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So I did find time to sit down for a relatively brief session of Rush Poker on Full Tilt yesterday. Jumped into the $25 max. buy-in, six-handed pot-limit Omaha game, where I joined about 160-170 others. A little over a half-hour later I’d played 111 hands, at which point the game paused. I noticed players quickly dropping out of the pool, and after a couple of minutes of waiting I decided to skedaddle as well.

I was happy enough to leave, having accumulated a handsome profit during those hands. I managed to double my buy-in (almost) very early on, then added a few more bucks before the pause. So I came away feeling fine, although the whole experience was likely unduly affected by my good mood at having that early success. In fact, I’m sensing a lot of early reactions to Rush Poker are tied pretty closely to whether the player won or lost during that first session or two, which is understandable.

With that in mind, I’m gonna resist offering some long-winded analysis and/or judgment of Rush Poker as of yet. I need to try it again and become more familiar with the ins and outs before presuming to say anything meaningful about it.

I will say one thing, though. Those initial hands, when I first realized how the game worked, evoked for me a feeling I hadn’t experienced for quite some time while playing online poker. I’m talking about that sorta nervous excitement that came with first signing onto a site and playing those initial hands. You remember that? That mix of fascination and edginess you felt when you first realized how online poker worked — how you could play against others all around the world, any time of day or night? And then, when you won your first hand, and thought, hey, I like this!

Not saying that getting to relive that feeling necessarily means Rush Poker is the cat’s pajamas. But it was pretty cool to “go back” like that, even if only for a few moments.

Speaking of “going back,” the New York Jets are playing the Indianapolis Colts this weekend in the AFC Championship game, with the Colts being huge favorites. Spent some time this week listening to “the Fan” — i.e., the New York sports radio station — and enjoying all the excitement and hype. And all of the references to Super Bowl III, the Jets’ finest moment, when “Broadway” Joe Namath led them to a stunning 16-7 victory. Over a heavily-favored opponent. The Colts.

As a Carolina Panthers fan, I have no particular allegiance to any of the remaining teams, which means like most unaffiliated folks, I’ll be rooting for the underdog in this one. That decision a few weeks ago by Indianapolis to rest their starters against the Jets and forgo the chance at an undefeated season — see “The Colts Find a Fold” — provides another reason to pull for the Jets on Sunday.

What a story that would be, eh? The Colts give a game away to the Jets, saving New York’s season, then find themselves in a nightmarish situation wherein a newly vitalized Jets team gives ’em all sorts of hell just one step from the Super Bowl. Sort of like a chip leader passing on a chance to eliminate a short stack, only to see that player then double up a few times to become a real threat to take it all away.

That Jets defense is obviously going to have to step it up to slow down Manning et al. And New York will absolutely have to run the ball effectively to chew up the clock and keep Indy’s offense off the field. Here’s hoping they keep that momentum going — first launched just four weeks ago in that game versus Indy — and make things interesting Sunday.

As far as the NFC Championship between the Minnesota Vikings and New Orleans Saints goes, I’m mainly just looking for a good game there. Really, whoever wins that one will make for an interesting story.

So enjoy the weekend all, whether it be filled with Rush Poker, monitoring the Jets’ rushing attack, or rushing around doing something else.

Like listening to Rush!

Related posts:

1. Full Tilt introduces Rush Poker, the world’s fastest poker game Full Tilt Poker is taking the online poker action…
2. SPORTSBETTING.COM helps you decide if you should jump on the Jets bandwagon or just stick with the Colts It will be a David vs. Goliath-like battle when…
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So I did find time to sit down for a relatively brief session of Rush Poker on Full Tilt yesterday. Jumped into the $25 max. buy-in, six-handed pot-limit Omaha game, where I joined about 160-170 others. A little over a half-hour later I’d played 111 hands, at which point the game paused. I noticed players quickly dropping out of the pool, and after a couple of minutes of waiting I decided to skedaddle as well.

I was happy enough to leave, having accumulated a handsome profit during those hands. I managed to double my buy-in (almost) very early on, then added a few more bucks before the pause. So I came away feeling fine, although the whole experience was likely unduly affected by my good mood at having that early success. In fact, I’m sensing a lot of early reactions to Rush Poker are tied pretty closely to whether the player won or lost during that first session or two, which is understandable.

With that in mind, I’m gonna resist offering some long-winded analysis and/or judgment of Rush Poker as of yet. I need to try it again and become more familiar with the ins and outs before presuming to say anything meaningful about it.

I will say one thing, though. Those initial hands, when I first realized how the game worked, evoked for me a feeling I hadn’t experienced for quite some time while playing online poker. I’m talking about that sorta nervous excitement that came with first signing onto a site and playing those initial hands. You remember that? That mix of fascination and edginess you felt when you first realized how online poker worked — how you could play against others all around the world, any time of day or night? And then, when you won your first hand, and thought, hey, I like this!

Not saying that getting to relive that feeling necessarily means Rush Poker is the cat’s pajamas. But it was pretty cool to “go back” like that, even if only for a few moments.

Speaking of “going back,” the New York Jets are playing the Indianapolis Colts this weekend in the AFC Championship game, with the Colts being huge favorites. Spent some time this week listening to “the Fan” — i.e., the New York sports radio station — and enjoying all the excitement and hype. And all of the references to Super Bowl III, the Jets’ finest moment, when “Broadway” Joe Namath led them to a stunning 16-7 victory. Over a heavily-favored opponent. The Colts.

As a Carolina Panthers fan, I have no particular allegiance to any of the remaining teams, which means like most unaffiliated folks, I’ll be rooting for the underdog in this one. That decision a few weeks ago by Indianapolis to rest their starters against the Jets and forgo the chance at an undefeated season — see “The Colts Find a Fold” — provides another reason to pull for the Jets on Sunday.

What a story that would be, eh? The Colts give a game away to the Jets, saving New York’s season, then find themselves in a nightmarish situation wherein a newly vitalized Jets team gives ’em all sorts of hell just one step from the Super Bowl. Sort of like a chip leader passing on a chance to eliminate a short stack, only to see that player then double up a few times to become a real threat to take it all away.

That Jets defense is obviously going to have to step it up to slow down Manning et al. And New York will absolutely have to run the ball effectively to chew up the clock and keep Indy’s offense off the field. Here’s hoping they keep that momentum going — first launched just four weeks ago in that game versus Indy — and make things interesting Sunday.

As far as the NFC Championship between the Minnesota Vikings and New Orleans Saints goes, I’m mainly just looking for a good game there. Really, whoever wins that one will make for an interesting story.

So enjoy the weekend all, whether it be filled with Rush Poker, monitoring the Jets’ rushing attack, or rushing around doing something else.

Like listening to Rush!

Related posts:

1. Full Tilt introduces Rush Poker, the world’s fastest poker game Full Tilt Poker is taking the online poker action…
2. SPORTSBETTING.COM helps you decide if you should jump on the Jets bandwagon or just stick with the Colts It will be a David vs. Goliath-like battle when…
3. Party Poker releases new Card Rush promotion Online poker site PartyPoker.com is about to unveil the…

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So I did find time to sit down for a relatively brief session of Rush Poker on Full Tilt yesterday. Jumped into the $25 max. buy-in, six-handed pot-limit Omaha game, where I joined about 160-170 others. A little over a half-hour later I’d played 111 hands, at which point the game paused. I noticed players quickly dropping out of the pool, and after a couple of minutes of waiting I decided to skedaddle as well.

I was happy enough to leave, having accumulated a handsome profit during those hands. I managed to double my buy-in (almost) very early on, then added a few more bucks before the pause. So I came away feeling fine, although the whole experience was likely unduly affected by my good mood at having that early success. In fact, I’m sensing a lot of early reactions to Rush Poker are tied pretty closely to whether the player won or lost during that first session or two, which is understandable.

With that in mind, I’m gonna resist offering some long-winded analysis and/or judgment of Rush Poker as of yet. I need to try it again and become more familiar with the ins and outs before presuming to say anything meaningful about it.

I will say one thing, though. Those initial hands, when I first realized how the game worked, evoked for me a feeling I hadn’t experienced for quite some time while playing online poker. I’m talking about that sorta nervous excitement that came with first signing onto a site and playing those initial hands. You remember that? That mix of fascination and edginess you felt when you first realized how online poker worked — how you could play against others all around the world, any time of day or night? And then, when you won your first hand, and thought, hey, I like this!

Not saying that getting to relive that feeling necessarily means Rush Poker is the cat’s pajamas. But it was pretty cool to “go back” like that, even if only for a few moments.

Speaking of “going back,” the New York Jets are playing the Indianapolis Colts this weekend in the AFC Championship game, with the Colts being huge favorites. Spent some time this week listening to “the Fan” — i.e., the New York sports radio station — and enjoying all the excitement and hype. And all of the references to Super Bowl III, the Jets’ finest moment, when “Broadway” Joe Namath led them to a stunning 16-7 victory. Over a heavily-favored opponent. The Colts.

As a Carolina Panthers fan, I have no particular allegiance to any of the remaining teams, which means like most unaffiliated folks, I’ll be rooting for the underdog in this one. That decision a few weeks ago by Indianapolis to rest their starters against the Jets and forgo the chance at an undefeated season — see “The Colts Find a Fold” — provides another reason to pull for the Jets on Sunday.

What a story that would be, eh? The Colts give a game away to the Jets, saving New York’s season, then find themselves in a nightmarish situation wherein a newly vitalized Jets team gives ’em all sorts of hell just one step from the Super Bowl. Sort of like a chip leader passing on a chance to eliminate a short stack, only to see that player then double up a few times to become a real threat to take it all away.

That Jets defense is obviously going to have to step it up to slow down Manning et al. And New York will absolutely have to run the ball effectively to chew up the clock and keep Indy’s offense off the field. Here’s hoping they keep that momentum going — first launched just four weeks ago in that game versus Indy — and make things interesting Sunday.

As far as the NFC Championship between the Minnesota Vikings and New Orleans Saints goes, I’m mainly just looking for a good game there. Really, whoever wins that one will make for an interesting story.

So enjoy the weekend all, whether it be filled with Rush Poker, monitoring the Jets’ rushing attack, or rushing around doing something else.

Like listening to Rush!

Related posts:

1. Full Tilt introduces Rush Poker, the world’s fastest poker game Full Tilt Poker is taking the online poker action…
2. SPORTSBETTING.COM helps you decide if you should jump on the Jets bandwagon or just stick with the Colts It will be a David vs. Goliath-like battle when…
3. Party Poker releases new Card Rush promotion Online poker site PartyPoker.com is about to unveil the…

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Opened up PokerStars yesterday for a brief session. While scanning the available tables I noticed one with a little yellow square before it indicating that I had taken a note on a player at that table. That’s a relatively new feature at Stars, I believe. Curious, I opened the table, saw the player, and read the note.

I’m not as diligent a note-taker as I should be. Nor am I necessarily always confident in the quality of my notes, either. A lot of times inspiration for the note comes from a single hand, and thus may or may not offer sound information about how the player plays, more generally speaking. Even worse, sometimes that hand involved me taking a bad beat, and the note is really just an outlet for my frustration, a slightly more constructive alternative to whimpering in the chat box.

When I took a look at my note for this particular player — I’ll call him Drifter23 — I realized that it was indeed partially an example of one of those dubious notes taken after I’d lost a hand. The note read “gambler; won big pot v. me after getting it in real bad; plays PLO50 mostly, six-tabling (PLO25-6).” That latter designation tells me where I had encountered him — at a $25 max. buy-in, six-handed pot-limit Omaha table. Which is where I was finding him now. With a seat open on his left.

Noting that he’d more than doubled up at this table (to about $55), I took the seat with a vague expectation that I might well be playing a big pot with Drifter23. A couple of orbits went by without much incident other than the two of us having battled for a couple of smallish pots in blind-vs.-blind hands.

Then came a hand in which Drifter23 minimum-raised to 50 cents from UTG+1, I folded a crap hand from the cutoff, then a player I’ll call RowdyRon, who had $26.45 to start the hand, reraised pot (to $1.85) from the button. The blinds folded, and Drifter23 made the call. The flop came . Drifter23 checked, and RowdyRon bet $2.50 — about half the pot. Drifter23 then check-raised pot to $11.35, and after thinking for a while RowdyRon finally folded, conceding the $8.65 pot to Drifter23.

An unremarkable hand, it seemed, until the chat started up:

Drifter23: i thought you were gonna take it all that time
RowdyRon: fk up nit
Drifter23: youre more of a nit than i am for sure
RowdyRon: go suck a ball sack
RowdyRon: and buy lotto

The chat revealed at least three things to me. For one, these two apparently had butted heads some before I got there, it seemed. Secondly, RowdyRon’s calling Drifter23 a “nit” didn’t seem to jibe with my note on the dude, while Drifter23’s denial perhaps did. (In fact, I’m going to guess from the action and subsequent chat that Drifter23 had flopped a draw there and was ready to play for stacks — not that “nit”-like, really.) And thirdly, RowdyRon was clearly a jerk.

The chirping continued, and it became clear that the pair’s conversation had indeed probably begun sometime earlier. It also revealed a few more things.

Drifter23: as i said, if lotto gave me these odds…
RowdyRon: thats why ur break even over 50k hands
RowdyRon: what a wste of life
Drifter23: for sure
Drifter23: quite terribad
RowdyRon: i recommend find a new hobby
RowdyRon: thats just incredible
Drifter23: cheers
Drifter23: i recommend stop breaking pstars rules btw =)

I thought I had a little bit of extra info on Drifter23 when I’d sat down at the table, having taken my note on him during that earlier session. But RowdyRon knew even more. He’d obviously taken a peek at Poker Table Ratings to discover more about his nemesis. I wrote about this site a couple of weeks ago, one which tracks all cash games and where one can look up any player’s number of hands played, net profit/loss, and BB/100 for all stakes/games. One can even do some cursory analysis regarding their looseness/aggression, replay hands or sessions, among a few other investigations.

Drifter23’s reference there to PokerStars’ rules alludes to the fact that the site forbids players from accessing Poker Table Ratings for such information. In fact, the way Stars’ rules are written, one isn’t to look at PTR while playing (something Stars can, theoretically, check for), nor even while away from the tables, although there’s no way Stars can enforce that prohibition.

Unless, of course, someone pipes up in the chat box to volunteer that he’s accessed such info.

RowdyRon: now u angry hey
RowdyRon: i hit a nerve?
Drifter23: my observations tell me that only one of us are crying
RowdyRon: or learn to play
RowdyRon: youll be better off either way
Drifter23: thanks =)

As play continued, I thought about my little note on Drifter23. Hadn’t really attached that much value to it in the first place, but now I realized how easy it was to discover much, much more about him if I so desired. I also was now playing with an awareness that RowdyRon may well be checking my stats to see if I were a winning player, if I were a “nit,” and so forth.

In that post from a couple of weeks ago, I expressed a bit of bother about being tracked so closely (and not having the ability to opt out of the tracking). Having thought about it some more, I guess I’m less worried about it, although I still feel like my opponents’ knowledge of me ideally should be limited to hands they’ve played against me. And I remain cynical about sites having rules they can’t really enforce.

Kind of appreciated Drifter23’s reference to what his “observations” were telling him there, which I took as a cheeky allusion (intended or not) to RowdyRon’s having supplemented his observations with extra data.

I liked Drifter23’s apparent attitude as well. Can’t do much about folks investigating you like this. Nor about folks giving you hell in the chat box. Saying “cheers” and “thanks” and typing smiley faces seems as appropriate a response as any, I guess.

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Ever get the feeling you’re being watched? Used to be just the paranoid few who were afflicted by this malady. But hey, it’s 2010. We may not have hover cars, but we do have Google Earth. And a ton of other ways to leave our footprints — actual, virtual, etc. — thus helping others track our every move.

There’s been a lot of talk lately in online poker about the various tools available with which one can track one’s opponents. The big blow-up regarding that Brian Hastings-Isildur1 session from 12/8/09 — the one in which Hastings took around $4.2 million off the mystery man in less than 3,000 hands of $500/$1,000 heads-up pot-limit Omaha — had to do with Hastings’ having perhaps benefited from some “data mining” of Isildur1 performed by his CardRunners buddy Brian Townsend (see “Digging for Gold (Mining Isildur1)” for more.)

In a subsequent interview with PokerNews, Isildur1 made known his intention to make a “formal complaint” to the site, Full Tilt Poker, perhaps in an effort to recover his losses, although Tony G’s recent blog post in which he states he might stake Isildur1 seems to suggest the player probably won’t be pursuing the matter. (Tony G also implies there Isildur1 is not, in fact, Viktor Blom.)

If such a grievance were to be pursued, it would be because of the apparent violation of Full Tilt Poker’s “Site Terms” that might have occurred when Townsend shared his findings regarding Isildur1 with Hastings. Such an action perhaps fell under the site’s definition of “an unfair advantage,” namely, “a user accessing or compiling information on other players beyond that which the user has personally observed through his or her own game play.”

Anyhow, it was from following some of the articles and forum threads regarding that incident that I recently became reacquainted with the website Poker Table Ratings. You ever visit this sucker? Wild stuff.

I remember I’d actually visited PTR at least once previously — for example, to watch a replay of that limit hold’em hand on UltimateBet between Phil Hellmuth and DOUBLEBALLER ($400/$800 stakes) in which Hellmuth was strangely shipped the pot despite having the worst hand. The site had gone online back in the spring of 2008, I believe, but I hadn’t really paid much attention to what exactly it offered. Like I say, the recent debates over Hastings and Isildur1 recently led me back to the site in order to explore it more fully.

I started out doing what I imagine most who visit PTR do when they first open the site — I looked up myself. Although PTR prevents full access without having signed up for a free account, one can poke around some without registering. Checked out what they had for me from the two sites where I’ve played just about all of my hands here of late, PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker.

Whoa. Looks like just about everything.

According to the site’s FAQs, they’ve only been tracking PLO since October 2009, meaning they’d only had the last three months or so of my play in their database, since that’s been my only game. I have Poker Tracker and so I have my own, fairly thorough record of what I’ve been doing over the last three months against which to match what PTR was saying.

The site correctly shows how I’ve been doing okay at Stars, but not so well at Full Tilt Poker (particularly lately). Some of the FTP losses were mitigated by that bonus I’d been working off over the last month, but that isn’t reflected in the stats. In addition to wins/losses, you can check my relative looseness/aggressiveness, my showdown frequency/winrate, and look at specific hands with my biggest pots won or lost. You can even replay some of my recent sessions in their entirety.

Ooh, whether I’m winning or losing, can’t say I like that too much.

There’s also a way to see my top ten “enemies” and “friends” — that is, the players against whom I’ve won the most and lost the most since October. Checking PTR’s figures against what I have in Poker, it looks like their list is pretty close to mine. The amounts aren’t exactly the same, and there are a couple of guys in my records that don’t show up in theirs, but on the whole the lists match up pretty closely.

PTR goes so far as to offer to sell you hand histories, too. For example, if I wanted to, I could buy 5 million hands of PLO played on PokerStars, 0.10/0.25 blinds, 3-6 players for $204.75. Pretty sure doing so would mean gaining “an unfair advantage,” wouldn’t you say?

I emailed PTR to ask about blocking my own stats from searches, and they sent a quick reply letting me know “that feature is not available at this time,” although my request “has been sent to our development team as a possible future enhancement.”

Sure.

I also rechecked Full Tilt Poker’s list of prohibited programs and, yes, Poker Table Ratings is one of the ones “Not Permitted During Play.” Then I looked over at PokerStars’ list of “Third Party Tools and Services FAQ” and noticed how they, too, prohibit users from using Poker Table Ratings — not just during play, but at all times.

Stars actually lists over 50 programs and sites as being out of bounds. The penalty? Well, Stars says if they discover you’re using any of the programs or tools you’ll get a warning. Then, if they find out again, they’ll block Stars from running on your computer. Full Tilt appears to be a little less specific about penalties, but they of course reserve the right to judge each case as they see fit, and “Full Tilt Poker management decisions are final in all matters.”

So I don’t think I’ll be fooling around with Poker Table Ratings anymore, though I imagine some of my opponents will.

Was listening yesterday to the latest episode of the Gambling Tales Podcast (1/2/10) in which Special K and Falstaff finished their interview with Lee Jones, the new poker room manager over at Cake Poker. I haven’t got an account at Cake, but I have to say I’m newly intrigued to get one thanks to the way the site allows one to change one’s Player ID every seven days.

Looks like if you take notes on a player at Cake, those notes remain regardless of the ID change. Still, the feature appears a way to ensure sites like PTR can’t track folks. Not yet, anyway.

What else could sites do to stop the rampant data mining? Seems to me like it wouldn’t be that difficult for sites simply to allow players to “turn off” their names if they wanted to — that even to have a name could be a choice each user makes much like the choice of avatar or photo. You’d appear at the table as “Seat 1” and appear in hand histories as such, too. Would make it marginally more difficult to track one’s own play, I guess, but virtually impossible for sites like PTR to provide such thorough data. I suppose sites could do a lot of other things, too, such as make it impossible even to observe tables without sitting down — although there are obvious reasons why they’d prefer not to go to that extreme.

Will have to think about all of this further. As a recreational player, I like to keep close records of my own play and even explore some of the data in Poker Tracker to try to improve. But I can’t say I care much for being watched so closely by PTR — and not being able to prevent others from having comprehensive access to the same stats whether they’ve played a hand with me or not.

Then again, such is the world in 2010. We’re way beyond 1984. We’re all being watched. Always. Might just have to figure out a way to get used to it.

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