Blackjack ?!?!?!?!?!?!?

Yes, if you notice my bankroll update in the right hand column, you will see a new category for "blackjack." Has the Poker Geek lost his mind from all the bad beats? Having hit $2,000 since he started, has he just decided to blow his bankroll?

Far from it. The answer pretty much boils down to a combination of "because there was no good poker reload bonuses available" and "because I don't hate money." Even though blackjack is a -EV game even when played with perfect strategy, due to the bonuses currently available at a variety of online casinos it actually becomes a massively +EV endeavor. The basic idea is that the casinos are giving you so much money to play, that it much more than makes up for what you are expected to lose. Read that again - if you play you will lose money on your initial deposit, and there is no strategy and/or betting scheme that can change that. However, the amount of sign-up bonus the casino gives you far outstrips that expected loss amount.

The structure of a typical (cashable) bonus is the following: you make an initial deposit, the casino deposits your bonus money immediately, contingent upon you wagering a total amount of money until the bonus will be satisfied. To give a concrete example, the bonus I just finished (Intercasino) was a 100+100/2500 cashable bonus, meaning that for my deposit of $100, the casino added $100 immediately, and I have to place a total of $2,500 in bets before I can withdraw. The plan is to play perfect basic strategy and make very small bets to reduce the risk of going broke.

What can I expect in profit from this bonus played this way? For the sake of calculation ease I will use the figure of 0.5% as the house advantage against perfect basic strategy. Some sites have even less of a house advantage, and some slightly more, but the 0.5% will do for basic calculation / estimation. This figure means that for every $1 bet, the house will make $0.005. In the case of our $2,500 wagering requirement, this means the house will make (on average) $12.50. Thus, we are left with $187.50 for an (average) profit of $87.50 for this bonus.

As it turns out, you can increase your EV very slightly by betting more, but this also increases your Risk of Ruin. The main reason for me to bet more than the minimum is to trade off a bit of risk in order to decrease my clearing time (thus increasing my hourly rate) - not to increase my EV by a minuscule amount.

OK, so how long would this bonus take to clear? When I played, I was going through a bit more than 300 hands per hour. This seems like a good enough assumption - although this number could likely be pushed closer to 400/hr with dedicated play, better memorizing of the basic strategy chart and focus. Using the 300/hr assumption we obtain the following table:


This hourly rate is much, much greater than at poker (at least at the levels I am currently playing), but as could maybe be expected the variance is greater. Much greater, even for the lowest betting limits. Exactly how much greater? Stay tuned for the next blog post, where I anticipate much more math (and graphs!) As you can see from the amount listed in my bankroll, I ran rather "hot" on this first bonus (cue the conspiracy theorists, please!) winning $250 in a bit under 3 hours by flat-betting $3/hand. This corresponds to about $90/hr, but the expectation for a bonus like this should match the above table - about $31.50/hr for what I was betting. Like I said, I was running hot, and this is just the positive side of the previously mnetioned variance.

There are affiliate sites (much like PSO) that will give you even more cash for signing up through them. For example, I signed up through GamesGifts.com, which will give me an additional $250 for clearing 5 casinos.

A word of warning: Not all sites allow blackjack to clear the bonus. Not all bonuses are cashable - some are "sticky" bonuses, but are best left to after you exhaust all of the available cashable bonuses. Some sites (including Intercasino) charge you a $1 withdrawal fee (kind of ticky-tack, considering the amount you wager with them, but hey, them's the rules.....)

As you can tell, I've done quite a bit of reading on the subject, but am no means an expert. Anyone interested enough in this can follow up with pages off of casinobonuswhores.com, casinodave.com, and the 2+2 Internet Bonuses message boards.

I don't enjoy this as much as I do poker - how could I? I personally get no thrill out of the act of betting itself (in fact, I'm likely one of the more risk-averse people you'll ever meet), and there is no decision-making / strategizing anywhere. It is just reading a strategy right off a chart, and makes you feel like a blackjack-playing robot. At the same time, I don't hate money, and would hate to not take advantage of the situation as it exists right now. I expect to split my time somewhat between blackjack and poker and see how it goes.

A heater at $1/$2

So, due to a combination of chasing a specific fish, dropping 50+ BB at $0.50/$1 the night before, and some prodding from poker1eh, I decided to play a bit of $1/$2 this weekend. I figured, what better site than Paradise to try it? I was just clearing the last of my bonus there, and the tables there are the softest of any site I've tried. For the record, the only site I had tried $1/$2 at before was Prima, and I got absolutely hammered (lost $83 in 1400 hands or so).

Well, today the deck ran me over. I made $67.25 in 84 hands, for a nice clip of 40 BB/100. :-) I take no credit for any of it - it was all good hands and having them hold up. Note this still leaves me in the red for $1/$2 overall, but certainly doesn't hurt the bankroll or the confidence. A sample of hands:

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The very first hand I played:

Paradise Poker, Limit: $1/$2, 10 players

Pre-flop: (10 players) Hero is CO with 9♠ 9♦

UTG calls, 4 folds, MP3 calls, Hero raises, 2 folds, BB calls, UTG calls, MP3 calls.

Flop: 9♣ T♣ T♠ (4.5SB, 4 players)

BB checks, UTG checks, MP3 checks, Hero checks.

Turn: J♣ (2.25BB, 4 players)

BB bets, UTG folds, MP3 calls, Hero raises, BB folds, MP3 calls.

River: 6♥ (7.25BB, 2 players)

MP3 checks, Hero bets, MP3 calls.

Results:

Final pot: 9.25BB

MP3 shows T♥ 4♥

Knowing what he had, I likely missed some bets. The turn card was a total action killer.

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Paradise Poker, Limit: $1/$2, 10 players

Pre-flop: (10 players) Hero is MP3 with J♥ J♣

4 folds, MP2 calls, Hero raises, Button folds, SB calls, BB calls, MP2 calls.

Flop: A♦ J♠ 2♥ (8SB, 5 players)

SB checks, BB folds, MP2 bets, Hero calls, SB calls.

Turn: 8♣ (5.5BB, 4 players)

SB checks, MP2 bets, Hero raises, SB folds, MP2 calls.

River: 7♠ (9.5BB, 3 players)

MP2 checks, Hero bets, MP2 calls.

Results:

Final pot: 11.5BB

MP2 shows A♠ K♣

Wow - hate to be selfish, but I feel like should have gotten more action from the big Ace!

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Paradise Poker, Limit: $1/$2, 10 players

Pre-flop: (10 players) Hero is MP2 with A♠ A♦

UTG calls, UTG+1 calls, 2 folds, Hero raises, 2 folds, Button calls, SB folds, BB 3-bets, UTG folds, UTG+1 calls, Hero caps, Button calls, BB calls, UTG+1 calls.

Flop: 5♠ 6♠ K♠ (17.5SB, 4 players)

BB checks, UTG+1 checks, Hero bets, Button folds, BB calls, UTG+1 calls.

Turn: 9♥ (10.25BB, 3 players)

BB bets, UTG+1 calls, Hero raises, BB folds, UTG+1 calls.

River: 4♣ (15.25BB, 2 players)

UTG+1 checks, Hero bets, UTG+1 calls.

Results:

Final pot: 17.25BB

UTG+1 shows J♥ 8♣

Yes, if you are counting, UTG+1:

• Limped in EP with J8o
• Called 2 cold back to him preflop
• Called the cap preflop
• Stuck around on the flop with no pair, no draw in a pot that was 4-way capped PF.
• Called down with jack high

He's now on my buddy list. :-)

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These were by no means the only hands I won over those 84, but I'm sure my readers can only take so much!

Poker Hiatus

This is gonna be a short post - I will be going on vacation from July 1-9 and will not be playing over that time. In fact, since I haven't played since clearing my Prima bonus last weekend, by the time I get back and into it again it will be over two weeks without playing a hand. Longest break since I started on this journey. At the very least I'll have a nice bonus / site to come back to - just today Paradise put out a 25% up to $100, 10x bonus with no expiry. Sweet.

And, just to get some math in, it occurs to me that I can use my PokerTracker database (which is now over 200K hands!) to answer a simple question - is there anyone out there losing at a rate that is greater than they could clear (say) a 10x bonus?

To take a concrete example, let's take the above Paradise bonus (10x, $100) and see what that works out to if you clear at $0.50/$1.00. The percentage of hands at that level which are raked according to my database is about 43.5%, so to get 1,000 raked hands, one would need to play about 2,300 dealt-hands. In order to lose money overall, they'd have to lose $100 in those 2,300 hands, which works out to -4.35 BB/100.

So, I did a filter in my database of all players at $0.50/$1.00 who have played at least 2,300 hands at that level. I have 46 players in this category. As it turns out, there is only ONE player out of those 46 that is losing at a rate greater than that. In fact, this person is losing at an amazing rate of -8.5 BB/100 over 3,000 hands. The next-worst player is losing at -3.46 BB/100, just to give you some perspective on how bad this guys' play is. No, neither of those players are me. And, no, I'm not going to tell you their screen names! :-)

The other 45 people are either winning or are losing slowly enough that the would come out of such a 10x bonus still cash-positive, which only reinforces my previous calculations about bonus chasing.

The corresponding numbers at $1/$2 are 1600 dealt-hands and -3.1 BB/100. I actually have 4 out of 42 players losing at that rate or greater over a 1,600+ hand stretch. I really don't know what to make of that as compared to the $0.50/$1.00 numbers, but just thought I'd throw it out there.

$3/$6 at Casino Windsor

Well, poker1eh and I decided to go play a bit of live poker Saturday night - a bit of $3/$6 limit Hold'Em at Casino Windsor. Given that our other options were $1/$2 NL ($100 max buy-in), or $10/$20 NL ($500 min buy-in), I think we chose the right game.

My primary goal for the night was to pay attention and see how accurately I could put people on hands. Specifically (given how these games have gone before - typical low-limit limp-fests) I wanted to pay particular attention to what players chose to raise with preflop or take aggressive action on postflop. My secondary goal was to play "proper" poker - that is, to ensure that I'd play the hand exactly the same way as if I was playing $0.50/$1, ignoring the fact that I was playing for 6 times the stakes.

We arrived at a bit after 6:00 (to try and beat the Friday night crowd) and amazingly enough both got seated immediately at the same table. Much to poker1eh's delight (I'm sure), he got the seat two to my left. In the first button revolution it was readily apparent that this was a typical fishy table - I don't think we saw a preflop raise for at least 2 button revolutions, and had 5-6 people to the flop. We even had one guy who was somewhat unsure how that whole betting-thing worked, and seemed to call down with anything. Yum.

A few hands I remember from the evening:

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Not too far into the evening: early position limper, folded to me in late position, I raise with AQ, knock out the blinds and get it heads up.

Flop Axx. Check/bet/call
Turn K. Check/bet/call (although he took a LONG time to call that bet)
River 6. Check/bet/call

He flips over A6. I guess I should be fortunate he didn't raise me on the river. Nice 3 outer.

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44 in mid position, I limped behind another limper, the guy to my left raised, and knocked out everyone else except me (including the original limper) .

Flop J44.

Wow. I thought only online games were rigged. :-)

I check/called the flop.
Turn was a blank. I checked (going for the check-raise), and the guy checked behind. Bummer.
I bet the river blank and he called. He didn't show but claimed he had no part of the board and would have folded to a turn bet from me. Oh why couldn't he have had a big pair or AJ?

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Early position limper, folded to me in the CO, I limp with JTs, and the button raises. He knocks out both blinds but keep me and the EP limper.

Flop AQTr

check/check/button bets, EP calls, I call. Pot is easily big enough to try to hit one of my 6 outs (4 Kings, 2 tens)

Turn K. And EP bets into me! Sweet! I raise, the button calls and EP calls.
River blank, checked to me, I bet, and both call.

EP had KT, button had AA. Nice pot - I figured for sure I would have to split it with one of them. I am truly shocked that both of them call my river bet.

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It was folded around to me in the CO, and I raised with AQo. Poker1eh took a long time to think about it in the SB and finally called, as did the BB.

Flop 3 low rags.
It was checked to me, I bet, poker1eh called, and we lost the BB.
Turn another low rag. poker1eh checked, and I checked behind.
River was yet another rag, poker1eh bet out and I called. He showed down A-worse kicker and I win.

This was definitely a "read" play - when he took so long to call preflop, I knew it wasn't a pair or suited connectors or anything, more than likely two high cards. And by the river I was ahead (or tied) with every high card hand except AK, and that one he would have three-bet me with preflop. Thus the call. Of course, if I was that sure of my read, I should have raised him. :-)

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An MP raiser, and I 3-bet in the SB with AK. We lose everyone else, and he just calls.

Flop 3 low rags. I bet, he calls
Turn another rag. I bet, he calls
River another rag, I check, he bets, I call and get shown KK.

The only reason I fired again on the turn is that I had seen this guy raise in EP with A9 a button revolution previously. But in general he was showing down pretty good hands, so even if I did fire at the turn, at the very least I could have (reasonably safely) folded to the river bet.

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Few limpers, I get a free look in the BB with 65o.

Flop 955. I bet out and only an EP caller sticks around.
Turn A. I bet out, and get called
River 5. (!!!!!!). I bet out, get raised, I 3-bet, and he only calls me. Flips up Ax and I take down a nice one.

Yes, if you're counting, that's two quads for me tonight. As a side note, the very next hand after this one, the guy I just beat flopped a flush and lost to turned quad queens. Yes, one guy lost to quads on two consecutive hands. Like I said, I thought only online games were fixed.....

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It was a limpfest, and I limped in the CO with Kx suited.

Flop QQx with two of my suit. Bet from EP, I call, and the button calls.
Turn 8, completing my flush. EP bets, I raise, we lose the button, and EP 3-bets. I actually said "this is gonna get expensive" at this point, to which poker1eh replied "looks like it already is" I just call the 3-bet.
River was a blank, call his river bet and get shown Q8. Ouchy.

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How did I do as far as my goals? As far as the first goal (pay attention, and putting people on hands), I give myself an B+. I was shocked how easy it was to put some people on hands. The only reason I don't get a better grade is that by the end of the night (about 6 and a half hours!) my attention had started to decrease. As far as playing "proper" poker, I think I'll give myself an A-. Preflop I think I played very well given the loose conditions (e.g. pocket pairs and suited aces playable from any position for a limp) and postflop I think I only got out of line twice (the AK hand above, and a flush+OESD that I check/raised on the turn heads up). I missed one or two equity value raises with a flush draw with 2+ opponents which is something that I need to work on in my online game as well, so I can't blame the stakes for that one. I'm actually very happy with the way I played my draws - it seemed none of them came in, but that didn't make them any less correct to play.

At the end of the night I was up $11. Figure even with the shuffle machine we saw (at most) 35 hands an hour, or somewhere around 225 hands the whole night for a winrate of 0.8 BB/100.

But, you start doing the math and see how expensive it is to play at a casino and how much better this win would have been if I had just played the same hands at $3/$6 online:

1) The dealer toke. By rough estimate, I probably won about 15 pots over the evening, each of which had a dealer toke of $1. Thats $15 that would have remained in my stack if I was online.

2) The increased rake. The casino rake is double what the online rake is: 10%, although it caps at $5. Again, figure I won 15 pots over the evening and each one was about 5 BB ($30), and thus raked $3. So I paid $45 in rake over the evening, of which I'd have only paid $22.50 in rake online. That would be another $22.50 in my stack.

So, all in all, if the same events would have transpired online, I'd estimate my I would have ended the night up almost $50 instead of the $11 I actually won. Like I said, expensive!

Just for fun, let's figure out how much the toke and rake are in terms of BB/100. If you use my average win rate online to judge how many pots I'll typically win, it'll be about 8.5%, so I'll pay $8.50/100 hands, or 1.4 BB/100 just in toke. Likewise, if those 8.5 pots are raked at an average of $3, I will pay $25.50 in rake, or $12.25 more per 100 hands than online. That is about 2 BB/100 in increased rake.

So, the conclusion is that it actually costs you about 3.4 BB/100 in increased costs to play $3/$6 at this casino! Think about it - that is truly amazing. If you are crushing the low limit games online to the tune of 3 BB/100 (which I am not), you would actually be a 0.4 BB/100 loser playing the same game at the casino. I knew that casino play was expensive, but I really had no idea how expensive. That being said, I think the competition at the casino is far weaker than even an awesome Party table, but 3.4 BB/100 is a hell of a disadvantage to try to overcome.

But, looked at another way, it is actually a pretty cheap way to spend an evening. For a more typical 5 hour playing session, 3.4 BB/100 works out to about $35. That's only $7/hr which is a remarkably cheap way to spend a Saturday evening. In fact, that's a (much) lower hourly rate than I spent on golf earlier that day, plus I actually have a chance to do something I like and have a chance to come home with more money than I started with (unlike golf!).

Ah Prima, you !@#!% b1tch......

Well, it has been a while since my last blog post, and I can't really say that poker has treated me that well. Or, rather, I should say Prima hasn't treated me too well. Here is my last month of play at Prima:


The upswing at the right was last night, where they evidently let some fish loose on the Prima network - instead of the usual 16-20% table VPIP and $4 average pots, we had 40-55% VPIP and $7-11 average pots. I have never seen a night like it on Prima yet, but hope it continues - I have some ground to make up!

I have some bizarre numbers over the 2,000 hands I've played there - my worst hands are

• AA (-2.25 BB/hand) - won 3 out of 8, and all three of those were either blind steals or over on the flop.
• AKo (-1.39 BB/hand) - won 4 out of 14, and two of those were blind steals.
• 99 (-1.19 BB/hand) - won 2 out of 4, with one blind steal.
• 88 (-1.12 BB/hand) - won 1 out of 13. At least it was a decent pot and not a blind steal
  
• AQo (-0.91 BB/hand) - won 5 out of 19 with two of them blind steals.
  

I was actually down $54 on my first 49 pairs there, but have "come back" and now I am "only" down $10 on my 113 pairs that I've seen. Hard to win with numbers like that.....

Oh, and I made a bankroll update and will attach my latest "overall" graph:


I am within one night of clearing Bet365 and was going to head over to PokerRoom to get away from Prima, but if the fish are going to stay at there I may look up a Wild Jack bonus or some such.