This week my Mom won a poker tournament at the Las Vegas Planet Hollywood. She won over $900 for taking first in the multi-table tournament her biggest poker accomplishment since she knocked my dad out of a poker tournament final table in the early 1980’s.

I took down a tournament on Full Tilt Poker, it was a 7 Card Stud tournament and I was so dialed in that I nearly led from start to finish.

My brother took down a Pot Limit Omaha tournament winning over  $1,200 while simultaneously making a final table in a Pot Limit Omaha rebuy tournament for a score of over $2,100.

Go out there this week and win a tournament, good luck!

With my head high up in the clouds about my perceived unbelievable disc golf skills I have come crashing back down to earth at the hands of Good Luck Chuck, who for the second week in a row showed me what reality really looks like. And it looks a lot like I am going to have to put my leap into professional disc golf on hold if I can’t even beat my friends. What I am learning is it’s not all about the skill shots and the power shots, because I more often then not out-drive Good Luck Chuck and AAron with quite a bit more consistent accuracy then either of them have. I also regularly make some amazing recovery shots out of the woods or from behind trees, and my approach shots are usually a thing of beauty, but, and this is a huge but, I am a Train Wreck whenever I %$#ing THINK. When your out there and something goes wrong the key is to stay relaxed, put the previous shots behind you and focus only on the current situation. Frisbee golf can make you feel like your trapped inside a pressure cooker, but the only way to keep from exploding is to keep yourself in check by not allowing yourself to get tilted from something that happened in the past.

Obvious, the analogy to poker here is along these same lines. You can have world class skills, dead on reads, and a plethora of experience, but if you continue to throw all of those positives to the side and fall into the common trap of making decisions because you have become emotionally charged about something in the past then you are setting yourself up for a disaster. This is known as tilt, and it the single, biggest leak that affects poker players. Every poker player.

Bad beats in poker are similar to that unexpected random tree branch that deflects your disk and costs you the hole. However, in the scheme of a round of disc golf or an entire poker session, that is only one single incident and it will not by itself determine your success or failure. But if you tilt because of it, and all your later Frisbee shots or poker decisions are influenced by your bad break then it will a huge negative impact on your overall results. Unlucky breaks or tough beats happen to everyone, but winners compartmentalize their emotions and keep them separate from their future decisions while losers just look for excuses.

Remember, excuses are like assholes, everybody’s got one.

The stage was set… Player A has just won the biggest pot of all time, nearly eliminating 2 players in 1 hand and was now facing an extremely shortstacked Player B who can’t believe his good luck that he snuck not only into the money but into 2nd place at the same time when he figured he’d be the bubble boy.

The stage was set… Player A was stacking his chips for 10 minutes after that hand where he flopped trip fours and sloppy Player C chose not to check the flop with his Ace-Queen, ace high hand, but erroneously go all-in for shits and giggles, except Player A had set that stage with a trap and broke the laughter.

The stage was set… It was over, all except the cleanup because a 20:1 chip advantage is as sure a sure thing as there is in poker.

The stage was set… Everything was going player A’s way. Player B had Ace Jack when Player A had the Ace 5. With two pair on board Player A and Player B chopped the pot and kept Player B from getting some much needed ammo.

The stage was set… For victory shortly thereafter, Player A with Jack-Jack and Player B with 6-6.

The stage was set… For the Greatest Comeback Ever!

yada yada yada…

After gaining a slight chip-lead, Player B agreed to chop the pot and save Player A from all sorts of embarrassment.

The stage was set… with $20 held out of the prize pool for a winner take all Morley Field Disc Golf heads up battle, Player A had a chance to get back some of the respect he lost. But Player B wasn’t done shmacking Player A around as there was another heads up meltdown by Player A and simultaneous clinic by Player B.

Player B owns Player A, end of story

There is a Pro Poker School hosted tournament on Pokerstars this Sunday, July 27th, a $22 buyin that can be found under the private tourny tab at 9 pm ET the password is scottw. Half of all cashes will go to help save the life of fellow poker player Scott Kowalske, who is fighting for his life from a rare degenerative disorder, Chronic Wasting Disease. Scott’s last chance is a stem cell treatment that may be able to treat his disease, and he needs to raise another $10,000 to pay for the treatment. Here is a story in Cardplayer.com about Scott. If you play poker on Pokerstars, consider playing in this tournament to help a fellow poker player in need. Thanks

First off congrats to Surfer Dude Steve who won the poker home game last Wednesday for a couple hundo, with my wife taking second. Playing some of his best poker this summer, Surfer Dude has been on a tear. Between the tidal surge of Surfer Dude and the American Airlines AAron (who shocked me by beating me by 2 strokes in Frisbee Golf this week), there has been few others who have been owning at the home game lately. Even after I took the first three hands of the night, and 5 out of the first 6, I still only managed to bubble the money taking 4th when a huge overbet all-in preflop with 5-5 hit the reef when Surfer Dude decided to hang ten calling with A-7 and spiking an ace.  The up and down and up and down and up and finally down night I had was epic, but not worth bitching about anymore so all I am going to say is watch out Wednesday I am honing in on winning this week.

btw, the title has nothing to do with this post except indirectly because the Red Hot Chili Peppers albums were the music we were listening to last week while we played. Well except for their best song/album, Californication, which our poker hosts/dj’s don’t own because they didn’t want to cross over into the ‘pop’ crowd. Go Figure.

ps, The WSOP TV coverage begins this week!

As I write this, the final table of the 2008 World Series of Poker is pretty much set, only 11 of nearly 7,000 players remain. They will continue to play until there is 9 players left and then the final nine will play in November to see who the WSOP Champion is. By playing in November, which is a long five months away, ESPN will have a chance to build the suspense. While they air the main event on TV over the next couple months ESPN will have a chance to familiarize their viewers with the final table personalities. Then in November, the final table will be played live on TV which should make for some amazing reality TV as the winner will walk away with a cool $9 million dollars. All of the nine finalists will be paid right away the amount they would get if they finished ninth, so the nine will have plenty of money ~$900,000 to spend immediately. On top of that, with so much time and excitement building, these players will get so much publicity and will have unlimited amount of endorsement deals offered to them.

One girl, a reporter for pokernews, nearly made the final table but came up short by getting knocked out with two tables remaining. Her name, Tiffany Michelle, will be well known as she got plenty of camera coverage on her way towards making history. An aspiring actress, her career will get a huge boost in the coming months and she may appear on the big screen sooner rather then later thanks to her remarkable run in this years WSOP.

The current chip counts are like this:

Dennis Phillips	PokerStars	27090000
David ‘Chino’ Rheem	PokerStars	16100000
Peter Eastgate	PokerStars	13400000
Ylon Schwartz	PokerStars	13225000
Dean Hamrick	Full Tilt Poker	13100000
Ivan Demidov	PokerStars	13100000
Joe Bishop		12400000
Scott Montgomery	Full Tilt Poker	10100000
Craig Marquis	Full Tilt Poker	9700000
Darus Suharto	PokerStars	7000000
Kelly Kim		4900000

My pick to win is David “Chino” Rheem. A cool cat who I’ve met several times and a good friend of my brother. Earlier today he was down to just 1.3 million chips and his comeback has been nothing short of spectacular. Go Chino!

On the road now for a week at the 2008 World Series of Poker here in Fabulous Las Vegas! Wifey, doggie, and me jumped into our car last week when we found out that my dad was 3rd in chips with 20 players left in the $1,500 HORSE tournament (HORSE is a rotation of limit games, H stands for holdem, O stands for Omaha h/l, R stands for Razz (7 card stud played for low), S stands for Stud, and the E stands for Stud hi/low eight or better). With Phil Hellmuth as the current chipleader, I was envisioning my dad crushing him heads up for the the title and bracelet. As it turned out, I was still driving when he got knocked out 16th after a run of bad cards, which was still a very impressive showing considering almost 2,000 players entered that event.

The main event is on right now, my brother Brett Jungblut and my dad both advanced to day 2. Brett has about 22.5k chips and my dad has about 13k. Players started with 20,000 chips, but with over half the field getting eliminated the first day it is most important to just make it to day 2 where anything can happen. Brett Jungblut was seated next to Allen Cunningham, a multiple bracelet winner and 4th place finisher in the 2006 main event when Jamie Gold won the WSOP Championship.

The good news is that we brought along camera, who is very exhausted at the moment having taken over 2000 pictures so far. Camera caught some serious pros (Doyle Brunson, Jerry Yang, Daniel Negreanu, Johnny Chan, Phil Hellmuth, Greg Raymer, Chris Moneymaker, and many more (if you don’t know these names, you have to check out Faces of Poker) and one beautiful movie actress from American Pie Shannon Elizabeth.

I’ll be putting the pictures we’ve taken so far up on Pro Poker School website when I return home. Next year I’ll get a press pass so I don’t have to risk sending wifey inside the ropes to take photos only to have her nearly thrown out…

As you see here in this picture, wifey snaps a great pic of Sully Erna of the band Godsmack, but if you look in the background you have a hater pointing her out to the floor personnel at the World Series of Poker whom politely asked her to stay behind the ropes.

This cameraman is obviously a FTT (Fucking Tattle Tale) and seriously needs to get a life.

I know I ripped the title “It was a Crazy Game of Poker” off of the band Oar, but that song is befitting of our weekly home game this week.

I haven’t written alot about particular hands the last few months because there really hasn’t been that many amazing hands worth talking about. This week, there were so many crazy unbelievable hands I might have trouble remembering them all.

Everyone was in good spirits, probably because the spirits were flowing, and we had a couple of new faces at the table. Because I am lousy with names, lets just go ahead and name them Roller Coaster Jimmy and the Lucky MoFo. It was pretty apparent early they seemed to be a little over their heads playing against such superstars as myself, but they hung in there long enough to have the deck hit them in the face. First was Roller Coaster Jim, who had won several hands in a row with ace high and a pair of shit (threes) to take the chiplead, and then comes the biggest hand of the night.

After a preflop raise which was called by half the table, I dealt the flop of 3-9-J with two spades. The action went something like this, bet…raise…all-in, all-in, all-in, all-in, all-in. So 5 players all in on this action packed flop. What could they all possibly have?

Surfer Dude turns over pocket 10’s. AAron was AAslowplaying and in AAnotsoenvious multiway hand with his AA. The short haired ex-hippie threw down the top two pair, jacks and nines, and Neildot.com had something relevant that I don’t remember. Of course the Roller Coaster was in there as well with the 7-8 of spades! The queen on the turn gave Surfer Dude an openended straight draw and some hope, while AAron was hoping for a non-spade 3 or a non-spade Q for two pair, while the top two pair hand was hoping for an absolute brick. With the tension in the air so thick you could cut it with a knife, the 4 of spades came crashing down sending 4 players to the rail in one hand as the Roller Coaster flushed the competition down the drain.

Roller Coaster continued to play loose and pretty much let everyone at the table double through him by calling with king high on a whole bunch of hands. The major recipient was none other then the player formerly known as Blake J. Nolan but now known as the “Angle Shooter”. In fact, after the Roller Coaster pushed nearly his entire stack his way, he decided to board the Roller Coaster and give all his chips away to the rookie, Lucky Mofo. In back to back hands, Blake J. Nolan made trips on the turn and had the Lucky Mofo in trouble with his pair, but the river both hands paired the board with the two-outter Lucky Mofo needed to win with a bigger full house then Blake J. Nolan had made.

This whole time I am playing phenomenal shortstack poker, biding my time waiting to pounce like a lion hunting his prey. One of the winning hands I had tonight was when I limped with a 9-3 offsuit on the button and the flop came 9-3-3. Everyone checked to me on the flop and so I abliged by checking as well giving everyone a free card and hoping somebody would make a hand. The 4 on the turn got Neildot.com interested as he fired 300 into the pot. With everyone folding in front of me I decided to keep the trap wide open so I just smooth called. The river 6 sent fireworks flying as Neildot.com threw a 500 chip into the pot which I quickly reraised all-in. Without hesitation he called all-in for 1,700 more while proudly flipping up his 2-5 for a runner-runner straight (2-3-4-5-6). I interrupted him while he was reaching to scoop the pot with my table shocking full boat!

Later, I finally get on a roll and win a few hands and become a factor three handed with AAron and Lucky MoFo. I am then dealt ladies (pocket queens). A preflop reraise to 3500 was enough to get the initial raiser AAron out but not the dangerous Lucky Mofo. On a flop of 9-6-4 I move all-in on Lucky Mofo for over 7,000 chips. Lucky Mofo doesn’t hesitate with the I’ve already called 3,500 so I have to call this bet while turning over the K-2 for what appears to be a total of 3 outs (any of the three kings). No king on the turn or the river, but the 5 on the turn and the 3 on the river makes everyone do a double take and notice the wicked straight Lucky Mofo just pulled out of his ass, (2-3-4-5-6). gg (good game) me.

Four Crazy Midnight rebuys by Wifey, the Angle Shooter, Neildot.com, and myself proved to be a waste of money and we were all reeliminated.

After a few minutes of heads up play, AArron and Lucky Mofo split the pot and put an end to the Crazy Game of Poker.

Last blog I threw out some excuses for not blogging, but the truth is I’ve been dominating online poker lately and haven’t been able to stop! I won a tournament and made the final table in 3 consecutive tournaments finishing 7th, 1st, and 3rd. The tournaments only had between 100-200 players in them but still, that is quite an impressive run if I do say so myself. And I do say so myself. I still don’t have an update on this week’s winner at the home game, but even better then that I have an announcement to make. A brand new video of my online poker win this week is available to watch and listen to by going to the home page of Pro Poker School. This is an opportunity of a lifetime, so what are you waiting for, run, jump, fly, click to it and get yourself a bag of popcorn to watch me take down a No Limit Omaha Hi/Low tournament!

I was blogging every week, and then, because of an uber-busy lifestyle a week was skipped and what prey tell happens? I get chastised for it! The French work 30 hour weeks, all jobs give you multiple week vaca’s every year, there are off-seasons in every sport, and I decide to skip one week and get more verbal wtfs’ (what the fucks’) then I can count on my left hand. We all like excuses, because we all know excuses are like assholes… everyone’s got one. So here are mine…

• It was my birthday week! And, since only direct family members seemed to remember my birthday despite my obvious attempt HERE to broadcast it to every1 I got no love. btw, ty Aaron for throwing me a belated b-day wish (with demands).
• Lots of great sporting thingies were on tv the last couple of weeks, like Tiger winning (as I so boldly predicted) the US open on one leg and the Celtics handing the Lake No Show an ass whooping.

But actually the truth is I donked out of the weekly home game tournament early and didn’t have much to say. Since I had been undefeated in June up to last week, I figured that if I skipped a week I might actually win this week and can therefore have something more substantial to say. Well, that didn’t happen so I have to BS for a bit. Good news is that Surfer Dude (aka Steve) who has been on a tear for a month finally broke on through with a win last week and was still alive when I exited this week. Also of news to report, neildot.com finished an impressive 2nd place coming from the CrAzY mIdNiGhT rEbUy (the only one of its kind on the planet). The CrAzY mIdNiGhT rEbUy is a special provision which was implemented into our home games when we moved it from OB to PB (Ocean Beach to Pacific Beach).

The CrAzY mIdNiGhT rEbUy

1. A player who ran out of their two rebuys can come back in
2. After midnight but before 1 am
3. Receiving the starting chip stack of 2,500
4. One time
5. If they leave the premises and travel (walk, bike, drive etc.)
6. At least one mile

Normally, the CrAzY mIdNiGhT rEbUy has little bearing on the game besides fattening the prize pool b/c the average chip stack is well over 15,000 chips and the drunk who goes for it normally doesn’t last long enough to matter. But in this case, neildot.com managed to time his nicely coming in with three players left, knocking Blake J. Nolan out on the bubble and outlasting the shortstack Aaron to parlay his CrAzY mIdNiGhT rEbUy into 2nd place and a 300% ROI (return on investment)!

…and they played happily ever after