I did bust out 20th in the HORSE tourney. It's never really fun doing that, but I think there was more of a feeling of acceptance than last year. I never really had an in-the-money stack, my max was around 650k, where an average ITM stack was 1M, and I knew we were playing limits where losing one orr two hands would be several hhundreds of thousands. I will post about some of those hands later but first three PLH hands.

Hand #1. I start the day with 30K. I decided to buy in late around 1pm and get my full stack. So 200-400 blind level player 5-off makes it 1200, he has a little over 10K left. I have TT immediately to his right. What is your play? I decide to call. Flop K73 rainbow, he checks I decide to check. Turn is a 6c, putting two clubs on the board. Check again, I decide to bet 2K (pot is now 3K), he effectively jams, I decide to call, he has AcJc, I sweat the 15 outer and win. The question here is the check on the turn. I usually bet in that spot after two checks--the TT is vulnerable to overcards, etc, but then of course you risk a convenient check-raise.

Hand #2. Blinds 400-800, I have about 70K, Kathy Liebert has 18,800 exactly. I make it 2300 on the button with 44, Kathy makes it 7500, BB folds. Question is do I just jam here and play showdown? I decide to call. Flop is KQT, two clubs you have a club. Check, I decide to check. Turn is an Ac, check, I decide to check again with an eye to bluffing the river if a club doesn't come. River is a 6, she checks, I jam, she calls with A9. Comments?

Hand #3. This is the hand that happened during when Jerrod was winning the Mixed. I have Kh4h. I have about 65k at this point, blinds 600-1200. Player in the cutoff makes it 3300, I call. Flop is 3h2h2c. I decide to check, bet of 4500, I decide to check-raise to 12K, he makes it 33K, I count my chips exactly and have 29K behind if I call. I decide to call here planning to jam on some rivers. I decided to send it when an offsuit A hits the turn. The cards I decided to send it in were a relatively high heart, an A, a K, or a 5? Comments?

I happen to be still in the 50K HORSE tourney. I ended the day with 324K, thanks to a rush at the end. Hoss is also in, they don't have the table draws up yet but I really need to get some sleep soon. Sorry about the lack of updates. Actually many things have been happening. Jerrod won the 2500 8-game mixed event, congrats, it's his first bracelet after his third time heads-up. It's quite a feat getting in the top two three times over a hundred or so WSOP tournies. I am glad it went his wat this time. More reason to buy our book...

We also had a great BBQ at our house last Saturday, wow that was a week ago! My friends were also in town for a few days it was great to see them again. I will post hands when I have some spare time, I went deep in the 10K PLH also, managing to bust out around 40th place when they paid 27.

But now I want to get some sleep for tomorrow. I am glad Carole and Josh came out to visit me, I wish I had seen more of them, but Matt and I were busy playing HORSE.

So we are in the second day of the Stud event. Good luck to Sabyl, Matt Grapenthien, Bob Luria, and others also playing today. Sorry I mhaven't had many posts but it's late nights like this that stop me. My friends froom SIG are coming into town today and staying for three days. BTW there is a Party at the Poker house 4-11pm Saturday. RSVP through one of the housemates or me if you know me, and we will send you details.

I ended with 35500 in chips. Nothing really eventful in the later rounds that I can remember, a few tough decisions at the beginning. The mclassic situation I frequently find myself in is a 2 brings it in, a 3 completes I have (J6)J with a T, a 4, and the bringing and completer to act, so I raise, the 3 defends, SO by 5th the 3 is showing 632 and I still just have (J6)J4Q, What is your plan? I decided to check and call. Jerrod argues for folding which I think is rather tight given how big the pot is now. Of course if you are against a small pair and a low draw you would call, but again it depends on the range of the 3's hand. Andrew prock says calling down is the best option. Anyway, he catches a 4 on 6th and I decide to fold. But each oof these decisions are non-trivial. Even the 6th street decision, if it had been a 5, given that I saw a couple of 4;s fall, I might be inclined to call. This shows it's hard to have generic rules for Stud games as liveness/deadness of cards is key.

Congrats to Matt Hawrilenko in the 10K limit Holdem, it's Matt's best game, and he could be the best limit hooldem player in the world. i played at his table the first day and it was toough, although I got the better of him in many of the hands we played, he survived and made a good run at it before finishing 5th.

Well I made it to 35th and cashed about 5K. I had one tough hand, we are close to the money, and the player to my right Bill the Croc from Australia has been playing rather tight. Cutoff raises, Bill raises from the button, I have AKs, so I make it 4 bets, losing the cutoff raiser and Bill calls. Flop is 632 (or some semblence of it) two diamonds. I decide to bet, Bill calls. Turn is the Jd, what do you do now? I decided to continue to bet and Bill thinks for a long times and claims to have folded a pair without a diamond. My thinking at the time is that Bill is likely to have AQ, KQ, etc with a diamond So I definitely want to charge him to draw to it. I mean if I check I am check-calling, perhaps folding the river.

Anyway that hand allowed me to make the money. The other hands went soort of downhill from there. On the last hand in the 4k-8k limit, I have AQ and I decide to 3-bet, with 9k behind. Flop is T-high checked to me. Question is do I check here or do I bet? I decide to bet, my opponent puts me in, he has a pair of 6's and I am out.

Anyway I decided to play the 2K at noon today, but I am taking advantage of the late signup to play at 2pm. The reason is that I am planning to play the 5pm 10K limit holdem if I am out, so don't want to spend 15 hours playing poker... Anyway I do play aggressively, the thing about that is that it works for a while until you get into an ineveitable confrontation and you have to win it. So I make my way to 10K, then I lose KK to a coold caller behind with 65s (flop Q53, turn 5). And then defend the BB with 55, check raise all in on a QdQc3d flop, he calls with AJ with the diamond draw, and he wins the race. I am not too unhappy as my plan was to play the 10K Limit anyway.

I ended up with 60600 chips, which is nearly triple an average stack, there are 124 players left. 63 make the money. I am actually the second big stack there, as Dominik Kulicki has 61100. It was just one of those days where I gained chips on every round at a ridiculous rate. BTW congrats to Matt Hawrilenko, who finished 8th in the 3K HORSE tourney. I played that one too but busted early in the second day. So during the second day I was seated between Daniel N and Barry G, we were all chatting about something, and then one player says "I have a question, a hand question." Daniel chirps up "A strategy question"? Anyway he has T877 on O8 two diamonds, there is a field raiser, he askes what he should do (they are playing 800-1600). He decides to reraise and on a flop of AJ3, one diamonds someone bets into him, he asks what to now...? Daniel quietly turns to me when he is away and says "see you get a lot of information just sitting down." We never get to the O8 round, as he gets (J2)2 in the stud 8 round, decides to call a completion and a raise when I have (QQ)5 and wins with 2's full.



So, about the limit holdem here are my chip counts for each round:

0-4500 to start
1-5600 (50-100)
2-8600 (75-150)
3-9025 (100-200)
4-10200 (150-300)
5-18600 (200-400)
6-22900 (300-600)
7-37000 (400-800)
8-48600 (500-1000)
9-52500 (600-1200)
10-60600 (800-1600)

So on average I probably over 10 bets/hr for the whole day. This *looks* like pretty steady growth, plotted on a log-graph anyone would be pleased but this is the tail end of the distribution, ridiculously running well


It's really hard to recall all of the hands that happened as you do get to play a lot of hands during a limit holdem tourney. I saw Daniel N in the noon tourney, it's a rare noon appearance for him, but he said he really couldn't pass up a limit holdem tourney. I was very lucky to get a good table draw that didn't break until round 9. There were several limped pots and really poor postflop play, basically players missing bets.

Here's the hand of the day. After dinner there is a player on the button who limps. He is one of the originals at our table and says "Well, I would raise but I know you are going to call anyway." SB calls. Flop is T74, check to him, he bets, SB folds, I call. Turn is a T. Check-check, River is a J. Check-check, he turns over QQ. I had A4 which to me is an auto check-call on the river, but I am not really sure I pay off in this case.

But anyway it's nice to be able to take the blinds when I make a field raise. Because of this, I lowered my raising requirements in late position against certain blinds. This gets to be a problem as aware players behind me will lower their three-betting standards. I certainly fell into this problem when Rep Porter and Mimi Tran moved to my table in round 8. I have played a bit of short handed holded with both of them and they certainly ruined the party on a couple of hands. But before that, the problem with many players is that you can't just tell them to play tighter, looser, more aggressive, etc. It's like they can't really balance their distributions postflop, they decide to ram A-high as a bluff, etc.

It is fairly tough to play after getting 3-bet. I raise with 98s two from the button. Reraise 1-off by one of the better players at the table. All fold, and I call. Flop is K97. Ok, i check-call. Turn is a J. Check-bet, your move? I reallly hate these situations here I decided to call down. Fortunately the river was a Q, he checks QQ behind and takes the pot, of course he should bet, but I would have folded (I think).



So even at 60K I still only have 30 bets for the next round (1k-2k) this shows how precarious these tournies are. I really don't know anyone at my table but I will probably recognize a few faces from yesterday. Well today is another day, I probably won't run as good, but I probably don't haave to run as good to make the final table.

I played the 5K NL today. We started with 15,000 chips, ended the day with 31,900 chips. The second round I had a pretty tough decision. I pick up AA with 12K left, early limper for 100 (blinds 50-100) I raise to 400, field player calls, limper calls. Flop is 9s5s2d, I don't have the As. Check, I bet 1000, fold, limper check-raises to 3000, what do you do? I decided to jam there, but I think calling is reasonable also. Terrence suggesting calling and folding to a turn bet but I think that is fairly conservative. My opponent thought for a while and then asked "you really have a set of 9's" and folded. I now have 17K.

During rounds 3-6, I play a lot of pots. There is a player who is playing a lot of hands in the field, either by calling or calling a single raise. So there are occasionaally 7-way pots in the game. It was an interesting situation to play in, I ended with about 25K. A couple limpers in the 100-200 round, player raises to 700, I reraise to 2000, he calls. Flop is KdQd4c, I don't have the Ad. He has 11K behind. It's a really weird situation to bet out here with especially on this flop, I decided to jam and he folded.

At dinner I have about 24K. I am actually pretty happy about the 90 minute dinner break, Gavin and I were able to eat at the Voodoo Lounge and make it back with a couple of minutes left.

After dinner, I make it up to 70K in rounds 7&8 and lose it back to 31900. The two big hands were where I had 5s4s. I call a raise in the field after another overcaller. Flop is AT7 with two spades and nobody bets on the flops. Turn is the 3s, I bet 5000 into a 7k pot, guy to my right who also cold called a raise also calls. On the river, I bet another 5K and get called. The player to my right had A7 so I guess I might have been able to get paid off a little more. Unfortunately my table breaks. In the 300-600 round, raised 5 way pot when I am in the BB with 88 to 1700. Flop is AT6, two spades, checked around, turn is an 8, now there are two draws on the board. SB bets 3600. I thought the board was sufficiently scxary to raise to 15K, with about 25K behind. The SB thinks and folds. I prromised I would post about the hand in my blog so he he could find out what I had.

Round 10 was fairly bad for me. I will tell you the major hands I lost. One hand I raise to 3K with QJ, two callers who are the blinds. Flop is A9x. I decide to to C-bet another 6k, the SB calls and then bets out 15K on the flop. On one hand I have QQ. UTG raiser (5 off) raises to 2500 in the 500-1K round. I raise to 8K with QQ. The player looks at me and asks "Are you crazy?" He calls , flop is KT3, two suited, and he jams immediately for 20K more. What do you do? I decided to fold. Opinions?

Anyway I end the day with 31800, Gavin is to my left with about 69K. There was some discussion about whether to play the 10K O8 or wait for the 2500 short handed if I bust. I think I will play the 10K. BTW I created a twitter account--billchenpoker where I will posting chip counts.

So I had a tough hand to play, it reminded me of a hand similar to the one Jerrod played yesterday. Blinds 600-1200, 100 antes. Player two off makes is 3500, I am on the button with 55, I call, and the SB calls. Flop is 653, two hearts. Check to me so I decide to bet 9000, call by the SB. Turn is a 4, check-check. River is a king, BB fires out 12K. Your move? The pot is 30.3K so I'm calling 12 to win 42 or 7:2. Yes, it seems like a vallue bet with either the 7 or the deuce, but I call and am shown T7. Then with 40K left in the 800-1600,200 round A pleyr makes it 5000 in the field. Holding TT I decidd to jam. Player in the SB calls with KK. IGHN. 70th place paid 4063. I guess I am glad I played, since I was going to sit out and just play the mixed and go to dinner, so it's 2500 more than I would have.

The mixed tourney I will just tell you about the last hand. I had Q654 in PLO and got a free play. Flop is Q73, two clubs. UTG limper bets the pot, Goodbrian in the SB calls, it seems from past play that the initial bettor might be betting trying to taked the pot, so I effective jam (raise the pot with about 1K behind) with my last 13K. He folds and Goodbrian hems and haws and calls with QT and a small club draw. I don't think I should have taken my shot there but today is another day of tournies.



Bill

Well at the beginning of the day I was wavering on whether to play. I wanted to play the mixed the next day, and was invited to a meet and greet with Mario Batali at the Venetian at 6pm. I was going to take Jerrod or Matt but they both decided to play. The fact that the mixed was the 5pm tourney the next day decided the issue. I made it to the second day with 68700 and we're in the money down to the last 108 so I am glad I played.

So in the first round, we started with 25-50 and 4500 in chips. Hand #3, I open for 125 in Seat 3, Seat 6 raises in the BB to 625, and I fold. Two more orbits, I open with JJ for 125, BB in seat 6 calls. Flop is T96, two spades. I bet 200, he check raises to 650. I call. He bets 1200 on the turn of a 4, I call. River is another 6, I check, he bets all-in and I call. He throws his cards into the muck and walks away from the table without showing them. Anyway, I did feel he was more likely to be bluffing or semibluffing, perhaps given the dangerous board it's right to just jam on the turn.

Lots of small pots, ended with 11K after the second round. In round 3, I defend the BB with AQs, flop is QTx, two diamonds, I check raise to 1500, and he moves in, at this point I have 13K, and I decide to call. He has A9d and i sweat the draw and double up. At this point the table seems desirable in that they have been just calling my raises in the field and checking to me. I guess maybe it feels better than my actual equity, but it does seem I can take several free cards. One big hand when I had around 35K, player opens for 600 (in the 100-200 round), player in the field calls, I have KK in the small blind, so I make it 2100. The initial raiser folds and the field player calls. Flop QT7, i bet 3K, field player raises all in for 10K more. I do call, and he has 77 and I lose, I mean I don't think I can do anything else.

So I am moved to Jerrod's table with about 30K. A lot of small pots are played and I build my stack to 45K at the dinner break. One hand there was a raise 3-off, call, button raises to 2500, I make it 7000 with QQ, everyone folds he shoves for 20K more. I decided to fold. He later told me he had AK. Certainly I am at the bottom of my range,,,

One hand I got in with 97 on a flop of 9d7d2c against Td8d, and an 8 comes off on the turn, winning somehow. One hand I think I missed a bet against Jerrod. He raises 2-off, I defend the BB with 77. We both hava a lot of chips. Flop is Q82, I check, he checks. Turn pairs the 8, now I checked intending to call but against Jerrod the right play may be to bet. My distribution is unlimited at this point, and I rate to have the best hand. Many players will just take a shot at the pot there so the best exploitive strategy may be to check against most players. Anyway I get a lot of chips after dinner calling an all-in with 77 on a KQ-high board after my opponent bets the flop and checks the turn. I think my play was actually close in practice even if he didn't give an indication he was bluffing. Then I end up taking AA vs QQ and build up to 70K, basically play a few small pots, and I have 68K at the end of the day.

So we have a cool house for the WSOP. We've already started prop betting! So we rented a house with the same occupants from last year: Gavin Griffin (who found the house, thx!), Jerrod Ankenman, Matt Hawrilenko, Kenny Shei, Terrence Chan, and me. The house is pretty sweet with a snazzy pool, pool table, movie projector room, and this huge freaking aquarium in the family room. We are having a party on the 20th, details later.

So Terrence was talking about doing 100 burpees which seem to include doing a pushup and getting up and jumping. SO the conversation went Terrence: "So how long could do you think it would take you?" Gavin:"I don't think I could do 100." Somehow this ended with Gavin betting $1000 I couldn't do 100 in an hour. I thought this was fairly absurd as it consisted to doing less than two a minute. After doing like 30 in 6 minutes, I bet Gavin another $1000 that I could finish them in 30 minutes. It did take me 25.

Then we had the bedroom auction. We have the following rooms:

1) Master Bedroom--you can imagine how fancy it is with a Jacuzzi in the master bedroom, etc, but it does have a hole in the wall where the TV used to go and it adjoins Bedroom #6. Gavin was also occupying this bedroom earlier along with Kristen and Penny so it also has dog hair.

2) Outside Bedroom, nice and spacious.
3) Hall Bedroom, it has a nice sitting area with a TV which is part of the Bedroom.
4) Smaller Bedroom but has a bathtub that's important to Kristen, and thus Gavin.
5) Smaller Bedroom with a nicer bathroom than #4
6) Bedroom with no bathroom. Rules are when someone is up out of the room, person #6 is able to use their bathroom.

So the rules of the auction are that the winner gets first pick, pays the other 5 his bid price. We have a new auction for right to pick second, after the first person has picked. Winner pays the other 4, etc. Remember this is for six weeks.

So Terrence and Matt proceed to have a bidding on the first choice, Terrence is bemoaning the fact that we aren't helping push Matt higher. Matt takes it for 1800 and takes the master bedroom.

I really wanted room #2 but was reasonably happy for room #3. I bid 800, Terrence bid 1000, I let him have it, I was a little sad he picked room #2, since he was temporarily staying in #3, and thought he might take it.

Jerrod pushed me to 900 for bedroom #3, clearly the only pick at this point. Jerrod bid 750 and I bid 900.

Then Gavin bid 700 for Bedroom #4, outbidding Kenny and Jerrod, setting up a fierce auction for the access to a bathroom. Kenny took it for 700.

So the results of the Auction were:

Matt #1 -$1800
Terrence #2 -640
Bill #3 -290
Gavin #4 +210
Kenny #5 +560
Jerrod #6 +1960

Analysis, Matt overpaid for the Master, since bedrooms #2 and #3 were of good quality. I would have bid more aggressively for #2 had I knwn Terrence was going to choose it but the overall result didn't seem that bad. I thought Jerrod did very well to collect. I thought Kenny bid a little too much, a 1400 difference in the two bedrooms is a bit much to pay.

Anyway more on the house and the party later!

Well 0 for 4 already. But the WSOP has just started. The 1k last weekend, I only played one level then picked up AdQd. 4 way raised pot preflop, flop is Ks6d3d I bet 300 into a 400 dollar pot, player in the BB check raises to 800, he does seem to know how to play. I jam for my last 3500. He calls with 5d4d, 3 on the turn. BTW, he still has all 14 outs, since all the straight cards work. He hits a 2 on the river. The 10K Stud yesterday, I had just a few unfortunate confrontations. Lost AA, KK, and then 77 when I hit a third 7 on 4th street to three different sets. But no I was never close to much, hopefully this changes soon. I would go through all the tough decisions I made during the stud tourney but it seems a bit painful at this point.

I'm here again in Vegas for the World Series of Poker. I'm basically planning to play as many events as I can. Only 4 events are for sure. The 40K NL which I am still in, the 10K 8-game mixed event, the 50K HORSE, the 10K Limit Holdem and the Main Event. The others I plan to basically play event after event, maybe skipping the noon event if I want to play the 5pm and maybe skiping the 5pm if I want to play the next day noon event. Of course as usual SIG has been very generous giving me the time off to play. I have to say this year I again have a feeling of anticipation. I'm really excited to play these events. Maybe I should be a seasoned pro by now, but from my experience if there's no feeling of butterflies at the start of a relationship, it usually doesn't turn out well. It's that feeling of anticipation, nervous excitement, and a bit of uncertainty. Like a tournament, you may be out the first round or play late into the night. Sure poker is a little different (and I haven't been on a great date in a while) but you really need a little passion in order to keep learning and striving to improve your game. After all it is hard work to constantly think about the game from a different perspective and analyze whether you made the right play outside of the results.

Just a short note. So many of my friends will be in town the 19th-21st, I'm thinking of switching our annual house party to the 20th. Traditionally it's the day before the HORSE tourney but there's a 10K PLO in the afternoon that i could skip. If anyone has an opinion that may be attending the party, please comment.

So I'm in the 2nd day of the 40K. We started with 120K in chips, this year all the tournies are triple the starting chips, I don't really like this trend of more and more chips, it alll seems unnecessary. Anyway I would have to say my table and the entire tournament field was pretty tough. There were certainly soft spots, but most of them would be positive equity in another other WSOP NL tourney. I went on a rush in round 5, at the end of the round I had the vast majority of the 100 ante chips on the table but was only able to go from 110K to 190K. I lost a confrontations and my opponents were able to fold to my river bets, call my bluffs and avoid being trapped the time I flopped a full house. Actually in round 8 they folded to our bllinds and the SB said "Wow, this is the first time that has happpened, and then proceeded to raise... But today is a new day. We started with 201, we are down to about 90. I have half an average stack, the blinds are 2500-5000 with 500 antes, so I have an M of about 12. No matter how deep stack the tournies start, the sage of M=10 to 15 seems vital. I am actually pretty confident with these stacks, so we will see how it goes. Today we are only playing 8 rounds, down to the 27 in the money, so it should end by midnight, and I will have some time to post abot the hands from yesterday and today.

Bill

So it felt like I had a few tough decisions today (well I am all ready for the "that hand was easy, you are just a hoser") but I guess it eventually worked out, we started with 10K, I was down below 2K three times and ended up with 33K going into Day 2.

First round, I lose my seat assignment, so I get put on the late starters table which included Patrick Antonius. I'm all ready to deal with him playing aggressively and being in every other hand, my plan is to play tigher preflop if he hasn't acted and a little looser and more aggresively postflop against him when I'm in the pot. So he folds like the first twenty hands in the first level and doesn't really play much more aggressively after that. I now have 12K in level three and the table breaks--well so much for planning. I know you shouldn't get too psyched out with anyone at your table.

So round 4, blinds 100-200, no ante. I make it 500 7 off the button with AcAd (yeah we are playing ten handed, sigh) 4 callers including the BB. Flop is 543, two clubs. I bet 1600, fold, one caller, Dag Palovic raises, everyone else folds. (A an aisde I didn't know this guy. In fact I hardly know anyone playing in the tourney, it's a weird experience. It turns out he is a French/Slovac player, has made several EPT finals, etc.) Anyway he raises to 4K, he has 5K left behind. What do you do? Well, yes, I jammed, and yes, he had 33, and no, I didn't catch my deuce or ace.

So this is about distributions again. The problem is I can't really have too much better than aces there. Maybe I should just check-fold from the beginning, but the pot is already 2600, a quarter of my stack. I was thinking once I bet and got raised, even if I were against a set, I would still have 6 outs, and who knows maybe he just did it with an overpair, etc. I don't really want to call and then figure out what to do with the next card.


I blind down to 1775 and then on the last hand, a player raises, I jam on the BB with QQ, and he calls with 66, I am at the dinner break with 3650. I like the way they did the dinner in three shifts, at the end of round 4, they had a third of the tables go to dinner, than an hour later another third while the ones returning from dinner played round 5 and the others continued with round 6, then they went to dinner and the two groups played round 6.

So now I build up my chips to about 4K, blinds are 150-300, 25 ante. 2 limpers, you have J4 in the SB. You? Well I limped, I really hate the hand but it seems for 150 it's worth it, I mean you can hit top pair right? Well the flop is J73. Now what? I dunno, I bet 1000, once caller in the field. Turn is a 6. I decide to bet again, but I think my play here is jam? Anyway I do take down the pot. Maybe that means I shouldn't have called preflop... Actually the guy gave away the strencgth of his hand (or lack of) on the flop fortunately so the turn bet wasn't too hard--but normally I don't know if I bet or check-fold or check-induce. With him having a relatively weak hand I think I want to jam to prevent him takign a free card with an overcard and a pair and he might call with a weaker hand like a pocket pair or a7, etc.

So now I have 8K. Raise on the button to 900 (same 25-150-300 limit) with Q9. He calls. flop KQ9, check, bet 1500, raise all-in for 4K more. I call of course, of course he has JT, and no I don't improve.

So I now I double up immediately. but then blind out a few hands, round 7 i have 3150 with blinds 50-200-400. So you take the BB, SB, get nothing. Now you are down to 2000. You pick up T8s 2-off the button. Yes, you are about to jam when there are two limpers in the field now what? Well I decided to call, of course is someone else raises I will take the overlay and call, but if it's a limped pot, I can play. Opinions? I thought about both jamming and folding. Anyway button also calls (there seems to be lots of multiway pots at our table). I flop the flush, Q93. Check to me, I jam, and get reraised by A9, none of the suit. Yay! Ok same round, two limpers you have T8 on the button with about 6200, you? I decided to limp. Flop is K97 rainbow, 1800 bet from the guy to your right. I decided to call, now the BB makes it 5K, everyone else folds. I have the odds to go in for my last 4K. Maybe I should have just jammed the flop. Anyway BB has K4 (? I guess it was a good read) but I hit a Jack (actually two Jacks) and win.

Ok same 50-200-400 round. You have 15K. UTG (7 off) who is a tight player raises to 1100. You are next with JJ. I decide to call. Dag, who now has over 30K, makes it 4500. Folded to you. I considered all three options and then folded. Opinions? Yeah it does feel a little hoserish the way I played the hand, especially letting a potential squeeze play go by with JJ.


Still the same 50-200-400 round, still about 14K. You are in the BB with AhTh. Player 2 off the button raises to 1550. I call. Flop is As6h2h. I check he bets 3100. I check, he bets 3150, I jam, he goes into the tank for a long time. He seems ready to fold then asks "so you really have a set"?) Then fianlly decides to call. Not what I wanted, I turn over my hand, and he says "damn I'm practically drawing dead") Yes, he has 9j7h and no he doesn't hit runner-runner.

Now, that's how I ended up with 33,000 going into day two, It's pretty late hear (past 4am) so I should get some sleep.

At the request of some folks, I'm reposting the reasons I am voting for Obama tomorrow from the BARGE list. I decided to post this the nigth before because it might actually change the most minds without getting into an endless discussion. Has anything changed since I posted this? Well not much, McCain has said he would tackle entitlements but has not said anything specific. It's a pretty long list and there is defintiely a preference here.

Anyway whoever you support go out and vote!

Well I voted for McCain in 2000 also. Things would
certainly have changed if he had won that nomination,
no matter what happened in the general. But let's see
how the issues stack up for me in this election, in
alphabetical order:

Abortion--Yes, McCain changed his stance, but let's
take him at his word that he changed his mind. The
issue for me is if someone has an unplanned pregnancy,
should I compel her to go through with it? I don't
really feel I should be able to do this, especially
since there are a lot of bad circumstances where this
could have happened. Obama is strongly pro-choice,
clear choice here.

Economy--See Tax and Spend. Before this weekend I was
going to say we should be grateful we don't live in a
country where private companies are taken over by the
government...

Civil Liberties--I thought this would be a bigger
issue given the candidates backgrounds (Obama's as a
civil rights activist and McCain's as a POW). Obama
is stronger on gay rights and passed anti racial
profiling laws in Illinois. To his credit McCain has
also spoken out against torture in Guantanamo and
nobody has more gravitas on this issue (Yes I
understand national security concerns, but I have also
been on the other side). Slight edge Obama.

Foreign Policy--McCain's hero is Teddy Roosevelt. I
do beleive that he has also adopted his philosophy of
using American strength to lead the world into some
kind of global nirvana (in a good way of course). I
just disagree with this, especially considering all
the resources we're spending on military bases
worldwide, etc. Obama did take a stance against the
war from the beginning, true he never had to cast a
vote in the Senate--but I think this bodes for a less
interventionalist stance than McCain. This also
aligns with my view (against the war from the
beginning). Like to me this is more important than
whatever timetable for troop withdrawal. Win one for
Obama.

Immigration--I like the 2000 McCain. Of the current
choices, consider that most of the immigration debate
in the primaries sounded like "I want to build a
fence" "Well, I want to build a taller fence" "I want
to build a huge fricking fence with electric barbed
wire and guns mounted on top." Seriously I am glad
none of those candidates won. McCain passed
McCain-Kennedy, Obama supports a path to legalization.
Given the virulent anti-immigration stances of a lot
of the GOP, I give a slight edge to Obama.


Tax and Spend--Crap, both of these guys believe in
using the power of government to do stuff they believe
in. Tax and spend or spend and spend? Tax the rich,
or who's rich anyway? I do have to believe McCain and
the GOP will be better on this issue though,
especially since Congress is going to be Democratic.
I don't expect either to tackle enetitlements in any
reasonable way, slight win to McCain.

UIEGA--I would have to go with Obama here, since the
GOP was the one who pushed UIEGA. I do believe McCain
would sign some version of repealing the law though.


Ok what about "intagibles"? I discount these, but
yes, Obama is younger, his speeches are more
inspirational. If we had to pick one of the two who
could really transform this country, who would it be?
Well not McCain, though one could argue that Palin
would have a chance... Win one for Obama here.

Well to me it seems pretty clear to vote for Obama.

For the Main Event, Jerrod and the other housemates were of the opinion that we should play lots of pots postflop. This isn't far from how I normally play anyway, I raise with a wide range of hands, and I am probably the most liberal in defending the blinds. Also I prefer smallish raises becaus that also encourages postflop play (yeah you'd rather take down the blinds most of the time, but there is a tradeoff if you raise larger you can't raise as frequently). Yes, a lot of postflop situations are difficult, but the field is generally the weakest in tournament poker. You may make mistakes postflop and you may play in an exploitable manner, but you will also play better than your opponents in general and be able to exploit them. That's the theory anyway.

I think I ended up playing about 25%-30% of my hands, which is a lot of hands over the five two-hour levels of play. The hands I am posting about are the hands I had the most difficulty with, so most of these hands I lost money on etc. Given the number of hands I played though I am reasonably happy with my play, even though it may not seem like it from the following hands. I did finish the day with 48,750 which is an above average stack. I really liked the structure this year much better than last year.

So in the first couple of orbits I pick up 65s 6 off the button, blinds 50-100, I have my 20K starting stack. I make it 200--we decided this was a little better than limping bcause it puts a little pressure on the blinds, I'm still deep stacked after the raise. So a player calls on the button, the BB defends. flop is Q53, I bet 400 the button calls and the BB folds. The turn is the 2, I check, the button checks. the river is now a J. I decide to bet 500, which is a third of the pot. Yeah it's a thin value bet... So the button now raises, I had planned to fold of course, but I think there is some indication he's bluffing. Anyway, he raises to 2100 and I call--the other players at the table said it was an insta-call but he did take like 30 seconds to make his decision. Anyway he says "you got it" but doesn't turn over his hand. Eventually he turns over 95. Not a good start. It turns out he is a top French player, and accumulates a lot of chips early, he has about a 60K stack when we get into our next confrontation. I have to say it's the best value raise anyone has ever made against me.

In the same round, I pick up KK 5 off the button. I open for 225, player 3 off raises to
750 call by the French player, I make it 2500. Initial raiser calls, fold, and we're heads-up. The initial raiser has 15K left. Flop is 642, two hearts, I bet 5K and put him in on the turn when the 8 and the second flush draw comes in on the turn. He folds. Not a really tough hand, but just a question on how you genrally play postflop.

In the 150-300 blind round, I raise in the cutoff with AQ, the button with 16K left calls, the SB makes it 3K BB folds. the SB has about 6500 left. What is your plan? I decided to call and fold when the flop is 842, two clubs. The thing is given my range I don't know if I can fold AQ there, but maybe the best thing to do is to reraise all-in.

So a similar hand happened right after the dinner break. I have about 35K left, The aformentioned French player makes it 800, still the 150-300 round but with 25 antes. He has been playing a lot of pots but just lost a big pot an orbit earlier and seems a little tiltish based on his hand seclection, but of course he could have just been doing this all along. He is down to 60K in chips at the start of the hand I am down to 32K. I have AK and make it 2500, he makes it 8K, what do you do? Here again I called, flop was 552, he checks. I decide to check back because it just seemed out of character there. Anyway the turn is a 4 he bets 13K, and I decide to fold. I am sure I hosed this in a few ways.

Although the main Event to me was the 50K HORSE. Of course it's painful to get there with 600K in chips and not cash, but hey that's poker. What happened? Well I lost 3 big hands toward the end, two to Doyle , one to Brandon Adamns. To Brandon, I had a made 7 on 6th showing 42T7 vs 6AQ8, me betting the whole way. So I fail to imprrove on the river. I value bet my 7, get raised and lose to a 6 on the river. Against Doyle I had (QJ)Q vs 5(QQ) he completed, I raised, he reraised. So we catch blanks, he catches a K on 6th, on the river I catch a J, but Doyle catches another K on the river and makes KKQQ vs my QQJJ. On the last hand Doyle completes with a low card, I raise with (T7)7, Katja behind me raises with a 4 showing, it turns out she had pocked aces and Doyle has pocket Jacks. I am all-in at this point. Doyle catches a J to win vs Katja's Aces and fours. And I'm out also.

I have to say many of my friends have had success this year. Jerrod hgfalling had the biggest win, 300K in the $10K limit holdem event, finishing 2nd. I was probably more diplomatic on the air, but I certainly disagreed with most of the commentary during the final table. There was one point where the commentator (Barry Tannenbaum) pointed out Jerrod would simply give up on the turn if he check-called the flop and checked the turn. Certainly anyone who has played with us knows the check-raise turn is in our arsenal there. This is less a criticism of Barry because he's just reporting what he's observing, but it shows how it's hard to genralize a player's strategy even from observations of several hands. Also, playing short handed or heads up at a high level is different from the games Barry is familiar with and the idea of "momentum" or any effect of previous hands on how well Jerrod is going to play is certainly minimal.

Also, Bob Lurie finished 3rd in the 5K Stud-8 event, in a very tough field including Chris Ferguson who finished 2nd. Alan Jaffray made a final table of a NL tourney. Andrew prock made the final table of the 1500 Limit shootout, which required winning two tables. Matt Grapenthein also finished in the final table of the 1500 HORSE. Also congrats to fellow Team Pokerstars pros Daniel, Barry, and Dario for winning bracelets this year. I am sure many successes are left off this list so I apologize.

Matt hoss_tbf is going to have a man vs machine match. I am going to chill out a little before the Main Event, maybe play a little NL on Stars, try a few things, and be ready to play Saturday. Anyone who isn't aware, there is a PokerStars party at Rain at the Palms Monday night. It;s a burlesque party and will be a lot of fun. If you need a pass to the party, contact me in some way.

I won the O8 hand, I think the O8 play is definitely clearer. I feel I fold a lot more in "marginal" O8 situations because I have less of a sense what marginal is in that game. Anyway here's another hand against Greg Raymer, that's been reported in the press.

I have [Tc 9h] Jh in Stud, Greg completes with a 4 in early position, the only high card behind you is a K held by Perry Friedman, the next highest card is a 7. Poker is a game of live cards, so I reraise. A low card (Seat 5) cold calls two bets, Greg calls. On 4th Greg catches an A, I catch the Th, the low card catches a K. I bet, willing to gamble a little with it now, both call. On 5th street Greg catches another A, I catch a heart, the cold caller catches a brick. Greg bets, well at this point I call and the other player folds. I decide to call on 6th street when I catch a 7, and I river a flush, Greg checks I bet, turns out Greg started with JJ.

So I'm up early to work out at noon and then get ready for the tourney at 3. Does anyone know whether it's in the Amazon or Brasilia room? Thanks,

Bill

Just a quick note to everyone who has been rooting me on. The HORSE has been fun, I have 326K to start the day tomorrow, average is around 220. A lot of hands played today, obviously. I'm a little too tired to remmeber them all--we had to play six 9 minute rounds, more of the same tomorrow.

Ok a couple of tough decisions I had to make. So Greg Raymer raises on the button and you have AJs in the SB, you reraise. Flop is Q92, you bet, Greg calls. Turn is a 2. Now what? If you decide to bet, you get raised. What is your plan now? What happened was I called and called again when the river was a 9.

On the cutoff you pick up A445, you decide to raise, button 3-bets. BTW this sequence has happened a couple of times already. So the flop is AQ9 rainbow, you check, he bets, what do you do? Anyway I called. Turn is now an 8, and I check-call. Now the river is an 8, you check and he bets?

BTW I decided to call down both times, I won once. Guess which it is.

On another note, the structure is awesome.