Sunday, November 3, 2013

M&M's melted in my hands

Above: The shot clock at the Fall Poker Classic shortly after my elimination.

Busted out 29th today at the Gold Strike Event 1 tournament. I chipped up to 135K after moving to a new table. The guy on my right was somebody I had played with last night for several hours. He was a loose cannon who loved to bully people. It folded to him in the small blind and he raised to 14K where the blinds were (I believe) 3000/6000/1000. I raised to 30K and he did what I expected -- he went all in! I called, he looked surprised and turned over Q 4. I showed A 5. How can I raise, then call an in with such a medium hand? I knew he would do exactly what he did when I raised him. If a maniac like this plays back at you, you can't give up.

The turn was the 4, unfortunately, and I shipped $75K of my stack to him. I checked later, and I was 67% preflop to win. The villain was lucky to have as much equity in the deal as he did.

Playing with a stack of around 10 big blinds isn't fun, but that was what I was left with. The blinds kept advancing, and when they were 10,000/5,000/1500, a young guy raised to 20K from middle position. It folded to me in the small blind and I moved in for 85K. He had K J -- would you call for 65K more? Even though he knew he was behind, he was getting better than 2:1, so called. Most players would have shrugged and folded with such an easily-dominated hand. I turned over A 9, better than he could have hoped. The flop was a king, the turn a jack and I was out of there. Notice that even if I had A-K, he would have beaten me. If I had won, my stack would have been 200K and I would have been back in business.

Let's do the math. The kid put in 20K. There was 13,500 in antes (nine players) 10K from the big blind, and my 85K. It cost him 65K to win a pot that was already 138.5K, so (depending on what range you give me for my shove), his call was righteous. You gotta win deals like that to win the tournament. These weren't bad beats, but it was unlucky to lose both -- just sayin'.

Above: Vendors set up shop. Shown are some of the tee shirts that were for sale.

Above: This shot shows a few of the many racks of card protectors. They sell from $15 up to $30 each. If you click to enlarge, you can see one for the St. Louis Cardinals. Maybe I should buy it.

Photos taken with my P&S.

4 comments:

  1. I think that losing as a 67% favorite to Q 4 off when it calls you all-in preflop is a bad beat... Another great cash though - keep it up!

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  2. Not a bad showing. You cashed and played correctly. Your day will come, sir.

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  3. Great run, Mojo! That Q4 hand was ridiculous. You played great. Congrats on the cash! On the t-shirts, I love the I See Donkeys one. Russell likes the one that says Ship the Sherbert to Herbert haha

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  4. Good cash nevertheless. Congrats on the cash.

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