Big Tournament Coming Up

The bankroll has been replenished and back over $4,400 thanks to some nice scores in the 50 Sits and a first place in a 3 table $33 sit. I still have a long way to go to clear the bonuses on Full Tilt and Noble but I hope that playing 6 handed in 2-4 will improve my limit hold'em play. Short handed is such a totally different game.

The big day on this week's agenda is Saturday. My friend Jeff is organizing a poker tournament at a friends house. The first two that I played in were definitely juicy. The first one, I came in Third and probably should have won except that I got impatient at the end. The second one, I was in great shape until a guy on tilt pushed all his chips in with nothing and I called with 3 of a kind, only to see my chips go away when he hit the runner runner flush. I win that pot and I am the chip leader with about 20 left.

So this tournament has a $150 buy in for $1000 in chips. There are $100 rebuys for the first 2 hours. The evite says there are about 40 players signed up so far. The tricky part about these tournaments is that a majority of the players have no idea about tournament strategy. It's important to identify these players quickly and figure out a way to trap them.

The usual mistake I see in this type of tournament is very passive play preflop and then if they get a good hand, they love to slow play it. This makes it very hard to put a player on a hand. The key to playing these players is to make sure you are in position so you can see what they do first. So if I flop top pair and good kicker on the flop and it's checked to me, I can make a bet and see what they do. If they just call they may be trying to slow play. If the turn doesn't improve my hand, I may just check it through and see what happens on the river. At least this keeps the pots small, early on.

I also think I will be playing lots of small pairs and suited connecters for cheap trying to make a big hand. I swear some of these players may not even realize a flush or straight is possible when they look at certain boards.

The rebuys will help as well since I can afford to be a little more aggressive and try to get chips early. I think my back is healthy enough to attempt a tournament at Casino Arizona on Tuesday or Wednesday just to get some practice in at reading people again.

The win in the 3 table tournament was pretty amusing. I got short stacked with about 20 players left when someone put a bad beat on me. I stayed patient and moved in a couple of times to keep my stack at 5-7 times the blinds. It was amazing I was still in, because i really hadn't had any decent starting cards.

Suddenly I began to get cards and the timing was right because others got cards that were just a little bit worse than mine. Before I know it, I'm in the money at the final 5. There were 30,000 chips in play and I had about 5000 with 250-500 blinds. There were a couple of guys over 10,000 and they swapped chips around. I won a couple of hands and finally everyone was just about even in chips around 6,000. For the most part, the table was still playing kind of tight with just min raises and every once in a while someone would come over the top and they would all fold. Very few flops.

I decide that now is the time to be aggressive because the blinds had just moved up to 400-800. I felt like if I start pushing all in, 75% of the time I am going to win the 1200 in blinds and the other 25% I may just have to get lucky. But the great part is, if I get lucky I am then in prime position to win. So here is the hand history from that point forward:

Opponent chat is in blue. Mine is in purple.


#Game No : 2568758431
***** Hand History for Game 2568758431 *****
NL Texas Hold'em Trny:15011432 Level:11 Blinds (400/800) - Saturday, August 20, 19:03:52 EDT 2005
Table 3 - Table(433627) Table #1 (Real Money)
Seat 1 is the button
Total number of players : 5
Seat 1: jcsmitty22 ( $7255 )
Seat 4: naguara ( $4610 )
Seat 6: RTL43 ( $6853 )
Seat 8: larryvq ( $5710 )
Seat 9: Pitbull201 ( $5572 )
Trny:15011432 Level:11
Blinds (400/800)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to larryvq [ Ah 3s ]
larryvq is all-In [5710]
Pitbull201 folds.
jcsmitty22 calls [5710].
naguara folds.
RTL43 folds.
** Dealing Flop ** [ 8h, Qs, 2d ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 3d ]
** Dealing River ** [ 6d ]
larryvq shows [ Ah, 3s ] a pair of threes.
jcsmitty22 shows [ Ks, As ] high card ace.
larryvq wins 12620 chips from the main pot with a pair of threes.
yeah dude
good one
fckin retard
yes!!!
Game #2568760468 starts.

#Game No : 2568760468
***** Hand History for Game 2568760468 *****
NL Texas Hold'em Trny:15011432 Level:11 Blinds (400/800) - Saturday, August 20, 19:04:17 EDT 2005
Table 3 - Table(433627) Table #1 (Real Money)
Seat 4 is the button
Total number of players : 5
Seat 1: jcsmitty22 ( $1545 )
Seat 4: naguara ( $4210 )
Seat 6: RTL43 ( $6053 )
Seat 8: larryvq ( $12620 )
Seat 9: Pitbull201 ( $5572 )
Trny:15011432 Level:11
Blinds (400/800)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to larryvq [ As 2s ]
Pitbull201 folds.
jcsmitty22 folds.
jcsmitty22: way to be a fckin assclown
RTL43: brutal
jcsmitty22: when u steal blinds u raise them 3-4 times so u can lay down to a better hand
jcsmitty22: you dont just go all in under the gun like a fkcing retard
jcsmitty22: jesus christ
naguara folds.
RTL43 folds.
larryvq does not show cards.
larryvq wins 1200 chips
learn how to fckin play poker
Game #2568763472 starts.

#Game No : 2568763472
***** Hand History for Game 2568763472 *****
NL Texas Hold'em Trny:15011432 Level:11 Blinds (400/800) - Saturday, August 20, 19:04:54 EDT 2005
Table 3 - Table(433627) Table #1 (Real Money)
Seat 6 is the button
Total number of players : 5
Seat 1: jcsmitty22 ( $1545 )
Seat 4: naguara ( $4210 )
Seat 6: RTL43 ( $5653 )
Seat 8: larryvq ( $13020 )
Seat 9: Pitbull201 ( $5572 )
Trny:15011432 Level:11
Blinds (400/800)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to larryvq [ 2h 8d ]
jcsmitty22 is all-In [1545]
naguara folds.
RTL43 folds.
larryvq folds.
larryvq: here's 400 back
Pitbull201 calls [745].
** Dealing Flop ** [ 4d, 3c, 6s ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ Qd ]
** Dealing River ** [ 2s ]
jcsmitty22 shows [ 8c, Jc ] high card queen.
Pitbull201 shows [ Tc, Kd ] high card king.
Pitbull201 wins 3490 chips from the main pot with high card king.
Player jcsmitty22 finished in 5 place and received $90
no crying JC it is poker
what a joke
jcsmitty22 has left the table.
Game #2568767452 starts.

#Game No : 2568767452
***** Hand History for Game 2568767452 *****
NL Texas Hold'em Trny:15011432 Level:11 Blinds (400/800) - Saturday, August 20, 19:05:42 EDT 2005
Table 3 - Table(433627) Table #1 (Real Money)
Seat 8 is the button
Total number of players : 4
Seat 4: naguara ( $4210 )
Seat 6: RTL43 ( $5653 )
Seat 8: larryvq ( $12620 )
Seat 9: Pitbull201 ( $7517 )
Trny:15011432 Level:11
Blinds (400/800)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to larryvq [ Kh 9c ]
jcsmitty22: larry what a joke you are
RTL43: gg
jcsmitty22: risk 6k to win 1200
RTL43 folds.
jcsmitty22: what a fckin douche
jcsmitty22: not a gg
jcsmitty22: a ridiculously stupid game
naguara: gl JC
jcsmitty22: just keep hittin buttons larry
larryvq: tilt much?
jcsmitty22: keep it up
larryvq raises [2500].
Pitbull201 folds.
naguara folds.
larryvq does not show cards.
larryvq wins 3700 chips
learn how to play poker
then come to the 33 buy-ins
Game #2568771246 starts.

#Game No : 2568771246
***** Hand History for Game 2568771246 *****
NL Texas Hold'em Trny:15011432 Level:11 Blinds (400/800) - Saturday, August 20, 19:06:28 EDT 2005
Table 3 - Table(433627) Table #1 (Real Money)
Seat 9 is the button
Total number of players : 4
Seat 4: naguara ( $3410 )
Seat 6: RTL43 ( $5653 )
Seat 8: larryvq ( $13820 )
Seat 9: Pitbull201 ( $7117 )
Trny:15011432 Level:11
Blinds (400/800)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to larryvq [ Th Ad ]
jcsmitty22: jesus christ moron
larryvq raises [2400].
Pitbull201 folds.
naguara folds.
RTL43 folds.
larryvq does not show cards.
larryvq wins 3600 chips
i only 7xx blind, all in is good bet
Game #2568774099 starts.

#Game No : 2568774099
***** Hand History for Game 2568774099 *****
NL Texas Hold'em Trny:15011432 Level:11 Blinds (400/800) - Saturday, August 20, 19:07:02 EDT 2005
Table 3 - Table(433627) Table #1 (Real Money)
Seat 4 is the button
Total number of players : 4
Seat 4: naguara ( $3010 )
Seat 6: RTL43 ( $4853 )
Seat 8: larryvq ( $15020 )
Seat 9: Pitbull201 ( $7117 )
Trny:15011432 Level:11
Blinds (400/800)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to larryvq [ 2h 3c ]
Pitbull201 folds.
naguara folds.
RTL43 folds.
larryvq does not show cards.
larryvq wins 1200 chips
Game #2568775229 starts.

#Game No : 2568775229
***** Hand History for Game 2568775229 *****
NL Texas Hold'em Trny:15011432 Level:11 Blinds (400/800) - Saturday, August 20, 19:07:16 EDT 2005
Table 3 - Table(433627) Table #1 (Real Money)
Seat 6 is the button
Total number of players : 4
Seat 4: naguara ( $3010 )
Seat 6: RTL43 ( $4453 )
Seat 8: larryvq ( $15420 )
Seat 9: Pitbull201 ( $7117 )
Trny:15011432 Level:11
Blinds (400/800)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to larryvq [ 5c 9c ]
naguara folds.
RTL43 folds.
larryvq: seeing guys go crazy like that is half the fun of online poker
larryvq folds.
Pitbull201 does not show cards.
Pitbull201 wins 1200 chips
Game #2568777616 starts.

Anyways I started to get some great cards and the other players were moving in on me and I busted them fairly quickly after that. What sucks is that first place is only $270. First place on the $55 one tables is $250 and much easier to win. Still it was fun to book a nice win.