Vegas November 2011

Day 1 - VDSE NLH

Last Updated: 2011-11-10 15:56:44

Easy flight as usual, didn't even get the usual bumpiness taking off in Denver.

Got to the gate right on time, after checking in ended up getting to Venetian about 15-20 mins after the tournament started and bought in.

Got some detail from Leon on his weekend to that point. Had played at Wynn Friday, finished 7th paying 5. He had had a fever all day but a good night of sleep apparently cured him and he was ready to go Saturday.

The final tally was 357 players, paying 36.

The table I started out at was clearly going to be the second table broken up, so I knew there wasn't much point of building a table image. I pretty much played ABC poker.

Had a good, loose player at the end of the table who was playing most hands and was building a nice stack stealing pots left and right. But as is often the case with that kind of player, he didn't know when to stop. One guy started catching hands and let the loose guy bluff off most of his stack to him. Then when he had about half a stack I looked down at A-K either under the gun or UTG+1.

Simple plan. Limp, someone will raise, if nobody raises by the time it gets around to loose guy he'll shove and i'll insta-call. Guess how it went...

Limp, limp, limp, all-in from loose guy. Pete goes over the top, everyone folds, loose guy turns up K-10 (I think he shoved dark) and pete "Halfs-up". I love it when a plan comes together...

Leon meanwhile had doubled up and was in good shape.

So not long after that we get broken up and I move to a new table. I quickly learn that I'm betting into three calling stations, so if I decide I want to steal any pots I'm going to have to be willing to fire 2 or even 3 bullets and take my chances. Not an ideal situation. Plus there's the huge stack betting into me, who I would like to reraise now and then, but, again, three calling stations after me...ugh.

Well long story short I did consistently build my stack and stayed above average to a little while before the dinner break. Didn't have a lot of big hands aside from catching quad 7s, didn't get paid a whole lot for them (the other guy took one stab at stealing on turn, folded to a very good pot odds bet from me on the river, clearly had little or nothing).

After I was at the table an hour or two Leon came over dejected. All in A-K vs A-Q, other guy caught running straight cards. Ouch.

But I've noticed a pattern in these tournaments, which is that if you look at the format it looks like it goes up very gradually, when you get around the dinner break your cost per round starts to go up very quickly. That means that your 30k stack can be plenty of chips at one point, but if you just stay there for two rounds suddenly you only have enough chips for 8 or fewer rounds.

So after hitting the quads I was over 30K, I might have peaked around 35K after winning one pot soon after, but went into the 3rd break back down around 27K. We sit back down and I'm starting to feel a little blind pressure, but I look at pocket aces. Make a little raise, someone shoves and I'm up against Qs but against a shorter stack.

Aces hold up, I'm over 40k.

Two rounds before the dinner break, I've been card dead and I'm down around 37k going into dinner.

Coming back the blinds are only 800/1600/200ante. That's 4400 every time around the table, I can't sit around too long.

In the big blind a guy who had recently sat down and proceeded to play almost every pot and bet post flop 100% of the time there wasn't a bet into him limps in on my big blind. Small blind calls, I check 10-7 off. Flop J-7-5. At this point I'm convinced my middle pair is probably good against the loose player and i'm 100% confident loose guy will bet anything. I'm going to check-raise him.

Check from SB, I check, he bets 3000 into a 6000 pot. SB immediately folds and I think and then go over the top for half my stack, 13k.

My first thought at that moment was "why didn't I shove?" But in hindsight, I clearly made the right move. If I shove there it clearly looks like a bluff, and if this guy actually has a hand I want to to believe me. He was smart enough to know that I was smart enough to know that I was pot committed, no chance I was going to fold. This bet looked like I had a monster and I wanted action if he did have a hand, and clearly that was not the case. I had an iffy hand that I thought was the best hand but knew it might not be.

This guy was clearly a very good player. Up to this point he never thought more than a few seconds about what he was going to do. But this time he didn't know what to do. I just stared at the board, never moved my eyes, didn't move a muscle. He stared at me. And stared at me. And stared at me. Then he counted up the pot (I think). Then he stared at me. And stared at me. Then he did something I never saw anyone do.

He started to look at the pot, then jerked his head back. This guy was actually trying to catch me changing my expression. He did it two more times. You can't make it up.

Finally after what seemed like forever he let out a disgusted sigh and threw in a bunch of chips, he knew I wasn't folding and he knew the rest were going in anyway if he was beat. He put me all in.

I called and he turned over pocket 8s. Ouch! 5 outs twice and a runner runner draw isn't great but isn't horrible, but the 8s held up.

Hindsight, I still am very happy with how I played it. I made a great move, good chance I had the best hand anyway. He made a great call. What can you do.

So Sunday it will be brunch at Bellagio followed by football at the sports book and then the 3pm PLO/PLO8 tournament at venetian.

Wish me luck!