Campfire Stories

Mirage Poker Showdown Event #5, $2000+100 NLHE

18th is better than 19th! I had a ton of fun tonight considering the circumstances. I came into today feeling very good. I didn't have anything interesting happen until about 75 minutes in. I had 4600 left when I open-raised to 325 with the blinds 50-100 with 99. I was called by the button and the SB made it 925 to go. I called as did the button. Flop K7x. SB checks, I check, BTN checks. Turn 9. Nice. Board is rainbow. SB bets 1500, I call, BTN folds. River 7, he bets 2k, I go all-in for 2800, he insta-calls and shows AA. Thanks for the freebie buddy.

After that I flopped top two with AK and got some action. Then, with about 16k (good for tournament chip lead at this point) going into the last hand before break, I opened to 350 UTG+1 with J J . The SB called only who had played litereally less than six hands the entire two hours thus far. Flop 2 3 5. He checked, I bet 550, and he made it 1725. He had 4400 left in his stack. My read was that he was strong, but not sure how strong, and he had an ultra-tight image, but he was a young guy with versace sunglasses, whatever that means.

Fold, call, or put him all-in? If I call, what's my plan then?

I decided to just call because it was a strong enough play and I had position, but I was alson thinking strongly about putting him in. The turn came Q and he put the rest of his 4400 in the pot. At this point it was a pretty easy fold. We talked later and he told me that he had 4x4 . Thoughts on this hand?

I didn't do much level three playing a bunch of small pots or most of level four. Last hand before the break, blinds 100-200/25, I raised one limper from the cutoff with QQ to 850 and got calls from the BB and the limper. Flop KQx rainbow. BB checked, limper bet 800, I knew BB was folding, and i decided to just call because this player had a tendency to hang himself.

Turn a blank, he checked, and I bet 2200. He called.

River 9, he checked, and I could tell that he wasn't super excited about that card (ie didn't have JT). I had him squarely on KJ or KT and wanted to get some value. I bet 3100 and he insta called with K9. Devo chip-leader again.

Come back from break, blinds 200-400/25. First hand a guy raises to 1200, I flat call from the hi-jack with 88, SB (Darrel "Gigabet" Dicken") calls. Flop A 8 2. Check, check, I bet 2200, both fold. Bummer.

Next hand: Villian from earlier JJ hand opens to 1100, I flat call with 99, SB/shorty goes almost all-in, first raiser folds, and I insta re-raise knowing he's weak. He had 85o and my nines held up.

Devo huge chip leader with 38k. And I never got past that point. This was level five with about 55 players left. I did not play another interesting hand until there were 20 players left, top 18 getting paid and I had 22k in chips. I went so sickly card dead and was unable to manufacture chips in most ways. Anyways, I opened UTG with JJ, short stack shoved for 10k and I called. He had AQ and I won a race one time. Another player busted at the same time on another table and we were in the money. Sweet! I still had a ton of work to do with 31k in chips and the average at 43k and the leader, some guy named Michael Mizrachi with some stupid number of chips like 150k. He had a hand with 21 left vs the second chip leader, he had 66 vs. AK on a KK6 flop and 7 turn when all the money went in and his hand held up. I cannot remember the last time I had some sweet cooler set-up hand like that. It's been a LONG time. I have to win my chips with ace high and crap like that.

Speaking of which, I made a sick AK high river call on a JT862 board that was good vs. A9 in the 100-200/25 level.

Meanwhile, we re-draw for seats. First hand, blinds 600-1200/100, I raise to 3500 with QQ UTG. The next player makes it something like 12k. This was the sixth time he had re-raised me in the past 75 minutes. Everybody folded, our stacks were very close, and I said, "All-in."

"Come again?" he said.

"Sorry, I need a break before I can do that again."

Laughter.

"You're all-in?"

"Yes."

"I call."

"Really? Whatcha got?"

"Aces."



Flop A22, turn A, river x.

I get 800 chips in return, it's my big blind. I win. I get 3k in chips.

I then fold my SB vs. a bunch of action. 2300.

There's six seconds on the clock before an hour long dinner break, my button. I'm playing almost any hand.

I get 72o.

AYA! At least the buffet is free and tasty!

Return from dinner, blinds 800-1600/200. I have 2200 before the hand. I get to open shove from the cutoff with Q 8 , make a boat, and almost quadruple up to 8400. Next hand, open shove blind, steal the blinds and antes. 12400. Fold the next hand. 4th hand: open shove JTo, get called by the button. He had jacks. AYA.

Flop: KQ first two cards off the deck. Best non TT flop ever! The last three cards came bricks however, and I went home with my $2927 as a consolation prize.

Oh well. Tomorrow: $2500+100 NLHE. I'm really feeling a big hit coming on soon here. I just need to start running good one freaking time rather than having to actually play good to make my chips. It's impossible to win a tournament through good play alone unfortunately and that's all I have been able to do lately. I honestly haven't seen AA in 8 of the last 9 tournament days, and the one time I saw them I lost a huge pot (5k circuit event). Just an indicator, ya know?

Peace and good luck,

Devo

posted by Devo @ 2:26 AM |