The Mookie

I'm going to break my long-standing policy of not using exclamation points in the blog, to begin by saying What a blast! Fifty players signed up for the Mookie tournament last night. A new record turnout, again with the full final table getting payouts. I'm proud to say that at least one of the guys openly stated that he got the password from me on this blog. For some reason, I've never been a pimper on the blog. I don't know why that is. I'm not personally opposed to the idea. I did pimp Iggy's WSOP satellite tournament earlier this year, because I would pimp just about anything if the Blogfather wanted me to, so it's not like I refuse to allow my artful blog to be used for such a base purpose. Nothing cheesey like that. Anyways, for the first time the other day, I thought it might make sense to post the password for the Mookie when I say every Wednesday morning that I'm going to be playing in it that night. Why not? So I'm glad I could help contribute to the fun n games that is the weekly Wednesday Mookie tournament. It is still the best source for your weekly Hammering, trash talking and hoying money can buy. I've said it before and I'll say it again. If you're interested enough in how I roll on the virtual felt to read this blog, and if you play any poker online, but you aren't making time in your schedule for the weekly Mookie tournament, then you need to have your head examined.

I'm also a bit under the weather right now. Hammer Wife was a little sick, and then both of the Hammer Girls have also been snotting all over our place (those of you with kids know exactly what I mean) for the past several days. So I broke my own rule of always multitabling last night, and devoted my full attention to the Mookie, and making my second cash in three weeks in the event if at all possible.

My starting table at the Mookie last night had a lot of baaaaaaaad shit on it:



For starters, CJ to my immediate left, and DuggleBogey to my immediate right. Surrounded by aggressive guys, with both guys the types who are always willing to contest the blinds in the right situations. Two to my right is Weak Player, and two to my left is Jules, fresh off of her 3rd place cash in the Monday Hoy tournament this week. Our estemmed host, Mookie himself, is also at the table with me, still looking for that elusive haircut, and Wldwldwmn across the felt from me rounded out what I knew was sure to be a tough task to excel in the earlygoing.

About 12 minutes into the event, I had my first elimination. I check-limped in from the BB with K6o, and saw a flop of 234 hit the board. I decided to lead out with a bet of 80 into the pot of 75 chips, thinking that CJ, my only opponent, was highly likely to have missed that flop, and hey I always had the inside straight draw going too, right? I think this was a good bet. CJ flat called. I had to put him on some kind of draw, or maybe a medium pair, but nothing more than that given his play thus far in the hand. Then the turn card came a 5, making me the top end of the straight (losing only to 76, which I could not possibly put CJ on) as well as a second-nut flush draw. So, knowing CJ to be the observant type, I figured I had an opportunity to make like I had tried to steal on the flop, got called and now was ready to give up the hand. More importantly, I also knew that CJ could easily have called me with an A-x hand, figuring he had a straight draw as well as an overcard to create some good outs, and that now his ignorant end of the straight could cost him a lot of chips to my high end. So I needed to make sure he did not put me on a 6 in my hand. The opportunity to make some money was so great in my eyes that I decided right away I would have to simply disregard the possiblity of the flush on the board (especially with me holding the suited King in my hand). So I went ahead and checked this strong turn card to CJ, who promptly led out for 175 chips. I pondered, and figured he did indeed have an Ace and was playing his straight here, so I reraised in the hopes that he would think his hand had to be good here:



When CJ just flat-called my 750 raise on the turn, at that point I knew he had just an Ace. He would have raised me his last 400-some chips if he had held a 6, I've played with CJ enough to know that about his game. So when the river came a harmless offsuit 9, I did what I had to do:



I dropped the hoy. On CJ. This is definitely the biggest blogger personality on whom I have ever personally dropped the hoy. But, then again, the hoy knows no boundaries. The hoy doesn't care if you're fishy joe playing online poker for the first time. Or if you're CJ or Iggy or Pauly, or for that matter if you're Phil Hellmuth or Phil Ivey. The hoy just likes to do its thing, and who was I to stand in the way of that? Anyways, CJ was committed so he called like I knew he had to, and he showed his Ace:



That was a sucky beat for the guy, as that 6 on the turn really did him in. I know Doyle would say that he could have put me on a 6 since I had check-limped in from the BB so a 6 was just as likely as an 3 or an 8 or a King or higher Ace for that matter. But in practice, I can confirm that it is essentially impossible to really believe someone just happened to catch the top end of the straight with a random 6 holding at the same exact time as you happened to catch the bottom end. I doubt I would have played an A2s from first betting position preflop -- that's just not how I roll -- but CJ's game works very well for him obviously, and last night he just got slammed by a random turn card that made it very difficult for him to escape that hand alive.

Just a couple of hands later, I eliminated my next player when my standard 4x raise from LP worked well to disguise the true strength of my hand, eventually leading a MP limper to raise me allin preflop where of course I had to call:



If you're wondering what Susan was holding in that hand, here it is:



OK so good to know. Susan will reraise allin with AQs preflop on a short-ish stack against a guy who had just 4x raised preflop from middle-late position. That one definitely went in the Notes, if you know what I mean. And meanwhile, I was off to a great start in this week's Mookie event.

I want to make a special pokerstars-style shoutout to Rons2112, a guy I don't recognize but enjoyed playing with, because he took two awful beats in the early part of the tournament that I personally witnessed. First, Mookie bested Ron's pocket Aces right on the flop here, keeping alive Mook's (and Mook's wife's) dreams of a haircut for at least a little while longer:



and then, about 25 minutes later, Rons was involved in this hand with Weak:



which, after a couple of runner runners, turned into this:



And just like that, our new friend Rons was gone. That is a rough way to go if I don't say so myself. And a few hands later, the first break came, with me in 3rd place out of 27 remaining players, going strong and having failed to make a single mistake or bad bet as yet in the tournament.

Speaking of making mistakes, Buffalo-bound Iakaris disobeyed one of my cardinal rules that only fish call allin bets with AT or AJ, and ended up running into a bona fide monster hand:



Just like in the Hoy tournament this past Monday, Jules again demonstrates that she knows how to play and win with the Hammer. Nice work.

About halfway into Round 2, I put Duggle allin where I was sure I had the best hand, and I got the call I wanted:



But infuriatingly, this happened:



and I was knocked way down to just over 3000 chips, instead of being in 2nd place before that three-outer hit. Just. Plan. Gross. But I got a lot of those chips back in what was probably my favorite hand of the Mookie tournament for me last night. With blinds 100/200, it was folded to me on the button, and I made it 750 to go when I found ATo in my hand. As most of you know, I would have bet 750 into that pot no matter what two cards I held after it was folded to me on the button, so my opponent in the big blind went ahead and called, with what I assumed was a decent pocket pair. When the flop came Ace-high, he checked to me, and I made sure to insta-check him back, trying to send him a subtle signal that I had no Ace, and that therefore his pocket pair might still be good. When the turn card came a raggy 8♠, I did my patented Slow-Bet™:



and it worked, in that Bthecloser almost immediately raised my 600 bet up to 1200. Now, I wasn't about to back down now, as I was fairly certain that this guy did not have my TP10K beaten at this point, and I really had him on a pocket pair other than Aces. I had tried to get him to raise me, and it worked like a charm, so I felt I only had one option here. More hoyage:



Bthecloser thought and thought. Eventually:



He folded, and I took down a large pot. And I commend Bthecloser, because the guy had the ballz to make a move that the majority of online players do not have the ballz to do when his instincts told him I was weak. And also because when it became apparent to him that he actually was beat, he abandoned his bluff. That was at least as hard to do as the bluff was in the first place, and probably harder given where we were at in the hand. So I commend you my man, and I thank you for the chips, which brought me back up to a tournament high for me.

A few hands later, I eventually eliminated Jules after we got allin on the flop with these cards, bringing up to another fresh tournament high in chip stack and to 2nd place of 17 players remaining:



And then I added even further to my chipstack when once again Bthecloser tried to mess with the wrong marine. I had raised weakly from the cutoff, putting in just a 3x raise instead of my more usual 3.5x to 4.5x raise preflop, trying to feign weakness when I actually held a strong hand. For the second straight time, my subtle hints were picked up on directly by Bthecloser, and he reraised me allin:



Is there any better feeling? Turns out he had KQs, but my Aces held up to win another nice pot for me. Meanwhile, people slowly but surely were dropping out, and we inched our way down to 14 players left, then 12, and then finally down to 10, one off the final table bubble and one off the money spots. Things tightened up as per usual at this point, but then eventually Mookie himself pushed with top pair on the flop, but ran into an overpair and things were not looking good for him ever getting another haircut:



But then the Supercuts gods intervened, sending Mook this river card, and the host with the most would live to see another day:



And then, mercifully, Drewspop took a tough beat on the other table, and was blinded out on the following hand, leaving us with the latest Mookie final table, all of whom would receive payouts thanks to Mookie's record draw this week and last:



Duggle was the first one out when his suited slick failed to win a race against 23skidoo's pocket 10s just a few hands into the final table:



Oh and here is me hoying a few hands later with a particularly strong hand:



A sad moment for QueenofHrts came a short while later, as Samson'sMookie's hair was relegated to at least another few days of growth when he ran suited A-x into Waffles' decent pocket pair:



Here is me a few hands later reverse hoying hcr with SMTL, another fine hand I decided last night to try to work into my repertoire a little bit:



And about 5 minutes later I took down a large pot after calling stump12's hoy-raise preflop, when he ended up having AJo against my AQo:



This hand put me in the middle of the pack with just 6 players remaining at the final table, and I began to entertain thoughts of taking this tournament down for my first time in its short existence. Then this shit happened on the turn card after a preflop allin confrontation:



Which looks very similar to this from about five hands later, when Waffles was tilted again and managed to suck out restoopulously on GScott:



Skidoo went out a short while later when he could not win from the slightly short end of another race situation:



and we were down to 5. Which is when the effing inevitable happend to me again in another big spot late in a tournament. I ran into muggafugging Aces. Again. And had already bet most of my stack on my top pair on the flop. Again.



I wish I could understand why I have such a penchant for running into Aces in big spots in MTTs. It actually plays out as one of the biggest "holes" in my game. It's not that I'm not giving raisers enough respect for having good hands, because in almost all cases it involves me being the one doing to moving-in to begin with. And it's not like I got slow-played here. I took a cheap flop. I hit top pair decent kicker at a very short table. So I pushed. Dammit. This hand crippled me, and it was then only a matter of time before I pushed it all in preflop, which I was lucky enough to be able to do with AKo, a great hand to push with preflop, especially at a short table. Unfortunately, wouldn't ya know it, jjok in a slightly larger stack just happened to have pocket 6s at the same time. And, well, you know how I've been doing lately in my races:



and IGH in 5th place, for a cool $40 payout, pretty sweet given how much fun I had making that $30 profit. And, congratulations to GScott (do you have a blog, GScott?) for taking it all down, outlasting a late push from Waffles to keep Waffles from winning two straight of these things (something which, trust me, none of us want to have to hear about all week):



Again, thanks to Mookie for another great time and another great tournament. And all of you reading this, I expect to see you there next Wednesday at the Mookie tournament, password vegas1.

As soon as I'm feeling better, I will be back out there attacking the nightly guaranteed tournaments, and some more of the weekend million tournament satellites on both pokerstars and partypoker. See you then.