I played in my regular Monday night game and took home $28. I'm trying to figure out why I hardly ever clean house in this game. Even though I win consistently, I hardly ever win a decent amount (greater than $100). Perhaps I'm a little too passive? I know I'm definitely too loose. Although, most flops in this game are seen 4 or 5 ways, so I'm kind of "forced" to play more hands than I normally would because of the pot odds.

So, if I'm playing too loose and too passive, then that'd make me "loose passive", which is probably the worst type of player out there. The player that usually loses. I don't know, I guess I just can't help being loose because of the limits. Obviously, if I were playing in a higher limit game, there's no way that I'd be seeing so many hands preflop.

Oh well... I'm not really playing in this game to make money. I'm mainly playing to learn to how to read players better and to optimize my strategy in higher limit games. Although, I must say, after playing in this game, I tend to play a little looser in the higher limit games.

Well...here's one hand that I remembered from Monday night:

1) I had 66 in middle position and make it $5 to go. 3 or 4 players call. The flop comes 258. An early position player bets out $10. One player in between, calls, as do I. The turn brings a 7, giving me an open ended straight draw. The early position player bets out $10 again. The player in between folds and I call, hoping to either catch the straight on the river or bluff him out. I was fairly certain that he had an 8 and a high card. The river brought a T. He bet out $10 again, and I pause for a second and make it $40 to go. The pot now had over $100 in it. There's a straight on board and an overcard...I was getting roughly 2.5 to 1 on my bluff. He ended up folding. He didn't show his cards, nor did I, but nice bluff huh?

That's it...that's pretty much the only hand that stuck out in my mind from the Monday night game. I guess it's because I sucessfully pulled off a bluff. There's something exciting about pulling off a bluff...a little mini-adrenaline rush. It's similar to calling someone else's bluff with Ace high. I don't know, it's hard to explain. It's definitely not the same "rush" as staring down a pocket Aces.

Alright...time to get to bed. I spent the entire day working on the NFL Challenge 2005, which should be up and running soon. It's gonna be awesome and it's going to be FREE. If you have checked it out yet, make sure you hit up www.boogster.com for more details. The FAQ is up.

Boogster

Source: Boogster's Poker Blog