Bodog Ari

I'm Ari Engel and am also known as BodogAri online. I've played poker for a living for virtually my entire post-college life. In the last few years I have started teaching people my style and philosophy on poker tournaments. Many of them have done very well. If you are interested in getting my help, email: thebodogari@gmail.com

Monday, July 31, 2006

Main Event

The Main event was fun, even though I joined the 10000 non-winners very early. I played very loose and fast, and unfortunately things didn't go my way. Normally, I do not play that style in the beggining of a tournament, but I had promised myself that I'd play the opposite of my table. They all seemed to be playing tight, not wanting to make any mistakes, so I figured I'd be able to pick up lots of small pots, and get paid off when my rags hit.

Thank you all for the well wishes, and now its back to the grind.

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

Bodog Party

Bodog had it's crazy annual party, and supposedly it was real cool. I stayed home and played poker, not too big on the partying thing.

I start the main event on Sunday, hopefully things go well.

Thursday, July 20, 2006

WSOP 1500

So, I went deep in the 1500, finishing 31 out of 2K plus entrants. Obviously tourneys, are all about winning, and I didn't, so I can't say I was happy with the result. However, I'm 22, and hopefully will be in the situation again, so it's all a good learning experience.

This was my 4th event of the series, and I now feel like I am an expert in "Live poker". Lol. Here are some thoughts about the event.

The best live players (grinder, John Juanda, etc) are absolutely sick, and I have a long way to go to reach their level.

The average live player is equal or worse than an average entrant into a Stars 100 Freezeout. The competition in the Stars 100 rebuy is way better than you'll ever see at the average WSOP table.

Poker is poker, and the differences between live and online are not that great. Yes there are some additional factors that you can use for analysis when seeing the person in front of you, but all in all, I didn't feel any disadvantage (other than extreme slowness) playing live.

Thank you all for the support, I had a good time, and hopefully next time, I can take it down.
Marvin Garden (Chris Birchby) and ImsoLucky0 (Jordan Morgan) have both made the Final Table of the event I played, GL guys.

Thursday, July 13, 2006

Congratulations

to online player Pokertrip/Reactrix aka Jon Friedberg who won his first bracelet taking down event #17 @ the WSOP for over $526K. He came into the final table 8 of 9 in chips and obviously dominated. Sick!

People have been predicting that this will be the year of the internet player, but the truth is that this has been the year of the pros. It's just that your average "online pro" is basically just as good as your average live pro, and in alot of cases not nearly as rusty. Say what you want, but the game has changed dramatically, and you can see it in some of the results of these live "pros". And the people that have the most experience playing the new style of playing are succeeding whether they are internet players or not.

On the random WSOP commentary note, Carlos Mortensen has 3 top 10 finishes already. Damn impressive.

Played in the 200 Stud hi lo and 500 NL holdem at the Orleans Open, and busted early in both. But been having tremendous success online, so I'm just chalking it up to lack of attempts. I've gone 35 times in a row online before without cashing, and had 12 separate streaks of 15 or more tourneys out of the money. (Those numbers are just from Stars Multi-Tables, and come from thepokerdb.com, where I pay for the enhanced version) So I'm just gonna keep doing what I'm doing, and I'm fairly confident things will work out in the long run. Getting hung up in short term results is something I used to do when I started, but imo is just dumb, too many ups and downs in poker to get too caught up in the moment.

Monday, July 10, 2006

Busted

in the 1K today early, and never really had much going. The highlight of the day was sitting next to Colson10, who played very well/aggresive early, and picked up about 1/3 of the pots w/o a showdown. He ran his JJ into QQ and busted shortly before I did. My story was a lack of good situations, and although I tried to play aggresively to make up for it, I never really had a shot, and busted shortly before the first break, when my k6 hh couldn't outdraw aq, even with a 2 heart flop.
Been playing well in general, so I have no complaints, although I certainly wouldn't mind winning a bracelet one of these days. Hopefully next time.

Sunday, July 09, 2006

Sunday

Major's today. Hopefully a Big Day! Then tommorow, I'll be playing the smallest buyin wsop of the year, a 1K freezeout. Hopefully I can get a hold of some chips early, because if not it's likely to be a short day with only 1K in chips to start. Either way, I'm gonna start playing a little more live.

The Rio offers a 2nd chance tourney for $500 daily, but it starts at 5pm, and that's about the same time as the big nightly tourney's online. So I haven't played in it yet, but a couple of online players have been doing well in it, so I think I'll give it a try a couple of times this week.

Thursday, July 06, 2006

Bubbled

both the party "super" $150 and the paradise 30R. Both tourneys had fields of more than 1000 people and I got within 10 people of money before getting knocked out. One of the sacrifises that I sometimes make for overagrresive bubble play, but its all worth it because the serious money is only at the top. Still its not fun to go home empty handed, but I gotta to look at it longterm and realize that much and I mean tons of money is made on bubble play.

Forgot to mention that I sat with John Juanda the other day in the omaha h/l tourney, and I thought that he played like a true professional, both in his play (obv) and his mannerisms. A breath of fresh air. I'm looking forward to playing some more live as we approach the main event, and I attempt to get used to the boredom of 1 tabling, live dealers, and geniuses that need have a hard time folding they're j10 sooted in bet, raise, reraise situations without making a scene.

Tuesday, July 04, 2006

Played

relatively well today at the 2k omaha hi lo event, but maybe a little too tight, either way things didn't go my way, and i lost a bunch of times when I was favored while most of the money was going, finished around 180/670 with about 60 paying, but never really had much going, reaching a max of 7k. Not sure yet when I'm playing next yet, and suprisingly, I'm not particularly upset, I did what I could, and sometimes you just can't make it. (Of course, that's not to say I didn't make any errors).

Happy B-day America!