My last blog left off at the Wynn, so let’s start there.

I played the 2k and the 3k, and got fairly deep in one, but did not cash.

In the 10k main event at the Wynn, I had an insane starting table. You know how there are tables so loose that no one ever gets a walk in the big blind? Not only did it never fold around to the big blind, but it didn’t even fold around to the CUT OFF a single time until the level before last of the day.

I had a very rocky day, which is pretty typical for me since I play so many pots. I went from 20k to 50k to 7k to 70k and ended the day somewhere around 50k.

I built up to 70k on day two before a monster hand came up.

At 400/800 I open raised the cutoff to 2200 with AT of diamonds. Hassan Habbib called from the big blind. The flop came AT3 with two spades. Hassan checked, I bet 3200, and Hassan check-minraised me to 6400. I reraised making it 9k more, and he 4 bet me making it 11k more. Both of his reraises were so tiny that it screamed like he had a monster hand, but I had both an ace and a ten accounted for. There were only one combination of AA and TT left, and he probably wouldn’t smooth call those preflop. Maybe TT, but it would be pretty terrible for him to smooth call AA that deep, especially since I had already shown a willingness to play against 3 bets at the table, including a 4 bet bluff that I showed with 75s. If Hassan had been paying any attention, he would know that 3 betting a big hand would rarely end the pot right there, especially since I had position.

The only other hand left that beat me was 33. I figured if I move all-in, I’m repping a stronger hand than 33, so it would be pretty hard for him to call, and if somehow he does call, I still have 4 outs.

His minraises really threw me off. Wouldn’t he raise bigger with 33 on that board? I didn’t think it was likely he had a draw given his raise amounts, but just calling against a draw would be a pretty big mistake.

I wasn’t happy about it, but I decided to move all-in.

He insta called with AA, and for some reason felt a need to rub it in by saying, “you’re drawing dead.” I hate it when people make comments like that, especially when they’re not true. Running tens would have been sweet justice.

Maybe I could have just called when he made it 11k more to go, although I still would have gone broke because another ten did roll off.

I guess I gave too much credit to Hassan. I had made it extremely clear to the table that I was willing to play back against 3 bets, so smooth calling aces against my open raise was a really terrible line to take.
Basically I just got coolered. It’s completely standard to lose your stack when you have under 90 big bets with top two pair on a board like AT3. It’s like he tried to let me get away from it with his terrible bet amounts (it’s so likely I have a draw there that he really should be betting more, not to mention it makes his hand look weaker while still getting more money in the pot). But enough about that hand.

I flew back to LA for a few days after that, and then flew to Reno where I am now.

I bubbled the 2k prelim, getting 11th out of 101 players. I lost two coinflips and AJ vs JT all-in pre. I built up a pretty monster chiplead early on, so it was frustrating not to cash. I made a marginally +cEV shove on the bubble that maybe I could have passed up on since the payout structure was somewhat flat, but playing for first is never a huge mistake, especially when the field is rather weak.

I played the 3k prelim which only got 40 players. We started with 8k in chips, and I was down to under 1500 pretty early on after some unfortunate run-in’s including losing a decent pot with KK. I managed to find the nuts a few times and doubled up three times with my opponents practically drawing dead. I got moved to a new table, and right off the bat got 88 all-in against 65 on the 643 flop. Unfortunately my hand did not hold up, and I was out of the tournament.

Congrats to Matt Graham (MattG1983 or something online) for winning the 2k. We celebrated by bowling. I’m pretty terrible at bowling and can’t score over 100.

Today is a satellite day (i.e day off for me), and then tomorrow is the main event. I’m really looking forward to it because it should be a small turnout filled with some terrible players which means I’ll have a pretty decent chance of making the final table. I’m still jonesing for that final 6 breakthrough as anyone that reads my blog should know.

Gary Wise started a new project where he got a bunch of online players to discuss a new topic each week. It’s called the ESPN Think Tank, and the lineup is as follows:

Myself
Annette15 Obrestad
Brian “SBRugby” Townsend
Isaac Haxton
Kevin “BelowAbove” Saul
Matt “Hoss_TBF” Hawrilenko
Mike “Schneids” Schneider
Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond
Shane “Shaniac” Schlegar
Todd “Dandruff” Witteles
Tom “Durrrr” Dwan

The week one topic was “Given that the televised poker industry values entertainment equally with competition, will online players ever gain the respect they feel they deserve as elite players? Are their feelings justified?” You can read the discussion at:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/poker/columns/story?columnist=wise_gary&id=3285950

Week 2’s topic was “Is there a negative stigma applied to online poker players?” You can read that discussion at: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/poker/columns/story?columnist=wise_gary&id=3299767

I hope you check em out. I’m pretty excited about this project, especially as the questions get more interesting. The one we are discussing now is a pretty important topic for online players to consider IMO, but I don’t want to reveal the topic just yet.

Anyway, room service is here, so I’m gonna wrap this blog up abruptly.