Sup yall.  Lots been going on!  Lots!  The main thing… I won a tournament!  Yes, finally I have another major title under my belt, winning the Borgata Winter Open earlier this month.  I couldn’t be happier, and I know I’ve had critics and people waiting for me to get back on top and have some big finishes… I know this is just the beginning of a great year.

I consciously made a decision to hit a few more tournament stops this year I hadn’t been to in a while, and that included the Borgata which I hadn’t been to in over a year.  Atlantic City ain’t my favorite spot, but the Borgata is nice. 

I started by playing the 2k heads-up event they ran, and ended up winning four matches but losing two and juuust bubbling the money.  My third match was against none other then Michael Phelps, a buddy of mine I hadn’t seen a while.  His game has definitely been improving as I know he plays a lot online and is always working to get better… it definitely showed in our match and he had me down to 5k to his 35k.. of course I was able to suck out a couple times and come back to win.  I think I tilted him for a while after that one!

The main event was a $3500 buy in, which I feel is the right range of buy in to make big events nowadays because it attracts more players and is good for poker.  This tournament got a healthy 780 players or so, and I was lucky to start quickly right out of the gate, getting some big pairs and making good reads all throughout the first few days.  I won’t get into too much detail but check out my next column in Bluff Magazine where I talk a little bit more about the tournament.

Basically it was a smooth ride to the final table where I actually made one biiig mistake and got lucky… besides that I’m happy with how I played the whole tournament and how I’m playing right now in general.  Although I feel like I’ve been consistent and have had some nice cashes in the last year and a half, this is the kind of finish that you need as a poker player to truly get on the radar of other players especially helps in getting myself back out into the public eye.  Big things to come I hope.

One fun fact I didn’t mention in Bluff was the incredible fact that the player I ended up beating heads-up for the title, Sirious Jamshidi, is the same player who I beat in my first heads-up match in the 2k Heads-up tournament just two days before.  What are the odds of something like that?

Ok, I have more to talk about, including LAPC, Vancouver, and some other shizz..  I’m lazy so I’ll write another blog in about week including the upcoming Bay 101 in all that.  It’s safe to say things have been pretty interesting lately.  I’m not as bored as usual which is good!

Holleratchaboy