Rooting for a rout

As I write this the Phillies are beating the Rockies 16 to 4 in the 8th inning. Last night they beat the Astros 15-6. Some may say that a rout like that gets boring. Not me- I relish a good old fashioned ass-whoopin. No heart attacks as you worry that they may blow a 1 run lead or need to pick up some runs to win. Just pure unadultered fun. The Phillies offense again is starting look like it has in recent years and hopefully we'll see even more games like the last 2 nights.


EDIT: Now it's 20-4 and bases loaded for the Phils!! BAHAHAHAHA!!

Online poker is rigged

well, not most sites, but do not play at Absolute Poker or Ultimate Bet

Ultimate Bet Cheats

The Phantom Five

Today I read an article/opinion piece that profiled the ownership group of the Phillies. It's a long article and somewhat poorly written in some parts, but the overall view of why the Phillies is run the way it's run makes it worth reading.

Essentially, we may luck into a World Series title in the next 5 years with this incredible core of players like Howard, JRoll, Utley and Hamels but unless the current ownership group is replaced I doubt we'll ever have an organization that holds its upper level employees responsible for wins and losses. Here's hoping for dumb luck.

Please, please, please, make it so, RyHo!

The Phillies first baseman, Ryan Howard, went 3 for 5 last night with 2 homers and 4 ribbies. That may not seem out of the ordinary for the big guy but this year it has been. Slumping thru most of April and May and with JRoll out for a few weeks I was amazed that the Phillies stayed above the .500 mark with only one good starting pitcher. You can thank Utley and Burrell and their hot streaks in the early going for that.

Ryan really hit the homers far too, so let's hope this a new trend and he's emerging from his slump. With Howard back at his old ways, JRoll in the lineup and perhaps some pitching help from Benson or Happ and we can make another run. The next few weeks the schedule doesn't look so scary, so hopefully they make the best of it. Cross your fingers.

LOL Donkaments

Poker when played optimally will lead to winning money over enough time and hands. Of course there will be short term variance that will lead to losing streaks despite how skilled you are. Tournaments have an even higher variance due to the escalating blinds and antes (forced bets) that create players to act with hand holdings that are less than preferred and players will try to bluff and steal more often than in cash. The increased luck factor obviously takes out some of the skill. The more players that play in a tourney, the more luck is a factor over skill. It's why guys like Chris Moneymaker and Jerry Yang have won millions of dollars in the main event of the WSOP.

The higher variance of tourneys has led the posters over at 2+2 to nickname them "donkaments". The donk part refers to "donkey"- lingo for a bad player. The posters there even raised alot of money to donate to Barry Greenstein's charity to get him to say the phrase, "LOL Donkaments" on the TV show, High Stakes Poker.

This past Saturday's home tourney reminded me of why donkament is such an apt name. Never have I seen so many inferior hands win over statistical favorites. One player even called an huge all-in pre-flop bet with an ace and ten of hearts to be dominated by his opponents aces. Less than one times out of ten will the ace ten suited win, so it was a big suck out when 4 hearts hit the board and the poor player with aces went home in 4th place.

Personally, I even beat 4 to 1 odds to win a huge hand that propelled me to a 2nd place finish. The blinds started to get big and it was time to start making some moves. I was dealt a king and queen of diamonds so I came in for a raise. I ended up with 3 other callers (BAH-No respect!!) so already the pot was large before the cards came out. The flop was ragged as it contained a 9, 10 and 5 with 3 different suits. Since I was the preflop aggressor and there was a decent amount of chips to be won I figured I should take the first stab at it. I bet the size of the pot and I got a quick call from Chris, the others folded.

Chris is a solid player, but his flat call made me suspicious. It meant one of two things to me- he had a huge hand and was trapping me (possible but unlikely) or he suspected me of stealing (which I was) and had a "bluff-catcher". A bluff-catcher is a hand that probably beats most of my holdings if I'm bluffing. So, he could have hands like AK, AQ, 88, 77, 66, etc. I ruled out jacks or better because I think he reraises preflop with those. I think this type of hand is the most likely and therefore I think I can move him off the hand with an all-in bet if a favorable turn card comes. If I get called by nines, tens or fives then "c'est la vie" and I go home.

The turn card was a 4, so unless Chris was fucking around with a 78 the card is a good one to make the bluff with as it likely hasn't hit Chris. I take a little time to count out my stacks and then push it in and announce my all in.

I get instacalled.

He turned over pocket 8's which really surprised me. That basically told me he thought I was bluffing the whole time as there really weren't many hands that he can beat except for a bluff. Pocket 7's were the only holding aside from a bluff that I could have that he could be beating and even that hand would be me bluffing at the pot. A10, A9, 78, K10, J10, 10's, 9's, 6's, 5's, jacks thru aces wre all strong possibilities for me to have in my hand. Chris went with his gut that I was making a play and made a great call here. I have to give kudos to him.

Unfortunately for him, the bad luck was high that night and the queen came on the river and I won the huge pot and took the chip lead. (I had about an 18% chance of winning with a jack, queen or king) He lasted a little while on a short stack but never recovered. My respect for Chris' game has risen over the past year and I somewhat regret inviting him to the game. (not really tho, because it's mostly for fun)

I eventually got heads up with a 6 to 1 chip lead but as luck would have it my opponent doubled up twice with some small bad beats to me and I had no choice but to go all in with an ace three and lost to his ace queen. Shame the worse hand wins trend stopped there.

What can you do? LOL Donkaments

Who's Ed McMahon?!!

Just this past Saturday night I played in my regular home game and poker tournament. (report coming up tonight or tomorrow) At the final table I am sandwiched in between two guys in their early 20's, Tim and Chris. I was fairly manic-y that night as I usually am during poker events. The previous night I was up until 3am with insomnia due to racy thoughts. So fueled solely on a manic high I was more Brian-ish than usual. (Wow, two made up words in one paragraph!!) I was singing at times. I was making inappropriate jokes (like joking about Tom sucking on his Mother's tit with her right next to him). I was also doing silly impersonations. In other words, I was my usual obnoxious self.

Certain phrases and words said by others were triggering my brain to sing songs that those words or phrases reminded me of. So, when someone announced that he had a pair of sixes by saying, "I got sixes", the Schoolhouse Rock song, I Got Six popped into my head and I started to sing it. Tim curiously started to look at me as I was singing the song, "I got six, that's all there is. Six times one is six- one times six." "Is that a made up song?", he queried.

I fully expect someone of Tim's age and generation to not know the Schoolhouse Rock catalog of songs. Especially as I Got Six is one of the more obscure and less popular ones. The Schoolhouse Rock animated shorts were beloved by my generation as they played in between the usual mix of Saturday morning cartoons. Most of my core knowledge of the multiplication tables, American History and the preamble to the constitution, basic science and human physiology and grammar was due to me being a typical kid couch potato every Saturday morning. I weep for Tim's generation as they did not have Schoolhouse Rock's catchy tunes beaten into their young impressionable brains. He did a have a glimmer of recognition when I told him it was the same guys who made I'm Just a Bill and Conjunction Junction.

I felt a touch old as I thought about that but then I felt even older a few minutes after that. After a interesting card came out on the turn on one hand I screamed, "Hey-o!!" in my best Ed McMahon impersonation. (well, it really was an impersonation of the late, great Phil Hartman impersonating Ed, but you get my point.) I followed up my initial Ed catch-phrase with a "You are correct sir!" and an Ed laugh. Chris then asks me, "Who are you impersonating?" I didn't know if I should be insulted as I thought Chris didn't recognize the impersonation because I was doing it poorly. I sheepishly replied, "Ed McMahon" Then the shock and awe bombing began with the next question from Chris-

"Who's Ed McMahon?"

"Are you serious?!" I incredulously replied somewhat out of line.

After some explaining that Ed was Johnny Carson's sidekick on the Tonight Show and he's the guy who delivers the big Clearinghouse sweepstakes check, he did know who Ed McMahon was. He then made the comparison to him being an Andy Richter and since he was close enough, I let the subject drop. A person who was a pop culture icon to my generation and to the 2 or 3 generations before me was becoming a footnote.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think Chris is dumb or anything like that for not knowing who Ed McMahon is. Quite the contrary as Chris appears to me to be a very intelligent, mature and funny young man. (good poker player too) Looking up the tonight Show on wiki, I see that Ed and Johnny said their goodbyes in 1992. While 1992 doesn't seem all that long ago to me, it's 16 years!! Chris was around 7 years old when Ed for the most part left the TV scene. Unless Chris' parents were completely neglectful or had weird ideas about when to put children to bed and what to let him watch on TV, It's understandable that he wouldn't instantly recognize the impression or name as I do. It's just like when I got a dirty look for not knowing who Ernie Kovacs was when I was in college. (I do now, having seen alot of his stuff, he was brilliant and groundbreaking)

So there you have it- what was once a star is now a memory. I am a bigger old fart than I previously thought (yet again, it seems to be getting worse...) and my only solace is knowing that someday Chris might finding himself saying, " 'Who's Andy Richter?!!' How could you not know who Andy Richter is?!!"

Accessible art

This week we received a note from Jonathan's art teacher that his art work will be on display at the North Penn high school for 2 nights in their gym. While this sounds like another brag about my son (and I do like bragging about his wonderful talent), it really is about something else entirely.

The art show was for the entire North Penn school district, from Kindergarten to the 12th grade. I was astounded as to the number of pieces of art that was on display. I know that North Penn is a huge school district but the amount of work that was on display from just high school students filled 4 long hallways filled with kiosks. Upon closer inspection I noticed that alot of the art work was digital photography and manipulation of photos.

Most of us have a certain level of creativity and we can imagine designs, pictures and ideas rather easily. Unfortunately, the problem we run into is that most of us can't draw worth a lick to express what ideas we have onto paper. So unless you can draw, sculpt or paint you are shit out of luck when it comes to creating art. (I'm excluding things like acting and writing as "art") Even with training and instruction the ability to create art is mostly innate. While artists will benefit from art schools and courses, unless you have that natural flair that someone like my son, Jonathan has to begin with, it usually won't improve your ability enough to make people notice or have the quality be acceptable to yourself. Most of us don't have that access to create our own art.

It's a shame really. While art is accessible in the sense that anyone can try it and do whatever they want without "rules", it isn't accessible enough that anyone can do what they want and translate what's in their head to the paper, canvas or clay. But after attending last night's show I'm starting to think that has changed.

Aside from clever internet pictures where you put your head on muscled body or make a cat say some funny things, photo-shopping and digital photo manipulation is making the creation of art more accessible to a new generation. You don't even have to have the ability to make a perfect circle because the computer will do it for you. Plus you can even do things that may not have even been possible to do with a traditional art medium. There were some really clever, scary, disturbing, moving and inspiring things that I saw some 14-18 year olds doing with their digital photos. While it may never gain true acceptance into the art world, it does allow us regular schmoes to express ourselves in areas that we couldn't do before.

With accessible art and tons of free internet porn for the next generation I don't feel so bad any more about global warming, peak oil production and depleted social security.

What the heck is up with Myers?!

As I write this the Phils are losing badly to the Braves because our starting day opener, Brett Myers, has let up another big lead.

I've heard reports that he doesn't have the velocity once had. Maybe he's a basket case and isn't pitching with his head. Maybe he was screwed up by being in the pen last year.

Whatever the case may be, I hope he gets it straightened out, because the Phils need him if we wish to contend. Eaton is falling back to suckitude again, Moyer can't last forever, and Kendrick is spotty at best this year.

Cross your fingers that Happ continues his success in the minors and Kris Benson can make a come back.