20k, FTOPS and More Razz Cash

Today I was planning to give my thoughts on the NFL season as it has gone so far, including fantasy football updates, my NFL Pickem league that a bunch of bloggers are also involved in, and the stories and teams that I like at this point in the season. But instead (I'll have to get to the football shizz tomorrow), you're gonna love some of the stuff that I saw in my poker travails yesterday. I missed the WWdN, but managed to get in to the 20k guaranteed tournament on full tilt, the $5 turbo mtt on pokerstars that I final tabled last week in probably my 20th time playing this event, two FTOPS satellites (PLO and 6-max NLH), and some fun times at 5-10 razz and 2-4 hilo.

I thought you'd be interested at least to know how I got eliminated from the 20k guaranteed tournament on full tilt last night. I'm certainly interested in sharing it. We're just ten minutes in to the 20k, blinds are still at 15-30, and I'm dealt pocket 5s in middle position. It's folded around to me and I just smooth call the 30-chip big blind, and four players call/check to see a beautiful flop of 954 rainbow. I check my trips, and it's checked around. Yes I usually bet there, but nothing in great poker is set in stone. On a fully raggy board like this, I have very little to worry about in the way of drawouts, and I want someone who maybe made top pair middle kicker, or even a baby two pairs, to think they're best and maybe I can make some chips on this hand after all.

The turn card comes a 7, for a board now of 9547, and me sitting with trip 5s. As my favorite fast-food restaurant says, I'm lovin' it. I bet the pot (120 chips), and my opponent smooth calls me. When the river is an offsuit Queen, I bet the pot again, my opponent minraises me, and I call the minraise for the rest of my chips. We flip our cards:



and BAM, IGH in the first hundred players out of an 1172-person field. Guy hits his phucking inside straight on the turn precisely when I happen to flop trips for the only time of the night. Dam you poker gods, dam you!

Speaking of which, in the $5 turbo mtt on pokerstars at 10:39pm ET last night, the event that I final tabled last Thursday evening, I made it through the first half hour or so but lost a big hand that took me right back down near my starting stack of 1500 chips, when I found AKo UTG. I open-limped with the hand, intending to get raised (the play in these turbo mtts is hyper-aggro as you can probably guess) so I could then reraise allin and hopefully double up, and I got my wish when someone else pushed in from MP preflop:



Of course I called, and we flip the cards:



What a phucking moron this guy is. I mean, he was sitting on over 3000 chips at the time, so he was a bit below average but nothing even remotely close to desperate at that point. All-in with 76s? Me thinks somebody has been watching a little too much Daniel Negreanu on High Stakes Poker. Anyways you can probably guess the results of this one. Anybody up for a little runner-runner action?



Assholes.

Also, check out this hand at the 5-10 limit tables on full tilt where I made a straight flush:



Unfortunately, the game was razz, so this is the straight flush that wasn't. But it was a wheel, and the wheel was good for $99 cold hard cash into my stack, so I'll take it.

In the PLO FTOPS satellite, I made the final table in the middle of the pack, but Cracknaces was right across the table from me, and quickly dispatched me in 9th place when my double-suited pair of Aces ran into his KK88, and an 8 came on the flop to send me home. I had a similar story in the 6-max FTOPS satellite, except I did not quite make the final table before getting busted to an unlucky turn card in my elimination hand. Oh well. I have to say, though, I am really liking the new FTOPS satellites and sng's that full tilt is running these past few days. I would say it's fairly likely that I will try my hand at several of these things over the next week or two, as I try to make my way in to my first ever FTOPS event. I would have loved to play the FTOPS back in August, but if you recall I was away in Arizona for the entire week that the FTOPS went down, so I couldn't play in any of the events. But given my plethora of experience playing poker on full tilt, I think it would be an abomination if I did not play in at least one of the FTOPS events when they run again in November. And, kudos to full tilt for the timing of these tournaments -- the weekday ones at least all begin at 9pm ET, a much more manageable and reasonable time than, say, 3pm ET like pokerstars did for all of its WCOOP events this past summer. Yet another example of how full tilt knows its market, and caters to our wants and needs. F partypoker and their cripey software and preemptive pullout from the U.S., and F pokerstars for their 3pm ET start time for all of their biggest tournaments of the year during WCOOP time.

Oh yeah before I go -- get your ass over to the aforementioned full tilt and sign up for Mookie's weekly Wednesday night tournament tonight. As always it will go off at 10pm ET (remember, no late registration on full tilt, so be on time), and the password is "vegas1". You should really be playing in this thing. Lately the Mookie is the largest blogger tournament of the week, and we've had over 60 players a couple of times now since the big switch from pokerstars to full tilt. So come on, pay the measly $10 and get involved in the best game for bloggers and readers of blogs that there is on the planet -- anywhere. I will definitely be kicking it live at the Mookie myself -- Hammer Girls be dammed -- and I will have my eyes open for you as well. Help us to make Al's dream of 80 participants a reality. The guy posts really, really great NSFW pictures on his blog, so the least we can do is help him help to get 80 players for the weekly Mookie tournament. Be there!