Camp Hold'em

Super Bueno Roster

2009-03-30T19:51:00.000+08:00

00 lamberto datu - large
03 john tiong - medium
13 scott syling - medium
15 chicco fornier - medium
19 bong sia - small
23 rocky nuguid - medium
32 hans ang - medium
33 agu veloso - medium
36 mike tee - large
41 migs libre - small
58 benny lim - small

01 karla cabel - small
05 abby bauca - small
?? nicole hernandez

28 andy huang - medium

07 small
08 small
09 large
10 medium
14 medium
20 medium
24 medium

Our Religions: Are they the Religions of Humanity Itself?

2008-09-23T17:33:00.000+08:00

Daniel Quinn

Delivered October 18, 2000, as a Fleming Lecture in Religion, Southwestern University, Georgetown, Texas

Contrary to popular opinion, Charles Darwin did not originate the idea of evolution. By the middle of the 19th century, the mere fact of evolution had been around for a long time, and most thinkers of the time were perfectly content to leave it at that. The absence of a theory to explain evolutionary change didn't trouble them, wasn't experienced as a pressure, as it was by Darwin. He knew there had to be some intelligible mechanism or dynamic that would account for it, and this is what he went looking for--with well known results. In his Origin of Species, he wasn't announcing the fact of evolution, he was trying to make sense of the fact.

In my mid-twenties I began to feel a similar sort of pressure. The modern Age of Anxiety was just being born under the shadows of rampant population growth, global environmental destruction, and the ever-present possibility of nuclear holocaust. I was surprised that most people seemed perfectly reconciled to these things, as if to say, Well, what else would you expect?

Ted Kaczynski , the Unabomber, seemed to think he was saying something terribly original in his 1995 diatribe blaming it all on the Industrial Revolution, but this was just the conventional wisdom of 1962. To my mind, blaming all our problems on the Industrial Revolution is like blaming Hamlet's downfall on his fencing match with Laertes. To understand why Hamlet ended up badly, you can't just look at the last ten minutes of his story, you have to go right back to the beginning of it, and I felt a pressure to do the same with us.

The beginning of our story isn't difficult to find. Every schoolchild learns that our story began about 10,000 years ago with the Agricultural Revolution. This isn't the beginning of the human story, but it's certainly the beginning of our story, for it was from this beginning that all the wonders and horrors of our civilization grew.

Everyone is vaguely aware that there have been two ways of looking at the Agricultural Revolution within our culture, two contradictory stories about its significance. According to the standard version--the version taught in our schools--humans had been around for a long time, three or four million years , living a miserable and shiftless sort of life for most of that time, accomplishing nothing and getting nowhere. But then about 10,000 years ago it finally dawned on folks living in the Fertile Crescent that they didn't have to live like beavers and buzzards, making do with whatever food happened to come along; they could cultivate their own food and thus control their own destiny and well being. Agriculture made it possible for them to give up the nomadic life for the life of farming villagers. Village life encouraged occupational specialization and the advancement of technology on all fronts. Before long, villages became towns, and towns became cities, kingdoms, and empires. Trade connections, elaborate social and economic systems, and literacy soon followed, and there we went. All these advances were based on--and impossible without--agriculture, manifestly humanity's greatest blessing.

The other story, a much older one, is tucked away in a different corner of our cultural heritage. It too is set in the Fertile Crescent and tells a tale of the birth of agriculture, but in this telling agriculture isn't represented as a blessing but rather as a terrible punishment for a crime whose exact nature has always profoundly puzzled us. I'm referring, of course, to the story told in the third chapter of Genesis, the Fall of Adam.

Both these stories are known to virtually everyone who grows up in our culture, including every historian, philosopher, theologian, and anthropologist. But like most thinkers of the mid-19th century, who were content with the mere fact of evolution and felt no pressure to explain it, our historians, philosophers, theologians, and anthropologists seem perfectly content to live with these two contradictory stories. The conflict is manifest but, for them, demands no explanation.

For me, it did. As evolution demanded of Darwin a theory that would make sense of it, the story in Genesis demanded of me a theory that would make sense of it.

There have traditionally been two approaches to Adam's crime and punishment . The text tells us Adam was invited to partake of every tree in the garden of Eden except one, mysteriously called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. As we know, Adam succumbed to the temptation to sample this fruit. In one approach, the crime is viewed as simple disobedience, in which case the interdiction of the knowledge of good and evil seems entirely arbitrary. God might just as well have interdicted the knowledge of war and peace or the knowledge of pride and prejudice. The point was simply to forbid Adam something in order to test his loyalty. Under this approach, Adam's punishment--banishment from Eden to live by the sweat of his brow as a farmer--was just a spanking; it doesn't "fit the crime" in any particular way. He would have received this punishment no matter what test he had failed.

The second approach tries to make some connection between Adam's crime and his punishment. Under this approach, Eden is viewed as a metaphor for the state of innocence, which is lost when Adam gains the knowledge of good and evil. This makes sense, but only if the knowledge of good and evil is understood as a metaphor for knowledge that destroys innocence. So, with roughly equivalent metaphors at either end, the story is reduced to a banal tautology: Adam lost his innocence by gaining knowledge that destroyed his innocence.

The story of the Fall is coupled with a second that is equally famous and equally baffling, that of Cain and Abel. As conventionally understood, these two brothers were literal individuals, the elder, Cain, a tiller of the soil, and the younger, Abel, a herder. The improbability that two members of the same family would embrace antithetical lifestyles should tip us off to the fact that these were not individuals but emblematic figures, just as Adam was (Adam merely being the Hebrew word for Man).

If we understand these as emblematic figures, then the story begins to make sense. The firstborn of agriculture was indeed the tiller of the soil, as Cain was said to be the firstborn of Adam. This is an undoubted historical fact. The domestication of plants is a process that begins the day you plant your first seed, but the domestication of animals takes generations. So the herder Abel was indeed the second-born--by centuries, if not millennia (another reason to be skeptical of the notion that Cain and Abel were literally second-generation brothers).

A further reason for skepticism on this point is the fact that the ancient farmers and herders of the Near East occupied adjacent but distinctly different regions. Farming was the occupation of the Caucasian inhabitants of the Fertile Crescent. Herding was the occupation of the Semitic inhabitants of the Arabian peninsula to the south.

Another piece of background that needs to be understood is that in very ancient times farmers and herders had radically different lifestyles. Farmers were by the very nature of their work settled villagers; but herders (by the very nature of their work) were nomads, just as many present-day herding peoples are. The herding lifestyle was in fact closer to the hunting-gathering lifestyle than it was to the farming lifestyle.

As the farming peoples of the north expanded, it was inevitable that they would confront their Semitic herding neighbors to the south, perhaps below what is now Iraq--with the predictable result. As they have done from the beginning to the present moment, the tillers of the soil needed more land to put to the plow, and as they've done from the beginning to the present moment, they took it.

As the Semites saw it (and it is of course their version of the story that we have), the tiller of the soil Cain was watering his fields with the blood of Abel the herder.

The fact that the version we have is the Semitic version explains the central mystery of the story, which is why God rejected Cain's gift but accepted Abel's. Naturally, this is the way the Semites would see it. In essence, the story says, "God is on our side. God loves us and the way we live but hates the tillers of the soil and the way they live."

With these provisional understandings in place, I was ready to offer a theory about the first part of the story, the Fall of Adam. What the Semitic authors knew was only the present fact that their brothers from the north were encroaching on them in a murderous way. They hadn't been physically present in the Fertile Crescent to witness the actual birth of agriculture, and in fact this was an event that had occurred hundreds of years earlier. In their story of the Fall, they were reconstructing an ancient event, not reporting a recent one. All that was clear to them was that some strange development had saddled their brothers to the north with a laborious lifestyle and had turned them into murderers, and this had to be a moral or spiritual catastrophe of some kind.

What they observed about their brothers to the north was this peculiarity. They seemed to have the strange idea that they knew how to run the world as well as God. This is what marks them as our cultural ancestors. As we go about our business of running the world, we have no doubt that we're doing as good a job as God, if not better. Obviously God put a lot of creatures in the world that are quite superfluous and even pernicious, and we're quite at liberty to get rid of them. We know where the rivers should run, where the swamps should be drained, where the forests should be razed, where the mountains should be leveled, where the plains should be scoured, where the rain should fall. To us, it's perfectly obvious that we have this knowledge.

In fact, to the authors of the stories in Genesis, it looked as if their brothers to the north had the bizarre idea that they had eaten at God's own tree of wisdom and had gained the very knowledge God uses to rule the world. And what knowledge is this? It's a knowledge that only God is competent to use, the knowledge that every single action God might take--no matter what it is, no matter how large or small--is good for one but evil for another. If a fox is stalking a pheasant, it's in the hands of God whether she will catch the pheasant or the pheasant will escape. If God gives the fox the pheasant, then this is good for the fox but evil for the pheasant. If God allows the pheasant to escape, then this is good for the pheasant but evil for the fox. There's no outcome that can be good for both. The same is true in every area of the world's governance. If God allows the valley to be flooded, then this is good for some but evil for others. If God holds back the flood then this too will be good for some but evil for others.

Decisions of this kind are clearly at the very root of what it means to rule the world, and the wisdom to make them cannot possibly belong to any mere creature, for any creature making such decisions would inevitably say, "I will make every choice so that it's good for me but evil for all others." And of course this is precisely how the agriculturalist operates, saying, "If I scour this plain to plant food for myself, then this will be evil for all the creatures that inhabit the plain, but it'll be good for me. If I raze this forest to plant food for myself, then this will be evil for all the creatures that inhabit the forest, but it'll be good for me."

What the authors of the stories in Genesis perceived was that their brothers to the north had taken into their own hands the rule of the world; they had usurped the role of God. Those who let God run the world and take the food that he's planted for them have an easy life. But those who want to run the world themselves must necessarily plant their own food, must necessarily make their living by the sweat of the brow. As this makes plain, agriculture was not the crime itself but rather the result of the crime, the punishment that must inevitably follow such a crime. It was wielding the knowledge of good and evil that had turned their brothers in the north into farmers--and into murderers.

But these were not the only consequences to be expected from Adam's act. The fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is harmless to God but poison to Man. It seemed to these authors that usurping God's role in the world would be the very death of Man.

And so it seemed to me when I finally worked all this out in the late 1970s. This investigation of the stories in Genesis was not, for me, an exercise in biblical exegesis. I'd gone looking for a way to understand how in the world we'd brought ourselves face to face with death in such a relatively short period of time--10,000 years, a mere eyeblink in the lifespan of our species--and had found it in an ancient story that we long ago adopted as our own and that remained stubbornly mysterious to us as long as we insisted on reading it as if it were our own. When examined from a point of view not our own, however, it ceased to be mysterious and delivered up a meaning that not only would have made sense to a beleaguered herding people 8,000 years ago but that would also make sense to the beleaguered people of the late twentieth century.

As far as I was concerned, the authors of this story had gotten it right. In spite of the terrible mess we've made of it, we do think we can run the world, and if we continue to think this, it is going to be the death of us.

In case it isn't evident, I should add that of course my reading of Genesis is only a theory. This is what creationists say of evolution, that it's "only a theory, it hasn't been proved," as though this in itself is grounds for dismissal. This misrepresents the point of formulating a theory, which is to make sense of the evidence. So far, Darwin's theory remains the very best way we've found to make sense of the evidence, and my own theory has to be evaluated in the same way. Does it make sense of the evidence--the stories themselves--and does it make more sense than any other theory?

But solving this particular riddle only began to alleviate the pressure I felt for answers that were not being looked for at any level of our culture. The philosophical and theological foundations of our culture had been laid down by people who confidently believed that Man had been born an agriculturalist and civilization builder. These things were as instinctive to him as predation is to lions or hiving is to bees. This meant that, to find and date Man's birth, they had only to look for the beginnings of agriculture and civilization, which were obviously not that far back in time.

When in 1650 Irish theologian James Ussher announced the date of creation as October 23, 4004 B.C., no one laughed, or if they did, it was because of the absurd exactitude of the date, not because the date was absurdly recent. In fact, 4004 B.C. is quite a serviceable date for the beginning of what we would recognize as civilization. This being the case, it's hardly surprising that, for people who took it for granted that Man began building civilization as soon as he was created, 4004 B.C. would seem like a perfectly reasonable date for his creation.

But all this soon changed. By the middle of the 19th century the accumulated evidence of many new sciences had pushed almost all dates back by many orders of magnitude. The universe and the earth were not thousands of years old but billions. The human past extended millions of years back beyond the appearance of agriculture and civilization.Only those who clung to a very literal reading of the biblical creation story rejected the evidence; they saw it as a hoax perpetrated on us either by the devil (to confound us) or by God (to test our faith)--take your pick. The notion that Man had been born an agriculturalist and civilization builder had been rendered totally untenable. He had very definitely not been born either one.

This meant that the philosophical and theological foundations of our culture had been laid by people with a profoundly erroneous understanding of our origins and history. It was therefore urgently important to reexamine these foundations and if necessary to rebuild them from the ground up.

Except, of course, that no one at all thought this was urgently important--or even slightly important. So human life began millions of years before the birth of agriculture. Who cares? Nothing of any importance happened during those millions of years. They were merely a fact, something to be accepted, just as the fact of evolution had been accepted by naturalists long before Darwin.

In the last century we'd gained an understanding of the human story that made nonsense of everything we'd been telling ourselves for 3,000 years, but our settled understandings remained completely unshaken. So what, that Man had not in fact been born an agriculturalist and a civilization builder? He was certainly born to become an agriculturalist and a civilization builder. It was beyond question that this was our foreordained destiny. The way we live is the way humans were meant to live from the beginning of time. And indeed we must go on living this way--even if it kills us.

Facts that were indisputable to all but biblical literalists had radically repositioned us not only in the physical universe but in the history of our own species. The fact that we had been repositioned was all but universally acknowledged, but no one felt any pressure to develop a theory that would make sense of the fact, the way Darwin had made sense of the fact of evolution.

Except me, and I have to tell you that it gave me no joy. I had to have answers, and I went looking for them not because I wanted to write a book someday but because I personally couldn't live without them.

In Ishmael, I made the point that the conflict between the emblematic figures Cain and Abel didn't end six or eight thousand years ago in the Near East. Cain the tiller of the soil has carried his knife with him to every corner of the world, watering his fields with the blood of tribal peoples wherever he found them. He arrived here in 1492 and over the next three centuries watered his fields with the blood of millions of Native Americans. Today, he's down there in Brazil, knife poised over the few remaining aboriginals in the heart of that country.

The tribe among aboriginal peoples is as universal as the flock among geese, and no anthropologist seriously doubts that it was humanity's original social organization. We didn't evolve in troops or hordes or pods. Rather, we evolved in a social organization was was peculiarly human, that was uniquely successful for culture-bearers. The tribe was successful for humans, which is why it was still universally in place throughout the world three million years later. The tribal organization was natural selection's gift to humanity in the same way that the flock was natural selection's gift to geese.

The elemental glue that holds any tribe together is tribal law. This is easy to say but less easy to understand, because the operation of tribal law is entirely different from the operation of our law. Prohibition is the essence of our law, but the essence of tribal law is remedy. Misbehavior isn't outlawed in any tribe. Rather, tribal law prescribes what must happen in order to minimize the effect of misbehavior and to produce a situation in which everyone feels that they've been made as whole again as it's possible to be.

In The Story of B I described how adultery is handled among the Alawa of Australia. If you have the misfortune to fall in love with another man's wife or another woman's husband, the law doesn't say, "This is prohibited and may not go forward." It says, "If you want your love to go forward, here's what you must do to make things right with all parties and to see to it that marriage isn't cheapened in the eyes of our children." It's a remarkably successful process. What makes it even more remarkable is the fact that it wasn't worked out in any legislature or by any committee. It's another gift of natural selection. Over countless generations of testing, no better way of handling adultery has been found or even conceivably could be found, because--behold!--it works! It does just what the Alawa want it to do, and absolutely no one tries to evade it. Even adulterers don't try to evade it--that's how well it works.

But this is just the law of the Alawa, and it would never occur to them to say, "Everyone in the world should do it this way." They know perfectly well that their tribal neighbors' laws work just as well for them--and for the same reason, that they've been tested from the beginning of time.

One of the virtues of tribal law is that it presupposes that people are just the way we know they are: generally wise, kind, generous, and well-intentioned but perfectly capable of being foolish, unruly, moody, cantankerous, selfish, greedy, violent, stupid, bad-tempered, sneaky, lustful, treacherous, careless, vindictive, neglectful, petty, and all sorts of other unpleasant things. Tribal law doesn't punish people for their shortcomings, as our law does. Rather, it makes the management of their shortcomings an easy and ordinary part of life.

But during the developmental period of our culture, all this changed very dramatically. Tribal peoples began to come together in larger and larger associations, and one of the casualties of this process was tribal law. If you take the Alawa of Australia and put them together with Gebusi of New Guinea, the Bushmen of the Kalahari, and the Yanomami of Brazil, they are very literally not going to know how to live. Not any of these tribes are going to embrace the laws of the others, which may not only be unknown to them but incomprehensible to them. How then are they going to handle mischief that occurs among them? The Gebusi way or the Yanomami way? The Alawa way or the Bushman way? Multiply this by a hundred, and you'll have a fair approximation of where people stood in the early millennia of our own cultural development in the Near East.

When you gather up a hundred tribes and expect them to work and live together, tribal law becomes inapplicable and useless. But of course the people in this amalgam are the same as they always were: capable of being foolish, moody, cantankerous, selfish, greedy, violent, stupid, bad-tempered, and all the rest. In the tribal situation, this was no problem, because tribal law was designed for people like this. But all the tribal ways of handling these ordinary human tendencies had been expunged in our burgeoning civilization. A new way of handling them had to be invented--and I stress the word invented. There was no received, tested way of handling the mischief people were capable of. Our cultural ancestors had to make something up, and what they made up were lists of prohibited behavior.

Very understandably, they began with the big ones. They weren't going to prohibit moodiness or selfishness. They prohibited things like murder, assault, and theft. Of course we don't know what the lists were like until the dawn of literacy, but you can be sure they were in place, because it's hardly plausible that we murdered, robbed, and thieved with impunity for five or six thousand years until Hammurabi finally noticed that these were rather disruptive activities.

When the Israelites escaped from Egypt in the 13th century B.C., they were literally a lawless horde, because they'd left the Egyptian list of prohibitions behind. They needed their own list of prohibitions, which God provided--the famous ten. But of course ten didn't do it. Hundreds more followed, but they didn't do it either.

No number has ever done it for us. Not a thousand, ten thousand, a hundred thousand. Even millions don't do it, and so every single year we pay our legislators to come up with more. But no matter how many prohibitions we come up with, they never do the trick, because no prohibited behavior has ever been eliminated by passing a law against it. Every time someone is sent to prison or executed, this is said to be "sending a message" to miscreants, but for some strange reason the message never arrives, year after year, generation after generation, century after century.

Naturally, we consider this to be a very advanced system.

No tribal people has ever been found that claimed not to know how to live. On the contrary, they're all completely confident that they know how to live. But with the disappearance of tribal law among us, people began to be acutely aware of not knowing how to live. A new class of specialists came to be in demand, their specialty being the annunciation of how people are supposed to live. These specialists we call prophets.

Naturally it takes special qualifications to be a prophet. You must by definition know something the rest of us don't know, something the rest of us are clearly unable to know. This means you must have a source of information that is beyond normal reach--or else what good would it be? A transcendent vision will do, as in the case of Siddhartha Gautama. A dream will do, provided it comes from God. But best of all, of course, is direct, personal, unmediated communication with God. The most persuasive and most highly valued prophets, the ones that are worth dying for and killing for, have the word directly from God.

The appearance of religions based on prophetic revelations is unique to our culture. We alone in the history of all humanity needed such religions. We still need them (and new ones are being created every day), because we still profoundly feel that we don't know how to live. Our religions are the peculiar creation of a bereft people. Yet we don't doubt for a moment that they are the religions of humanity itself.

This belief was not an unreasonable one when it first took root among us. Having long since forgotten that humanity was here long before we came along, we assumed that we were humanity itself and that our history was human history itself. We imagined that humanity had been in existence for just a few thousand years--and that God had been talking to us from the beginning. So why wouldn't our religions be the religions of humanity itself?

When it became known that humanity was millions of years older than we, no one thought it odd that God had remained aloof from the thousands of generations that had come before us. Why would God bother to talk to Homo habilis or Homo erectus? Why would he bother to talk even to Homo sapiens--until we came along? God wanted to talk to civilized folks, not savages, so it's no wonder he remained disdainfully silent.

The philosophers and theologians of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries weren't troubled by God's long silence. The fact alone was enough for them, and they felt no pressure to develop a theory to make sense of it. For Christians, it had long been accepted that Christianity was humanity's religion (which is why all of humanity had to be converted to it, of course). It was an effortless step for thinkers like Teilhard de Chardin and Matthew Fox to promote Christ from humanity's Christ to the Cosmic Christ.

Very strangely, it remained to me to recognize that there once was a religion that could plausibly be called the religion of humanity. It was humanity's first religion and its only universal religion, found wherever humans were found, in place for tens of thousands of years. Christian missionaries encountered it wherever they went, and piously set about destroying it. By now it has been all but stamped out either by missionary efforts or more simply by exterminating its adherents. I certainly take no pride in its discovery, since it's been in plain sight to us for hundreds of years.

Of course it isn't accounted a "real" religion, since it isn't one of ours. It's just a sort of half-baked "pre-religion." How could it be anything else, since it emerged long before God decided humans were worth talking to? It wasn't revealed by any accredited prophet, has no dogma, no evident theology or doctrine, no liturgy, and produces no interesting heresies or schisms. Worst of all, as far as I know, no one has ever killed for it or died for it--and what sort of religion is that? Considering all this, it's actually quite remarkable that we even have a name for it.

The religion I'm talking about is, of course, animism. This name was cut to fit the general missionary impression that these childlike savages believe that things like rocks, trees, and rivers have spirits in them, and it hasn't lost this coloration since the middle of the nineteenth century.

Needless to say, I wasn't prepared to settle for this trivialization of a religion that flourished for tens of thousands of years among people exactly as smart as we are. After decades of trying to understand what these people were telling us about their lives and their vision of humanity's place in the world, I concluded that a very simple (but far from trivial) worldview was at the foundation of what they were saying: The world is a sacred place, and humanity belongs in such a world.

It's simple but also deceptively simple. This can best be seen if we contrast it with the worldview at the foundation of our own religions. In the worldview of our religions, the world is anything but a sacred place. For Christians, it's merely a place of testing and has no intrinsic value. For Buddhists it's a place where suffering is inevitable. If I oversimplify, my object is not to misrepresent but only to clarify the general difference between these two worldviews in the few minutes that are left to me.

For Christians, the world is not where humans belong; it's not our true home, it's just a sort of waiting room where we pass the time before moving on to our true home, which is heaven. For Buddhists, the world is another kind of waiting room, which we visit again and again in a repeating cycle of death and rebirth until we finally attain liberation in nirvana.

For Christians, if the world were a sacred place, we wouldn't belong in it, because we're all sinners; God didn't send his only-begotten son to make us worthy of living in a sacred world but to make us worthy of living with God in heaven. For Buddhists, if the world were a sacred place, then why would we hope to escape it? If the world were a sacred place, then would we not rather welcome the repeating cycle of death and rebirth?

From the animist point of view, humans belong in a sacred place because they themselves are sacred. Not sacred in a special way, not more sacred than anything else, but merely as sacred as anything else--as sacred as bison or salmon or crows or crickets or bears or sunflowers.

This is by no means all there is to say about animism. It's explored more fully in The Story of B, but this too is just a beginning. I'm not an authority on animism. I doubt there could ever be such a thing as an authority on animism.

Simple ideas are not always easy to understand. The very simplest idea I've articulated in my work is probably the least understood: There is no one right way for people to live--never has been and never will be. This idea was at the foundation of tribal life everywhere. The Navajo never imagined that they had the right way to live (and that all others were wrong). All they had was a way that suited them. With tribal peoples on all sides of them--all living in different ways--it would have been ridiculous for them to imagine that theirs was the one right way for people to live. It would be like us imagining that there is one right way to orchestrate a Cole Porter song or one right way to make a bicycle.

In the tribal world, because there was complete agreement that no one had the right way to live, there was a staggering glory of cultural diversity, which the people of our culture have been tirelessly eradicating for 10,000 years. For us, it will be paradise when everyone on earth lives exactly the same way.

Almost no one blinks at the statement that there is no one right way for people to live. In one of his denunciations of scribes and pharisees, Jesus said, "You gag on the gnat but swallow down the camel." People find many gnats in my books to gag on, but this great hairy camel goes down as easily as a teaspoon of honey.

May the forests be with you and with your children.

http://ishmael.org/Education/Writings/southwestern.shtml

Conversations

2006-06-14T22:37:00.000+08:00

"So tell me your story."

"I lived a normal life. Really ordinary. Worked as a lawyer. Had a wife and two kids. I never cheated on my wife. Went to Church as a family every Sunday. I regularly donated to charity. Gave my kids everything, time, money, affection. I can honestly say I was a good man. Too bad I died early."

"I see. What else can you tell me?"

"Well, I took up Bible study as a kid..."

"Oh, so tell me what you know of the Bible then."

"Seriously?"

"Do I look like someone who has time for jokes?"

"Alright. There's the Old Testament, and the New Testament. The Old Testament is basically made up of epic tales and folklores passed on through hearsay and word of mouth. It tries to explain how the world came to be through the Christian point of view. The New Testament has the four Gospels - Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, which is about the life of Jesus and the prediction of His second coming, the end of the physical world, and the beginning of life everlasting with Christ in the Kingdom of God. More?"

"I doubt you have anything more to tell me."

"Yup. This isn't the Kingdom I was hoping to find."

"What did you expect? A host of angels welcoming you with lights and clouds and singing?"

"Uh, yeah."

"Do you believe in God?"

"Of course. Why else would I have taken Bible study and attend Mass every Sunday?"

"Do you know that there are more than four Gospels?"

"My parish priest would slap you if he heard that. Father Larry was very strict back in his prime."

"The Word of God, the Good News, like any other story, has many versions and many variations among the earliest Christians. The life of Christ is no exception. There are more than thirty versions. There's even the Gospel of Judas, and according to it, he was the most loyal apostle. That's why Jesus asked him to betray him. Unfortunately, religion often gets in the way of God. The Catholic Church chose to omit all the other versions to protect the institution, which was being persecuted by the Romans at that time. The New Testament was compiled haphazardly to suit the purposes of men, and thus hinder his faith. It was one of my greatest achievements."

“Who are you?”

"My name is Lucifer."

"So I’m in hell then."

"Not yet. Contrary to my reputation, I'm not that bad. A long, long time ago I was an angel once. I can't just take you without your consent. It's not how the game works. You still have a chance. God's greatest gift to man is choice, but that privilege ends at the same time his life ends. Like Jesus, I need to tempt you. It's tough to be the bad guy, you know? A lot of rules I need to navigate around, but nonetheless, I found loopholes in the Grand Design. Consider this your last temptation."

"Does everybody have to go through this ordeal?"

"Mhmmm."

"Wow, you have a good deal going for you here. Whatever happened to Judas?"

“He’s up there somewhere, seated beside the Son.”

“I have to say, you managed to fool everybody by omitting him and the other Gospels.”

"I know. Let's get started then. I don't have all eternity. Actually I do, but there's a long line waiting to be tested."

"Okay."

"Before we begin, tell me your heart's desires."

"All of them?"

"Top three will do. Don't lie, I'll know if you do."

"Well, fame, fortune and good health, but I guess I died before I could get any of those, especially good health. I wanted to become a professional poker player, but I couldn't leave my job. And my wife wouldn't let me. I also had to think about my kids."

"Have you ever envied someone who had everything you ever wanted?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, let's begin."

"Whoa. Where are we? This certainly beats oblivion."

"The penthouse of the Bellagio. When you wake up, you are the greatest poker player in the world. You've won more bracelets than Doyle Brunson, Johnny Chan and Phil Hellmuth, not to mention more money than Andy Beal. You have one day, and then I'll be back. See you later."

=-=-=-=-=

Billy Dougherty woke up in an enormous king-sized waterbed. He had a strange dream about selling his soul to the devil. He laughed silently because he almost felt like he did all his life. He got out of bed and went outside to the balcony and watched the afternoon sun set over Las Vegas. He slept during the day and went to work in the night. This was the only time he saw daylight in his profession. He was a poker player, and a damn good one.

He was called Billy 'Gates' by his peers because of the amount of money he has won in such a short span of time. Some say he's extremely lucky, but skillful pros know he has a natural talent of reading people. He is adept in knowing what other players have in their hands, almost like a psychic ability. He's just twenty-three and he's won the Main Event, No Limit Texas Hold’em in the World Series of poker a record four times, and has an unprecedented total of sixteen WSOP victories under his belt. Texas Hold'em is the Cadillac of Poker, the Main Event, because it can make or break a player with just one hand, by going all-in with all his chips in one go. So far, the only result Billy has ever seen was him breaking other players.

His name and face was already a household name, especially because of all his endorsements, commercials and occasional TV sitcom appearances. It helped to have good looks along with his phenomenal skill. He sometimes felt like a rock star, having groups of women running after him wherever he went. Security had to restrain them, but Billy sometimes brought a few of them up his suite and had a little fun.

There was no doubt of his god-like stature in the world of poker and in Vegas. Everywhere he went, he was treated like an emperor. Everything was usually on the house, since his appearance alone brought in droves of people to the casinos. Not that he needed the freebies, he had a few million dollar companies and partnerships on the side. He had his own designer clothing line. He had an online poker business. He had a book that became a bestseller overnight. He had it all.

Tonight, he was going up against the Corporation in a televised high stakes No Limit Texas Hold'em event. The Corporation consisted of the best poker players in the world. Big names like Doyle Brunson, Phil Hellmuth, Gus Hansen, etc. were going to try to take Billy down heads-up on national television. The first person to take all his chips wins. Unlike Andy Beal, the eccentric billionaire who went up against the Corporation a few years ago, using cash as leverage, Billy fought them on even ground, and the stakes were harsher than cash. Andy Beal lost cash he could afford, but Billy was putting his reputation, his livelihood and everything he owned on the line. If he lost tonight, he would quit playing poker and close down his businesses. If he won, the Corporation would quit playing the game, and he would become more than a legend.

Billy stretched and went back in his over-the-top luxurious suite. First deal was in an hour, so he had to hurry. Having a butler sure made everything easier, having his clothes and dinner prepared ahead of time. All he had to do was take a quick shower, get dressed, grab a quick bite, go down to the casino and take his seat on the table. Tonight was the night he was going to cement his place in history as the undisputed king, or ace, of poker.

When the elevator doors opened, media men were already there waiting for him. His public relations assistant escorted him to the private high roller table. The Corporation was already there.

Unfortunately, Billy never played that game. He had a massive seizure and heart attack before the first deal of the biggest game in poker history…

=-=-=-=-=

"You said I had one day."

"I'm the devil. I lied."

"You said you weren't that bad."

"But I never said I was good. Besides, if I let you enjoy too much you might not take my offer anymore. If you want that life, then you must give me your soul. Plus, as I said, there's a long line waiting to be tested."

"What if you've ticked me off too much that I won't accept it anyway?"

"More than two thousand years of experience say that this isn't the case for you."

"That's your trick isn't it? Nobody can get a glimpse of the Kingdom of God, but you can give people a glimpse of a perfect life they can have."

"Yep, ingenious isn’t it? So what is your decision?"

"I'm with you."

"Splendid. Would you want to play that big poker game now? I can put you right back in that very moment. Any other requests before I send you off?"

"Yes, and no thank you."

"Don't worry, God's Kingdom is pretty boring. You won't miss a thing."

=-=-=-=-=

When the elevator doors opened, media men were already there waiting for him. His public relations assistant escorted him to the private high roller table. The Corporation was already there.

Billy shook hands with them, showing his respect. He grew up watching them, and he took up the game because of them. But now, it was the changing of the guard. It was his time.
His first opponent was none other than the legendary Doyle ‘Texas Dolly’ Brunson, the Godfather of poker. Dozens of cameras surrounded the green-felted table, all eyes on Doyle and Billy and the inconspicuous dealer. The dealer shuffled the deck and the first cards were dealt.

Billy took a peep at his hole cards and found the Ace and King of spades. Billy bet a small bet, trying to disguise the monster hand he held. Doyle responded with a heavy raise, his signature aggressive play. Billy put him at either a mid to high pocket pair or a bluff. He had studied Doyle’s game all his life and he knew he was more likely to be bluffing. With Big Slick in his hands, he made a smooth call.

The flop came Ace of diamonds, King of hearts, and Six of hearts. The flush draw was a potential threat, so he bet a huge amount, trying to make Doyle buy the next card. Doyle did. The crowded casino was going crazy. The Corporation was among them, pumping their fists.

The turn came the King of diamonds. Billy had made the full house with three Kings and a pair of Aces. Billy went all in. Doyle remarkably called. Billy flipped his cards over, stood up and smiled at Doyle. Doyle smiled back and flipped his cards over, revealing Pocket Rockets, a pair of Aces. He also made a full house, but he had three Aces and a pair of Kings. Billy was dominated from the start, and he played right into it. It was pandemonium in the casino, the Corporation hugging each other. But there was still one card left, the River.

The dealer dealt the card and flipped it over. It was the King of clubs. Billy had hit the quads. Four Kings. He beat Doyle. He jumped up and raised his arms in triumph. But he noticed so was the Corporation. He checked the table again. His cards were not the Big Slick, but pocket sixes. He could not believe his eyes. Doyle won with a set, three Aces. He also made a different kind of set: 6 - 6 - 6.

He looked at the dealer, and like a jolt, his heart stopped beating and he was hit by a massive seizure. He recognized the dealer, and somehow he changed the cards Billy was holding. He fell to the ground but never took his gaze off the last thing he ever saw. It was the face he had dreamt of, the face of Lucifer.

=-=-=-=-=

“No! What happened? I already gave you my soul!”

“Fool. There was no test. You’ve been in hell all along. Hypocrites like you who claim to be men of God don’t even deserve a chance. Lawyers like you are my favorite. You use God to make yourself credible in order to pursue your avaricious ends. You will have to live the life you dreamt about and before you can reach it, you will fail over and over, each time becoming more tragic, more heart-wrenching, again and again and again, until your pitiful spirit has shriveled into nothing. In the end, you won’t even get to achieve anything, you will just become a useless speck of dust. You will lose everything you ever loved. There will be no joy or fulfillment for you, only pain and suffering, for all eternity. Shuffle up and deal.”

=-=-=-=-=

“So tell me your story.”

“I lived a normal life, nothing really spectacular. I never married, and my parents died when I was young. My friends were there to help me, but I never did take off on my own. I managed to scrape a few bucks to pay the rent and buy a few commodities, but that was about it. I wasn’t really religious, never went to Church, much less read the Bible. One thing I’m proud of though was I never gave up trying. I’m sorry, but I don’t have much more to tell you.”

"Child, you are not judged by what you know, or don't know about the Bible, or God. The essence of faith is not about scriptures or Bible passages. Actions and deeds without true faith are empty and meaningless. The Good News, no matter what the version, even if it's a totally different religion. Or no religion at all even. The Word of God is about the faith of the heart. Science, logic and dogma are merely obstacles to true faith. The mystery of the universe and life is what keeps the human spirit going. Humans weren’t designed to know everything. If you knew everything, what is there left for you to believe in? To find the Kingdom of God, you must find it in your heart. And today, you’ve found it, child. You never gave up, and you remained true to yourself and to your friends. The odds were stacked up against you, and it would have been easy to just give up. But you believed in yourself and pushed through. You found it in your heart. Welcome to the Kingdom of God."

A New Beginning

2006-05-31T15:28:00.000+08:00

It's been over two months since we last posted, so I guess it's time to bring back some flava' in the blog community. My hiatus in the poker scene ended last night. Looks like we've found a new place to play in, and it's atmosphere is very familiar to that old state of mind. Well, maybe not exactly, but the people you see are the same guys and it's always fun to play with guys you know. I took a shot at the ring game last night and busted out, but at least it was the Grouch who got me. I went all in with my short stack with KJo, he called with a must-call AJo. His Ace hit on the flop and that was that. But the food was great and beer is never bad. It was lotsa fun. Can't wait for them to hold an MTT weekly.

The Man

2006-03-19T22:45:00.000+08:00

If Chuck Norris played NLHE, he'd have only 1 hole card. - and win... forever.

www.chucknorrisfacts.com this site is f'ing hilarious!!!

Are We Safe?

2006-03-12T19:25:00.000+08:00

'Sir, may I have your name please?'

After waiting for 45 minutes, you sit down with the max buy at the airport casino 50/100 NL ring. You know you got what it takes to reel in chips, win big pots with monsters, using well timed bluffs and accurate reads... You see a couple of familiar faces at the other tables but none atyour table. You are alone... with 9 strangers who also want to take people's money. You sit tight andwait for that hand. (No not wired As) Something like AK or AQ comes your way, so you raise, you play your odds, position and everything else well but it seems like the action is too loose and too fishy for you. (and the chance you don't hit the flop)You back down not only once but twice...

4 hours have past and you are down to 1/4 your buy-in, you decide to call it a night. So you stand up and cash out your remaining chips, grab a cup of coffee and head home. You are a tight player, so while driving home you recall some of the hands you played a while ago and figure out why you din't get paid. You felt like it was just one of those days were the cards weren't going your way, a losing day in short. You take a deep breath and swallow the loss and play again the next day.

The next day, you see that you're sitting again with the same group of players. Now you've got that sly grin on your face because you know it's payback.You sit tight again, wait, wait and wait for the right time. You win a couple of small pots, then you get a small beat. After a couple of hours, you look down at your stack and see you're down again. The action is still the same very loose and very fishy. You get Aces, you raise big, get 4 callers. The flop comes out very rough, but you push and get two callers. One having a flush draw, the other holding a f'ing two-pair. The guy with the draw takes down the huge pot. You go to the bar, (fuck the coffee) get a scotch neat, you down it and head home. While driving home, you recall and replay again the things that happened at the table, now you have profiles about the players at the table, you are so keen and sharp that you even remember the conversations at the table, the tells even the hands they played. Then you slam on your horn and curse all the way home, you grab your rear-view mirror and point it at your faceand you stare long and hard at yourself...you see a sucker... because for all this time you've been cheated.
_________________________________________________________________________

I just got a call from a 'friend' of mine. He's asking if there's any game tonight, so I tell him he could go down to the airport to play some rings. He tells me 'I don't want to because the people cheat there, they use sign language.' I take it lightly, and tell him well, there's a game at the libis area, you should check it out. I put down the phone, continue watching tv (rayban celeb poker) hehe... then it struck me. I have some violent reactions to cheaters because in poker - Cheaters can win by collusion, if they do it right.

Collusion is a very very serious matter in my opinion. For every serious poker player this is a mortal and deadly act. I would pop a cap in those motherfuckers heads if a group of players cheated their way to my money. It's stealing, more like a planned robbery. They better not try fucking any Danny Ocean shit at my table. Anyways, it is inevitable that we can encounter cheaters at everything, especially at poker becauseyou can play with absolutely random people all the time. As for me, I play online and the chances of me sitting with a player whom I've played with before are very very slim.

It would take a very sly and ingenius team to form a system to use at the table, an effective collusion plan that would make them profit. It's like the MIT group that brought the house down playing blackjack, there plan worked and they were famous for it. It's also like the ESPN series Tilt, where the matador uses collusion to get thousands of cash at the high stakes cash game. (For home games, the most effective way of cheating, is manipulating the deck, as seen on the movie Rounders were Edward Norton would deal Matt Damon, wired pairs at 7 card stud.) It is possible guys, and most probably there's already an Ocean's 4 or 5, roaming around the casino floors...

Online playing is no excuse, I think cheating is more rampant online that it is live. (I even have circumstances where a friend would ask me 'is it safe to play online?') This is done through multiple accounts & using messengers. The most recent controversy of cheating was done by the supposedly ZJ and JJprodigy, they would enter MTT's using 5-6 accounts. It's like playing a tournament with 6 lives. Total disadvantage to the other players. Luckily, there was a keen online player that observed the game so much that he reported it to the security department of the site. True enough, it was cheating. The plan was foiled, cracked, busted. Almost $200k+ was taken from the multiple accounts, and the criminals were banned from playing at that online poker room.

It's a shame that people resort to collusion to get money. It's not having an edge, it is cheating and it can be done by anyone. Here in the Philippines, people are trying so hard to put poker into the mainstream but then if it is only going to resort to cheating then that beats the purpose, poker would become a cheater's game. I guess history does repeat itself. (A little trivia, poker before was played at steamboats because gambling was illegal during that time at towns. So players would play cards or play poker - which is considered the 'cheater's game' - and the way the game is played is they would invite a rich sucker to join their 4 player game. Then these guys would play for hours and hours, cheating their way to wealth. At the end of the night the sucker would be down right bankrupt not knowing he was cheated ex. The movie Maverick)

My two cents, I would advice that serious players beware and be conscious. If you feel something going down at the table just stand up, try to report it to the authorities. Signs of collusion would be fishy all-ins, sandwhiching, chip dumping, sign language etc... there are a lot! I also would want the airport casino security to treat this as a very serious matter and they should take care of theirplayers because the future of the game is at stake...

Let skill trample over luck and cheaters.

I would be pleased, if you guys would share your reactions... because we ALL can be victims of collusion.

Some Stuff

2006-03-02T02:22:00.000+08:00

I don't know what the fuck is wrong with my blog, I can't view it for some reason.

Anyway, I've got so much stuff in my head, mostly poker related. I played at the airport last night, the table was okay, no loose gamboolers, sad to say I din't profit...

Let's get to the topic at hand. Like what I said I've been thinking (deeply) and also reflecting on what poker is to me and what its impact is in my life. Let's weigh the pros and cons...

Why? because I'm planning to put more hours/games in order to increase my roll hence moving up in limits. My roll has been stagnant for the past 3 weeks (which sucks) I don't think I can play more games in a day since I'm only allowed one table per game, 1 table would take 45m-70mins. I want to put 25-30 games in 2 days so that's like 15 games/day = 15 hrs (give or take a 2-3 hrs) Damn, how the hell am I going to do that??? Pros: Increase in volume may increase profit Con: Increase variance, it's going to be tiring and more focus is needed. ...so many games, so little time...

Next, there's school, we're down to the last 3 weeks and the load is piling up. Papers and more papers, and of course, exams. And yeah, I'm taking summer classes. I've got to get my school shit straight...But my priorities are f'd up, poker is my distraction.

These are just a few things that I've been thinking about and how I can manage to perform optimally on both fields.

How? When? Why?

It's all about seeing the big picture. Do you guys have any suggestions?

The Grouch a.k.a. Nutsboy with Mr. Binion

2006-02-22T16:15:00.000+08:00

Doyles Room Baby!

2006-02-22T16:14:00.000+08:00

Tilter with Mr. Binion

2006-02-22T16:13:00.000+08:00

Once in a Lifetime

2006-02-22T15:28:00.000+08:00

Mr. Doyle Brunson, Mr. Jack Binion and the 3 stooges.

Doyle and Jack with Benny, Mark and Mike. (feeling close)

He signed my book. We shook the hand of a living legend.

The early birds did get the worm. It's a beautiful day. (U2)

I only imagined THIS happening in my dreams (or wet dreams for some)

that dream came true.

...Benga!

The Vengeance Scale

2006-02-15T22:25:00.000+08:00

Took me a long time to find this. I read this a year ago or so, and the following link which I bookmarked didn't work anymore. But for intellectual property rights' sake, this article was written by Bill Simmons of ESPN.

http://proxy.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/040720

Welcome to the Vengeance Scale

As promised, the Vengeance Scale. A few quick primers ...

This column relies heavily on reader input: Nearly 1,500 suggestions over the weekend (some of which were redundant, but still ... ). Since it was impossible to give everyone credit without destroying the flow of the column, let's just call this one a group effort. If the Pulitzer Committee ends up calling, I'll share the award with everybody. And thanks to everyone who took the time to write in.

I shied away from historical examples (like Stalin deporting Trotsky, or Germany's response after World War I), only because that's probably a whole other column. And I'm not the one to write it.

If it seems as if there are too many wrestling examples, that's only because most wrestling story arcs hinge on somebody seeking vengeance. In fact, once we entered the mid-'90s, that was EVERY wrestling story arc. So I concentrated on the classics from the '70s and '80s that set the tone. And if you have something against wrestling ... well, I don't care.

MJ's got his imprint all over the Vengeance Scale.

MJ appears on the Vengeance Scale a whopping eight times. If that doesn't tell you why he was the greatest NBA player of all time, I don't know what does.

The Corleone family is represented a whopping five times. If that doesn't tell you why "The Godfather" was the greatest movie of all time, I don't know what does.

I'm sure we missed a couple. So be it.

Onto the Vengeance Scale, from 0.0 (least vengeful) to 10.0 (most vengeful). And remember, the whole reason we're doing this is to figure out where Angry Shaq fits in. Anyway ...

0.0 -- Rocky Balboa beating up Tommy Gunn.

(Note: This was disqualified because "Rocky 5" never happened.)

0.1 -- O.J. Simpson's valiant attempt to find the "real killers."

0.2 -- The rest of the Rockets after Rudy Tomjanovich was clocked by Kermit Washington ... the rest of the Yankees after Pedro threw down Don Zimmer ... the rest of the Dodgers after Juan Marichal swung his bat against John Roseboro's head ... Rangers fans after the Bruins charged into the stands at MSG in 1979.

0.3 -- The immortal Frankie Williams after Roddy Piper cleaned his clock on "Piper's Pit."

0.4 -- KG's reaction to Anthony Peeler's elbow to the stomach in the 2004 Playoffs ... Kurt Rambis' reaction to getting clothes-lined by Kevin McHale in the '84 playoffs.

0.5 -- Marvin Hagler disappearing to Italy after losing the Leonard fight ... the '91 Pistons storming off the court before the end of the Bulls series.

0.6 -- Vin Baker after getting waived by the Celtics ... Shawn Kemp after getting traded from Seattle ... Drew Bledsoe after leaving the Patriots ... Emmitt Smith after getting dumped by the Cowboys ... Dominique Wilkins after getting traded by the Hawks.

0.7 -- Marty Jannetty after being thrown through a plate-glass window by Shawn Michaels ... Robin Ventura charging the mound against Nolan Ryan.

0.8 -- Mike Piazza's reaction after Clemens threw the bat at him in the 2000 World Series.

0.9 -- Shawn Estes' attempted plunking of Clemens the following summer.

1.0 -- The Orphans' response after the Warriors walked through their turf without taking their jackets off. (Bonus points for the Orphan leader with the fish eye.)

1.1 -- Zack and Slater pouring punch on each other (from "Saved By the Bell") ... the Sammy Hagar-David Lee Roth feud.

1.2 -- Al Nipper drilling Darryl Strawberry during an '87 spring-training game. (Note: Maybe the all-time classic example of winning a battle after you lose the war.)

1.3 -- Donna Martin after finding out that Ray Pruit slept with Valerie ... Brenda's reponse after Kelly stole Dylan away from her (both from "90210").

1.4 -- Cameran breaking Charlie's guitar (from "Real World: San Diego") ... Lisa turning Chet into Jabba the Hut (from "Weird Science") ... Moses Malone vowing revenge on the Sixers after they traded him in '86 ... Paul Westphal in the '76 Finals ... Puck sticking his fingers into Pedro's peanut butter.

1.5 -- Tyson resorting to biting Holyfield's ear in their famous rematch.

1.6 -- Buffalo Bill's reaction when he realizes that the Senator's daughter lured Precious into the well: "Don't you hurt my dog, lady! You don't know what pain is!"

1.7 -- The newspaper kid on the bicycle screaming "I want my two dollars!" (from "Better Off Dead") ... Goldie Hawn coaching the kids to football glory in "Wildcats."

1.8 -- George Costanza feeding lobster in an omelete to Jerry's non-lobster-eating girlfriend ... Scottie Pippen's dunk on Ewing's head in the '94 playoffs (the one where he stood over him and glared).

1.9 -- Thelma and Louise.

2.0 -- Big Tom faking out Boston Rob on a handshake, then telling him, "Don't be stupid, stupid."

2.1 -- Malakai slamming Patrick Dempsey against the video machine and screaming, "You s--- on my house! You s--- on my house!" (from "Can't Buy Me Love").

2.2 -- Lennox Lewis knocking out Hasim Rahman (in their rematch) ... Antonio Tarver knocking out Roy Jones Jr. ... Roy Jones Jr. knocking out Montell Griffith ... Latrell Sprewell dropping 31 on the Knicks at MSG, then trash-talking the owners.

2.3 -- Music fans refusing to buy any of Yoko Ono's albums or songs ... Sato's nephew vowing revenge in "Karate Kid 2." (Penalty points because he got his butt handed to him by Daniel-San.)

2.4 -- David Letterman jumping to CBS after getting passed for the "Tonight Show" job ... Sarah's emergence as the "Queen of the Gauntlet" (from the "Real World/Road Rules Challenge").

2.5 -- Roger Clemens's first appearance at Fenway with the Jays (16 K's, staring down the owner's box on his way off the field -- of course, this was the regular season).

2.6 -- Paul Pierce vowing revenge after dropping to 10th in the 1998 Draft. (This would have been four points higher two years ago.)

2.7 -- Pedro Martinez in Game 5 of the '99 ALDS (coming out of the bullpen after the Indians fans had been taunting him, then throwing no-hit ball for six innings).

2.8 -- Brad Pitt killing Kevin Spacey after being handed a box with his girlfriend's head in it (from "Seven" -- penalty points because he deliberated a little too long).

2.9 -- Andre the Giant after Big John Studd and Ken Patera cut his hair ... Andre the Giant after Killer Khan broke his leg.

3.0 -- Stephen running outside and slapping Irene after she called him gay (from "Real World: Seattle" -- bonus points for throwing her stuffed animal into the river).

3.1 -- Nicole Kidman winning an Oscar after splitting up with Tom Cruise ... Aileen Wournos going on a killing spree against men (penalty points because this resulted in a movie that actually led to me not being attracted to Charlize Theron).

3.2 -- Ty Webb deciding to play against Judge Smails in the big "Caddyshack" skins match ("My father never liked you").

3.3 -- Jon Gruden against the Raiders (in the Tampa-Oakland Super Bowl) ... John Elway against Dan Reeves (in the Broncos-Falcons Super Bowl) ... Mike Shanahan every time he plays the Raiders ... Randy Moss every time he goes against the Cowboys ... Nick Van Exel every time he's playing the Lakers ... Carlton Fisk every time he played the Red Sox.

3.4 -- Danny Ocean ripping off three casinos because his wife started dating someone else (from "Ocean's 11").

3.5 -- Larry Bird firing Isiah Thomas as Pacers coach ... Larry Bird toppling Chuck Person and the '91 Pacers in Game 5 ... Wesley Snipes in "Passenger 57" (the "always bet on black" scene).

3.6 -- MJ destroying LaBradford Smith's career (possibly apocryphal).

3.7 -- Babe Ruth vowing revenge against the Red Sox (possibly apocryphal).

3.8 -- Piazza tipping off all of Clemens' pitches in the 2004 All-Star game (possibly apocryphal).

3.9 -- Babe Ruth's ghost sending Pedro to the DL in 2001, just days after Pedro's "Wake up the damn Bambino and have him face me -- maybe I'll drill him in the ass" comment (possibly apocryphal).

4.0 -- Daniel LaRusso somehow toppling all of Cobra Kai in one karate tournament (possibly apocryphal).

4.1 -- Sugar Ray Leonard beating Roberto Duran after the "No Mas" fight ... Larry Bird beating Magic and the Lakers in the '84 Finals ... Patrick Roy demanding a trade from Montreal and winning a Cup in Colorado the following year.

(Note: For the best sports feuds of all time, check out Ralph Wiley's column from two years ago. Similar concept, different examples. I think he would have enjoyed the Vengeance Scale, by the way.)

4.2 -- Robert DeNiro eschewing his post-bank-robbery getaway to go after Wayne Groh (penalty points because he ended up getting caught and killed) ... Tommy Marcano and John Reilly running into Kevin Bacon's character near the end of "Sleepers."

4.3 -- Guido the Killer Pimp taking all of Joel Goodson's profits ... Lance Armstrong vs. the French ... Marvin Hagler against the world (during the Hearns fight) ... Dallas's "We're doin' it for Johnny!" speech (from "The Outsiders").

4.4 -- MJ and Pippen against Toni Kukoc in the '92 Olympics (bonus points because they were taking out their frustrations with the Bulls' front office on the entire country of Croatia).

4.5 -- Larry Bird against the Bucks in the '86 playoffs (four 3s in the fourth quarter of Game 4 to complete the payback sweep) ... the last 15 minutes of "The Last of the Mohicans" (penalty points because I'm almost positive this was a chick flick).

4.6 -- John Kreese and Terry Silva against Daniel-San in "Karate Kid 3" (extra points here because of the premise -- a billionaire businessman taking time out of his busy schedule to destroy an aging local teenage karate champion.)

4.7 -- Alanis Morissette getting back at an ex-boyfriend with the vicious song "You Oughta Know," which turned out to be the biggest hit of her career.

(Note: This should have ranked in the 8s, but there were major penalty points here when it turned out that the song was almost definitely written about former "Full House" star Dave Coulier. 'Nuff said.)

4.8 -- Inigo Montoya vanquishing Count Rugen in "The Princess Bride" -- "My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die." (Penalty points because this was a kid's movie.)

4.9 -- Kerry Von Erich getting his head slammed in a cage door by the Freebirds (launching the classic Freebirds-Von Erichs feud) ... Hulk Hogan vowing revenge on (fill in the blank: Macho Man Savage, Paul Orndorff, Brutus the Barber, Andre the Giant).

5.0 -- The blood-feud between Dylan McKay and Anthony Marchette that resulted in Dylan's smoking-hot wife getting killed (from "90210") ... Crazy Joe Davola vs. Kramer and Seinfeld.

5.1 -- Rob Lowe beating up Raki at the end of "Youngblood."

(Note: Penalty points here because this outcome never could have happened in real life. I mean, this NEVER could have happened in real life. For God's sake, Rob Lowe couldn't even skate. Couldn't the movie have ended with Raki knocking him out with one punch, followed by Lowe's head hitting the ice and rendering him a vegetable? Would anyone have been against this?)

5.2 -- Isiah dropping 44 on John Stockton after "Dream Team 1" was announced.

5.3 -- Karl Malone dropping a 50-stitch elbow on Isiah's head the next time they played.

5.4 -- Tommy Vercetti being betrayed by Lance Vance in "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City" ... Roddy Piper after Adrian Adonis and Don Muraco jumped him on "Piper's Pit."

5.5 -- Bill Russell and the '69 Celtics against the Lakers (after finding out about their planned post-game celebration following Game 7 of the Finals) ... Delta House vs. Dean Wormer and Omega House ... the Revenge of the Nerds.

5.6 -- Shannon Tweed sleeping with Andrew Stevens' entire family and killing his maid in "Scorned" ... Roger Dorn's wife sleeping with Ricky Vaughn in "Major League" ... Rebecca DeMornay wreaking havoc as the nanny in "The Hand That Rocks the Cradle" ... Glenn Close's "I will not be IGNORED" speech in "Fatal Attraction."

5.7 -- Vince McMahon against Ted Turner and WCW ... Sonny Corleone beating up Connie's scumbag husband Carlo in the streets of New York (penalty points for the punch that missed by two feet).

5.8 -- Norman Dale re-deflowering Myra Fleener.

5.9 -- Dr. Kimberly Shaw returning from her car accident with a red wig and a giant alien scar on her head, seeking revenge on the entire "Melrose Place" cast.

6.0 -- MJ against Drexler in the '92 Finals ... MJ against Barkley and Majerle in the '93 Finals ... MJ refusing to play on the original Dream Team unless they left off Isiah.

6.1 -- Van Damme going after Chong Li in "Bloodsport" (penalty points because there's no way he would have won this fight in real life, especially after being blinded).

6.2 -- Tony Montana shooting Manny ... Roger Clemens' career from 1997-2004.

(Note: I'm not sure which one of these events, in retrospect, was more traumatic for me. Let's just move on.)

6.3 -- Shaq dropping 61 on the Clippers (because they made him pay for extra seats on his birthday) ... MJ dropping 69 on the Cavs (after the Cleveland fans cheered when he took a nasty spill in the first half) ... Charles Barkley dropping 56 on the '94 Warriors (inspired by C-Webb's behind-the-back dunk over him in the regular season).

6.4 -- Wyatt Earp at the end of "Tombstone" ... Todd Bertuzzi's attack on Steve Moore.

6.5 -- Steve Largent's revenge on Mike Harden.

(Reader C. Weaver explains: "In 1988, Harden knocked out two of Largent's teeth with an illegal hit and put him on the IR for a bunch of games. The next time Seattle played Denver, Harden picked off a pass intended for Brian Blades and looked like he was going to score, but Largent scorched his way across the field and just destroyed Harden with a devastating and perfect-form tackle. Largent hit him so hard that the ball came loose and Largent recovered it. The hit was so nasty that it was a part of NFL telecast montages for years afterwards. Later, Largent called it the favorite play of his career. And this guy is in the Hall of Fame. Whenever sports vengeance is mentioned, that hit stands out for me. Totally legal and totally bloodless.")

6.6 -- The entire Fenway crowd during Game 3 of the '99 ALCS (Clemens vs. Pedro) ... the entire Garden crowd calling for Laimbeer's head during Game 5 of the '87 playoffs (and getting it when Parish clocked him).

6.7 -- Michael Corleone coming out of the bathroom at Louis's Restaurant and shooting Solazzo and McCloskey ... Jimmy Snuka's next two months after Roddy Piper rammed the coconuts in his head on "Piper's Pit."

6.8 -- Eric Clapton's entire "August" album ... Conan the Barbarian (once he gets mad in the movie) ... Patrick Swayze cleaning house after Sam Elliott's character is killed in "Road House" ... the Kenneth Starr investigation of President Clinton and Whitewater.

6.9 -- Mel Gibson in every "Lethal Weapon" movie ... George Brett charging the umpire during the Pine Tar Game ... Forrest Whitaker's first football game after his car was trashed (from "Fast Times at Ridgemont High").

7.0 -- Every time Larry Bird played against Kent Benson.

(Note: Back in 1976, the Fledgling Basketball Jesus enrolled at Indiana University and left after a few unhappy weeks, eventually settling down at Indiana State two years later. During his brief I.U. stage, Bird felt that some of the veteran players on the team, including Benson, hadn't been very nice to him. So when he made the NBA, he went out of his way to embarrass Benson -- a mediocre big man for the Pistons -- at every opportunity. This culminated in Kevin McHale's 56-point game in 1985, when Bird kept feeding McHale on the low post because Benson couldn't handle him. The lesson, as always: Don't mess with Larry Bird.)

7.1 -- Snoop and Dre taking shots at Easy E in "Wit' Dre Day" ... Biggie recording "Who Shot Ya?" ... 50 Cent creating the word "Wankster" in a song about Ja Rule.

7.2 -- Darren McCarty beating up Claude Lemeiux (after Lemeiux broke Kris Draper's jaw the previous season) ... Ricky Steamboat learning to speak again after Randy Savage crushed his larynx with the ring bell, then ultimately seeking revenge (bonus points for the comedy of every taped piece where Steamboat pretended he couldn't speak, so he had to make crazy gestures to indicate how angry he was).

7.3 -- MJ's reaction after Karl Malone won the '97 MVP Award ... Hakeem's reaction after David Robinson won the '95 MVP Award ... Sammy Sosa sending approximately 450 hitmen to Tony Montana's Miami compound to have him killed at the end of "Scarface."

7.4 -- Pedro getting charged by leadoff hitter Gerald Williams in Tampa Bay, then promptly throwing 98 mph the rest of the way and retiring the next 24 batters in a row before John Flaherty broke up the pseudo-perfect game.

7.5 -- Cam Neely beating the holy bejeezus out of Ulf Samuelsson.

(Reader Richard Harb explains: "Ulf blew out Cam's knee, leading to the thigh muscle calcification and hip injury that eventually ended his career. I was at the Garden when they first played against each other after that, when Neely went after him after Ulf took a cheapshot after the whistle on one of the B's players after Barrasso had frozen the puck. It was the loudest I had ever heard the Garden, louder than C's championship games, B's Stanley Cup games, anything. I've never seen a man more angry than Neely. My best friend Ted had season tix at the Garden, first balcony, front row, on the blue line above where the scrum was, and Neely was on a mission. Just raw emotion. You couldn't blame him.")

7.6 -- Bruno Sammartino after his WWF apprentice Larry Zbysko busted his head open with a chair, culminating in their famous steel cage match at Shea Stadium ... Bill Simmons's eventual response to ESPN25's "Best 25 Sports Movies List."

7.7 -- Jack Cates shooting Ganz 147 times at the end of "48 Hours" ... Bret Hart decking Vince McMahon after the famous "Montreal Screw-Job" ... Joe Pesci taking out Billy Bats in the "Now go get your shinebox" scene (from "Goodfellas").

7.8 -- Max Cady in "Cape Fear" ... Cartman's revenge on Scott Tenorman (from "South Park") ... Montresor trapping Fortunado in the wall in "The Cask of Amontillado."

7.9 -- Michael Myers against the babysitters in Haddonfield, Illinois ... Jason Voorhees and Mrs. Voorhees against the counselors at Crystal Lake ... Freddie Krueger against everyone on Elm Street.

8.0 -- Justin Timberlake's "Cry Me A River" video.

(Note: The most underrated example of vengeance on this list. After Britney cheated on him, not only did he dump her, he put out a best-selling album fueled by a song about their breakup in which he basically destroys her with the lyrics. Just an unbelievable piece of work. It's devastating. I can't even imagine what she did when she first heard it. And if that wasn't enough, he made a well-received video about the song, starring a Britney look-alike. And if THAT wasn't enough, he immediately started going out with Cameron Diaz. By the time he was done, Britney's career was in the tank -- she was chain-smoking and hanging out with backup dancers and white trash guys from her hometown. Now that, my friends, is vengeance. Bravo, Justin. Bravo.)

8.1 -- Steven Seagal during the "I'm gonna take you to the bank, Trent ... the blood bank" scene (from "Hard to Kill") ... John Rambo against sheriff Brian Dennehy and his deputies from "First Blood" ... Tubbs and Crockett taking down Calderon in "Miami Vice" (in the classic two-part episode, "Calderon's Revenge").

8.2 -- Andy Dufresne escaping from Shawshank through a sewage pipe, setting up the Warden and Hadley on his way out, then escaping to Mexico.
(Reader Red explains: "Andy crawled to freedom through 500 yards of s--- -smelling foulness I can't even imagine. Or maybe I just don't want to. 500 yards. That's the length of five football fields. Just shy of half a mile . . . when I think of him heading south in his own car with the top down, it always makes me laugh. Andy Dufresne, who crawled through a river of s--- and came out clean on the other side. Andy Dufresne, headed for the Pacific.")

8.3 -- The great Gabe Kaplan thrashing Robert Conrad in a 100-yard dash (after being challenged by Conrad in the original "Battle of the Network Stars"). And yes, this deserves its own column.

8.4 -- MJ's performance during the entire '96 season, a direct response to everything that happened with Nick Anderson and the Magic in the '95 playoffs.

8.5 -- The outlaw Josey Wales slaughtering half the Union Army ... John Matrix's paralleled killing spree from "Commando" (penalty points because he's now running the state of California).

8.6 -- Mick O'Brien and Paco Moreno landing in the same juvie prison in "Bad Boys" ... Ali and Frazier fighting for the championship of each other in Manila.

8.7 -- Shaquille O'Neal after finding out that the Lakers were trading him for Odom, Grant and Butler (work in progress).

8.8 -- Charles Bronson in every "Death Wish" movie.

(Seattle reader Monty has more: "In the first one, his wife gets murdered and his daughter gets raped, so he kills a bunch of lowlifes. In the sequel, his daughter gets raped (again) and commits suicide, so he kills a bunch of lowlifes. In the third one, his friend gets killed, so he kills a bunch of lowlifes, but this time it's in Los Angeles, not New York. In the fourth one, his friend's daughter overdoses, which is, again, bad news for lowlifes. And in the final one, his girlfriend gets killed, with predictable results. Well, by this time he's killing people with soccer balls, not bullets, but it's still vengeance.")

8.9 -- Jesse Owens winning four gold medals in Berlin (in front of Adolf Hitler) ... Jackie Robinson's career from 1947-1956.

9.0 -- Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes burning down Andre Rison's house ... the Lorena Bobbit Era.

9.1 -- Tupac Shakur recording "Hit 'Em Up."

(Note: In my book, the most devastating rap song of all-time. And you wonder why Pac was murdered. This made "Who Shot Ya?" look like it was written by James Ingram and Michael McDonald. Every line is crossed: This one has death threats, admissions of sleeping with other people's wives, jokes about sickle cell, mama jokes and at least 100 F-bombs. I'm not kidding. And while we're on the subject, "We ain't singin', we bringin' drama - f--- you and your motherf----- mama!" remains the greatest single moment in 2Pac history. And yes, I know I'm white.)

9.2 -- Michael Corleone settling all family business at the end of "Godfather 1" ... Vito Corleone returning to Sicily to avenge the murders of his mother, father and brother by ripping a knife through Don Ciccio.

9.3 -- Muhammad Ali vs. Ernie Terrell and Floyd Patterson.

(Note: These were the two "What's my name?" fights, when Ali displayed a dark side because they kept calling him Cassius in the weeks leading up to the fight. Big mistake. BIG mistake. The Patterson fight is legitimately depressing to watch -- Ali carries him for about eight rounds longer than he needed, just so he can keep torturing him. Hard to believe this was the same guy who was wobbling around and throwing those painful jabs against Jeter last week.)

9.4 -- Uma Thurman's revenge in "Kill Bill" I and II ... William Wallace in "Braveheart" ... Maximus in "Gladiator" ... Will Munny in "Unforgiven."

9.5 -- Rocky Balboa holding a dying Apollo in his arms as Ivan Drago sneers, "If he dies, he dies."

(Note: This led to Rocky fighting on Christmas Day in Russia for no money; nearly losing his unfeeling wife; climbing a 55,000-foot mountain in snow boots; singlehandedly ending the Cold War; and possibly ending up with brain damage, although we will never know for sure since "Rocky 5" never happened.)

9.6 -- Marcellus Wallace after being raped by two hillbillies and deciding that he needs to get "medieval on their ass" (from "Pulp Fiction") ... Rambo during the "Murdock ... I'm coming to get YOU!" scene (from "First Blood 2").

9.7 -- Edmund Dantes seething in a French prison after being framed for treason in "The Count of Monte Cristo."

(From reader Adam Bloch: "Let me sum that 1,276-page book up: man wrongfully imprisoned for 30 years in hell-hole; has his wife, life, and sanity stolen from him; escapes; gets ridiculously rich; devotes all energy, time, and money to destroying the lives of those who wronged him. I think that qualifies pretty high on the vengeance scale.")

9.8 -- Michael Corleone ordering the death of his brother, Fredo.

(Let's have a moment of silence ... I still haven't gotten over this.)

9.9 -- Sissy Spacek destroying her high school class in a supernatural telekinetic fit of rage (from "Carrie").

10.0 -- Keyser Soze in "The Usual Suspects."

(I'll let reader Verbal Kint explain: "He lets the last Hungarian go, and he goes running. He waits until his wife and kids are in the ground and he goes after the rest of the mob. He kills their kids, he kills their wives, he kills their parents and their parents' friends. He burns down the houses they live in and the stores they work in, he kills people that owe them money. And like that he was gone.")

Rants

2006-02-15T01:43:00.000+08:00

1. Valentine's Day, I don't see the point - somebody enlighten me please!

2. My PLDT DSL connection sucks, we apply for the top of the line dsl plan and I can't even play a single sng without getting disconnected 3213128491749 times. This fucking sucks because, I get disconnected at crucial moments of a sng when the blinds are big and it's the bubble.

3. 20/40 at the airport casino - Do you know the feeling when you sit down at the table, post your blinds for the first time, then peel your holecards and see pocket As? I do, it happened to me awhile ago. My aces din't get cracked, in fact I won around 1k with it, but how about sitting there for 3 more hours, not getting a single premium hand? -700, after three hours. The game was perfect, it was loose passive. You'd see 7-8 limpers, giving you pot odds to call any hand for that matter. Then NO ONE will bet the flop, but if someone did, 5-6 players would call it, regardless of the odds. Those fools would CHASE flush draws with 10 or Q high, CHASE gutshots on the river, AND WOULD SPIKE IT!. Man o man, that's how the action is at the airport. The game is very very soft, like a baby's bottom! So for those who have the rolls , I suggest you grind it out there.

Takes A LOT of patience to play this game we all love...

all it takes is just a lil paaaatieeenceee *whistles*

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Weekend Wrapup

2006-02-13T04:24:00.000+08:00

I rolled with my tito Lance last night. I told my uncle we'd go to the Airport Casino to play cards. (Uncle Lance, plays limit hold'em and PL Omaha at frisco and party). We sat at different tables, I sat down at a table with players having 6-8k in front of them, bought in for 2k and hoped for the best. I was expecting the fools to push me off every pot but they din't, played tight, then made a mistake where I called 700 bucks with pockets 10s with two queens on the board the guy bet his set... and called my preflop raise of 300 with QTo. I played for 3 hours, went home losing -300 pesos, my tito went home with +1100.

After playing some rings, I was in no mood to play online but then to my surprise, Goma said he was already doing the grind so we decided to sit down at the 5's, we play for 40mins I find myself short stacked and UTG, I get KK. I push all-in, Goma PM's me and says, I've got Aces... guess what he does? hahaha....Next it was bubble time, We killed the short stacks, then finally it was heads-up... me and Goma.

It was a tight match, then thanks to fuckin' PLDT I got disconnected from the game, blinds were 300-600 at this time, I had about 4000+ in chips goma with 3000+. I get re-connected and see that my stack is around 2000+ so I pushed and lost. Goma took 1st place and I finished 2nd.

He was lucky, I got disconnected. I would've been a clinic... hehehe til next time goms... til next time...

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Congrats to my team, the UP Men's Judo team, for bagging the gold for this year's UAAP '06, good job guys.

Because We're Poor

2006-02-06T22:46:00.000+08:00

Last Saturday afternoon, we witnessed another tragedy. It was the first year anniversary of a popular local noon-time show, Wowowee. 71 people died at ULTRA that afternoon, who are we to blame? The show promised to give lots of cash that day, who would say no to that? Lots of people went in hopes of winning a couple of hundreds even thousands if they're lucky.

While waiting outside ULTRA, people started pushing and shoving, I saw in paper that the gate collapsed, and the crowd fell like dominoes. Then people started rushing into the gates, it was the elderly who suffered badly. It was a STAMPEDE, seen all over the world that Filipinos cannot line up properly.

Many said it was because we're poor. I say, we poor because we are like this. When will we learn? Fact is I had some experiences were our unfortunate brothers, act in disrespect and blame the fortunate ones for being like that. Oh, I wish we all learn from this.

Thank you

2006-01-19T00:32:00.000+08:00

Alright, just when I thought that there's no more way but up, guess I was wrong. I'm not complaning, it's just the way things are. We can't do anything about it. Life must go on. The fight must go on. They will be another hand to be dealt, another chance to see a brighter day.

To those of you who have shown support, thank you from the bottom of my heart. Guys, you have no idea how much it meant to me receiving those words of encouragement from you via SMS or other means. You keep my bankroll in this game called life seem limitless. Thank you.

Mom, wherever you may be, I know that you are in a much peaceful place now. Thank you for the numerous sacrifices you had done for us. You are and will always be my hero and my best friend. There is no way that I can pay you back, but my plan is to show that I understand. You are appreciated.

Mom, this ones for you

Mike

Another Home Game

2006-01-18T13:46:00.000+08:00

Played an 8 man SnG last night, mostly against people new to the game, but there were a few who were starting to improve. Hats off to Bri for using my favorite hand J-4 to win it all. I officially denounce that hand from now on, and I also denounce drinking good scotch at the table. I busted out when I saw my J-4's and I had a couple of rounds of scotch in me already, so I gambled, and of course, I lost.

But we played another game, and I showed Fish how it's done. Haha. A little short-handed 3 man winner take all SnG, and got the win. Got my money back from the first game and a little extra for my school lunch for this week. :D

Yo Fish, straight forward poker is the way to go huh? hahaha.

Pilots of the Airwaves

2006-01-12T17:49:00.000+08:00

Episode 03 is out guys, if you have some spare time, please listen to it. The Camp is very grateful to those who have been tuning in our low budget productions. Thanks guys!

If you want your favorite song played, just let us know and we'll try to squeeze it in the show. Plus, if you want to guest or suggest a topic, please feel free to shout us a holla!

Grouch

Missing In Action

2006-01-10T06:15:00.000+08:00

It's been a while since I posted something that has really something to do with poker. Why? It's because I have not played for about two months now. Gottta get my education done for the poker gates to really open up for me. The promise land.

The smoke, the steel door, the MSG of the cup noodles, the dart board (hey, what happend to that dart board?), the overall gansta feel of the state of mind, miss that place. Well, as they say, shit happens, and the only thing for us to do is to wipe it off our ass and move on. The good thing is that there are a lot of games these days, legit or gansta, social or war-like, you can find the game that suits your needs.

Gotta get it done

School is cool

I Damn You Pikachu!

2006-01-07T19:24:00.000+08:00

This week I got two SMSs asking where to buy poker chips. So I told them where they can avail of the clay composite poker chips. I guess mostly everyone owns a set of poker chips, some even poker tables! :p It is a fun way to spend a weekend together with friends or family, battling it out on the felt taking ones chips/money. Playing it out til the end until one claims victory and bragging rights hehe.

The best thing about this is a lot of new people are coming to the game. Playing the game they saw on the celebrity poker showdown... But the sad thing about this is, the poker blogs don't have much traffic anymore. How I hope that the people playing poker now can just give 5 minutes of their precious time to visit the number of blogs online (they might learn a thing or two, that I'm sure) Our number of readers decreased! from a whopping 2 readers... now there's only 1 reader!!!

I think that there's one reason why this is happening... it's because of that damn pikachu... All it did was dance and frolic, it was funny but it wasn't funny anymore when he tried to manipulate, connive and even threathened the lives of people who gave it respect and friendship.

I'm glad that was over, pikachu is gone now and something important went with it...

...that state of mind.

DAMN YOU!!! Now I can't play poker anytime I want, you scum! :P

Let Us Know!!!

2006-01-05T01:46:00.000+08:00

If you have any poker stories, bad beats, raves, rants or shoutouts...

For Heads-Up - tell us what hand/s you want us to discuss...

... Pretentious Mike might drop by the show, if you have any questions or 'challenges' for the guy let us know...

and we'll include it on our 2nd episode.

:)

When Poker met the Ipod

2006-01-04T00:30:00.003+08:00

Love at first sight.

Now, you can tune in to what the boys from Camp Hold'em are up to using your iTunes.

Podcast is the wave of the future and Camp Hold'em is proud to bring you podcast episodes weekly!

Visit http://uberadio.blogspot.com (link on the left), just follow the simple directions on how to download it using iTunes (might take some time but it's worth the wait ;) or you can just click the title of the post (ex. episode 1) for the live streaming.

Hope you guys listen in and keep us posted with your comments and suggestions.

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excuse us for the wrong pronounciation and grammatical errors, we're not certified dj's, just crazy cardplayers. :p

New Year Bang!

2006-01-02T21:30:00.000+08:00

Happy new year to y'all! Sorry no real decent poker post these days, we're trying to create a more hi-tech feel to it.

We'll keep you guys posted!

grouch

Merry Christmas!

2005-12-25T01:08:00.000+08:00

Wishing all of you a Merry Christmas! May you have bigger and better bank rolls next year! :D

Home Game Friendly

2005-12-20T01:21:00.000+08:00

I held a home game recently at the Camp with three friends, a four way SNG. But with a catch. Since it was almost Christmas and everybody was low on cash, we played for a different incentive: MAGIC SING. mwehehehehehe. Winner doesn't have to sing squat, second sings one song, third sings two songs, fourth sings three songs. Who says that only money can make us play seriously?! It was intense, nobody wanted to experience the shame of singing in front of laughing friends. I am proud to say I took the game down against two newbies and one average player. Seeing them make a fool out of themselves was just as good as winning cash... maybe... err now that I think of it... hahaha. Money can't buy happiness? Gah, greed is such a motivating force. I think money can't buy happiness literally, but I believe having money can give you more opportunities to be happy. Gotta love our capitalistic society!

The Unforgettable

2005-12-18T16:50:00.000+08:00

It was the first time in that I would go to a casino to play a NLHE tourney. It sure was an experience to remember, I'm extremely glad and thankful that I was given the opportunity to participate the Airport Casino's First Texas Hold'em Tournament, the last blast before the new year.

They did save the best for last...

The Airport Tourney was the grand finale for this year. The main highlight of the event was the speech given by Mr. Nick Galan who shared a short anecdote on how much work was done to make things what they are now today! The wonderful people of PAGCOR did a great job with the dealers, tourney set-up and importantly giving poker a home here in the Philippines (and we know it's just going to get better folks.)

The grand finale had 115 players, a prize pot of 575,000 pesos, 15 standard poker tables...making it the biggest tourney before the year ends and Casino Filipino opened their first cardroom located at the 2nd floor of the airport casino.

Did I mention the chips? The chips were exclusively made only for poker use (if i'm not mistaken) It reminded me of the paulson chips...*drool*

Thanks to Tito Nick and FutureBet Asia for giving us the chance to participate in the event. Visit fbapoker.com for more information about FutureBet Asia.

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G'bye '05... Hello '06!

2005-12-14T01:51:00.000+08:00

Looking back at the past year makes you want to re-live some moments and forget some unfortunate events. I don't know what it is with the new year but I'm feeling a good vibe this coming '06 (glad that '05 is completely over) It's like what my mom told me "New year, new life!". Thanks '05 for givin' me a good one.

My New Year's Resolutions:

1) Study harder...
2) Play more poker...

Where the party at?!?! Let's start the year with a BANG!!!

CHEERS!

fish

Long Time, No Blog

2005-12-11T23:16:00.000+08:00

Funny, it took me about a hour to start writing this post...

It was difficult to blog somethin down when I haven't been playing cards. Last game I had was the tong-its game with Grouch and Tilter, (After playing a 3 handed limit freeze-out...closest thing to NLHE)

I guess what I'm trying to say it...Poker is the fuel of this blog (and also the other blogs if im not mistaken ;)) and without the game, this blog would not have existed.

Now, School is the grind. Time to sacrifice table time for library time (ugh.) I can't wait to to get to the REAL grind. Been itching for some rings but....

THANKS to the X-mas season, I'm broke bloke. No roll... :( That sucks.
Finally... a post?

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YOURS TRULY, claims to be the undisputed limit champ of the camp... does anyone want to dispute the chump... champ? hehe

Benga!

2005-11-30T09:37:00.000+08:00

Pretentious People

2005-11-28T01:42:00.000+08:00

Ever heard of the term, D.T.A.? Don't Trust Anybody. Especially in POKER.

The game has exploded beyond imagination, and thus you find yourself playing more and more against people you don't know. Most of us started playing the game with friends. But eventually, you meet other people who also play the game, in order to get better. There are some people who you might encounter that aren't really there to make friends, but just to take your money. That is normal. But then, there are some who just wanna screw you over. Period.

In poker, the greatest lesson one can learn is not how to manage money, but to learn how to read other people not just at the felt, but also outside of the gameroom. Don't be stupid to think that it's just a game, and the screwing over only stays within the game. It happens in real life all the time.

Poker is a microcosm of the real world; it is cunning, merciless and brutal. Concordantly, just as in real life, there is a hierarchy in the food chain. If you want to survive, you have to be the at the top. Survival of the Fittest.

If you think everybody around you are fishies and dolphins, think again. There are always sharks lurking around, pretending to be dolphins. So don't trust anybody you meet at the poker table. It's just a facade, a soiree, a masquerade.

I got soul but I’m not a soldier

2005-11-27T20:11:00.000+08:00

It’s been almost two weeks now that I haven’t played the game. It’s hard, but I have to keep my priorities straight. I must admit, I screwed up big time; fortunately, it’s not too late for me to set my life straight, at least for the moment.

We hit some bumps along the way that forces us to make a detour towards our destination, our main goal. We must dig deep within ourselves to have the courage to continue on. We will encounter countless schmucks that will try to take advantage of us, and even try to take us down; we should be ready for those kinds of situations to protect our interests.

The show must go on as they say, and so must we.

Soul power to the y’all. You know who you are.

A White Christmas

2005-11-27T16:26:00.000+08:00

The month of december is just around the corner. Bright parols and christmas lights seen all over the metro, Christmas songs playing at the malls, kris kringle and xmas shopping...............

I'm no scrooge but I think that my xmas is going to suck. It all started when I could not play poker anymore because of complications that led to the destruction of the matrix.

I just feel bad that there was once a place I called a second home were, people would come in, play some damn cards, have a couple of laughs (and beers) and have a fun time. But yes, shit does happen and it hit the fan.

It's sad and I'm pissed about everything, I'd pick bad beats over this.

Sorry guys, just wanted to vent (it is a blog), I hope you guys share the same feeling.

Home games anyone?

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I played the first ever JG Dead Money Tourny with a bounty twist. Great tourny, salutes to Jardine, and the JG group. The Camp gives it's all out support in all your up coming tourneys. Congratulations to Barb, who played at the Tagaytay tourny, great news (sweet payout).
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I am the one

2005-11-21T18:50:00.000+08:00

I am the one.

sweet emotions

2005-11-19T10:23:00.000+08:00

You know what tilts me lately? Emotions at the poker table, I absolutely hate it. I can’t stand players ranting or bitching when they lose a hand. I can understand disbelief, shock, or even depression when they lose. So maybe it’s not emotion that I hate, it might be ego. Yeah, that’s right, I think its ego. I want to outplay rather than outcard these kind of players.

Let’s face one fact, and that is no one really tells you how to play a certain hand. You control what happens to you at the table. Not the dealer, not your opponent, not the deck, not your hole cards, not the flop, turn, or river, but you, and you alone. Yes, we all get unlucky sometimes when we are ahead before the flop then the board will favor the other guy. Tough luck, after all, it’s still gambling we’re doing. But don’t bitch when you get beaten by a guy who makes his flush on the river. Yes, you maybe ahead, but maybe you shouldn’t be in that hand after all playing your ace rag.

Let’s just stop pointing fingers. Let’s think if we did the right thing first… let’s be responsible for our own actions. don't always think that you are the best player at the table, chances are you're not. Cconfidence is a good thing, but being self - aware is way better.

at last, a poker related video

2005-11-15T23:03:00.000+08:00

my new hero

2005-11-15T22:57:00.000+08:00

Benga of the Week / poll of the week

2005-11-13T12:52:00.000+08:00

Played the BBC5, went all in early on with my pocke aces with several limpers inform of me. The guy to my left calls with pocket kings. Flop was:

7, Queen, Jack, Queen, King!

Benga!!!

Watcha gonna do? Alright, my question is this, If you have a big hand such as pocket aces, do yo show it right away to scare people off? Some players do it, I don't. I wanna know what you guys think and the reason for it.

Before Poker

2005-11-11T18:55:00.000+08:00

Stuck in traffic, listening to friday madness - all the 80's hits , today! Got me thinking about poker, gambling, betting and more poker...

Just got home from the big c because Paul, a buddy, wanted to play some baccarat. After an hour of play I was down 3 big. I played some stud, baccarat, stud and then more baccarat. The first few minutes were fun, I was shuffling and riffling my chips, hoping to get lucky and win some party money. Then the next half hour, it wasn't fun losing 4-5 hands straight playing that damn baccarat game. No reason to tilt because that would be stupid.

The house will always win that's for sure. On the way home, I thought back on my first experiences gambling. 1. Pusoy Dos - betting 5-20 pesos per game, winner take all. 2. Playstation - 1-5k bets. Proud to say, I did (and will still) beat a lot of guys playing NBA live, including one famous UAAP cager just turned PBA pro (I just had to put that in! hehe) 3. Sports Betting - Broke even. 4. Casinos - sometimes even, most of the time broke, 'nuff said. 5. Poker - ...

Playing poker for almost 7 months now, I've learned tons of stuff, won/lost losta hands... what's the use of winning tonight when you're going to lose it tomorrow or the next week? When what matters the most is what happens in the next couple of years. Then ask yourself am I winning or losing, what do your spread sheets say?

To be continued....

PS2 NBA Live 05 or 06... any challengers? hehe :p

crazy chinese

2005-11-11T17:17:00.000+08:00

The JG Poker Tour Dead Money Bounty Tournament

2005-11-08T10:53:00.000+08:00

The first-ever JG Poker Tour Dead Money Bounty
Tournament

Date: November 19, 2005

Venue: Penthouse. Legrand Condominium. Valero St.,
Makati City.

Game: No-Limit Texas Hold 'Em - No Rebuys

Maximum Players: 70

Registration time: 230pm

First Deal: 330pm

Places Paid: no. of tables plus two

Payouts: Guaranteed 45% of the pot for the 1st, 20%
for the 2nd, all other places to be announced during
the tourney

Buy-in: 1,200 + 300 + 100 (If you're wondering what
the 50 is for, we'll explain later).

Finally, a tournament hosted by the members of the
sole poker group that is proud to admit that all its
members are dead money.  In an embarrassing display of
pure bravado, JG poker tour is inviting the best
players in town to pit their skills against their own
somewhat mediocre poker-playing abilities.

In this amazingly lopsided tournament that can
possibly seat 70 contenders, manila’s greatest poker
players will play against themselves (and JG Poker
Tour’s somewhat confident beginners) where people will
eliminated one by one until only a sole survivor
remains to claim victory.


Bounty Hunter Twist

Two players will be chosen randomly and he/she will
have a bounty on his/her head.
The bounty hunters who take the two players out will
half the total bounty..
BUT... if the person with a bounty is able to make it
to the final 2 tables, he/she gets the winnings to
herself.

Pre-register today and avoid the pains of a waitlist.
Contact Jardine at 0918-9072729 or check out our
friendster site by searching user:
jgpokertour@yahoo.com

the prime shift

2005-11-07T23:30:00.000+08:00

the pinoy band wagon is starting all over again. before there was the shawarma, the pearl drinks, the macarena, and the ocho ocho. now its, no limit Texas hold 'em.

i have nothing against it, i'm actually happy that it's happening. let the good news spread across the land! that will be great for all of us. but, we have to be a step ahead of everyone else, the trendsetters if you will.

we should start learning how to play limit, pot-limit, omaha, 7 card stud, razz, draw ball, etc. that's just me. more poker the better for me.

information is power. the more tactics and strategy we have, the better.

grouch

Who's that? It's Tim Yap!

2005-11-06T17:30:00.000+08:00

Decisions decisions...

2005-11-02T09:58:00.000+08:00

Alright, I've been thinking about a certain scenario that could arise during a tournament, and I want to hear your views about it. Lets say your playing a Multi-Table Tournament, got a bit unlucky, not getting the cards, being outdrawn by your opponents, resulting in a short stack. The question:

When do you push? What are the deciding factors for you to consider risking all of your stack and your tournament on the line?

Benga of the Week

2005-10-30T00:31:00.000+08:00

Alright, it's time for the weekly benga. It's about the best or worst beat that I saw all week long. Played the cash game and a 7 handed last Thursday, lost tons of money playing the 20-40 table and landed 3rd, which unfortunately was the bubble place. I got pocket queens twice, lost twice, pocket kings twice, lost once. Skipped the BBC500 coz I had to report to my parole officer hehehe.

Then the poker itch got into me, and the itch to gamble.

Played gin rummy against my old man, first for fun, then it got serious. It started out with a 50 peso bet, then turned inot a 100, then to a high of 150. Lost 200 bucks to him, which he gladly took. Then he took us, his three boys out for dinner. What a gracious gentleman.

Called up fish, borrowed his chip set, went home then challenge my family to a 5 handed SNG. My liltle sister, who was supposed to sleep over her friends house, learned that we we're going to play, she immediately ask us to pick her up so she could join us. A 7th grader passing up on a slumber party to play poker against her older brothers, hehehe what a sight. We played two games, the first of which was a 200 buy in, with a 70-30% split between the winner and the 2nd placer, then we went to play a 100 winner take all tourney.

Here's the benga hand:

First game, final three. Me, short stack, Martin, my youngest brother, who eventually won, was chip leader coz he took out my dad and my sister at the same time. Justin, my protege, average stack.

I went all in with JT, Justin Called with pocket duece. Flop was:

QUEEN NINE KING! I flopped the straight!!!!!!!!!! Then the turn card was a queen.

Daddy Tee: Panalo na yan si Mike:
Mike: Wait, a queen or a duece will save his ass
Justin: La na yan

River was a duece....................................................................

BENGA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

JGPT Girls featured in FHM!

2005-10-28T14:03:00.000+08:00

Check their scintilating shots over at The Riverhouse!!!

The Downswing

2005-10-27T15:40:00.000+08:00

"Some days you're the windshield, and some days you're the bug." - 2+2

2 months ago, I started playing rings, I thought I knew the right stuff to get chips at the table. I was wrong. Instead of getting chips, I ended up losing...and having a scorched roll to go with it. I had to adjust, losing is tough and nobody wants to lose, that's for sure. But no matter how I press my edges, I still get beat. Every poker player's worst fear - The variance monster, laying bad beats, takes your chips, burns your roll, leaving you with almost nothing. Playing through the variance is tough, I can't be pretentious and blame JUST the variance, the way I was playing that time was also a reason why I was losing.

After a few weeks playing the rings, I was down 10k. Like I said, I had to change the way I play - the transition from sngs, mtts to rings, that was the plan. I cut my losses to 4k. Then I got cocky, went down, went up, went down, went up. It's a financial rollercoaster, now I just want my grind time and slowly...slowly claw back.

___________________________________________________________________

Last night, I played a 2 plus 2, 10 handed single re-buy SNG. The pot was sweeeeet, I bubbled, that wasn't sweet. The worm and the grouch won heavy pots, nice one bros. Patience does pay right? hehe. Anyways, I just want to comment on what transpired that night. Last night I got a call from the grouch, we talked about some things - of course, poker related stuff. I just wanted to post this...

'The truth is that when bad players are winning and you're losing, they're not only playing better, but better against you.' - 2+2

Yes, some players are BAD but last night there were no bad players, fo sho. Which makes things even more difficult for anyone to take down those kind of games. 'They're not only playing better, but better against YOU'. Limit your mistakes or better yet don't make any. It's not that you're read, it's just one of those days when nothing goes your way. They did play better than you, but it doesn't mean you're a bad player.

To all the players experiencing the downswing....

Self-realization comes with experience and discipline, and it's the toughest part of gambling to master. Everybody looks great when the cards are falling for him. The ones that keep reaching into their pockets with a grim look on their face no matter what the situation are the ones that haven't conquered their own egos or, worse yet, their own addictions. Show me the player that not only can play when he's behind, but can pack up and leave without any hesitation or apologies, and that's the player I'll put my money on.

In the end, playing when you're behind isn't much different than playing when you're ahead. You just need to make the proper adjustments to your opponents. Staying off tilt is much easier when you can make sense of a situation, and losing streaks don't seem to occur as often or last as long when you stay in control. When you learn to recognize that a situation has changed, through experience and study, you will learn how to adapt.

The best players I know are masters at adjusting to changing circumstances, and rarely, if ever, lose control of their game or their bankroll. Good luck! - Rich Sudy of 2+2.

Damn those guys are good.

Can you dig it?

Fishizzle!

Blessing of the bad beat

2005-10-24T17:18:00.000+08:00

Bad beats, everyone hates them. And why wouldn’t anyone? You were miles ahead, pure domination, and then a freak card rivered and took away your stack of high society. You just got benga! You go home, feeling stupid, contemplating about the hand, trying to re-analyze everything, trying to figure out your mistake. Turns out, you didn’t do anything wrong, poker happens.

After reading the first part of the Skalansky book, I got a renewed respect or view for bad beats. According to the book, bad beats will always happen to the better player because chances are the better player entered that pot ahead. HE made the right decision when it mattered most, then simply got out carded by the amateur.

Poker happens

Benga!

hail the logo of the camp

2005-10-24T16:47:00.000+08:00

Pick a Hand

2005-10-24T16:12:00.000+08:00

AKs or Pocket Queens. A lil bit of info for you guys... pre-flop according to the Poker Stove QQ vs AKs... QQ will have a 8% advantage pre-flop or exactly 53.951 to 46.049. :)

Take your pick, may it be according to statistics, favorites, superstitious beliefs etc...

I'm kinda leaning towards the dog hand here...

Fish-Out

The Rooftop Invitational

2005-10-23T22:01:00.000+08:00

Another tourney in the books. The A55 Rooftop Invitational brought together the tougest poker players of Manila in one roof...top. There was 30 players, 150+k pot, the winner got paid handsomely and went home with the trophy.

Congratulations the winners of the rooftop invite, Pablo, Big Wally, Ace S., Jun Uy and Aries. Also the A55, Poker Filipinas and BBC group for another successful tourney.

Big thanks to Jardine G. and Big Wally for the support, I really wanted to win it or at least make it deep into the tourney, I did not want to disappoint you guys. Unfortunately, poker happens.

Tomorrow will be another day, another tourney, another chance to win it all.

Fish

I'm not your energizer bunny plus THE BENGA OF THE WEEK

2005-10-23T01:05:00.000+08:00

Man, what a tournament! Intense! Just like what NickG said, there was very little dead money on that tournament. You know what I'm talking about, the Rooftop Invitational.

None of the soldiers of the camp made it into the money, heard that Fish got run overed by the Siberian Express and my trip ochos got rivered by trip aces. Thriller(aka Goma) was our only hope. We decided to leave him for a while, let him do his own thing, grab something to eat coz my parole officer(aka my girlfriend) showed up for support. When we got back, Thriller had a huge stack, but eventually lost it again to the Siberian Express. We failed to bring home the bacon today, too bad, but everythings cool. That's poker.

I can't think of a way to become pretentious while writting this post, other than that tournament drained our energy. We were hungry like a wolf, ate our hearts away over at Congo. Gone are the days when we have the power to drive all the way to Alabang, play some cards, then drive to Ortigas Center to play more cards. As the field gets tougher and tougher, it gets harder too physically, mentally, and emotionally.

Texas Hold 'em - takes a minute to learn, but a lifetime to master!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Benga of the Week

I'm trying to write the Benga of the Week every Saturday. It will be about the worst beat, the best bluffs, best plays, etc. or can be about anything worth shouting BENGA!!!! What does benga mean? I really don't know, but from what I understand, it's what you shout when you hit jackpot or somthing. Realy don't care what it means, it just feels good shouting BENGA! when you hit your card on the river to beat the schmuck who went all in with 7-2os.
Blinds 50-100

Dealer, pocket 8s, I raised 200 more for a total of 300, got re-raised 200 more by the guy to my left, everyone folds, I call.

Flop came King 8 Queen, rags.

The guy went all in for his last 530 I think, got him covered. Added a lil hollywood, ask him if he would show his cards if I fold, he said yes. I called my tirps.

Turn card was a junk, river card was an ACE! Benga!!!!!!!

Went on tilt, went all in next hand with A7 Diamonds, got called by pocket queens, Flop comes 7, 3, 7. BENGA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good play, great cards, one pretentious player

BENGA!!!!!!!

beach house

2005-10-21T16:09:00.000+08:00

pretentious bong strikes again

2005-10-21T16:08:00.000+08:00

how cute

2005-10-21T16:04:00.000+08:00

Life is good....

2005-10-21T16:00:00.000+08:00

heavy drinkers

2005-10-21T15:59:00.000+08:00

everybody loves mikee

2005-10-21T15:57:00.000+08:00

oops... wrong door...

2005-10-21T15:56:00.000+08:00

the prophet, the prime minister of the Bong Nation together with the Pretentious Bong

2005-10-21T15:54:00.000+08:00

u aint macho bro

2005-10-21T15:53:00.000+08:00

again, being pretentious

2005-10-21T15:52:00.000+08:00

200 empty bottles of beer

2005-10-21T15:51:00.000+08:00

goma, tilter, fish, grouch, no.1 rounders. the camp baby

2005-10-21T15:48:00.000+08:00

benga!!!!

2005-10-21T15:47:00.000+08:00

mike g, the grouch, tilter having a great time

2005-10-21T15:46:00.000+08:00

he's going down!!!

2005-10-21T15:45:00.000+08:00

tilter had way too much san miguel

2005-10-21T15:44:00.000+08:00

Blogging My Ass

2005-10-21T14:38:00.000+08:00

Okay...Last Tuesday night, after a night of beer bongin' san mig lights, chuggin' gin and juice, the camp played some poker.

It was Tipsy, Goma, Grouch, No. 1 Rounder, a friend and Fish. We played for... pride. (Some guy said, 'Pride lang?') I was laughing my ass off. Anyways, same shit, different day. We all wanted to kick No. 1 Rounder's ass since he was 'rusty' haha. You being rusty is an understatement, start reading you gay ass. I was fancy'ing things up, stirring some shiz at the table, but Tipsy had to ruin my party. It was like a game of tag - who's going to catch who. All I can say is, it's damn good to see your opponents, thinking of folding top pair because of something they 'think' somebody has a better kicker and/or a set but then it's all about psyching out each other, proving who's got bigger balls, making laydowns, slow playing monsters...

I think that there will be no consistent winner in the Camp Hold'em games because we all started playing the game at the same time, made the same bad call, going/calling an all-in with nothing (couple of outs), we all studied the game, reading books, websites, have conversations about the game etc...Not being equally skilled but we do have our own strengths and weaknesses. We just need to learn from each other and continue to develop our games by helping each other out, pointing out our weaknesses and gradually improving more on our strengths.

Tells, plays, aggression, patience...BENGA!

Fish-Out!

If someone is interested... i'm selling shares for sat...i'll give you guys a good deal :p

The Boys are Back in Town

2005-10-21T12:49:00.000+08:00

After taking a three day vaca, with a couple of friends, lots a booze, good food and no poker. (okay i lied, we had like 2 or 3 games :p) I guess everyone needed a break from the stress, bad beats and hate mail. The whole camp sat down and talked about cards for like 20 minutes, sharing experiences, strategies, bashing No. 1 Rounder most of the time! hehe then it was time to become pretentious, it was beer bongs all night for everyone. It was an awesome break.

Last night the boys got back to the state of mind and played the re-buy satellites for saturday. Goma won the seat from the first SNG, Grouch, won second. In the 2nd SNG, I cashed in 2nd against Big Wally. I was a good feeling ITM'ing the first night back in town not just that but the fact that three of the campers ITM'ed last night.

Saturday is a day away, I just hope to be in the right state of mind, remain focused, and not pretentious. It's a big one, with a small field, I'll be shooting with some big guns, including the Siberian Express hehe. Thanks to a good friend for believing, you gave me the inspiration to play good poker on Sat, won't let you down bro.

I'll bring it...

Fishizzle!

A Tribute

2005-10-16T10:28:00.000+08:00

Everything
Lifehouse

Find me here
Speak to me
I want to feel you
I need to hear you
You are the light
That is leading me
To the place where
I find peace again
You are the strength
That keeps me walking
You are the hope
That keeps me trusting
You are the life to my soul
You are my purpose
You are everything
And how can I
Stand here with you
And not be moved by you
Would you tell me
How could it be
Any better than this
You calm the storms
You give me rest
You hold me in your hands
You won't let me fall
You still my heart
And you take my breath away
Would you take me in
Would you take me deeper now
'Cause you're all i want
You are all i need
You are everything
Everything

Hero or Zero

2005-10-15T15:38:00.000+08:00

I really don’t know any game with as much complexity as poker. This game never fails to impress me every single day. You prepare for the play, assess the situation, make a decision based on the imperfect information that you have, and then hope that your plan works out. If you get it right, you’ll win most of the time, but getting it right will never be an assurance that you will win every time. Occasionally, you will lose, and the explanation of it will be so enigmatic that it can drive you crazy. It’s like farting, yeah that’s right, farting. Everyone mastered the art of farting especially in public places, doing it in a very discreet manner at the right place and at the right time. But what happens when it’s not only gas that you discharge? Uh-oh, plan foiled, you just sharted. You will get a million different opinions about it, whether or not; it’s the right thing to do.

I’m glad poker is getting more and more sophisticated as we speak. The members of the Camp already have different personal approaches to the game, we’re currently sharing our own opinions to each other to help create and develop our very own unique style. It’s also happening at the state of mind* where people are know sharing their views with one another, truly a state of mind.

It’s just hard when you’re in a situation where you can be the hero, or you can go zero. I hate sharting!

Grouch

Put your money where your mouth is

2005-10-14T13:14:00.000+08:00

To Pretentious Mike,

Here's your shot bro, I'm giving you a real chance of trying to take my money. Just come out in the open, prove that you are indeed Pretentious Mike, then we'll play heads up. Whatever the buy-in, limit or no limit, 10k up, lets do this. Just say where and when and I'll be there.

Let's see if your so called poker game and skills can cash the checks your mouth's been signing. Enough of this circus.

Grouch

Life Goes On

2005-10-13T00:15:00.000+08:00

Okay, so the bad blood has been spilled and the hate mail is flowing. I guess this can only mean this blog is getting some damn heavy traffic. So, on behalf of my fellow campers, I'd like to say thank you to our avid readers and posters. We appreciate your participation and criticisms. There are a few of you loyal readers who don't post but just read our blog (you know who you are), but we are grateful nonetheless. A new dawn for poker is on the horizon folks. There are cards to be dealt and money to be won. So let's move on, pamper our bankrolls, and play some pokuh!

(To the Campers: The Braggart's Cup is just a few days away amigos. Better start practicing!)

here it goes

2005-10-11T17:45:00.000+08:00

pre·ten·tious (pr-tnshs)
adj.

Claiming or demanding a position of distinction or merit, especially when unjustified.
Making or marked by an extravagant outward show; ostentatious. See Synonyms at showy.

I just like to share to all of the readers of our blog an interesting comment directed to me by someone named 'pretentious mike'

Mike

This is just becoming too sad. You talk about like you’ve been winning, well in fact, u've been losing (and to the times that u did win, u always seem to magnify it ). You talk about fishes, but it is common knowledge among the small and upcoming community of ours that you are one of the biggest fishes out here. You mentioned that its so lucrative to play with newbies, well its more lucrative for when mike tee is in a ring game with us: your countless buyins are amazing, good thing for us you have almost an unlimited bankroll.

But I give props to you: you always find a way to tell us what we should’ve done after we beat you to hand? If that’s not amusing, I don’t know what is. In fact we have this whole journal of your famous anecdotes. So I suggest mike that you should stop teaching us what to do after you bluff, your tells are enough for us.

Do you even realize that your fellow campers: mark and goma are way ahead of you in terms of skill? I remember that skyland tournament, you were out like what? 10 minutes into the tournament while your two friends were battling it out on the final 5, don’t bullshit me when you say it didn’t hurt a little bit, bet you didn’t get enough sleep that night. You should be indeed called “the flash”, you were out unbelievably fast.

And about that exaggerated break of yours, we all knew you are going to come back. But you should’ve stayed out longer: the stories about you were just too entertaining, too bad that we have to settle instead on your bankroll

So this is it mike, we just can’t stop letting you this way anymore. We all need someone to pull us out from being a condescending, obnoxious and hypocritical asshole, hope you take this as reflection and maybe you too can become a good player.(coz quite frankly you really are that bad)
________________________________________________

We are open to all suggestion and criticisms, it's a free world, say whatever it is that you have to say. From the looks of it, you, sir, just don't like me, don't like the way I play, don't like what I write in our blog, don't like the way I lose my bankroll, don't like the way I tell my stories etc. That is acceptable, I don't expect anyone for that matter to agree or admire me. If in your eyes i'm the biggest fish our there, then too bad for me I guess. I won't stop you from trying to take my money for I'm sure I'm also trying to take yours. Yes, Goma and Mark are ahead of me right now, and it doesn't bother me that they are ahead because they are my friends. I want to be better at playing, but I'm not bothered that two closest friends of mine are indeed better than me. As for my so called exaggerations, I can't help it, I'm one heck of a story teller. For the so called exaggerated break, I sent Mark out to have a press con right after I got the ban to up my popularity, I need the publicty.

If I ofended you in anyway, kindly reveal yourself in private, so that an avenue can be opened to clear things up.

Thanks for spending time reading and posting a comment at pinoyrounders.

Ticket to the promise land

2005-10-06T17:54:00.000+08:00

There’s so much political turmoil around us these days, it’s affecting every aspect of lives already and it looks like it will just get worse and worse. And as a good citizen that I am, all I can think of right now is how to help our oh so poor country. ‘If I’m the president’s adviser, what would I say to her?’ Being a poker junkie, you know what I’m going to say.

Here are some of the ideas that I’ve heard throughout the years.

Legalization of jueteng – in my opinion, even if you legalize it, there’s still too much room for cheating with this game.

Legalization of marijuana – I heard this from a crazy classmate I had in my philosophy101 class. Convert all our land resources into marijuana plantations, and be the premiere supplier of Mary Jane to the whole wide world. C’mon, do we actually think this will be fucking feasible? I don’t think we’ll get much respect from the international community once we make marijuana synonymous to Philippines.

Shift to a parliamentary form of government – My answer to this? No matter what modifications you do to the bus, as long as you have a shitty driver and stubborn passengers, you’re riding a highway to hell at 160mph.

Train every Filipino to be the next Manny Pacquiao – should I even consider this?

Train every Filipino to be the next Efren Reyes – this is currently being done, but I don’t think this is the best way to do it. Why? Few tournaments both here and abroad. Even our pros are having a hard time making it their living.

Promoting poker to the masses – now that’s an idea! And why not, we’ve been gambling since god knows when? There is a growing market across the globe, and I think now is the perfect time for us Filipinos to jump on the bandwagon. Thanks to the Spaniards, we are so much fatalistic and there is no doubt in my mind that this will be a hit to Juan dela Cruz. My seatmate in my accounting class got a glimpse of one of my text messages about poker, then we started to talk about it, apparently, we plays with his friends and knows Texas Hold ‘Em as seven card poker. But still, poker is poker and the fact that it’s slowly trickling down to all classes of society excites me so much. Poker will replace checkers, chess, and other card games the family drivers play while waiting for their bosses. We’ll soon fear the dark skinned kid when he steps inside the poker room rather than the English speaking dude who drives an expedition.

Just a matter of time ladies and gentlemen.

And to the president, Ma’am, you might need me in your staff.

grouch

Online Poker

2005-10-06T17:35:00.000+08:00

Like most of us, I started playing poker online (UB). Back then, it was sooo difficult to set up a live game, we needed to text players, drive north/south of manila just to have a good time playing cards. We'd have 2-3 games a week, 4-5 if we get lucky that everybody shows up, so the other alternative when not playing live games was playing online.

I used to play close to 8 hours a day, playing big freerolls at UB :p. Trying to hone some of my MTT skills hehe. I guess the best skill one could acquire while playing online is patience. 'Patience is a virtue, my friends' Imagine yourself sitting long hours waiting for Aces, Kings, AK, AQ, it's a loooong wait I tell you but it's well worth it when you do get the hand and win a huge pot. Prolly, the best thing about online poker is you get to see 4 times more hands than what you'd see at a live game thus more hands seen/lost/won = more experience. It's a freeroll! so you are not risking any dough playing online, its a very good way to practice your skills before you sit at the table.

Now, we do have solid live games going down every night, 2 big MTT's a month, a couple of homegames...online poker?! :( I hope that in the next few months, we'd get to have a online poker server that would accomodate the needs of cardplayers here in the Phils because most of the known poker servers do not accept transactions from the P.I., that sucks. Plus, I ultimately believe that online poker here in the Philippines would bring in more players to the community, inviting them to play Texas Hold'em - learn the game for free, have a good time and hopefully after gaining experience and confidence, we'll all hit the live games :)

THat's it for now folks more posts/pics to come.

Fishizzle!

The Shadow Knows

2005-10-01T12:39:00.000+08:00

Anyone of you connected to Solar Sports of ESPN Asia, please let them know that I’m wishing that they air the latest season of the World Poker Tour and the World Series of Poker. This will benefit our local community grow and spread to the masses. But to be honest, I have another reason for wanting that to happen.

These shows edit out the boring part of the game, and only telecast the mega action that's happening on the table. We see Gus Hansen raising all in with 82os, and we go wow over that play. as a result, most of the new players think that poker is all about bluffing and tons of luck. After dumping tons of hours playing and losing my graduate school tuition, I know that this is'nt the case. As Dan Harrington said in his book, hold 'em is like real estae or the stock market. it's a game of imperfect information, and how you'll optimize the information that you have will be the key to your success. Pot odds, implied odds, position, your stack in relation to the blinds, the bet in realtion to the blinds, your stack compared to the stack of others at your table; these are the things that really matter in poker, especially in no limit texas hold 'em.

It’s always great to play people who think that poker is all about bluffing. How I wish I can play with these kinds of players every single day; it’s so lucrative. Every time they do a Gus Hansen or a Daniel Negreanu move, my bankroll gets fatter than my belly. Munch away ladies and gents.

Maybe I should change my nickname to “the shadow”, “night crawler”, “the invisible boy”, or the “the flash”. (you guys know why lol)

grouch

My First Money

2005-09-28T06:20:00.000+08:00

Day 6 of my no more live games thing. Been itching to play live poker for money... this is the closest thing that i can come up with:

Alright, been playing the freerolls over the net trying to polish my poker skills. My site of choice is Poker Champs the home of Gustav Hansen! LOL. Anyway, they have this freeroll tourney which guarantees money if you place 28th above, here's the breakdown;

1st - $5
2nd - $3
3rd - $2
4th - 28th - $1

I always play this coz I really wanted to know if they'll actually give yout the money if you win. The field is tough i tell you, plus the fact that it's so hard to concentrate coz you know you got to play for free and nothings really at risk, not unless you really consider time as gold. the field ranges from 1200 - 2600 players, I don't know the time for each level, all i know is that it's fast and at some point, they introduse antes already.

So I did my thang, played 3 play money tables while playing the tourney. This is why I love this site! You can actually watch/play 4 tables all at once. I ordered my food from Jolibee to keep me busy while watching and waiting for the schmucks take out each other. Then it sounded the 5 minute break after the first hour of play. Wow! the field is only about 170 at this point(i think we started with 2500) and I was ranked 22nd! The best finish that I know of is my brother who ended up 52, my best finish was 70. there were too many wonderful moments to mention, but I ended up 19th taking home $1! yahahaha!

phase two of the investigation, i checked my account to see if i got the $1 they promised, well it was there. next step was to play it in the real cash games. i bought in the whole amount at the .02/.04 table, max buy in was $2. went all in with my AK diamonds pre-flop, got beaten by pocket aces by a guy who was playing the first hand that was dealt to him. wow!

well, coz of this online tourney that they have, i actually feel that my tourney play is getting better, of is at its best right now. im alot more patient than before. Also, I appreciate more online poker now than before coz i now see the possibilities of playing online. you are dealt more hands. unlike live games, you get bored easily, but with online, you can enterntain yourself by surfing the web, reading poker articles, listening to mp3, checking your email etc.

lets just hope i get out of this online poker thing alive! As they say, what does not kill you will only make you stronger. something like that.

grouch

WTF?!?!?

2005-09-28T01:38:00.000+08:00

Yes, you heard that right! I don't know WTF is happenning to me now, I don't feel the itch to play no more. It's been bugging me for quite a while, I miss hanging out and playing cards. But Tilter suggests, I finish reading Beyond Tells by J. McKenna before I play again. Im feeling exactly like fish out of water.

I was browsing through this book I read a year and a half ago, The 48 Laws of Power by R. Greene. To my surprise, now that I read some of the laws again, I find it very applicable and powerful to use them at the poker table. Let me share to you guys one law...

LAW 48 ASSUME FORMLESSNESS

JUDGEMENT
By taking a shape, by having a visible plan, you open yourself to attack. Instead of taking a form for your enemy to grasp, keep yourself adaptable and on the move. Accept the fact that nothing is certain and no law is fixed. The best way to protect yourself is to be as fluid and formless as water; never bet on stability or lasting order. Everything changes.

I just love the way he said 'never BET on stability'. When you think you're stable and ahead you bet and then you get beat, it's how the game is. The last line of this law goes something like this...'You use formlessness, not because it creates inner harmony and peace, but because it will increase your power... It means that ultimately you must throw out the laws the others preach, and the books they write to tell you what to do, and the sage advice of the elder.' 'The book states '...the definitive guide to modern manipulation.' Sounds like a good guide to me, take a look at it, and trust me it is a power poker book. ;)

I wish to become formlessness... fluid like water... fish to the water.

Fishizzle!

Tribute to the Prodigal Son

2005-09-28T01:32:00.000+08:00

Posted the pics from the Aruba days at Grouch's place. The fun times. Also, posted the heads-up super fight of NickG and Mike. What a battle.

From home games to ring games at the joint... it's just the start folks, it's all going to be better, like what Nostradamus said. hehe

I'll take more pics next time... :D

Fishizzle!

2005-09-28T01:25:00.000+08:00

Mike against Nick, look at the shades, ipod and the monster stack.

2005-09-28T01:22:00.000+08:00

NickG heads up against Mike (JGPT OG) look at that bad ass mofo.

2005-09-28T01:21:00.000+08:00

The last hand of Grouch and Beach - Two pair 4's and 3's

2005-09-28T01:20:00.000+08:00

Grouch takes down the tourney vs Beach

2005-09-28T01:18:00.000+08:00

Grouch and Tipsy at the Friday 2 table mini tourney at 'aruba'.

This helps me a lot

2005-09-26T08:22:00.000+08:00

The Universe Conspired to Help

The man had a dream
He knew what he wanted, it seems

Once he was sure in his heart this was it
He vowed someday that he would achieve it

He wasn't quite ready to do his thing
But he felt fairly certain what the
future would bring

When one day the time was right
When he was ready to fight the good fight

He conquered all his excuses and set forth
To take the risk-fraught first step
without any remorse

Once he took his first step down the line
The universe conspired to help make sure
he was fine

He never dreamed that he would accomplish so much
That the universe would give him such incredible luck

Now older and wiser he understood the hardest part
Was convincing himslef that it was time to start.

-Phil Hellmuth

need I say more about what i'll be in the very near future? can't wait to get back...

grouch

Mango Classic

2005-09-26T02:37:00.000+08:00

107 playahs + 160k pot = Great pokuh action.

Tourney's just get bigger and better, the last tourney was around 70 people. Despite the poor weather conditions, sudden unfortunate change of venue, people still participated and played at the Mango Classic. It trully is a 'classic', being the biggest tourney YET. I would like to congratulate Misha Peters for winning the tournament and Migs 'Maverick' Cuneta. for bagging 3rd place, both played awesome at the tourney. Good job guys.

I would like to salute the A55 and Poker Filipinas group for making everything possible. These are the only group of people I know that can run kick-ass tourneys here in the Philippines. You can bet that the next one is going to be bigger and better, that's for sure. Also, thanks to the Stehmeier family, because without their support the Mango Classic would not have happened.

To everyone who joined the tourney, let's play more poker.

Fish-Out!

P.S. Somebody hook me up with a SNG game. TY :)

He's out of the can.

2005-09-24T13:34:00.000+08:00

I think All of us have seen or know about Sesame Street. Big bird, ernie, bert, elmo, cookie monster, the big hairy mammoth... but there's one character that always remained a mystery to me and that's the grouch. I remember when i was little, i never ssaw the grouch anywhere but there inside his can. He never got out of the dumpster to go eat cookies with the cookie monster or go take a bath with ernie and his rubber duckie. So Why doesn't the grouch get out of his trash can?

I guess the grouch is happy that way, living in his own space, nobody bugging him to go clean his room, take a bath or go get a social life. He is happy. That's the most important thing. I guess all of us have our own 'grouch side' We can all be happy doing what we want to do.

There's no way that anyone will stop you from doing what makes you happy.
As the saying goes, you can take the grouch out of the can but you can't take the can out of the grouch.To the prodigal son... WE KNOW you'll be back... as for now.. The bets are on, mark your calendars boys! hehe

fish-out

For the Nth time, Bankroll Management!

2005-09-22T20:04:00.000+08:00

How many times has this topic been mentioned in this blog? I can never reiterate how important game selection is. It's just as important was knowing when to fold. Why? Coz turning down a game you know you can't handle is just the same as mucking a marginal hand when overcards are showing on the flop. The game does not start when the dealer shuffles the cards. The game starts when you pay for your buy-in. If the game you're gna be playing will hurt your bankroll, don't play. If you know ur wallet is gna hurt if you lose, then you might as well engrave it in stone that YOU WILL LOSE. Your game will be different coz at the back of your mind, you are defensive. You're protecting something. It's very very simple and easy to grasp. I don't care how good you are or how brave you are, but it's just stupid to play a game you can't handle. It's even more stupid if you continue to keep playing after you lost. This quote is from a book I just read:

"A loser's favorite game is to play catch-up. that is, they lose and keep playing, hoping to win back their losses. players who are being responsible will play what they can afford and stop when they reach that limit, true, both are losing. responsible players will be disappointed, but will not sulk for the rest of the day or stay to lose more. winners will take teir losses and play another day not only because they have reached a loss limit but also for other reasons. such reasons may be noticing changing conditions at the table or feelings like simple not wanting to play any more. these are the reasons that a winner usually leaves whether ahead or behind. losers will just keep playing and losing. their feelings in the end will be the negative payoff losers are accustomed to collecting. when winners lose, they're disappointed and don't collect such negative payoffs. they get on with other things until they play again. winners know how to lose. losers cannot allow themselves to lose. even when luck is against them, losers will chase their luck as if it is just around the corner."

Sea World

2005-09-20T12:45:00.000+08:00

After a week of trying to integrate the ‘super tight is right’ philosophy I got from reading Phil Hellmuth’s book, things look kinda bright. I no longer get exited when I have a king or an ace with a shity kicker, and folding those types of hands became easier.

As I log more hours on the felt, the same basic principles of the game reaffirms itself into my brain. Patience and discipline, those are the two key factors that will help any player get by the night. As you might have notice, we are getting a lot of guest to our state of mind, and these guys aren’t poker players, they’re gamblers. If you don’t have enough patience to play these kinds of fishes, you’re in big trouble buddy.

It has been preached that playing with the fish is a very profitable venture for you and your bankroll. Very true, but it has its buts. Let’s say you’re the lone shark surrounded with smiling dolphins, do you actually believe that you have a fighting chance against those smiling mo’fos? It’s always better when the sharks outnumber the dolphins, reel them in, then you all go for the attack. In this way, you’ll all be getting some action but not from one another, get the picture?

Initially, I was pissed by these kinds of players, but I soon realized, bring it on. We’ll be here waiting for our tummies to be filled and appetites satisfied.

the grouch is munching away.... yummmmmmmmmmmm

Home Away From Home

2005-09-20T02:01:00.000+08:00

I never imagined a place so unique, where you can just go there, feel at home, be with friends without noisy music or expensive beer. It's a place where you can sit back relax and play cards. It's my home away from home. It's my favorite place.

I haven't been winning these days. I've been booking small wins, minimal losses, got a55 whooped at the Friday 5 by, due to some stupid play and nice read from Barb. I partied hard on the weekend though so it's all good ;)

Oh yeah, the books are on the way, Harrington on Hold'em advance strats for tourneys and Theory of Poker by Sklansky, can't wait!

Mango's just around the corner, let's see some action guys.

Fish-out

Back in Action

2005-09-16T17:21:00.000+08:00

Friday 5 in 4 hours, some intense sh*t is going down. It's Friday again and you guys know it. New game, new plays, new crazy ass sh*t. Titler's going to play tonight, he's in for a wild ride and he doesn't even know it. hehe

As for me, I gotta bag a win. I've gone so far and so close that I can taste it already. I hope to have the same focus and state of mind later. I'm not going to get served by Atty., this time I'm going to bust him out.

Beware of the 'quinine' guys... hehe

Twenty Questions

2005-09-13T16:03:00.000+08:00

This was a test conducted by Gamblers Anonymous to guage if you were a compulsive gambler or not. If you answer yes to seven questions, then you are a compulsive gambler.

1. did u ever lose time from work due to gambling?
2. has gambling ever made your home life unhappy?
3. did gambling affect your reputation?
4. have you ever felt remorse after gambling?
5. did you ever gamble to get money with which to pay debts or otherwise solve financial difficulties?
6. did gambling cause a decrease in your ambition or efficiency?
7. after losing, did you feel you must return as soon as possible and win back your losses?
8. after a win, did you have a strong urge to return and win more?
9. did you often gamble until your last dollar was gone?
10. did you ever borrow to finance your gambling?
11. have you ever sold anything to finance gambling?
12. were you reluctant to use gambling money for normal expenditures?
13. did gambling make you careless of the welfare of yourself and your family?
14. did you ever gamble longer than you had planned?
15. have you ever gambled to escape worry or trouble?
16. have you ever committed or considered committing an illegal act to finance gambling?
17. did gambling cause you to have difficulty sleeping
18. did arguments disappointments or frustration create withing you an urge to gamble?
19. did you ever have an urge to celebrate any good fortune by a few hours of gambling?
20. have you ever considered self-destruction as a result of your gambling?

a friendly reminder: if you are a compulsive gambler, it means your attitude in playing poker is probably bad. your attitude will reflect on the way you play. poker is 25% luck, 5& skill, and 70% attitude.

Sunday Morning

2005-09-13T15:49:00.000+08:00

It was the same ol' Saturday night, went to the JG game played a couple of SNGs. After, I went to the regular joint, it was a slow night. I'm kinda used to the slow Saturday nights just playing cards and having a couple of beers. But I wanted to play...

There was action at the tables but it wasn't the kind I'd prefer. It was super loose, I don't like loose games, it's bloody and ugly. I didn't play until after my 5th beer, I couldn't wait any longer for a good ring so I sat down and threw chips around. I lost.

I was still there having my nth beer, then familiar faces walked in. The FAPA group, Kix, Nik, Ricky and Ex-Pope. We decided to have a lil 11 handed SNG, 300 buy-in, 3 place pay-out. (Damn, miss those games.) It was 3 am, Sunday morning when we started, the game lasted for almost 2 hours. Goma took it down vs Kix, Ed took 3rd. I hope next Saturday we'll have another 300 SNG.

Card players don't sleep.

Can't wait til Friday... dammit slow playin' mo'fo!

Like a Virgin

2005-09-13T15:27:00.000+08:00

Bought a book last Sunday, Play Like The Pros by Phil Hellmuth Jr. started reading it right away and i caught something that really made sense to me.

Super tight is right

Ooohhhh... another poker concept that i am sure will bring a lot of heated arguments. Just like any other buyer in the market, you gotta test drive first to see if you like the ride of that car that you will buy, and eventually serve you.

Some people were actually shock to see me play so tight. The funny thing was, it was actually working... yeah, i was up a bit, but unlike before, i don't expereince the swings like before. then just like any experiment, you have to compare it to something right? so i went loose. guess what? i lost it all.. lol

im not saying that this is the best way to play poker, all im saying is that it actually works. i want and need to read more books and theories about poker strategy to be really knowlegable.
just like my previous major, you need to read Marx, Webber, and Durkheim first before you decide which type of a sociologist are you.

grouch

Friday Again

2005-09-09T16:47:00.000+08:00

It's Friday again and you know what that means. I'ma keep my eyes on two guys tonight, that would be Ken S. and Bry, the money makers from last week. I was close to ITM'ing, right after the bubble. I lost patience and played badly got chip hungry and lost my huge stack.

Now, it's a new week, a new Friday, a new game. You guys better get ready coz I'm gonna bring it! Friday 5 yo!

Hitting the Books

2005-09-08T03:30:00.000+08:00

I got back my copy of the bible. I'm hitting the books! This is how I started before playing poker games and now after months of play, my goal is to internalize the fundamentals of the game. From pre-flop openings to river plays, connectors, together with the attitudes and principles. I'm hoping to become more solid after this, it's better reading it again because now I understand the concepts more due to my experiences at the felt.

After the bible, it's Sklansky, then I'll limit hold'em by Jennifer Harman AGAIN! I won't forget the magazine articles at 2+2, damn those guys rule. It's study time for me, not only reading but also I plan to play online again, after months not playing. It's going to be a learning experience for sure.

Class has just begun.

Book the Win

2005-09-07T04:06:00.000+08:00

In the past, every time I play a ring/cash game, I will sit there until I have a massive stack or have nothing at all.

Big mistake

Our local scene here got started with single table tournaments(sit and go's aka SNG), and for you to win that, you must get all of the chips at the table. It was how we learned to play the game, watching WPT, and for the more fortunate, WSOP, and for a while, that's the only thing we know of. The only time you will leave the table is when you don't have any chips left. You sit there and wait for the current tourney to be over and for the next one to start.

But as you all know by now, the texture and the overall mechanics of a cash game is totally different. Sure, it is basically the same game, No Limit Texas Hold 'Em, same rules, same structure and all, with some differences which I would'nt call minor. Blinds don't increase, and you can cash out or rebuy anytime.

I notice a lot, and I mean a lot of players playing the ring game as if it was a SNG, playing til they stil have chips. I for one, is guilty of this kind of mentality, but I'm getting the hang of it. If your down already, analyze the situation whether or not it will be a right thing for you to buy in again, maybe it's time for you to call it a night. On the other hand, if your up, again, analyze the situation, maybe what you have right now is the best that you can do for that night and be happy with it.

I could have won more, or lost less, if I just applied this months ago. Thinking too much about how much I can make was detrimental and became my waterloo. At least I learned from it, and I hope you guys learn from it too.

Grouch's balls to the wall comment of the week: Yeah, right now poker here is a social thing. We meet, greet, and chit chat with the players, it's like the new golf course a friend of mine told me months ago. But it's not so much more sociable losing money to the guy next to you isn't it, no matter how small you lose? unless you have money to burn, which i don't think most of us has. think about it.

In peace, prepare for war; in war, prepare for peace... (or the other way around?)
-Sun Tzu

grouch

Baby Steps

2005-09-06T03:56:00.000+08:00

I was talking to a friend, a student of the game, a good player. We talked about poker here in Manila, from it's humble one game a week beginnings whereas now, there's 3-4 games a day plus tourneys on the weekends. Playing endless hours, grinding at the felt, winning big and burning paper. Then we talked about this one article at 2+2, it was about the transition of players committing themselves to the 'poker life'. Are we ready for this big step? Or are kilometres ahead of ourselves? It got me thinking.

In the Phils, poker has been here for a long time- Variation poker, pusoy dos, pusoy ayos and the like. The NLHE mania was in result of the WPT. People started to play, learn, play and play more. Then the craving for more poker knowledge led to reading books, poker websites, magazines and articles. It was a development stage for the community and thanks to a couple of people, now, the poker dream is now reality. What I mean by this is that, poker will soon reach that point were everyone knows/plays the game and hopefully its going to be as big as basketball.

The market is still at its infancy stage, and yes we are kilometres behind. But with time, patience and work, we will get there. As for now, just play a lot of poker, learn/read more about the game and love it.

The Mango Cup is around the corner, 150 seats available, biggest tourney in the Phils yet, BIGGEST pot yet (Around 225k). It's going to be a whole day event so bring your cap, shades and ipod cause its going to be a good one.

Next Case. hehe

doing the phil

2005-09-02T06:42:00.000+08:00

yeah yeah, im doing the phil right now... the phil....

years back, phil mickelson was regarded as the best player without a major win. for those of you who hate golf, the major consists of The Masters, the U.S. Open, The Open Championship or more pupularly known as the British Open, and the PGA Championsip. Any professional golfer in the world wants to win at the very least one, some have as many as 18 like Jack Nicklaus, i think Tiger Woods has about 11 right now. Any golfer can win millions of dollars winning around the world, but they won't feel as fulfilled if they won't win one.

As I was saying, Phil was 'majorless' since he turned pro back in the 90's til he won his first green jacket(the masters) in 2004. Before he won it, he was branded as the best player never to have won a major. then he broke thru and recently got his 2nd major this year winning the 2005 PGA Championships. he persevered, never stopped believing in hs abilities and continued working hard on his game til he got, not just one, but two majors.

My Point? When I taught my lil' bro Mafioso21(that's his camp holdem and poker champs handle) to reach the state of mind otherwise known as the BBC, he met a good buddy of mine named Ace. Ace was taking care of lil' Mafioso, chatting with him a lil' bit, trying to teach him the ropes, and described yours truly as 'a very good player who always loses'.

And it's true

I've been losing like crazy lately, again. I know there's no way but up, but right now, I'm still stuck on the bottom of the ocean trying to reach the surface again.

No worries. Why? coz I'm trying to fix my game, and I know, in time I will be able to figure out what's wrong with it with the support group that I got right now. They're helping me identify the flaws of my play, and hopefuly, we'll be able to figure it out soon. I'm not being cocky or anything, just trying to allow the positive chi in and the negative out. tyring to stay optimistic about things even if the situation is already choking me to death.

hey, not everyone's born a tiger, some of us gotta dot the phil...

by the way, got the straight flush 3-7 spades earlier. had quad aces, quad 6's, and no the straight flush in more than a week. but I ended up losing that night... see what I mean? the phil...

note: to those who know me and actually see or played with me before, please leave a comment or opinion on the flaws of my game. it will gladly be appreciated

grouch