Focus

One SnG per night.  Focus.  Concentrate.

Win.

+$85 for one hour.  Is good, no?

I’m a season ticket holder for the San Jose Stealth, the local indoor lacrosse league entry, and they sponsored a “schmooze night” to try and encourage us to schedule group functions.  It came with FREE food (hot dogs and potato salad, bonus points for providing sauerkraut), drawings for prizes (t-shirts and hats mostly), and FREE tickets to that night’s Sharks’ game.  It’s a lot like those timeshare offers you get in the mail, where they offer you cheap (or free) accommodations at some luxury timeshare resort.  The small print says that you must attend a “brief 90-minute presentation” about why investing in timeshares is like buying into Yahoo’s IPO.

I took the Boy with me, and he got his lacrosse stick signed by multiple players and we won a bobblehead (Jim Moss, if the name means anything to you).  We enjoyed the Sharks’ game immensely (won in OT on a rare three-on-four shorthanded goal), and trudged home at around 10:30pm.  Mrs. Commish was already half-asleep in bed watching TV, so I left her there and fired up a quick $25+2 on PokerStars.  The house was quiet, no interruptions, the only sound was SportsCenter.  Just the way I like it.

Focus.   Concentrate.

Win.

First hand was KK on the button.  Two limpers and I bumped it to 4xBB.  One of the blinds and one of the limpers came along for the flop which predictably had an Ace.  Two checks to me and I fire a standard looking I-have-an-Ace half-pot bet.  The limper calls and I know I’m behind.  Now, this being PokerStars, I realize that there’s no way he’s folding any Ace, so I’m disinclined to push and represent either AK or two pair.  So I allow him to check it down and he shows A2o.  He called a raise out of position with A2o.  Fine.  I mark down a quick note on his file and move on.  

Turns out that was my only high pocket pair of the night.  In fact, I didn’t even realize it at the time, but I didn’t even win a hand until we had already lost three players.  By then, Mr. A2 was one of the chip leaders along with a calling station who seemed to soft-call every raise.  He was showing down crap like Q3s and K5o from MP, but seemed to be catching cards.  I knew I could bide my time and nail both of them.  Turns out that both of them were picked off by others, but I managed to chip up by doing nothing but value-betting my draws and pairs.  No bluffs (they never work against calling stations), no pushing stacks, no premium hands.  Just betting the cards solidly.  Played more connectors and sooted high cards, knowing the calling stations would give me odds.

By the time it got down to four players, I knew I would come in first or second.  And the funny thing is that I knew who the other guy would be too.  He and I started picking off the blinds like we were school bullies taking lunch money from the Math Club.  We picked them off so quickly that we were head-to-head while blinds were still at 100-200 (with 13500 in play), giving us plenty of play.  I shifted gears earlier than he did, and flip-flopped his 3-2 chip lead with aggressive raises and re-raises with borderline hands.  Either he was horribly cold-decked or didn’t have the stones for post-flop play.  I was raising with any Ace or King or connectors or sooted cards.  And he let me.  Eventually he tried to push back with A7 when I had A8 and the eight on the flop killed him.  

Lack of focus.  Lack of concentration.  Lose

Focus.  Concentrate.

Win.

Easy.