WSOP Trip Report Day 5
DAY 5 – Monday
On my last day in Vegas, I did what I ended up doing for most of the trip: I looked for a multi-table tournament, found one, and signed up for it. Before I did that, I slept in until about 1:00 in the afternoon. I then went to shop for gifts for my girlfriend. She asked for something cheesy, so I got her a sparkly little WSOP 2004 t-shirt. And a red thong with the words ‘The Professional Hooker’ across the front and ‘Vegas 2004’ on the back triangle that I bought on the street. After phoning around, I found a tournament—again at the Mirage—for $130 buy-in plus rebuys and an add-on. Before going to the Strip, I checked out the final table of the $1500 Limit WSOP event.
It wasn’t being shot for television, so it was easily accessible. Matt Savage was doing a capable job with the play-by-play on the mic, I stood about 5 feet away against the rail, and looked at monitors when I couldn’t see. It was more interesting than I thought it would be. To make it even more interesting, there was a blond woman that everyone seemed to know sitting in the front row wearing as close to nothing as I’ve ever seen in public. In addition to this, Phil Hellmuth—who I hadn’t seen previous to this—was playing the first day of the Omaha hi-lo event nearby, and he was constantly getting up and walking past the barricades up to the final table to watch. I also saw Amarillo Slim in attendance. For the record, by this time in the trip I’d also seen Men the Master, Scotty Nguyen, and others whose names escape me at the moment. The only person that I wished I’d seen or talked to but didn’t was Howard Lederer. He was playing in the 2K NL event but I missed him. The only poker ‘celebrity’ that I thought would be at the WSOP but wasn’t, was Chris Moneymaker. Like it or not, he is a poker celebrity, and I thought he’d be there.
I went over to the Mirage after watching the final table for a little while to take a final walk around the strip before playing. I’d already made up my mind to finish the night playing poker at the Horseshoe, so it was time to check things out.
So, I checked things out. Caesar’s, the crazy corridors for shops, etc… I ended up in a plaza of sorts outside in the hot sun where a cover band was just finishing their closer: ‘Pour Some Sugar on Me’, by Def Leppard I believe. They had a dancer, and afro wigs. The crowd was right into them. I stopped at a sunglasses vendor on the street, and I found an awesome pair of Elvis shades. Big, dark, silver frames, and even UV protected. 11 bucks, sold. I couldn’t find the owner of the cart so I could pay him, though. I wandered around back, and found him and a girl with a hose, spraying the short concrete wall behind them. I asked them what they were doing, and they said they were trying to kill a very big cockroach.
So, I bought the sunglasses, and actually wore them at the poker table in the tourney for the first time. Clearly, I needed some kind of change. The tournament attracted about 70 players, and I discovered after a couple of hands that is was a limit tournament instead of a no-limit one like the night before. I should check my entry cards more carefully. No matter, as I played what I wholeheartedly felt was my best limit game since arriving in Vegas. I won three relatively big pots on stone-cold, well-timed bluffs. Hung on when I had to, and made moves when I had to. I was seated to the left of a very good player from St. Catherines, Ontario. I’ve read about a group in St. Catherines that holds tournaments to send members of the group to the WSOP. Sure enough, he was one of them, an older guy who’s clearly played a lot of limit hold’em.
After playing well and getting some good flops, I made it to the final table. It paid top nine, and I was in the money, but I was a bit shortstacked. I went into serious ‘survive-and-move-up-the-ladder’ mode. Then, when a few players had been knocked off the final table, I got a hand when the blinds were huge that turned it around for me.
It was A A, the first time I’d seen a big pocket pair all tournament. The big blind was at 4000, and it was coming to me, and I had about 8500. Being dealt pocket aces is great in this spot, because obviously your opponents will assume that you’re getting desperate, and that you’ll get your chips in with any random better-than-average hand in this spot. So, I got the aces in middle position, and after I thought for a while after it was folded to me, I raised it to 8000, leaving me with 500 in front of me. Folded to the big blind, who had 4000 in already.
As an aside, the big blind, a while earlier, had done something that I thought was interesting. He was heads-up against an opponent, and he flopped top two pair. When it was checked to him on the flop, he put in only half of the required bet. After the dealer told him he owed some more, he asked, “Can I take it back?â€, implying that he wouldn’t have bet if he’d known it was going to be so much. Of course, he knew full well that he couldn’t take it back, and that he’d have to complete the bet, which he did. His opponent called him all the way down, and he won a nice pot. Maybe this little trick is widely known and I just haven’t seen it or heard about it before, but I though it was clever.
So, the BB had lost a lot of chips since that 2 pair hand, and calling my raise would leave him with enough chips to play with, but just barely. He asked the dealer, “So if I raise him and win I can knock him out?â€. The dealer said he could, and he raised me for my last 500. I called. He said, “I have a pairâ€, and turned over pocket fours. I said, “So do Iâ€, and flipped over my aces. It was the closest I came to slowrolling in Vegas. The gentleman to my right from St. Catherines smiled and tapped the table twice in front of my aces.
They were good, and I doubled up. The guy with the fours busted out soon after, along with another player or two. There were now four of us left, and I was doing just OK. Then it was folded to the gentleman from St. Catherines. We’d been giving each other a fair amount of respect, if only because we are both Canadian. He raised my big blind, and I knew he meant business. However, I was dealt K K in that particular big blind, and had to re-raise him. He called, the flop came ace high, he checked and I bet. The blinds were such that I was in this pot all the way after the preflop action, ace or no ace. He thought for a while, and folded. I showed him the kings, he said ‘nice hand’, and I’d taken a big chunk of his stack with the preflop 3-bet alone.
And then I screwed up. More hands were dealt, there were still four of us, and I didn’t have to make a move. I could afford to get at least third, if not second or first, by just waiting for hands. But I got greedy. The guy to my left had just won a nice pot the hand before this one. I’d been folding every small blind to his big blind every single time it was folded to me, because I’d always have less than eight high in those situations, out of position.
So, I figured that most players, after winning a big pot like he’d just won, would usually fold all but premium hands to a raise so they can get back to stacking their chips and outlasting at least two other players. This—combined with the fact that I’d folded my small blind junk every time it was folded to me against him—made me think it was a good idea to raise his blind from the small holding nothing but the J 6 offsuit. He called.
The flop came ace high, with no jack or 6, and no draw. I bet, and he called. What have I done. The turn was something, and I checked, feeling sick. Of course he bet, of course I knew he had at least a pair of aces, and I folded. In the next break, still four-handed with me extremely shortstacked, I went up to him and said, “You’re welcomeâ€. He told me he had A 7 or something for two pair, and asked me what I had. I told him I had absolute garbage, and that I’d made a big mistake, and he nodded.
I busted out in fourth place shortly thereafter. I deserved it. I made some mistakes in Vegas, and that J 6 hand was a big one. I didn’t have to make a move, but I did. When the game is that tight, they’re just waiting for someone to make a play with a bad hand, and I should have been waiting, too. So, I took fourth and a nice prize of around $1500. The tournament director sat me down and explained why I’d be given only $1200 or so and an IRS tax form. The withholding tax. I’m going to have to figure it out, but the nice guy from St. Catherines (who took third) gave me his card and told me he’s been through the tax-recovery process a bunch of times. I’m going to e-mail him and figure out the easiest way to get my money back.
I left the Mirage that night feeling pretty good, actually. I walked along the strip, and determined that my first night’s win paid for my first WSOP entry, and the win I just got at the Mirage paid for my second. So, they cancelled each other out. My overall performance in the 20/40 games paid for my numerous entries (including the 1K Bellagio event) into ‘smaller’ tournaments. It also paid for all of my meals. So, as far as poker was concerned, I was on a freeroll and then some. My expenses besides meals though—flight, hotel, and missed days at work—came out of my bankroll. This amount added up to much less than five percent of my poker bankroll, so I was satisfied. From a business standpoint, I was down, considering that I had to pay anything at all out of my pocket. From a vacation standpoint, I was up, considering that all of my meals and entertainment were paid for.
So, we’re even.
I went to Binion’s and played in a 10/20 Omaha hi-lo game with a half kill, just because it’s a fun game to get hammered in. Everyone’s drawing to the nuts, and somebody usually gets there. It was the first and only time I was inebriated at a poker table (in Vegas). I played until 2 hours before I had to catch my flight out, and I made a bit of cash to pay for the hotel. Overall, a good last night in Vegas, and I was off to bed.
On my last day in Vegas, I did what I ended up doing for most of the trip: I looked for a multi-table tournament, found one, and signed up for it. Before I did that, I slept in until about 1:00 in the afternoon. I then went to shop for gifts for my girlfriend. She asked for something cheesy, so I got her a sparkly little WSOP 2004 t-shirt. And a red thong with the words ‘The Professional Hooker’ across the front and ‘Vegas 2004’ on the back triangle that I bought on the street. After phoning around, I found a tournament—again at the Mirage—for $130 buy-in plus rebuys and an add-on. Before going to the Strip, I checked out the final table of the $1500 Limit WSOP event.
It wasn’t being shot for television, so it was easily accessible. Matt Savage was doing a capable job with the play-by-play on the mic, I stood about 5 feet away against the rail, and looked at monitors when I couldn’t see. It was more interesting than I thought it would be. To make it even more interesting, there was a blond woman that everyone seemed to know sitting in the front row wearing as close to nothing as I’ve ever seen in public. In addition to this, Phil Hellmuth—who I hadn’t seen previous to this—was playing the first day of the Omaha hi-lo event nearby, and he was constantly getting up and walking past the barricades up to the final table to watch. I also saw Amarillo Slim in attendance. For the record, by this time in the trip I’d also seen Men the Master, Scotty Nguyen, and others whose names escape me at the moment. The only person that I wished I’d seen or talked to but didn’t was Howard Lederer. He was playing in the 2K NL event but I missed him. The only poker ‘celebrity’ that I thought would be at the WSOP but wasn’t, was Chris Moneymaker. Like it or not, he is a poker celebrity, and I thought he’d be there.
I went over to the Mirage after watching the final table for a little while to take a final walk around the strip before playing. I’d already made up my mind to finish the night playing poker at the Horseshoe, so it was time to check things out.
So, I checked things out. Caesar’s, the crazy corridors for shops, etc… I ended up in a plaza of sorts outside in the hot sun where a cover band was just finishing their closer: ‘Pour Some Sugar on Me’, by Def Leppard I believe. They had a dancer, and afro wigs. The crowd was right into them. I stopped at a sunglasses vendor on the street, and I found an awesome pair of Elvis shades. Big, dark, silver frames, and even UV protected. 11 bucks, sold. I couldn’t find the owner of the cart so I could pay him, though. I wandered around back, and found him and a girl with a hose, spraying the short concrete wall behind them. I asked them what they were doing, and they said they were trying to kill a very big cockroach.
So, I bought the sunglasses, and actually wore them at the poker table in the tourney for the first time. Clearly, I needed some kind of change. The tournament attracted about 70 players, and I discovered after a couple of hands that is was a limit tournament instead of a no-limit one like the night before. I should check my entry cards more carefully. No matter, as I played what I wholeheartedly felt was my best limit game since arriving in Vegas. I won three relatively big pots on stone-cold, well-timed bluffs. Hung on when I had to, and made moves when I had to. I was seated to the left of a very good player from St. Catherines, Ontario. I’ve read about a group in St. Catherines that holds tournaments to send members of the group to the WSOP. Sure enough, he was one of them, an older guy who’s clearly played a lot of limit hold’em.
After playing well and getting some good flops, I made it to the final table. It paid top nine, and I was in the money, but I was a bit shortstacked. I went into serious ‘survive-and-move-up-the-ladder’ mode. Then, when a few players had been knocked off the final table, I got a hand when the blinds were huge that turned it around for me.
It was A A, the first time I’d seen a big pocket pair all tournament. The big blind was at 4000, and it was coming to me, and I had about 8500. Being dealt pocket aces is great in this spot, because obviously your opponents will assume that you’re getting desperate, and that you’ll get your chips in with any random better-than-average hand in this spot. So, I got the aces in middle position, and after I thought for a while after it was folded to me, I raised it to 8000, leaving me with 500 in front of me. Folded to the big blind, who had 4000 in already.
As an aside, the big blind, a while earlier, had done something that I thought was interesting. He was heads-up against an opponent, and he flopped top two pair. When it was checked to him on the flop, he put in only half of the required bet. After the dealer told him he owed some more, he asked, “Can I take it back?â€, implying that he wouldn’t have bet if he’d known it was going to be so much. Of course, he knew full well that he couldn’t take it back, and that he’d have to complete the bet, which he did. His opponent called him all the way down, and he won a nice pot. Maybe this little trick is widely known and I just haven’t seen it or heard about it before, but I though it was clever.
So, the BB had lost a lot of chips since that 2 pair hand, and calling my raise would leave him with enough chips to play with, but just barely. He asked the dealer, “So if I raise him and win I can knock him out?â€. The dealer said he could, and he raised me for my last 500. I called. He said, “I have a pairâ€, and turned over pocket fours. I said, “So do Iâ€, and flipped over my aces. It was the closest I came to slowrolling in Vegas. The gentleman to my right from St. Catherines smiled and tapped the table twice in front of my aces.
They were good, and I doubled up. The guy with the fours busted out soon after, along with another player or two. There were now four of us left, and I was doing just OK. Then it was folded to the gentleman from St. Catherines. We’d been giving each other a fair amount of respect, if only because we are both Canadian. He raised my big blind, and I knew he meant business. However, I was dealt K K in that particular big blind, and had to re-raise him. He called, the flop came ace high, he checked and I bet. The blinds were such that I was in this pot all the way after the preflop action, ace or no ace. He thought for a while, and folded. I showed him the kings, he said ‘nice hand’, and I’d taken a big chunk of his stack with the preflop 3-bet alone.
And then I screwed up. More hands were dealt, there were still four of us, and I didn’t have to make a move. I could afford to get at least third, if not second or first, by just waiting for hands. But I got greedy. The guy to my left had just won a nice pot the hand before this one. I’d been folding every small blind to his big blind every single time it was folded to me, because I’d always have less than eight high in those situations, out of position.
So, I figured that most players, after winning a big pot like he’d just won, would usually fold all but premium hands to a raise so they can get back to stacking their chips and outlasting at least two other players. This—combined with the fact that I’d folded my small blind junk every time it was folded to me against him—made me think it was a good idea to raise his blind from the small holding nothing but the J 6 offsuit. He called.
The flop came ace high, with no jack or 6, and no draw. I bet, and he called. What have I done. The turn was something, and I checked, feeling sick. Of course he bet, of course I knew he had at least a pair of aces, and I folded. In the next break, still four-handed with me extremely shortstacked, I went up to him and said, “You’re welcomeâ€. He told me he had A 7 or something for two pair, and asked me what I had. I told him I had absolute garbage, and that I’d made a big mistake, and he nodded.
I busted out in fourth place shortly thereafter. I deserved it. I made some mistakes in Vegas, and that J 6 hand was a big one. I didn’t have to make a move, but I did. When the game is that tight, they’re just waiting for someone to make a play with a bad hand, and I should have been waiting, too. So, I took fourth and a nice prize of around $1500. The tournament director sat me down and explained why I’d be given only $1200 or so and an IRS tax form. The withholding tax. I’m going to have to figure it out, but the nice guy from St. Catherines (who took third) gave me his card and told me he’s been through the tax-recovery process a bunch of times. I’m going to e-mail him and figure out the easiest way to get my money back.
I left the Mirage that night feeling pretty good, actually. I walked along the strip, and determined that my first night’s win paid for my first WSOP entry, and the win I just got at the Mirage paid for my second. So, they cancelled each other out. My overall performance in the 20/40 games paid for my numerous entries (including the 1K Bellagio event) into ‘smaller’ tournaments. It also paid for all of my meals. So, as far as poker was concerned, I was on a freeroll and then some. My expenses besides meals though—flight, hotel, and missed days at work—came out of my bankroll. This amount added up to much less than five percent of my poker bankroll, so I was satisfied. From a business standpoint, I was down, considering that I had to pay anything at all out of my pocket. From a vacation standpoint, I was up, considering that all of my meals and entertainment were paid for.
So, we’re even.
I went to Binion’s and played in a 10/20 Omaha hi-lo game with a half kill, just because it’s a fun game to get hammered in. Everyone’s drawing to the nuts, and somebody usually gets there. It was the first and only time I was inebriated at a poker table (in Vegas). I played until 2 hours before I had to catch my flight out, and I made a bit of cash to pay for the hotel. Overall, a good last night in Vegas, and I was off to bed.
Comments
hiya all_aces
have ya got your money back from the tax-recovery process? :?:
how does that work? :? :shock:
how is that going? :?:
thanks,
CO
No, I haven't e-mailed that guy yet. I'll let you know what hoops I have to jump through as soon as I find out.
Regards,
all_aces
Thank god someone out there is still using the phrase "stone-cold bluff".
The WPT has re-shaped this phrase and successfully butchered it, sending the new version into into the cold stone land of meaningless metaphors.
First, Vince had transposed the phrase into "cold stone bluff", which doesn't make too much sense. This not-so-subtle change, makes a courageous bluff out to be some sort of giant slab of granite.
Now, Mike Sexton, possibly having absorbed Vince's re-ordering, has repeatedly botched the phrase as "stone bluff".
At least it's a great player tell. If anybody uses the phrase "stone bluff", they've only been playing poker seriously since 2003 or later.
ScottyZ
LOL soon it'll be 'cold bluff stoned' :shock: :shock: :shock:
lmao @ Vince
keep us posted
CO
lol
That itself might be a good description of Vince...
ScottyZ
indeed
gonna read this again
thx all_aces