HugePoker

I hopped in my car and barreled home, arriving late Sunday night. I only stopped to take naps, get gas, and have dinner in Portland with Team Huge members Melissa and Tom - roughly 20 hours of driving in 30 hours elapsed time. I’m happy to be home, greeted warmly by wife and dog (I don’t remember if I’ve reported this in the blog, but while I was in Vegas we made official our adoption of Alfie, who we had been fostering). It is always a weird transition time after leaving Vegas, and this year is no exception. After a month of focusing only on poker, jumping between frozen A/C and 108-degree outdoor temps, and eating a lot of beef … Seattle is an odd kind of fresh-air shock to the system.

I think I have less disappointment at busting out of the main event than I have in past years, which is a little surprising given that I built up my stack nicely on Day 3 and then got all my chips in the middle as a dominating favorite (with AKs vs KQs) and got pretty unlucky to bust out. A lot of factors temper my reaction … I’ve been less focused on poker this year; I had the nice score at the Wynn on my first day off between day 2 and day 3 of the main event which took some pressure off; I went into Day 3 with such a short stack that I half-expected to get all my chips in in the first hour and bust out; and I felt very good about the way I played my bust-out hand, applying a good read on my opponent to feel confident that my AKs was in great shape against his range. That’s not to say that it wasn’t crushing - getting bad-beated out of the main event when winning the hand would have given me above-average chips approaching the money-bubble sucks really really hard, but I recovered pretty quickly and am not wallowing too badly now.

ESPN has been doing something very different this year - they’re broadcasting semi-live video of the featured tables, and sometimes even showing hole-cards after the hand is over. Today is the last day of play - they started the day with 22 players and will play down to the fabled “November 9″. It’s actually a great broadcast, with a higher level of commentary than you see on the typical over-edited ESPN coverage. If you like watching poker, or if you just want to get a feel for what I go through every year, this is the best opportunity to do so. I think you can watch it on regular TV, but I’ve been watching it on the web:

http://espn.go.com/espn3/player?id=203064&league=WSOP

They might be stopping coverage soon and resuming at 5PM-7PM (Pacific time), and then again at 9PM until they get down to the final table. They just got down to 18 and are redrawing seats for two tables. One of the Irish gang who I’ve met a few times is second in chips and playing very well - Eoghan O’Dea. The matchup between him and the Ukrainian chip leader and the certain Player-of-the-Year winner Ben Lamb will be very exciting to watch. Check it out if you can - if you’re accustomed to the normal inanity of Norman Chad in the ESPN after-the-fact broadcast, this will be a nice change.

Thanks for all the support for the past month.

-huge

In 2007 I had my best cash in the WSOP main event, and busted out by getting all my chips (400,000 of them) in with the best hand pre-flop against … KQs (that year my hand was AQ). In 2011 I hadn’t gotten as far, and was not in the money, but again my big-stacked hyper-aggressive opponent spazzed out and got all-in against me with … KQs. This time I was holding AKs, and the pot was *only* 200,000 chips, but seeing the Queen fall on the flop still was a kidney punch. Having the jerk say “YES! Spiked it!” didn’t help.

My WSOP is over. I’ve had a mildly profitable trip thanks to my success at the Wynn tournaments. I’m disappointed at not making another splash/cash in the main event (if I win that pot I’m well above average in chips and in excellent position to make the money, possibly a lot of money) but happy with the way I played and glad I got another shot at a main event run. I certainly hope they continue to run that tournament at the Wynn next year, because that’s a freaking gravy train.

Thanks for all the support, comments, tweets, texts, hugs, breakfasts, etc. It’s damn thrilling to feel like a rock star for a few days every July, and damn sad when it ends.

-huge

I had a really hard, grueling Day 2 of the WSOP Main Event, with my chip stack dropping from 61K to 30,500. Yuck. I had some bad luck - early on I called a short-stack’s shove with AQ, mildly happy to see him turn over KT, moderately happy to see nothing on the flop, very happy to see a Queen on the turn, and crushed to see the King on the river to lose me a 30K pot.

There was a brief bright spot when I knocked out a shorter stack with my AA vs his JJ, which got me back to 64K, but I very soon got into a really ugly spot with my own JJ, having to fold the river on a AAT3K board after putting significant chips into the pot (my opponent had an Ace, so it was a good fold, but still painful).

For the last few hours of the night I had Ted Forrest on my right, but I never tangled with him. I raised & got reraised with AA but was shocked when the guy who reraised to 8600 folded for the remaining 18K in his stack. I guess I should have tried to trap him, but I just didn’t think he could put a third of his chips in and then fold.

I will be short stacked coming into Day three at noon tomorrow. Strangely enough there is a player at my table tomorrow with exactly as many chips as me, but everyone else will have more - some of them a lot more.

Given my stack and where the blinds are, it could realistically be a very short day for me, or I could double up early or chip up gradually and start a climb back into a healthy stack. I will have a long climb to get anywhere near making the money, but I’ve made that climb before. Noon tomorrow Vegas/Seattle time, start crossing your fingers, toes, intestines, whatever. I’m gonna need some luck and/or some good decisions, but hey, I’ve survived to day 3 of the main event, as I have done now for 4 out of 5 of the main events I’ve played, and I have my starting stack (which while way below average, is actually worth considerably more at the start of Day 3 than it was at the start of Day 1, so I have actually increased the value of my seat in the tournament just by surviving).

It should be exciting … watch for updates on my twitter page and on pokernews.

I had two days off after Day 2, and on the first I just couldn’t resist playing in the 20th and final day of the Wynn Summer Classic, which has (as always) been my redemption in an otherwise grim 2011 WSOP. It started off grim as well, with me spewing chips and rebuying left and right, getting my stack in with top-and-bottom-pair vs top-two (A5 vs A8 on an A85 flop), as well as other atrocities. At the end of the rebuy period I was in for $1225 and was really feeling stupid for playing a tournament on my day off from the main event, but things turned around, as they did in my first good cash at the Wynn. I ran well, I played well, I found good spots, I made the final table, I made the final six, I made the final three, and then I busted … third place for $11,787 - enough profit to pay for my main event buyin, and enough to make me mildly profitable for the trip, even if I don’t cash in the main event. In the Wynn tournament I cashed 5 times out of 12 entries, with a 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 6th and 12th place finish (out of fields ranging from 78 to 175 players), for total cash exceeding $30,000 on buyins totaling less than $10,000. Not too shabby.

If I can run (and play) as well in the main event as I did yesterday at the Wynn, I’ll be sitting on a mountain of chips by the end of the night.

Josh and Vanessa are both still in as well, both with a few more chips than me (41K for each), but both in need of some serious help tomorrow. If we all make it to Day 4 there will be some serious cause for celebration.

Time for some solid sleep and then some serious focus tomorrow…

[see my comment below for some WSOP numbers]

I’m pretty sure this was the toughest day 1 table I’ve ever faced in the main event of the WSOP. Things started off badly, in fact I raise-folded the first hand (I had 66 and probably should have called to set-mine, but his 3-bet was pretty big and I just didn’t feel like playing a bloated pot out of position on the very first hand of the main event). Soon after that I lost a pot with KQs on a king-high flop - check-call on flop, turn and river, where the river brought top-two pair to KTo. Blecchhh.

I got down as low as 22k before things turned around, with AK vs 44 on a 47AAK board. I got as high as 77k after flopping a set of Queens to crack Aces, before a minor disaster took me down around 50k.

There are a lot of stories, but now I must sleep. I picked up some chips near the end of the night and in the end, bagged and tagged 61,500 chips, just over double my starting stack. I can’t remember if I’ve ever had over 60k before at the end of day 1.

I am completely wiped, and looking forward to gorging at the Wynn brunch buffet with Team Huge in about 9 hours.

Thanks for all the twitter support. My day 2 will be Monday, when we will join up with the survivors of Day 1a.

Stay tuned.

-huge

I have just pushed $10,000 across a counter for a nice lady to count and give me in return a couple of seat tickets (one for me, one for the dealer) and a $10 food voucher, all of which entitle me to play poker and purchase part of a meal. I’ve heard that this year I will also receive a voucher good for a pair of slippers, but I haven’t got that voucher yet.

In about ten hours I will be sitting down for Day 1C of the biggest poker tournament in the world. I don’t know who I’ll be playing against, but I hope they’re terrible. A diminished Team Huge (Deb and Jerry and Pete are much missed) will be joining me for the traditional pre-Day-One breakfast of champions at 10:30AM, and cards will be in the air at High Noon.

Watch my twitter feed for updates on my progress, and watch POKERNEWS for general news about Day 1C action.

Time for some Huge Sleep…

After all the initial love, the Wynn has been unkind to me lately. Two days in a row I’ve put together good runs and gotten close to the money, only to be shot down in spectacular and annoying fashion. Sunday an idiot limped the small blind to me, I shoved from the BB with KQ, and he loudly snap-called me. I was sure I had been trapped by a monster until he turned over ten-seven. Wow. But a seven on the flop put me out of the tournament. Well played, sir.

Yesterday I lost big pots with 99 vs Q7, and with AJ vs 48, both against the same online pro who really should have known he wasn’t getting tight folds out of me. Sigh.

I’m a few minutes away from sitting down at today’s $1500 bracelet event. Watch my twitter feed for updates: twitter.com/hugepoker

Finished 6th out of 122 at the Wynn for $2,881.  Much tougher field today.

At 6-handed my opponents consisted of a very good, very aggressive, very young, very blond Finnish kid with a ton of chips, and four wimpy passive terrified players.  It was very frustrating that I busted out by losing two back-to-back coinflips, because it would have been very fun and profitable taking turns with him bullying the other players and then battling him heads up for the $18K first prize.

They’ve run this tournament for the last 8 days.  I’ve played it 7 times.  4 cashes, 3 final tables, $18,500 cash prizes on $5,700 invested.

I can’t remember if I’ve posted this before - if anyone wants to make a mad impetuous jump to Vegas, I’ve got some cheap duplicate hotel reservations that I’ll have to release soon - starting July 4.  Team Huge is arriving on July 7/8 for the weekend so that’s when the party starts, but I’m happy to have visitors/rooters any time.