WPBT Results - Vegas Day 1

Out in 27th. Out of 30. So much for winning. I'm not too disappointed though. I played the hand that crippled me the way I thought it should have been played. Here, then, is my brief WPBT Holiday Classic recap:

I avoided the Table of Death -- the one that had Felicia, Charlie Shoten and Max Pescatori. Here was my draw:

Seat 1: PokerProf
Seat 2: -EV? I can't remember.
Seat 3: Mas [Edit: actually, apparently it wasn't Mas! Once again, shows how much I was paying attention. Who was sitting here? A little help?]
Seat 4: Derek
Seat 5: Julie from the Blue Parrot
Seat 6: Ferrari
Seat 7: me
Seat 8: HDouble -- I think. I can't remember. How bad is that? This was the player on my immediate left!
Seat 9: MrsCantHang
Seat 10: Maudie

I started in the small blind, T2000, blinds 25/50. My first hand, the action folded to me. With K7o, I raised to 150. The big blind called and then folded to my bet on the flop. For the record, a king hit.

Next hand, I found ATo on the button. Once again, the action folded to me. Again I raised (175 this time). Both blinds folded. I folded the next few hands, but the table was playing tight, no question. I made a mental note to be a bit more liberal with my raises. Unfortunately, I didn't have much of a chance to take advantage of it, because on my next small blind I hit disaster.

I was in the small blind with J6o (a killer hand if ever there was one). MrsCantHang at UTG, Maudie at UTG+1 and Ferrari on the button all limped in -- maybe someone else as well. The blinds were 25/50, and I figured "What the heck, it's only 25, let's see if we can flop something interesting." The big blind checked.

The flop was A-6-6, two clubs. Interesting indeed!

With the ace on board, I was not afraid to check my hand to try to trap some money in the pot. I was sure that someone would bet the ace. I was wrong. Instead, it checked around. That didn't make me very happy, but the turn was an offsuit 3. My hand was probably still best. I bet 200 into the pot. Folded around to Ferrari on the button, who raised to 400. I've known Ferrari to try to push people around quite a bit. I discounted K-6 and Q-6. A6s maybe, but more likely clubs or something like 76s. I pushed.

And into the tank went Ferrari. He asked me "You don't have A-6, do you?" and I got just a tad uneasy. I responded, "I don't know. I haven't looked yet." He took his time, thought it through some more, and then called. I showed him my trips, and he showed me... pocket 3s. Apparently the look on my face was priceless, but despite there being innumerable digital cameras in attendance, nobody took a picture of it. None of my seven outs came on the river, and I was down to 500. Ferrari gave me the obligatory "I was out if you bet the flop" but I just shrugged. That's poker. Like I said up top, I have no reservations about how I played the hand. With 20 minute rounds and an aggressive blind acceleration, I wanted to trap a little extra money in the pot and had what I perceived to be a good chance to do so. Who knew that none of the other five players would have an ace?

Oh well. Down to 500, I pushed A7s, got no callers, then pushed KQ against MrsCantHang's preflop min-raise (at 50/100). She called with 77, no help for me, IGHN. 27th out of 30. At least I avoided the Gigli booby prize. And MrsCantHang now has a very attractive black t-shirt with a large white "F" in an orange circle to add to her wardrobe.

I put myself on the list for 4-8 and finally got in after an hour. It was mostly older locals, with one young carpenter who didn't have a clue. The game was pretty rocky, so I just turned into a semi-loose aggressive raising machine while I waited for the tournament to finish. I couldn't put much of a rush together though, AND the table calling station sucked me out twice. Then there was the hand where I lost a bunch with a king-high flush to the ace-high flush. End result, I only finished up about $40. Oh well, again.

Ferrari, Julie, Pauly, Derek and I shared a cab back to Excalibur. We hit Sherwood Forest for dinner, where we ran into Bad Blood, Maudie and CJ from Up for Poker. Ferrari made the dubious choice of getting the fish and chips for dinner (he hardly touched it when it came) while the rest of us stuck to burgers. Not a wise move, Ferrari. After dinner, we joined Pauly and Derek in their room so Pauly could "unwind" and then Ferrari and I went and hit the poker room.

The options at Excalibur: 1-3 spread holdem, 2-6 spread holdem, and 1-2 $100 min/max NL holdem. None of those options were very attractive, so we hopped the tram over to Mandalay Bay. I've played there twice before, and although the room itself is nice enough, I absolutely hate the way it is run. This experience was no different, and I'm quite sure I'm never going to play there again.

The options at Mandalay were 2-4-8-8 holdem with a half-kill, 2-4 $200 min/max NL holdem, and maybe one other limit (1-2-4-4?). We popped into the 4-8 game. A pretty typical 4-8 game. I think it was three hands before either of us noticed -EV sitting at the other end of the table. I guess Saturday was just not a good day for my powers of observation! Not long after we noticed him, he and I had a fun hand.

From MP, he raised to $6. Action folded to me in the SB with 99. I decided to get aggressive and three-bet him. Ferrari folded his BB, action back to -EV who capped. I called.

The flop was raggedy, maybe 7-5-2. Whatever it was, I definitely had an overpair and weighed my options. I had a sneaking suspicion he had AK. I checked. He bet, and I called, thinking I could check-raise him on the turn. The turn was a blank. I checked. He thought about betting, then changed his mind and checked. The river was an ace. Not a good card. I decided to make one last stab at the pot - nothing about how I played the hand suggested that it was impossible I had AK. He seemed surprised by my bet -- probably had already put me on a pair -- and raised. I mucked my hand.

"Misplayed on all streets", as Iggy would say. Well, maybe not preflop. But trying to get fancy on the flop and turn cost me the pot. I said to -EV "You had to check behind on the turn, didn't you!" and he laughed and said that he got the sense that I was going to check-raise him. Do I have a tell? Hmm.

Ferrari left after a bit, up a good $100 and tired. I stayed for a while, but wound up dropping $30 over two hours. Just couldn't get it going. Back to Excalibur!

Everyone who was anyone was at Excalibur. As soon as I walked in, I spotted Pauly and Derek playing 2-6, HDouble, Grubby and MrsCantHang on a $100 NL table. Iggy came by later. I put my name on the list for 2-6 and for $100 NL. The 2-6 list moved quickly and I was soon called. I probably should have taken the seat, but a friend from LA arrived and wanted to play NL, so I passed on the 2-6. Both my friend (Rob) and I were soon seated at HDouble et al's table.

This was probably a bad table to be at. HDouble and Grubby were playing pretty tight, as was a young cowboy to HDouble's right. As a result, there was very little action on the table. When there was action, someone's solid hand was getting killed by someone else's more-solid hand. And the structure didn't help... my Hilton Sisters ran into aces. There went $100. It was tough. There was a raise preflop from the cowboy; Grubby called. With QQ in the SB, I reraised to $22. Both called for $68 in the pot. I only had about $70 left in my stack, so when the board came 9-high with no made straight or flush, what else could I do but push? A bet of $45 or more was committing me to the pot and leaving me no ammunition for the turn, so I had no choice but to push. The Cowboy called with aces, and that was that.

Later on, MrsCantHang raised to $10 preflop. With the Hammer, I reraised to $30. She pushed all-in for $20 more and I groaned. Forced to call. She showed KK. Surprise, surprise, KK held.

And that was my night. The rest of the night was more or less break-even, but those two hands put me in the hole $150. At 3am, Rob and I finally gave up after moving to a looser table where Rob had KK cracked; AA cracked by J9; and a flopped queen-flush to a guy who called Rob's flop shove with a draw to the king-flush that got there on the river. We drove back to Sam's Town and tried to get some sleep for the next day's festivities, which promised to hold watching the Jets lose and drinking with Iggy. Only none of it worked out that way.

Well, almost none of it - the Jets did lose. More to come...