sick blur tilt, smoking rubble, another campaign bombed like dresden…

Had the PokerNews Cup ME yesterday. I knew this tourney would be one of the softest fields ever for a mid-range tournament as PokerNews has qualified almost half the field through freerolls with most of the rest qualifying through satellites.

I was nervous about spending yet another full day with live poker players, who freak me out a little if they talk to me, but my first few tables were quite enjoyable. Straight up, I had Damonas from PokerNews and Peter Pratis on my first one, and I played pretty crappy for the first level, trying to bluff in retarded spots and running AK into sets a couple times. Before I knew it, I was down to 4 or 5k after an hour and probably should have been on the rail had either of the sets played their hands a bit less strong.

I doubled up a couple times before getting moved to the “tv” table with Vos and Sammy Khouiss and Jason Gray who are all quite entertaining, so a few hours flew by and I peddled up a bit to 40k when I got moved to what has to be the softest table I’ve ever played at. Everyone limping, playing hands very soft, folding a lot, it was beautiful. Ran QQ into JJ and lost a decent pot, ran AQ into AJ and lost a decent pot but it didn’t matter on that table as any 1/2 player could cruise easily just picking up pots as if it was 2004.

Unfortunately our glorious table broke and I got moved a couple more times before I found myself on a soft, but laggy table. A guy I’ve played with before who definitely knows what he’s doing opens UTG for 3k, I wake up with QQ over-raise a little to 11k and he tanks and pushes AI with AKo. I call and win the race, doubling to about 70k.

I get moved again to the table from hell (my 7th table for the day I think). My table has Julian Powell who is very good and laggy, Eric Assadourian who is very tough and laggy, Aleks Lackovic who is laggy and impossible to put on a hand so he’s very tough to play, and some other guys I don’t know who are pretty slick and definitely know what they’re doing. There is lots of raising going on, I pick a couple good spots and pick up some little pots with 3bets. Julian is steaming a bit after being 4-outed in a big pot by this young American guy and I raise into both of them on the button with JT. The US kid calls and the flop is KJx 2h. We both check (I’ve been doing lots of pot control with marginal hands all day against people I think are capable of making moves, as I think I get moved off a lot with the best hand in tourneys). Turn is a T, he leads out, I just call as I think he folds everything I beat if I raise. River A, we both check and he has AT so I sigh and muck. Probably the worst hand I played in the day.

I build up a little bit more and run AK into a short-stack’s AA and get some genuine luck in a small pot when the first 4 cards are spades. I’m up to about 120k with about 15 min left in the day and Aleks has been forcing me to drink. I get drunk ridiculously easy so am already a bit messy after just a few drinks but its almost the end of the day so I figure its ok. Aleks opens UTG, I wake up with KK on the button and pot it, SB with close to avg stack, pushes AI with QQ. I call, and with the avg at 55k, I lose an 80k pot when a Q peels. Over 80% equity but standard for me in tourneys these days, I’m actually fine but everyone is commiserating, which makes me think maybe I shouldn’t be fine and I start getting a bit tilted. I open AJ and its folded to Aleks in SB who is a great guy but very drunk at the time I think and thinks its just a blind battle. He’s making to raise the short stack BB, I quickly realise this could work out really good for me if I stay quiet as if Aleks over-raises (which he’s been doing a lot, and is totally fine against a short-stack), it could reopen the action and I can push in and pick up an easy 15k. Inaction is an action though, and to stay quiet would be unethical, so I yell at Aleks that I’m still in, he goes “oh shit” and thanks me, and just calls. The flop is A-9s-8s and he openpushes for 30k. The pot is about 15k and I’ve played a lot with Aleks and am way ahead of his range here. A better Ace, 99/88 raises me pre with his stack I think so I just have to worry about A9 or A8. Aleks can also genuinely have like 44 in a spot like this, so after a long time, I call and he shows A9 after a long time, probably just an accidental slowroll but it tilts me a bit after I did the right thing and let him know I was still in the pot.

I’m steaming by this stage, with about 4 min left in the day, I pick up QQ and open, Julian calls behind and another quiet, good player, calls in the BB. Flop is Kd-Td-x, I fire, Julian puts me all in quickly for 40k, BB folds, I muck in disgust and yell “fukkkkk” in frustration. In WSOP this is a 10 min penalty, but I ask the dealer if there is any penalty for swearing and I’m told “no there isn’t” so mostly as a joke, I yell “FUKKKK” again but it felt good. No penalty = awesome.

Crown has some great dealers, but there is some ridiculously bad dealers here also and I’ve had a few of them today. I really dislike paying high vigs and being given crappy dealers in return, and I’ve been gentle with lazy or poorly trained dealers all day but late in the day, I raise, get called a few times, dealer doesn’t give me my change (about the 5th time today that’s happened) so I tell him to do his f job and stop being lazy. Apparently, someone blogged about what a wanker I was over this situation, and they’re probably right, I could have been meek and nice like I’ve been all day with dealer mistakes but I’d just had enough. I mean, some of the dealers can’t even work the table without help, antes flip them out and complicated things like counting an AI the bad ones get right about 25% of the time. It frustrates me when casinos put dealers of this level on the floor. Maybe they’re not getting paid enough and need to get paid more to attract higher quality, maybe the training isn’t adequate, maybe they’re just lazy, whatever - this stuff shouldn’t be the norm.

The day ends, in the last 15 min I lost almost 100k and now I have to peddle a short-stack today. After 20 minutes of waiting, no one is coming to bag our chips, I’ve had just about enough after 12 hours of live poker so I’m on sick tilt, I can see us all waiting an hour while a single FM tries to bag 150 players’ chips over the next 90 minutes. Arul sees I’m about to lose the plot, and gets me out of the situation, telling me to chill and go home, I realise he speaks wisely so I just walk off, leaving the chips there. Seriously tempted to not bother showing up for Day 2 today, but I probably still have a couple thousand equity in the tourney, and I’m a bit too nitty to blow it off - also I’ve done some swaps, so I’m forced to go down, go through the motions, get eliminated and that will be yet another promising campaign burned up in a heap of tilt and pain. Sigh.

Posted in Live Tournaments |

2 Responses to “sick blur tilt, smoking rubble, another campaign bombed like dresden…”

2 Comments »

1. Tough beats man.

   I was wondering about your JT hand. As you wrote it you had two pair vs one pair. Why did you muck?

   Comment by Kajagugu — October 29, 2007 @ 2:57 am

2. My opponent had Aces up.

   Comment by Jonny Vincent — October 29, 2007 @ 11:50 am

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