Thursday, January 29, 2009

CPL Week 4 - More of the Same (and a first )

Week 4 was a night of rarities, a first time event, and (perhaps) all too common occurrences, ultimately ending in Bill "Comeback Kid" Lanoux's heads up victory over Mike "Blind Me Down" Behr. In this writer's opinion, it's becoming an all too often sight (much like Jefe's absences) with Bill and Blind Me Down pointing in each of the first four weeks of this season.

It would be difficult to not say the biggest hands of the night hit Blind Me Down as his Quad As squashed "Black Widow" Muldoon and he road his boat of 8s full of Ks over Greg "New Life" Durand. Yes, normally it would be difficult to not credit those hands as the big kahunas of the night - except that "New Life" scored a direct hit over Voni "Rookie" Khang with the CPL's ever first ROYAL FLUSH!!! We've had 4 straight flushes and, statistically, we'll get 5 more before another royal is hit - so here's how it went down:

Early in the tourney (indeed, Greg knocked out Voni in 10th with this hand), the flop comes out Kd, Td, Ah. The turn brings the Jh offering up to flush draw possibilities and Broadway. The river comes out the Q of diamonds - putting Broadway on the board. Voni checked and Greg moved all-in with what looked to be a move saying "This is a chopped hand - I'm just going to see if you have the guts to call me." Voni makes the call only to have Greg exclaim with glee "Royal Flush" and show Ad/Jd. Voni does not show her hand - leaving us to wonder why she stayed in the hand the whole way with 8/4 of spades.

Another rarity was the absence of the All-Time Most Matches Played record-holder (and CPL Director, Mark "Verbal" Cardenas"). Phil closes the gap to 1 career match behind Mark.

Big CPL Honorable Mention to Bud "The Monster" Abbott who made a run at having A/J supplant J/T as the most powerful hand in poker. After losing all but 30 chips to Wanda about 5 hands into the night, Bud was able to nurse that short stack back to about 200 or so via a couple of well timed A/J hands. A/J succeeded a couple of other times before it failed big time for "Unabomber". Bud went out in ninth but last through both the 20/40 and 30/60 blinds levels.

And, final CPL Honorable Mentions to Steve and Phil for finally pointing this season - Phil took 4th and Steve was in 5th.

CPL Quote of the Week (there were so many - but this was the cleanest) and delivered in the way that only "Comeback Kid" can deliver lines:

"I play great at the WSO....I play great at FullTi.....I play great on yahoo poker."


CPL (Unadjusted) Leaderboard:
Mike Behr - 63.7
Bill - 56.5
Mike Bowman - 43.1
Greg - 37.8
Bud - 28.9
Voni - 21.4
Malinda - 21.3
Pam - 20.7
Wanda - 20.6
Phil - 11.4
Steve - 10.1
Mark - 3
Jeff M. - 1

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Biggest Upset Since Tyson/Douglas

February 11, 1990 - The 42-1 underdog Buster Douglas with his 29-4-1 with 19 KOs record squares off in the far east (Tokyo) against 37-0 (33 KOs) World Champ Mike Tyson for a title bout. Douglas floors Tyson in the 10th round to take become the undisputed heavyweight champ.

Nearly two decades later (Jan. 24, 2009) - in the nearer east town of Independence, Minnesota - the West Side Poker League (WSPL) came of age in defeating their sensei league, the CPL. Gene "Ninja" Milne gathered his forces for the showdown between these two behemoths. The inter-league competition, comprised of a No Limit Hold 'em match and a HORSE match, would consist of 200 pts (100 pts for each match) with progressively more pts awarded for the higher up a player finished (30 pts to the team who won a match). The league with the most points would be crowned champion.

The WSPL - or, more specifically, JP "The Eliminator" - struck early and often taking out 3 of the 5 CPL players in Hold 'em. This meant that the CPL's two remaining players (Voni and Steve) would need to finish 1st and 3rd to even have a chance at calling this half of the match "a draw". Though Steve busted out in third, the draw didn't materialize as Voni went out in 6th. "The Eliminator", somewhat slowed by Jill "JJ Gold" (who managed to eliminate three of the 10 players), was able to score his 5th elimination when he took out Jill to win the match. This gave the WSPL a 76-24 edge (The WSPL took the 1st, 2nd, 4th and 5th place positions).

At the HORSE table, about this time, Brad had taken a hit for the WSPL in 8th while CPL Co-Director Mark "Verbal" Cardenas fell in 7th. The CPL held an early 2.5 to 0 pt lead. And, while the math hadn't yet been done - the match was over. When the CPL's Mike "Blind Me Down" Behr busted in 6th everyone knew that all was lost. Pam "Black Widow" Muldoon and Karaoke Phil, though, battled on valiantly and eventually Phil scored his third elimination when he took down "Ninja" Milne for the HORSE victory (and a 50pt to 50 pt HORSE table tie).

In the end, the WSPL gave the CPL its comeuppance with a 126-74 win. If we're physically able there may be some additional posts (with, perhaps a picture or two). For now, just be sure to listen to this week's upcoming podcast.

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Unabomber Rockets Over CPL Week 3!!


In a stunning showing of Pockets Aces after Pocket Aces after Pocket Aces....sprinkled with a few Big Slicks...and the occassional 9-2...Mike "Unabomber" Bowman took down a field of 12 to win the top spot during CPL Week 3 over Bill "Comeback Kid" Lanoux!

It was another great week in the CPL as we had 5 members remaining during the 500-1000 blind level and 4 players remaining at the top blind level of 2000-4000!  Another rough'em tough'em week of poker!

After the top two spots it was Malinda "Nemesis" Cardenas taking 3rd place who took out yours truly with pocket 9's that held up (yes that is the 2nd week in a row I've been taken out by pocket 9's), Voni "The Rookie" who registered her second week in the 4th spot, and Wanda "Wicked1" finally scores points by taking 5th.

CPL Honorable Mention goes to Mike "Blind Me Down' Behr and Bill "Comeback Kid" Lanoux for scoring CPL points for 3 straight weeks!

CPL Quote of the Week:
"Jack-Ten....I love that hand" --"Comeback Kid"


CPL (Unadjusted) Leaderboard:

















CPL Points Awarded During Week 3!


Home League Tip - Interleague Play: Or, the CPL accepts the challenge to crush the West Side Poker League

If you have an enduring home poker league you're going to inevitably hear about other area leagues. Or, sometimes, as was the case with the CPL, you'll have some members who strike out on their own to form a league on a different day or with their own structure. These other leagues offer a great opportunity to add an element of fun and excitement to your own home game via the InterLeague Challenge. This is the live version of the online forum challenges that you sometimes see. For your home game it offers a common "opponent" to go after as you determine which league has the better players. Be sure to set the structure and ground rules for such a match well in advance of game day. Extra fun comes into play if your league's are able to communicate in some way to talk smack before you play.

Here are some examples of the whole idea (including some smack talk) from our own CPL challenge that will be conducted with the West Side Poker League this Saturday. As background, several former CPLers, including the highly successful "Ninja" Milne and JP "The Executioner" left to create or join their WSPL. The idea was put forth to see if the students (that's the WSPL) were now better than the masters (that's us) and a challenge was issued.

We've created a two match challenge - No Limit Hold 'em (played each week by the CPL) and HORSE (played often by the WSPL - though they also play NLHE). Each match has a total value of 100 pts with position finish accounting for number of pts given to a player/league. The league with the most pts will be crowned the winner. And, since it's poker after all - we kept elements that cater to the individual as well as a "team" component. For fans of either the CPL or West Side - here are the team lineups:

HORSE TEAMS
CPL-----------------------------vs.---------------WSPL
Mark "Verbal" Cardenas----------------------Gene Milne
"Karaoke" Phil Fuehrer ----------------------Brad Smith
Mike "Blind Me Down" Behr ------------------Jodi Milne
Pam "Black Widow" Muldoon----------------Brandon Altman


HOLD EM TEAMS
CPL-----------------------------vs.-----------------WSPL
Greg "NewLife" Durand -------------------------Amy Altman
Bill "Comeback Kid" Lanoux --------------------John "JP" Pouliot
Steve "The Chaser" Bennewitz-------------------Larry Delmatio
Mike "Unabomber" Bowman--------------------Victor Bettendorf
Voni "The Rookie" Khang ------------------------Jill Schmidt

Then there's all the pre-match hype that goes into these sorts of championship events (sorta like a UFC vs. Pride event). We've used the end of the last several podcasts to advocate for the CPL, but some emails have been flying around as well - such as:

From Gene: All I want to say is when we kick some CPL butt , "Your going to have to tuck that tail pretty far up the back side" :)
From JP: Is Phil actually playing? I thought he retired, and is now committed to
blowing smoke up the CPL skirts full time on their podcast!


and,

From BMD Behr: I'm actually surprised we're still going through with this game next weekend. I expected the West side guys to have come up with some excuse for not being able to play so as to not be completely humiliated on there own home turf.

So, there you have it. Add some inter league competition to your home poker league to spice up the action, add some camaraderie and create something a little special.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Hand of the Week - Pocket 9s

This Hand of the Week sponsored by Mike Behr Photography . For a full audio analysis listen to the 2009 Spring Session, Week 2 podcast.

Our hero is in a 45-player, $10 + $1 FullTilt Sit-n-go. It's early in the tourney with blinds at 15/30 (starting stacks of 1500).

We're under-the-gun (UTG) with pocket 9s - 9h/9c. We min bet to 60 and get 5 callers including our villain - the small blind (SB) which creates a pot of 330.

The flop is Kh/7c/6d. The SB checks. Our Hero bets out 120. Only the SB calls. The pot is now 570.

The turn is Js. The SB checks again. Our Hero bets out 240. The SB insta calls.

The river is 7h. The SB checks again. What is our move? Check or bet? (open folding is not an option).

Get Mark and Phil's commentary and the final answer in the comments!!

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

NewLife Durand Takes CPL Week 2!


In a marathon 3hr 26 min match that went till almost 11pm, Greg NewLife Durand not only survived a field of 12 but also battled back and forth in a heads up match against Bud "The Monster" Abbott before claiming victory in a very exciting 2nd Week of the CPL 2009 Spring Session.

This weeks match was dominated by River catches (did I mention I went out with pocket 9's as my pair was counterfeited by a River J?) and HUGE swings in the chip stacks by not only the chip leaders...but everyone. In addition, no one wanted to be eliminated and fought to the end if they had a chip and chair. Near the end all remaining players had a chance at the top spot as there were 7 players remaining as we went into the 400-800 blind levels...without a dominating chip leader. As we went into the 500-1000 blind levels there were 5 remaining and there were 3 remaining as we hit the top blind level at 2000-4000.

CPL Honorable Mention goes to Mike "Blind Me Down" Behr who came back from 1500 in chips to the chip leader with 10,000....and eventually went out in 3rd place.

And hats off to "The Monster" who has had two great starting weeks at the CPL! Way to go Bud!

Great match to all! Including Voni, Malinda, and Bill who survived into the points!
Quote of the Week:
In describing "The Rookie's" monologue which coxed "NewLife" to call her Pocket Aces:
"I haven't seen choreography like that since the Lee Harvey Oswald prison transfer!"
--Bill "Comeback Kid" Lanoux


UnAdjusted Leaderboard:
















Points Awarded During Week 2:



Sunday, January 11, 2009

Home Poker League Tip and CPL Record Books

If you’re going to run a home poker league over a course of time – someone will be interested in knowing who holds various records. You should, then, find some way to keep track of these records if for no other reason than to trot out the fact that you win 85% of the time when you’ve won the first hand of the week (or whatever esoteric stat works for you). Look for a future post to discuss league management software and website – some of which allow for such stat keeping. For now, however, here are some records and all-time leaders from the CPL (which we use an Exel spreadsheet to keep track of).

The CPL has finished up two complete seasons (6 sessions total – Spring, Summer and Fall sessions make up a season with each session consisting of, usually, 11 weeks), which, in total make up 77 matches that have been played. And, while there have been tweaks from time to time this is still largely comparing apples to apples (since we’re in charge we’re saying it is exactly like comparing apples to apples). So, here’s a look back at the first two CPL seasons and the CPL record books.

Most Points in a Session
Karaoke Phil – 128.8 (Summer, Season I)
JP “The Eliminator” – 120.8 (Spring, Season II)
Mike “Blind Me Down” – 113.8 (Fall, Season I)

Most Regular Sessions (11-weeks) Won
Karaoke Phil – Summer, Season I and the recently concluded Fall, Season II (95.4 pts)
Mark “Verbal” Cardenas, Blind Me Down Behr, Jeff “Matusow” Matson, and JP “The Elimator” have each won one session.

Most “Career” Points
Karaoke Phil – 506.9
Mark “Verbal” Cardenas – 476.5
Malinda “Nemesis” Cardenas – 422.85
Mike “Blind Me Down” Behr – 401.9
Bill “Comeback Kid” Lanoux – 366.2

The following records are based on a minimum of 16 matches played within the CPL:

Most Matches Played
Mark “Verbal” Cardenas – 74
Karaoke Phil - 72
Malinda “Nemesis” Cardenas - 70

Career Wins
Karaoke Phil - 11
Mark “Verbal” Cardenas and Malinda “Nemesis” Cardenas tied with – 9
4 players tied at 5 wins each

Times in the Points (top half finishes)
Mark “Verbal” – 43
Malinda “Nemesis” – 39
Karaoke Phil – 36

Percentage of Time Winning
Karaoke Phil – 15.28% (11 of 72 matches)
Malinda “Nemesis” 12.86% (9 wins in 70 matches)
Mark “Verbal” – 12.16% (9 of 74)
Vince “Cursed One” Castellanos – 11.76% (2 of 17 matches)
Jeff “Matusow” Matson – 11.63% (5 of 43)

NOTE: In seeking to confirm whether a Mike “BMD” win is either a “rare” or “100-year” event we have ascertained that prior to his Season III, Week I win Mike had pulled off the feat 3 other times in 49 matches. That 6.12% winning percentage puts him in 13th place of 14 qualifying CPL players (minimum of 16 matches). However, take a look at who leads the next CPL record.

Percentage of the Time in Points
Mike “Blind Me Down” – 65.31% (32 times in 49 matches)
Jeff “Urkelnator” Kuhlman – 61.54 % (24 of 39)
Mark “Verbal” – 58.11% (43 of 74)
Malinda “Nemesis” – 55.71% (39 of 70)
Steve “The Chaser” Bennewitz – 54.76% (23 of 42)

Honorable Mention goes to JP “The Eliminator”, Gene “Ninja” Milne, "Whatever happened to" Damon and Jill “JJ Gold” who, variously, have the percentages to qualify as top record holders in some of the these categories but who have failed to play the required 16 CPL matches to qualify.

Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Blind Me Down Takes CPL Spring Session Week 1







Happy New Year and Welcome to another great CPL poker session! The Spring session of 2009 for the CPL kicked off tonight and after seating 13 members and playing for over 3 hours Mike 'Blind Me Down' Behr took first place in a rare top spot finish for Blind Me Down!

The Spring Session of the CPL is off to an exciting start as we saw Quads AND we saw a straight flush (4th ever in the CPL)! But the really amazing part is that our newest member to the CPL, Bud Abbott, had BOTH of these hands tonight! Talk about getting hit by the deck during your first CPL match! Welcome to the CPL Bud! Congrats on your 4th place finish!

Selecting Bud's CPL Moniker is easy after tonights action.....

Bud Abbott will forever be known within the CPL circle as Bud "Monster" Abbott.

CPL Honorable Mention goes to Pam 'Black Widow' Muldoon who went heads up against Blind Me Down and scored a fabulous 2nd place finish during this first CPL week.

Overall a great week of poker like usual....good luck to everyone during the CPL Spring 2009 Session!
Quote of the Week:
"When I hear this song it reminds me of my mom having an RC and a cigarette" --Bill "Comeback Kid" Lanoux

CPL Points Awarded During Week 1
Mike Behr--30.20
Pam--17.70
Mike Bowman--12.90
Bud--10.30
Bill--8.70
Greg--7.60
Steve--1.0
Malinda--1.0
Voni--1.0
Jeff M-1.0
Phil--1.0
Wanda--1.0
Mark--1.0



--
CPL Director Mark Cardenas
and
CPL Co-Director Phil Fuehrer

Find the Podcast on ITunes: CPLDirectors Podcast

New site numbers in - or, back to the future

Okay, we've actually had the month 3 numbers for a little while now. And, yeah, they aren't "up movers" (generally), but we hide nothing here at CPLPoker. Our numbers, not coincidentally, started dropping around Thanksgiving and have largely been down since. These holiday blues for us, we believe, are the results of two things: 1) people being busier and visting less often and 2) your CPL Co-Directors being busier and not posting as much (all of November had 11 posts vs 16 in October - and there were only 2 posts from December 1 to December 27). All that is changing as the Holidays are behind us and were redoubling efforts for 2009 (though we're pretty sure the month 4 numbers will also be down as the recovery is just now beginning).

So, on with the show:

We're having some issue with uploading the map so, none this month. It shows (or would have) 263 visits from Nov. 16 to Dec. 15 from 57 cities and 13 countries. These are all off the pace of the previous month.

The highlight for this month has to be the traffic sources. Last month readers in Sydney Australia put that city #6 on our visitor list. This month we have a non-US city breaking into the top 5. As may forever be the case, Minneapolis and St. Paul led the way again. Our number 3 and 4 spots flip-flopped again with Hennepin County again coming in ahead of Circle Pines. Osseo, MN pushes it's way into a tie for spot #5 with....wait for it.....Givatayim, Israel (yeah, I had to look it up, too).

Another report in a couple of weeks - and, more quality posts in the meantime. So, keep on reading.

Monday, January 5, 2009

Karaoke Phil busts poker pro Esther Rossi, Blind Me Down Mike Behr, however, posts a better finish

The CPL's Blind Me Down Mike Behr and Karaoke Phil sat down to the $4K Guarantee HORSE Tournament this evening to slug it out with some of FullTilt's best. There were 199 entrants by the time registration closed.


Karaoke went out during RAZZ about 2hr 5 min into the tourney in 56th place outlasting FullTilt pros Diego Cordovez and Adam Schoenfeld. He also assisted in knocking out Esther Rossi (in 96th place). Here are the winning (and losing hands) that busted Rossi (it should be noted that Karaoke also took down a nice pot against her during the Stud level as well-even if it was a bit of a suck out):




As this entry went to posting, Mike "Blind Me Down" Behr had taken some damage during Stud and Stud H/L dropping from about 8K in chips to just under 5K, but pumped it back up and ended the Stud H/L round with 8K once again . He then moved up to nearly 12K during holdem. With 34 players left he stood in 11th. Look for updates in the comments section as they available.