Justin: I believe that 6.Nf3 and 6.Bg5 are considered better moves than your 6.Be3. I've had pretty good luck with Bg5 myself, although my sample is quite small.  Also, I'm not sure 8.cxd5 was your best. Why not the simple Bd3? It's true he can play dxc4 and make you move the Bishop again, but the resulting IQP position looks fine for you.

In the unusual position that arose, I think 12.d5 looks interesting. 12...exd5 13.Qxd5 Qxd5 14.Nxd5 seems to give you the initiative. Also, consider 13.Nxg5 Qxg5 14.O-O.

I know the endgame was bleak, but just shuttling your King between h2 and g2 is really a passive way to defend, and besides being passive, it's so boring and defeatist that you probably wouldn't be alert enough to respond if an opportunity came your way. I think you should has at least brought your rook to c2 or d2 where you would be ready to become active if the chance arose. 47.Rc2 would have you fight a bit longer, 47.Rxe4 was death.

Ya I totally missed Kf5 after Rxe4. And probably Ne5 was bad since I got the doubled pawns. I still think it was strong game for someone of my rating vs. his.

Don't get me wrong, you played pretty well. I just wanted to point out some ideas in the opening and early middlegame that I thought were interesting. I'm not sure I would have seen them all over the board, but that's why we study our games.

As far as the endgame was concerned, I just wanted to make the point that piece activity is essential, so putting your rook where it might be able to do some good seems right. One idea might have been to put your rook on a good file, and put your King on h3, so that Rxb2 isn't check. Then see if you can swap your b-pawn for his a-pawn somehow. It would be very hard for him to win a rook and pawn ending with 3 versus 2 on the same side of the board. My main point is that pure passivity is almost always a losing strategy in these endgames.

Since you're a diamond member, why not take a look at Danny Rensch's series on rook endgames? There's a lot of good stuff there, and you're strong enough to be able to use it

wasnt really that close IMO, Black was just playing solid and waiting for a slip. A typical 1st round pairing where the stronger player just squeezes and waits for a mistake. Your opening was unorthodox so black probably had to adjust his thinking but this is only going to benefit the stronger player. Whose more likely to make a mistake in an unusual position?Players learn that trying to flatten someone tactically leads to unnecessary complications and risk when just waiting for the lower rated player to make a series of small errors and just squeeze

quick points

1) study IQP pawn structures- it is very clear you dont understand them and where the pieces go etc...  look at the games review and you will see. Seems the player with the black pieces had to figure things out since the position was different than most opening sequences since I dont like some of his moves either. (Na4?!)   If you want to learn from this game study what Black should have done to punish whites loose pawn structure in the center and around the king. 

2) study pawn endgames. you should have NEVER traded rooks in that position since the pawn endgame was just dead lost for you and very easy to understand so a glaring weakness to me. Losing with rooks on the board fine but the rook trade was just the same as resigning.

3) rook endgames as well,... too passive and black pounced on this once he saw you were trying a passive defense Minev has an exceptional book on rook endgames you can find and just read that wont make your head hurt like other books. also the videos on chess.com are good too

Thank you all for the feedback. Good to know what I need to work on. When I play the average player, one doesn't realize that those mistakes won't be overseen by a strong player. Hey at least I ain't horrible.

I used to talk to an IM a lot on another site a few years back and share games etc. He asked me once,... What is your evergreen game? I said "what do you  mean?" His clarifcation was, "a game you feel you played brillantly in." I responded,"Well I had a few that I was proud of until I looked at them with you and realized how much I missed." Horrible is so relative.... you doing fine just areas that I saw that were highlighted to me.

Thanks TonyH. Good luck in your games!