Our good Florida friend Bearded Mike has a hat.  Here is a photo of it:

This is Bearded Mike’s hat.  It is not Bearded Mike.

That was kind of gratuitous, particularly for a poker blog.  However, Mike plays poker in the WSOP, and that really is his hat, so it counts.

Stuff the poker, Vegas is alright without it.

Adrian made his 4th final table cash for the trip today – one in the Binion’s Classic series, 1 in the Caesar’s Mega-Stack and the other 2 in other Caesar’s tournaments.  He’s cashed over $14k and since the Binion’s cash has been on some run of form.  His tournament game is top notch, and if he could satellite into a few big ones I can’t see it being long before he takes down a big score.

He was very down ion his game after the first week here, it just goes to show how one result can change things around.  Last year it was Ads who bubbled everything.  This year it’s me who can’t get anywhere.

Nevermind.

A few nights ago we decided to play pot limit omaha, (PLO), at Excaliber, where they have electronic tables.  At these tables there are no dealers, it’s very like playing online.  There are many more hands dealt per hour, and the casino rakes much more.  My feeling is that all poker rooms will go this way, simply because the casino’s know they can make massively increased profits from it, and money talks.  In a game like PLO, it also means there are no dealer errors, and split pots are worked out for you.

Mike & Johnny on the electronic tables at Excaliber

You can see from the photo that each player has their own ’station’, and you use a card to get money in and out of the game, with a community screen in the middle to show the flop and the pot.  Your hole cards are face-down until you touch them.  I actually think far more sophisticated tables are coming, which will be similar to Microsoft Surface, which will be more popular than these tables.  I don’t say it will be a positive thing, becuase I personally love chips, cards, dealers, I just think it’s inevitable.

For what it’s worth, I didn’t win any money in the PLO session – I actually hate the game, just wanted to try the tables…

After lunch I gathered myself together and decided to have a shot at the evening tournament at Caesar’s.  Again, I tried to keep the risks low and build a stack, and did ok in the first half hour.

Here’s a strange pot tho.  A Swedish guy opens for 250, with blinds at 50-100.  I called in late position with A-10 to see a flop.  The flop misses me completely.  The Swede checks, so I check behind.  The turn is a blank too.  He checks, I took a stab and fired out 300.  He thought about it and called.  The turn was another blank.  He checked again and I decided to fire out again, first to try to take it down, second to potentially value bet what might well be the best hand.  I hoped he’d fold, so I wouldn’t have to show the bluff, but in fact he called.  I announced that I had nothing and he must win, and he showed…. A-10!  I showed and we split it.  He looked pretty smug, but it’s one of the weirder calls I’ve had made against me.  He risked neatly 1000 chips to split the pot, and with A-10 even my bluff might have been better than his hand.  Strange.

Anyway, then this happened.  A guy opens for 350, the Swede calls and I call on the button with AK.  The flop is 10-K-Q, all diamonds.  I have the ace of diamonds, so I’m in great shape here.  The first guy makes it 1500 to play.  The Swede raises to 4200.  There’s no getting away from this – I have top pair, top kicker and the nut flush draw with an inside royal flush draw.  I push all-in.  First guy folds, but the Swede calls.  He has AJ, and so has flopped a straight.  I still have a lot of outs for the flush, or to chop.  However, naturally it bricks out and I’m gone.

The drink and cigar help to deaden the pain

I’m now 8-0 down in all-in pots on ths trip.   The scenario is the same every time – everything goes well and I build steadily, and then I find a situation whcih forces me to put my chips in the middle, and it’s gone.  I just need one of these monsters to hold up and I’m there, but we’re running out of time.  The trip as a whole is awesome, but the poker is a now a sever test of my patience.  Deeply depressing.  PLaying again tomorrow, but kind of dreading it.  Last chance saloon…

The $330 Mega-Stack at Caesar’s Palace, and I felt confident given my recent play, despite the appalling run and no cashes.  During the early play I found myself to be day-dreaming heavily, and during the first break I gathered myself together and locked myself in to focus properly.  From then on I built my stack up to around 20k on the back of a good call with AK on a ace-high raggy board, where my opponent had played it really strong, calling and raising me all the way before shoving on the end, and a couple of other plays I was happy with.  All plays where I had a decent hand, a good read and was not risking my stack.

Then, an older Russian guy wn a huge pot, knocking someone out.  He was still stacking his now monstrous amount of chips when I was dealt QQ in early position.  With blinds at 100-200, and with one limper, I raised it up to 750.  The Russian guy glanced at his cards and raised me to 2500.  I flat called, looking to see a flop and not looking to get into a raising war.  He continued to stack his chips.  The flop came 2-2-7 and he immediately announed all-in.  The thing was, it wasn’t his turn to act, it was mine.  For me, this was a huge WTF moment.  Here’s this guy with a monster stack, throwing 40k at a 5k pot, acting out of turn and still stacking his chips.  Inside I knew it could only mean he had a huge hand, and my QQ was probably beat by KK or AA.  However, the injustice (as it felt) of this made the red mist descend a bit.  I wasn’t sure whether to shove, or to check and let him complete his all-in.  If I did shove, would he go back on it and fold?   Would he call and show JJ? Or AK?  Should I check-fold, or would I be giving up a great spot to double=up to a monster stack?  I threw in a 5k chip.  In hindsight I did this to commit myself to call if he did shove, meaning I wouldn’t have to sit there and think about it anymore.  He did shove.  I called, fearing the worst, and he did indeed have KK and I lost.

I found this to be deeply, deeply irritating.  Even tho, for me, it would have beena huge fold, I know I am capable of making it and I was annoyed at mysefl because once again I had built a stack by playing good, small=pot, low-risk poker and had it blown apart with one massive hand.  What I really hated was the cold-deck of me getting QQ with KK behind me.  As a one-off, you just tend to accept this, but after the week of beats I’ve had I will admit that it clouded my judgement a bit.  Others have said it was a 50-50 call and it’s ok to have made it, and that I would have been second-guessing myself all-day if I had folded and missed a chance to double-up.

Another sick day.  At this point I have played 7 all-in pots, more than half of them with a dominant hand, and lost every one of them.

Right, back to hold ‘em.  A huge event at The Venetian, a $330 evemnt with nearly 1000 entries and a huge prize pool.   I got there late and was the 110th alternate, (alternates come in as people get knocked out, up to the first break).  This meant I was blinded out until I could start, so I had 10k of the original 12k stack to start with.  Nothing really happened for me to be honest – I managed to get my stack up to about 18k, but blinds were getting up there.  I lost about 8k when I made a very tight fold with AK on a board of A-7-Q-Q, and I was probably wrong, but I got it back again a few hands later making a shove move on the same guy with another AK.  At the break, with blinds at 500/1000 with a 100 ante, I had 15k and really needed a double-up.

And so, first hand back and in the big blind, I woke up with K-10 and decided to see if there would be an opportunity to make a move.  A guy with 20k raised to 3.5k from early position, and it folded round to me.  Now if I pushed, and he folded, he’d still have 17k left, whereas if he called and lost he’d be crippled.  Therefore I decided to shove and hope had a hand he could fold.  He thought about it and then said “let’s gamble”, called and showed K-J – exactly the sort of hand I thought he could fold.  Obviously he won, and I was out.

Then I did something bad.  The frustration of the last few tournament beats boiled over and I kind of threw my chips to him, quite aggressively.  He stood up, and in a big of a temper, I swiped his drink and his chip stack across the table.  Chips went everywhere, and so did coffee.  A security card was nearby, (of course), and I was escorted away from the poker room.  It was made clear that I wouldn’t be welcome back, and given that they have all my details from registration, I have to hope I’ll be able to play at Caesar’s tomorrow…

OK, actually none of that happened.  Well, in a way it did happen, coz the scenario certainly played itself out in my head while I smiled, said “nice gamble”, and wandered away…

Finally got around to writing this one up.  Off to the Golden Nugget for the event that Ads, Mike and I had really been waiting for – the 2-7 Triple Draw at the Grans Series of Poker at the Golden Nugget.  Triple draw isn’t spread at many places, so it was great to be able to enter an affordable buy-in tournament. There weren’t many entries and only the top few got paid, but even so it was worth winning.

I didn’t have a good table – full of good young pro’s and grinders who all knew the game.  I was hoping that the experience of the game that I had would mean I could really chip-up from people not really knowing what they were doing, but it was clear early that in fact I was easily the least experienced player there.  Even so, early on I crushed the game.  I hit a few really good hands and got paid on all streets.  I also pulled off a bluff I was quite pleased with.  It folded around to me in the small blind and i decided to raise to steal.  My hand was something like 5-5-7-7-8, so nothing to write home about.  The big blind put me on the steal and called.  At this point I decided to ’snow’ (bluff).  I announced to draw 2 and picked 2 random cards from my hand.  BB also drew 2.  I actually drew yet another 5 and another 7.  I’m now very confident that I’ve had a lot of the BB’s potential outs and that he won’t hit his draw, and that if I continue to play the hand strong then I ‘ll bet him off it.  I bet, he called.  I drew one, (to make it look like my hand had improved), and the BB drew 2 again – perfect.  I bet, he called again.  This time I stood pat, and he drew one.  After the last draw I bet and he folded.  He’d missed his draw, mainly because I’d got all his outs at some point.  If he had somehow hit some miracle I would have had to show down a totally screwed random hand.  Later on we had a truly weird hand, which ended with 3 of us having the nuts – 2-3-4-5-7.  No-one had ever seen this before, and no-one probably ever will again.  One person was pat on the 2nd draw with it, and the other 2 of us hit it with our last draw.  Very very weird.

Monster stack looming above the bag and glasses

At the break I had a huge stack.  However, I was still very wary.  The problem with triple draw is that if you are dealt a monster draw, say 1 card to a 7, you are committed to betting and calling raises with it on every draw in order to try to hit it.  If you miss all these draws you can easily spew 5 or 6 big bets in one hand.  A couple of these close together and your stack can easily be decimated.  It’s exactly what happened to me in the WSOP triple draw event last year in fact.    And, undortunately, it’s exactly what happened to me again.  First of all I actually had rough 9 that I stodd pat with after 1 draw against a guy drawing 3, then 2, on the grounds that I thought he would probably miss.  With 15k in the middle he actually hit the nuts on his last draw, halving my stack.  Then I got dealt 2-3-4-7-x and drew 1 card all the way and missed, and that was me out.  I think I was out around 12 or 13th.

Great fun, but sadly, still no sign of a cash…

Quiet day, decided to play the $240 game at Caesars at 4pm.  Had no playabke hands and no position for the first hour, then it folded round to my button with blinds at 300-600, and I raised to 1400 woth A7, (with 8k behind).  The small blind folded but the big blind put me all-in.  I thought about it before folding.  The very next hand I got pocket kings, and I made the same raise to 1400, hoping that someone would see that I previously folded to the shove, and put me all-in again.  The big blind did just that, and I obviously called.  He showed JJ, so my kings were miles ahead.  A jack on the flop killed me, and that was that.

So, 3 consecutive tournaments – AQ loses to A7, AA loses to QQ and KK loses to JJ all-in.  Given that this is the only time of year that I really get to play a lot of events one after the other, this is pretty sick, and is now officially my worst run if sickness ever.

Tomorrow is a highlight of the trip, the Triple Draw event at the Grand Series of Poker at the Golden Nugget.  Looking forward to a break from hold-em to be honest, despite the fact that I feel really on top of my game, I have to say that sick beat after sick beat is killing me right now.

So, went into todays $330 event at Caesars with renewed confidence and expectation following the WSOP, in which I didn’t make the dinner break but was very happy with my game.  I started well, playung a few hands and was never down on chips.  During the first break I was pleasantly surprised to find that they sell jelly in the Caesars food court, and you can get cream from the coffee shop.  A new standard snack for the poker is born.

My first table was good fun, with a lot of good guys, including Mike – I haven’t sat at his table since the WSOP Triple Draw last year.  During our game the USA were playing Brazil in the final of the Confederations Cup in South Africa.  USA actually went 2-0 up in the first half, (an almighty shock), at which point I stated that Brazil would win 3-2, and I was confident enough that I would go to the sports book outside the poker room and put money on it.  Sadly I couldn’t do that as we were playing, but shortly after half time Brazil scored.  I reminded everyone that a Brazil win was inevitable, and when they duly got the 2nd and 3rd everyone round the table was wondering what I would have won if I’d placed the bet.  One guy then asked how much injury time there would be, to which I replied, “dunno, 3 minutes I would guess”, just as 3 extra minutes appeared on the clock.  In an attempt to claim a hat-trick I suggested that Fabiano would get man-of-the-match, despite me not having seen the game.  Later we found out that he did.  Thankfully I then found out that Caesars would not have taken my 3-2 bet as they don’t take in-game bets on football.  I wonder what I would have got if they had?

Anyway, back to the poker.  Our table broke – Mike said to the floorman “just do me one favour, please don’t move me to a table full of douche-bags” to which the floorman replied “sir, this is a poker room”   The new table was tough, but I won a good couple of early pots and had established a great image, and had a well-above average of 30k this happened:  Blinds are 300-600, and I am in the big blind looking down at AK.  A fat kid with about a 20k who had just shown a big bluff calls the 600 in mid-position.  A guy who I hadn’t any real info on next to him also called, (he had me well out-chipped).  I duly raised it up to 1800, and they both called.  The flop was 6-K-3 rainbow.  Obviously I felt I should be ahead, and as I tend to do I lead out for 2100.  On that board I’m half-expecting them both to fold, but the fat kid shoves.  The guy next to him insta-calls.  Now I was going to snap-call the fat kid, but now what?  I could call, with 10k behind, or re-shove to get the other guy to put more of his stack in.  Or I could fold.  To be honest, I immediately knew I ought to fold.  I didn’t know what the fat kid had, but the other guy surely had to be really strong didn’t he?  A set of 6’s? Aces?  I agonised for couple of minutes and mucked the hand, and hoped I was right.  It turned out that the far kid had the aces, and the other guy only had K-10!  Right fold, wrong person.  I felt pretty good about the fold tho – maybe you agree, or maybe you reckon it was obvious, but I was quite happy that I took the time.

Anyway, I stayed around 30k, still well above average, when this happened:  I got dealt 2 red aces UTG, with blinds at 400-800.  I raised it up to 2200.  A guy in the cut-off re-raised me to 6000.  I re-re-raisd 11,000 more and he shoved, and I obviously called.  He had 2 black queens.  The dealer dealt the cards fast so I can’t remember what they were, but he dealt a 4 card spade flush to the guy on the river, so I was out.  Sick.  Really quite physically sick.  I would have had a 60k+ stack and been well on the way to day 2, and it was a bad, bad feeling.  Particularly bad as I again felt I was playing my A-game.
Still, an hour later and over it now (!).

I have 3 or 4 more opportunities to go deep and cash left on this trip, but to be honest it feels a bit doomed at the moment – AQ losing to A7 in the WSOP, and now AA losing to QQ with a flush, not good ways to go out.

That’s poker folks.

So here we are, somewhat lacking in confidence at the big one and really needing to turn it around and play some decent poker.  I got up around 10am and didn’t actually feel too bad considering the night before, and headed to the Rio…

Entry for Event #51 at the World Series of Poker 2009

I decided to play differently than usual and play the flops and streets more.  In the end, although I did bust out around 6pm, I have to say I was really quite proud of how I played – particularly given how things have not been going my way at the poer tables on this trip so far.  I made some really good reads, value bets, calls and lay-downs along the way and restored a lot of confidence.  At the same time, it was doubly rough to go out because I was so zoned-in I felt I could go a long way.

The main room at The Rio before play begins

I made a very slow start, and when my aces got no action at level 1 I really thought it was going to be another one of those days.  However, midway through level 2, when I was down to about 3k, I flopped bottom-2-pair in the big blind with 5 limpers and managed to make it pay.  I won another very tricky pot with pocket queens, with overcards and a flush down, to work my way to 12k by the break – more than double the average.

The redbull was absolutely necessary

After the break I took a series of hits to my stack – missing flops by a mile, having to lay-down down some good hands and trying to stay focussed and patient.  Down to 3k, I then managed to build back up 10k by picking a few spots and winning a decent pot with pocket 9’s.  At the second break I was down to 8k, but this was still average and I’d have been pretty happy to make the second break with average chips if offered it at the start of the day.

So, back after the 2nd break and looking forward to a long session, I got AQ in the small blind with blinds at 100-200 and a 25 ante.  There were 2 limpers and I pumped it up to 700.  The big blind called, and both limpers.  This was pretty unexpected and unwelcome to be honest, 1 caller would have been preferable.  Anyway, the flop of A-7-2 with 2 spades looked pretty good to me and I very much felt I ought to be ahead of the limpers.  It checked around to me and I fired out 2k.  The big blind folded but the first limper re-raised big.  The other limper folded.  I then had to consider what someone would limp in early position with and then call a decent raise.  I could be losing to a set, but the flush draw felt more likely.  I decided that this was a good time to start to become more active, and I shoved.  The insta-call told me all I needed to know – he showed A-7 for a flopped 2-pair to beat my AQ.  The same player had been playing some funky hands all day, but there you go.

So, the bracelet dream is over for another year, but I take a lot from this event.  I fought hard and made good decisions, (well, until the last one I guess…), and this gives me a lot to be hopeful for as I look forward to Caesars tomorrow and Monday.  Two years ago I came through with some late cashes to get ahead for the trip, and we’re only halfway thru this one, and perhaps my game has arrived at last.  Fingers crossed…