Vegas Baby...

7/12/08

Vegas Baby...

Man…just got done with a poker session at Treasure Island. I have been playing tight, as most of the players I observe played very loosely. I started out with $300.00 bucks on the table. Toward the end of this poker session, my stack went down to about $140.00, when I woke up with pocket Aces (Heart and Spade) in the big blind. Prior to me looking down at my cards, the button raised it to $15.00. The small blind folded and I in turn re-raised the button to $40.00. The button contemplated for a minute and called my bet. The flop came out Jack of Hearts, Seven of Clubs and Eight of Hearts. The pot held about $90.00. My only fear is that he held pocket Jacks. I then went all in for my last $100.00 and was quickly called by the button player, with of course his set of Jacks. Turn came Ten of Hearts, so I’m hoping for a river Heart and/or Ace to scoop. Any non Heart Nine would chop the pot as well. But the 4 of Diamonds hit the river of course. How you like them apples? At least I got a $28.00 dollar poker room comp ($2.00 comp for every hour played, not bad) for food, which probably equates to food for 0.75 people on the Strip, lol…But no, I used $15.00 of it at Canter’s Deli to drown my sorrows with a Coke, a kosher hot dog and for dessert, frozen chocolate custard. Mmm, mmm…Will try to get further hours in at the poker room, so I can actually have enough to feed two or more people – that’s my motivation, hehe…I’ll tell you what, if you are a poker player, you’ve seen your Aces go down in flames as well. The day before, I was playing at Treasure Island. I too cracked the Aces with my pocket Jacks on a one outer on the river (it does feel good, so I have experienced both sides baby)…
As for my tournament sessions, I have played a total of 4 poker tournaments to date. I played in 2 $80.00 NLHE tournaments at Orleans, a deep stack NLHE event at Caesars for $235.00 and an Omaha 8 or Better Tournament. I couldn’t crack the top 30% of the field yet, but hopefully the cards will even out and I can cash in my future events. You still need some premium hands to get through these fields. I was pretty card dead throughout, and was surprised that I made it as far as I had in these fields. All in all, I thought I had done a pretty decent job, even though my actual results have not shown it so far.

I still think about this hand I had in the Caesars tourney, where the blinds were $50/100, in the second level. This tourney was a pretty good format, where you started with $7,500.00 in chips and the blind levels increased every 45 minutes. In this particular hand, I raised from mid position with Four/Five of Spades to $250.00 (trying to make a deceptive raise, as I would try to control the size of the pot and if I hit a good flop, I could then reap the rewards). I got a call from the dealer button and big blind. In the pot was $800.00. The flop comes out all Spades, Six, Queen and Ace. The big blind contemplates for a minute and shoves in the rest of her chips, to the amount of $5,300.00. That is a big over bet, I probably most likely have the best hand with a baby flush. I tried to put her on a range of hands. I thought she may have Ace with King of Spades, two pair Aces/Queens or maybe a set of Sixes. She would have probably re-raised preflop if she had pocket Aces or Queens. I had the nuts so far, but she could draw out on me on the turn and river for the nuts. I thought about the situation, I only had $250.00 in the pot, I still had $7,400.00 behind. If I called her and lost, I would basically be a short stack with about 20 blinds. I still had to think about what the dealer button player would do as well, but he looked like he was going to fold (his right hand was holding his cards near the muck – not a sign of strength). After a few minutes of thinking, I decided to fold. When the dealer button folded, the all in player showed her hand to me and the table. She had a set of Sixes. I probably would have called her if I had a redraw to the nuts (even though I had the nuts itself at the time). I guess you can make a case for folding and calling. I think in this situation, I felt that the fold was in order, as I still had effectively 74 bets, being this early in the tournament, I would have plenty of time to stack up in chips.

Another hand that bailed me out, was when I had pocket Kings and still held on to about $7,700.00 in chips. The action went like this. Under the gun player goes all in for $5.600.00, I quickly went all in after him, everybody behind me folded, and the dealer button called my all in. The small and big blinds fold. The UTG player flipped up Ace/Jack OS, I flipped up my Kings and the dealer button flipped up his pocket Queens. The flop brings up brings up nothing for each of us. The turn pairs a Jack for the UTG player. Jesus, blank it on the river! The river hits air. Wow, I chip up to about $20,000.00, lovin’ it.

During the $600/1200 blind level with $100.00 antes – I hold about $16,000.00 in chips – which is dangerous territory with my short stack. In this hand all the players folded to me in the small blind, where I held Jack/Four OS. The pot had $2,800.00 in the pot already. The big blind had approximately $4,000.00 left (including his big blind). I thought for a minute and felt that I wanted to gamble with the big blind at that time. If I fold, I would leave a much needed $2,800.00 on the table. If I lose, I would have $12,000.00 left in chips, pretty much leaving me on the same situation, but I still would have some fold equity during the rest of the round of play, before I get back to the blinds. I decided to put the big blind all in and he called with his King/Five OS. It was pretty much a random race situation. But of course the board blanked for both of us and he won with King high. In the very next hand, everybody folded to me in at the dealer button, I peeled the cards up and saw Ace/Eight OS. I paused for a second and pushed in with my last $12,000.00, leaving the small and big blind much fold equity. Anyway the small blind player agonized for a few minutes before calling with his King/Queen OS. A race situation again, at least I had the best of it. The flop brought out Eight, Nine and Ten OS. Cool I flopped a pair, but the small blind had 4 more additional outs with Jacks to win, along with Kings and Queens. The turn brought a sexy Two…but whattaya know, the river brought him his pretty Queen. Sucks…The next consecutive hand, all the players folded, but to my right the big stack player opened for $4,000.00. I then looked at my cards and saw Ace/Eight of Clubs. I had only $3,500.00 left, so it was a natural call. The dealer button, small blind and big blind quickly folded. The player to my right flipped up pocket Sevens. Cool, a race at least, a coin flip at best. Again the board bricked out for me and I was out of the tournament. I placed 120 out of 457. Not bad, but not good – no money!


7/13/08

Today I hung out with Ms. X (I don’t have permission to use her name yet) , who is a friend of my buddy Frank and my cousin Danny in Sacramento. She is originally from Sacramento and moved to Las Vegas a couple of years ago, when she was sent out by the card room she was working for in Sacramento, sent her to the Bellagio for a week for an employee appreciation event. She decided to call in sick after her event was up at the Bellagio and stay in Las Vegas to deal poker. She now works for of course the Bellagio in the poker room. We talked a bit about some of the players she has dealt for there. Tonight she is dealing in “Bobby’s Room”, which is where the big sharks play. The usual stakes are $4,000/8000 Limit Holdem, with a player pot cap of $100,000.00 (meaning any one player can only lose up to a maximum of $100,000.00 on each hand, cool…You can buy a decent two bedroom condo for that in Vegas, hehe). You gots to have some balls to put up the equivalent of your house value in play at any time. Crazy. It surprised me, but then didn’t surprise me that some of the players there (usually the old school ones) are pretty rude to the dealers and each other. Television doesn’t show that stuff – well, of course not, they wouldn’t be able to market these big time players. The thing that was funny to me was that she made more in tips at the lower level games (i.e., $2/5 No Limit Holdem, $4/8 Limit Holdem) than the “Big Game” at times. Sometimes she would get a tip of $5.00 after dealing a pot of over a couple hundred thousand. I told her I was tipping too much then, as I usually tip the dealer $1.00 to $5.00 depending on the size of the pot I won. I got to pick her mind about the game and got some tidbits about the games in Las Vegas.

I was feeling a bit down after all these early losses in the tournaments and cash games I’ve recently played. But I thought about it, it’s still early and I know it’s a process. Find the right game, just play your best each time and the success should come. You can also find a bit of short term happiness getting a lap dance from a half Chinese/Mexican stripper named Charmane (Thursday to Saturday nights only, as her “real job” is a hairdresser in Huntington Beach – I love interviewing strippers!) at the Rhino..Well maybe not, no potential to win your money back…Am I funny or what?