Above: The Golden Nugget is located downtown Las Vegas on Fremont Street.

I played in a $240 tournament yesterday at the Golden Nugget. This was for seniors. There were about 4400 that entered the WSOP on Friday and all but about 700 (not sure of this number, but an estimate) were knocked out, so this gave some of them another shot at glory. Caesar's Palace also had one.

The Nugget is downtown (vs. the Strip), but that's good. After I busted out, there was the Fremont Street Experience!

My busto hand? I was under the gun with about 13,000 chips. Blinds were 600/300/50 and I peeked at my cards and saw Q-Q. I raised to 1800 and it folded to the cutoff who hemmed and hawed and finally called. The button went through the same stuff and finally called as well. It was obvious neither hand much. The small blind folded and the big blind moved all in for about the same stack as mine. What would you do?

This smelled like a squeeze play to me as he "knew" neither caller had much. I called and the two others went away. Unfortutely, the big blind had a hand -- K-K and I didn't improve. Sometimes, that's just how it goes and if you can't accept it, tournament poker isn't for you. Don't forget that there's another tournament tonight or tomorrow.

Above: The image above shows one-half of the ~490 players in the senior's event Saturday at the Golden Nugget.

Above: The shot clock when I left. Note that first place paid almost $22,000.

Images taken with my P&S.

The rest of the story

Above: The Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino is the venue for the World Series of Poker.

Remember that guy on the radio named Paul Harvey? He had a show called "The Rest of the Story."

Even at a $1000 buy-in WSOP event, you see some horrible poker. No offense to geezers (since I am one), but I'm sure it's even worse in a Senior event where there are so many players who have absolutely no chance.

Yesterday, when the blinds were 75/150, there were three limpers to the big blind who was the oldest person at the table and a totally ABC player. He basically played each hand face up. The old man raised to 350 and my antenna immediately went up.

I can't think of any hand where that is the correct bet, can you? What do you think he has? My thought was A-A. Bad players think that they finally have a good hand and want action. I think I need to make a big re-raise to thin the field or win a small pot now.

He got three callers. I don't remember the flop, but one player stayed all the way and they were all in on the river. The old man showed his aces and lost to some crap hand like ♥7♥8.

Now, the old man will go home and brag to his friends that he played in the WSOP and went out on a bad beat -- he had his aces cracked by a 7 and a 6. His friends won't know the rest of the story, but you and I do.

Image taken with my Canon SX200 point-and-shoot.

Out way too early

Above: Shown are some of the more than 4000 senior poker players who participated in today's WSOP event.

The WSOP today was disappointing for moi. We started with 3000 chips and 25/25 blinds with one-hour levels.

I had very few good hands, and when I had a pair or two high cards, I would raise, get called and whiff the flop only to have the deal taken away. When the blinds were 75/150, a guy raised to my right to 425. I had 1600 which is an awkward stack size. If you reraise, you are pot committed, so I shoved with A-K. A player behind me re-shoved, everyone folded and he showed aces. The flop was J-10-x, so a queen would save me, but the board ran out clean. GG MOJO.

Poker blogger Bug busted out about the same time I did. On the other hand, the guy I came out here with has built his stack up to 11,000, so my rooting interest is now with him.

Above: One of the towers of the Rio is shown in the background. On the right is the entrance to the area where poker is played. Players come out here to smoke.

Above: Welcome to the World Series of Poker!

Photos taken with my P&S.

On vacation and taking it easy

Above: The Rio is the home of the World Series of Poker.

I took today off, although I played a little online -- only a semi-degenerate, not a full-fledged one. I might not play tomorrow either. If I do well in the WSOP event that starts Friday, I could be playing long hours for three days.

I might tweet for the WSOP, handle is MemphisMojo. I'm not going to tweet as often as some because I find it distracting.

Here's a link to the event at the Caesar's Mega Stack Summer Series tournament in which I finished 6th in a one-day event: click here.

Thanks to all who are leaving comments.

Above: There are signs everywhere welcoming poker donks players.

Photo taken with my P&S.