Hey everyone,

       It’s been a really long time since I posted a blog entry, so I figured I’d post one to end the year. I’ve had a great year playing poker, both online and live. Sometime around June 9th, I started playing the turbo husngs on Full Tilt, and I played them for a few months. I initially liked the fast structure, but ended up not liking the decreased roi and higher variance with turbo speeds, and thus I stopped playing them mid August. From mid August until September 30th, I played a ton of multi table tournaments. Some of my notable finishes were:

Aug 14th: Finished 2nd out of 576 players in the Full Tilt $24+2 NL Holdem Tournament for $2,147

Aug 22nd: Finished 5th out of 676 players in the Full Tilt $24+2 NL Holdem Tournament for $1,029

Aug 25th: Finished 5th out of 987 players in the Full Tilt $10+1 NL Holdem Tournament for $606

Sep 4th: Fin 4th out of 1334 players in the Full Tilt $10+1 NL Holdem Tournament for  $1,072

Sep 6th: Fin 11th out of 1218 players in the Pokerstars $10 rebuy NL Holdem Tourney for $283

Sep 6th: Fin 9th out of 777 players in the Full Tilt $24+2 NL Holdem Tournament for $309

Sep 15th: Fin 7th out of 825 players in the Full Tilt $10+1 NL Holdem Tournament for $236

Sep 18th: Finished 6th out of 500 players in the Pokerstars $2 rebuy Tournament for $154

        Multi-Table tournaments are very time consuming. You have to literally sit at the computer for 8, 9, 10+ hours straight to get the proper volume in each day, and you only get one five minute break per hour. I didn’t like this aspect of MTT’s, so I decided to go back to playing Heads Up Sngs full time on October 1st, 2010. As most of you know, with husngs, you can take breaks whenever you want, for however long you want, and you can play less hours to make the same money as you would with MTT’s. Also, the week to week variance is lower with husngs, and your graph is obviously gonna be smoother with husngs, leading to less frustration and a better piece of mind. So, since October 1st, I have been  back to grinding heads up sngs full time. I’m currently playing the 50s, 80s, and 100s. Been mixing in a lot of 50s lately because the games load quicker.

        Currently, as of December 26th, I’m ranked 19th on the Full Tilt December Heads Up SNG Highest Limit Leaderboard. As many of you know, this is the first month that Full Tilt invented this leaderboard, with cash prizes awarded to the top 50 on the leaderboard.  My goal is to stay in the top 20 for the month of December, and hopefully I can make it into the Top 10 for the month of January, as long as I put in the proper amount of games.

2011 Goals:

       I plan on playing approximately 5,000 heads up sngs in 2011, consisting exclusively of reg speeds and deepstacks. I will not play any more turbos, and I particularly do not want to play any superturbos, because I don’t feel comfortable with the faster structures. 

      I plan to work on my live 2/5 no limit cash game, to the point where I should be able to make 7-8bb/hr at the live tables. To do this, I will definitely be reading a lot of the Live NL strategy threads on 2+2, and I will be working hard on my live game.

      I will make at least 3 training videos for husng.com. Tentatively, they are scheduled to be released Feb 1, 2011, Feb 20, 2011, and March 15, 2011. These dates may be pushed back a month, but this is the plan for now. If my new videos are well liked, I will be making more as 2011 progresses, but that will be up to how well the husng.com subscribers like the initial ones.

      I plan to win my cousin's 2010 year long football pool which was run on yahoo. There were 13 players, each putting up $20 to start the season back in September. First place is worth a mere $200, and 2nd place is worth $60, but it's more about bragging rights than the money lol. I won the football pool in 2008 and finished 2nd in 2009, thus I'm planning on cementing my football pool dynasty with a win in 2010 lol. The last week of the NFL season is Jan 2nd, so hopefully I can ship the $200 first place to start the year. Currently I have a 3 game lead over the nearest opponent, with the late games yet to be finished today. Ship the cheese lol.

Legislation of Online Poker:

2011 should be an interesting year in the state of New Jersey, where I currently reside. There is about a 99% chance that NJ will become the first state in the UnIted States to legalize online poker, and it will most likely happen in the beginning of January 2011. A few things, following this legalization, could happen.

1)      Full Tilt and Pokerstars could pull out of the state of NJ, so that they can “spin off” into NJ sites, and offer legal online poker in NJ. This scenario has approximately an 80% chance of happening in my opinion, and in the opinions of many great legal minds in the poker legislation forum on 2+2. If this happens, I, along with every other NJ resident, will be unable to play on Full Tilt and Pokerstars from any location within the state. Thus, I will be moving out of state, to Las Vegas Nevada, if this occurs, to continue my husng career on Full Tilt Poker. Living in Las Vegas will also mean that I will be very close to the casinos, which means that I will also be able to play a lot of live games as well. So it should be interesting. I will probably just find an apartment for 6 months, preferably within 5 miles of the Vegas Strip, and just get 6 month leases at a time. Then, eventually, I will find a nice condo near the Strip and purchase it once I’m all settled in my new location.

2)      There’s about a 20% chance that Full Tilt and Pokerstars will not pull out of the state of NJ. If they do not pull out, I will just continue to live in NJ and continue my normal routine from here, moving to Vegas in about 3 ½ years.

       So, to say the least, 2011 should be very interesting! Be sure to check out my new training vids on husng.com in the next few months. Also, you can send me any questions about anything poker related, legislation related, or anything else fwiw, and I will answer them when I get a chance. You could either send me a message through husng.com, or you can send me a message on 2+2 where my name is Brilliant27.

Happy Holidays to everyone, and good luck(skill) in 2011.

Brilliant27