Lots to report…

Since my last blog entry, we’ve had 2 tourneys, followed by a cash game, and two nights devoted exclusively to cash. In addition, we’ve had a lovely new player join our group. It’s been exciting on multiple levels.

The first big thing to report is that the Good Look club is re-opened! We've gotten independent confirmation from Cheryl, who actually played there a few days ago, that the good look club is back up and running in it's original location. I'll provide a first hand scouting report as soon as possible.

The next big thing I need to report is that I’m finally stacking players with my big hands. Yes, I’ve gotten lucky recently in getting some big hands, but I’ve been betting properly in getting paid off on them and it’s been a good confidence booster. The big one recently that comes to mind was when I stacked Kevin at the cash game last Wed.. I had AJo in early position and called a moderate pre-flop raise from John H., who had been drinking and making good size raises all night. Kevin, as well as two other players, called. The flop was AJ8, all hearts. I flopped top two, but it’s not a monster with that big heart draw on board. Kevin bet out at the pot, maybe $12, and I called, along with John H.. The turn came a wonderfully beautiful As. I was no longer worried about the flush draw. Now I was just worried about how to get paid off on this. John bet out $15 into the pot and Kevin promptly raised to $40. I worked it out in my mind and a few possibilities came through. Either he had the case Ace in his hand or he flopped the flush. I smooth called the $40, hoping to represent that I was on a flush draw as well. John folded to the heavy action. The river was a fantastic 5h. I now had the absolute nuts and there were 4 hearts on the board, making a Kh a pretty good hand. Kevin checked to me and I carved out a value bet. In retrospect, it was low, but I put in $25 and waited for Kevin to act. He reacted with incredulity. He flashed his cards at everyone else at the table and asked out loud, “How can I fold this”? John said he would give Kevin *his* chips to bet. I was somewhat amused, knowing I had the lock on this hand, but I wondered what was so good, and yet on the cusp, that he would even contemplate folding. Then he tried to get a read off of me. “There’s only three hands that beat me,” he said. “Should I just call, or go all in”. Finally, after a minute of agonizing, he said the magic words. “All in”. I confirmed with him, “you said ‘all in’”? He said yes and then I showed him the bad news. What did he have? How about JJ? Wow. He flops the middle set with the case Jack and then the Ace slots on the turn. Yeesh, what a cooler.

In previous months, I would have been on the other end of this hand, so it felt good.

Other hands in the past week that I’ve benefited from:

1. I took $50 off Nuveen when I played 36c for a small raise and flopped A24. A 5 turned to give me the nuts and Nuveen paid me off with his set of 4’s.

2. I stacked Ross H. when I flopped a straight with 56o and the board of 347 rainbow. He bet ten on the flop, about a pot bet, and I raised to $30. He smooth called, which gave me a good indication he had flopped a monster. He either had AA, KK, 77, 44 or 33 in his hand to smooth call such a large raise. The board was the Th, and he checked to me. Trusting my read that he was attempting to trap me, I moved all in for almost twice the pot, which put Ross all in. He insta-called and proudly flipped over 77 for flopped top set. He wasn’t happy at all to see my flopped straight. I sweated the river, since he still had 10 outs, but it was the 9c and I dragged down a huge pot.

In other news, I was happy that my absolute last minute Wed. cash game invitation was happily met by 8 players. I gave an hours notice and was able to get a decent game going. Even more happily, yesterday’s Sunday game was a spectacular success with a full 11 players playing .50/1 no limit cash. Mary was the big winner with $305 profit, but I did very nicely with $276 profit as well. Scott St. G. continues to be a monster at cash, profiting about $170. For someone who feared the cash game as recently as two months ago, he has conquered his phobias quite nicely. When will he come down with us to the $1/$2 game at AC? Time will tell…

One last thing. Wall Street records are made to be broken and John H.’s recent cashout on Friday night of ~$550 is a new Wall Street record for money taken off the table. However, since he bought in for $220, his impressive profit total of ~$330 is *not* the record. That particular high water mark was set by myself, our distinguished host (ha), on November 3, 2006 for a profit of $377.50. Curiously enough, that day, until very recently, was the producer of the top two marks in cash game production. The current top ten performances at a cash game at the Wall Street game belong to:

Player
Date
Buyin
Cashout
P/L

Jamie W
11/3/2006
$ 100.00
$ 477.50
$ 377.50

John H
7/13/2007
$ 220.00
$ 550.75
$ 330.75

Mary DeM
7/15/2007
$ 100.00
$ 405.00
$ 305.00

Wendy R
11/3/2006
$ 100.00
$ 404.50
$ 304.50

Wendy R
6/15/2007
$ 150.00
$ 446.00
$ 296.00

David R
11/29/2006
$ 50.00
$ 340.50
$ 290.50

Michael B
11/18/2006
$ 100.00
$ 379.75
$ 279.75

Jamie W
7/15/2007
$ 75.00
$ 351.75
$ 276.75

Karol S
5/4/2007
$ 200.00
$ 471.25
$ 271.25

Adam B
6/15/2007
$ 100.00
$ 367.00
$ 267.00