WSOP Trip Report Day 1
I just got back from Vegas. This is probably pretty long, but there’s plenty of poker talk and celebrity hijinx. I left my girlfriend at home, and my intention was to play poker first, and see the sights second. I didn’t see many sights. I wrote this all last night, and I figured I’d cut and paste it onto this site for your enjoyment (hopefully). I like to write, and I like poker, so I’m going to keep track of ‘major’ poker happenings in my life. If you only read some of it, or none of it, I understand. I probably wouldn’t read something this long either…
DAY ONE - Thursday
The trip got off to a hectic start with me sprinting for ten minutes through what must be the biggest airport in the universe—George W. Bush in Houston—to catch my connection to Vegas. I made it with about one minute to spare, drenched in sweat. I stayed at Binion’s Horseshoe downtown because that’s where I planned to play, for the most part.
I should talk about Binion’s for a moment. If anyone is planning to go to Vegas, and planning to stay downtown, I’ve been told (too late) that the Four Queens is the best place to stay. The rooms at Binion’s—at least the ‘tower room’ that I was in—aren’t bad. The cost is $75/night. I probably could have talked this rate down a bit, but I didn’t bother trying. Since Harrah’s took over, they’ve replaced all the mattresses and a lot of the carpeting, and it shows. My room was nice enough, and really quite spacious. There were four unusual things about it though:
1) The very large window opened all the way, with no screen, 14 stories up. I was under the impression that this is a no-no in a town where people probably contemplate suicide more often per capita than in others, but Binion’s either doesn’t know about this, or doesn’t care.
2) The television only had 14 channels; your general basic cable package. I assume this is to encourage people to spend as little time as possible in their rooms.
3) I was in one of those rooms that had a secure door—but a door nonetheless—leading to an adjacent room. The noise factor was minimal from every direction except that one. I’m a pretty heavy sleeper, so it wasn’t a huge factor.
4) The shower puts you to a decision for all your chips. There’s only one knob, and it controls both the pressure and the temperature. So, if you open the valve a tiny bit, you get a trickle of cold water. If you open it a lot, you get a decent amount of pressure and a scalding hot shower. Middle ground is hard to find. Also, there’s a time limit. You are up to your ankles after about five minutes.
With all that being said, the Horseshoe was not an unpleasant place to stay. It was clean, for the most part quiet, and certainly conveniently located.
I threw my stuff in my room, and went to register for the two tournaments I planned to play in: the $2000 buy-in No-Limit event, and the $1500 Limit event. This process took a very long time. There are actually ‘only’ three lines that you have to stand in to accomplish this process. The first one is where you get your free WSOP identification tag. Essentially, you’re assigned a number. You also sign a television waiver form which, by and large, gives the producers of the show custody of your first-born child, with an option for the second.
So, once I got my number, I stood in the event registration line. This is where I finally got a chance to look around, and saw that Chris ‘Jesus’ Ferguson, Daniel Negreanu, and Phillip Ivey were milling about with us common folk. It was refreshing to see that they weren’t acting like they were special, and nobody was really affording them any more attention than was to be expected. I got to the front of the line, threw my traveller’s cheques on the desk, and was told that I had to buy ‘tournament chips’ to register for events, as they don’t deal with money at all.
So, I went to the tournament chips purchasing line, and stood in that for a while. I got to the front of the line, threw my traveller’s cheques on the desk, and was told that they don’t accept traveller’s cheques at that desk. I’d have to go to a cage downstairs to cash them first.
So, I went downstairs to a cage, stood in line, and was then told that I’d have to go the Main Cage to cash the cheques. I went to the Main Cage, and after a lot of phone calls to American Express to confirm the legitimacy of the cheques (which is actually a good thing), I was given my $3500 US. Back upstairs to the tournament chips line, then to the event registration line, and I was officially registered for both tournaments. I was given my table and seat assignments, and vouchers for free meals at the buffet.
Feeling like a mouse that had successfully made it through a maze, I wanted my piece of cheese. I went up to the steakhouse at the top of Binion’s for my first meal in Vegas. I ordered prime rib, regular cut instead of the super-size Binion’s cut. It was an inch and a half thick and it took up the whole plate. I said, “This is the regular cut?†and the waiter told me it was the leanest they had. It was delicious, and with a corner view and glass walls at dusk I had a great view of the strip. It was pretty cool. It was almost time for poker, but first, I wanted to find the Leafs game. I walked across the street to the California Club, which I was told had a sports book. They had every game on at the same time on different screens, with the Leafs game relegated to the smallest, highest screen available, no sound. It was perfect. Vegas doesn’t seem to care much about hockey; it’s all basketball and baseball. The guy sitting next to me had (I assume) quite a bit of money on New York in the basketball game. They were losing to New Jersey by about 3 points with 2 minutes left, and he was absolutely losing it. Yelling at the screen, jumping up and down, pointing, etc…. I couldn’t help but get caught up in the basketball game. Unfortunately, New York lost, by about the same 3 points. Even worse, the Leafs lost too.
I went across the street to the Golden Nugget. I’d heard a bit about their new poker room, and for those who haven’t heard about it or seen it themselves, I’ll share my thoughts…
The Golden Nugget’s room is going to be the place to play in Vegas. It may already be—all of their tables were full on Saturday night, and they have a lot of tables. It’s big, with really high ceilings that have fabric draped under them to dampen the sound. It’s enclosed from the rest of the casino, with glass walls that run the length of the room on two sides, and a sort of massive plastic wall with big plastic windows that runs the length of a third side. This side looks out onto the ‘pool sunning’ area. One more time: this side looks out onto the ‘pool sunning’ area. Nice.
It’s smoke free, the tables are big, and there’s tons of room between the tables and in the aisles, so you never get bumped. It’s quiet, and—probably since it’s only been open for a week now—spotlessly clean. The staff is friendly, although they may be a little keen: they had no less than four security guards standing around the big game, $2000-$4000 mixed with an all-star lineup that included over the course of my stay Phil Ivey, Layne Flack, Doyle Brunson, Johnny Chan, the Devilfish, and others too numerous to mention. I think Chan is on the payroll for the Nugget, or he’s at least being seriously comped. He was wearing a Golden Nugget jacket on day one of the 2K NL tourney (the next day), and I heard that he was asking the cameraman to get a good shot of the logo. Who knows if that’s true, but if it is, so what. It’s a nice room.
The only downside to the Nugget is that there are a lot of new dealers. The place just re-opened, and I guess they had to get more dealers to accommodate the number of tables. A couple of them really had no clue, and the players in my game—20/40—really let them have it over the course of my stay. To their credit, they took the criticism well, and tried not to make the same mistakes twice. I think all they need is more experience, and there is no shortage of that in store for them.
The press that the Nugget was getting from Chan seemed to be working. The room was buzzing, everyone seemed to be in a good mood, and in addition to the big game, there was a $50-$100 pot-limit game going with no security, right next to the rail, and lots of room to stand and watch. The rail was never crowded, and none of the players seemed to mind the occasional passers-by stopping for a minute to check it out. $50-$100 pot limit hold’em isn’t 2K/4K, but it’s a pretty big game in itself, with its own cast of all-stars. But these games aren’t for me. When I walked in, an announcement was being made that they needed one more person to play in a single-table sit-and-go. After learning that it was winner-take-all, that deals were allowed, that the winner was paid in cash, and that is was no-limit, I sat down. The buy-in was $225 with the winner to receive $2150, more than enough to buy into the WSOP event the next day which I’d already bought into.
I played my usual single table 10-person tournament style: tight at first, waiting for the blinds to increase to the point where making moves would become worthwhile. I raised UTG with 66, with maybe 5 people left. Only the big blind called. The flop came 8 4 2 rainbow—a good flop for me. BB checked, I moved in and he called with the K8 clubs. He had me covered, but when a 6 came on the turn I was back in it and then some. The very next hand, I got 66 again, this time in my big blind. It was limped to me and I checked. The flop came T 6 2, it was checked to the button who moved in, I called and he showed K T. After doubling through twice I was in great shape.
Down to three: me and another guy were about equal, with the third stack at about half the size. The guy who was equal to me in chips started to propose a 3-way deal… a save of $500 each etc. etc. I axed it before he could go into too much detail, saying I would consider a deal when it got down to 2. I felt I had an edge on these guys. Basically, I was full of shit for the most part and they, for the most part, weren’t. I’d been picking up a lot of small pots with nothing, to get to this point.
So, we played on. The guy who tried to make the deal had decided that now was a good time to push all-in whenever he was in a pot and he had something, so when I got aces on the button with him in the big blind, I knew I had to capitalize on the opportunity. I made a strange little raise I’d been making with garbage and with big hands: double the blinds. SB folded, and BB called. The flop came 332, and BB pushed. Hmmm. Maybe I trapped myself here. I called, and he flipped over the K 2 suited. I had him covered, and now I was heads-up with the shortstack.
I had a chip lead of 4:1 or so, with the blinds at 300/600, so obviously I didn’t want to make a deal. We traded blinds for a little bit, and then I decided to raise it up to 1200 from the button with J9 clubs. He moved all-in for 1300 more. Now what have I done to myself. If I call, it’s a terrible call, really. But, I’m already in for 1200, and if I win, the thing’s over. I mulled it over for a long time, and finally called, telling him he was ahead, which he was. He had J K off. However, when the flop brought a nine, with no help for him on the turn or river, I was the proud owner of $2150. He was PISSED OFF, but he still shook my hand when I offered it. The Nugget for some bizarre reason gave me all $2150, without withholding any money for the IRS. I tipped the dealer, played in a $125 single-table tournament with poorer results, and then went to bed relatively early to rest up for the 2K NL tournament at noon the next day.
DAY ONE - Thursday
The trip got off to a hectic start with me sprinting for ten minutes through what must be the biggest airport in the universe—George W. Bush in Houston—to catch my connection to Vegas. I made it with about one minute to spare, drenched in sweat. I stayed at Binion’s Horseshoe downtown because that’s where I planned to play, for the most part.
I should talk about Binion’s for a moment. If anyone is planning to go to Vegas, and planning to stay downtown, I’ve been told (too late) that the Four Queens is the best place to stay. The rooms at Binion’s—at least the ‘tower room’ that I was in—aren’t bad. The cost is $75/night. I probably could have talked this rate down a bit, but I didn’t bother trying. Since Harrah’s took over, they’ve replaced all the mattresses and a lot of the carpeting, and it shows. My room was nice enough, and really quite spacious. There were four unusual things about it though:
1) The very large window opened all the way, with no screen, 14 stories up. I was under the impression that this is a no-no in a town where people probably contemplate suicide more often per capita than in others, but Binion’s either doesn’t know about this, or doesn’t care.
2) The television only had 14 channels; your general basic cable package. I assume this is to encourage people to spend as little time as possible in their rooms.
3) I was in one of those rooms that had a secure door—but a door nonetheless—leading to an adjacent room. The noise factor was minimal from every direction except that one. I’m a pretty heavy sleeper, so it wasn’t a huge factor.
4) The shower puts you to a decision for all your chips. There’s only one knob, and it controls both the pressure and the temperature. So, if you open the valve a tiny bit, you get a trickle of cold water. If you open it a lot, you get a decent amount of pressure and a scalding hot shower. Middle ground is hard to find. Also, there’s a time limit. You are up to your ankles after about five minutes.
With all that being said, the Horseshoe was not an unpleasant place to stay. It was clean, for the most part quiet, and certainly conveniently located.
I threw my stuff in my room, and went to register for the two tournaments I planned to play in: the $2000 buy-in No-Limit event, and the $1500 Limit event. This process took a very long time. There are actually ‘only’ three lines that you have to stand in to accomplish this process. The first one is where you get your free WSOP identification tag. Essentially, you’re assigned a number. You also sign a television waiver form which, by and large, gives the producers of the show custody of your first-born child, with an option for the second.
So, once I got my number, I stood in the event registration line. This is where I finally got a chance to look around, and saw that Chris ‘Jesus’ Ferguson, Daniel Negreanu, and Phillip Ivey were milling about with us common folk. It was refreshing to see that they weren’t acting like they were special, and nobody was really affording them any more attention than was to be expected. I got to the front of the line, threw my traveller’s cheques on the desk, and was told that I had to buy ‘tournament chips’ to register for events, as they don’t deal with money at all.
So, I went to the tournament chips purchasing line, and stood in that for a while. I got to the front of the line, threw my traveller’s cheques on the desk, and was told that they don’t accept traveller’s cheques at that desk. I’d have to go to a cage downstairs to cash them first.
So, I went downstairs to a cage, stood in line, and was then told that I’d have to go the Main Cage to cash the cheques. I went to the Main Cage, and after a lot of phone calls to American Express to confirm the legitimacy of the cheques (which is actually a good thing), I was given my $3500 US. Back upstairs to the tournament chips line, then to the event registration line, and I was officially registered for both tournaments. I was given my table and seat assignments, and vouchers for free meals at the buffet.
Feeling like a mouse that had successfully made it through a maze, I wanted my piece of cheese. I went up to the steakhouse at the top of Binion’s for my first meal in Vegas. I ordered prime rib, regular cut instead of the super-size Binion’s cut. It was an inch and a half thick and it took up the whole plate. I said, “This is the regular cut?†and the waiter told me it was the leanest they had. It was delicious, and with a corner view and glass walls at dusk I had a great view of the strip. It was pretty cool. It was almost time for poker, but first, I wanted to find the Leafs game. I walked across the street to the California Club, which I was told had a sports book. They had every game on at the same time on different screens, with the Leafs game relegated to the smallest, highest screen available, no sound. It was perfect. Vegas doesn’t seem to care much about hockey; it’s all basketball and baseball. The guy sitting next to me had (I assume) quite a bit of money on New York in the basketball game. They were losing to New Jersey by about 3 points with 2 minutes left, and he was absolutely losing it. Yelling at the screen, jumping up and down, pointing, etc…. I couldn’t help but get caught up in the basketball game. Unfortunately, New York lost, by about the same 3 points. Even worse, the Leafs lost too.
I went across the street to the Golden Nugget. I’d heard a bit about their new poker room, and for those who haven’t heard about it or seen it themselves, I’ll share my thoughts…
The Golden Nugget’s room is going to be the place to play in Vegas. It may already be—all of their tables were full on Saturday night, and they have a lot of tables. It’s big, with really high ceilings that have fabric draped under them to dampen the sound. It’s enclosed from the rest of the casino, with glass walls that run the length of the room on two sides, and a sort of massive plastic wall with big plastic windows that runs the length of a third side. This side looks out onto the ‘pool sunning’ area. One more time: this side looks out onto the ‘pool sunning’ area. Nice.
It’s smoke free, the tables are big, and there’s tons of room between the tables and in the aisles, so you never get bumped. It’s quiet, and—probably since it’s only been open for a week now—spotlessly clean. The staff is friendly, although they may be a little keen: they had no less than four security guards standing around the big game, $2000-$4000 mixed with an all-star lineup that included over the course of my stay Phil Ivey, Layne Flack, Doyle Brunson, Johnny Chan, the Devilfish, and others too numerous to mention. I think Chan is on the payroll for the Nugget, or he’s at least being seriously comped. He was wearing a Golden Nugget jacket on day one of the 2K NL tourney (the next day), and I heard that he was asking the cameraman to get a good shot of the logo. Who knows if that’s true, but if it is, so what. It’s a nice room.
The only downside to the Nugget is that there are a lot of new dealers. The place just re-opened, and I guess they had to get more dealers to accommodate the number of tables. A couple of them really had no clue, and the players in my game—20/40—really let them have it over the course of my stay. To their credit, they took the criticism well, and tried not to make the same mistakes twice. I think all they need is more experience, and there is no shortage of that in store for them.
The press that the Nugget was getting from Chan seemed to be working. The room was buzzing, everyone seemed to be in a good mood, and in addition to the big game, there was a $50-$100 pot-limit game going with no security, right next to the rail, and lots of room to stand and watch. The rail was never crowded, and none of the players seemed to mind the occasional passers-by stopping for a minute to check it out. $50-$100 pot limit hold’em isn’t 2K/4K, but it’s a pretty big game in itself, with its own cast of all-stars. But these games aren’t for me. When I walked in, an announcement was being made that they needed one more person to play in a single-table sit-and-go. After learning that it was winner-take-all, that deals were allowed, that the winner was paid in cash, and that is was no-limit, I sat down. The buy-in was $225 with the winner to receive $2150, more than enough to buy into the WSOP event the next day which I’d already bought into.
I played my usual single table 10-person tournament style: tight at first, waiting for the blinds to increase to the point where making moves would become worthwhile. I raised UTG with 66, with maybe 5 people left. Only the big blind called. The flop came 8 4 2 rainbow—a good flop for me. BB checked, I moved in and he called with the K8 clubs. He had me covered, but when a 6 came on the turn I was back in it and then some. The very next hand, I got 66 again, this time in my big blind. It was limped to me and I checked. The flop came T 6 2, it was checked to the button who moved in, I called and he showed K T. After doubling through twice I was in great shape.
Down to three: me and another guy were about equal, with the third stack at about half the size. The guy who was equal to me in chips started to propose a 3-way deal… a save of $500 each etc. etc. I axed it before he could go into too much detail, saying I would consider a deal when it got down to 2. I felt I had an edge on these guys. Basically, I was full of shit for the most part and they, for the most part, weren’t. I’d been picking up a lot of small pots with nothing, to get to this point.
So, we played on. The guy who tried to make the deal had decided that now was a good time to push all-in whenever he was in a pot and he had something, so when I got aces on the button with him in the big blind, I knew I had to capitalize on the opportunity. I made a strange little raise I’d been making with garbage and with big hands: double the blinds. SB folded, and BB called. The flop came 332, and BB pushed. Hmmm. Maybe I trapped myself here. I called, and he flipped over the K 2 suited. I had him covered, and now I was heads-up with the shortstack.
I had a chip lead of 4:1 or so, with the blinds at 300/600, so obviously I didn’t want to make a deal. We traded blinds for a little bit, and then I decided to raise it up to 1200 from the button with J9 clubs. He moved all-in for 1300 more. Now what have I done to myself. If I call, it’s a terrible call, really. But, I’m already in for 1200, and if I win, the thing’s over. I mulled it over for a long time, and finally called, telling him he was ahead, which he was. He had J K off. However, when the flop brought a nine, with no help for him on the turn or river, I was the proud owner of $2150. He was PISSED OFF, but he still shook my hand when I offered it. The Nugget for some bizarre reason gave me all $2150, without withholding any money for the IRS. I tipped the dealer, played in a $125 single-table tournament with poorer results, and then went to bed relatively early to rest up for the 2K NL tournament at noon the next day.
Comments
I don't think that's a terrible call. In fact, I'll go completely the other way and say this is an *automatic* call. This is the classic case where you've already committed yourself to the pot by betting about half of the active (i.e. smaller) stack size.
You're getting pot odds of 3700 to 1300, or almost 3 to 1. You've got to call here if you think you've got at least a 25% chance of winning this pot, which you certainly do unless your opponent has a pair above 8's. In fact:
http://twodimes.net/h/?z=288832
pokenum -h jc 9c - js kc
Holdem Hi: 1712304 enumerated boards
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
Jc 9c 493392 28.81 1169112 68.28 49800 2.91 0.303
Js Kc 1169112 68.28 493392 28.81 49800 2.91 0.697
This analysis actually made me think of something I've never thought about before. Do pot odds computations even *matter* when you would eliminate your heads-up opponent if you win the pot? I mean, it hardly matters how many chips you're going to win from the pot since the tournament will be over...
Well, you called and won, so it must have been the right move. 8)
Great post, and I'm looking forward to reading all of them.
ScottyZ
I haven't got a chance to read the other posts right now, but I can't wait dude. I checked the updates after the weekend and saw you didn't place in the big events, but I'm looking forward to seeing how it all went down.
Winning that single-table must have felt amazing to begin your stay - perfect actually. You can go into the rest of the weekend knowing you've already won something tasty and can just play it nice and easy, unless you want to gear up into maniac mode to freak the locals the fvck out...
Yeah, I guess you're right. Once I'd gotten myself into it, I had to call. I guess I just should have realized that if I even doubled the blinds, I'd be committed to play the hand for all of his chips. With that in mind, I probably would have limped and folded to a preflop raise, if I could do it again. I don't like jack high in an all-in situation... I'd rather wait for any ace.
Thanks Scotty. I know they're ridiculously long, so I appreciate the fact that you and others are taking the time to actually read them. I write this stuff mostly for the benefit of friends and family--when they ask me about my trip, I just point them here, which prevents me from leaving anything out and from having to repeat myself numerous times.
I admit it's a bit impersonal, but there you have it. Also, I figure that poker players in general might enjoy killing time at work by reading about poker.
I like to write and I always have, so it's no skin off my back and it'll give me something to look back on and chuckle about, years from now.
Al:
Yeah, you nailed it. I was feeling a little weird about just having parted with $3500 USD. Winning the 2K helped a lot.
A lot of the locals were already there...
I thought about this some more, and I believe the answer is that the usual calculations of pot odds *do* matter even in an elimination setting. Why? Because your decision will affect the amount of chips your *opponent* has at the end of the hand. This is one of those things that sounds unbelievably obvious *after* you think of it...
Here's an example.
Let's say you have lots of chips your opponent moves all in for 100 more into a pot of 500 (600 is now in the pot total if you include the bet). Suppose you assess your own hand as a 3:1 underdog, and for the sake of argument, you are sure that this is correct.
Now, all we need to do is compute your *opponent's* EV based on what you do.
If you fold, your opponent wins the pot. His EV is +500. (Note: you don't usually count the "active" bet in EV calculations... the interpretation is that the opponent is currently betting 100 to win the pot of 500)
If you call as a 3:1 dog, you win 25% of the pots. Your opponent's EV is
(0.25) * (-100) + (0.75) * (600) = +425.
Since your opponent is worse off when you call, calling should be the right play.
Note that you get the same decision when you work out your own pot odds in the usual way.
Folding has EV of 0 (as it always does).
Calling has EV of
(0.25) * (+600) + (0.75) * (-100) = +75.
So calling is the also right decision based on the standard pot odds calculation method.
Note: it's no surprise that we got +75 in using the second method, since 500 - 425 = 75. Changes in your own EV are always counter-balanced by changes in your opponent's (or opponents') EV.
ScottyZ
gonna read this again
thx all_aces
lol i guess i'm a little psychic :eek:
hope to see them in CPP for sure
( my CPP subscription is due to expire in May i think :frown:
hope they'll send me a renewal notice
oh you didn't know :eek: he borrowed sloth's time machine
btw, I think I had that a similar contraption in a Vancouver hotel shower. My choice that morning was to take a steam.
Keep writing all_aces. Your journey reminded me of an old Infocom text adventure with hints of Douglas Adams!
These reports were a blast to write.
It's one of those absolutely maddening games in the text-based interactive fiction genre. Basically, you spend hour upon hour dealing with the finer points of your life, such as:
> put on pants
I don't see any 'put' here.
> wear pants
You are now wearing some boss slacks. Sexy!
> open door
You aren't going to go outside with no shirt on, are you?
> wear shirt
I see no 'shirt' here.
> look in closet
The closet door is closed.
> open closet
You open your closet door and find a single 100% polyester shirt hanging there. That was convenient, don't you think?
> wear shirt
You don't have a 'shirt'.
> get shirt
I don't see any 'shirt' here.
> get shit from closet
I don't see any 'shit' in the closet.
> get shirt from closet
Taken.
> wear shirt
You look fab, and just about ready for a night on the town.
> open door
You aren't going to go outside with no underwear on, are you?
I still have a copy of it on my PC. :cool:
ScottyZ