Black Widow Wins Marathon CPL Week 8!

In a CPL Week 8 that ran 3 hours and 38 minutes...that had 4 members reaching the CPL Plaque Rounds....a week that may be remembered as the "If you have 2 outs you SOOOO are going to win"week...and a week that had the final 3 all still playing as the maximum blind level of 3000/6000 was reached...Pam "Black Widow" Muldoon survived the field of 13 to take her first win of this Spring Session besting your CPL Director Mark "Verbal" Cardenas in heads up play and moving "Black Widow" into a commanding 4th place on the CPL Leaderboard.

CPL Honorable Mention goes to Steve "The Chaser" Bennewitz for his 3rd place finish, although we were looking forward to the first ever CPL heads up match between Black Widow and Chaser, it was not meant to be this week.

CPL Honorable Mention also goes to Jeff "Matusow" Matson for having the chip lead with 4 players remaining and successfully pulling off the "Matusow Blow Up" and Donkey-ing off all his chips and going out 4th! (okay, okay, Verbal's unbelievable 0.3% to 99% runner runner Queen to best Matusow's full house had something to do with it)

In other news....Blind Me Down has now been knocked out 1st for the second straight CPL week...followed by the Unabomber and Newlife...and also this week Comeback Kid failed to score points....are the point leaders sitting back on their heels waiting for the TOC?  Have they been lulled into a false sense of security?  We'll see if they snap out of it for Week 9!

Only 3 CPL weeks left before the coveted CPL Tournament of Champions!

Next Week!  Wine Night at CPL Headquarters...always a good time!!

CPL Leaderboard (Adjusted)

Week 8 points Awarded

Hand of the Week - Rockets Come Crashing Down?

This week has our hero, Mike, is playing a .25/.50 pot limit holdem cash game when he is dealt Rockets (Ah and As) in the BB. He has had great success thus far and is up $160 on the day. Three limpers reach him preflop so he rides his streak and bumps it up pot ($3.25) - all the limpers call giving us a pot of $13.25.

The flop brings us the Js, Jc and Kd. Mike leads out with $7.50. He gets only one caller (a tight player) who started the hand with $51.75 in his stack. The pot now contains $28.25.

The turn is the Td. Mike leads out again - this time with a bet of $15.50. The villain raises all-in with his last $41 - making the pot $84.75 and requiring us to put in $25.50 more if we wish to see the river.

What do we do? Call and win? Call and watch our Rockets come crashing down? Pre-emptively self-destruct our Get Mark and Phil's commentary and the final answer in the comments section!! Or, listen to the "2009 Spring Session Week 7" podcast for the full discussion.

CPL Week 7 Taken Down By Comeback Kid!

In a CPL Week that will be known as "Beatles Night", Bill "Comeback Kid" Lanoux scored his second win of this CPL Spring Session besting Jeff "Matusow" Matson in heads up play where Rockets again became the winning hand in the CPL!

Comeback Kid had a great week of reading folks and successfully called weaker hands for big wins over and over to give him a huge chip stack going into heads up play and eventually his second win of this session.

Keep watch on Comeback Kid, Blind Me Down and Unabomber in the last 4 weeks!  They all have 

a shot at breaking the all time CPL Session Points record!!

CPL Honorable Mention goes to "NewLife" Durand for trying to win a pot by simply announcing at the showdown that he had a straight...when in fact no straight was possible on the board....

CPL Quote of the Week:

"...speaking of Love...I was on this website...Bikers or Not.com"--Wanda Wicked1

CPL Leaderboard "Adjusted Points"

Points Awarded During Week 7

"It's "gone", MacReady." - an anamnesis of LaunchCast

5365 songs, 667 Albums, 628 Artists, about 5 years. Those are the numbers and the amount of time it took for me to "rate" my music on LaunchCast (later bought by Yahoo and then known as either LaunchCast, launch.yahoo.com or music.yahoo.com).

It was a great, neat, little system. The more things you rated the more often you heard your higher-rated music. Yet, the system also required that something like 30% of the songs be things you hadn't yet rated giving you access to new music, etc. But, it's now gone.

I shoulda seen the warnings - all the news stories (apparently) in early December about how CBS online radio was going to acquire it - but I didn't. I thought life was just fine and kept on rating music these last 6 weeks or so.

Sure, there's still a "LaunchCast" or a "YahooMusic!" powered by CBS or whatever the bastardization they have up there now is (they've kept the same color scheme and layout). But, it's like "New" Coke - it's NOT Coke and it's not LaunchCast. The rankings no longer work, the system no longer works - it's "gone" MacReady.

LaunchCast - you shall be missed.

UnaBomber Takes Down CPL Week 6!

The worst CPL Venue Ever was pretty good for the UnaBomber as he took out the competition and has scored his second victory in this Spring Session of the CPL!  

Out of six weeks in the CPL session 'Mike's' have won 4 of the weeks....I'm going to change my name to Mike!

In another roughem toughem CPL week where 9 CPL members were still around during the 200/400 (elimination blind 

level) the competition was definitely stiff....but in the end UnaBomber went up against The Chaser and took it down after 3 and half hours!!

CPL Honorable Mention goes to Jeff Matusow Matson for finally making the points!!

THIS JUST IN!!!  3 CPL Members Clinch TOC seats!!

If my math is correct....Blind Me Down, Comeback Kid, and UnaBomber have all clinched seats at the CPL TOC for this 2009 Spring Session with 5 weeks remaining!  Congrats to Mike, Mike, and Bill!! 

Quote of the Week:

"They're playin real poker...good thing I'm out!" --Bill 'Comeback Kid' Lanoux

CPL Leaderboard "Adjusted":

Week 6 points awarded:

Hand of the Week - Greg's Dilemma

In a twist to the HOTW - Mike has guest Greg "Nice Life" Durand on as they discuss a $2 heads up SNG they played.

It's early in the tourney (about 2nd hand - blinds at 10/20 and 1500 in starting chips) when Greg gets 9c 9h with Mike on the button. Greg's dilemma is that he's been losing way too many of these decent starting hands when out of position and he's wondering what to do differently. Here, Mike leads out with a bet of 60 which Greg smooth calls.

The flop comes 4h, 6h and Th. Greg decides to check raise and Mike complies by betting 60 behind Greg's check. New Life raises to 220. Mike calls.

The turn is 2h. Both players check - with Greg commenting that he only has a the 9h so a J/Q/K or Ah have him dead.

The river is the 4s. Greg decides to make one more stab and bets 220 into the 560 pot. Mike takes about as much time as he can (including his time bank) and raises to 460. New Life considers his options and folds.

Was this the right play? Was the hand played correctly? Get Mark and Phil's commentary and the final answer in the comments section!!

CPL Director gets much needed win on Full Tilt!!

In a match that went 4 hours 30 min...your CPL Director bested a field of 180 to take the top spot in the Full Tilt 8.00 +0.80 tourney on Sunday with a take of over $380.00! Woo Hoo!

A combination of tight aggressive play and 3 timely suck outs ( I was completely dominated and had 2, 3, and 3 outs respectively and hit) made the difference....however I must also give credit to my Full Tilt conscience (Karaoke Phil) for talking me through the down spots when I was short stacked for about 45 min....without Karaoke, I would have never made it that far!  

Thanks Phil!

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

Find the Podcast on ITunes: CPLDirectors Podcast

Another 100 Year Event! Blind Me Down Wins CPL Week 5!

Are we already in the year 2109?  One would think so by what we witnessed tonight at the CPL!  Mike "Blind Me Down" Behr has taken down the top spot during Week 5!  This is an event we do not expect to see twice within a persons lifetime...yet it has happened!  Like two solar eclipses in one year, like the Cubs winning the World Series in two consecutive seasons, we have seen Blind Me Down win two weeks within one CPL session!

More amazing however was that Blind Me Down bested CPL Director "Verbal" Cardenas in a heads up match that will haunt Mark for quite a while. 

And EVEN more amazing still was that earlier in the match Blind Me Down was the short stack, went all in and Verbal called with AK suited against Blind Me Down's miniscule Q-J off suit....then came the quote of the week...not ripped off from Dennis Miller...

"Oh...I know how this ends" --Bill "Comeback Kid" Lanoux

And the result!  Blind Me Down outdraws Verbal to not only double up and stave off elimination for the week out of the CPL points...but eventually wins the match over Verbal in heads up play!

Did I mention that Verbal was All In with AK suited last night on Full Tilt against QJ Off Suit and was outdrawn last night?  Ya....thanks Bill.

Outside of that however, it was an AMAZING week as ALL 11 CPL members were still in the match after the first break....and ALL 11 still standing after the 2nd break!  But the 200/400 blind level (known as the elimination level) started taking folks down...and soon the blinds were at 500/1000 with 5 members remaining!!

CPL Honorable Mention goes to both Blind Me Down and Comeback Kid for making the CPL points for the 5th straight week this session! 

CPL Honorable Mention also goes to Jeff "Matusow" Matson for making it to a CPL week.  Jeff of course went out on the CPL points bubble!

CPL Leaderboard--Un-Adjusted

Points Awarded During Week 5!

Site Numbers Back Up - and, Climbing

With the holidays behind us and our new resolution to post more often (along with getting back to producing podcasts) - our traffic numbers are back up (from Dec. 16 to Jan 15). They should be even higher on the next report (as long as the trending holds). Here's the pretty map again with our site visit locations:

This month's stats are a mixed bag. Visits are up to 321 (from 263) as is the Country count - 18 this month up from 13. But, our city count dropped by 2 to 55.

Speaking of cities - Minneapolis and St. Paul again lead the way. Hennepin County kept its lead over Circle Pines for third and fourth. It's not a non-us city, but a non-Midwest city burst into 5th place this month: Palo Alto, CA. And, Las Vegas, Nevada was right behind in 6th. What happened to Givatayim, Israel you ask? They dropped to 8th - tied with a bunch of others.

Look for bigger and better numbers next month - and a sneak preview: The Big Apple is likely to land in our top five cities for the first time.

Hand of the Week - Fire the Third Bullet???

The Hand of the Week is sponsored by Mike Behr Photography . For a full audio analysis listen to the 2009 Spring Session, Week 4 podcast.

Our hero is in a 45-player, $10 + $1 FullTilt Sit-n-go. It's early in the tourney with blinds at 10/20 (starting stacks of 1500). The table is currently 8-handed as we've lost a player and our hero sits at 3170 in chips

We're under-the-gun (UTG) with pocket As - Ah/Ac. We make a standard raise to 60 and only the button calls.

The flop is 9d/Kd/6d. The SB checks. We're first to act and bet 60 into the pot of 150. The button raises to 180 and we smooth call it.

The turn is 5d (the fourth diamond). With the pot now at 510 we lead out with 120. The button calls.

The river brings a 3 and a flush on the board. Our question here is what to do? Fire the third bullet? Check/Raise? Check/Call?

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