Monday, June 3, 2019

Twas the Night Before Vegas...

Been awhile, and we will get to that in just a moment, but wanted to give a rundown of where we are at right now.

As of now my plan is to arrive in Vegas around noonish tomorrow (6/3), head directly to the Rio, buy into Event #14, and check out the final table of the $50k Highroller event. That starts at noon, so most likely will miss a little bit of that.

I'm calm, and I had to compare this to my last foray into the WSOP, I would say I feel less confident than I did 10 years ago, this is due to a few reasons, including the fact that I was looking to plan a NL event and I had been playing mostly NL events (cash and tourneys) pretty much most days leading up the event. This time, I'm looking to play HORSE, which I've only been able to play limit hold'em (albeit a LOT of limit hold'em), and done bad at O8. I haven't played Stud Hi in many many years (probably 3-4 if I had to guess, maybe more?) and I have never played Stud8 or Razz live sans for a cash game in 09 that I don't really remember.
That being said, I don't feel nervous or anxious or, well, really much of anything. Don't get me wrong, I am extremely excited about this week, but I also don't have any reservations about thinking that making Day 2 will mean a lot to me, and then we will go from there and see what develops.

Alright, so lets now discuss the last 3 weeks....

Whence we left off, I had just booked a win playing O8. Tuesday I was back at VQ playing 3/6 Hold'em. We never really did get started and was down most of the night. Towards the end we got up 70ish bucks, only to give most of it back and end the night $3 up.
This is the last bit o' good news I will have poker wise for at least a week.

Went back the next night and couldn't do anything. I jumped between 3/6 and 4/8 games to find a groove and it wasn't there.Down $126

Went back again Thursday and ended up losing $115 in poker, thought it would be a bright idea to try and win it back at Blackjack....and I gave up $130 more.

Saturday came and it was back to Talking Stick for more O8. It went fine at first, but then, a few hours in the DOOM SWITCH was turned fully to on. Nothing I did would ever give me the nut high or nut low hand, and anytime I showed down a hand it was always second best.
Finished that session $300 down.
So, in the span of 5 days and 4 poker sessions I was down almost $700. That's a pretty big blow  to the $1000 up through the middle of May.

Back to VQ the following Monday for splash posts and again gave back an additional $106.
 To sum it up nicely, I was bummed. Really bummed. Not about losing, not about my self-critique on where I could be playing better, but really that I had been doing so well building up the bank for WSOP and I just completely curbed stopped in a little over a week.
I woke up on Tuesday in a funk, even Liss could sense it and talked to me about. Felt good just verbalizing my frustrations and she even convinced me to go back that night and give it another shot.
 This night was important, I got sat at a brand new 4/8 game, and not long into the game I got my AK, flopped K beat by a K6 that called a preflop raise plus bets all the way to the river with K6, for a rivered 2 pair.
I gave myself an internal pep talk saying this is not going to get out of control tonight, play better, play SMARTER.
Few hands later we wake up with 109dd in the hijack. The button straddled to 8 already and I had seen him blindly bump his straddles previously so I knew this was going to be at least a 3 bet hand. But if I wasn't going to make a stand with 2 suited connectors in LP, I didn't know when I ever would. Everything happened as expected, bunch of people called, button raised his straddle...and then the SB raised. Bunch of calls in front of me and I know the button straddler who loves action and big pots is going to bump it again, so I raise still on the believe that I want to play a big pot with multiple people holding suited connectors in LP. Button caps raises at 5 bets, everyone calls. So preflop, that's 5 people who put $20 in each.

FLOP: Qs-Js-8c

Well ok, we flopped the nuts on a very dangerous and drawy board. SB leads out, I raise, SB raises, I re-raise and cap betting at 4 bets a piece. 5 headed to the turn, another $80 in the pot.

Turn: 7d

Still got the nuts, SB again leads out, I again raise and show my 1 chip behind to the SB in the hopes she'll just raise and put me all in. Doesn't happen and 3 of us head to the river. Another $36 in the pot.

River:2h

We did it! We faded all the flush draws and AK/A10/K10/K9 draws! SB AGAIN leads out and I toss my 1 chip, other guy folds.I show the nuts, SB shows...... AsAc ???
I was expecting a set or 2 pair, did not expect the same color bullets.
SB gets mad that I cracked the AA (she gets $100) but every time I think about her line of play in the hand, none of it (outside pre-flop, and leading bet on the flop) makes any sense. Why lead every street when you are being raised/re-raised?
Anyway, that 1 hand starts the session off in pretty grand style and we end the night after 5 hours up $341.
I felt great, it essentially wiped away the O8 loss and some of the previous week's destruction.

I take a few days break, and on Saturday I head back again to Talking Stick to try my hand at O8. This session went much better than the DOOM SWITCH a week before, but it was pretty rocky the whole way through. I was up $70ish at one point but it was pretty much mostly down the rest of the session.
There was a weird spot in a hand where I feel like an opponent was upset I bet my hand wrong, but I'm not sure how looking back on what happened.

I had 8x7xXxXx on the button and it was unraised.

Flop comes: 9x6x5x

 Guy beats out, and old guy to his right just calls. I raise, they both call

Turn is a blank

 I bet, both call

River was a 3x so a low could be made but my straight is still nut hand

Guy leads out, old guy calls. Its at this point I think both of these guys are chasing with A2 for nut low, I still have the nut hand, so I raise. Both call. I flip up nut high...he flips up nut high...old guy flips up 24 for second nut low. So we both get quartered.
He says to me "I was hoping you had A2". I said I figure you both were going for low, not high. He says and kinda gives me a face "I wouldn't lead there with A2". I know nothing bout this dude, he came to the table recently and hadn't played any pots, so I had no idea what he would bet out on.
It made me rethink, should I have just called there? I keep coming up with I feel like I played the hand right, but I'm not so sure.
We end this at a loss of $62 but still feel pretty luck its only that amount.

Then finally last Tuesday more LHE at VQ. only to book another $59 loss. It would have been worse, but we won a raffle that gave us $100.

So that's all the poker I played between the last post and now....but I did something pretty great 2 days later!

Liss' friend who is tripping up to Vegas with us came in on Thursday. We decided to show her VQ and play a little BINGO. While waiting for BINGO to start, I wandered over to the "Big Texas Hold'em table" to see if I could play a few hands. It was full. Crap. Wandered over to BJ and took a seat in the middle. Looked like the shoe was almost down so I told the dealer I would wait. The shoe ended up taking a little longer than I thought it would, and I noticed back at the Hold'em table someone was just getting up, so I headed over quickly and grabbed the seat.
Second hand in, I get Jc10c.
Flop is AcAs3s
Checked my nothing hand
Turn is Kc, River is Qc.
What I saw "hey, I hit a straight, hopefully the dealer doesn't have a boat"
Dealer flips over her cards to show, I have no fucking clue because I then in that instant realized I had a Royal Flush. And I didnt freak out, but I did say "Oh my god...I have the royal" which caused everyone to look at me. She turned the hands of the 2 people to my left up and then revealed my Jc10c for the Royal!

Took a bit, but the final total payout was $2,735. Just the kind of shot a bankroll needs right before the WSOP. So I'm freerolling this week, which to some extent, has made me feel less stressed because no matter what happens, I'll still have a bankroll over $5500 when I get home (this is my buyin and assuming I lose $1k in cash in Vegas).

So yup, some real shitty luck followed by some amazing luck. Lets hope that luck keeps on running through Event #14.

Thanks for reading!

 



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