The recent revelations about Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi and Andy McLeod, two of the best online tournament players in the world, have driven most poker discussion boards into a frenzy of allegations, accusation, and side selection. As always, people are looking to divide the various personalities and issues up into black-and-white chunks. And as always, it’s not that simple.

Almost everyone who has met Sorel really likes him. He’s a friendly guy, charming and funny. His poker skills are undeniable. And yet, he didn’t see a problem with repeatedly account-buying after the practice has been widely exposed as unethical, and defined by all of the sites as illegal. He also didn’t have much of a problem with throwing a couple of his “friends” under the bus as a way of apologizing for his actions. And, as Beanie pointed out in an article link, giving the “whole truth” scoop to a site other than the one that made him an online poker celebrity reeks of “what have you done for me lately?”

A large number of Sorel’s friends, acquaintances and/or admirers have chosen to pile on and bury him for actions that they KNOW many other big buy-in players are doing. Others have chosen to bury the buriers and vouch for what a good guy Sorel is, downplaying blatant and repeated cheating.

The truth is that nobody playing the biggest buy-in online tournaments is innocent. If you’re not multi-accounting, buying accounts, sharing on AIM, ghosting and being ghosted…you know someone who is. Either you believe it’s OK and you’re an unethical cheater or you’re choosing to protect an unethical cheater. There is no black-and-white here. It’s all shades of gray…some darker than others. The only pitch-black around here are the bruises around the eyes of online tournament poker.

As an entrepreneur I spend a lot of time reading business venture blogs.  I liked the emphasis on failure in this one because it is my opinion that failure is what I have learned the most from.

http://www.unionsquareventures.com/2007/11/why_early_stage.html

This is just fact. Every other day it seems like there is some type of scandal yet if you sign onto Full Tilt, Poker Stars or any site really there is no discernible drop off. EVER!!! Look, I realize that people want to be upset and I would love to see more protections. Let me give you some examples of what could be done but won’t because unless all of your competition plays by the same rules you are screwed.

1. Require every player to send in identification. To get a new account you need to be who you say you are.

2. You can only play on one IP.  Only one player per IP, no exceptions.

3. From 100 down any tournament over say $100 needs to be gone over with a fine tooth comb.

4. Stop inner account transfers.

It isn’t the guy that came in second that got screwed. It is the guy that placed 4th, 8th or 21st that got knocked out because of deception. Fact is, no matter what protections are put in place you will be cheated, that is just fact. If you think anything differently you are kidding yourself.

But let’s just stop saying “I am going to quit playing online” because you won’t. Certainly the sites should do a better job of protecting us but the reality is that very few people win. When you lose in a Casino often you feel you were cheated. The only difference here is that you can take the probably out when it comes to online poker. Whenever money is involved people will try to deceive other people, the sites are doing a woeful job in protecting us from cheaters, that needs to change but I doubt it will. Competitively it puts them at a disadvantage.

So does that mean you can’t win online? Of course that answer is no. I am asked all the time “don’t you feel like you are being cheated” and my answer is always the same, “if they are I hope they continue”. I am nowhere near the biggest winner online but I have done O’kay, if I never read forums I would likely never have any idea I am being cheated on a daily basis.

Yet again everyone on 2+2 and Pocketfives are screaming bloody murder. The facts are these:

Cheating happens

You know cheating happens

Yet you play the Sunday’s every week

Can we just quit pretending to be naive about this and admit that we just can’t stop playing? Call it addiction, call it whatever you need to make yourself feel better but whenever these scandals happen it doesn’t change a damn thing and the reason is simple. Most people are playing for fun and don’t mind losing a few dollars.

So there is your answer if you knew you were being cheated would you still play the game and for most players playing online today that answer is a resounding “Yes”.

I had a fantastic Thanksgiving. The whole family was there and the food this year was the best we’ve ever had. My aunt, Gigi, has been working on this specific type of stuffing for like 10 years and she might have FINALLY perfected it! It got better year by year. It was so freakin’ good; I ate more stuffing than I did turkey! I just love thanksgiving. I spent a lot of time with my grandma, Malak. She is getting pretty old, but as old as she is it’s remarkable how sharp she still remains. It must be surreal to sit in a room and know that you are responsible for the creation of so many people. Between her kids (4 of them) and all the grandkids it adds up. I can’t wait to be a father. Grandfather…not so much! Wow so sick to even think of being that old, but hey, it will get here before I know it.

After Thanksgiving my friends and I went to the Deer Club, a place up in the Morgan Hills Mountains, (secluded from everything) that my friend, Jeff’s family has owned for years. It really is the perfect getaway. Tony (my best friend) is a great driver; great, but also CRAZY! I’ve never been in a car with someone who can drive like him. He is a machine. Since we were on private property and there weren’t any other cars for miles and miles, and there was no chance of getting pulled over, my boy was in rare form. He was going buck wild. In my entire life of being in the car with him behind the wheel I have never felt unsafe. On the way down the mountain Tony ruined his ZERO crash or accident record by losing control around a turn and heading straight into a mountain. Our speed was about 35 or 40mph, head on. WHAM! I saw my whole life flash before my eyes. The air bag popped out (which I didn’t even notice btw until AFTER it was over) and saved me from SERIOUS injury. My glasses were smashed against my face by the airbag and the explosion–airbags burst by an explosion similar to a gunshot– made serious marks on my face. I was bleeding profusely and all in a matter of seconds. It went down way too fast for me to comprehend what had just happened. I rushed out of the car in a state of panic, but kept my cool once I realized that everyone was ok and that I wasn’t dead. It was pretty trippy to say the least. At that very moment I had no idea what my face looked like. The pain wasn’t that bad yet, but that might have been due to the adrenaline rush I was on.  After a while the bleeding stopped and I realized nothing was broken and everything would eventually heal. I’m on day 4 of recovery and things are on the up and up. Thank God, it really could have been so much worse. I’m just happy to be alive. Tony didn’t even get a scratch. So sick I never win!

Yesterday I had a court case where some lady is suing me from 3 years ago (see previous blog). I kind of choked in front of the judge. The facts still remain and I am confident I will win the case, but I was very disappointed by my performance in front of the judge. I like to be in front of crowds, I like to lecture, but somehow I couldn’t pull myself together in the courtroom. I said what I needed to say, but I didn’t say it with pizzazz. I’ll know the verdict by mail in 2 weeks.

Adios for now,

 

Antonio

It is sort of funny when everyone comes to the same conclusion all at once. Case in point I have moved down to 3-6NL short handed to try and get fat again and low and behold so have many other players. Seemingly all at the same time. Certainly it is tougher sledding than it used to be but I think something more important is going on, the need and want to move up in stakes has slowed and people are looking for the easiest games with reasonable profit. I can say on my end I am up about 4k for the week and I haven’t had a particularly difficult game all week. On Bodog. Full Tilt is another story, I was short on that site so I started playing the 4-8NL deep stack (oh, how I love deepstacks), at the end of the evening I had blown out my FTP account (I didn’t have a lot in there, I was actually surprised to find anything in there, similar to finding pennies in your cushions except this is 2 grand). In general though poker is treating me well and I don’t have any plans in playing too much higher as long as I am winning at a decent rate. The problem I usually encounter isn’t that I lose it is that I don’t win enough and eventually get bored and move up and do well or blow out.

Cane is my current favorite TV show on the network primetime schedule, though it started off with a bang and is starting to whimper. Basically the show is Jimmy Smits having a bad day on the regular, you can read better reviews than mine but if you are looking for something to watch and you miss the Sopranos this might help. Journeyman is also a pretty good show, it is a little out there and it may take you the whole show to kind of get it but once you do I think you will agree that the payoff was worth the wait.

HBO is doing it’s 24/7 documentary on the Mayweather/Hatton fight coming up on December 8th. I really hope Floyd Mayweather is trying to be a douchebag because what a shame if he isn’t. This Hatton kid seems pretty interesting but he will likely get outboxed. Mayweather is not an entertaining fighter to a casual fight fan like myself. Watching him run away from his opponents is a yawner, though I will likely buy the fight because you never really know.

One of the first lessons I learned in poker is that catching up is not only profitable it is the difference between being a winner and a loser. Back in those days I was playing limit poker and hands like Ace King were useless unless the flop came Jack Queen Ten. Even then you had to sweat the board pairing, typically 9 people saw the flop (out of 11, yes I am well aware this is a silly game) and everyone hit a little bit of something. The name of the game was playing hands that caught up easily like pairs. Over time the losers couldn’t chase any longer, they had just lost too much doing it so the game soon went to only 5 people seeing the flop. Ironically, that was when I made my most profit. With too many people playing almost no one is doing anything too terribly wrong so your edge against the collective group is not that significant.

These days No Limit is the game and the punishment for playing badly is swift. Even in a loose $5-$10 game it would be rare to see 5-7 people calling $100 raise. So the field size gets smaller assuming you make decent raises and don’t price people in. Raising to $40 with 5 people in screams of a hand like Sevens where if you hit your set you have 5 other people on board and can stack at least one of them with top pair. So let me introduce you to a few concepts:

First Bluff: As you see more flops the texture of flops becomes easier to read and understand. It is important to bluff at favorable flop textures to set up some of the plays I will be mentioning later. In the case of playing against an overly aggressive opponent that always makes continuation bets you might want to check raise them with air occasionally just to let them know that you are onto their plan and that won’t fly while you are at the table.

Set Mining: This is the hobby of all nits everywhere. They just wait for pairs to hit the flop and try to get all the money in and unfortunately most people aren’t paying attention and don’t realize they haven’t played a hand in two hours. That is one of the advantages of online, between surfing for porn and sweating the $20 bet they have on Youngstown State people don’t pay attention so tight players get away with more online. This is why First Bluff is so powerful because when you hit your set you will build a monster pot by just leading out, if you bluff enough eventually people start calling you down with weaker hands. That is when you show them the nuts.

Playing suited connectors in position: You have at least 2 more options playing suited connectors in position than you do out of position. Ideally you would like to hit your hand occasionally and not bluff all the time but suited connectors give you the added option of semibluffing in position with information. Playing suited connectors early you are really only guessing.

Hands like Ace King and Ace Queen are great and likely represent the majority of playable hands but it is rare that someone will “stack off” in a decent game with a hand like Ace Jack. Sets are the best “catch up” hands. In the case of suited connectors it is likely better to hit your off card rather than the card that makes you. As an example, you will likely make more from your opponents by hitting the card that gives you trips (assuming you have a pair and a flush draw) than you will if you hit your flush. So bang the six harder. You have to have a feeling of how the table perceives you and use that image against them. Otherwise, the image you have established hasn’t allowed you to take advantage of catching up.

Paul “Beanie” Nobles

When I started the articles section it was meant to be a hub for all the cool articles written around and about gambling, specifically poker but certainly all forms of gambling are welcomed.  We have about 5 people who post articles regularly but we need more, a lot more.  So here is the contest.  We will be giving away $1,000, $500 for the best body of work and 5 people will get $100 each.  You will be graded on quality, not quantity.  I will be very liberal but I will delete things that I deem inappropriate or not relevant.

So what is appropriate and what is relevant? Well, forum posts about interesting topics are relevant, so is poker news of any type, especially poker news off the beaten path like in local newspapers.  Any article with gambling content qualifies and any article that is just damn interesting qualifies but keep in mind the audience.

The signup process is not difficult and will only take you about a minute.  This is not a huge push for an email list either, I already have 10,000 worthless emails, goodness knows I don’t need 50 more.

Also, I will include blog comments in the contest just make sure to use the same username as you do in your posts.  

If you are a webmaster and you are concerned that you may be spamming don’t be, if your content is relevant post it.

Beanie

LSU is the most talented team in the country in my opinion but you can’t be the best team and barely beat Ole Miss.  So was the fate of LSU, as individual talents they were special.  The funny thing is that the best LSU football team I have ever seen was last years team.  A similar fate is befalling USC, who is coming on really strong.  Anyway, I have never really thought highly of Les Miles’ coaching ability and I hope he goes to his dream job and LSU can get a coach that doesn’t make silly mistakes.

The funny thing is though that I feel a sense of relief, every week was a 3 point game against teams they should have beaten by 20.  They will likely beat Tennessee because there is no pressure on them.  Some teams respond to pressure, this years team did offensively but the defense never did.

I hope everyone else’s holiday was as good as mine. My wife does a turkey treatment with herb butter tucked under the skin so it gets really crispy, and the cavity stuffed with lemon slices and herbs to infuse the meat with a variety of flavors. Add in all the sides and dessert and there’s a reason my waistline is what it is.

None of those are good enough reasons to play your A-game, and I’m sure I suffer in some ways for it. I know I’m not alone, either. I would never dream of comparing my place in the poker industry with, well, anyone who’s actually IN the poker industry. But when I see a Howard Lederer or Taylor Caby making the rounds at the World Series, playing because they’re supposed, I feel a kinship. I get it. The trick is to stop it.

Thanksgiving is by far my favorite holiday of the year. No matter what the whole family gets together and hangs out. There is nothing quite like having your entire family in one spot. It’s amazing no matter what you accomplish in life no matter how much money you make, no matter how many tournaments you win, if you don’t have that kind of love then none of it means ANYTHING.

I am just about to go to the airport to catch a flight back home (San Fran) for Thanksgiving. Soooo very excited. I miss my old stumping grounds. I really actually grew up in San Jose and then moved to the city in my early twenties. Wow I feel SO incredilbly old describing my EARLY twenties. Holy shit. I am old. Birthday is in a couple of weeks and then before you know it ill be thirty. So sickening. I hope what they say about 30 being the new 20 is right!!!

On Monday I have to be in court in San Francisco for something so incredibly ridiculous. A few years ago I crashed my dodge viper into a few parked cars. I’ll admit I was clearly at fault. One of the 3 cars filed a claim with my insurance company and got rewarded 3700. Three years later she is trying to sue me for MORE money claiming the car had sentimental value and this and that (Btw the car could not have been WORTH more than 3k, total hoopty). My lawyer informed me that the judge would laugh at this case seeing as how she ALREADY got paid!!! My guess is that she saw me playing poker on TV and is trying to take advantage of the situation. I’m sure she is banking on the fact that I won’t show up. Not only am I showing up but I CANNOT wait to show up and have this case dismissed and get the last laugh. Wish me luck!!!

Happy thanksgiving to everyone enjoy the time with your loved ones.

Antonio

I love art, artistic things inspire me and they provide me with a relief from my daily reality.  One of the things about this site is that it is somewhat of my expression of art combined with people I know and trust.  People I knew other people would like to know because they are good people.  My current best show on television I have talked about before, it is Iconoclasts on the Sundance Channel.  It is artistic people talking to other artistic people.  It is essentially the best form of a biography type of show because it is people you would enjoy to hang out with and in a sense you are because the show is very casual.  If you have TIVO or some form of DVR you should check it out.  I think it is the best show on television.

 

Since this is the “ART” blog I will give you my impressions of two movies I have seen recently.  Neither of which blew me away.  American Gangster was the first and I do believe it was a wonderfully acted movie, you can always tell when a movie is well acted because you forget who the actors are and you see them as the characters they are on screen.  When you look back and you realize you were captivated you know you experienced something special.  While the acting was good the movie was only entertaining, partially I think this was because there was so much hype and I wanted it to be similar to The Departed.  I would recommend you see it but I doubt it will blow you away unless you don’t see many movies then it will be spectacular.  The other movie starred Phillip Seymour Hoffman called “Before the Devil knows your Dead”, it is an independent film and is getting a lot of Oscar buzz and once again it was well acted but was real flat in certain spots.  I wouldn’t recommend that you see this movie, while I didn’t consider it a waste of life it might be worth some Netflix love but that is about it.

 

Continuing with my art theme I have been listening to a lot of Paolo Nutini, it seems like every song he has is vastly different from the others.  I have a passion for music and just enjoy hearing new sounds.  I am not pretentious enough to not care about current music but being originally from New Orleans I really enjoy Jazz as well, more so as I get older.

 

Have a Happy Thanksgiving.

Brandon posted this on 2+2 and it generated a lot of discussion. The post compares online poker players to live poker players and why it is difficult to compare poker to really anything else.

Brandon Adams

It’s important to know how the other players at the table perceive you. You as a poker player must know what they think of you. I know, when I sit down at a poker table, what most everyone thinks about my style of play. I tend to play a bit more on the aggressive side; however I can also be a squeezer. If I am playing with someone I’ve never played with before I know they think of me as an aggressive maniac. When I sit down with professionals I have played with in the past I know they know I can squeeze.

There are many ways to change your image. It all depends on the nature of the game and the people in it as well. When you first go into a game not knowing anybody the best thing to do is play a couple of hands you would never play. And play them terribly, but make it a point to somehow show the hands without making it obvious that you are trying to show. That alone will give you a great image; that of an idiot, which is EXACTLY what you want. It’s amazing to me poker players seek validation more than anybody. Why in the world do you want your peers (the same guys you PLAY against) to think of you as a good player?!? You want them to think of you as a donk. When you sit down and make a couple of dumb plays and play a few hands you should not be playing you are set for the rest of your session. It will cost you a little bit in equity playing these bad hands but you make up for it in payoff vig throughout your session. The last thing you want is to be known as an FBS (a full blown squeezer). You want them to think of you as a gambling knucklehead. Good luck!!

Antonio Esfandiari

A couple months ago, I wrote a blog about Phil Hellmuth at a televised final table from this year’s WSOP, focusing how he took the bad side of every insurance bet with Phil Ivey. My theory, which I still believe, is that Hellmuth thinks the -EV of those bets is counterbalanced by being seen with “hip” people like Phil Ivey.

Some discussion about a hand from that table has come up recently on a couple of message boards. Hellmuth made a large raise pre-flop for approximately half his stack, then folded to a re-raise. The general consensus amongst the so-called intelligensia is that Hellmuth’s play is terrible, he’s getting way over 2:1, he should make that call with almost any two cards, etc. But Phil Hellmuth doesn’t think like any other poker player.

There is nothing more important in Phil Hellmuth’s world than being on television. Why else would he be interested in doing VH1’s “Surreal Life”, a haven for broke C-list celebrities who are willing to suffer any indignity to revive their careers? Hellmuth’s got 10x the money of everyone who has been on that show put together. In his mind, the more he’s on TV, the bigger his empire outside of poker can grow.

In keeping with that, I’m sure part of Hellmuth’s decision to fold for the other half of his stack is based on the cameras. Mathematically, against the range of some very loose opponents, it’s a bad fold. In the pseudo-math of TV-time value…it’s a different story.

Is he right? Or is there something as “too much of a good thing” when it comes to a personality that a lot of people can’t stand? I dunno. We’ll talk more about poker money without playing the game later.

Rather than posting the link (which is long and confusing I am just cross posting what most people think is the best response). This does change my opinion a bit and only leaves me questioning what the states will do in response (but given the alternative, I would take my chances).

I do think the movement of money issue is a bit of a red herring, anyone who bets sports knows that movement of money is a small hassle but it isn’t the end of the world. That said, I am convinced, the Wexler Bill has my support.

Alright, beanie, I read your blog. I like your attitude, but you dont really have a full grasp of the legislation out there. I will try and fill in some details for you.

Altough it is true that PLAYING online poker is only illegal in a few states per state law, whats about to get even more difficult than it is now is the ability to move money to and from the sites - this was the intent of the UIGEA, and unless we change the law, getting your poker money moving through the financial system is going to become difficult or extremely difiicult. Obviously, in this day and age, savvy players will find a way. But the poker economy depends on average players finding a way - that is likely to disappear unless there is a change.

Your blog post seems to confuse the differences between the Wexler “skill games protection act” and the Frank “IGREA.” There are a lot of open issues with the Frank bill, which applies to ALL internet gambling, taxes being one (but there are no specified taxes int he Frank bill, those get determined later, do I dont know where your 5% figure comes from), licensing being another, state opt outs being a third.

The Wexler bill, on the other hand, applies only to skill games and specifically includes poker as a game of skill. It allows anyone to offer poker over the internet (provided the sites also have age verification and a few other “safety” protections). Not only does this mean all reputable foreign sites become or remain legal in the US, it also means the US could have its own sites. Taxes do not change under Wexler (a US site would pay US corp taxes, foreign sites pay their own country’s taxes, players pay their income taxes). No state can opt out (though it would be an interesting legal states right test as to whether states like WA that already make playing illegal could continue to do so). The Wexler bill does not make the US WTO compliant - but it does not increase our being out of compliance either.

The Wexler Bill is the poker player’s perfect legislation. You should support it completely.

The Frank bill has potential, it needs a lot of work to become a WTO compliant bill, and a bill that wont have negative economic impacts on the game. This may well occur as the Frank bill progresses through congress, especially if the WTO orders huge sanctions against the US and congress is forced to act, but we can only wait and see what develops.

But Wexler deserves your full support right now.

Skallagrim