BBT Cumulative Review

Well here's a post I had mostly written a couple of months back but just never got around to finishing and posting. With Al announcing that the BBT4 will be the final BBT run by full tilt, at some point before leaving for Las Vegas this past summer, I took the time to review all four of the BBT final leaderboards, ranging back from BBT1 in the summer of 2007 to BBT2 in the Winter of 2007, then BBT3 in Summer 2008 and finally BBT4 in Summer 2009. I tried to spot trends or patterns among some of the more prominent and/or more successful individual players, as I figured it made sense to try to come up with some cumulative way of measuring people's performance over four grueling tournament series spanning over two full years of play from the start of the first to the end of the last.

First, there are a few disclaimers to be set out. Like, anything cumulative automatically puts at a significant disadvantage anybody who was not around playing in the early days of the BBT. It also hurts those who just haven't had the time to play all of the events like some people have, as well as those who missed an entire series or more whether due to bankroll issues, availability, timing, etc. On a different point, remember that the formula for assigning BBT points was changed after the BBT1, with BBT1 awarding points to the top 50% of finishers in each event, while BBT2-BBT4 awarded points to I think only the top 25%. So that makes the first BBT a little out of whack as far as balance with the rest of the series for those categories involving total BBT points won. Lastly, recall that the first BBT also did not feature a Tournament of Champions at the end, but rather a freeroll for the top 50 players on the leaderboard plus the most frequent players during the series, while the last three BBT series did include a series-ending ToC. This increased dramatically not only the interest in, but the competition involved in, winning a BBT event in the final three series as opposed to how things were back during BBT1.

Shortly after the last BBT ended, I took a close look at all four BBT final leaderboards, looking for people who showed up regularly near the top in at least two or three of the series, trying to figure out who the best overall BBT performers were over the entire lifetime of the Battle of the Blogger Tournaments. In the end I narrowed things down to 20 players whose numbers I delved into in more detail, representing a smattering of what I believe to be the top overall BBT performers plus a few others I thought people might be interested in seeing cumulatively. I did not take into account performances in any Tournaments of Champions or series-ending freerolls, opting instead to just evaluate everyone's performance over the "regular season" BBT events, which included 39 events from BBT1, 27 events from BBT2, and 56 events in each of BBT3 and BBT4, for a grand total of 178 BBT tournaments played over the lifetime of the BBT. I also did not include the total one-hit wonders -- guys like Scott Fischman for example, who played in exactly one BBT event, winning it of course after playing I think worse than even that 13-year-old who stole the Riverchasers from me that one night way back when. I tried to limit my list of 20 BBT participants to people who had played in a fair number of the events over the last few years, except for one or two guys who might have some particularly interesting stats but haven't played quite as many events as the rest of the big scorers.

So, to review and be perfectly clear, in compiling the below I only spent time looking at the people included in the below list. If you think you should have been included in the below because your performance throughout the all four BBT series was better in some areas than some of the people below, you could be right. If you think I have omitted something you did or accomplished during the four BBT series, you might be right. In fact, if you think I got your numbers wrong and have accidentally made an error in any of the calculations below, again you could be right. Shit, if you think I have purposefully misstated any figures in the below chart just to make you look bad or make you seem like a bad player, who knows you could be right about that too. This compilation list is not official, full tilt hasn't seen it, I haven't consulted Al or anyone else about it, and I did not check my work. I just looked at the posted leaderboards for each of the four BBT series, did some quick math -- most in my head instead of by calculator at that -- and wrote down the results I came up with. And I rounded everything to the nearest dollar or nearest whole BBT point just to make it even easier and less precise. So take it all for what it's worth.

Here's what I came up with after some quick back-of-the-envelope calculations for the players I reviewed, in no particular order other than the one I happened to list them in:

	Player	Wins	Win %	Final Tables	In the Points	In the Money	Events Played	BBT Points	Points/Event	Money Earned	Money/Event
1	bayne_s	4	.023	26	57	19	169	3709	21.95	$3151	$18.64
2	1Queensup1	3	.057	15	20	14	32	1743	33.51	$2290	$71.56
3	Buddydank	2	.016	22	56	19	124	3376	27.23	$2596	$20.94
4	Heffmike	4	.034	23	39	21	119	2983	25.07	$2580	$21.68
5	jjok	2	.050	6	18	6	40	1233	30.83	$1020	$25.50
6	jeciimd	2	.015	21	58	21	128	3715	29.02	$3788	$29.59
7	Hoyazo	4	.027	22	44	25	146	3444	23.59	$4592	$31.45
8	Shabazz Jenkins	2	.020	18	35	21	102	1033	10.12	$1314	$12.88
9	Astin	3	.023	21	43	19	132	3371	25.54	$4578	$34.68
10	pvanharibo	1	.007	17	35	16	143	2587	18.09	$2109	$14.75
11	Waffles	1	.008	15	38	17	118	2516	21.32	$1733	$14.69
12	Mike Maloney	2	.027	12	30	15	73	2071	28.36	$2342	$32.08
13	smokkee	3	.026	16	43	15	116	2685	23.15	$1476	$12.72
14	Pirate Wes (a10412)	0	.000	17	40	16	105	2636	25.10	$2292	$21.83
15	lucko21	6	.042	17	34	16	142	2921	20.57	$3243	$22.83
16	DDionysus	1	.007	23	50	21	135	3205	23.74	$2670	$19.77
17	twoblackaces	2	.016	20	39	20	124	3002	24.20	$2480	$20.00
18	Tuscaloosa John	5	.050	22	48	25	101	3776	37.38	$3777	$37.40
19	HighonPoker	4	.059	15	25	13	67	2127	31.74	$2029	$30.28
20	NewinNov	1	.007	25	51	19	140	2996	21.40	$1664	$11.88

SO there you have it. Above I have highlighted in red font the best total score in each category. The figures highlighted in green font represent those figures which are at or above the leader for that category, but which did not play a minimum number of events to be what I am considering "qualifying" scores for all four BBT series taken cumulatively. Anybody who played in fewer than 100 events total out of the 178 tournaments in BBT1 - BBT4 got a green font for any higher-than-highest scores they achieved. For example, 1Queensup1 utterly destroyed in BBT4, winning outright in 3 out of the 52 total BBT events he played, but he never played in any of the first three BBT series. So his incredible numbers across the board in BBT4 are in green because he killed it but only did so over 52 total events, a far cry in sample size from those with 100 or even 150 BBT tournaments played.

What conclusions can we draw from the figures above?

For starters, kudos to bayne, winner of the first BBT, for making more final tables than anyone else throughout the course of the four tournament series. And although bayne was not nearly as hot after BBT1 as he was during the original BBT, more than half of those final tables came from BBT2 - BBT4, so bayne is someone who was strong in terms of final tables throughout the 2+ years of BBT competition.

Similarly, there is lucko who won the most BBT events overall with 6. Lucko is also the only participant who won at least one event in each of the four BBT series. While lucko's overall cumulative numbers are not as strong as some of the other people on the above list, winning 6 events in 142 appearances against this crowd is quite an accomplishment, and I think it speaks volumes about lucko's overall playing style in blogger tournaments generally. Lucko isn't going to win in cumulative BBT points because, like many of the more successful poker tournament players in our group, his style is just too aggressive too early, leading to too many early bustouts to compete in those categories against the fold-to-the-points types, of which there have been many throughout the four BBT series we have run. But, give that boy some chips and he becomes an absolute monster, including winning more events than anybody else over the past couple of years, which is very impressive I think no matter how you slice it. Special mention should be made here, however, of three other players who really shined in terms of outright winning BBT events. First is 1Queensup1, who as I mentioned above somehow managed to win 3 BBT titles in just 52 events played. I'm still trying to figure out how someone can run so hot during three months of nearly 20 tournaments a month. Secondly there is Jordan from Highonpoker, who busted out of nowhere with four wins during just the BBT4 for a .059 win percentage overall through just 67 events over all four BBTs, a truly incredible feat given the crowd being played against here. And lastly there is Tuscaloosa Johnny, a name you just can't get away from when reviewing the four BBT series in their entirety, who won 5 events -- one fewer than lucko -- but did so in just 101 total tournaments, meaning TJ came up with a win for every 20 BBT tournaments he played overall, giving him the category lead for win % with at least 100 events played. Really incredible.

Jeciimd deserves mention as well I think in that he ended the BBT with the most "in the points" finishes of anybody who played, and although jec logged a lot of events at 128, that number is less than many others on the list which only makes jec's ITP accomplishment all the more impressive. 58 out of 128 BBT tournaments in the points, making the points an astonishing 45.3% of the time. It might be tempting to think this gives jec the crown of being the best fold-to-the-points guy in the group -- and there was a time during the first two BBTs where there might have been some merit to that position -- but by the end jec finished having won $3,788 net from the BBT series, not to mention winning the BBT2 ToC and the 12k Aussie Millions package back in December 2007. Once again Tuscaloosa Johnny and his 37.38 BBT points per tournament played won out overall in this category. TJ also just edged out jec in total BBT points obtained with 3776 over the lifetime of the four BBT series.

As far as money won from the BBT overall, this is where I really shined as I tied with Tuscaloosa Johnny with the most ITM finishes at 25 (mine albeit in far more events than TJ). I also just barely eked out a win in total cumulative cash winnings with $4,592 over 146 events in four series, although Astin finished just behind me with a total of $4,578, again over 14 fewer tournaments. Like me, Astin had three very strong BBTs -- winning $734 in BBT1, $1,800 in BBT2 and $1,892 in BBT3 before crashing and burning in BBT4. My bugaboo was the BBT2, the only two-month challenge we ran, as I nabbed $1,600 in winnings in the first BBT, $1,602 in BBT3 and $1,234 in BBT4. In cash won per event played, again 1Queensup1 recorded a seriously incredible figure of over $44 won per BBT tournament over just the 52 tournaments he played in BBT4, but the category title again goes to Tuscaloosa Johnny and his $37.40 won per BBT event with a minimum of 100 total BBT tournaments played.

In all, what guys like 1Queensup1, Jordan and jjok did in low numbers of events overall is really amazing when these guys were all in competition for the rest of us, fighting hard in each and every event. Six players total ended the four series with at least four BBT wins, but Queens, jjok and Jordan did so in far fewer events than anybody else on that list. Ten players posted at least 20 final table finishes, and only five can boast making the BBT points in at least 50 events overall. Bayne has to be the clear winner in frequency and availability, showing up for 169 out of 178 total BBT tournaments, which is a testament to his dedication to the series as a whole. Eight participants ended the series run with at least 3000 BBT points won, and six of us finished with at least $3000 in net cash winnings from the BBT.

And in the end, looking at the above chart, there is just one inescapable conclusion from everything: Tuscaloosa Johnny pwned us all. I mean, this guy won BBT events outright with the highest percentage of anybody with more than 67 events played. He finished in the money tied for the most times with 25, again leading in percentage terms by making the money in just under 25% of the BBT events he played. TJ amassed the most overall BBT points, the most BBT points per event, and the most money won per event played. And the amazing thing is, TJ only played in the BBT3 and the BBT4! Anyone looking to decipher the way to beat the bloggers over the long run would do well to mimic whatever it is that Tuscaloosa Johnny has done to the rest of us over the past couple of years on full tilt.

BBT3 Tournament of Champions

Well, I failed to cash in the BBT3 Tournament of Champions this weekend, busting out in 38th place of 46 runners after I lost all my chips to oossuuu754 who eventually ran all the way to 4th place and won a 2k prize package for himself along the way. Here is how I went out, presented in all its screenshotic glory:



So I'm in the big blind against known hugely aggro player osu. He just open-limps from the small blind, I've got a sooooted Ace, almost sure to be ahead and with nice prospects for a top pair-type of flop, so I bump it up to 400 chips. Standard play. Osu quickly calls. Also standard. He hasn't thought I actually had a hand since some time in the mesozoic era. 800 chips in the pot.

The flop comes down AQT rainbow. It's a bunch of high cards, not necessarily the best flop for an Ace-high hand like mine. But at the same time I have osu on precisely ATC, so I'm going to bet here. 800 chips in the pot, I bet 550, my standard roughly 2/3 the pot c-bet. Osu calls and calls quickly.



Turn card is a King. Now there is AKQT on the board. Any Jack makes a straight for osu. Now, he quick-called my bet on the flop, but again I also know that osu hasn't respect a single c-bet from me since When Dinosaurs Roamed the Earth. He didn't raise, which I believe he definitely would have done on that flop with an Ace, and I can't put him on a Jack just because he smooth called my flop bet -- is he really doing that with just a gutshot? I think not.



Before I can figure out how to much bet again, osu pushes allin on a massive overbet. And now I'm thinking -- that bet screams that he has a Jack. He is repping the Jack big time. But I'm looking at the previous action -- again, I just don't see him calling me on the flop with just the inside straight draw. Maybe he has a Jack and a pair on the flop I guess, but if he really has the Jack, would he really push allin on this massive overbet like this? I mean, sure this could be the old Over Bet For Value, but that is just not the right play with the nuts in this spot, and I can't see as how osu is making that play here. Try as I might, I simply cannot find a reason to actually believe that my top pair is behind, and the overpush on the turn here just makes me more sure than ever than he is not ahead. This guy has me on ATC every single time I steal, and every single time I c-bet, and I just don't think he has to have the straight or anything close to it in order to push like he did in this spot. I call.



Bingo! Right again, Batman. That is one of the biggest calls of my entire poker career, in that normally top pair shit kicker on an all-high-card board is not something I'm ever sticking around to call off with, but I just had him on a dead read right from his preflop limp, and the turn overpush just solidified in my mind what was going on, and I had to go with it for the rest of my chips.

What's worse, so osu insta-called my big blind raise with K6s, and then amazingly pretty much insta-called my flop c-bet as well with K6 on an AQT board. That one I am still trying to figure out. I know osu has me on literally ATC (literally), so I guess he thought his King had me high-carded. I had bet 550 into an 800-chip pot on the flop, so he had to call 550 into 1350, which don't even come close to approaching his actual odds of filling on a gutshot there (that is approximately 17% with two cards to come on the flop round of betting), and he didn't raise, so he must literally have believed that his King high was ahead. I don't know. All I know is, I got in as a 90% favorite here, calling off my entire average-sized stack with just top pair shit kicker and getting my opponent drawing to just five outs.



Boooyah! Thank you thank you ladies and gentlemen, I'll be here all week. I've written about this a million times, but beats like this are the worst stuff in poker as far as I'm concerned. I mean, you get allin with AA against QQ and the guy hits a Q on the flop, that is super annoying of course, but it's just dumb luck, you were both getting allin preflop anyways late in a tournament or whatever, and you just lost to a 2-outer. It happens, and when it does, it's bad but it's not the worst. The worst has always been for me when you completely outplay someone and then they suck out on you. In this case, I made just about the only hero call I've made in the past year of my poker life, and I still fall victim to the 9-to-1 underdog draw at the river. And if you read here often you know how much I can't stand when I wait until the after the turn card to get it allin, proceed to get it allin ahead, and then I still get sucked out on the river. Waiting till the turn should be significantly decreasing my suckout percentage, and yet it does not seem to have done much of anything in the times I have been successful in reaching that goal.

Anyways, I am not here to slam on osu's play so much as to lament what could have been for me in the Tournament of Champions. I did sit and watch peripherally throughout most of the rest of the ToC until the middle of the final table when I had to run, and osu brandished his big stack like a beast. I didn't mention this, but the pot osu knocked me out on literally was a first-place chip stack pot. I was 90% to be leading the tournament with 38 players left, and then instead osu was leading the tournament and I was out. So he had the leading stack after this hand with me and he brandished it like a sword throughout, not making any other fishcalls that I saw all the way through, though I suspect that people folded to him far too much at the final table based on my read of osu's game. But the best players make people fold repeatedly, and this weekend was no different for osu as he ran to the cash in the ToC.

So congratulations to all of the ToC cashers, which were osu and katiemother winning 2k apiece for 3rd and 4th place, and Loretta8 and OMGItsPokerFool each nabbing the 12k grand prizes for their top-two finishes. Amazing runs for both of those guys, and both well deserved.

I got some IMs and comments this weekend about my strong job handicapping the BBT3 ToC odds in my post from last Friday. To that I will just say this -- I ended up ranking what I perceived to be the top half of the field, so it's not like it's that amazing that 5 of the final 6 players were among my top half. And the other thing is, and I know some people got uppity when I posted this earlier during the BBT3, but this was a dam easy field to handicap when it came right down to it. About half the field had strong credentials and a strong case for lasting to the end of this thing, and the other half of the field basically did not, plain and simple. I know some people don't want to hear the truth this, but as I said earlier, about half of the BBT3 ToC field was a longshot to last to the end. It's just the way it is. A lot of the BBT3 tournament winners got lucky, sucked out repeatedly, played more or less like donkeys all through the series including the events they won in. People can get mad at me for my opinion I suppose if they like, but that doesn't change anything. A number of people who won ToC seats were not good players, and that showed in the ToC against a field roughly half full of the best of the best of our group and otherwise. Still others in the ToC field might be good limit or PL players and won their way in in those events, but actually are not strong nlh tournament players and did not have a good chance of cashing in this thing regardless of having played very well to win ToC seats in non no-limit events. This is again not meant as a slam on anyone, but let's just say that it was pretty easy for me to slice off half the field as having a good chance of cashing and half the field as having a poor chance, and again 5 of the final 6 runners were ranked in my top half. It's really not a big deal and I imagine anyone else who understands things would have ranked the players similarly if given the chance.

One other thing for today:



That's right, the MATH is back again tonight at 10pm ET on full tilt, password as always is "hammer". Once again the format is 6-max no-limit holdem, the buyin remains at $26, and for the second straight week the prizes will once again be paid out in increments of buyins to the upcoming Sunday afternoon large guaranteed tournament on full tilt. I saw that Astin used his buyin from winning last week's MATH tournament to play in the 750k guaranteed on this past Sunday, but the oesfd on the flop did him in when it did not hit by the river. So come on out tonight and try to win your way in to this coming Sunday at 6pm ET's big guarantee event. I will definitely be there to try to prevent you from doing so in what will be my last MATH tournament until my return from Las Vegas and the WSOP later this week.

Two days. Two days and seven hours until my flight, to be exact. It cannot come fast enough.

BBT3 ToC Predictions

Here it comes. Although today is only going to be sunny and around 80 degrees in the afternoon, Saturday not only features the BBT3 Tournament of Champions in the late afternoon (5pm ET) but it is also expected to something like 96 degrees for the next three days in New York City. The first heat wave of 2008 where I live will coincide with the BBT3 ToC, my wife is furious with me as I mentioned to have to play at 5pm, and I will just have to find a way to try to get to my happy place to be able to play well. I'm sure most of you are familiar with wife tilt or girlfriend tilt. I've had FTOPS Main Events, live WSOP tournaments, Bracelet Races, and every kind of blogger tournament imaginable where I had to try to find a way to play my best while also dodging thrown sharp metal objects and every insult known to man. It's good times. So hopefully I can get where I need to be before Saturday's big BBT series ender.

OK time for those predictions. One more time here is the list of all 46 players in this Saturday afternoon's BBT3 Tournament of Champions:

Scott Fischman
columbo
corron10
twoblackaces
TuscaloosaJohn
lucko21
Smokkee
swimmom95
dwal78
Chippy McStacks
pureprophet
ScottMc
tilt away
hellory
GottaWinSum
misogynist
Breeze81
Martyr99
wwonka69
katiemother
PokahDave
Loretta8
SirFWALGMan
RecessRampage
iam23skidoo
hoyazo
MEMPHIS00
ShipFaced12
wormmsu
DonkeyPuncher74
PirateLawyer
RNallin
cmitch
surflexus
oossuuu754
bdidde
JD Schellnutt
heffmike
OMGitsPokerFool
Shabazz Jenkins
Julkeus
lilkimmer77
Astin
Bone_Daddy84
scottc25
maneki_neko

And remember again, out of 46 runners, the top 4 will cash in some way, with the top 2 winning 12k WSOP ME packages and the 3rd and 4th place finishers winning 2k WSOP packages as well. After thinking this over for some time, I think rather than insult some people I will just provide odds for those players who I believe have better odds to end in the top 4 than the "natural odds" of 1 in 11.5 (since 4 out of 46 runners will in fact reach the cash in this tournament based on the payout structure). This will amount to around half the field, and those not on my list are simply the players who I see as having 10.5 to 1 or worse odds of cashing. Nothing more. Not a commentary on their play, their intelligence, their odor or anything else other than the consistency of their play in the blonkaments in general, which is the most relevant factor I can find when it comes to predicting the results in any one given tournament event.

OK no more beating around the bush. As we all know, the most likely player to finish in the top 4 or in the top 2 is obviously this guy. You know it. I know it. He knows it. We all know it. He's playing the best in mtt's generally, and he's playing right near the best in the blonkaments overall. Lucko is without a doubt right at the top of the list.

But it's not like he is greater than 50% to cash or anything. He probably had 5 or 6 top-4 finishes throughout 50-some events of the BBT, so even when running hot over a whole series, the odds are nowhere near more likely than not that a player of Lucko's caliber cashes in the top 4. I'm thinking Lucko's odds of finishing in the top 4 are better than any other individual player among the 46 of us BBT3 tournament victors, but they still can't be better than what, 1 in 6 to cash in the top 4 places, right? I would say 5 to 1 for Lucko to cash.

The next most likely player to cash I think has got to be Tuscaloosa Johnny. I had not realized this at first, but Tusca not only won the 2k WSOP prize package for being BBT3 Player of the Month for March, but he won that same thing again for May! That right there is as much of a crushing as the BBT has ever seen. The same guy wins the best BBT player in two of the three months of the challenge? Sizznick. Anyways that is more proof than anyone even needs if you played a lot of these things that Tuscy has a very good chance of surviving to near the end. He can play a very different style from a Lucko in general, and yet both have proven extremely successful in the blonkaments over the past few months, pretty much all of which had significantly more runners than the 46 set up to fight it out in the ToC on Saturday afternoon. With Tusca, I will set the odds at just barely worse than Lucko's, let's say 6 to 1 to Tusca to cash in the top 4 spots in the tournament.

No way any blonkament can ever leave surflexus out of the equation, what with his 85 career Mookie wins and probably another two or three hundred other blonkament victories to go with them. I'm laying the odds there at around 7 to 1 for some kind of a cash.

Shabazz Jenkins and twoblackaces. I like both of these players, both performed well during the BBT with at least a small handful of deep runs. Both seemed to be playing well as the challenge came to a close, and I lay odds on both of them somewhere around 7 to 1 to cash.

Cmitch. Any reader here knows I love cmitch's game. He does not focus nearly as much on tournaments as he could, and as a result he doesn't have a huge number of significant mtt scores, but he's done enough in the tournaments he's played, including once again several deep BBT3 tournament runs including in a few of the biggest games. Also 7 to 1.

PokahDave (or DDionysus, whichever you prefer). This guy was another surprise for me who recorded again a number of very deep runs, including two if not three heads-up finishes during the BBT3. Dave is obviously a better player than I had previously given him credit for, and I lay his odds at just worse than the previous crowd, around 7.5 to 1 for a BBT3 cash.

Loretta8, hellory, dwal78. The three original gbiffs of the BBT all have the aggro game to win with a little help from the cards. All probably better than average chances to score a cash in the BBT. Let's say 8 to 1 for Loretta due to his strong performance around the middle of the BBT3, and 9 to 1 for the other two of these guys.

OMGItsPokerFool is a 9 to 1 guy in my mind. He hasn't been a huge blogger tournament winner over time, but he hasn't played in so many of the events, and he came out of nowhere with some consistent attempts during the BBT3 with two separate event wins. I can't put him right up at the top of the list, but again he is clearly someone with a better than average chance to win in my view.

Another 9 to 1'er is columbo. Columbo has been playing some bad poker per his blog lately, which is why he isn't even higher on this list than he is. But the man has obvious skills and displays them regularly these days in the blonkaments. Definitely above average chances of cashing in the BBT3 ToC.

OK at 10 to 1 I'm going to include everyone else I haven't mentioned already who won more than once BBT3 tournament. So that includes JD Schellnutt, corron10, Evil Wonka, wormmsu and Chippy McStacks. With the "natural odds" of cashing set at 11.5 to 1 (4 out of 46 get paid), in my book every player good enough to win two or more ToC seats is obviously worthy of better than the natural odds based purely on the number of cashers compared to the number of total players in the Tournament of Champions.

Also at 10 to 1 I would place perennial strong nlh tournament player Scottmc. Scott has demonstrated himself to be tricky, trappy and able to get paid and to steal with the best of us, and I definitely see him as above the "natural" 11.5 to 1 odds to cash in this thing.

The last three players I will include on the "better than natural" odds to cash list are generally tight, careful players whose style could help them to last deep when they can hopefully go on a rush or pick up a big hand or draw and get into position to win. Those three players are swimmom95, Byron and katiemother. These three I will put in at 10.5 to 1 to make some kind of cash in the BBT3 ToC this weekend.

Lastly, I should mention red FTP pro Scott Fischman. If you recall, Fischman donkeypunched his way through to the win in the very first BBT3 tournament, that first Big Game with like 105 entrants and a 50 million dollar prize pool. Now, even though Fisch is a big time pro and all, it's not like I think he is 4 to 1 or something to finish in the top 4 in this thing. I do expect him to take the tournament seriously though, and for that reason I have to expect his odds to be well above average for the ToC. Let's pencil him in at around 8 to 1 as well.

So here's my grand total of players I am providing better than average odds on today for cashing in the top 4 spots of this Saturday afternoon's BBT3 Tournament of Champions.:

Lucko21 5:1
Tuscaloosa Johnny 6:1
Surflexus 7:1
Twoblackaces 7:1
Shabazz Jenkins 7:1
cmitch 7:1
PokahDave / DDionysus 7.5:1
Loretta8 8:1
Scott Fischman 8:1
hellory 9:1
dwal78 9:1
OMGItsPokerFool 9:1
columbo 9:1
JD Schellnutt 10:1
Evil Wonka 10:1
corron10 10:1
Chippy McStacks 10:1
wormmsu 10:1
scottmc 10:1
swimmom95 10.5:1
bdidde 10.5:1
katiemother 10.5:1

Of course, present company has been completely excluded from the above odds figures, but then if you count them up, I said I would do half the field above the "natural" odds of 11.5 to 1 and half the field below, and yet the above list only contains 22 and not 23 names. So you can take from that what you will. And again, if you do not see a particular name on my above odds list, it simply means that I don't think that person's odds of cashing are better than 11 to 1. Some of those not mentioned are probably around 12 to 1, and others are much lower than that. I would estimate that the worst player on that entire list (and yes I know exactly who that is) still probably has about a 20 or 25 to 1 chance of cashing I would say, as it's just not that impossible to finish in the top 4 out of 46 runners in a tournament, but there are a number of people on the list who have had a whole lot of trouble reaching final tables with any consistency in their entire playing careers, during the BBT3 or even just over the past month or so, and when I have to pick someone to make it to the top half of the final table I am always going to be inclined to go more with the hot hands than people who have not been there often before.

So there you have it. My predictions for the most likely players to cash in the BBT ToC this weekend. Again, don't forget to stop by to check out the action, even later in the evening as Al managed to secure a kickass structure with several added, levels and relatively slow blinds escalation as well, which hopefully should increase the weight of skill play and lessen the import of luck in the overall tournament results.

Any guesses from anyone as to the sleepers in this thing? It is likely that at least 1 of the 4 players who receive payouts from the BBT3 ToC will be someone unexpected. Any predictions for people not mentioned in my odds above?

And don't forget, this past Monday at Mondays at the Hoy, Astin and chitwood each won $216 entries into this coming Sunday afternoon at 6pm ET's 750k guaranteed nlh tournament on full tilt. Not sure if either or both will be playing, but let's hope they are and don't forget to stop by and cheer them on as well if you log on around that time and see them still alive in the largest of the weekly guaranteed tournaments on full tilt. With all that plus of course the donkament tonight at 9pm ET (password as always is "donkarama") and the Sunday Heads-Up tournament (password = "shovemonkey"), it is shaping up to be quite the busy weekend for us over at full tilt poker. Best of luck to everyone in the ToC, and even those not in the ToC who might be playing some poker either live or online over the next few days. And if you're in New York City, stay cizznoool as best you can.