So I had another work related deadline a week ago Thursday (October 15) and worked pretty hard leading up to that date. So it worked out perfectly when I discovered that the Borgata was having a $250k guarantee with 2 starting dates, 1a on Sunday the 18th and 1b on Monday the 19th. I got the go ahead from the Mrs. and shot up there on Sunday in time for the 4 p.m. satellite. The tournament itself featured a $550 buy-in while the satellite was for $115 meaning 1 in 5 would get the seat to the tournament.
Satellites are notoriously soft and thus I felt like it would be pretty easy to lock up a seat. Well that proved out at the first level.
My stack ~7200 (we started with 7k)
Button ~6800
I raise 77 to 150 in middle position, 3 callers including the button who appeared to be a weak calling station.
Flop K73. I bet 500 into ~700 pot. Button raises to 1700 and I call. Turn is perfect, another K. I check, he bets 2400 and I ship. He snap calls and I expect to see AK or KQ, maybe even KJ. Well he has K4 offsuit...lol. River misses him and I am up to over 14k. Pretty funny.
Basically I chip up and easily drift into the top 20 and get the seat. Played some cash that night and crushed the 10/20 Omaha game for about $600 and this was looking like it could be a good trip.
Wake up Monday and find my seat for the tournament. As usual the structure of Borgata tournaments is very good and allows for a lot of play. This is good for a player like me who likes to play a good number of pots and see a lot of flops.
BY first glance it appears all of the tough players are on my right which is ideal. I keep it pretty low key for the first few levels and win some meaningless pots to get up around 22k. There is a pretty spewy internet type kid on my right who I am trying to play pots with and finally get a chance at 200/400/50ante. He raises to 1k and I call with AJcc. Flop comes 99J rainbow. He checks and I bet 1600 and he calls. Turn is an 8 and he checks again. I elect to check behind and control the pot. Don't really want to have to make a big decision here if the spewtard decides to make some sort of strange check raise. River is perfect, another J. HE checks for the third time and I bet 3500 into a pot of 6300 and he starts fumbling with his chips and min raises me to 7k. With abt 16k behind my play is pretty easy and I ship and he insta folds. I assume he had AK there and thought 2 pair with A kicker was good. Very strange play for sure but was a gift for me. That gets me up to over 32k and I sort of bounce around between 30-35k.
Then a bad one comes up at 400/800/75a. I raise A2cc UTG and find one caller two to my left...a weak older gentleman who is pretty unimpressive in his play. Flop come A2Thhh. This is pretty good but not ideal. Obviously I have no hearts but my hand is pretty disguised. I bet 3200 and he insta calls. At this point I am pretty sure he has KT, QT or JT type of hand with the non T heart. Turn is dreadful, 7h. I check call 3k hoping to fill on river. River is a blank and I check ready to fold but he checks behind and shows QT with Qh. What a donk. Calls with that shit hand after a raise from UTG raiser...then miracles the flop and turn and gets absolutely no value out of it. HEEEEE-PHUCKING-HAWWWWWW...
Then the spot of the tournament comes up for me. I am down to around 21k at 400/800/75a and open AKss to 2200. Find 2 callers until BB goes into tank for good while and finally ships in. He is good player for sure but don't think he does this with AA or KK so at worst I feel it is a race and there is too much in there to fold. I stick it in the others fold and he flips JJ. Turn is an A and I am up over 45k. Few hands later same player ships 15k at 500/1000/100a and I reshove button with QQ. He flips AK and I win anopther race and am up to ~65k. Work my stack up to abt 80k then slowly drift down to ~60k where I end day and bag up my chips.
Came back for day 2 and found my seat with no players I recognized. Played no hands for a few orbits and was still around 60k when my first suckuot of the tournament. I raise JJ UTG to 4k at 800/1600/200. Button shoves 20k and I call. He flips KK and I spike a J on the turn. Few hands later I rasie one of my favorite hands in SB to 4500, 79 suited. BB calls and we see a flop of AA7. This is actually a good flop for meas he is unlikely to have an A here. If he has AK, AQ he probably reriases me preflop and all other A hands other than perhaps AJ and maybe a suited A are folding pre. BB was a very good, accomplished players and good players don't play big pots with A rag. Had he been a weaker player I would have been less comfortable. Anyway I lead 3500 and he folds.
Next big hand comes after I have been moved. Blinds are up to 2500/5000/500a. Blinds had just popped and I raise JTdd UTG to 12,500. Had I realized blinds were up I would have raised a bit more but oh well. BB is a ver y accomplished well known internet player. Flop comes JT8 with 2 spades and he insta-ships all in. I think for a second and can't fold this hand to a shove. He has AQ with a spade. Meaning he needs a K or 9 for the str8 or running spades or running AQ to crack my two pair and I hold and am up to 225k. I then went totally card dead for quite a while. I did lose the minimum with TT vs KQ at 4000/8000/1000a and ultimately drifted down to abt 100k.
Finally shoved 100k(blinds 5000/10,000/1000a) holding AJ suited UTG and was called by a weak player holding KQ. Puts in half of his stack with that trash...lol. I flop an A and a J and he misses the T and am up to around 225k. Little later same player raises to 35k in mid position with 120k behind and I find AA in BB (my first of the tournament BTW). Not sure how to play as I want to get all of his chips in middle. Finally decide he might call with 88-TT type hand preflop but fold if the flop comes with an over card, so I put him all in and he tanks for a good while and folds 55 face up. We are now inside the money and I am trying to accumulate as many chips as possible. A pretty inactive player raises the button to 40k at 6000/12,000/1,500a. I put him in for another 135k from BB with AQcc. He feels committed and calls with K8cc and I actually make a full house. That puts me up to around 450k in chips when we reach the final 3 tables and the play for day 2 is paused.
I am 11th in chips. Later that night they post the seating assignaments and I am happy to discover that both the big stacks at my table are on my right. In fact, the player to my direct right is the biggest stack and I have him pegged as a pretty big spewtard who overvalues mediocre hands like TT, KQ, KJ, 99, etc. and will put a lot of chips in the pot with those hands. In fact, I told 2 of my buddies that if I keep position on this guy I will get him to put a lot of chips in the middle in bad shape at some point on day 3. Keep that in mind later. I also do some research and discover that none of the players at my table have any significant cashes with the exception of the player 2 to my right with career cashes over 300k. There is also a very solid internet player at my table but the rest of the table seems bad.
Well day 3 could not have gotten off to a better start. Third hand in we are at 8/16k/2ka and I am in BB. Button is the successful player I mentioned above and he raises to 45k. I peek at KK and start talking to him. He keeps saying he is strong so I just ship it in and, in fact, he is strong with QQ. Flop KQ4, turn K and I get quads and bust the most successful player at the table. That gets me up around 650k. Stayed pretty quiet and consciously decided to stay out of pots with the one internet player left who seemed very solid. He lost a lot of chips and decided to shove 55 for 225k at 12/24k/2k. I wake up with KK again in BB and hold and am up to around 850k.
We get down to 12 players and it seems that everyone is tightening up a good bit trying to make the final table. So, of course, I see this as an opportunity to steal pots with any two cards. One hand blinds were 15/30k/3ka and there are 2 limpers. I am in BB and peek at J4 offsuit and raise to 140k. Everyone folds. The very next hand a weak tight woman opens for 125k and I rr to 350k with AKdd and she folds again. She comments that she thinks I am running them over. A few hands later the weak older player at the table limps, SB (the spewy chip leader) completes and I check with Q6. Flop comes JT4. Check Check Check. Turn Q putting 3 diamonds on the board. Check Check Check again. River 6 and chip leader bets 100k into 125. I call with 2 pair and he shows 89 off for turned str8. Not much I can do there as I don't think I can fold.
I then played an interesting pot with the spewy chip leader at 15/30k/3ka. He raised to 90k and I called button with AQo. Flop comes A84 rainbow. This is a good flop for me but I sensed a bit of strength from him and checked behind on the flop. I don't see how I can bet here. If he has any A he may check raise me and if he has a worse hand like TT, 99, etc. he is just going to fold. So there really is no value in betting this flop. Turn is a J which is a really really bad card. Now the only A that he may have and might make sense given the line is AT. I am losing to AK, AJ and chopping to AQ. I am either crushing or crushed and no in between. He bets 125k and I call to see what happens on river. River is a rag (6 maybe??) and he bets 225k. I tank for quite some time and just can't find a hand that I am beating. Again the only A I am ahead of here most likely is AT. SO unless he just doesn't believe I have an A I beat nothing. I fold AQ face up and he can't believe it. He shows me 88 for a flopped set. So that was a good fold.
At this point we were down to 11 players and a discussion ensued for a save. A save is when all of the players are guaranteed a certain amount and the remainder is then allocated to the winners. I was ok either way as I felt I had a playing edge over the remaining players but with blinds getting high so much crazy stuff can happen. Finally an agreement was reached where the two big stacks were guaranteed 16k and 18k and the 2 short stacks were given 7k and 9k. Everyone else, including me, was offered 12k. I probably could have pushed for another 1k or so but it was hard enough getting everyone to agree. We would then play for the following additional amounts:
1st 50k
2nd 20k
3rd 5k
4th 2k
We all agreed and locked up our amounts. A player on the other table then immediately busted and we combined to one table. A short stack busted a few hands in on the final table and then the following happened.
UTG is the spewy guy I mentioned that I would get a lot of chips from. He raises to 200k UTG at 20k/40k/4ka. I look down at QQ eith 850k total. not sure what to do but again my read on him is that he will put a lot of chips in teh pot with marginal hands. So I finally decide to shove all in. Folds to him and he snap calls off half his stack with TT. Flop is just dirty T34 and I miss on turn and river. So here this guy plays for 3 full days and builds a huge stack and decides to put half of it in with TT. Boggles the mind. Obviously I want him to make that call as I am 80/20 to win that hand. Also if I do hold I have 2nd chip stack and I am pretty sure I would have gotten to the final 2 or 3 at a minimum. So that was very disappointing.
But I was glad the deal was made because had it not I would have only cashed for $5,800. As it was this is my biggest cash to date and but for that unfortunate T I had a good shot to cash for 20k-50k more. Hard to even type that....
I will be going to the Taj in November for the USPC and playing the $560 Omaha Hi-Lo and a $560 NLHE. I will also try and satellite into the $2,500 PLO event they are having which features a TV final table. After that I will likely play 2 or 3 events in the WSOP Circuit event at Harrahs in AC and then the Borgata Winter Open in mid-January.
