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You and Ryan, the previous poster, have really prompted quite a personal story. I was going to wait a while to introduce this one but I guess now is as good a time as any.
Worst moment.
I've been on Sky Poker for a while, pretty much since it started. Wasn't a great player when it began, I donked around on a few sites, made a little and had a laugh. All was good. As I have alluded to before one of my major leaks was the Blackjack table. On a bad day most of the profits I made on the poker table over the period of weeks would get swallowed up on a blackjack table in a period of minutes. Wasn't anything tragic, this was all profit and I'm not a pro so I wasn't going hungry. After doing this a number of times I finally kicked blackjack. I just couldn't bear to have that feeling of self annoyance again, plus the lovely way the SkyPoker emails would be sent with an old balance on from time to time. I can't tell you how many times i shouted at a SkyPoker email "I DON'T HAVE THAT ANYMORE!!!!!"
I saw sense and self excluded from any casino site connected to any poker site. Now the balance was just poker. Going to be great right? Well it was for a while, I spun a couple of hundred quid up into a few thousand in a couple of months, mainly through DYMs and some low level cash, particularly PLO. Life was good. Then i had a downswing.
We're in August 2010, life's good, playing great, running well, I'm planning to use some of this new found wealth to treat my family to some extra special presents this Christmas. Just spin a little more and we'll be in for a cracking crimbo. Now jump to December 2010, it's a wet Saturday morning and I've just bubbled for what must be the 100th time out of 150 DYMs. I had to go back to DYMs because the juicy PLO games that helped me build my roll dried up, I was running bad in the NLHE cash games and a MTT bink seemed a million miles away as I always lost 'that flip.' I click show balance on the website and it says £63.19. There it is. Thousands spun down to this in just a few months. And no Blackjack to blame this time, not played a hand of it. This is all poker. Blackjack always felt like someone else was playing. This was all me. The loss was all me. I'd already had my C4Ps that month, without that I would already be bust. I was a losing player.
I took myself into the bathroom and literally had a good long hard look at myself in the mirror. I must have stood there for five minutes, glaring at a person I despised right now, and who I pitied. I made a decision. I'm not going to reload. Ever. If I'm not good enough, then I'm just not good enough. It'll be freerolls, birthday bonus cash, come back cash, having a laugh on the forum from now on. When, not if, but when I bust the last dregs of my once very nice roll then that's it for me on SkyPoker. Probably that's it for me and poker. I had withdrawn most of the rest of my balances to pay some bills.
I wandered back into the lounge, registered for two £22 DYMs and rolled the dice on last time.
Best moment
Every day since.
Love the look in the mirror bit, don't we all do that after a bad stooopid session )
Seriously, I love cheese that would be declared a health hazard.
1) Got to put Harry out of the equation. I'm a Spurs fan who was until recently a very big England Team man as well. The last World Cup and particularly the attitude of the players and management towards the shirt have really shaken my love of the English Football team. Personally I think Roy Hodgson is a great fit if he got total support from the FA and was allowed to take on a five year project, clearing out nearly all of the old guard. Hodgson has so much experience, set him up with Pearce as an understudy and they might be able to build something.
2) Starting line up:
Hart
Walker
Richards (yes I'd move him inside to Centre Back)
Ferdinand
Cole
Parker
Carrick
Young
Downing
Gerrard
Welbeck
Dawson and Defoe were very close for me. Defoe is just not getting enough game time right now and while I think Dawson is a much better defender than Richards, you'd need pace at the back alongside Ferdinand who is vital just to organise the back line.
By the way, I wouldn't take Rooney or Terry at all.
3) I follow nearly every sport. I used to play Tennis as a junior to a county level. I watch any sport going from Cricket (Go Essex) to American Football (Chiefs FTW, although that rarely happens).
4) Tough one. I think that's all about pacing, if you race off too soon you'll really suffer in the later stages. I'd go for an average eat time of 10 minutes (which would include puke time, not the greatest Big Mac fan) so I think I can manage 18. Maybe 20 if I go for it towards the end.
As you say you ran bad played bad to get to that point.
But was there a specific time when you thought, hang on, this poker game, I can do this, I can stop messing around and actually make some serious dough.
Was there a point when you suddenly stopped thinking as a recreational punter and thought this could be a potential goldmine.
Give hope to us small fry with big dreams if you can
Dave
On Ferguson, I really wouldn't be surprised to see him get a deal from a new room. Picture the scene, it's the HQ of new American poker room 'StackedInOurFavourNowThisIsLegalAgain.com' The business suits who are not poker players are discussing pros to endorse.
'Hey, who's that guy with the long hair who could cut a carrot with a card'
'Chris Ferguson, but we can't sign him, he was involved in that Full Tilt stuff'
'But he was a World Champion, and the vegetable cutting stuff would look so good on a commercial'
'But people don't trust him because of Full Tilt'
'I've got a report here that a load of people ran back to the new Full Tilt bought by a convicted fraudster offering a 50% first deposit bonus. Do you really think poker players are that discerning? What's this guy's nickname?'
'Jesus.'
'Great, we'll run that deposit bonus we were going to run anyway, but now we'll line it up with signing this Ferguson guy and call it the Jesus Resurrection Bonus, marketing will eat that up. People will love it. Anyway, people blame that chubby veggie bloke for Full Tilt. How does a vegetarian get that big anyway?'
'I don't know. I just don't know...'
I realised tonight that even if I did bink a huge score by poker or lottery I really don't have the mentality to be a ruthless pro. A forum reg who I quite like sat with me tonight at a level they don't normally play as far as I know. He's already been mucking about with me, winning a couple and getting a gentle slap on the wrist in another couple.
Then I get Aces in the BB. They open, I 3bet and say to myself 'don't call XXXX, I've got it.' They call.
Flop 8 3 Q two diamonds. I lead and say to myself 'Don't float me this time XXXX, I've got it.' They call.
Turn is the 3 of hearts. I bet and say to myself 'Don't bluff now XXXX, I've got it.' They jam, I call.
They have 52 Diamonds, river is a brick.
The reg will probably read this, I'm not digging you out mate and i won't reveal who it is. If I was a shark I wouldn't be having these reactions. I think I'm more of a dolphin.
Weirdly that's twice today I've had someone run 52s into me when I'm holding Aces. Been a funny old day.
As long as it's a fair game and no-one is being set up then it's a war
This might take a few posts to go through as I don't really want to have one huge post, people don't read them in truth.
Dealing with the most important thing first, I, along with James Hartigan, were accused of gently mocking the studio guest in the chatbox on the official show thread. This did not happen. Yes there was banter, after I got carnaged for flatting J8 on the button (I had my reasons which I'll go into later) I joked in the chat box 'I'm going to flat every button now no matter what.' Obviously I didn't. Also after James A expressed a perfectly valid opinion of not just playing the player and ignoring your cards in cash, which is a totally valid point of view, I put in the chatbox 'SnG mentality.' That was certainly not mocking and I still think what I said was true, that in a SnG mindset you very rarely play the player. James A is a SnG master so that is why he would have that opinion in that spot.
More on the chatbox banter, James H and me were mercilessly taking the micky out of each other. This was totally banter and neither of us took any offence. What a lot of the internet generation will have to learn is there is a huge about of ribbing and banter in poker, but real poker players know where the line is and whlle they sometimes try to step on the line they never go over it.
On the last Sunday Roller show I FT bubbled in a massive cooler (33<66 BvB on a 2263 board). Luke Swartz was the Studio guest alongside Carlo. They were close to wetting themselves with laughter as the cooler ran out. I didn't take any offence from this because they are coming from a place where they have had this happen to them and the laughter is coming from how ridiculous poker can be, how sometimes you can't get your money in fast enough only to realise you're drawing dead.
Think that's the serious stuff addressed now.
An opinion I have long held is that, at most big international football tournaments, there are 8 teams that can win it - in many ways a bit like the FA cup. Yes, occasionally Portsmouth (Greece) surprise us, but it's just that - a surprise.
England is one of those 8 teams. Now we won the world cup in 1966 (home advantage and all that), and have failed since. Yet, at every championships it seems the press build and build England up - probably in anticipation of the crash and burn. England will win a major football tournament again - it may well be the European Championships this year, or it might be the 2030 world cup. The secret is to enjoy (or not as the case may be) and participate.
Rugby Union - England
Last world cup. Was it a debacle?
I watched an England side struggle to beat 4 of the 5 teams in the 6 nations (an lose convincingly to the other), yet going out in the last 8 of the World Cup was seen as a failure, and player shenannegens was cited as the cause. What rot. A poor team performed poorly - off-field antics were only in the minds of the press-room.
I'm not sure if this fits in this diary, but I thought I'd share it anyway. Great read so far, Tommy.
As an aside, my original note on you (at the tables) simply read "calling station" - maybe it was during your downswing. (it has been amended)
On the whole your point about the press is valid. However there have been notable exceptions, mainly under the reign of the late, great Sir Bobby Robson.
Under Sir Bobby there was a weird dichotomy from the Press. At times they loved him, at others they destroyed him to the point of him deciding to announce his resignation before Italia '90. The press really laid into him during the warm ups and the awful Euros performances England had, yet at Mexico 86 and Italia 90 they were fully behind him and England. They hailed them as heros after each tournament.
We should have won Italia 90. Yes in typical England fashion we bumbled through the group, but they were getting better and better. If Chris Waddle's shot in extra time against Germany had just spun in off the post instead of breaking the laws of Physics and spinning out we would have picked off an aging Argentina in the final.
Regarding the Rugby reporting, there are two factors here. One is the press need a story to sell papers, that's not personal it's just business. The English Rugby team, including one who has married into the Royal family, going to a club where there is Dwarf bowling is a story that people eat up. The second factor is the English people will forgive a multitude of sins of their sports stars if they are deemed to give 100% on the field. This applies to both the Rugby and Football team as in their recent efforts the general feeling was that neither really gave their all for manager or country. Then you read them up to all sorts. There are so many sports fans in this country who would sell their soul to represent England, to wear the Three lions, that seeing people lucky enough to have this talent treat what they deem to be a huge privilege so lightly is offensive. It sickens people. And frankly i can see their point.
Finally change your note back, I'm still a station
"...Finally change your note back, I'm still a station
Did I ever mention that you called me once with a 3 flush?
PS - Stunning diary, great balance, & I hope you keep it going.
When a golfer has an off-day, bo-one thinks he's not trying his best - yet with team sportsmen we jump to this slightly bizarre conclusion.
P />S> I agree no Terry (too old and slow anyway) or Rooney (you fon't take a banned player for 2 games). Far too often in the past have England managers collapsed to press insistance of taking a player that is unfit (Beckham and Rooney) only for us to see that player performing well below their abilities. A fit and available Rooney is worth any player in the country, but an 80% Rooney isn't better than a Campionship player.
P.P.S. - I lied - I never changed it, you station.
I'm not starting Bent. Yes he's a very good striker and has a great club record when he is the number one guy up top. But in tournament football sometimes it comes down to one chance in the last ten minutes, the crucial chance that's the difference between going through and going out. I'd rather have Welbeck on the end of that than Bent. In fact I'd rather have Crouch on the end of that than Bent.
Are we just going to get all the usual pre tourny hype and optimism only for England to fail again!
Lets be honest here, we just ain't good enough, let's prepare ourselves for the worst.