A rough start to the WSOP, “men” in the ladies event, an awkward Walmart encounter, and next week’s poker schedule…

 

 

Contrary to what the title may indicate, I am really not sweating my atrocious start to the 2010 WSOP.  If you’re surprised, that makes two of us.  I came into the series having a halfway decent year on the live circuit, and a rare online semi-heater with a few deep runs in big tournaments.  I was feeling good and ready for some strong results to open the World Series.  I had a pretty piss poor WSOP last year, so I was anxious to get off to a good start.  At zero cashes in fourteen tournaments, that has obviously come and gone.  But I’m taking it very well, and there are a few things on my side.

 

My mental state is good and ready for the stresses of big money tournament poker.

I’m relatively secure financially, and I’ve been playing more cash poker for a more consistent income.  It’s very important to be able to look at the WSOP as an opportunity rather than a must-win.  There is just too much variance in these events to put the weight of final tables and bracelets on your shoulders.  I’ve also been really active lately, playing golf, basketball and racquetball, working out, and just hanging out with friends barbecuing around the pool.  Being happy in life helps to keep things in perspective when poker goes temporarily south.

 

I’m playing well

I didn’t play my best last year.  I gambled too much early in the smaller buy-in no limit events, and made a suspect play or two in the only tournaments I really had a chance in.  This year, I’m playing very well, and things just aren’t working yet.  I’ve mostly been card dead or unlucky early in the events.  In the few events I’ve mounted any sort of charge in, I’ve taken some pretty brutal beats to send me packin.  All I can do is play well and hope the rest falls into place.

 

Most of the events I’ve played so far have been on the smaller side.

I’m out $36,000 for the WSOP so far, which isn’t bad at all when you consider I’ve played 14 tournaments.  Fortunately, the bigger buy ins I’ll be playing are stacked more toward the back of the series.  I’ve only played one 10k and two 5ks so far, with the rest falling between 1k and 2.5k.  I may be halfway through the series in terms of tournament quantity, but I’m not even close using buy-ins as the measurement.

 

I’ll be playing the $2,500 6 handed no limit hold’em event tomorrow, and I like my chances in it.  I probably won’t win it, but I very well could.

A note on the WSOP ladies event

Apparently, there were a few “men” that played in the ladies event at the WSOP this year.  All of them should be embarrassed, though I have a feeling none of them is.  In just about every ladies event in poker, there is always some douche that plays in the name of civil rights and anti-discrimination.  On some level, you can understand where they are coming from: White men have had it extraordinarily tough in this country for a long time.  However, any reason a man gives for playing is generally super weak.  The ladies event isn’t there to segregate, or because the girls need their own event.  It’s there to give women an opportunity to come out and play against other women, in a setting that may be less intimidating for some than the usually 98% (minimum) male dominated fields.  No matter what the reason for having it, it works.  Over 1000 women came out to play and enjoy themselves.  Any “men” that feel the need to intrude upon this are just lame.  Shaun Deeb is one of two guys I know that played.  He even went so far as to dress up like a woman.  This may have been funny if he didn’t actually look just like a woman, which turned things rather creepy.  Unfortunately, he forgot the one accessory a real woman never would: a bra.  This left his man tits flapping around a bit too freely.  I don’t know if he lost a bet or won one, but even making this part of a bet is a queer thing to do.  I’ve also heard reports that there was some charitable cause for women used as a front for his participation.  That is like going and bothering a bunch of bums in the name of helping the homeless.  He seems like a good enough kid otherwise, but for this he’s a douche.  Ricky Fohrenback, a poker player I’ve spent time with traveling and would consider a friend, also played.  Ricky, you’re a douche too.

 

Grocery Shopping

My good friend, who had been living with me and acting as my assistant for a few months, left to go back to New York last week.  Not only do I no longer have anyone to play foosball with, but I had to do my own food shopping yesterday.  I know, I know – My life is sooooo hard.  So anyway, on my way through the health related isles to pick up some face wash, I stopped and moved my cart to allow a mother and her baby daughter to get by me.  They reminded me of my friend who has a 9 month old daughter and I was instantly happier upon seeing them.  I smiled at the baby girl first, then the mother.  While the baby seemed happy to see me and intrigued with my presence in her sphere as only a baby could be, the mother didn’t smile and hurriedly moved along.  As I contemplated the different reasons I could have been snubbed – she was in a rush, she didn’t like my beard, my smile is creepy – I turned and noticed something.  I was standing right next to the condoms.  Virtually every brand on the market was right in front of me as I smiled at this mother-daughter combo.  No wonder I didn’t get the return smile.  Rather than explain to her the unfortunate coincidence of our meeting, I thought it better to just let her go on her way and not creep her out any further.  Before I went on my way, I noticed one more thing – Magnum condoms are about 30% cheaper than the regular size.  Just one more advantage of having a big penis…

 

 

This week’s schedule:

 

Monday - $2,500 No Limit Hold’em (6-handed)

Monday - $1,500 Stud 8 or better

Tuesday - $2,500 Pot Limit Omaha

Wednesday - $1,500 No Limit Hold’em

Wednesday - $1,500 HORSE

Thursday - $5,000 No Limit Hold’em (6-handed)

Thursday - $2,500 Pot Limit Hold’em/Omaha

Friday - $10,000 No Limit Hold’em Heads Up Championship

Saturday - $1,000 No Limit Hold’em

Saturday - $3,000 HORSE

Sunday - $10,000 Pot Limit Hold’em Championship

The cards don’t care how much you think you deserve to win a tournament.  They don’t care if you’re playing lights out, piss awful or somewhere in between.  All that matters is what falls and the value of the respective hands when all the cards are out.  This is rather unfortunate for me, at least so far.

 

First, the bad news: The series has not gone well for me thus far.  I’ve played seven tournaments and have been out of all of them on day 1.  I don’t recall much from the first three, but the last four have been especially brutal.  In hold’em, I’ve busted AA  Last night, in No Limit 2-7 Single Draw (a much lesser known but great, great poker game), I got all in pre draw for an over double average pot with a made 9 and was beat out by a two card draw to 2h3h5h.  I’m not quite certain of my equity on this hand, but I’d put it about 88-90%.  The hold’em hands are frustrating, but there are still hundreds and hundreds of players to wade through even if I win those hands.  The deuce hand is far more frustrating, so please allow me a moment to vent.

 

Only 250 players signed up for the $1,500 NL Deuce event, and at 1am last night there were around 100 players remaining.  The table is 7-handed, and other than myself, there are two good players including Erick Lindgren and an unknown player both on my right, three bad players, and a new player with a pretty big stack who is a decent hold’em player but I’m not sure about his deuce game.  I’ll be more sure in just a minute.  I’ve been playing extremely well all night, and opening a lot of pots, when the following hand happens.  I open the button to 750 at blinds 150/300 and a 75 ante, with an 11k stack.  The new player I described is in the big blind, with 16k chips.  He looks at his hand, puts on his sunglasses, and fires out about 5000 chips.  I move in, he calls, and draws two to beat my pat 9.  If you know anything about the game, you know his play is bad, but it is especially piss awful for a few more reasons.  Since he is a good enough hold’em player, he should have the mind to know some no limit tournament strategy.  He should also have already spotted the three marks at the table.  He must also know that he is two to my left, and will have position on me for five of every seven hands.  He may not know that I’m the best player at the table (sorry Erick) and top 5 in the tournament, but he should have a better idea of that now.  So, this player, who we’ll refer to as Mr. Piss Awful for now, decides to play a pot for over 2/3 of his stack, almost 80 blinds total, in a somewhat rare out of position pot, against the best player at the table, with about as bad a hand as you can get in with.  Maybe I made him snap, maybe he snapped on his own, or maybe he thinks it’s a good play, I don’t know.  I just know that this tournament was probably my best shot to win a bracelet, and with more than double average in a 100 man field full of people just looking to take a shot at a bracelet, I’m no worse than a 10 or 15 to 1 dog to get one.  Wiping the tears, moving on…

 

And now, the good news:  The series is hardly a week old.  I’m playing well.  Only one buy in was for $5k, with all the others $2,500 or below.  I’m going to rehab today.  Life is good.  If you can keep things in perspective as a professional poker player, especially if you’re a tournament player, you’ll be a lot more successful, and more than that, live a much happier life.  It’s easy to get tunnel vision and only see that you have bricked your last seven events; but, in the big picture, it’s really only seven events.  There are over 30 on my schedule for the month, and that’s only this month.  Now, I just need to try to make a few day 2s.  Because right now I’m on track to play all 30+, and that would be bad.

 

I’ll leave you with this week’s schedule.  I really hope I don’t play all of them like I did last week.  I opted to skip the $1k NLH yesterday for the NL Deuce, so I may play it today if rehab isn’t amazing.  But then again, what are the odds of that?

 

 

 

This week’s schedule:

 

Sunday – Rehab at the Hard Rock, possibly a late reg for the $1,000 No Limit Hold’em

Monday - $1,500 No Limit Hold’em (6-handed)

Tuesday - $5,000 No Limit Hold’em

Wednesday - $10,000 No Limit 2-7 Single Draw Championship

Thursday - $1,500 Pot Limit Omaha

Thursday - $1,500 Seven Card Stud

Friday - $2,500 Limit Hold’em (6-handed), or possibly a day off since I despise limit hold’em

Saturday - $1,000 No Limit Hold’em

Sunday – Who wants to go to rehab?

It’s that special time of year.  Every card player’s Christmas.  The Rio is handing out bundles of cash and with the perfect mix of skill and luck I just may get some of it. 

 

If by some chance I don’t hit something big in the next six weeks, it won’t be for lack of trying.  I live about 15 minutes from the Rio, but I’ll be setting up camp in the convention center through mid-July.  I’ve probably glanced at the schedule over 100 times in the past 5 months, but I haven’t really mapped out exactly what I’ll be playing yet.  This is, of course, because I get so excited that I black out every time I try.  The WSOP staff seems to have done a real good job this year and I think I’m excited about every single day of tournaments.  If there should be an off day, you’ll find me at the cash tables at the Rio or Bellagio, and maybe even some satties over there.  Bottom line: I’m amped.  I’m feeling good, I’m playing well, and I’m putting in a ton of hours.  If I don’t hit something decent, it can only be because God hates me.  But with this mojo, even He might have a tough time getting in the way.

 

This week’s schedule:

 

Monday - $1,500 No Limit Hold’em

Tuesday - $5,000 No Limit Hold’em Shootout

Tuesday - $1,500 2-7 Triple Draw

Wednesday - $1,500 No Limit Hold’em

Thursday - $1,500 Pot Limit Hold’em

Friday - $1,500 No Limit Hold’em

Saturday - $1,000 No Limit Hold’em

Saturday - $1,500 No Limit 2-7 Single Draw

Sunday – Rehab Party at the Hard Rock, then day 2 of whichever Saturday event I’m still in

There are a multitude of philosophies when it comes to World Series preparation, falling into two general camps – play a lot and stay sharp or take it easy and avoid getting burnt out.  This year, I will definitely be taking it easy.

 

Since the middle of December, I’ve been at home in Las Vegas for a grand total of two or three weeks. I’ve been to Long Island, The Bahamas, upstate New York, Biloxi, Vegas, Los Angeles, Vegas, San Jose, Vegas, Austria, Vegas, Long Island, London to San Remo via bus (a nightmare), Nice, Monte Carlo, and now finally back home to stay for the next several months.  Traveling the world is great, but I couldn’t be happier to be in Vegas right now.  I’m playing a few SCOOP events here and there, and spending the rest of my time working out, playing golf, and just enjoying the Vegas sun.  I haven’t had much time this year to hang out with my friends and roommates, and I’m pumped to finally have some.

 

After SCOOP wraps up on Sunday, I’ll have about 10 days before the first WSOP event.  I’ll probably dabble with some mixed cash games to brush up for some tournaments and the side cash action, but the majority of my time will be spent barbecuing, hitting some Vegas pools, and going out with some people that are coming into town.

 

The World Series is a great opportunity with a lot of big tournaments, but it is also an extremely draining six week period.  I’m looking forward to the chance to make some big things happen, and I’ll be preparing for it by soaking in as much sun as possible over the next few weeks.

I finally made my first WPT TV final table appearance last week at Bay 101.  “Finally” may be a bit of an exaggeration, considering that I am 25 and have only been playing WPT events for less than 18 months.  However, I think I’ve earned the right to use such dramatic language.  I don’t believe that anyone has made as many “second to last” days in WPT events as I have over the past year or so without making the final day.  It’s always frustrating to get so close to a win and fall short, but I’m happy to have finally broken through into a top 3 spot.

 

I started day 1 strong at a tough table which included: Phil “USCPhildo” Collins, Antonio Esfandiari, Paul Wasicka, and Josh Arieh.  I was involved in nearly every pot and managed to have the winner at almost every showdown.  When you’re running well and playing well, it’s hard for anyone to play back at you.  I slowly increased my stack throughout the rest of the day without too many setbacks despite some tough tables.

 

Day 2 started out even better than day 1.  I was the chip leader at my table and came out firing.  I opened just about every pot I had the chance to, and was lucky enough to have some hands when I got played back at.  I 3 bet called Howard Lederer’s shove with AQ and was up against his JJ for a good chunk of chips to add to my stack and a $5,000 bounty as extra incentive to make the call.  The flop came 9 T K, which isn’t great for my hand since a Q now makes Howard a straight.  The turn bricked but the river brought a J to make three Jacks for Lederer but complete my straight.  Howard was a gentleman and stuck around for the picture and shirt signing, but the $5,000 bonus was the real prize.

 

From there I moved to another semi-tough table with plenty of chips on it.  I sat next to Jonathan Tamayo when we were 1^st and 2^nd in chips.  This didn’t last long, as I encountered my first big setback of the tournament.  Steve Sung limped the button, Brandon Cantu completed the small blind, and I raised out of the big blind with A9o.  Steve Sung now reraised about 25% of stack.  Cantu folded, and I decided to move in risking about 40% of my chips.  Sung tank called with TT, and I missed to move down to the middle of the pack.  My play here was very high variance, very aggressive, and ultimately unnecessary.  However, in my defense, I thought he was folding (obviously), and sometimes that’s the only reason I need to make a play.  Sung makes some very odd stack size plays and I just didn’t think he was all that strong here and knew he had no problem folding after putting in 25% of his stack.  These odds plays can elicit some odd responses, and that’s exactly what he got out of me as well as a bunch of my chips.

 

I built back up and put a pretty mean cooler on Joe Cassidy when we got all the money in on the turn of a 3 9 T J board with my KQ vs his TT.  This propelled me to over 200k and I kept it rolling from there.  We hit the money and went 6-handed at 36.  My new table was pretty soft and I took advantage.  I built up to 400k and then got lucky getting two pair in against a straight on the turn and smashing the four outer on the river for another 100k boost.  I ended the day around 450k, about 40% of the final table average with 27 remaining.

Day 3 started pretty mixed, with a few decent pots going my way and a few going against me.  Most notably, I lost a flip with KQ against Mclean Karr’s 77.  This was a mere stepping stone in the most absurd run of cards I’ve ever seen, but you can see how his story ended at worldpokertour.com.  I moved tables and the usual second to last day nonsense began.  I proceeded to lose every all in against short stacks and got rivered out of some very crucial pots.  I had Joe Sebok’s empathy as he watched me fall from over 800k to under 200k.  I had members of the press needling me about my falls from grace late in WPTs.  And I had my own thoughts as to how miserable yet another WPT choke would be.  I wallowed in my own misery for a bit, but this time, I refused to die.

 

It’s a funny thing about going from big stack to short stack; it can be a very freeing experience if you allow it to be.  Of course, I’m always trying to accumulate as many chips as possible.  However, with a big stack late in these tournaments comes pressure.  You have everything to gain, as well as everything to lose.  Again, there’s nothing better than being a big stack late in a major tournament, but a short stack has one advantage: Nothing to lose.  When you’re on the shorty, and everyone is just waiting for you to go broke, you have everything to gain but nothing to lose.  If you can forget about the stack you had, and live in the moment, you can play your stack well and aggressively and put yourself in good spots to double up.  I’m proud to say I was able to go from under 200k to about 500k without ever being called all in.  I used this momentum and the confidence it gave me to run it up the rest of the day.  We went 5+ hours without losing a player, but finally got to the 7-handed final table after midnight.  Andy Seth took out the 7^th place finisher, and the stage was set for the following day’s 6-handed TV final table.  I’d be going in 3^rd in chips with 1.1 million.

 

Andy Seth, Phil Hellmuth, Mclean Karr, Hassan Habib, and Matt Keikoan stood between me and my first WPT title.  I’ll leave the final table happenings to television, and comment on it when it airs around June 7^th or 13^th I’m told.  Overall, I’m happy with my play, but we’ll see how it looks on TV.  It was a good experience and I hope to be back real soon.  For now, I’m in Austria for EPT Snowfest.  I already busted the main event, but I’ll be snowboarding the Alps for the next four days so I can’t be too upset.  I’m going to try and post some video on here so hopefully that comes out well.