THE DEEP BLUE SEA, ON-LINE AT LAST

I have to admit, I was skeptical about the whole internet poker scene. From the static avatars to the legal issues I beat to death earlier. Well, I’ve now been playing around for a couple of days at the micro-limit games and, I suppose a report is in order.

The Micro-limits or “All Stations Calling”

I cannot easily recall a hand that didn’t go to the river in the .50/1 micro limit. I played with this for about 400 hands. Although I won a bit in the long run it was hard earned, because you cannot bet aggressively enough to chase people out hunting for a river miracle and with 2 to 4 players hunting for runner-runner as often as not someone catches it making even pocket rockets a 50/50 proposition. I decided to move on and try a few of the single table tournaments.

Single Table Tournaments or “where did my fish go”?

I played in exactly 10 taking 2nd twice and 3rd twice. The rapid blind increases and small starting stacks meant if I didn’t hit a flop in the first 30 hands or so I’d be in trouble. If I did hit early I could almost always coast into the top 3 places with ease. The big problem I found here was when it got down to four or five players play became tighter then Scrooge on Christmas Eve. Once down to 3 play loosened up again, but the monster blinds or either 150/300 or 200/400 at this point devoured stacks quickly. I wound up in 3rd both times going into the final three with a severe short stack. In both 2nd place finishes, when it was down to two of us I faced a crap shoot where it was either go all-in or fold. In short, this is the least profitable thing I’ve tried.

1 / 2 Hold’em or “My God… it’s full of fish!”

Well, this is where I’ve been for the past three days and I must say for a solid, patient player 1/2 is a dependable source of revenue. Every table has calling stations, but, unlike the micro limits, they are rarely more then 3 people at the river, so the good hands tend to hold up. People play mediocre hands and I see a lot of action at these tables.

After my first few days on-line I’d say, “Come on in, the water is fine.”