LinkBack URL
About LinkBacks
(copied and pasted from Facebook)
Venentian Deep Stack
422 people registered, and the top 3 spots paid 28k, 17k, and 11k respectively. Day 1 went pretty well. I played some very good poker, played my game. I was making good reads and playing patient, mixing it up between tight and loose. There were some key hands on Day 1. 3 that come to mind:
1) It is about 5-6 hours in, and I have been card dead for the last couple hours. I built up my stack early thanks to poop truck and a few other key hands. I don't remember the exact details of this hand, but I had ~15 big blinds (I think the blinds were 800/1600/200). I'm in the SB, the table folds around to the cut off (he has ~16000), who raises to 4000. The button (~45000) re-raises to 12000. I (~22000) look down at AA, and try not to cheer too much. I move all in. The cut-off calls, and the button thinks for a while but ends up calling. I'm against JJ and AK, and the AA holds.
2) A bit later, I've lost some chips when I lost a race and made a bad read, so I'm back down to ~36000. Blinds are 1k/2k/300. A tighter player in MP (~40000) raises to 8000. I call on the button with 99. (About 30-45 minutes earlier, he had said he wasn't ready to take big risks yet, it wasn't time, something like that.) The flop comes Q high and raggedy with 2 clubs. He makes and continuation bet of 9k, which seemed small and scared to me. I thought for a while, and raised all-in (another 18k or so). He thought for a while and ended up folding. I'm 99% sure he had 10s. Good play by me. :P
3) Much later, getting close to the money bubble. Blinds are 3k/6k/500. I'm in the BB with ~70k. A very good female player raises in EP (maybe UTG+1) to 18k. It folds around to me, and I have 33. She had been playing pretty tight, solid poker, but had raised my BB the last couple rounds, and I had laid them down. This time, I decide to try and exercise my fold equity and stack and 3-bet all-in. She thinks for a while, and ends up calling with AQ clubs. I put my head down because I don't want to see the flop. The table all makes some kind of noise when it comes down (gasp or "wow" or something), and I'm not excited to look up, but I do and realize I flopped a set. The turn gave her a club draw, but the river blanked. Nothing like playing poker for 12 hours to then flip a coin for your tourney life.
Once the money bubble broke, I went on a mini heater and upped my stack from ~90k on the bubble to the 263k I had when we bagged up at the end up of the day (had AA against QQ when a player went all-in, 55 held against A9 against another shorty all-in). Day 2 was looking promising, with me being 5th in chips of 26 left, and lots of shorties that would probably be desperate at the start of the day.
Less than 40 minutes into day 2, we had already lost 6 people. I hadn't really had any thing, but had stolen the blinds once. An aggressive player (whom I had played with for ~5 hours the previous day) was open raising 2-3 times per round, including stealing my blinds a couple times. I had played (and won) the one hand we had played on day 2. He had shown down a Q9s that he had raised with a bit earlier, so I was planning on trapping him. I got my chance when he raised my BB again and I had A4 hearts. I thought this was way ahead of his range, but I didn't want to just take his raise. I thought if I hit the flop decently at all, I could get a lot more from him. I was right... sort of.
He had ~280k to start the hand, and I had ~250k. Blinds were 6k/12k/1k. He makes it 27k and I call. The flop comes AJ7 rainbow. I'm very confident I'm way ahead of him, so I check planning to check-raise his continuation bet. He complies by betting 24k. I check-raise to 74k, thinking this will just take down the pot. I was wrong. He goes all-in. Now I'm not quite sure about my hand, but I've already put over 100k in the pot, leaving me with only 150k if I fold. Putting in 40% of your stack and folding would just be a huge leak I think, and there's still a chance I'm ahead. I decide to call. Before we turn over the cards he says "you're ahead, I thought you were weaker than that". Phew! He turns over J8s.
Unfortunately, I tend to run really bad when someone makes a pretty ridiculous play like this against me. This was no exception. The turn brought a 10, giving him a gut shot and 4 more outs. The river gave him that gut shot when a 9 hit, and he had the J high straight. I stood up, said some bad things under my breath, and walked away, taking 19th. If that hand holds up, I'll have a 500k stack and move into second in chips for the tourney, virtually securing a spot at the final table, and probably a top 3 finish with the caliber of players that were left. I'm still getting queezy thinking about it as I'm writing this......
In the end, the positive is that I played really well, got my money in way ahead, and placed highly (and cashed) in a large Vegas tournament, which was my main goal going out there. It sucks that it ended how it did, but I'm confident that if I play well, I'll take one of these down at some point.
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks