Frustration

Very frustrating night at the Legion tonight.  In turn, I get unlucky, play poorly and have opponents get lucky against me.  I flop gutshot, turn double gutter, whiff.  I flop two pair, lone opponent rivers a gutshot straight.  I flop bottom pair, turn flush draw, straight draw comes in, whiff.  Last hand, flop a set of 6's vs. AQ off.  Two of his diamonds on flop....runner runner diamonds, player down.  The hand before vs. this player I folded bottom pair on flop, turned trips....nice pot too bad I folded.

The table was extremely toxic.  Two major calling stations, one X factor playing like a calling station and getting lucky.  Four good players, and one luckbox.  My plan is to keep getting my money in good and make a draw now and then plus avoid getting unlucky.

Back to Beach Poker

So, my Friday night tournament started out great with a double up the second hand dealt.  With a bunch of limpers I completed the small blind without checking my cards.  The flop included 2 spades, and lo and behold I had the Q/7 of spades.  Hallelujah!!  I bet around $120 into the 120 pot and was raised to $240.  The other players folded and I reraised to 540.  Keep in mind that our starting chip stack is only $2150.  The player called my 3-bet.  The turn brought another spade and I shoved.  He tanked for a few minutes and finally called, turning over J/9 of spades and drawing dead.  Nice start.

I wish that I could say that everything fell into place after that, but twice I raised (KQ, AQ) and was called.  Missed flop and folded to big bets.  Flopped a set of 5's and won a nice pot, but couldn't get the other player all in.  Knocked out the dealer later....I was the only one who had knocked out anyone when our table broke.  Moving to another table I met disaster after disaster, folding winners and playing losers.  Honestly though, would you call a big bet with A7 and an all in bet?  No problem for A/10 to snap QQ but I folded a full house with A/7/7 on the board.

My nemesis Carl came back from a short stack with AK, then knocked me out with another AK on my UTG shove with A9.  The board paired jacks, so I had lots of outs as the board pairing again gives us a chop, but no.  Player down.

On a more positive note, playing online after that, I advanced to step 7 in my quest on Cardplayer website.

Here is a downside of online poker...Playing today for a seat in the Las Vegas deepstack, twice I had the stone cold nuts and my computer froze up.  When I reconnected, my hand had been folded!  So, I reverted to a "shove or fold" strategy.  This works pretty well, and I chip up but also get snapped a couple of times by a very loose player.

Despite having to leave when I was poised to win a seat on level 2, things turned out great.  The reason I left early was to collect money for the 4:00 tournament at the American Legion.  The regular person was out of town and she asked me to fill in.  I wasn't sure if the $100 once a month tournament was a good one for me, but the structure was better than Friday night's with more chips and longer blinds.  With 20 entries, the prize pool paid 4 places:  $900, 500, 300, 200 and change, with 100 to high hand.  Decided to play (other option was to deal and get guaranteed maybe 100).  I ran card dead early and late, but had a great middle game, entering the final table with 2nd largest chip stack...another card dead early player caught fire just before the FT.  I really just survived, getting AQ snapped by A4 from the giant stack, and losing to 6/6 blind vs. blind with my Q/J suited (flop was 10/K of my suit)  had way too many outs to hit...any Q, any J, that is 6, plus any ace (4 more), any 9, 4 more, any diamond, 7 more, giving me a total of 21 outs twice on the flop....Jeesh, and he was low stack on the bubble.  How the heck do you miss that many outs?  Anyway, discussion was had about paying the bubble, and the huge stack agreed to go along with what everyone else decided.  But, one player said no....so no deal.  Being the short stack then, was not too happy.  The other short guy decided to gamble with Q10 and was called by the big guy with A9 who spiked an ace.  Saved some money not paying the bubble.  We played until a break and counting chips found that three of us had nearly identical stacks of around 10K, while the chip leader had 57K.  I proposed we give him first and chop the balance, which was $330 each, about a $205 profit after buy-in and tip.  We all agreed and ended the game after 4 1/2 hours of play.

2 & 3 Outers

There is probably no more frustrating situation in poker than to have your opponent(s) totally dominated, yet lose to them when they hit a 2 or 3 outer.  I absolutely love it when my shove with AK is called by A/7 off.  What? A seven on the river?  Nice catch sir.  KQ vs. QJ, no problem for the villain to catch a jack to finish you off. But I digress.  Yet again. To illustrate that it is possible however for even me to get lucky in these situations, I will tell you about a couple of hands yesterday online.

First hand of tournament (CardPlayer.com) for a seat in a $1000 cash tournament final.  There are 88 players.  I am on the button with....8/8.  Some kind of omen, huh?  Sure enough, some donk shoves, followed by another.  Hmmm.  8's probably no good here, but signs are signs.  I call for all my chips.  Whoa, yet another player shoves.  Hey, this hand is no good.  Cards revealed, A/10, K/J, Q/3.  O.K., only every overcard in the deck except for the 9.  Flop comes with 2 spades, jack high.  Not good.  Turn an ace...of spades.  Really bad, except for one thing....I have the only spade.  Gin/Yahtzee/...etc., spade on the river.  I become the early tournament chip leader with over 4,000.  Would like to say it had a happy ending, but despite cracking kings with my J/9 (flop J/2/3), turn 3, river J., I ended up 8th in tournament with only 4 moving on.  It hurt that I sat out for nearly an hour while taking the dog to the beach. But, hey, at least I hit my 3 outer!!!! Congratulations luckbox boy. 

No News is Good News?

Not much to post about poker adventures since the Friday night Legion game was off because of some dumb holiday (oops, 4th of July is not dumb).  We enjoyed the local parade with little granddaughter Eva catching a lot of candy thrown from the vehicles. Afterwards we made our way to the fire station to enjoy a barbequed hotdog, complements of the taxpayers (me) I suppose.

My online games consist of:  having the best hand, someone catching some improbable cards to beat me.  Example: pocket aces cracked by A/7 with him using the 7 to make the bottom end of a straight.  Here's another:  shove with 10/10, 4 callers!!!!  The amazing result, everyone beat me.  K/J caught a jack, Q/8 made a queen high flush, Q/3 made a flush with his 3, and jack/8 made 2 pair.  Wow!!!

This is not to say that I did not make some good and even great hands.  For example, playing K/J suited, I flopped four to a royal flush, then completed it on the turn.  It was bet by another player and a caller on flop and turn.  Another heart on the river killed my action, but hey, you don't get a royal flush every day.

I am trying to score again on the 10 step tournament for $10,000 prize pool.  Have worked my way up to step 6 at this point.  There is also another cool tournament for a Vegas trip, entry in a $1500 deepstack plus $1500 in travel expenses.  Definitely need to focus on that bad boy.

The good news is that this Friday the Legion tournament is back on, plus there is a once a month Sunday tournament for $100 buy-in.  Will definitely be there for that.

I am enjoying a visit from the Seattle family, they leave tomorrow, so gotta go.      

Random Pictures from WSOP Trip

 An overview of tables.  Impossible to show how large the room is and how many poker tables.

 Took this picture at midnight the last night we were in town.  The $1500 buy-in super deepstack tournament was just breaking for 20 minutes.  It was a madhouse.

 Don and I leaving the Rio.  Car packed and ready to go to Phoenix.

 Stopping at a rest stop on the way to Phoenix.  Intimidating sign.  I saw a couple of huge lizards on this tree.  Must have been 110 degrees in the shade there....except there was no shade.

Selfie taken while waiting for plane out of Vegas back to Tri-Cities.  The display featured '60's era flight uniforms.  Nice stewardess outfit.

WSOP Day 6

Now, those of you who know me may find this tough to believe, but after spending the week in Vegas I was tired.  I had mentioned to my sister that if things did not go well for me, would think about renting a car and driving to Phoenix (5-6 hours) for the weekend.  Don and I had a short discussion Friday morning and decided to pack up and leave.  We drove to Phoenix, had a great time visiting my mom and sister.  I caught a plane last night (Sunday) back to Vegas, checked into hotel and am now waiting for the shuttle to the airport.  Fun trip, definitely could have played more poker, but not stuck too bad (flight was covered with frequent flyer points) and avoided the weekend hotel at the Rio cost.

WSOP Day 5

So, day 5 we decide to change things up, driving to IHOP for breakfast.  Those buffets can get mighty tiring I must say.  So, rather than play in a deepstack (they had been cancelled due to overwhelming demand for the $1M guarantee superdeepstack that added 3 additional flights over 7800 players), we wandered over to the Mirage for the 11:00 tournament.  Don outlasted me, but neither of us cashed.  In the meantime, I played some 1/2 NL and chalked up a mini-win of $12.

We then took a cab over to the MGM for the $80 buy-in tournament.  It did not go well for me, but Don chopped 4 ways for $600 and repaid me the entry fee per our agreement.  While waiting for Don, I played some 1/2 NL, buying in for $150 and cashing out for $243.  A profitable day for both of us.

We got back to the Rio late, checked out the action at the WSOP.  They were just breaking for dinner, so it was a madhouse.  Called it a day and went to bed.