The Sunday Roundup

On the Poker Scene:

Playing NL25, I have managed to win $324.06 since last Tuesday. About $103 of that was bonuses cleared at Littlewoods, Paradise and PokerPlex. I managed to lose a little over $50 playing $1/$2 and $.50/$1 limit on Friday and today, while trying to put a dent in the $100 Holdem Poker bonus, and the new Party 15% to $75 bonus. I am finding that I am preferring NL over fixed limit, but there are times when I have to play fixed in order to clear the bonuses faster. I ran into a horrendous patch of hands getting beat by very poor players. I lost a $50 pot on Saturday with my KK, when a complete fish chased down and hit a set of 3s on the river. That was how my day was going...Awful.

I watched the WPT Mirage tournament that I had taped from Wednesday night. This was the first event in their fourth season, and it was quite a good tournament. Ted Forrest's ability to read the other players was simply amazing. I watched him fold hands that I know I couldn't fold in his position. And he really knows how to change gears. I don't think I saw him play a hand until two players were gone. A kid named Gavin won the $1.1M 1st prize, as he was definitely going through most of his nine lives that night. He won some huge pots when he had one foot out the door. But you cannot win a tournament without some degree of luck.

Right after watching the WPT event, they were broadcasting the final table action of the River Belle.info Monte Carlo Millions. This is a big-stake $10,000 buy-in event, with a nice twist. All of the players who are eliminated before the final table play another "Second Chance" tournament, and the winner of this, gets the 7th and final seat of the final table. I don't know if this person gets 10 x the BB, or if that was the way it worked out, but John Juanda managed to play his way onto the table and was the shortstack with 160K chips on 8K/16K blinds. 7th and 6th place both pay $100,000. The only other notable on the final table was Phil Ivey who had more chips than the rest of the table and, of course, knows how to use them. Juanda went out 6th, and the field was pared down to Ivey and two others when the hour finished. I will try to post the result here after I watch that episode.

Gearing Up for March Madness:

I am a College Basketball Fanatic. My team is the Golden Bears of California. They did very well to finish third in the PAC-10, but going into the final two weeks, definitely had their fate in their own hands. A tough loss to Washington sealed their fate, and then they lost an 11 point lead on the last regular season weekend to UCLA at home. They managed to tie it up and get the overtime, but scored but one point in the extra 5 minutes. I knew at this point that they had to be a lock for the NCAA Tournament. UCLA and Washington finished 1-2, and their were a lot of knowledgeable people who were saying that Arizona, which finished 4th in the PAC-10, would be in the tourney. Although I have seen some strange things in the NCAA arena, both on the basketball and football sides, I couldn't even concoct a way that the Bears could be shut out of the Big Dance, while allowing Arizona in. Much to their credit, the Golden Bears beat USC for the third time this season, rallied in two overtimes to beat the Oregon Ducks who beat Washington. Down 16 at one point in the first half against the UCLA Bruins, Cal went on a 13-0 run at the end of the first half to go into the lockerroom down only 3. They almost caught the Bruins in the second half, only to wilt under the pressure. I think that 2OT win that finished at almost midnight the night before weighed heavily on the visibly tired Bears. They played gamely enough and got to the finals, and were rewarded with a #7 seed. They have NC State on Friday, a game they can definitely win. It will be dependent on Powe getting support from Ubaka and Midgley. It will also be dependent on Hardin staying out of foul trouble.

There is, however, one thing that really bothers me with regards to the PAC-10 Tournament. That is that since it was reinstated in 2001, every single one of them have been hosted in Los Angeles. Now I understand that the venues are larger down there, but why give the two Southern California schools home field advantage every year? So what if the smaller venues won't generate as much revenue? You can always host them in bigger arenas within the area. Let's think about this.

• Of course LA has the capacity to host the tournament.

• Stanford can host in San Francisco, California at the Oakland Coliseum.

• Arizona has the capacity in Phoenix to host a large crowd. This might infringe on Arizona's homecourt advantage, but Arizona State would at least have an advantage.

• The Oregon schools can host in Portland.

• The Washington schools can alternate between Seattle and Spokane, both venue large enough for the tournament.

This way, all the schools could have a part of the advantage without just giving that advantage away to the SoCal schools.

Finally, I think it is about time for the PAC-10 to expand into the PAC-12. I say it is time to bring in Nevada-Reno and UNLV. Both of these programs have outgrown their conferences. The revenue they will bring to the PAC-10, and the revenue brought from the PAC-10 would benefit all parties involved. It will expose both schools to the national spotlight in all collegiate sports activities. It also is a very good fit. Travels times for all schools involved would be minimal.

Well, that's my two cents worth today. I will attempt to keep this blog more up-to-date than I have, but I've been so busy playing poker and living my life, that sometimes I get behind.

Take Care!