He Said What?

Daniel was asked about what his opinions regarding the Ladies Event at the 2010 World Series of Poker, he had the following to say:

“What irked me is that this woman has the audacity on her website to call herself ‘the best female poker player in the world.’ So I’m like ‘how offensive are you, you f***ing c***? You want to say you’re speaking for women, yet you claim superiority over all of them.’”

The Explanation

After the article was released, a firestorm ensured and eventually, Daniel was asked loosely about this in an interview with Kimberly Lansing at the Legends of Poker event in Los Angeles. Daniel then claimed that the comment he made about Duke was supposedly made off the record and was not supposed to be printed. He then offered a somewhat loose apology to women that may have been offended by the use of the “c word” but not to Duke herself.

Reaction to Story

Duke’s brother Howard Lederer said the following on Twitter in response to Daniel’s comments:

“Hey Daniel, nice job representing poker and reinforcing that our attitude towards women is still Neanderthal. I understand some agree w DN on the ladies poker event issue. Many do. But abusing those you disagree with is never cool.”

Duke later released an “Open Letter to PokerStars” on her blog where she criticized the site for not admonishing Daniel for his comments. In fact, one of the PokerStars support staff actually backed Daniel and his right to say what he wants, further drawing the ire of Duke. Online support is one of PokerStars Texas Hold’em poker site features that is not an official voice of the company.

PokerStars Official Reaction

After Duke’s open letter on her blog, PokerStars, issued the following statement:

“PokerStars does not support the use of derogatory or hurtful language directed at any other player. While this was a personal matter between two players, we wish that better judgment had been used in the choice of words.”

PokerStars also went on to state that the support representative that spoke about Daniel did so on opinion, and not at the request or approval of PokerStars. They went on to state that PokerStars did not support the comments made by the support person.

What Has Come Out of This

In the end, nothing really materialized from this story. The only thing that this did was put Daniel in a bad light. In a time of economic downturn and poker websites struggling to become legal in the U.S., this really equated to being a story that should have just stayed buried. However, it is probably safe to assume that this story has went a long way to reignite a long standing feud that really has no real signs of ending anytime soon.

This is the blog entry I was hoping I wouldn’t have to write at all (though I would have taken writing it later in the week). I’m out of the Main Event.

There’s really nothing too glamorous to report. I started day three with 47.1k during 500/1000/100, and played for two hours without winning a pot that was more than just stealing the blinds. That left me fairly short-stacked. I doubled up once back to 43.4k with Aces against Queen-Jack, then bled back down. Having 25-40 big blinds is kind of a weird stack: you can’t really three-bet anyone light, nor is it really advisable to call a lot of raises, so if the pot has already been raised, you pretty much need to look down at a strong hand in order to become involved. In a live tournament, it’s not uncommon to go a few hours without really ever looking at a strong hand.

I won a couple of small pots here and there but it wasn’t enough to stay ahead of the pace that the blinds were eating away at my stack. During 1000/2000/300, I was down to 23.5k when I shoved Tens in late position and was unable to generate a suckout (despite quietly wishing for one pretty damn hard) against the small blind’s pocket Kings.

That’s poker.

Busting out of the Main Event is kind of a unique experience. Poker players talk about it being the worst day of the year. It’s definitely disappointing, but it can provide some interesting perspective too. As I walked out to my car, I wanted to feel really sad and disappointed. I mean, I wanted to be really upset, but I just couldn’t muster the emotions. I tried. I gave “being really sad” my best shot, but I could only get as far as about “being bummed”. I tried to figure out why this is and what I came up with is that I just don’t see any reason to be really, really upset about busting out of the Main Event. It makes me appreciate the life I have. Doing well in the Main Event would have been awesome, but it’s kind of like icing on the cake of life. I mean, what’s it say about your life if your biggest problem is that you weren’t able to make a deep run in the biggest poker tournament of the year? I’d say it means you have a pretty good life and have a lot to feel grateful for.

Other than just not having a sick amount of luck, I don’t really have much to feel upset about. I feel pretty confident in saying that I didn’t make any big mistakes all tournament. I’m not saying I didn’t make a couple of small ones, I’m sure I did, but I definitely didn’t make any big ones and anytime you can say that, there’s really nothing to be too disappointed about.

I’ve got another three nights in Vegas before I head back to Houston. I feel like I’ve been here forever. It’s been fun, I’m definitely glad I spent the whole WSOP out here at least one time, but I’m not sure it’s something I’d want to do again. Anyway, that’s another entry for another time. I’m gonna spend the worst day of the year rest of the day relaxing and enjoying the zen-like disposition I’ve got right now – it’s not a state of mind that comes easy in this town.

It’s been a while since I’ve written a blog. I haven’t played any poker since busting out of Event 49 in 150th nearly a week ago. A week off has been so nice. My girlfriend was in town the whole time and we had a really nice week just doing various stuff around Vegas most of which didn’t involve poker.

On Saturday, we went to the Rio to check out some of the celebs in the Ante Up for Africa tournament. When she saw the WSOP (for the first time), she immediately noted that she didn’t understand how someone could play every day for the whole summer without going totally insane. That made me feel a little better about having gone kinda insane after five weeks of continuous poker!

There was a point on a dinner break last week where all I wanted was to get away from poker. Like, badly. I just wanted to go somewhere where I could sit down, enjoy a meal, and not be around anyone talking about poker. I tried a Thai restaurant about a mile from the Rio. Just as I was about to dig into my Pad Thai, I overheard this woman in the restaurant saying, “I three-bet him preflop with Seven-Six…”

AHHHHH!!!

I thought I was losing my mind. Is there not anywhere to go in this city to get away from people talking about various poker hands? It actually seems kind of funny to me looking back on it, but at the time I was losing it due to poker overload.

Hearing my girlfriend’s perspective on the WSOP was pretty interesting. It’s second nature to me at this point, so I’ve kind of lost perspective on how an outsider would be likely to view the poker culture. She just didn’t see how people could sit at a table all day every day without going insane and noted that a lot of the people we encountered apparently lacked basic social skills and kind of seemed like a part of this zombie sub-group incapable of functioning unless they’re gambling or talking about gambling.

Five weeks of being immersed in the poker community can take a toll on your sanity. Vegas and poker is such a false reality that I think hearing someone point out what an abnormal lifestyle the poker playing community has was kind of refreshing. It’s like, “oh yea, a bunch of people passing around millions of dollars over a deck of cards for six weeks is pretty nuts, isn’t it?”

I know it sounds like I’m dogging on poker and poker players, and in a way I kind of am, many of them are truly insufferable people, but I don’t want to make it sound like I don’t love poker or the poker culture. I do love poker. I have a blast playing poker and really enjoy the types of conversations you can have with poker players that are hard to achieve with people unaccustomed to forbidding emotions from playing a part in their thought process. But with that being said, everyone reaches their breaking point, and I think I reached mine after five weeks of nearly daily exposure to poker and poker players, so a week off felt really, really nice.

Okay, that’s enough about the psychology of poker. It’s time for a celebrity photo dump! (Apologies in advance for the picture quality that lies ahead; all of these were taken with my phone).

A few nights ago, I was hanging out with a friend in Aria who pointed out a gentlemen at a roulette wheel that he thought might have been Roger Clemens. I walked over for a closer look. Yup! That’s definitely Roger Clemens. I wanted to take his picture (I mean, it’s Roger Clemens!) but I figured he probably gets sick of being bothered in public, so I decided I’d just snap a picture of him on my phone from a few feet away. I really didn’t expect him to notice me, so I figured it was win-win: I get a picture of Roger Clemens, Roger Clemens gets to avoid being bothered by some fanboy.

There was just one problem: he noticed me. Right as soon as I was taking a picture of him, he wagged his finger at me and said, “dude, it’s not a zoo, if you want a picture all you have to do is ask!”

“I’m really sorry… but would you mind?” I asked, feeling pretty embarrassed to have gotten caught and called out. “Not at all!” he said. I gave my phone to my friend and pulled my girlfriend in for a picture with him. (I photoshopped her out since I dunno if she wants her picture on a poker portal that gets thousands of daily visits).

He was a really nice guy, and huge, too; I thought he was going to crush my hand when he shook it. We chatted with him for maybe a minute about Houston (since he’s played there) and about the WSOP (he asked what we were in town for). I told him he should give the Main Event a try and offered to coach him, but he said something to the effect of wanting to leave that stuff to the big boys like Hellmuth.

The next afternoon, we were walking through the Forum Shops at Caesars and noticed Pete Rose signing autographs at a collectables store (he’s the one with the hat on).

So in a span of like 15 hours, we saw two of the most famous baseball players of all-time, both of whom, incidentally, have had their storied careers overshadowed by controversy. Pretty ironic.

At the Ante Up for Africa event, we saw Matt Damon (black hat in the one seat; note the very DOJ-friendly table draw of Lederer and Ferguson seated together):

Jerome Bettis (ten seat) and Don Cheadle (seven seat):

And David Alan Grier:

I was surprised at how short Matt Damon is. He stood up at one point when his table broke and was like… little. The internet says he’s 5′10″, but he didn’t look an inch over 5′7″ to me. All in all, the celebs in the tournament seemed to be enjoying themselves. You could tell poker is still new and exciting to them. Ahh… I remember those days.

Today is Day 1A of the Main Event and I’m still not sure if I’m playing or not, though I would say it’s pretty unlikely at this point. I might try a couple of satellites, but barring luckboxing one of those, I doubt I’ll play this year. I’ll be fairly disappointed if I don’t end up playing, but what can you do?

The plan for the next few days is to bet soccer (Netherlands over Uruguay and Spain over Germany both for fairly big bets) and try to run hot in a couple of satellites or something. If push comes to shove, I might put a couple hundo on a number on roulette and try to spike a Main Event seat (how good does that story have the potential to be?). I’m taking suggestions for what number to bet (0-36). The suggestion with the most logical reasoning for why that number will hit might just get my action!

Another washout.

Today was a $560 at Venetian. Things were going nicely for a while, I won some pots, flopped a set and dodged two outs, and was sitting on 45k during 300/600 when I lost a 65k pot with KTdd all-in against TT on a 932dd flop. A few hands later, I got AJdd all-in preflop against the same guy’s 99 for a 28 big blind pot and watched him flop quads. Run better against me in races, dude.

One individual at our table was setting records for how long it took him to fold each hand. An older gentleman at the table timed him and determined that he was taking an average of 9 seconds to act preflop. If that doesn’t seem like a long time, believe me, it is. When most players fold preflop, they do so in about 1-2 seconds from the time the action is on them. Nine seconds is considerably long. I told him that I’ve never seen someone take so long to play each hand. If he was wasting 7 seconds per hand more than a replacement player, that means he was wasting a full 5 minutes and 15 seconds per hour if we assume we were playing 45 hands per hour. Five minutes an hour wasted waiting on this guy to fold!

On one hand, my lone opponent began to reach for his chips to make a bet on the flop and I just went ahead and folded while he tried to determine his bet size. I told the table, “I’m trying to re-coup some of our time that this guy is wasting.” Everyone laughed since they were all equally annoyed at him. Despite the chastising, he seemed unfazed and continued wasting time every hand. I would love to have it in me to be that selfish and inconsiderate to others. Life must be a total charm when you can do whatever you feel like and not be least bit affected by how your actions impact others. I’m sure he never uses a turn signal and likes to smoke cigars indoors too!

Something I got to thinking about at the table today was how much poker players seem to discuss strategy right at the table with their opponents and why this is obviously dumb from a value standpoint. I know making comments like, “I figured you were three-betting fairly wide there otherwise I probably wouldn’t have shoved that hand,” is just harmless social small-talk, but it’s actually pretty dumb for a few reasons.

First, you’re basically announcing to the table that you’re a good, thinking player. Why make it easy on them? Second, you’re encouraging bad, non-thinking players to become thinking players. I understand that away from the tables people are going to talk about poker and improve, but do it away from the tables! Let’s not forget that when you’re sitting at a poker table, the other people at the table are your opponents. You are playing a game where the objective is to beat them. I have no problem with people being social at the table about things that have nothing to do with poker, but why would you be social/friendly when the discussion topic is poker? It just doesn’t make sense to me and is a leak that a lot of players seem to have.

In general, players seem to discuss strategy at the table so regularly that it can be exploited. Since so many players give away information by verbalizing their exact thought process on key hands, the practice has become common enough that it’s gotten to the point where players almost expect you to disclose information! It seems like there’s always a few people who like to ask, “would you have called if I shoved there?” or “I wasn’t sure if AQ was in your three-betting range there or not…” that they make it really easy on you to mislead them. That’s what poker is about, right? Misleading people and inducing mistakes? Some players seem to make it all too easy to do this. You can set up whatever image you want to have with your words almost easier than you can with your play.

Alright, that’s enough about poker. Let’s talk about soccer. I feel like those two words describe my whole summer: poker and soccer.

I made a couple of World Cup outright winner bets tonight. I took Japan at 100:1 (Pinnacle has them at just 75:1) and Uruguay at 15:1. Both of those teams have fairly soft paths to the semi-finals. In the case of Japan, there will be quite the handsome hedging opportunity if they can get there.

A couple of other bets I’m eyeing are England at 10:1 and Netherlands at 8:1. Before the tournament started, England was 7:1. They allowed one fluke goal in their entire group stage, advanced, and are now 10:1?! The consensus seems to be that England is a disappointment, but I think if their attack can improve a little, people will be quickly reminded of why they were one of the favorites coming into the tournament. In the case of Netherlands, I just love them. They’re able to get away with being so attack-focused because their mid-fielders win a lot of balls which allow them to skimp a little defensively without consequence. My only concern with them is that they’ll almost certainly have to face Brazil or Spain in the quarterfinals which is unfortunate. If they were able to avoid playing the Big 3 (Argentina being the other one) until the semifinals, it would be a much easier position to derive hedge-value from. What am I saying? Hedging an 8:1 is pretty nitty. I’ll just bet it and root for them to win it all if/when US is eliminated.

Tomorrow is a $1,500 at the Rio.

It’s been a while since I’ve posted an update, so this might get kind of long-winded.

I got back into Vegas two days ago after spending the weekend with my girlfriend in New York. It was a nice break that I’m really glad I was able to take. There’s a lot to be said for clearing your head of poker for a couple days at some point during the WSOP.

My first tournament back was yesterday, a $350 event at Venetian. I really love the Venetian events. They’re just so soft albeit a little boring at times (okay, most of the time). I built a 12k starting stack up to a peak of 45k without ever being all-in or ever even making a value bet. Ten hours into the tournament I hadn’t hit one flop or anything. Just made a few bluffs, took a few pots down preflop… stuff like that and before I know there’s 100 players left with 63 primed to finish in the money.

I had a cruel welcome back to the tournament tables by getting AQ all-in preflop against AT for a 30 big blind pot and seeing a Ten come on the river. A disappointing outcome near the bubble after playing for ten hours, but what can you do?

On to the next one.

But before the next one could come around, there was the US-Algeria soccer game. I woke up at 7:00 am to sweat the US who needed to beat Algeria in order to advance to the elimination round of 16 (technically there was a scenario where a draw would be adequate, but late in the game it was pretty clear England was going to win meant the US needed to win). The game wound up being one of the most exciting sporting events I’ve ever seen. I’m sure anyone who cares already knows what happened, so I won’t recap the details, but this goal with just three minutes to spare was sooo sweet!

I think every US fan was just in a state of absolute despair around the 89′ mark, so to find a goal like that with just three minutes left in their World Cup dream just made my day. Heck, it made like my whole summer. I was going absolutely bonkers when that ball found the back of the net, as was pretty much every other American with a passing interest in soccer I’d imagine.

With a grin stuck on my face after that goal, I embarked on the drive to the Rio for today’s $1,500 event knowing no matter the outcome, it’d still be a great day. The atmosphere at the WSOP was just electric. Everyone was talking about the soccer game and the Wimbledon match between Isner and Mahut that will be heading onto its third day of play tied 59-59 in the final set. I mean 59-59!?! How insane is that? I didn’t think it was possible that there could be anything happen in the sporting world to top the story of the miracle goal by the US, but this tennis match might just have done it. I had tournament directors checking in with me to get an update on the match since they overheard me updating my table from my phone.

For what it’s worth, I like Isner tomorrow. He’s only -114 on Pinnacle. Isner is the better all-around tennis player, has the advantage of serving first out of every tie, and will be able to regroup after some much needed rest tonight. He looked weaker than Mahut for most of today, but I think Isner should be more of a clear favorite once the two continue play after a night’s rest. You gotta love Mahut’s unending effort though; he’s held serve fifty-nine times in the fifth set keep the match going! Although I think there’s some value on Isner -114, I’ll probably just pass on betting it. This is one of those once in a lifetime sporting events where a paltry bet is wholly unnecessary in order to increase the excitement and could actually detract from being able to enjoy what will be a historic finish whenever someone wins. If someone wins.

So the $1,500…

I played one of the top 3 or 4 most interesting hands I’ve played all summer in level three today:

Shortly after being moved to a new table, I raise to 500 with Ace-Ten of clubs after an Asian guy with a ton of chips limps for 150 under-the-gun. He checks a Queen-Ten-Trey flop and I check behind. The turn brings a Five putting two spades on the board. He checks and I bet 650. He calls. The river is another Five and he bets 3,000 (I only had 3,450 total when he made that bet). I immediately felt like I was good here. I didn’t see how he could have a Queen; if he had a Queen, I feel like he would have led out on the turn. King-Jack made a lot of sense to me. I just felt like he was bluffing such a huge percentage of the time here that I really wanted to make the call for basically all of my chips with second pair. Not only did no hands that beat me make much sense with the way he played the hand, but there’s also the Asian-factor and the huge chip-stack factor both of which made a bluff more likely to me.

Still, I had just the slightest bit of doubt regarding whether or not a call was the right play, so I decided to have a random outside variable make my decision for me. I told the table, “in a second, I’m going to look at the tournament clock. If the second-number is between 00 and 50, I’m going to call. If it’s between 51 and 59, I’m going to fold.”

I looked at the clock. 55. I said, “well, I guess I have to fold,” and did so by turning my cards over. The Asian dude showed King-Seven of spades, air. Ugh… what a bad beat. I gave myself a 51/60 chance of making that call and he sucked out on me by peeling a 55. So sick…

The only other time I’ve done the clock-maneuver at the WSOP was in last year’s Main Event where I gave myself just a 33% chance of making a call, hit it, and lost a key pot. So I’ve hit a 1/3 that was wrong and a 9/60 that was wrong. Brutal.

During a break, Phil Ivey was presented with his 8th WSOP bracelet which drew a huge crowd. He is an absolute rock star. Flashbulbs were going off like crazy when he held the bracelet up for the crowd. It was pretty sweet when they played the US National Anthem in honor of Ivey’s win. US soccer has one of the sweetest victories in their program’s history, the best poker player in the world gets presented with his 8th bracelet, and bam, the National Anthem right in everyone’s face. It was pretty cool. There was just a buzz in the air at the Rio today that I’ve never felt before. What an awesome day.

Here’s a pic I snapped of Ivey holding his bracelet:

The day got slightly less awesome when I got AQ all-in preflop against 44 for a 35 big blind pot and couldn’t find any help, but that will hardly ruin what’s been an awesome day so far.

I don’t have a whole lot of events left. So far, I’m 1/11 in tournaments this summer (0/10 in no-limit events… I thought that’s supposed to be my best game, what gives?) Tomorrow is a $560 at Venetian. There’s a $1500 WSOP on Friday. Saturday is off (go USA vs. Ghana!!!). Sunday is a $1k. Monday, another $1500. Tuesday the $3k triple chance. Wednesday I’m taking off because my girlfriend will be in town and it’s my birthday. Thursday another $1k. And that’s probably it before the Main Event (if I play).

This summer has gone by so fast I can’t believe it! I guess they say time flies when you’re having fun, and I definitely have a blast being in Vegas for the WSOP. No matter the outcome in the remaining events, I’ve had an awesome time out here this year, but one more deep run in something, anything, would be some nice icing on the cake!

If Bodog were to operate sans-sponsored pro, I might think they’re onto something. The whole sponsorship thing just screams “bubble” to me (but if you’re reading this Stars/Tilt, I’ll still take one! … eh, who am I kidding?) What puzzles me about Bodog is that they seem to shake hands with the sponsored pro concept but do so with the grip strength of Stephen Hawking.

Just today they announced they were parting ways with newly-minted WPT Champion David Williams and in his place signing… Amanda Musumeci. Who?! I had to Google her just to find out who she was. Since her poker resume is, to put it nicely, modest, I was left to conclude that she must just be really attractive. But I’ll have to keep waiting before I find out since I can’t be sure any of the images that appear in the Google Images results for Amanda Musumeci are actually her. None of the results depict anyone sitting at a poker table which might be because she has never cashed in a live tournament.

Musumeci joins Evelyn Ng to form the Most Uninspiring Lineup of Sponsored Pros Ever. The fact that they parted with Williams a week after he wore their patch while winning $1.7 million in front of the cameras at Bellagio and yet still retain Ng, who hasn’t cashed in a live tournament in nearly two years, seems to suggest they operate with a “what haven’t you done for me lately?” methodology. In that case, hey Bodog, I’m over here! You even interviewed me once, what do you say?

I don’t know what goes on behind the scenes with the decision to drop guys who sit on top of the poker mountain like Williams and Justin Bonomo and whether it was the players or the poker site who initiated the end of their agreements, but I can speak from experience and say that whoever is running Bodog’s sponsorship program is quite likely wholly incompetent. I’ve twice won satellites to major live tournaments on their network. In each case, they tried to get me to sign some agreement in which I essentially had to hand myself over to them for a full calendar year in exchange for zero compensation.

After winning a 2008 Irish Open package and reading the fine print that said they had exclusive sponsorship rights to me for a full year after the tournament, I laughed at them and told them I wasn’t going to sign their silly document. In Ireland, I took their free hat and shirt and reminded their agent that since I never signed their ridiculous sponsorship agreement, the only place he’d see me wearing their shirt was at the gym.

After winning a package to the the £10,000 buy-in 2008 WSOP-Europe Main Event, they emailed me the same ridiculous document to sign. I told them “no thanks” once again, only this time I received an email from their player coordinator who informed me that since I wasn’t going to sign the document, they weren’t going to register me for tournament in London. I pointed out to him that nowhere in the fine print of their WSOP-Europe satellite promotion did it say winners had to sign a sponsorship agreement in order to be registered for the tournament. After he responded saying it didn’t matter, I took it a step further and asked him if he really thought it was wise to upset a high-volume customer who runs a major poker information portal. He called me twenty minutes later and had nothing to say other than, “there’s no problem, Mr. Albertson. We’ll register you for the tournament in London.”

One need only look at their market share to see that Bodog is clearly not in the hands of adept management, but their actions with regards to sponsored players just seem head-scratchingly incompetent. I can only assume Bonomo and Williams left under their own prerogative because even a monkey is capable of realizing that you don’t drop those guys from your brand unless you have to. So since they left under their own prerogative, I can only assume Bodog was no longer giving them a good reason to stay on as a sponsored pro. And if that’s the case, then why is Bodog even trying anymore? Either stop trying to maintain sponsored players altogether or, if you’re not prepared to spend the money to attract the game’s top talent, throw lowball offers at several b-list players who probably have no chance of getting a deal anywhere else. Try to build a real stable of pros even if they are the Schleger’s and Dunst’s of the game and not the Ivey’s and Dwan’s. That or just stop trying altogether, but please, don’t just put out a “stable” of two players, neither of whom have done anything to deserve their sponsorship status beyond winning a coinflip at the point of conception, and think you’ve done something good for your business as a result.

Me: i’m really curious to see how soft the games are [at the wsop] this summer
Me: i just feel like it’s inevitable that everyone will get decent/competent
Me: ’cause tbh nlhe tournaments seem pretty easy to me
Me: so i keep waiting for everyone else to start thinking the same
Him: nahhh
Him: ever read the dunning-kruger effect?

In any given 12 hour day in a live no-limit hold’em tournament, I feel like I face one or maybe two decisions that seem genuinely difficult to me. It’s not that I think I’m some amazing player or anything, there are certainly a lot of guys who think on a better and deeper level than I do, it’s just that I don’t really find no-limit tournaments to be very challenging. For me, “playing good” is pretty easy and I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop at the WSOP where everyone is “playing good”.

The Dunning-Kruger Effect seems to suggest I’ll have to keep waiting.

The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which “people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it.”[1] The unskilled therefore suffer from illusory superiority, rating their own ability as above average, much higher than in actuality; by contrast, the highly skilled underrate their abilities, suffering from illusory inferiority. This leads to a perverse result where less competent people will rate their own ability higher than more competent people. It also explains why actual competence may weaken self-confidence because competent individuals falsely assume that others have an equivalent understanding.

The article also includes a quote from Bertrand Russell that I find particularly reassuring:

In the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.

The Dunning-Kruger Effect is relatively new in the world of psychology. It was only published in 1999. They ran a bunch of studies on Cornell students where they examined self-assessment of logical reasoning skills, grammatical skills, and humor. Basically the kids who scored poorly vastly overestimated their own rank while kids who scored well accurately estimated their rank. In other words, everyone thinks they’re good, but some people are fooling themselves.

This effect as it applies to poker is very powerful. I think just about every player at any given poker table in Vegas thinks they’re a good player, but obviously someone has to be losing. What is most meaningful, as this effect relates to poker, is that the bad players, on account of the fact that they think they’re good, essentially prevent themselves from gaining competence in the game. Basically, once bad always bad unless they’re able to admit they’re bad and work on trying to improve.

I find the Bertrand Russell quote to be particularly comforting. In general, I’d say I’m not nearly as confident of a person as I wish I was. Like anyone else, I have my moments where I feel really confident, but by and large I feel like I would say I have below average confidence. Before reading about the Dunning-Kruger Effect, I think I always used to view confidence as directly correlated to competence. Now I’m kind of thinking that a lot of the “confidence” out there is all based in falsehood.

For instance, I remember I was once at a blackjack table in Bellagio with this Iranian guy who was betting $2k a hand. He asked me what I do. As I slid my comparatively meager $50 bet onto the table, and I told him I play poker. He went on to say that he’s one of the best poker players in the world and would play me anytime for any stakes I wanted. My response to this was to shrug and think to myself, “well, he probably is.” Looking back, that just seems stupid. I’m not saying I should have played him or anything, but I should have had the confidence to realize he was almost certainly in the ‘cocksure’ category and that I probably would have been a favorite in a heads-up match against him.

Anyway, much thanks to Ray for pointing out the Dunning-Kruger Effect. I think it’s changed the way I view poker and the world.

Getting some distance away from any area you spent a significant length of time and then going back kind of helps you appreciate certain things you used to take for granted. There are definitely some qualities unique to small towns. For instance, my parents didn’t think twice about just leaving their front door unlocked Saturday afternoon in case a visitor they were expecting who needed to drop something off came by before the four of us returned from a walk.

I spent Saturday night out with a few friends in a nice suburban area just outside of Indianapolis. We went to this place called ‘Pinheads’ which did a pretty good job of fusing bowling with a nightlife experience. We all bowled pretty terribly. There were probably a few reasons for this, but I think one of them was that the lanes were poorly lit. There were all these black lights and neon lights to make you feel like you’re at a club or something rather than just standard flourecent lights. That’s fine for the purposes of recreational, non-competitive bowling, but I think the game becomes much more of a challenge when the lanes aren’t well lit.

In our first game, I gave my friend 40 pins on a $20 bet (I’m a pretty good bowler). I needed only a 125 to cover. We went double-or-nothing on our second game with him getting 60 pins and my 111 was nearly enough to cover again! I think all of us posted about the worst scores of our lives which I guess will happen when you’re throwing a houseball down a dark lane.

After that, we went to some other place that sells beer pong set-ups for a little more low-stakes gambling and competition. I used to be a really solid beer pong player (I think being tall is a bit of an advantage in that game), but after two years of not playing I feel like I kind of lost my edge. My girlfriend and I got beat pretty handily by two of my friends despite my assurances that if she could make one shot we would win the game (she made two).

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When we got to our gate at the Indianapolis airport today (I’m flying back to New York with her for week), I noticed our plane had a Baltimore Ravens-themed paint job. Take a look at what I mean:

At first I thought that maybe it was a team plane owned by the Ravens and that they lease it out to airlines during the offseason. However, a Google search yielded that it was part of a marketing campaign AirTran did to drum up business in Baltimore, a city in which they are the second-largest air service provider.

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There’s a couple of things I’m excited about for this trip to New York. On Saturday, we’re going to Yankee Stadium to see them play the White Sox where, apparently, my girlfriend and I will each have a small bet on New York.

“I have a good feeling about the Yankees next weekend. We should bet on them. They’re going to win.”

“But baby, we don’t even know who’s pitching yet or what the odds are!”

“I know! But I still think we should bet on them.”

So hopefully it’s hip to be square on Saturday.

Also, the Tribeca Film Festival is in town. On Tuesday, we have tickets to see Dog Pound. I don’t really know much about it yet other than that it has to do with the juvenile correctional system.

I get pretty excited to spend time in New York. It’s not a place I’d want to permanentally reside because of all you have to give up in order to live here (basically everyone in this city seems like a huge square to me), but it’s still a fun city to hang out in for a few days at a time. On that note, I’m heading out for a bagel.

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Oh that bagel will have to wait a sec. Before I forget, I wanted to link to a few articles I wrote for the PokerTips strategy section the other day. Mixed games, especially 8-Game, seem to be getting decently popular, so we thought there might be some interest in related strategy content:

Intro to 8-Game
7 Card Stud Strategy
Razz Strategy
7 Card Stud Hi/Lo
2-7 Triple Draw Strategy

Gotta give thanks to my buddy Sebastian Sabic, who can be seen playing 8-Game for the highest stakes on PokerStars under his screenname ’seb86′, for helping me out with the 2-7 Triple Draw article. I understand the Stud games well enough to write beginner-level strategy content, but I’m still pretty much a complete n00b at 2-7, a game that Sebastian is one of the best in the world at.

Alright, it’s the end of the quarter and as usual I kept a list of the movies I saw this quarter with a letter grade. Hope this is useful to someone out there. I haven’t watched as many movies in the past couple of weeks, and probably won’t for the next several weeks, as I normally do thanks to a newfound addiction to Entourage. What an amazing show. I can say with full confidence it’s the best TV show I’ve seen in terms of dialog. I watch it with subtitles on so as not to miss any muttered gems. I’m already through the first two seasons and will probably start on season three after I finish this post. Watching several seasons of awesome TV shows in chronological order is the nuts.

Here are a couple of links I want to post before I get to the movie grades:

1. I wrote a knockout tournament strategy article for PokerTips that might be interesting to tournament players.

2. My buddy Timex wrote a blog entry about semi-retiring from poker that I think is worth a read. He’s had a ton of success in the game and is finding himself in a bit of an existential crisis at the age of 20. I think Timex is one of a handful of young guys out there who have made tons of money playing poker such that they’re no longer super-motivated to keep playing and also a little out of touch with the rest of society and people their age due to their submersion in poker and rapid ascension to a state of wealth. It’s a tricky and unique place to find yourself at 20 and I find it interesting to observe from a sociological standpoint. I think the key for guys like Timex will be to find another arena in which they can compete for high enough stakes to hold their interest and still feel they’re +EV at whatever they’re doing. To me, the business world sounds like a clear (and perhaps only) option. I hypothesize that in a decade or two you’ll see a lot of guys who were formerly really successful and big into poker make waves in the business world and only play poker for fun on rare occasions (ie: WSOP Main Event).

3. My buddy Jason Day started a humor blog on various social issues. His latest entry is about the ridiculousness of Tiger and Jesse James playing the “sex addict” card when they got caught cheating. Check his site out, I think you’ll find his writing to be really entertaining and on point.

Alright, without further ado, first quarter 2010 movie grades:

A

Wall Street – Fantastic. Can’t believe it took me so long to see this.

A-

Funny People – A very complete comedy. Check it out.

The Book of Eli – Love Denzel and post-apocalyptic stuff, so the combo of both of them rocked.

Brooklyn’s Finest – I’m a sucker for a cop drama.

B+

Sex Drive – Hilarious comedy kind of cut from the same cloth as American Pie. Seth Green’s character killed me.

Invictus – Somehow, at the age of 79, Clint Eastwood finds the time and energy to make at least one, but usually multiple movies each year. And every single one of them is usually damn good at worst. This is no exception.

A Serious Man – Coen brothers film that is kind of a modern day (well, sort of, it was set in the late 60s/early 70s) story of Job from the Bible. This is one of those movies that you appreciate more by reading about it after seeing it.

The Blind Side – I had been really reluctant to see this after reading the book for fear that the movie would ruin it, but it was mostly solid.

Green Zone – Very concise storyline, didn’t try to do too much like war movies can tend to do. Solid.

Hot Tub Time Machine – Made me laugh more than I thought it would

C

Repo Men – Pretty damn terrible, but it had its moments.

D

Couples Retreat – This was so disappointing; rarely laughed.

Tell-Tale – Just awful.

It’s such a sick city like that because no matter what happens they’ve got you hooked and you’ll want to be coming back.

This trip was just disastrous in every way imaginable for me on the gambling front. I mean, we’re talking 99th percentile in terms of statistical “run bad”. I may never have a trip like this again from just a sheer “odds going against me” standpoint. I lost everything. I mean everything. Overpairs vs. underpairs in poker for a $5k NAPT seat. Got rivered. Doubling down on 11s, I musta been 0/14 on catching a Ten. Sports bets? Forget it. Anyone who had taken the other side of my sports calls and put triple their normal bet on it would be clinking together glasses of champagne on a yacht right now and having a hearty laugh with their friends off the coast of Monte Carlo. I mean it was that bad but of course I’ll still go back in a couple months.

On our last night there, we were at this place on the 58th floor of the Palms that is like a hybrid between a nightclub and a casino. They’ve got blackjack tables and a roulette wheel so if you want to gamble and skip all of the dancing and socializing, you can. After three nights straight of going out to fancy-shmancy places, all I really wanted to do was sit down at a blackjack table and leave the dancing to the new arrivals.

My friends were pretty much feeling the same way, so they joined in. One friend, I’ll call him Terry since I don’t know how he’d feel about his business being aired on the Internet for everyone to read, had won a ton of money playing slots of all things. I mean, everyone knows that there are plenty of sucker bets in Vegas, but slots are the sucker bets of the sucker bets. Even the three card poker players view the slot machine players as total suckers. But Terry likes to overlook this fact and sit down at the slots thereby making all of his friends uncomfortable since playing slots is a very chick thing to do. How does Terry do at the 15% house-edge slots? Kills them, of course. So while Greg (another fake name) and I are getting killed at things we’re good at (poker) and things that don’t have thaaat bad of a house edge (blackjack), Terry is absolutely mutilating the slot machines to the tune of a couple thousand.

And it’s not like he hit some big jackpot either. He was just spiking $100-$200 scores on the slots all day like that type of thing just happens normally.

So we’re up there and Greg and I are just getting killed. Absolutely killed. I finally catch a good card. I hit a 13 against a 10 and spike the perfect 8. Sweet! I am finally going to win a hand. Before the dealer showed their down-card, I said, “if I don’t win this one and somehow push, I’m done. I’m out of here.” Dealer’s down-card is a 2, draw card is, you guessed it… 9.

I grab my chips and leap up out my seat. “Nyet! I’m outta here. I’m going back downstairs. Screw this place.”

After I walk away, Greg tells Terry that he should play the next hand that I would have been dealt if I hadn’t left. He was like, “listen, I know you don’t like blackjack, but you’re basically the luckiest guy in the city right now. You need to put $100 on the next hand that Cory was going to be dealt. You’re a guaranteed winner.” Terry complies and of course gets a blackjack.

Near the very end of the night, we wind up at a blackjack table downstairs where there is this Asian male dealer. At this point, I was totally down to the felt. Whatever money I could lose on this trip was pretty much already gone. I had maybe a couple of bets left in me before it was time to take that long, painful walk to the elevator with nothing but your room key in your pocket.

At some point we learned that the Palms blackjack tables allow surrendering. If you don’t know what that means, don’t sweat it too much; it’s basically just a nice alternative to hitting or standing that can save you half your bet when you have a really bad hand.

So I get dealt a 16 against a 10 which is pretty much the worst statistical scenario you can find yourself in at a blackjack table. I motion to the guy that I want to surrender my bet. Now this is how cold I was running… I had already lost so much hand over fist that it had gone from being frustrating to just being funny. So I motion surrender and the dealer looks at me, swear to God, and says, “why?”

Pause… pause…

I look around in disbelief with my arms in the air and just say to him, “I dunno man!!…. CAUSE I SAID SO!! Since when is that not good enough?!” My friends and I just lose it. Even he started laughing. I mean… I was running so cold that I couldn’t even get the dealer to just do what I wanted him to without having him drag me over the coals about it! What makes it especially startling is that surrendering is what you should do in that situation from an optimal-strategy standpoint! I mean… really?!?! What do you mean, “why?” For one, because you’re supposed to, but more importantly, why on God’s green earth are you asking me? Just deal the card!!

The whole thing was a pretty good laugh. It truly did feel like something out of a movie where there was a moment where you couldn’t even believe what was happening. He turned out to be really cool and ironically reminded me that surrendering was an option when I was later put in the same 16 vs. 10 scenario on the biggest bet I made of the night (it’s easy to forget that surrendering is allowed since it usually almost never is). That was a moment I’ll never forget. I’ve played thousands and thousands of hands of blackjack before but never once has a dealer just looked at me and said, “why?” after I declared my decision.

Vegas is such a terrible place. Think about it… where else in the world can you visit, have the worst luck imaginable all trip, and on the flight home agree wholeheartedly when your friend says, “we should go back in April!”

Note: I didn’t really want to write much about poker in this entry since I already did so in an article on PokerTips.