Archive for March, 2010

So, in Vegas for work.  Yes, I know, it’s pretty sweet.  However, while most people think that ‘working’ in Vegas involves minimal effort and maximum debauchery I’m afraid that for me work means work, and hefty hours of it.  However, there are worse places in the world to work than Vegas and I have no problem with that in the slightest.

On the poker front, which is what this blog is about after all, I stayed at the Aria – the brand new casino on the Strip near Bellagio which has cost everyone an absolute mega-fortune at precisely the time of the worst financial downturn most of us have ever seen.  I was keen to play in it’s plush new poker room, but the game is $1-$3 and that’s not me.  Particularly how down I am on my game right now.  I did check it out tho, does look nice.  I headed out to Caesars, to find that they have replaced their $1-$2 game with $1-$3 as well, I think there’s a trend – more action, more rake etc.

Anyway, I didn’t get to play until the night before flying home.  I was very tired, and to be honest I played purely because I couldn’t really face the idea of being in Vegas for 6 days and not playing poker even once.  So I went over to the Flamingo and promptly dusted off $200 in about 3 hours.  I started playing quite well, without winning, and didn’t get involved in a big hand for ages.  I then lost a big pot when my flopped 2-pair with A-10 was out-done by a jack on the turn, giving my opponent a bigger 2-pair.  Then I lost to guy who called a pre-flop raise in 2nd position with A-2.  Then the tiredness caught up with me and I pretty much made a conscious decision to tilt-off the rest   Yes, I ‘decided to tilt’.  I do get very frustrated and annoyed, but it never affects my play, except that very occasionally I just decide to let it affect my play, and now was one of those times.  I ignored the Harrington in my head, and I when I left the table I couldn’t even remember what the hand was that had beaten the 2-pair I made on the river.

I headed to the Wynn at midnight to meet Bearded Mike, over from Florida for March Madness, (the biggest sports betting event of the year), and had cigars & white russians until 3am.  That was much more fun.  The moral?  Don’t play tired.  Proper poker to follow in Vegas in June.

Recently I have been reading Dan Harrington’s books on cash games, intriguingly titled “Harrington on Cash Games”.  I’ve been doing this for 2 reasons: first, I would like to play a bit more cash in Vegas and I am aware of how different the discipline is from tournament play, and second, the early stages of deep stack tournaments play very similiarly to cash games, and I feel that getting a decent cash game strategy will enable me to be far ore comfortable at these stages – bear in mind that most of the tournaments I play in Vegas are very deep stacked, (except the WSOP).

I haven’t read Harrington since reading his essential books on tournament poker, and I’d forgotten how good a writer on poker he and his co-writer Bill Robertie are.  It’s a great read, and I’m already incorporating certain aspects of it into my play.  Generally, my play in tournaments has been quite aggressive pre-flop and on the flop, and more circumspect after – I prefer the decisions to be easier and the situations I play to be less complex. Sensible stuff really, I’ve no problem with it and it’s served me well.  However, it’s not a good strategy for cash games, and I would very much like to broaden my skills on the later streets of a hand, and I already feel I am making good progress here.

I guess we’ll know a bit more when I hit the $1-$2 NLH tables at Caesars Palace…

Today I played for the first time at The International Club in London, which was formed from the ashes of the famous Gutshot when it was closed down a couple of years ago.  The International is bigger, but still has that certain ‘dive’ quality to it   Actually, I like it there – it has a good lounge area, bar and excellent menu, and I will definitely return.  The tournament tonight was a £100 freezeout as part of the London Poker Masters.  There were 167 runners, which is excellent, and the winner would receive just over £5k.  We started with 10k chips, half-hour clocks. It started at 7pm, and apparently no-one expected it to finish before 7am.

Well, this tournament continued the rather long run of card-dead tournaments for me.  I busted out around midnight, with 65 left.  I therefore played for 5 hours.  In that five hours I had AQ once and pocket 10’s once, and had to fold both due to the preceeding action.  Other than that, I had nothing at all, not even high cards.  However, this time I did actually make something of a go of it, and I’m pretty happy to have lasted as long as I did.  I managed this by finding good spots to shove on people and push them out of pots pre-flop, on the flop and on the turn.  This is something I do think I’m alright at, representing big hands and using my image, and it was nice to get back to doing it successfully again, although I do think I only got away with it by the skin of my teeth on several occasions.

Two hours in and I’ve hardly played a hand.  I’m down from 10k to 9k, having taken the occasional small pot pre-flop to keep my stack from dwindling.  I was quite happy at this stage, I don’t mind sitting out the early levels to be honest, and I really want the rush of cards when the blinds get higher anyway.  Sadly, that didn’t happen, and after a further hour or so I found myself down to around 7k, with blinds at 300-600 with a 25 ante, when this happened:

In the BB i found 9-10c.  A player in middle-position raised to 1600.  At this point I hadn’t seen a hand in what felt like years and was looking for reasons to play, and I flat-called.  I felt that if I shoved he would call, and I would be in bad shape.  Nevertheless, it was also clear to me that I was looking for an opportunity to shove on him at some point.  The flop came 2-4-4 – I thought about it for a second or two, and shoved.  He didn’t like that, and went into the tank for a while, describing a few hands he thought I might have.  He clearly had me absolutely smashed with whatever he had, but it was obviously marginal, probably at the high end of his marginal range.  Eventually he folded…

Later that same level I found 34d in the small blind.  The button limped, so I also called, and the big blind checked.  The flop came 5-6-8 with the 6 of diamonds, so I was up & down.  I checked, the BB bet out 1200 and the button called.  I decided to call here, with the straight draw, to see what would develop. Why not just get it in now?  Well, someone definitely has the heart draw and the other might have the 8, or a 7 for a different up and down draw, and both of these could easily call a shove.  I felt that there were a number of cards that could come off on the turn that could make things interesting and allow me to get the stacks in, provided the turn was a dead card to others.  So, the turn was the 5 of diamonds, so now I have an up & down straight flush draw.  I decided to check to see what the others would do – I’m def shoving, but if I can get another bet out of one or both of them then that’s just fine.  The BB bet out another 2100, the button called, and I shoved.  I fancied that it would be an insta-call for the BB, but that if I was going to gamble this was a decent enough spot to do it in, and there was an outside chance he would fold for the extra 5000. There was about 9000 in the pot already, before my shove.  The BB thought about it for an age, and spoke to me a lot.  He was clearly really on a knife-edge with his decision.  He said he had queen-high with both flush and straight draws, but that he didn’t think he had the odds.  Little did he know that at that point, I had 4 high   After about 2 or 3 minutes, he folded, and I was up to 14k or so.  There was some debate about my hand after this, (I didn’t show), but to preserve my tight image I ‘admitted’ to having the 5 for trips, with a straight draw to go with it.  After all, next time I shove, I’m probably hoping they will fold again.

Moving on, and with blinds now 400-800 with a 50 ante, I blinded back down to 12k or so, and again I’m looking to pick some spots as I am still being dealt utter cod, with no chance of parole.  In the SB I pick up J9,  A player in early position makes it 3k, and I shove.  Again he tanks for a while, and it feels like he has something like KQ, AJ or A10 and isn’t sure what to do.  Bear in mind that I hadn’t shown a hand down all night, not one single time, so it was hard for anyone to put me on anything, and I had folded 95% of my hands instantly.  So he folded, and I bought myself a few more rounds.

Then, with blinds at 500-100 with a 100 ante, it folded round to me on the button and I shoved for 10k with pocket deuces.  I did this because with only 2 players to act behind me there’s a fair chance I can take this down pre-flop and add 2500 or so to my stack.  Sadly the SB woke up with pocket 10’s and that was that.

So, a better performance from me, particularly considering I once again had no decent hand all night.  That’s 4 or 5 tournaments in a row now since I found a decent hand I could play.  Given the big intervals in between my tournaments, that spans about 6 months, and I’m thinking that it really would be nice to see pocket kings, or even AK, just once next time.  Perhaps I’ll have a chance to build a stack, rather than have to duck & weave in order to survive…

However, I enjoyed it, and felt I was much more ‘on my game’ than I had been for recent tournaments, and I’m looking forward to playing again.  The International Club is a very tough room, with plenty of grinders and regulars – much tougher than Vegas, and Brighton – and playing there should get me in good shape. Vegas is coming in 2 weeks as well, and I’m hoping to get one or two games in there during my stay.