Milestones

I reached three milestones yesterday. My bankroll hit four figures, my all-time profit reached five figures (if you include the Full Tilt money I may or may not get back) and my profit on Poker Stars for 2011 broke through the $2000 barrier. With my recent plunge the shark-infested waters of real estate and everything that involves, I've played my last hand of 2011(I'll do a proper annual report just before year-end).

I made $158 yesterday. Most of that was at 50c/$1 badugi where I won at the rate of one big blind per hand (big blind, not big bet!) in my last 155 hands, showing down 18 winners out of 23, as my personal settings were switched to God mode. In a fairly recent post I bemoaned my bad luck at those stakes - I should complain more often! I capped off a good day with a win in a 30-man limit badugi tournament. We were three-handed for some time until I got heads-up with a guy who I'd coded purple, meaning aggro-spewy. I'd seen him before in the $2/$4 cash games earlier in the year. He routinely three-bet pre-flop and drew two, which is throwing money away because I'm never drawing any more than two when I open. Maybe he had a big bankroll and was just there to gamble. He was a tricky customer though and I had to three-bet my entire draw-one range so as not to turn over my hand. I tried to snow-catch on a few occasions but surprisingly never caught him. I started heads-up play with a 2½-to-one lead, he got back to even, but I pulled away again. I got a good run of cards and on a different day he might have won. His username ended in 1980, clearly a good year for badugi. I think we would both be inside the top third of online poker players by age (however I'd guess badugi has a slightly higher average age - and more females - than say NLHE, but I might be wrong).

Here are two highlights from yesterday's badugi hands:

Hand 1
A pat hand this strong comes up once every 1600 hands; it's a real bonus when you get it paid off in a five-way pot.

PokerStars Game #72272915979: Badugi Limit ($0.50/$1.00 USD) - 2011/12/16 15:18:35 ET
Table 'China VIII' 8-max Seat #5 is the button
Seat 1: shoorikch ($16.70 in chips)
Seat 2: Dmetr ($13.65 in chips)
Seat 3: Tryanerror ($24.50 in chips)
Seat 4: Oleg Azmagul ($16.70 in chips)
Seat 5: plutoman20 ($24 in chips)
Seat 7: solano1987 ($15.20 in chips)
Seat 8: XBlackDog81 ($35.25 in chips)
Hoyster87 will be allowed to play after the button
solano1987: posts small blind $0.25
XBlackDog81: posts big blind $0.50
*** DEALING HANDS ***
Dealt to plutoman20 [2c Ah 6d 4s]
shoorikch: calls $0.50
Dmetr: calls $0.50
Tryanerror: folds
Oleg Azmagul: calls $0.50
plutoman20: raises $0.50 to $1
solano1987: raises $0.50 to $1.50
XBlackDog81: folds
shoorikch: calls $1
Dmetr: calls $1
Oleg Azmagul: calls $1
plutoman20: raises $0.50 to $2
Betting is capped
solano1987: calls $0.50
shoorikch: calls $0.50
Dmetr: calls $0.50
Oleg Azmagul: calls $0.50
*** FIRST DRAW ***
solano1987: discards 1 card
shoorikch: discards 1 card
Dmetr: discards 2 cards
Oleg Azmagul: discards 2 cards
plutoman20: stands pat on [2c Ah 6d 4s]
solano1987: checks
shoorikch: bets $0.50
Dmetr: calls $0.50
Oleg Azmagul: calls $0.50
plutoman20: raises $0.50 to $1
solano1987: raises $0.50 to $1.50
shoorikch: calls $1
Dmetr: folds
Oleg Azmagul: calls $1
plutoman20: raises $0.50 to $2
Betting is capped
solano1987: calls $0.50
shoorikch: calls $0.50
Oleg Azmagul: calls $0.50
*** SECOND DRAW ***
solano1987: discards 1 card
shoorikch: discards 1 card
Oleg Azmagul: discards 2 cards
plutoman20: stands pat on [2c Ah 6d 4s]
solano1987: checks
shoorikch: checks
Oleg Azmagul: checks
plutoman20: bets $1
solano1987: calls $1
shoorikch: calls $1
Oleg Azmagul: calls $1
*** THIRD DRAW ***
solano1987: discards 1 card
shoorikch: discards 1 card
Oleg Azmagul: discards 2 cards
plutoman20: stands pat on [2c Ah 6d 4s]
solano1987: checks
shoorikch: checks
Oleg Azmagul: checks
plutoman20: bets $1
solano1987: folds
shoorikch: raises $1 to $2
Oleg Azmagul: folds
plutoman20: raises $1 to $3
shoorikch: calls $1
*** SHOW DOWN ***
plutoman20: shows [2c Ah 6d 4s] (Badugi: 6,4,2,A)
shoorikch: mucks hand
plutoman20 collected $28.50 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $29 Rake $0.50
Seat 1: shoorikch mucked [6s 3h 7d Ac]
Seat 2: Dmetr folded after the 1st Draw
Seat 3: Tryanerror folded before the Draw (didn't bet)
Seat 4: Oleg Azmagul folded after the 3rd Draw
Seat 5: plutoman20 (button) showed [2c Ah 6d 4s] and won ($28.50) with a Badugi: 6,4,2,A
Seat 7: solano1987 (small blind) folded after the 3rd Draw
Seat 8: XBlackDog81 (big blind) folded before the Draw

Hand 2
Earlier in the day I ran number four into number three. I was a little hesitant to three-bet the river and when he capped I feared the worst. Putting in eight big bets with a rough seven is a massive overplay on his part.

PokerStars Game #72295046631: Badugi Limit ($0.50/$1.00 USD) - 2011/12/17 0:17:46 ET
Table 'Tana VII' 8-max Seat #3 is the button
Seat 1: plutoman20 ($22.20 in chips)
Seat 2: ozziandy ($19 in chips)
Seat 3: brumegmau ($6.85 in chips)
Seat 4: cj.com ($1 in chips)
Seat 6: ddcl ($8.25 in chips)
Seat 7: Miroslav AA ($4.05 in chips)
Seat 8: tweekout ($24.45 in chips)
cj.com: posts small blind $0.25
ddcl: posts big blind $0.50
*** DEALING HANDS ***
Dealt to plutoman20 [3c 5d Jc As]
Miroslav AA: folds
tweekout: folds
plutoman20: raises $0.50 to $1
ozziandy: calls $1
brumegmau: folds
cj.com: calls $0.75 and is all-in
ddcl: calls $0.50
*** FIRST DRAW ***
cj.com: discards 1 card
ddcl: discards 1 card
plutoman20: discards 1 card [Jc]
Dealt to plutoman20 [3c 5d As] [5h]
ozziandy: discards 1 card
ddcl: bets $0.50
plutoman20: calls $0.50
ozziandy: raises $0.50 to $1
ddcl: calls $0.50
plutoman20: calls $0.50
*** SECOND DRAW ***
cj.com: discards 1 card
ddcl: stands pat
plutoman20: discards 1 card [5h]
Dealt to plutoman20 [3c 5d As] [4h]
ozziandy: stands pat
ddcl: checks
plutoman20: checks
ozziandy: bets $1
ddcl: calls $1
plutoman20: raises $1 to $2
ozziandy: raises $1 to $3
ddcl: folds
plutoman20: raises $1 to $4
Betting is capped
ozziandy: calls $1
*** THIRD DRAW ***
cj.com: stands pat
plutoman20: stands pat on [3c 5d As 4h]
ozziandy: stands pat
plutoman20: bets $1
ozziandy: raises $1 to $2
plutoman20: raises $1 to $3
ozziandy: raises $1 to $4
Betting is capped
plutoman20 said, "oh no"
plutoman20: calls $1
*** SHOW DOWN ***
ozziandy: shows [7s 6c 2d 3h] (Badugi: 7,6,3,2)
plutoman20: shows [3c 5d 4h As] (Badugi: 5,4,3,A)
plutoman20 collected $19.70 from side pot
cj.com: mucks hand
plutoman20 collected $3.80 from main pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $24 Main pot $3.80. Side pot $19.70. Rake $0.50
Seat 1: plutoman20 showed [3c 5d 4h As] and won ($23.50) with a Badugi: 5,4,3,A
Seat 2: ozziandy showed [7s 6c 2d 3h] and lost with a Badugi: 7,6,3,2
Seat 3: brumegmau (button) folded before the Draw (didn't bet)
Seat 4: cj.com (small blind) mucked [4d 6s Kh Ac]
Seat 6: ddcl (big blind) folded after the 2nd Draw
Seat 7: Miroslav AA folded before the Draw (didn't bet)
Seat 8: tweekout folded before the Draw (didn't bet)