Xmas Shoppin' and Ace Queen...

11/13/08

Xmas Shoppin' and Ace Queen...

Played a tourny at Red Rock Casino last Tuesday, Veteran's
Day. I was expecting a bigger turnout, as it was a holiday
for city, county, state and federal employees. The tournament
is actually capped at 40, but only 24 lowly degenerates showed
up to play that morning. I've been meaning to check out this
NLHE tournament for sometime. It's a pretty good format,
you buy in for $100.00, which gives you $5,000.00 in chips.
An additional $5.00 gives you a bonus of $1,000.00 in chips.
So you basically start out with $6,000.00 total. The blinds
change every 30 minutes, which is a pace I like. Plus with
capping the players at 40, you don't have to play like all
day, then bust out with no money. It makes it a little
quicker, plus you get a decent payout. As it was only
24 players to start, top 3 would get paid. Almost like a
408 Poker Tour game, with a couple less payouts. There is
always the chop factor, we could split later on with a couple
more players - well, if I make it that far.

I played my game, and found Aces when I had exactly 10 bets,
I think blinds were $200/400 at the time. What did I do to
double up? I went all in of course. Luckily the small blind
player, picked up Ace/King of Diamonds and called me. The
big blind player folded. We were now heads up. Everybody,
was like why did I go all in with the Aces? Well, I figured
I thought I might get one caller from my position, who would
think that I may be stealing. I was hoping for one of the
players in the blinds, who were the chip leaders at the time.
I got my wish, simple. Hehe...Let me get back to the hand.
The dealer dealt out a King of Hearts, 4 of Clubs and 7 of
Spades. Please no cooler King on the turn or river. The
dealer turned an Ace of Hearts - now I got it locked down.
The river was dealt a King of Spades. Wow, I have top full
house and the other guy has bottom full house. Pretty sick,
but good for me.

Anyway, I won't bore you with further details, I made it down
to the last 7 players. I had about 12 bets and was UTG with
Ace/Queen OS. I decided to make a standard raise to 3 times
the big blind, bets were $500/$1000, with a $100 ante. There
was about $2,200.00 in the pot preflop. Everybody folded
behind, but the small blind and big blind players just called.
Now there was $9,700.00 in the pot preflop. I had about nine
grand in chips left. I felt that if I didn't flop anything
good, I could still have some ammo for the next round of
cards. We still had about 20 minutes left in this round.
The dealer dealt Ace of Clubs, King of Hearts and Ten of
Clubs. Not a bad flop for me. I think if the other two
players had a hand like Ace/King, pocket Kings, or pocket
Aces, they would have reraised preflop. Both of the players
in front of me checked, they looked pretty weak to me. I
thought about the hand, I had top pair, back door flush draw
with my Queen of Clubs and a gutshot straight draw (needed any
Jack for that) - I went ahead and went all in for the last of
my chips. I thought it would win it right there. Boy, was
I wrong...The small blind player immediately called, I was
dead. The big blind player folded. I flipped my hand up and
expected the other player to flip up Ace/King. Nah, he had
King/Ten of Spades - dang two pair. Okay, I need a Queen,
Ace or Jack (9 outs twice). The turn card was dealt a
Seven of Clubs - cool, now I have Clubs, Sevens, Jacks,
Queens and Aces to win on the river (a total of 20 outs,
that's about half the deck to win). Alas, the river was
dealt out a Four of Spades. Gross, I think it was still a
coinflip on the river - could not outluck this guy.

7 out of 24, not bad - not good, no money...lol...

Again, Ace/Queen sucks...

Finished my Xmas shoppin - in two days. God, that's record
for me. I usually finish my Xmas shoppin a couple days after
Xmas.

Well, I'm gonna check out some of the Black Friday sales too,
but that's for personal stuff.

Aliante Station just opened up - another upscale local casino.
Will do my football picks there this weekend. I'm getting
closer - got 4 out of 6 on both parlays last weekend.