Well, I can't rival W's great blog but I went out, had some good things happen, had some not so good things happen, but all in all had another great experience at the WSOP. I highly recommend it. Here is the first couple days of the trip. I'll get to the rest tomorrow. Sorry it is so wordy.
Wednesday, June 20
Arrive Vegas just before noon. Get the bags and meet the limo at door #9. If you haven't reserved a limo before, do it. Presidential Limo was the service we used, $50 one way all the way to the Nugget downtown. No cab lines, no waiting and they treat you great. Worth the slight premium over a cab. Stayed at the Nugget for the first time ever. Not great, but not bad. One of the guys I went with has a high school friend who is now a Director of Player Development for the Nugget. So we got the perk of VIP check in but that was about it. We don't really do much gambling, just poker. The new pool with the shark tank is pretty cool, but the Nugget sure ain't the Bellagio. But hey, it's a guys trip and we're there to play cards. I'll save the Bellagio for when the wife comes along.
Drop the bags and cab it down to the Rio. First thing I notice is it is set up a little different than last year. The final table is way over in the corner and there is another final table set-up behind black curtains. OK, that's the sequestering table. Also, satellites are on the front side, closest to the cage, oppposite from last year. Both my buddy and I are there and we want to play sats for event 35, which starts Thursday ($1500 NLHE). Since we obviously don't want to play at the same table, I give him his chioice of the $125 or $175 table. He snags a seat at a $175 and I grab a $125. My friend just started playing about 6 months ago, play money on Stars, then real money about 5-6 weeke ago, so he is pretty much a novice. I just play my normal game, TAG, but when you start with $1000 in chips and 25-25 blinds with 15 minute levels you don't have a ton of play. So you have to pick some spots. One note, I am in the 2 seat, and at one point, thinking the action was to me, tried to limp into a pot. The 10 seat, whom I couldn't really see on the other side of the dealer, hadn't played yet. He raised, I aplogized for playing out of turn and pulled my call back and folded. Our dealer, an Asian lady named Ha, told me I had to put my call in the pot. I disagreed, stating that although I acted out of turn, the in-turn player changed the action (i.e. raised instead of just calling) so I had the option to pull my bet back. Floor was called whom agreed with me. Case closed. Anyway, about this time, the nine seat, a dude whom very well could have been homeless based on his appearance, decides to take his shirt off. I'm playing along, glance at the other end of the table, and homey down there (or un-homey as it may be) is shirtless. Whatever. No ones seems to concerned with it. Anyway, we get to 4-handed, I'm short and end up pushing UTG with K-10, get called by the button who woke up with KK and I'm out. The good news is that my novice friend is now down to heads-up in his first satellite with about 60% of the chips. He ends up chopping for 2 of the 3 $500 buy-in chips, giving the other guy one chip and the $120 cash. He is way excited, and I'm excited for him. Then I jump into a $175, determindd to play a little better, maybe a wee bit more aggressively, due to the blinds structure. A little over 30 minutes in, the blinds are 50-100, there are a few limpers, then a raise and I look down at KK. I push, ready to pick up the pot but get called by the raiser with QQ. I know it's coming, I even tell the guy, don't worry , queens coming, sure enough there she is on the turn. I'm second out.
So just like that I'm down $300 but figure I can go make it up in cash games. Need to do something else anyway. The lowest NL game is the 2-5, I sit down with $200 and watch awhile. Seems profitable, if I am patient. After about 45 minutes, I get 10-10, and raise it up. 2 callers, then a flop of K-J-10. So I am happy but not so happy. One of the blinds leads out, I re-raise, get a call from LP, then a push from the blind (had me outchipped). OK, I hate this situation, but decide that I am not getting away from it. Perfect chance to double or even triple up if I am against AK or a draw. So I call, LP also calls and they show down AJ (blind pos) and KQ (LP). My set is good until the A falls on the river and the sweet lady in LP gives it a "woo-hoo". I rebuy and grind till about midnight when I am back even (actually up $14). I call it a day (yes, only midnight - Vegas time - but I beat and I want to be fresh the next morning for the satellites).
Thursday, June 21
Up early, down to the Rio and in a $175 sat at 9:00 a.m. I am feeling good....and confident. Great table, nice guys, lots of chatter. Except for the really thin African American lady whom was last to arrive. She finally shows up, plunks down her purse and stuff, gives the dealer her entry cards, gets her chips and then just walks away from the table without saying a word. The dealer (Ha, the same Asian lady I had the disagreement with the day before) gives her a couple minutes, then shrugs her shoulders and starts the deal. The lady arrives just as the dealer mucks her cards on the first hand. Now the player is pissed. An argument ensues and the dealer explains that she has to be in her seat when the last card is dealt or the hand is dead. Af-Am lady is not having any of this and calls the floor. Another argument and accusations from Af-Am lady, but the floor agrees with the dealer and that is it. Af-Am lady goes on and on and the nice, fun environment is o-v-e-r. Then, another guy at the table tells Af-Am to stop being a b**** and Af-Am almost came across the table. Whoa. Can't we all just get along? In my head I am now envisioning Af-Am lady as a steaming double- up target. Until she busts some guy and suddenly has twice the stack as the rest of us. Anyway, I just play normally, catch some cards and end up busting the second guy (I honestly can't remember exactly what I had). Continue on, still get some cards and pretty soon it is down to about 5 of us (including Af-Am lady). Me and another guy have most of the chips. They color up the $25's and the guy to my right with only 2 $25 chips left, does not win a chip. The dealer (same Asian lady as before, Ha) scoops his chips and he gets up and walks away. I tell him to stop and tell the dealer that he can't eliminated in a chip race. Again, the floor comes over and agrees and dude on my right sits back down. I think every one else at the table may have been pissed at me but what are you gonna do? It was the right thing. So let's cut this short, I win table, get my buy-in chips plus $120, tip Ha $20 and am now in event 35 for a total of $375. Woo-hoo!
Sorry for the quality of some of these pics....these were my buy in chips won in the satellite.
I have to say that I love playing in an WSOP event. This is second time I have done it and man it is just a thrill. We start with $3000 in chips. I won't go in to all the details but I just play classic TAG. Very patient. This gets me to $5450 by the first break, about $7500 by the second and $14,400 by the dinner break.
My stack after the first break
We started play at noon and broke for dinner at 7:30. Before dinner I get moved from table 179 to table 47. I am started to get short (M=~4) about 6 pm, and end up getting it all in with an A
Q
. Not a great hand I know, but I had first in vig and based on the way the table was playing expected to pick up the blinds. End up with 2 callers, a guy shorter than me and a deep stack. We all flip and short stack has 8
9
and the deep stack has KQoff. Flop is A-9-8. Dang. I start to stand up, 6 on the turn....short stack has his fists in the air......6 on the river!!! Whew! Still alive and tripled (almost) up!. Sometimes you just gotta get lucky. Get moved right before dinner to table 22. John Juanda is at a table right behind me with a mountain of chips. We break for dinner in the middle of level 7 - $300/$600, $75 ante. My $14,400 gives me am M of almost 9. I mistakenly think we are going back to level 8, $200-$400, $100 antes (M of 6.5). I spend the dinner break discussing strategy with friends based on a M of 6.5 and 420 players remaining (270 get paid). Add to this a crazy guy on my immediate right whom had a huge stack - roughly $50,000 - and was raising/limping almost every pot. When we start back up, I am relieved to see we have 30 minutes left in level 7. Crazy guy on my right limps when we are both in LP on the second hand and I have A-3. I stupidly raise all in (what are you doing Paul???)
because I am sick and tired of his constant raises. He lays it down (yeah, I thought you would)
.
This is crazy guy on my right
Anyway, as it turns out, we lost 50 players in 30 minutes. Another 30-40 in the next 30 minutes or so. Now I am thinking that I may have a shot at the money............then Antonio Esfandiari sits down 2 to my right. Rut-ruh. Um, is anyone that is out here with me watching? Yo, the Magician just sat down at my table........(yeah, I was pretty scared).
Antonio
Antonio brings his own food. Seaweed salad in this case.
Then, I saw something that I will never forget. With my re-raise over the maniac to my right, I have in the neighborhood of $20K. AE has about the same. He plays EXACTLY one pot in the first hour. He raised on the button, freak show between us re-raised and AE folded. Same thing for the next 45 minutes or so. I mean he was tighter than a drum. Nice guy, making small talk at the table and accomodating all the people who were coming up to him at the table the whole time. My friend, the beginner, comes over and asks me to order him a Red Bull and vodka and just put it under my chair....WTF? So I try to discreetly give him my cell phone so he can take a picture of AE at my table. He asks, which one is he? Oh my God, are you kidding me? Anyway, I stay alive, actually double up through Antonio once when I open pushed with junk (7
8
) after crazy man had folded preflop UTG. For some reason AE decided this was one time to play (read me as weak I suppose) and called with A8o. I'm toast until a 7 comes of the turn and AE does not pair either card. We get down to 275 players (5 off the money) about 11:15 or so. The tournament folks decide that we will now play hand for hand (roughly 30 tables left). The clock keeps running while we take about 10 minutes to play each hand. AE is pissed, Juanda is pissed, Phil Gordan is walking around complaining to the tournament guys that this is crazy. Whatever, it goes on anyway. We finally get through that and hit the money at 12:20 am. $2900+. I actually stay in and finally bust at about 1 a.m. in 196th position. It was Antonio who busted me. We're $600-$1200, $100 antes and I have about $12,000. AE raised from the button (he had just recently started to play a few pots so I thought he might be loosening up a little - yeah, like I am going to figure out his play), crazy man folds, I should fold, but decide in my 12+ hours of playing poker mush of brian activity that pushing all-in is the right play with the 9
10
. It folds to AE, whom reluctantly calls with AK. When I turned my cards over, he said, "I'm not real good at these things", but in this case it held. I'm out, but cashed for $3,640. We celebrate by eating breakfast at 2:00 a.m. at Binions (this is what my 43 year old body has decided a celebration is). Call it a day after that.
Me before I got frisky and moved in on the Magician
Friday, June 22:
So, after Thursday, I try to sleep in but can't really. Assuming none of us were still in the WSOP event, we had planned on playing in the Binions special event scheduled for that day. BInions is running a summer poker series along with the WSOP, with buy-ins ranging from $100 to maybe $500. That day they were having a $100 NLHE tourney. It started at 2, so we had some time to kill. Since we were staying at the Nugget, we decided to play some cash games there. $1-$2 NL. Seemed like a good idea. Sat down at a new "must move" table and got moved to the main table within 30 minutes. An older guy with about $1000 and a never ending glass of Scotch, an old lady who liked to talk junk, a guy whom looked just like David Williams and a variety of other players. I should have killed this table. Instead I donated $360 in about 2 hours. I suck at cash games. I don't know why. One interesting hand though...there was a middle aged lady playing who evidently got pissed at another player for some reason or another. Then a hand comes up where it is raised to $12 in EP (the standard raise at this table), over half the table limped and button popped it to $120. That's right - $120. Folds around to the middle aged lady whom calls (remember this call, it is key). Flop includes a 2, with something like a 4 and a 9, rainbow. The lady checks to the raiser, whom bets out like $200. Lady calls. Turn is some blank...lady checks, bettor bets out and puts the lady all-in for another $300 or so. She calls instantly. River is a 3. Lady triumphantly flips over 2-3 offsuit for two pair, which cracks the original bettor's AA. Freaking terrible play on the lady's part, sick beat for the guy with AA. It was like a $1000 pot. No freaking idea what the lady was thinking. That was about the time I felt pretty good about getting out of dodge only down $360.
So we go across the street to Binions. Get in line and get signed up just as the tourney is starting. We start out with $3500 in chips (an odd number I thought) and 25-50 blinds. There are 576 entrants. This is the first time I have played at Binions and my table is within sight of the wall of Champions, all of the Main Event winners starting with Johnny Moss. Interestingly, Joe Hachem is the last photo they have - no Jamie Gold. I assume this is because Hachem was the last to play at Binions.......Jamie Golds was the first "all Rio" winner, right? I'm not sure. Maybe the folks at Binions just don't like Gold....???? Anyway, I feel very comfortable in this tourney, no nerves at all. Just like my home game, just a lot more players. Somehow, I sort of establish a table captain position, most folks were playing ultra tight. I raise it up a few times, everyone folds and I scoop. Then I get KK and raise it up again, this time it goes to a showdown and I have the goods. All is going good. I think I got KK 4 times in the first 2 hours. Obviously, it is easy to play when you catch cards. Anyway, I sort of repeat the day before and steadily build my stack. At one point, the guys to my left is joined by a guy to his left whom he happens to be traveling with. They are all Canadians and "met" on a forum associated with Full Contact Poker. Decided they should all do to Vegas to really "meet" one another. What kind of crazy idea is that?
Anyhow, the Canadian whom joined our table is one of those guys that obviously has read a lot of poker books. He's using all the right terminology, talking the talk and in general letting us know he's a "player". Then he calls a PF raise with KcJc. Flop was AcQc10C. I am not kidding. It goes to the river and he shows down the flopped royal. Freaking unreal. Anyway, my cards run sort of ended and I end up pushing with a medium stack against this guy twice. Both times I am beat PF, hands like AQ vs AJ. I suck out both times and bust him. It was really lucky on my part. But I'll take it. I've got about $90,000 by the dinner break. I walk across the street to the Nugget for dinner and the Fremont Street Experience is in full swing. It was pretty cool, everyone looking up at the lights, "yard long" glasses of pink and blue frozen drinks in hand, and I am Mr. Cool, the deep stack poker playing man just crossing the street to go the Noodle House at the Nugget. I'm no tourist...I am a freakin' professional. Get outta my way, soccer Mom. (It was a very cool moment for me).
Anyway, I am not very accustomed to playing the role of big stack at the table. I know I am playing too tight. I should be slinging chips around like there is no tomorrow. But inside I am still pretty much a wimp. But I do muster the courage to start picking up blinds at least once an orbit, plus I get my fair share of hands. I'm still OK. Then I over correct, raise in the cutoff with Q10 suited, get re-raised (guy goes all-in for the amount of my bet) and I figure I have to call (pot odds, man). Well, guess what - this time he has KK and poof, I lose half my stack. I manage to get most of it back when I play AA beautifully (if I say so myself) and get it all in PF against a guy with 55. Bottom line, I have a decent stack but the blinds keep raising and there are lots of folks with monster stacks. I make the final 2 tables, but am very short by this time. I am second out of the final 2 tables for a 17th place finish out of 576. Unfortunately, it only pays $285, so $185 profit. The real money was in the top 6-7 spots. The winner got $11,000+. But still a respectable finish for me the amateur. Gave me more confidence that I can continue to learn and maybe in the future have more success in these big field tourneys. Sure, I definitely had some luck along the way, but I also felt that I played some solid poker as well. I am disappointed to have not made the FT, but happy at the same time.
Saturday, June 23
Today is the first day of event 38, another $1500 NLHE tourney at the WSOP. I briefly considered just buying in directly, but I have essentially no poker bankroll at the moment, so the cash in event 35 could be the start of it. I decide to try my luck again in the $175 satellites. Since it is Saturday, the Rio is expecting a big crowd (>3000) and are announcing that satellite tables have to be cleared by 10:30 a.m. I get there about 9:00 so I better make something happen quick. I play tight and get down to about $700 and push it in the third level (50-100) in LP with one limper with 99. Limper calls with AQ and catches a Q on the river. I try another one and end up with a very similar situation and end up all-in with JJ against AQ again. This time the Q comes on the turn. By now the sats are closed so I am OOL. I hang my head and walk out of the Amazon Room. I just love the energy in that room. I love seeing all those starting chipstacks on 200+ tables simultaneously. I love that clatter of riffling chips right when the toruney begins. I am pissed at myself for not having the gonads to just buy in directly. I'm conflicted, but I walk out anyway, thinking that when I get hom with an extra $1500 in my pocket that I will say I did the right thing. (By the time it was all over, about $1500 was all I had left after some yet-to-come losses and paying for the trip, so I think it was the right decision - but it still sucked to walk away).
What's the cure for the blues in Vegas? In my experience, walking into the Bellagio always cheers you up, so off I go. I need to buy the kids something at the giftshop. I get that done and decide to check out the action in the poker room and at the Bellagio Cup III. The poker room is rocking. Every table is full. I notice they have re-covered the tables in a tan felt since the last time I was there....they look very nice. Bobby's Room is empty, but it's 1:00 in the afternoon and the WSOP is in full swing so that is not a surprise. I head down to the Fontana Bar where they hold the tourneys. Todays Bellagio Cup III tournament ($5,000 buy in) is supposed to start at 1 pm. The room is full of tables, with dealers and chips, but no players. They have a sign out front that say they are running satellites starting at 2 pm for the Saturday $1000+$80 tourney. I always check to see who cashes in these tourneys in Cardplayer, so this peaks my interest. This may be the best value in satellite action in Vegas. $240, 10-handed, and the top 2 finishers get the automatic buy-in to the tourney that night. These tourneys typically get 50-60 players and first is ~$25K. So I figure I'm in. I wait for 2 pm outside at the video poker bar next to some old guy......who as I look again is Dr. Jerry Buss. Cold have been any old retired guy on a bus trip to Vegas, but instead it's the ga-billionaire owner of the Lakers. Turns out he is there for the $5,000 BCIII event that day. This is where is gets strange. At 2 pm, I go in, pay up for my satellite, notice Dr. Buss and Joe Sebok among the handful of players taking seats at the other side of the room, then Jack McClelland gets up on stage. He takes the mike and annouces to the 3 tables of 6-7 each that this is the $5,000 buy-in Bellagio Cuo III No-Limit Hold Em tourney. He goes over some basic ground rules, etc., then tells the dealers to suffle up and deal. The clock states that there are 20 players, which looks about right to me as I survey the 3 shorthanded tables. What? This is the Bellagio Cup, right? That is Jack McClelland, right? 20 players? How come there aren't 200 players? It just seems surreal, especially after just having left the Amazon Room.
In the meantime, in my satellite, I am as card dead as I have ever been. I almost ask the dealer if there are any face cards at all in the deck. Then a guy on the end of the table wearing every gold jewelry device ever invented seems to have a slight tiff with the waitress. He ends up calling the floor over to complain that the waitress says he cannot get a watermelon juice, becausae they don't happen to have it at the moment. Watermelon juice? Jack McClelland presiding over 20 players in a $5,000 Bellagio Cup event? An erriely quiet Fontana Bar? The whole thing sorta semed llike a dream or something. It was wierd. I eventually bust out in 4th place. My last 2 hands were the best I got the whole time in the satellite. 33 and 22. Oh well. By that time, the clock in the trouney said there were 27 players and the first hour long level was ending. I read at Cardplayer.com later that they ended up with 39. I just don't think that was the number they envisioning when they planned the Bellagio Cup III.
Anyway, it has been a long few days. Many hours of poker, overall it's been good. After a great dinner at Rao's in Caesars (the best fresh mozzarella I have ever had and I've eaten it in Italy) we decide to end our trip back at the Nugget - 1-2 NL. I fianlly decide to relax, have a few drinks, and just have fun. Several Jack & Seven's later, I donk off $275 to people that I know I could outplay if I really tried, but just don't have it in me. But we had a lot of laughs.
So the balance sheet for the trip was:
Cash games ($635)
Satellites ($965) this does not count the $1500 in tourney buy-in chips that the one win gave me
Tournaments $3925
Net Profit = $2325
Like I said, about $1500 left over after expenses. For a rookie like me, I couldn't ask for more. If you haven't gone to the WSOP before, I highly recommend it. Start making plans for next year if you can!
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