Baller's Daily Grind

[ChuckyTheGoat]

Baller, u watch many videos?

I love this guy: Lex Veldhuis, one of my favorite pros:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMGlvDOKlso

[Ballerholic]

Sweep- Haha that thread is entertaining. Yea I need to hit up live cash which is my goal really. But BR way too small.

Chuck- Yea that guy is a beast. He streams really early though in the day.


April 7th

So I began shot taking 20-30nl, even though my roll is small I do believe I have an egde and I'm young so why not. Things unfortunately went horribly wrong as they always do. The amount of coolers I hit were unbelievable. I ran top full house into quads. Then 2nd full house into top full house. Top set into straight on turn against whale. On top of this I'm running a bit under EV. So BR is around $337 at the moment. Things are not looking too good, but it doesn't make any sense because these games are sooo good. Back to 10nl until I can hit $450 again and then I'll try 20-30nl. It's just so annoying after I put in 2 straight days of 10+ hours to grind all that for nothing. Around 40 hours total played for the week so far and it's not even over.

Profit: $-121.76

Bonuses/Rakeback: $ 47

[Ballerholic]

April 8th

Man what a terrible start to the day. Unbelievable. Just cooler after cooler again at 10nl. But luckily, I fought back and managed to turn some profit on the day.

Profit: $-96.73

Bonuses/Rakeback: $47

Sports: $-12

Some plays for the Masters.

Spieth -.5 vs Fowler Rd 4 -125

Rose -.5 vs Garcia Rd 4 -115

[Ballerholic]

April 10th

A bit of a downswing hit. Not too bad. I will be in profit at the end of this month!

Profit: $-132.78

Bonuses/RB: $47

Sports: $-36

BR is around $330. Still a lot of roll to play with. After reading about some changes to 888 poker, it seems that the RB program has been cut drastically so I'm considering moving over to iPoker for there insane RB incentives and the ability to also play speed tables.

[ChuckyTheGoat]

Baller, a few questions per usual:

1) What topics is your poker-coach helping out on? The more interesting spots (for me) are how to play the positions around the Blinds: Cutoff, Button, SmallBlind, Big Blind.

There's a lot of inter-play on what actions to respect and what plays look weak. Take a hand like AJ(o). May be too weak to call vs an Early Raise. But should be plenty strong vs Late-position Raises. Ahead of those ranges.

2) What sports do u like to bet?

[ChuckyTheGoat]

Baller, got a few more thoughts for u. U ever read Elky's poker-tournament book? A little dated, but a lot of attention to detail:

1) If u want my copy (w/ hi-lites), let me know. I'll send it your way.

2) If u want a clean copy, I'd send u that, too. Actually, if u want any poker book from Amazon, let me know. Note of caution: 99% of gambling books are trash.

[Ballerholic]

Chuck- Hey man ask all the questions you want! I haven't gotten coaching in about 2 weeks now. 1) But basically what I did was post hands I didn't understand and we would go through about 20 hands in an hour. He would go very deep into each spot. Basically we covered an array of situations. Spots to c-bet, limp, call, raise, delay cbet, check-raise as they came up. Usually he would be able to spot a pattern of situations I was having trouble with and would go further into those spots with me. As far as preflop, I did buy a preflop bible by some of the best high stakes player in the game right now from Bluff the spot. It has every situation you need preflop in a 6max game, besides 4bets really. I can send you that your way if you'd like. It focuses on very loose play pre, but making sure you get the right price.

2) I bet all sports. Mainly American football and basketball both pros and college. For big tournaments I'll bet golf and soccer. NHL for playoffs as well as baseball for playoffs or if I'm bored during the summer. That's actually why I got into poker, so that I could gamble during the summer when sports are dead.

I appreciate the offer, but I'm not a huge tournament player. I also agree, most books are trash, but I find the grinder's manual poker book to be very good off amazon. Also, good to see you're a Liverpool fan, that's my team!

[ChuckyTheGoat]

Cool, baller.

You're right. Summer-betting can be slow, especially in the odd-numbered years. IE, no major soccer-tournament. Can be fun, tho. Potpourri of different sports to look at.

[ChuckyTheGoat]

Baller:

* Some good news. Played $20 buy-in tourney today. Finished 3rd, turned it into $280.

* Only one hand that I'm kickin myself on a bit. Blind on blind hand, which is always tricky. The ranges are so wide. SmallBlind has about 17 BigBlinds, 1st to pot, he goes all-in. I have a deep-stack, like 60 BB. Holding 55, I call. He has 77, and I lose.

Not the worst play ever. Holding pair in Blind-on-Blind. But u know about middle-pairs. You're either small-fav or big-dog. I can't give him credit for bigger pair there. That is more likely to be a big-Ace. If it's 13 BB, I call for sure. 17 BB, my call may have been a bit too loose.

[ChuckyTheGoat]

Baller:

* Saw a hum-dinger today. I'm in SmallBlind, holding AA.

Open 3x in middle-position. Button re-raises to 6x. This "double-up" raise is a tell for me. That's a HUGE pair. Double-up raise = huge pair, b/c they want to KEEP u in the hand.

If he had AK, his raise would be to ~ 10x. More than a "triple-up"...to END the hand.

2 raises in front of me, I don't want to disclose strength of my hand and scare off action. I call. Original raiser re-raises, button calls. More than 50% of stacks in play, $$ is going in. I go all-in, 2 callers.

I have AA, original raiser has QQ, button has KK. Huge all-in. Board is 89T, turn pairs board w/ T. River is Jack! QQ wins massive pot w/ str8.

[sinmiedo]

Now I focus to live game instead of online, the main reason, is that i cannot control my hours on a computer, I get excited playing and large number of hours without resting, that has affected me during the years and the lack of timing to cash out when I was ahead , thinking that I can kill the game online.
The live play results are noticeable in my BR for the following reasons,
1 I'm playing only on weekends, and some times up to 14 hours secession at the local casino
2 When I play is after a good night sleep and no alcohol prior 48 hours of hitting the tables.
3 Moved up to 2 / 5 games as I play a lot tighter due to BR restrictions
4 One of the reasons to move up in limits was that I play bad in the lower limits, too loose and way to aggressive. .
5 the transition took 8 months as I experimented several times till find that I was able to play a lot better.

[Ballerholic]

Chuck- well done to cash that tourney! That AA hand is so sick. Wow you went from giving out a huge cooler to getting sucked out on, damn that's tough! I've been playing a lot of spin n gos lately so I'm kind of understanding the variance in tournaments.

Sin- Wow sin, it seems you are taking poker as if you are a professional. Although you definitely could be one if you are playing 2/5. How would you compare the live games like 1/2 to online stakes? I really want to play some live, but my BR is too small so I'm trying to figure out how much I'll need to shot take it. I assume the variance is much lower per hour?

April 17th

It's been a few days since I've last posted. I've been waiting for funds to be withdrawn to deposit onto a new poker site which I have finally accomplished. I did get some hands in the past few days though. Small profit over the past week. I think I was up about $70 at one point, unfortunately, some variance and bad play brought it down.

Profit: $-122.84

Bonuses/RB: $47

Sports: $-46.70

So now I have deposited onto a new site Coral Poker. Basically I get 60% RB based on the RPV method. I'll be playing a lot of twisters as well as they are fun and a lot of money is to be made from them. I'm going to grind now, but I'll post a more in depth look into twister and rb as well going forward later on today

[sinmiedo]

Chuck- well done to cash that tourney! That AA hand is so sick. Wow you went from giving out a huge cooler to getting sucked out on, damn that's tough! I've been playing a lot of spin n gos lately so I'm kind of understanding the variance in tournaments.
Sin- Wow sin, it seems you are taking poker as if you are a professional. Although you definitely could be one if you are playing 2/5. How would you compare the live games like 1/2 to online stakes? I really want to play some live, but my BR is too small so I'm trying to figure out how much I'll need to shot take it. I assume the variance is much lower per hour?

April 17th

It's been a few days since I've last posted. I've been waiting for funds to be withdrawn to deposit onto a new poker site which I have finally accomplished. I did get some hands in the past few days though. Small profit over the past week. I think I was up about $70 at one point, unfortunately, some variance and bad play brought it down.

Profit: $-122.84

Bonuses/RB: $47

Sports: $-46.70

So now I have deposited onto a new site Coral Poker. Basically I get 60% RB based on the RPV method. I'll be playing a lot of twisters as well as they are fun and a lot of money is to be made from them. I'm going to grind now, but I'll post a more in depth look into twister and rb as well going forward later on today

Here is a recount of the difference between live and on line:
Take away any software support you use to established opponents range and multi table play, their collusion friends and the online player feels naked boy in a jail full of Mr T look alike guys and there your have the comparison,( just my opinion ) .
As I mentioned before, i never used any soft or did multi tabling since i focus more to players actions, betting patterns, etc,etc,etc,etc,. That forced me to rely more on reads than soft stats and see actions for what they are.
Personally I think that as long you play cards, you should stay at the 1 2 or online penny poker , SNG and the ocational tournament, the moment you start moving up you will need to play POKER, that involve a lot more, something you will find out by yourself by making mistakes and learning from them. Poker is not a card game as you know, however a large portion of a players think it is.
Sin

[Ballerholic]

Sin- Haha I bet you can easily tell when an online player sits down at a live table for the first time. Very true that poker is way more than just cards. You need to be able to read an opponent and be careful they can't read you.

April 18th

Slight winning day overall. I've been doing very well in the spin n gos although I know it is high variance. I really need to focus on playing some speed poker and I will do that today.

Profit: $-117.66

Bonuses/RB: $47

Sports: $-46.70

So let me explain how being a rakeback grinder is going to work. So I get 60% based on RPV. That means that 30% of the entire 60% is given to me. From there the other 30% is depended on if I am winning, losing, or breakeven. So it's hard to really know, but at breakeven in total I'll probably get back 45%. On top of this I have a deposit bonus which is clearing at 30%. So in total that's 75% RB. Once that bonus is used up, I get a lifetime 10% bonus added on. So worst case that is around 55% I'm getting back minimum.

My goal is to 6 table speed poker. At around 250 hands per hour, that's 1500 hands in total an hour. At 10nl for the time being that's 12bb/100 in rake so about $18 raked per hour which give me back minimum $10. At 20nl, at 9bb/100 that's $27 raked an hour giving me back $15. Now let's say that over 120 hours for the month I'm raking $3,240. After including rake races from my affiliate, I should get an additional $400 back each month. So rake races give about an additional 10-15%. So overall, that's around 65% overall RB which is amazing. The only issue, is that for this very reason, the games are very reg heavy. But we'll try to do our best!

[slikec]

If you like twister try hero at bwin. They have promo this month you missed first half where every BI you got 1 free for 5 played per day now second half of month is you rake 0,5$+ playing any hero you get 1 random ticket from 1$ to 100$ mostly 1$ ofc. still if you look in terms of rake back that over 100% rakeback overall. So far i got 1x 10$ hehe so pretty happy with it

[ChuckyTheGoat]

Have seen some live-poker shops that give pretty sweet cash-back reward:

* $10 per hour for 30+ live-hours in a month. That sounds pretty good.

[sinmiedo]

My goal is to 6 table speed poker. At around 250 hands per hour, that's 1500 hands in total an hour. At 10nl for the time being that's 12bb/100 in rake so about $18 raked per hour which give me back minimum $10. At 20nl, at 9bb/100 that's $27 raked an hour giving me back $15. Now let's say that over 120 hours for the month I'm raking $3,240. After including rake races from my affiliate, I should get an additional $400 back each month. So rake races give about an additional 10-15%. So overall, that's around 65% overall RB which is amazing. The only issue, is that for this very reason, the games are very reg heavy. But we'll try to do our best![/QUOTE]
________________________________________ ________________________________________ ________

Look, for 400 a month, do any par time work delivering pizza or do any other income to supplement your BR, do it for a few months, that is guaranty money ( gambling money) then start playing some 1 2 live till you get the upper hand.
Wasting a month seating down a wasted time of your live.
Sin

[ChuckyTheGoat]

Baller, check out this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6CnwEwJvNM

Raszi!

[Ballerholic]

slik- damn I wish I knew about that sooner and I would have done that! I have to stay with ipoker right now because I only have a certain amount of time to clear my deposit bonus. But thanks for the info, I heard somebody hit a $200,000 multiplier there and also won the $50,000 bounty!

Sin- yea that is a good idea, but I just hate those jobs no offense to anybody who does them. I already have a part time job working at a desk in a swimming pool/lifeguard which gives me just under $700 a month. However, once summer comes around poker is going to have to be a significant source of income for me. Right now it's not looking too good so I'm a little worried.

Chuck- Yea Lex is a very good streamer, and bounty tournaments seem like so much fun. Personally I watch more Jaimie staples and that gang if I watch tournies. Most of the time I'm watching cash game players playing live or streaming coaching sessions.

April 21st

Profit: $-177.75

Bonuses/RB: $59

Sports: $-36.70

So the past few days have not gone very well. I tried playing a lot of tables at once to get my hands up, but I started playing robotically and not really thinking about my plays. So I think I'll try and play way less tables, but focus more to get my winrate up. Last night I did take the Celtics -2 and hit. So tonight I'm going to take the winnings + stake and put it all on the raptors most likely, so $21. If that hits I'll roll it onto the Pacers tomorrow night.

[Ballerholic]

ok plays so far

Raptors +2.5

Spurs -5

Hawks -3

Lillard over 28.5 points

*All to win $10 and I may also take Trailblazers full game

[Ballerholic]

Added...

Blues ML to win $5

Howard pts, rbs, ass under 24.5 to win $10

Millsap over 19.5 points to win $10

[Ballerholic]

April 22nd

Profit: $-203.65

Bonuses/Rakeback: $59

Sports: $7.30

Not a good day poker wise. I did go up $18 to start the day playing twisters, but those are so high variance and I just could not win a flip to save my life. Then I decided to play some 10nl which went very well, until I went a little card dead and at 15bb/100 rake it will kill you slowly. From there I decided to play some 20nl to avoid such high rake and I made one bad play which put me down a bit, but the rake at 20nl was still 12bb/100 which is crazy. I should be getting some more funds to add my my BR at the start of the month so I may try to play more 20nl, and worst case if it doesn't go too well then I can spend more time studying for exams haha. Anyway, sports went very well which is good and made the day a positive one! I will be playing a lot of games today and I might go big on the pacers. So far...

Celtics -2.5

Barcelona +.5 -125

[Ballerholic]

ok added a few plays

Pacers +4 -115 to win $40

Lebron does not record a triple double -200 to win $10

[Ballerholic]

Westbrook pts, rbs, ass under 56.5

Harden over 33.5 pts

[Ballerholic]

Mirotic under 11.5 points

Lopez over 13.5 points

Lopez over 8.5 rebounds

[Ballerholic]

3 final plays

Jazz -2.5 live

Jazz over 197.5 live

Maple Leafs to win OT +100 live

[Ballerholic]

April 24th

Profit: $-213.99

Bonuses/Rakeback: $59

Sports: $-8.7

So another losing day, but it could have gone either way if we hit the big bet on the Pacers. Unfortunately, Paul George didn't come to play and we got lucky that we bought the .5 point and that Lebron missed his last free throw. The poker games are nice and soft at the moment so I'm not really concerned with losing at the moment. I tweaked my strategy a bit yesterday and I think my biggest issue was passivity.

[ChuckyTheGoat]

Baller:

What do u think about bluffing flops based on how it hits "theoretical ranges"?

Start w/ premise that flops miss most holdings and therefore you're twice is likely to have a solid hand on flop (and 2/3 time, you have junk or a draw). Ignore your ACTUAL holding for a second. Certain cards are more beneficial to raiser, and other cards are better for Caller.

Most obvious would be "Ace helps raiser." Lower-end Broadway cards (like J and Ten) help Caller.

So, 2 angles to consider here:

1) If Raiser bets Ace on the flop...especially if u know he's an Aggro player, do u occasionally call him out w/ a check-raise? He doesn't have an Ace every time.
2) If flop includes Jack + Ten, as caller, do u rep a piece of that board even if u whiffed on it?

Thx and Good luck!

[Ballerholic]

Chuck- that's a really good question. Honestly, I need to think more about range versus range. When I tend to play I tend to be robotic most of the time. I know some players advocate just playing range vs range versus what they actually are holding sometimes. But yea I say in general try to play range vs range. For example one thing I'm trying to implement in my game that I found a midstakes pro teaching his student is to triple barrel most runouts when we are raiser in position versus the big blind. This is because big blinds range is so weak that it's auto profit to just triple barrel here on most boards. As for A high flops, occasionally I do raise them on very dry boards. You should get almost 100% of people to fold in these situations if they don't hold an A. Range versus range play really comes in to play on the river I find. A lot of players call too much, so when the river hits most of the time the range these players called the turn are a majority of the time a pair+draw, weak TP, etc. It is definitely possible to bluff these guys off of their hands. I find most players to get nitty on rivers.

In a single raised pot In position versus button on a semi connected board with those middle cards I don't usually bet it because yea it does hit villains range much harder. If it is a really dry board I will because they should fold, and if not and turn is a high card you can usually just triple barrel there and push them off it.

[Ballerholic]

April 24th

Profit: $-217.05

Bonuses/Rakeback: $59

Sports: $-37.53

Slightly losing day pokerwise, although it would be positive with RB. The funny thing is that if I received all of the RB I will eventually get for my hands played I would have an additional $152.38 in my account. This amount would basically put me at breakeven for poker over this period. I expect to be able to receive these funds sometime in May. Anyway, I didn't post my sports picks last night as I did it right before bed, but things did not turn out great unfortunately.

[Ballerholic]

April 25th

Profit: $-184.13

Bonuses/Rakeback: $59

Sports: $-37.53

Finally a good day on the felt! A few more of those days and we can end the month in the positive. I think one of the biggest issues I've had in these games is not being rolled properly. So this makes me want to take the option with less variance even if it might not be the best. What I mean is for example if I know villain is capped at 2 pair, but I can rep a flush or set I should alot of times it is +ev to Jam on a river but I usually don't. Or even bluff raising turn against a what I supposed is a stab.

[Ballerholic]

April 28th
Profit: $-147.43

Bonuses/Rakeback: $59
Sports: $22.21

Haven't been updating as much as I've got final exams at the moment. But man was yesterday a good day! 6-6 in NBA betting and +2 Buyins at 20NL.

[Ballerholic]

April 29th

Profit: $-126.64

Bonuses/Rakeback: $59

Sports: $22.21

Yesterday a reg and I were going at it. This guy wasn't the worst. He played around 31vpip and 20pfr with fold to 3bet of 40 and he triple barreled almost every board. So very aggressive. First hand, he's SB I'm BB. He opens and I call with Ks9h. He cbets flop Kd8c5s I call. He then cbets turn 2s I call. River is 9s and he barrels again. So here I am just rivering 2 pair, but the flush just hit and so did a possible straight of 76. The guy was triple barreling every hand and it was blind vs blind so I call and sure enough he has 76s. Another hand he opens in MP and I 3bet with KK in CO. He then 4bets me, at this point after about 500 hands he hasn't 4bet once, so I'm thinking it could easily have AA here. Anyway, I 5bet, he jams and we get it in KK vs AA. Turn is a K and I take 100bb off him. 30 hands later I open JJ UTG, BU calls and it folds around to this guy in the BB who squeezes pretty large. I call and SB folds. We then go to a flop and each of us have 200bb. He triple barrels on J434T board with none other than AJo. What a pot!

Anyway, I've received a 100% deposit bonus in bet365 so hopefully that's another $100 I can add to my roll. I do need to bet $600 though before I can withdraw it. But at $40 a day when the nba is running that's only 15 days. Current Bankroll right now for everything is sitting around $480 including the bonus I just got and rakeback I will receive for April. I could also add another $100 to that, but B365 won't let me withdraw my RB until June. I should also get some money for the start of the month to add to my BR. Fun times ahead! Time to look at some games for today.

[Ballerholic]

Ok guys, plays so far...

Wizards +5 -115

Thomas just went to funeral and is flying back. He hasn't performed well vs Bulls. Bulls with Rondo were killing the Celts. Now you get John Wall who is playing beastly.

Clippers -3 -120

Top capper on this team. They made adjustments and Paul and Jordan should go off tonight.

Hayward pk points vs Beal -120

Hayward should play extended minutes and stars shine in game 7s. Beal is being guarded by Bradley who shut up Butler.

Jordan over 27.5 Pts, Rbs, Ass -120

Has played very well in Game 7s.

Horford most assists tonight (vs Smart, Hayward, Beal) +130

His only competitor is Smart here and he plays more minutes and has higher assists per game.

Paul -1.5 points vs Beal -120

Paul usually goes off in Game 7s and Beal is guarded by Bradley tonight. I also expect Wall to go off which leads to less points for Beal.

Gortat +4.5 Rbs vs Jordan -140

Celtics lets Lopez rebound all over them and Gortat should have easier time versus the Cs.

Wall pk points vs Thomas +100

Wall is too big, too strong, too fast and Thomas has been out of it this series.

*I'll also probably play under in the Clips/Jazz game.

[Ballerholic]

April 30th

Profit: $-78.04

Bonuses/Rakeback: $159

Sports: $-8.79

Huge Day. Won ~2 buyins in poker playing 1 hour. Then got my bonus of €100 for sports. Unfortunately lost about $30 in sports, but that's not bad. Finally things have turned around.

Cavs -2.5 -225