HugePoker

My final table did not go well, I ended up finishing 7th for $1304, pretty disappointing given that I started the day third in chips and had a pretty good table draw (three shorter stacks to my left, big chip leader across the table from me). I went to Caesars 2 hours before the tournament restart to pick up the info sheet with everyone’s name and chip count so I could do some research and then walked over to the Mesa Grill for lunch (turns out it was brunch because it was Saturday, but that’s a good thing because they have this fantastic spicy chicken hash that … OK never mind, but the Mesa Grill is really good). While eating I was able to pull up everyone’s record on my phone, and I determined that there was only one player with more tournament cash than I have (an old-school European pro named Mark McLusky with $200k in live cashes - I have a little over $100k on record) and no-one else was even close. In fact there was an older gentleman two seats to my left with exactly one $300 cash from 4 years ago - but he was pretty short on chips so probably wouldn’t be around long (remember that thought for later). I looked into the massive chip leader first (he had 769k, 2nd in chips had 350k, I had 313k), determining that he had about $20k in cashes but then also finding that he had a twitter page. He had posted about the tournament all day Friday, and mentioned that he had a flight scheduled for Saturday morning so he was trying to “knock everyone out so that we wouldn’t have to play into Saturday”. As I’ve already reported, when we got down to 10 players there was a big brouhaha with some people wanting to play it out that night, and when it became clear that there were at least a couple of people who didn’t want to do that (me being one of them), then a few players started agitating for an even ten-way split of the prize money, which would be about $2500 each. It never ceases to amaze me that poker players will play for many hours to get down to the final few players, and then they’re all desperate to stop playing and split up the money evenly. The chip leader was so desperate, because of his flight in the morning, that he was willing to take an even chop even though he had more than double the next biggest chip stack. That’s just horrible poker, and entering a 2-day tournament when you have a flight the next morning is just brain-dead. I had a better-than-average chip stack, and I certainly believed that I had better-than-average poker skills at that table, so I wasn’t going to agree to an even chop, and I said so. On his twitter page he wrote “I have 769k and was willing to agree to an even chop, but one f’n guy wouldn’t chop!”. Ahhh, funny.

So the first development at the final table is that the older gentleman with $300 in tournament cash on his record made a bizarre play, raising for over ¼ of his stack with QJo and then just shoving all-in on a T93 board. The chip leader called him with QT, and it looked like I wouldn’t be able to take advantage of his weakness, but he spiked a King on the river to double up to 250k. I folded everything for a while, and when I tried to make a move or two, I got spanked, usually by the guy who had just doubled up and who I pegged as the weakest spot at the table. I don’t think I was wrong in my assessment, but either he was just catching great cards against me, or he was (as in his QJ hand) trigger-happy to get it all-in in any situation where he hit any piece of the flop. So I bled myself down to about 220k, while others gained ground and two of the short stacks busted out, so that with 8 players left I had slipped to 6th. My first real good news of the final table came when the agro player on my right got into a blind-vs.-blind tangle with me. He had stolen my BB three times when he tried it again and I picked up AJ. I flat-called and the flop came J73 all clubs (I had no clubs). I shoved all-in and he agonized for a very long time before finally folding, and I was up to 340k. But very soon after that I lot a big pot with AK when I raised and continuation bet, only to get insta-check raised by the old $300 guy, and I had to dump it. That and some lesser catastrophes brought me down under 200k. Another player busted out, and now I was 6th out of 7. When the very active chip-leader raised from mid position and I found a pair of Eighrs my stack and my hand looked pretty perfect for a reshove. The chip-leader thought for a while and finally called, turning over AQ. The flop was a bit of overkill - 3-Q-Q. So I was out in 7th, and our chip leader posted on twitter: “just busted the dbag who refused to chop”. So I’m a “f’n guy” AND a “dbag” … I must be doing something right.

I meant to write up more stories but this has gotten too long … Sunday I played online, as Pokerstars ran their big annual WSOP mega-qualifier, out of 9000 players I got down to 900th and then busted when I made a very difficult call that turned out to be correct - I had AK, my opponent had KQ and check-raised me all-in on a JT3 board. The only way he could win was to make the straight, and I had one of his Ace outs, but he found another one on the river to bust me (and I needed 252nd for the $12000 package). Sunday night I played a super weird single table satellite, in which I got it down to two players and got all-in with 83 vs. 75 on a A87 flop, and he spiked a 5 on the turn to beat me. And Vanessa made a great run in the $10k Heads-Up championship, making it to the round of 8 (they started with 256) and running a 5-hour marathon match yesterday, and also ultimately busting when she got her money in good. $90,000 is not a bad payday, but with such a good shot at a bracelet it really had to suck to go out that way.

I’m flying back to Seattle tomorrow for a 5-day break from Vegas. I’ll see some of you there… In spite of the title of this post, I’m actually feeling better about poker and the WSOP after my victory at the Wynn and good run at Caesars - obviously sad to finish 7th but I feel like I put myself in a good position for a much better cash, and just got unlucky to lose a coinflip.

-huge