Hey, check it out--call the neighbors, wake the kids--Mikey actually has something to write about today!
So instead of sitting on my ass here at the house and doing nothing last night, I decided to get out, be social, and go play a little poker in anticipation of the T2V Donkey Invitational next week. The Silverton hosts a great tournament on Tuesday nights, they call it the Industry Night Poker Tournament, and all that's required is a casino ID card. And forty bucks. And dealers are some of the worst poker players ever, so I figured my chances were good.
So I got drove down there at 9:30, and there were a couple of cash games going on--one of them was a crazy 3-6 game with about $4000 in chips scattered around the table and four people involved in each showdown. I thought about joining the cash game at first, especially since I saw three people at the table who I knew--one was a buddy of mine I hadn't seen in about a year, and he was just there killin' time with his short stack. Another was a chick I know who works at the Monte Carlo, and she was drunk off her ass and donkeying off all of her chips every hand, and the third was this squirrelly little dorky dude with bad personal hygiene who I've played against a few times at MGM Grand and taken about a hundy off of each time.
It certainly looked juicy.
But I wanted to wait for the tournament to get started so I just checked in at the podium and gave them my buy-in and casino credentials. I got my receipt just a moment later, and found that I was the first one to sign up--table one, seat one. Ugh. I *hate* seat one--you can't see shiat at the table, and if you have a left-handed dealer, you can't see the flop when it comes out, either.
Lesson learned, don't be the first one to sign up for a poker tournament. Since I had a half-hour to kill, I wandered over to the pit to the Pai Gow tables. Of course, Vegas being a small town chocked *full* of degenerates, I saw three of my regular players who were taking the night off from my casino and giving Silverton a little action that night instead. So I sat down and joined them. And immediately got three Pai Gows in a row, putting an end to that little field trip.
Back to the poker room!
I only had to wait a few minutes before they got the tournament started, and there were only about 30 players signed up. The good thing about it is that there is a guaranteed prize pool of $1500, even if only fifteen people showed up.
$700 for first place
$400 for second
$250 for third
$150 for fourth
Not bad for $40, so I think I'm gonna make this tournament a semi-regular event. I believe the buy-in was actually $37 for $2000 in chips, plus a $3 dealer add-on for an extra thousand. The $40 was basically automatic, however--they didn't even ask if we wanted it or not, and I can't think of anybody except for cheapasses like Johnny Chan or David Sklansky who would protest, and luckily they didn't make an appearance this night.
I figured I was in trouble immediately because as soon as the first card was pitched I realized that I'd left my lucky Tabasco bottle card protector back in my truck. Dammit. Oh well, I just had to deal with it, I suppose. I ended up using my last $5 chip from the Pai Gow table as a card protector.
I actually started out doing really well--I dragged three pots without having to show my cards, and had the chip lead at my table, and that third pot was a stone-cold bluff with absolutely nothing that forced two other guys to fold. Heh. I will admit, however, that I was sweating a call, and was totally lucky that both of the other guys folded.
We'd been playing for about a half hour when the hand of the night came up. I was on the big blind with $300 already in the pot when I was dealt pocket nines. There were two callers and one raiser. He only doubled the big blind, so three of us went to the flop with $2100 in the pot.
The flop came out King - Nine - King, two clubs.
Jackpot! I flopped a boat, and I was praying that somebody had a King. I checked, and wouldn't you know it the other two did all the work for me--raising and then re-raising. I just called.
The turn was an Eight of Clubs. I checked again. Next player goes all in. Woot!
The other player decides that he wants to go all in, too. Since I had both of them covered, I was doing the happy-naked-muppet-dance in my head!
Since I was the one who called, they had to show their cards first. One guy had Ace-King for trips, and the other guy had Ace-rag of clubs, holding what he thought was the nut flush. But I had the boat, and a huge lead going to the river.
And guess what came out on the river? The case nine, giving me four of a kind and knocking those other two out.
Bam--monster chip lead for Mikey!
I nursed that lead for another hour or so, folding pretty much everything, letting the small stacks knock each other out, and then made my first blunder of the tournament. I had pocket jacks, bet out $1500, and got one caller. The flop came Queen - Eight - Three, and the other player came out firing for $3500. I had a decent-sized chip lead, and I antagonized for a good thirty seconds before folding, and immediately kicked myself as soon as I did. The guy showed me pocket sevens before mucking them.
Damn.
After that, I got a little more aggressive with my stack, playing 'big stack' poker and stealing a shiat-load of blinds. That helped because by then the blinds were up at $300 and $600 and everyone was happy to limp in. I was cool with that, because on my big blind I had Jack/Three offsuit and only had to check to see a three-way flop. It came out King - Three - Three. Again I was content to just check my trips all the way until the river and let everyone else to the heavy lifting.
Again I knocked out two players, and the one guy who had pocket Aces about lost his mind, bitching up a storm that I'd stay in with Jack/Three. I was like, Uh dipshiat, you're the one who let me limp in and see the flop for free--it's your own damn fault for trying to get action for your Aces!
Heh. What's the old line? Better to win a small pot than lose a big one? Yep, had he raised even the bare minimum, I would've been out of the water like Chief Brody on the fourth of July. But he didn't. I bet you'll raise with Aces next time, Hippie!
I bled off about another $2000 worth of blinds before we got down to the final table, and I liked my chances--Only had to knock out five more people to get to the cash!
But it was not to be.
On the very first hand, I had Ace-Queen. I raised three times the blinds, got one caller, and the short stack at the other end of the table went all in. I had him covered, so I went all in. The other caller had me covered by about $1500, so he thought for about ten seconds and also went all in.
My Ace-Queen was up against King-Queen from the short stack, but the guy who had me covered had Ace-King. Damn. At least there was an Ace and a pair on the flop giving me a second's hope that I'd be chopping, but no help came on the turn or the river, and I went out in eighth place.
Damn Ace-Queen. Sticky was right--it never wins!
Oh well. I had a great time, and it was $40 well-spent. I realized that I'm not nearly as rusty as I thought I was, and I even got a compliment from a couple of other players who said I played a couple of hands really well (in addition to that snarky Nice hand! after my jack-three cracked the aces).
I also saw some terrible poker on display. One guy had the stone-cold nuts with a straight-flush and went all-in on the turn, basically killing his action and severely limiting the size of his pot, especially since he had two other players on the hook who took their own sweet time deciding to fold. Had he made a smaller bet, he could've taken them both out, especially if the river brought help to their hands. I couldn't believe how stupid that was. And he was so proud of his straight flush that he showed it to everyone.
I believe the words Nice play genius... Thanks for saving me four grand! were uttered at that point, giving a chuckle to everyone else at the table.
Anyhow, it was a lot of fun, and even though I didn't cash, I certainly did much better than I thought I would when I walked in the front door.
I'm ready for the T2V fish fry next week!
Mikey
No comments:
Post a Comment