poker reviews for January 2009 at PokerLabRat.com.