Bad Beat Deep as usual

Inside money is Stars $30 (1 rebuy and 1 add-on)...Love to have one of these go my way deep in a tournament one time.

No-Limit Hold'em Tournament, 1500/3000 Blinds (8 handed) - Hold'em Manager Hand Converter from HandHistoryConverter.com

MP2 (t46239)
CO (t49246)
Button (t235334)
SB (t85568)
Hero (BB) (t97163)
UTG (t61750)
UTG+1 (t138225)
MP1 (t27469)

Hero's M: 21.59

Preflop: Hero is BB with ,
6 folds, SB bets t5750, Hero raises t16500, SB raises t77943, Hero calls t65693

Flop: (t170386) , , (2 players)

Turn: (t170386) (2 players)

River: (t170386) (2 players)

Total pot: t170386

Results:
SB had K, J (two pair, Kings and Jacks).
Hero had A, K (one pair, Kings).
Outcome: SB won t173386

This was for the chip lead with 25 left...$7k for first. GG me

Borgata takes care of Big Fella, $1,500 Deep Stack Trip Report, and Sick PLO hand

As you all know I love the Borgata. It is, along with the Venetian, the best card room I have played in bar none. The games are plentiful and juicy, the poker room is comfortable and spacious, the facilities and food choices are great and I have had a lot of successes in their tournaments. In addition, ever since I won the tournament in January they have stepped up their treatment of me. When I returned for 2 nights the week after that win my room was comped both nights and I have been back for a total of 8 nights since April 15th and have paid for 4 of those nights (all at deeply discounted poker rates). Well this trip was even better as I was upgraded to a 1,500 sq. foot Piatto Suite. This suite was pretty sick and featured floor to ceiling windows, a multi-media entertainment center, whirlpool and huge living room area. Here a couple of pics:






































I ended up spending more time than usual in the room since it was so nice!

As far as poker goes, I played a lot of poker over the first few days of the week. Sunday was the Main Event for PokerStars SCOOP and Full Tilt's Mini-FTOPS but since both started at 5:00 p.m. and I was going to be out of town for a few days I didn't play either. I did, however, play a good bit after the kids went to bed and actually went fairly deep in 2 tournaments for medium type cashes. Both had started around 9 p.m., however, so I was up until about 3:00ish. Back up at 7:00 a.m. to get my daughter to school and then off to Borgata. Got up there in plenty of time and found my seat. Won't run through a lot of the early hands but I played my normal, just playing really tight and solid and waiting for others to make mistakes. That strategy works very well in these tournaments that have a lot of satellite players and casual players. Anyway I ran my initial 30k stack into ~135k at the end of Day 1. With 120 players making it to Day 2 I would start the day with a Top 15 stack. 36 players would cash and the plan was to play down to the final 2 tables.

So after finishing Day 1 I went up to my room to set up my laptop to watch a buddy of mine who was in a tournament to win a WSOP Main Event package and help him. He ended up not winning but still won $3k so that was good. While this was going on (at about 11:30) I fired up a PLO tournament on PokerStars figuring I would donk around until I busted. It was a $10 rebuy so if I got tired or whatever I could just shutdown and go to bed. Remember I got abt 3 1/2 hours of sleep the night before. Well fast forward 5 hours and we are at the final table playing for about $1k. Not bad for a $30 investment (I was in for one rebuy and an add-on). Anyway the final table took forever (like 90 minutes) which is very unusual for a PLO event. Lo and behold at 6:00 a.m. I shipped it and then just flopped into bed exhausted. Not a bad night.

Dragged myself out of bed on Tuesday morning in time for the 11:00 a.m. start on Day 2. I had a pretty good run of cards early and was up to ~150k when a good spot came up for me. An older man opened the pot at 800/1600/200a to 5,000, I call with TT and BB calls as well. Flop comes 778 with 2 diamonds. BB checks, Old Man bets, 12k into ~18kish pot. I call and BB folds. Turn is the Td. He checks and for whatever reason I don't even consider a hand like AKdd or AQdd. I am locked in on him having a big pair for some reason. Anyway, river is the case T and I have quads. He then pops up and bets 20k into 42k pot. I tank a bit and figure he likes his hand so let's raise it up. I make it 55k and he calls pretty quickly to show AQdd. Blah if I had that hand in his range I need to bet the turn and if I do I get all of his stack. Oh well. Stack up to ~220k. His bet-call is abysmal on the river. I mean what could I possibly be bluffing with on the river with a 778TT board. But whatever, I'll take the chips sir!

An orbit or so later he shoves from the SB into my BB for 32k at 1/2k/200a. I squeezed an A and called without looking at the second card and turned out it was A4cc. He tabled some trashy hand like T3 and I flopped an A to end the drama. Stack up to over 250k. I then was able to run the stack up to about 325k without really showing down any hands. At 2k/4k/500a a pretty tight player open shoved 39k and then the player behind him tanked FOREVER and finally reluctantly called. I put him on like 77-99 type of hand. So it folds to me in BB and I have AJdd and decide to shove. I had the caller covered by 150k or so so even if he woke up with a big hand I really would have a lot of chips still. But I am 99% that he is folding and the dead money he put in was too attractive to pass up on. Anyway he folds as expected but original shover had AQ and scoops a nice pot.

That seemed to really be the high water mark for me as I ran into a lot of resistance later. About 15 players or so before the money bubble was burst two big stacks got moved to my immediate left. One seemed to be a solid thinking internet player but the other was an older calling station type. This is horrible for me as my stack has drifted down to ~220k and they have about 550k each. So if I open a pot at least one of them is calling and then they have position on me for the remainder of the hand. So the adjustment I have to make is to play a bit tighter and bet made hands aggressively. Unfortunately, I went utterly card dead with a steady stream of A3, 94, Q2, T5, etc. hands. I did raise a few middle pairs only have to check-fold on flops like KQ9. Finally the bubble burst and the action folded to me in the SB. I peeked down at Q7 suited. With a bit over 10BB and blind vs. blind this is a shove 100% of the time. I bomb it and BB wakes up with A9 and makes the call. He holds and I am again out with a min-cash of ~$2,500. Oh well, I keep going rather deep so soon enough another good score is coming.

Finally, I love PLO and this hand is pretty wild. Both of these players are obviously studs and Patrik in particular is an insanely good PLO player. Andrew Robl was one of the first internet young gun sickos 5 or 6 years ago and plays on-line under the handle good2cU.



Andrew is clearly trying to represent AAxx when he 3 bets the pot on the flop. Unfortunately, Patrik wakes up with one of the hands Andrew is behind even if he had AA. They decide to run the board 4 times. This is often done at higher stakes cash games. The pot is simply divided into 4 separate smaller pots and each run out of the board is for one of the 4 smaller pots. PLO is so sick as PA has no pair and yet is nearly 3-1 to win the hand. As is Andrew is less than 1/2 of 1% to win all 4 pots!

WSOP schedule, Deep in SCOOP event, funny phony phone call (Not suitable for Work!!)

I have been working on my schedule for Vegas and the WSOP and this is what I think I have come up with:

June 19th WSOP $3,000 HORSE

June 20th WSOP $1,000 NLHE (if I decide to not play the HORSE on the 19th or am busto in that tournament)

June 21st Venetian $550 NLHE

June 22nd WSOP $1,500 PLO Hi-low 8 or better

June 23rd WSOP $1,500 NLHE

June 24th WSOP $5,000 PLO8 (I will only play this if I have a strong score of say $10k+ prior to this date and feel sharp after the week out there)

July 5th or 6th WSOP $10,000 Main Event

To the extent that I make Day 2s or am burned out from too much tournament poker I will adjust the schedule on the fly. I am particularly excited to play the HORSE and the the PLO8 as I think the mixed games are really my strength and a lot of others play them so poorly. However, the HORSE event will be loaded with talented pros due to the smaller fields than the NLHE events but it will be good to match up with them. HORSE is comprised of the following games (all played as limit games):

Holdem
Omaha Hi-Low (O8 for short)
Razz
7 Card Stud Hi
7 Card Stud Hi-Low (Stud 8 for short)

The following is a listing of my games in order of my strongest to weakest:

1. O8 (my best game overall and not really even close; I am better at pot limit then limit but still very strong in limit)
2. Stud 8 (really enjoy this game and plays similar to O8)
3. Holdem (if this were no limit or pot limit I would put Holdem above Stud 8 but I just really haven't played a ton of Limit Holdem)
4. Razz (Really like this game a lot; another lowball game played similarly to 7 stud)
5. Stud Hi (My weakest game by far but I am at least competent and can read other hands well enough)

So the strategy will be to play smallish pots in Stud Hi and try and win pots in the Hi-Low games. A lot of the poker studs grew up playing Stud (Ivey, Daniel, Doyle, Siedel to name a few) so I will just try and stay out of big hands with those type of guys.

I actually have decided to sell some of my action in these events in $500/share blocks and have sold 8 shares at this point. If anyone is interested in the deal let me know.

I have been playing a good bit on-line during the SCOOP (Spring Championship of On-Line Poker) series that PokerStars is running. They have a unique format that has 3 tournaments running at different buy-in levels of the same game. They designate this by low (L), medium (M) or high (H) buy in levels. I have played a few events in the L (usually $20-50 buy-ins and largest fields obviously) and M (usually $150-500 buy-ins) and have 2 cashes and a deepish run in Event 21-M which was a $150 PLHE/PLO format. I love pot-limit events because it is a bit more nuanced than no-limit where sometimes the player with the biggest balls can run over the table. Pot-limit really requires good post flop play and making more decisions in every hand. Anyway in the event I ended up cashing 22nd for ~$1k out of the original 1450 players. Always frustrating to go deep and not final table but I played really, really well but just never had a ton of chips.

Funny backstory about that event. it was Monday at 2 p.m. so I got home about 1 p.m. and fired up a ton of tournaments in the 1-3 p.m. time frame on both Stars and Full Tilt. I was cruising along until about 3:15 when my internet crashed. I tried everything including calling Comcast to bitch it up with them. I called a poker buddy of mine who lives not too far to have him play for me and I would talk him through until I got to his house. But he was in DC for business. I had approx $600 in tournament buy-ins that I was playing and not about to just give up on it. So I high tailed back to my office (15 mins away) and had to download the software on my office computer and play from there. Left the office when I busted about 1 a.m. I will probably play a few more SCOOP events including (my wife and kids are heading to the beach Friday and Saturday so I have those days to myself. Saturday morning I will play golf obviously):

• PLO8 (L and M for sure and possibly H which is $1,050 if I satellite in). Thursday at 5:00p.m.
• NLHE 1 rebuy and 1 add-on (L only most likely. Medium is $200 1rebuy + 1 add-on and too steep for me) Friday 2:00 p.m.
• Limit Holdem (L only $55) Friday 5:00 p.m.
• No-Limit Omaha Hi-Low (L and M-$22 and $215) Friday 8:00 p.m.

Meanwhile Full Tilt is also running their "Mini-FTOPS" which mirrors the FTOPS events with 1/10 the buy-ins. So they are large field events with low buy-ins and I will be playing a few of those also:

• MiniFTOPS #22 NLHE 6 max $22 Friday at 1:00 p.m.
• MiniFTOPS #23 NLHE Shootout $55 Friday at 5:00 p.m.
• MiniFTOPS #24 RAZZ $33 Friday at 9:00 p.m.

Hopefully something good will happen to supplement the bankroll before next month.

I had a funny hand last night in a home game tournament with a buddy of mine who shall remain nameless (though if you have watched the 2005 WSOP ME you saw him a lot....lol). So blinds are 800/1600/200a and I open red AA to 4200. The knucklehead calls me on the button and we take a flop together. Flop comes TJQ which is about the worst possible flop for Aces imaginable. I think and decide to check and see what he does. He thinks for a bit and bets 6k into the 12.8k pot. So now my turn to think. We both have 40k to start the hand so another ~36k after the flop bet. This is a really awkward spot for me. If I raise to say 15k and he shoves I probably have to fold and that is really bad to put half my stack in and fold. If I call and check the turn he is going to bet again and we are right back in the same spot. If I take the lazy way out and shove he only calls if I am beat (there is a small chance he calls with AQ but that is really it). So after thinking it through I look over at him and he is doing something very different for him (can't reveal tells but it was pretty strong one :) ). I look a little longer and now I am convinced I am beat. Finally I ask if he has any idea what I have and he will not believe what I am about to fold. He says "do you have Aces?" I say yup and fold face-up. He looks completely deflated and doesn't show. He absolutely shows if he was bluffing. Whole table is like "How the f%%# can you fold AA to him?" Finally, he sends me a text this morning and says he had AK for a flopped str8. But he often has the following range here: 89, JT, QJ, KQ, KJ, QT, AK, J9, maybe Q9 suited, TT and even JJ or QQ. In addition, he has random hands containing a 9 or K which would give him and up and down str8 draw and i am not that far ahead of that range at all. So sick spot for sure but I think I made the right fold. There is some non-zero percentage chance he has total air but the rest of his range is heavily weighted towards hands that beat me.

On a non-poker note, as you may know I am an avid Stern listener. For those that don't listen, he has 2 morons on the show, Richard and Sal, who make phony phone calls and other childish pranks. Some are priceless but this one is my absolute favorite. They terrorize various radio stations in the south and midwest that host "Tradio" programs where people call or email in with goods or services that wish to sell and others can contact them to buy those products. Oftentimes it seems these shows are hosted on Christian radio stations. So, in this case, these two retards email a list of "items" that they have to sell and the female hosts comment on the items with obviously no clue what the items are . This clip is not suitable for work but man is it funny:

Borgata Final Table (and few other random items)

Before I get into that final table, I do finally have some golf to report on. Monday was the qualifier for the MD Am and MD Open. I had been fortunate to have been exempt from qualifying for a bunch of years beginning in the early 2000s. Unfortunately, I was not exempt for 2009 and went to an absolute dog track to qualify and played like turds and missed. SO not wanting to do that again I chose to qualify at Rolling Road CC where I played HS golf. I have played there a million times and although not a great golf course I know it well and usually in good condition. Rewind to Monday, I drop my daughter off at school at 7:45 and begin my ~25-30 minute drive to RRCC which should get me there in plenty of time for my 9 a.m. tee time. Well at 8:45 I was still 10 minutes out and I had to make an emergency trip to the potty. Fortunately, tee times were about 5 mins behind schedule so I was able to do my business, hit one or two putts and get to the tee in time.

First hole I stuffed a 9 Iron to 4 feet and made that, then parred the difficult 2nd and pretty much cruised to an easy 71 getting me in with shots to spare. So June I will play the MD Am at Congressional CC and July will be the MD Open at Manor CC. So that is good because when you fail to qualify for these events it really feels like a wasted summer golf wise.

Now back to the Borgata. The day before I had busted rather disappointingly in the ME and considered getting out of town. But a buddy of mine convinced me to stay and play the Tuesday $400 tournament. So I signed up on time for once and found my seat with muffin, caffeinated soda (tough getting to your seat by Noon), I phone, earphones and hoody in hand. I drew seat 9 at one of the outer tables and sat down to recognize no one. I could immediately tell that this group was much softer than yesterday's field. Here is a rundown of the collection I faced:

Seat 1...Some kind of farmer or something. He was quiet but filthy. Also played really bad playing virtually every hand raised or unraised. I will stack this donk later.

Seat 2...Some kind of foreign dude from parts unknown. He seemed to have trouble with his teeth. Trouble being he didn't have very many. He seemed to be in a big hurry to get all of his chips in with 1 pair.

Seats 3-7...Collection of older and younger weak tight players with out any apparent clue. Really nothing in this group to be concerned about.

Seat 8...Middle aged dude with hideous breath. Kept breathing all over me and played a lot of pots with trouble hands like KJ, AT, QJ, etc. Not a bad player but maybe a bit loose with these hands that can get you in trouble.

Seat 9...Yours truly

Seat 10...Younger, competent player I have seen around before. Knows the game and likes to tell people what they have but not in an obnoxious way. Not really wanting to play a huge pot with him out of position.

So I ran really well in the first level picking up AK, AQ, JJ, 99 and 66 (flopping a set) when a really good one comes up. Seat 1 has been playing every single pot when I open AA UTG to 150 at 25/50 blinds. He 3 bets me to 450 and folds back to me. Against a better player I may flat call some non-zero percentage of the time but not against this cat. I 4 bet to 1600 (larger than normal as I want to try and get him all in on the flop or turn). He calls and his hand is basically face up as TT, JJ or QQ with the occasional AK thrown in for good measure (I guess he may show up with 88 or 99 at times too). KK gets it in pre-flop and low pairs probably don't 3 bet call. So pretty much his hand is heavily weighted to JJ or QQ. To be fair my hand is completely face up to any thinking player as KK or AA. I am never putting this many chips in at 25/50 with less. Flop comes 456 with 2 hearts and I bet 2200. He insta-snap shoves and I call to see QQ and I hold putting me up over 22k. I hung around there chipping up to ~25k just making hands. No particularly great play on my part just making good hands.

Then Dwyte Pilgrim got moved to my table in seat 1. He is a 3 time WSOP Circuit ring winner with multiple other final tables and big cashes. I have no direct experience with him but my expectation based on some of the reports I have read about him is that he will be highly aggressive and think he can outplay everyone at the table. So when I raise AA to 600 at 100/200 and he calls the button I suspect this may be a big pot (BB calls as well). Flop comes A45 with 2 clubs and I c-bet 1200 and only Dwyte calls. Turn is pretty good 5c boating me up. I think for a while and bet 3100 into the 4k+ pot. He calls rather quickly which is really weak generally like he wants to steal the river. River is really good for me 7 clubs. HE only had abt 10k in his stack so I was trying to figure out the best way to get a lot of those chips in. Finally decided to check. Hopefully he has like AQ with the Q clubs or just sense that I was scared of the 4 clubs on the board. He then pounces as I expected and bets 6k. I put on a few minute act then ship it all in and he just sits there motionless. Finally he folds and I guess he was completely full of it. So that gets the stack up over 35k.

I then got moved to a new table still with my ~35k stack. First hand I played I raised QQ UTG for 1100 at 200/400/50a. Folds to BB who tanks for a while and finally raises big to 4100 which is half of his stack. He appears to be a competent player who realizes that I am raising UTG and not trying to steal from late position. I can't call and shipping seems LOL bad since his play looks super strong. What I mean by that is I am only getting called by AA, KK or AK (maybe JJ if he is really bad but I don't think he is). So shoving is just not good IMO. So I opted for the safe route and folded face up and the table was flabbergasted. He shows me KK and I feel good about that.

Get moved again to Table 1 meaning I would be there until the redraw at 18 players. One of the first hands there at 300/600/75 a short stack shoves abt 5500 and I call in BB with 44 and hold against his J9s. I continue to run over the table a bit raising and 3 betting a bit more than normal and am up to over 50k when a young aggro internet kid gets moved 3 to my left. He immediately starts opening a ton of pots and trying to become table captain. Finally, he opens a pot in early position and I 3 bet in the BB with JJ. Blinds were 300/600/75s and he opened to 1600. I 3 bet bigger than normal to 5200 and he calls. Flop comes AA7 with 2 clubs. Now at first blush this may look like a bad flop for me but I think he almost never has an A here. Internet players don't play 3 bet pots with AJ, AT type hands and love to 4 or 5 bet with AK. SO unless he has AQ or tried to get tricky with AK he never has an A here. I decided to lead which may or may not have been a mistake and lead for 6500. He insta raises me to 15k and I start thinking. The only hand I really am worried about is 77 but why would he raise me if he has that hand? Why not let me bluff off with AK or AQ if I am that strong. So I really am pretty confident I am good here. Problem is if I call here he is I have to be willing to go all the way as he is not going to give up. So after a good bit of thinking I decided to take the wimpy route and fold. He shows 75s but I don't really get too upset about it. It is what it is. I read the situation right and just couldn't pull the trigger. I probably should have played that flop a bit slower and kept the pot smaller against an aggro maniac.

Played one more hand before dinner break at 400/800/100. Guy 2 to my right makes it 2400 and I call button with AQ. Flop comes AT7 rainbow, he bets 3000 and I call. Turn was a blank (2 I think) and action goes check-check. River is an A and he insta bets 10k and I beat him into the pot. This is a retard bet and makes zero sense given the action. He insta mucks and I drag a nice one.

At dinner I have a bit over 60k.

Back from dinner and I really just chipped up rather easily until I had about 80k. Called a few all ins and won some flips and was up over 100k when I made a real bonehead play. Blinds were 1000/2000/200a and a different kid was opening a ton of pots but really big opens. So he opens to 9000 and I wake up with JJ and 3 bet to 22k. HE ships 60k and I have to call to see AA. I am pissed because this is really a bad 3 bet spot. I am stuck calling if he shoves and if he shoves I am basically only ahead of AK. Plus I was picking up chips so easily it just wasn't necessary to play a pot for 60k with JJ. Dumb, dumb, dumb. If I flat call, the flop comes KQQ and I can comfortably fold to his continuation bet with minimal loss.

I then got stuck calling some small all in shoves. First I opened AQ to 5500 and guy shoves 15k and I call to see AK. Then I open TT and get shoved over for a very small amount and find AQ and lose the coin-flip. All of the sudden I am down to 7500 and wondering wtf happened.

I shoved 78cc at 1500/3000/300 and somehow the BB folded...lol. Next hand I shoved 9Tdd and BB thought for a minute and called with A7. Flop A4T, turn 6, river T..BOOOOOM! Gets me up around 30k. Shoved next hand with total air and scooped. 2 hands later I shove AJs in late position and get snap called by BB with AK. Flop AT8, turn 7, river J...BOOOOOM again!! Now I have 65k ish and can play again. Chip back up to around 80k. We are on the bubble and I am playing like a maniac opening pots, 3 betting, jamming over players. Basically run my stack from 80k to about 120k while on the bubble. The guy on my immediate right bore the brunt of it as I raised or reraised him over and over again.

Finally, the money bubble bursts and we redraw. I get moved to a new table and within an orbit bust 2 players. First guy shoves about 40k at 2000/4000/500a and I call from button with AK and hold against A9. Few hands later a young kid shoves 38k or so and I call from BB with AA. He has 55 and flop comes A9T, turn A...EZ GAME! Now up over 200k and rolling. We are down to 12 and people are tightening up again so I open up and pick up abt 30k in chips on the final table bubble.

Finally that bubble gets burst and we combine to the final table. Sadly I go completely and utterly card dead for the next 90 minutes or so. It was embarrassing how much I had to fold. 10th and 9th busted fairly quickly and we were playing 8 handed. 1 player was running the table over with 400k in chips or so and I was looking for any suited connected hand to bomb over him and slow him down. But it never materialized. Finally I was down to 120k when I found a real hand. UTG opened at 5000/10k/1ka to 35k. I woke up with 99 in the SB and this is really the dividing line for me. 88 I think I can fold fairly easily and TT+ is an easy ship with 12BB left. But 99 it is basically a flip. I decided to shove and he called. AK I see and am pleased. Flop comes about as bad as possible QQJ with 2 spades. He has Ks. Any A, K, J or T and I am in deep doo-doo. Turn is 6s now giving him spades. So any A, K, J, T or spade (other than 9) and I am toast. River is just brutal-3 spades. Out in 8th for a miserable 2k cash. Top 3 were all 8k+ with first at 21k. BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

But if I hold that hand I have 250kish stack and can actually play some final table poker where I really feel I would have had a great chance to win. Oh well. 3 final tables in 6 months isn't bad for the Big Fella.

Back up for the May Deep Stack event on May 17-19 and then probably won't play live again until WSOP in mid June.