Vegas June 2018 (WSOP)

The plan

Last Updated: 2018-05-10 11:38:00

As always this BLOG entry will evolve as various venues announce their summer plans...

UPDATE: The plan is pretty solid now. I'm mostly "done" with most places outside of WSOP and Aria for poker, Aria is so juicy for me. You never know...Golden Nugget, Planet Hollywood and (much less likely) Wynn or Venetian could come up with something to entice me but I really doubt it. Especially the last two as they've jacked up buyins and when the I'm not playing WSOP I want to keep buyins reasonable. Now that Patrick and Dyan are locked in to when they're coming this schedule is probably about as solid as it can be.

Turned out my choice of dates when I booked the trip in October was spot on! The schedule came out in mid-December, by far the earliest I've ever seen, and I couldn't have picked a better window of games I'd play in at the WSOP. And for the time being we are sticking with the dates, which is 8th-25th of June. Its just so hard to pass up these weekend rates I got when this is our annual get-away from life. I don't take a lot of time off at other times of the year.

The poker plan is that I will play in 2-3 WSOP events and the 1pm Rio and 7PM Aria daily tournaments on days I'm not playing in the WSOP. Because the trip is so long I expect to take at least a couple of days off, but I don't have those planned, below I show what I would play in on every day if I played every day... What I do and don't do will also be dependent on my level of success. 6 cashes last summer, 3 of which were sizable, allowed me to do a lot. If I were to get skunked for the entire first week of the trip this time I will probably have to slow down a lot in week 2. That said...

Here is our current but always tentative itinerary:

6/8	EARLY	Travel/Date Night	Drive out early, lunch at In-N-Out in Washington UT, dinner at Gallaghers at NYNY
6/9	3:00PM	WSOP Event #22	8-Game Mix
6/10	11:00AM	Aria Classic HORSE	(if no 8-Game day 2)
6/11	7:00PM	Aria Classic	(if no 8-Game day 3)
6/12	7:00PM	Aria Classic	Or Event 26 PLO?
6/13	11:00AM	Aria Classic	Seniors...because I can...
6/14	11:00AM	WSOP Event #30	Pot Limit Omaha
6/15	7:00PM	Aria Classic	(if no PLO day 2) Patrick and Dyan arrive
6/16	3:00PM	WSOP Event #35	* Omaha 8/b Mix (PL8, L8, Big O) if no PLO Day 3
6/17	1:00PM	WSOP Daily DS	** (if no 8/b Mix day 2)
6/18	7:00PM	Aria Classic	(if no 8/b Mix Day 3)
6/19	1:00PM	WSOP Daily DS	No Aria 7PM daily
6/20	1:00PM	WSOP Daily DS	Ditto
6/21	7:00PM	Aria Classic
6/22	7:00PM	Aria Classic
6/23	7:00PM	Aria Classic	Or Event 48 Monster Stack?
6/24	11:00AM	Aria Classic PLO 8/b	Or Event 48? Event 50 Razz?
6/25	Return home if no day 2 of Monster Stack or Razz...or book another night for me and a flight for Joann if I'm still alive!

*Joann and Dyan Gordon Ramsey Steak 6PM so Joann can finally have that Beef Wellington
** This day is a little up in air. If Patrick made Day 2 of Event 35 and I didn't I would most likely play in a second Aria Classic Seniors at 11am. If neither of us made Day 2 there is no 7pm at Aria (apparently 7pm cancelled at Aria all days there is a seniors event) so we can't do that. For now I'm assuming WSOP Daily Deep Stack, but I'm going to see what else there is around town for that day...hopefully we both make Day 2 and this is moot!

Other bracelet events in my price range that are going on while we're out there that I could jump into with a big score beforehand:

Comments on various WSOP options...

Right now I'm 100% for WSOP events 22, 30 and 35. Patrick is coming out specifically to play in 35 and I made day 2 in it last year. I'm 2-for-2 making day 2 in 8-game and I've cashed twice playing Omaha High. So they're all no-brainers.

That said, between the fact that I'm otherwise playing almost nothing but hold'em the rest of the trip and the fact that WSOP NLH tournament fields have gotten sooooo tough, it's hard for me to justify getting into a NLH bracelet event. OTOH the three I listed are all intriguing. Monster Stack is always a fave of mine. Event 34 is 10,000 chips for only $1000 buyin. And if I were to have a really deep run in 8-game, 26200 chips for "The Marathon" is over half a Main Event starting stack for only a little over a quarter of the buyin with 100 minute levels. Wow. But it's pricey...

PLO Giant is also inviting. Only $365 buyin. Multi-day tournament every Sunday that gets into the money (and pays out) every Sunday, but stops playing at a certain point and anyone who survives any given Sunday comes back 7/2 to finish out the tournament. And it's PLO. And I have three chances to give it a shot. And if things worked out and I'm out there anyway for 7/2, Main Event satellites run at that time also. Hmmmmmm.....

WSOP Seniors is there for completeness and because I can. But I really doubt I'd play in it. 5000 chips is not a lot and they're allowing a single rebuy, which means I would have to plan to fire two bullets getting only 5000 each time. Not enticing at all.

I really like the game selection of the Big Bet Mix (NLH, PLO, NL 2-7 draw, NL 5-card draw, Big O, PL 8/b, PL 2-7 triple draw) but it's a higher buyin, more than any of the ones I intend to play in already, it's also a single rebuy and that would be a lot to plan on two bullets.

And making day 2 in Razz would keep us in Vegas for an extra day, and Joann will likely be scheduled to work the next day...so...not terribly likely. Much more reasonable for me to play in the Monster Saturday so that if I made Day 2 we would have Sunday to make a plan for an extra day...but also not terribly likely.

Lastly, how much I play at Aria depends on how things are going. Almost every day is a 400 or 470 at 11am and a 240 at 7pm. If things are going well there could be a lot more 11am tournaments where you see 7pms. The two days I have listed for WSOP Daily DS Aria is running a 2-day $1K tournament at 11 and either cancelled or is running a WPT qualifier at 7pm.