SO sick, so very sick!!!!

This morning I go to San Manuel Indian Casino about 15 minutes from my home here in California. They have a nice poker room and the dealers and the staff have been there quite awhile.

There are many regulars who show up everyday and I have been going there off and on for about 20 years. I started out playing stud there periodically and the last 18 months or so I go there when I can.

I started playing $1.00-$2.00 games there and have actually played as high as $15.00-$30.00 there. But I am not really a cash player much anymore. I save my dollars for satellites and tournaments.

So this morning I head out there with 2 friends from work. Eric gets into the $100.00 Nl game and Mike plays in the $6.00-$12.00 game and I jump into a new $4.00-$8.00 game because there are no big stacks at the table and I did not want to wait for another seat to open up on the $100.00 buy in.

Second hand I look down at pocket Kings so since this is limit I just raise to $8.00 and get 3 callers. The flop is 10-A-A. Of course……I check as do the other 2 players….The turn A…..wow I have a full house but I still check I am almost positive one of the other guys has an ACE…If they do I have a Pocket pair bigger than 10’s and the Jackpot is 16,000 dollars. here at San Manuel the loser in the hand gets 50% the winner 25% and the table shares 25%.. I am so hoping my read is right, because i am going to be $8,000 dollars richer.

I keep my composure as the 3rd guy in the pot puts out $8.00 I call and so does the 2nd guy…The river is a 5 and I check 2nd guy checks and the third guy bets $8.00 so on a board of 10-A-A-A-5 I call his $8.00 and so does the 2nd guy.

2nd guy turns over 66 the third guy turns over an Ace and then a 9….holy crap!!!!! I show my Kings but there is NO jackpot because the 10 is on the board…AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH…. So I lost about $32.00 and we were so close……Damn 10….

I played for about another hour and couldn’t stay any longer. I was tired of people chasing flushes and crazy calls and I had lost a big hand with K-10 spades when the flop was Qs-5s-10h turn Kh giving me top 2 and a flush draw.. One guy bet $8.00 I raised to $16.00 he raised to $32.00 and I called..River 3h. guy bets $8.00 I call and he turns over 6-5 Hearts for the flush….unbelievable…thats why I do not like playing low limit games at the casino..So I was steamed and came home. I am trying to get the girls to clean up the living room. It looks like Toys R Us after a mad sale.

When they are done I am going to take them to dinner. After I will come home start a fire in the Fireplace and curl up on the couch with them and watch a movie..

Hope your Christmas day was everything you hoped for this year. Take care…be safe….

Just wanted to say Merry Christmas to the Wisehand Poker family and to all of the readers who support us everyday.

May your day be filled with joy and the upcoming New Year be a very blessed one for you and your families.

I look forward to 2008 and having the opportunity to share some great stories with all of you and to be able to hopefully bring you some extra happiness into your life!

Take Care and Be Safe!! Hope you all have some great flops this coming year,except when I am at the Table with you!

Scott Diamond

I am not going to name the site,but I have been playing some online poker the past week. I put 300.00 on line and began to play some small sit n go,s.

I kept track of my hands and I also used a new software called Poker Academy. There are some features I like on Poker Academy,mainly the one where it shows how I bet in certain positions.

I will never put another dime online and I have deleted the software!!!

Either there are many many lucky people out there or I should quit playing poker altogether. I understand there are bad beats in poker but the odds of some of the cards coming for my opponents in certain hands were MIRACLES!

I took 15 bad beats on the river the past few days and I gave out 4 bad beats on the river.

I played in a 3.00 satellite and won a seat into the main event of the day with a guaranteed prize pool of 15k.

I played for 3 hours and I had about 9k in chips. There were 400 players and we were down into the 67-68 person range,

Im in the Big Blind and have Q-10 the blinds are 800-400 One limper and it folds to me and I check. The flop A-K-J rainbow. I flopped the straight. Limper bets the pot I raise he goes all in.

A-2 off suit..Im clapping my hands. I just doubled up and it put me in the top 10,,,,I thought….turn A……..river 2,,,,,,,,,,,bye bye Scott.

I could go on but it would bore you and I am beginning to get really mad again.It happened so many times it was unreal.I see guys calling with the worse and hitting runners to win. I also noticed the BB and SB were always dominant winners if there were players betting out of position.
I am sorry to sit here and tell you about on line beats but for me playing on line takes the fun out of poker and I do not know how these supposed Internet guys are so successful continually. I play so tight you could not put a toothpick into my posteria.

I play my position at times and I would get calls with J-3 of clubs with QQ and lose to flushes. How does someone call 500 with J-3 I do not know. Maybe they think because I am in position I am bluffing. When I ask them in the chat room I usually get some profane answer.

Poker Academy software is a good tool to help you learn and I would recommend it to anyone. However not every on line site allows you to use it.

Again Merry Christmas all…and to all a GOOD NIGHT!!!

I should probably have something thrown at me. I have been up to absolutely nothing over the past few months, and definitely not stuff that you guys would probably have been interested to hear. I’m still on the worst downswing of my career with few final tables and no wins, but I decided to post this hand history of the winner take all 20 person $5k freezeout on pokerstars. I thought the tournament was soft and I had a good chance to win it, but in the end I didn’t get enough action with the right hands and I was playing 5 handed with some very tough customers. I’m not sure if I’ll play this weekend, but I’d sure like to.

http://gobboboy.homestead.com/files/gobbo5k.txt

If the link goes down, let me know. I don’t know how much traffic my crappy little hosting site can handle.

Well with Christmas just five days away and the New Year just around the corner, I find it amazing how fast this year has passed.

My older set of twins, Jennifer and Jasmine will be Five years old Saturday. Unbelievable 5 years has already passed. It seemed just like yesterday my wife and I were up every few hours changing diapers and feeding them. Then when Mia and Bianca were born 14 months later the cycle continued all over again,but FOUR girls were in diapers and Huggies loved us.

It seems just like yesterday I was at the WSOP playing satellites and entering my first ever WSOP event. Sweating my friends Bryan Devonshire,Michael Grazcs and Shawn Sheikhan,Gavin Smith, Jim Pittman, they all made final tables this year and I spent my days off there giving them my support.

I had about 16 Deputies over my house for a Barbq and to watch the Main Event on Direct TV and we all couldn’t wait to see ESPN’s coverage in order to see some of Jerry’s hole cards on his all in moves. Well ESPN’s coverage of the 2007 WSOP has come and gone and we are into repeats. Where did all the days go?

As I prepare to host my Charity Tournament for Fallen Heroes in February, I look at my family and feel the warmth one should feel everyday. Not just because its the Holiday season and people tend to get softer or more emotional this time of year,but I am truly blessed in more ways then one.

I have been given the opportunity to write here at Wisehandpoker when 2 years ago I was not even playing tournament poker. I have met so many new people and have established so many new friendships this past year it is amazing and truly a blessing.

It doesn’t matter how many gifts you receive under the tree this coming week but rather the ability to be able to live and share stories with those friends in time of need or just the fact we are able to wake up every morning and breathe and smell and see things so many others are unable to.

These are the true gifts of life and I want to wish EVERYONE who stops by wisehand a very Merry Christmas and thank you for supporting wisehand and all those other fantastic things you do the rest of the year!

Scott Diamond and Family.

hey all, just wanted to let you know that tomorrow night’s show should be a good one. We’ll be starting with Humberto brenes, with whom we’ll discuss tableside behavior. My understanding is that his son will be joining us and acting as translator. Humberto will be followed by Haralobos Voulgaris of pokerroad.com. be sure to check it out over at roundersradio.com.

Gary Wise
gary@wisehandpoker.com

The EU-WTO made an agreement yesterday with the United States regarding the World Trade Organizations loss of trade between several countries.

This agreement does not affect the suit bought against the USA by Antigua.

What I find extremely disturbing about this 100 billion dollar settlement is we the taxpayers are actually paying this new established debt. At a time when our economy is at a vulnerable point, we can dish over a 100 billion because a few elected officials have decided on line poker is immoral.

These politicians are just arrogant and spoiled. The USA also re-wrote the EU trade agreement so on line gaming can never be an issue again. How great is this. The world leaders come to an agreement many years ago and now the USA doesn’t like how it’s being interpreted,so they just re-write it and Canada and Japan along with the other countries in the EU say,”OK”. we will sign this new agreement. Pay up now!

Online gaming stocks are sure to drop over the next few days. The outcome of the Antigua lawsuit should be coming to a conclusion very soon. The USA has offered a measly 500 million in compensation and Antigua basically laughed at the USA and said we can make that in a few months by flooding your market with bootleg items.

Doesn’t sound like a big deal. But for law enforcement and the USA government the cost of fighting the copyright infringements will be enormous. I belive the Chinese will be getting very rich while assisting Antigua in flooding the USA market with bootleg copies of everything and anything.

I am not a big on-line player as I have stated before. But I believe it is the right of the American people to be able to do whatever they want with their own hard earned money. They can easily go to many casino’s throughout this country. Those Casinos are paying the USA enormous amounts of money,so why is on-line poker any different? Once regulated the taxes received by the USA will be very profitable and can be used for so many good things such as health care issues for the elderly,or money to help rebuild our infrastructure that is getting old and depleted.

But who am I? I am just a pea in the pod in the Poker community and I serve and protect the People of Los Angeles County 40 plus hours a week. I am just a number to the USA government who taxes me more than they should because I am in the middle class category.

Our country was founded by people who had the courage to travel across a great ocean in wooden ships to escape the wrath and taxation of the English Empire. We have no where to travel as the world and the universe have already been claimed by others. No continents available, no other planets that will sustain life. WHAT ARE WE TO DO?

The only suggestion I have is to get out of your house and VOTE. Write letters to the local newspapers about your distrust of the local government and our leaders. Spread your thoughts and share your ideas with friends and relatives. Washington politicians need a wake up call and realize what is best for this country and not just them and there bank accounts!

I put $50.00 on a poker site and have been playing some sit and go’s the past week. I have been up and down and I was up to 132.00 but I am down to 48.00 right now. Amazing the way the turn and rivers have come out on several hands. Suck out wise I have 3 the other players have 11. I tell you,playing on-line makes ME want to never play poker again.

When I was hurt I got a lap top so when I was in bed I could surf the net. Well I signed up at this one poker site under a different name and began to play. It was amazing how many times I placed in the money in events. My luck factor changed also. I still played the same way I did under my other name but I was having more success. Well when the online site found out I was playing under a different name they closed my account. I had not used the old account and I had sent them an e-mail requesting the old account be closed. I wanted a different on line name that is why I opened the other account. The site told me I could not do that so back to the old name and back to being a losing player again. Strange very strange how thing changed for me.

Well if I hear any good news in the Poker world over the next few days I will let all of you know. I have to finish my Christmas shopping the next few days. Have a great week and I have to tell all of you to listen to POKERROAD.com those guys are great over there. The interview with Doyle this week was awesome and the other shows they have are the best. Great job Mr. Joe Sebok for putting together a great site!

BE SAFE!!!!

Which professional sport is most difficult of all? A solid argument could be made for many, but for my money it’s hands down the sweet science. If you feel otherwise, try stepping into a ring some time and going more than 5 rounds - or alternately watch any Arturo Gatti vs. Micky Ward fight and picture yourself in that ring. Not pretty.

What’s also not pretty is participating in a home game and watching a retired golden gloves and Commonwealth Games boxing gold medalist getting his brains beaten in at the table.

Even though he only buys in for $50 at a time in a $1.00/$2.00 no limit cash game, this gentleman manages to lose $200-$400 in a night - over and over and over.

It’s like watching Muhammad Ali return the ring and get beaten down by Trevor Berbick or sitting ringside to watch Floyd Mayweather humiliate Arturo Gatti, except it happens every sunday night. Some people simply can’t get away from what they love. Unfortunately for this former boxing champion, his first love happens to be no limit hold em’, his second love is drinking beer while playing hold em’ and his third love is calling down anyone who dares to bet at him when he holds a pair of twos or better.

In brighter “non-alcholic or degenerate gambler” news, have a great holiday and if you wish to support the environment when making a holiday purchase, check out www.clickgreener.com . The site links to some major retailers and for no charge donates over half their referral fee from the stores to an environmental charity of your choice. I figure i may as well save some animals or air for the grand kids to breathe or see while i buy my next poker book.

Hey guys,

Sorry I haven’t been blogging much this week. Chip Reese’s unfortunate passing left me with a LOT of work to do. I’ve been hacking away at this keybard pretty much non-stop for the last week with no time between projects except for the occasional food and sleep breaks. That said, a few things to report.

- While in Vegas, I crashed at Justin Shronk’s place. Throughtout the week, he was having stretches where he wasn’t feeling too well, and they were apparently a harbringer. He was sent to the hospital wednesday night and according to reports is still there. I’m not going to post any specifics until I talk to him and find out what the real deal is. regardless, he’s feeling pretty bad, so if you have a moment to send a thought or prayer his way, I’m sure he’d appreciate it. Justin’s a good man. I’m worried sick.

- Apparently, the lack of time for food is helping me kick Gavin Smith’s ass. He and I have a bet on whether I can be at or below 230 on new year’s day. on November 10th, I was at 262 lbs; today, i weighed in at 232. 30 pounds in 34 days, baby, that cash is good as mine. The secret? Shrimp.

- On the Absolute article. It’s been floating in limbo for a month, and I talked to espn’s andrew feldman today. We’ve decided that I’m going to give it one more re-write after i finish a couple of projects with due dates over the next few days. Whe nthe re-write is done, I’ll submit it, and if they still don’t feel like they can print it (it would be due to legal holdups) then I’ll post it on wisehandpoker. a number of outlets have already pledged to front page link to it if it comes to that, so the story should get some of the exposure it deserves.

OK, I have to get back to work. Hope everyone’s happy and healthy heading towards the hollidays. Illiteration, you’ve got to love it.

Get well, Shronk.

Gary Wise
gary@wisehandpoker.com

If any of you have ever wondered why I do my Charity Event, go to abcnews.com and watch the video “The Dangerous Lives of Police Officers”.

There have been 170 officers lives lost this year compared to 145 all of last year. With a few weeks left of this year and the violence and aggression towards the police , I am afraid there will be more.

I have met some wonderful and caring people in the Poker Community since I became serious about my game. There are several individuals I would and do call FRIENDS and would go out of my way to help them.

Please if you support Law Enforcement and Firefighters come to my Charity Event or if you would like to make some sort of donation to the Charity Event, Please contact me at smdiamon@lasd.org and I will send you any information you may need.

Thank you and Happy Holidays!