So I started playing poker again. Nothing huge, just a couple tables every now and then on Full Tilt. And Rachel wanted to know before if my poker posts had some deeper meaning that you could tap into my life.
Well, here's how my poker night went.
1 table - about average stack, this maniac is pushing pushing so I push with AQ, he calls with QJ off. Flop an ace. Runner runner his 4 card flush. Loser.
2nd table - chip leader. Short stack limps, in BB I check with J8, flop J25, he checks I bet out he under-min raises his all in, I call he has AA. Very next hand I'm SB with TT, same guy is in he raises PF I call, flop is 258, he bets I push again he has QQ, eventually I whither away.
Great night at poker. This more equates to the week, this weekend has been great.
Tomorrow - Phillies/Nationals and Mets/Marlins. Biggest day in baseball..
Go Phillies
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Friday, September 28, 2007
Best weekend in sports?
As most of you know, I write a Giants blog. Here is the latest entry. I usually won't do this, but this is so important, it needs to be said everywhere.
I'm going to let you all in on a little secret. I'm a huge baseball fan. Don't get me wrong, football is probably the most entertaining sport out there, but baseball will always have a place in my heart. It's probably because as a little scrawny Jewish boy, I never played football, I played baseball. As most of you out there reading this know, the baseball season is winding down and if you're not a Yankee fan, then you're still a little concerned right now. At least, if you're a Mets fan, or from Colorado or Arizona or San Diego or Philadelphia.
Here's the basic run down of the baseball world - the NL East is now tied (as of Friday morning) with the Mets and the Phillies, and the NL Wild Card is led by San Diego by 1 game over the Phillies and the Rockies, and Arizona leads the NL West over San Diego by 1 game (and thus the Rockies by 2). There is only this weekend left to play. 3 games left, 5 teams within 1 game of each other, it's all very exciting.
But this is a Giants blog, right? And baseball doesn't have anything to do with football, right? Wrong. This weekend is a very special weekend. Let's forget the NL West teams right now and just focus on the Mets and Phillies for the NL East. If the Mets lose the division to the Phillies, it will be the 2nd greatest collapse by a baseball team in history. So every Mets fan is pacing and wondering what can happen. But, this weekend they have more to worry about. Sunday night we get to see the Philadelphia Eagles face the NY Giants. A battle of Phillie vs. New York. Oh man. Let's look at this some more shall we.
Sunday will be the first game the Giants play the Eagles this season, and while the game doesn't hold as dier playoff implications as the baseball games do, both teams are 1-2 and whoever is 1-3 has a very long shot of winning the division. The Cowboys are 3-0, Redskins are 2-1, and with a team 2-2 there's hope. There's little hope for a 1-3 team in the NFC East. So to say this football game is a big deal isn't even coming close to it.
Let's look a little further. I think that we can see who will win these games in a baseball/football comparison. The key underlier here is Washington. Both the Mets/Giants and Phillies/Eagles recently played a Washington team. The Mets just got swept in 3 games by the Nationals, and this weekend the Phillies play the Nationals at home for their final 3 games. The Eagles lost to the Redskins on an arrant throw by McNabb to miss a wide open receiver in the end zone on the final drive and the Giants beat the Redskins holding them on a goal line 3rd and short and 4th and short as time expired. The Mets lost to the Nationals and on the last game of the series gave up a 5-0 lead in the 6th inning. So football wise, Giants over Eagles, but baseball has Phillies over Mets in the Washington realm. But what of this weekend for the Mets? The Mets finish their season against the Marlins of Florida, who play in the same stadium as the Dolphins. The Redskins beat the Dolphins in OT in week 1, and as just stated the Giants beat the Redskins, so we can assume the Giants would beat the Dolphins, so we can go assume that the Mets will beat the Marlins.
Since the Mets and the Phillies are tied right now and won't play each other (obviously since there are 3 games left) there is also the possibility of a tie. If this happens, we would have a 1 game playoff. Playoff? Like last year? When the Eagles knocked out the Giants out on a last second field goal. So advantage Phillie if that occurs. But wait, let's look even deeper. The Giants started off last season 6-2 and finished 2-6, the Mets had a 7 game lead only 2 weeks ago that they have lost. If a one game playoff is how it's all decided, you better believe the spirits are pulling for the Phillies.
All I know is this. The final games of the seasons for baseball are played at 1:35 EST. Since the Giants play at night, you can bet your bottom dollar I'll be watching these baseball games.
Oh, and another secret loyal readers...I'm a Phillies fan, but not an Eagles fan. Go Phillies.
I'm going to let you all in on a little secret. I'm a huge baseball fan. Don't get me wrong, football is probably the most entertaining sport out there, but baseball will always have a place in my heart. It's probably because as a little scrawny Jewish boy, I never played football, I played baseball. As most of you out there reading this know, the baseball season is winding down and if you're not a Yankee fan, then you're still a little concerned right now. At least, if you're a Mets fan, or from Colorado or Arizona or San Diego or Philadelphia.
Here's the basic run down of the baseball world - the NL East is now tied (as of Friday morning) with the Mets and the Phillies, and the NL Wild Card is led by San Diego by 1 game over the Phillies and the Rockies, and Arizona leads the NL West over San Diego by 1 game (and thus the Rockies by 2). There is only this weekend left to play. 3 games left, 5 teams within 1 game of each other, it's all very exciting.
But this is a Giants blog, right? And baseball doesn't have anything to do with football, right? Wrong. This weekend is a very special weekend. Let's forget the NL West teams right now and just focus on the Mets and Phillies for the NL East. If the Mets lose the division to the Phillies, it will be the 2nd greatest collapse by a baseball team in history. So every Mets fan is pacing and wondering what can happen. But, this weekend they have more to worry about. Sunday night we get to see the Philadelphia Eagles face the NY Giants. A battle of Phillie vs. New York. Oh man. Let's look at this some more shall we.
Sunday will be the first game the Giants play the Eagles this season, and while the game doesn't hold as dier playoff implications as the baseball games do, both teams are 1-2 and whoever is 1-3 has a very long shot of winning the division. The Cowboys are 3-0, Redskins are 2-1, and with a team 2-2 there's hope. There's little hope for a 1-3 team in the NFC East. So to say this football game is a big deal isn't even coming close to it.
Let's look a little further. I think that we can see who will win these games in a baseball/football comparison. The key underlier here is Washington. Both the Mets/Giants and Phillies/Eagles recently played a Washington team. The Mets just got swept in 3 games by the Nationals, and this weekend the Phillies play the Nationals at home for their final 3 games. The Eagles lost to the Redskins on an arrant throw by McNabb to miss a wide open receiver in the end zone on the final drive and the Giants beat the Redskins holding them on a goal line 3rd and short and 4th and short as time expired. The Mets lost to the Nationals and on the last game of the series gave up a 5-0 lead in the 6th inning. So football wise, Giants over Eagles, but baseball has Phillies over Mets in the Washington realm. But what of this weekend for the Mets? The Mets finish their season against the Marlins of Florida, who play in the same stadium as the Dolphins. The Redskins beat the Dolphins in OT in week 1, and as just stated the Giants beat the Redskins, so we can assume the Giants would beat the Dolphins, so we can go assume that the Mets will beat the Marlins.
Since the Mets and the Phillies are tied right now and won't play each other (obviously since there are 3 games left) there is also the possibility of a tie. If this happens, we would have a 1 game playoff. Playoff? Like last year? When the Eagles knocked out the Giants out on a last second field goal. So advantage Phillie if that occurs. But wait, let's look even deeper. The Giants started off last season 6-2 and finished 2-6, the Mets had a 7 game lead only 2 weeks ago that they have lost. If a one game playoff is how it's all decided, you better believe the spirits are pulling for the Phillies.
All I know is this. The final games of the seasons for baseball are played at 1:35 EST. Since the Giants play at night, you can bet your bottom dollar I'll be watching these baseball games.
Oh, and another secret loyal readers...I'm a Phillies fan, but not an Eagles fan. Go Phillies.
Saturday, September 22, 2007
Monday, September 17, 2007
This Week in Sports
Dear Danny,
As some of you know, and all of you should know, this past week kicked off the 2007-2008 NFL season. It didn't disapoint. I mean, I was disappointed with a Bucs loss AND a heartbreaking Giants loss, but the 10 hours I got to watch were great. 3 last second wins, and a pretty good ending to the Monday night Bengals/Ravens game.
Now we're on to week 2, with a Bucs win, the Saints 0-2, the Giants 0-2 and the Texans 2-0...should be a good year in the NFL.
But I'm not here to talk about this past week in football I wanna talk about the offseason. We all know and will remember the whole Michael Vick saga but will we really remember Michael in 2 months, 2 years? I don't think that he'll be more than a glitch on the pop culture radar. What we should be looking at here is the man at the top. Roger Goodell starts his 2nd season as the commishioner of the league and has already had to deal with more shenanigans than anyone should.
What I want to bring up about Goodell is his nature towards sports. He brings in a new era of crack down no excuses football on and more importantly off the field. On the field he's bringing in more rules to get rid of player's hot tempers. We saw it today come into play when Jeremy Shockey spiked a ball and the Giants got a costly penalty. These new rules are trying to put a stricter sense of sportsmanship, which on one hand will just annoy a lot of hot tempered players but I also move to say it will bring out a lot more in terms of creativity, see Chad Johnson. Also look at a guy like Randy Moss. Hot tempered, showy, career going no where because of it. Now, and a lot of it has to do with the fact that he's under Billicheck, but he's more subdued and just about playing football, working out for him so far. The point is, the players are more about the game now.
Look further though to his offseason crack downs. It all started with Adam Jones, who I'm a huge fan of via Madden, and for the longest time I was a Jones supporter. He never did anything wrong was his case, and he shouldn't be harmed for doing so. But time and time again just showed how little Jones was taking this seriously. Now he's suspended, and we'll see if he'll play again. Then Tank Johnson was suspended and cut from the Bears, and still has yet to sign with any team. Then of course Vick, who hopefully will never play in the NFL again.
The point, at least in my eyes, is this - just because you're a sports star doesn't mean you're still not a person. Our culture now has risen sports stars to the level of pop stars (see A-Rod) and celebrities. Tom Brady was in People magazine, A-Rod the butt of many a Jay Leno joke, it's getting to the point of absurdity. Yes, I will admit that sports are just another form of entertainment, but that's not what they used to be. In the days of Ruth and Mays and Montana and Bird, sports icons were someone you could look up to as leaders. A sports star used to mean that you could lead your team through hardship and never give up. As a kid, I used to watch baseball games all the time and my favorite stat as a kid was the CG, the complete game. To me, pitching 9 innings, telling your coach that you didn't need the bulpen help, that you wanted to finish what you started, that was heroic. That's why Curt Schilling was my favorite player growing up, always wanted to go 9.
But now we don't look up to sports stars for inspiration, we look up to them to see records broken and slam dunks and hard tackles. Kids don't say, "I want to grow up to be a winner like Jordan" they say "I want to grow up and sign a huge contract like Jamarcus Russel." Hold outs and rookies getting 10 million a year without having thrown an NFL pass and kids coming out of high school has altered the goal of sports to peaked physical prowess to the top buck.
Michael Vick. Star quarterback. Flashy, showy, ran a lot, terrible, TERRIBLE quarterback. I could rattle off stats but that's not the point. The point is everyone wanted a Vick jersey. Martin Lawrence even wore one in Bad Boys 2. Kids idolized Vick. But then we see what he's like as a person. Cruel, destructive, a liar and a dishonorable person. I don't care if Whoopi Goldberg supports him, drowning dogs is cruel. So we have this should be convict in a time where heat sells, and as much as Goodell could have very easily not come down hard on Vick, he stands by his morals and sends him away. It sends out a message that this is not the kind of thing the NFL, or any sport, should support. Maybe Bud Selig can catch wind of this and maybe he'll do something about the steroid problem. Probably not, at least for another few years, but the example is out there now. Roger Goodell says that there's still hope for sports in this country, I think there is too. Look at some young guys like Vince Young, LeBron James, Greg Oden, Tomlinson, Jose Reyes or most of the Indian or Red Sox. Guys that like playing the game and like challenges and like meeting those challenges.
I don't think hope is lost for sports, but it will take a lot of time and effort to get things back even one tenth like the way they were
As some of you know, and all of you should know, this past week kicked off the 2007-2008 NFL season. It didn't disapoint. I mean, I was disappointed with a Bucs loss AND a heartbreaking Giants loss, but the 10 hours I got to watch were great. 3 last second wins, and a pretty good ending to the Monday night Bengals/Ravens game.
Now we're on to week 2, with a Bucs win, the Saints 0-2, the Giants 0-2 and the Texans 2-0...should be a good year in the NFL.
But I'm not here to talk about this past week in football I wanna talk about the offseason. We all know and will remember the whole Michael Vick saga but will we really remember Michael in 2 months, 2 years? I don't think that he'll be more than a glitch on the pop culture radar. What we should be looking at here is the man at the top. Roger Goodell starts his 2nd season as the commishioner of the league and has already had to deal with more shenanigans than anyone should.
What I want to bring up about Goodell is his nature towards sports. He brings in a new era of crack down no excuses football on and more importantly off the field. On the field he's bringing in more rules to get rid of player's hot tempers. We saw it today come into play when Jeremy Shockey spiked a ball and the Giants got a costly penalty. These new rules are trying to put a stricter sense of sportsmanship, which on one hand will just annoy a lot of hot tempered players but I also move to say it will bring out a lot more in terms of creativity, see Chad Johnson. Also look at a guy like Randy Moss. Hot tempered, showy, career going no where because of it. Now, and a lot of it has to do with the fact that he's under Billicheck, but he's more subdued and just about playing football, working out for him so far. The point is, the players are more about the game now.
Look further though to his offseason crack downs. It all started with Adam Jones, who I'm a huge fan of via Madden, and for the longest time I was a Jones supporter. He never did anything wrong was his case, and he shouldn't be harmed for doing so. But time and time again just showed how little Jones was taking this seriously. Now he's suspended, and we'll see if he'll play again. Then Tank Johnson was suspended and cut from the Bears, and still has yet to sign with any team. Then of course Vick, who hopefully will never play in the NFL again.
The point, at least in my eyes, is this - just because you're a sports star doesn't mean you're still not a person. Our culture now has risen sports stars to the level of pop stars (see A-Rod) and celebrities. Tom Brady was in People magazine, A-Rod the butt of many a Jay Leno joke, it's getting to the point of absurdity. Yes, I will admit that sports are just another form of entertainment, but that's not what they used to be. In the days of Ruth and Mays and Montana and Bird, sports icons were someone you could look up to as leaders. A sports star used to mean that you could lead your team through hardship and never give up. As a kid, I used to watch baseball games all the time and my favorite stat as a kid was the CG, the complete game. To me, pitching 9 innings, telling your coach that you didn't need the bulpen help, that you wanted to finish what you started, that was heroic. That's why Curt Schilling was my favorite player growing up, always wanted to go 9.
But now we don't look up to sports stars for inspiration, we look up to them to see records broken and slam dunks and hard tackles. Kids don't say, "I want to grow up to be a winner like Jordan" they say "I want to grow up and sign a huge contract like Jamarcus Russel." Hold outs and rookies getting 10 million a year without having thrown an NFL pass and kids coming out of high school has altered the goal of sports to peaked physical prowess to the top buck.
Michael Vick. Star quarterback. Flashy, showy, ran a lot, terrible, TERRIBLE quarterback. I could rattle off stats but that's not the point. The point is everyone wanted a Vick jersey. Martin Lawrence even wore one in Bad Boys 2. Kids idolized Vick. But then we see what he's like as a person. Cruel, destructive, a liar and a dishonorable person. I don't care if Whoopi Goldberg supports him, drowning dogs is cruel. So we have this should be convict in a time where heat sells, and as much as Goodell could have very easily not come down hard on Vick, he stands by his morals and sends him away. It sends out a message that this is not the kind of thing the NFL, or any sport, should support. Maybe Bud Selig can catch wind of this and maybe he'll do something about the steroid problem. Probably not, at least for another few years, but the example is out there now. Roger Goodell says that there's still hope for sports in this country, I think there is too. Look at some young guys like Vince Young, LeBron James, Greg Oden, Tomlinson, Jose Reyes or most of the Indian or Red Sox. Guys that like playing the game and like challenges and like meeting those challenges.
I don't think hope is lost for sports, but it will take a lot of time and effort to get things back even one tenth like the way they were
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Friday, September 07, 2007
Revival of the Horror genre?
Dear Danny,
This past summer was horrific, no pun intended, for horror movies. There was some torture crap and then the unnecessary prequel to the Halloween series. BUT, maybe there is some hope for this fall and winter.
First, Halloween weekend we get Saw IV. The director of the 2nd and 3rd comes back for the 4th installment. I personally liked the 3rd one a lot, it was more simple than the 2nd and left it open for a good 4th. The trailer makes me pretty excited, as it seems Lionsgate has finally realized they hit a franchise. "If it's Halloween, it must be Saw". That means there's a 5th and 6th on the way, which really just means I have the chance to make one in my life time and that makes me happy.
Also, the writers wrote "Feast", a winner of the Project Greenlight show a few years back. If you haven't seen Feast and you like good horror monster movies, please go see Feast. Extremely well written.
Saw 4 Summary
Saw 4 Trailer
Then at Christmas time, we get Alien Vs. Predator : Requium. Now, normally you might say : Oh geez, another sequel to a monster movie Asher's excited about. But let me tell you why this movie will be amazing.
1. The directors are brothers, and first time directors. Normally, this would be cause for concern. But let's look at their resume. They started as animators and worked up the ladder as visual effects artists. Recently, they were the visual effects coordinators for movies such as the 300, Constantine. They also worked on Titanic, Nutty Professor, Mission Impossible 3.
After they did a lot of visual work, they also did a lot of music videos. Stuff for the Red Hot Chili Peppers is the most noteworthy.
2. The trailer looks amazing. 10+ people die, including a child and a sexy girl. That is what the first movie lacked. Dying people and blood shed. The Alien movies and the Predator movies NEED violence and scary spooky music and lots and lots of dead humans. This movie looks to promise that. The first movie wasn't directed for horror or blood or anything fun. This looks like fun.
3. Slated for Christmas, gives me something to do Christmas day other than buy discounted candy.
Maybe there is hope for the horror genre. Except that it may lie in a 4th in a series and a sequel in a combination of series'. Maybe there isn't hope, but there sure is a lot of fun on the way. And lots and lots and lots of dead people
This past summer was horrific, no pun intended, for horror movies. There was some torture crap and then the unnecessary prequel to the Halloween series. BUT, maybe there is some hope for this fall and winter.
First, Halloween weekend we get Saw IV. The director of the 2nd and 3rd comes back for the 4th installment. I personally liked the 3rd one a lot, it was more simple than the 2nd and left it open for a good 4th. The trailer makes me pretty excited, as it seems Lionsgate has finally realized they hit a franchise. "If it's Halloween, it must be Saw". That means there's a 5th and 6th on the way, which really just means I have the chance to make one in my life time and that makes me happy.
Also, the writers wrote "Feast", a winner of the Project Greenlight show a few years back. If you haven't seen Feast and you like good horror monster movies, please go see Feast. Extremely well written.
Saw 4 Summary
Saw 4 Trailer
Then at Christmas time, we get Alien Vs. Predator : Requium. Now, normally you might say : Oh geez, another sequel to a monster movie Asher's excited about. But let me tell you why this movie will be amazing.
1. The directors are brothers, and first time directors. Normally, this would be cause for concern. But let's look at their resume. They started as animators and worked up the ladder as visual effects artists. Recently, they were the visual effects coordinators for movies such as the 300, Constantine. They also worked on Titanic, Nutty Professor, Mission Impossible 3.
After they did a lot of visual work, they also did a lot of music videos. Stuff for the Red Hot Chili Peppers is the most noteworthy.
2. The trailer looks amazing. 10+ people die, including a child and a sexy girl. That is what the first movie lacked. Dying people and blood shed. The Alien movies and the Predator movies NEED violence and scary spooky music and lots and lots of dead humans. This movie looks to promise that. The first movie wasn't directed for horror or blood or anything fun. This looks like fun.
3. Slated for Christmas, gives me something to do Christmas day other than buy discounted candy.
Maybe there is hope for the horror genre. Except that it may lie in a 4th in a series and a sequel in a combination of series'. Maybe there isn't hope, but there sure is a lot of fun on the way. And lots and lots and lots of dead people
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Summer 07
Dear Danny,
As I come in from my roof from some star gazing, as Queen starts singing Under Pressure on my iTunes random, I want to reflect on this past summer, which ends with my 9:30 AM class tomorrow.
I think this is the first time in my life I can say that summer didn't fly by. It actually seemed like years. I think back to the person I was May 5th and to who I am now and I can even scratch my head a little bit. Partly because my hair is so damn long now, and partly because I've upgraded so much. I've thought about the wording there. I haven't changed. I haven't morphed. I haven't evolved or devolved. I almost feel like I crossgraded, but that's not it. I've opened up a lot of things about myself, opened up to new people, new things, new views on the world and it's expanded my life to a new place that I feel very happy in.
In the past 3 months I have :
- traveled outside the country
- climbed a mountain
- been to borders of countries
- premiered a feature movie
- turned 21
- won a lot at poker
- lost a lot at poker
- lived as a homeless kid in NYC for 5 weeks
- dealt with brokers and landlords and construction crews
- became a blog writer for the NY Giants
- worked in a factory as a part of an assembly line
- worked at a burrito place
- worked with a reputable editor and hopefully set up a potential job
- shot and premiered a commercial for a nationally selling book
- met an award winning artist who now won't stop calling me
- moved into my new apartment complete with my own patio/roof
- made some new friends I will never lose
- tightened up some friendships for the long haul
- not shaved with no intention of doing so in the near future
If you want a short summation of the summer, Dustin said the other night, when explaining his Israel experience, "Can you believe all the stuff we did? In one night we smoked hookah with Bedouins, slept for 2 hours, woke up, rode a camel, climbed Mesada, swam in the Dead Sea then spent the night in Jerusalem"
I want to leave you all with this quote. It's from my new magazine craze "Discovery". The article is about the new known universe as we now have a picture of a lot more than we thought before. It talks about this galaxy, Andromeda that is apparently on a crash course with the Milky Way, in about 2 billion years that is. Avi Loeb, Harvard astrophysicist said, "Now when we look up, we see many galaxies. In the distant future, this will become a lonely place, with nothing to look at. If we want to learn about the universe at large, we'd better do it while we still can."
As I come in from my roof from some star gazing, as Queen starts singing Under Pressure on my iTunes random, I want to reflect on this past summer, which ends with my 9:30 AM class tomorrow.
I think this is the first time in my life I can say that summer didn't fly by. It actually seemed like years. I think back to the person I was May 5th and to who I am now and I can even scratch my head a little bit. Partly because my hair is so damn long now, and partly because I've upgraded so much. I've thought about the wording there. I haven't changed. I haven't morphed. I haven't evolved or devolved. I almost feel like I crossgraded, but that's not it. I've opened up a lot of things about myself, opened up to new people, new things, new views on the world and it's expanded my life to a new place that I feel very happy in.
In the past 3 months I have :
- traveled outside the country
- climbed a mountain
- been to borders of countries
- premiered a feature movie
- turned 21
- won a lot at poker
- lost a lot at poker
- lived as a homeless kid in NYC for 5 weeks
- dealt with brokers and landlords and construction crews
- became a blog writer for the NY Giants
- worked in a factory as a part of an assembly line
- worked at a burrito place
- worked with a reputable editor and hopefully set up a potential job
- shot and premiered a commercial for a nationally selling book
- met an award winning artist who now won't stop calling me
- moved into my new apartment complete with my own patio/roof
- made some new friends I will never lose
- tightened up some friendships for the long haul
- not shaved with no intention of doing so in the near future
If you want a short summation of the summer, Dustin said the other night, when explaining his Israel experience, "Can you believe all the stuff we did? In one night we smoked hookah with Bedouins, slept for 2 hours, woke up, rode a camel, climbed Mesada, swam in the Dead Sea then spent the night in Jerusalem"
I want to leave you all with this quote. It's from my new magazine craze "Discovery". The article is about the new known universe as we now have a picture of a lot more than we thought before. It talks about this galaxy, Andromeda that is apparently on a crash course with the Milky Way, in about 2 billion years that is. Avi Loeb, Harvard astrophysicist said, "Now when we look up, we see many galaxies. In the distant future, this will become a lonely place, with nothing to look at. If we want to learn about the universe at large, we'd better do it while we still can."
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