Is it me?

Is it me, or does it seem like the full tilt red pros really did not come up with many gold bracelets at the WSOP this year? I mean, how often have you heard Lederer Ferguson's name at a WSOP final table this summer, or even Cunningham or Seidel, or Ivey? Juanda bested Hellmuth for one red pro bracelet, but otherwise at least it looks like these guys have far too much on their mind right now to play their best.

A Quarter to Vegas

The proper title for this post, which I started to write a month ago when it really was a full quarter until my trip to Vegas, would at this point more like "Sixth to Vegas", in that it is now just a sixth of a year until I will be heading out for my annual trip to the desert for my shot at poker immortality. Well let me take a step back.

I still have not made any reservations for the summer. But things are slowly but surely coming into focus. It is looking more and more like I will be targeting the latter part of June as opposed to what I previously had thought would be more around the middle of the month, and it is increasingly likely that I will be rolling into town around the weekend of June 24-25 or the weekend of July 1-2. With the July 4 holiday and the Hammer Family's annual Independence Day beach trip looming, I think that June 24 weekend is growing more and more likely to be The Weekend, plus another day or two on either end of the weekend. You know, to give me time to have my gold bracelet sized, sign some autographs, all that stuff. But the stars are aligning such that it looks like that last week of June will be the best time for me and my entourage to head to Sin City, which means it's time to take another look at that WSOP nlh tournament schedule. I mean after all, just because I'm not allowed to play any more poker online, that doesn't mean I'm not allowed to play any more poker, period.

So what does the WSOP have in store on those two weekends? As usual with the new 50+-event schedule, they've always got something. In particular, I am looking at Event #43, the $1500 buyin nlh tournament scheduled for noon on Saturday, June 25, as well as Event #45 the next day, on Sunday the 26th of June, which is a $1000 event. All things equal, I would probably prefer the Saturday tournament, for a few reasons. First, the extra 1500 starting chips should make a real difference, especially given that both of these tournaments will follow the WSOP's standard donkament structure for the low-buyin bracelet events. And secondly, the $1000 tournaments will bring in the lowest of the low, the donkest of the donk, the poorest of the poor among all poker players, and even the bump up to the $1500 buyin should make a difference when there is a 1k event that same weekend, and if you've read here for any extended period of time then you know how much I prefer not to be stuck playing against the chasemonkey asseater horsesassses at the bottom end of the spectrum. Even for $1000 or $1500 cash money, you simply would not believe how fucking horrible some of these assyshits are at this game, and how readily they plunk down a Large or more when their only conceivable chance of lasting even a few hours in this event -- let alone a few days -- is to get some serious AstinBaynage coming their way. Early and often AstinBaynage in fact.

If I wanted to come in the weekend of July 1, on Saturday the 2nd is also a $1000 donkament, but this has two Day 1s and will probably be the largest single tournament in the entire WSOP other than the main event. And with the two Day 1s, it's going to run straight into July 4 and I really don't want to have to be sitting at that final table and wondering if Hammer Wife and the kids are enjoying their fireworks. For a lot of reasons -- not the least of which is that it is seven days sooner -- I think July 24 is going to be The Weekend 2011. But my brother is in along with most of my usual annual trip crew, so we're just waiting to finalize until everyone confirms that that's going to be it.

WSOP event #43. Next I'll take a look at the Venetian DSE schedule again and see which of those tournaments I'm likely to look into. It's always fun returning to the scene of the crime.

Venetian Deep Stack Extravanganza -- Summer Schedule

I saw this on cmitch's blog, but the Venetian has finally released the schedule for this summer's much anticipated Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza. This tournament will always be near and dear to my heart, and frankly, although the Day 2's leave a lot to be desired in terms of room to play, thanks to a very favorable Day 1 structure the DSE represents a much better tournament bang for your buck than even most of the lower-buyin WSOP events available during June at the Rio.

Although I am waiting for some contingencies to work themselves out before picking my exact dates for my WSOP trip to Vegas this summer, as I have mentioned previously, the odds are very high that my trip will be somewhere between Saturday, June 11 and Monday, June 20, 2011, so I have naturally been focusing as well on which events the DSE will be running on those days. Well, I am happy to report, there are a great many of them, unsurprisingly, mostly all of them very attractive to me.

For starters, on both Saturday and Sunday, June 11-12, as well as on Thursday the 16th and again on Sunday the 19th, there is a $340 nlh tournament at the DSE on each day. Generally I would prefer a higher buyin event, but it is great to know that there is a favorably-structured tournament in no-limit holdem at my favorite poker room in all of Las Vegas on both days of that weekend as well as the middle of the next week, should I opt not to pursue multiple of the myriad $1000 and $1500 nlh events at the WSOP this year. These $340s are a great option for anyone who is out in the desert and yet who does not want to drop the 2k or more often required to play in that day's WSOP tournaments, but who is looking for a great structure and a great location to wile away the hours playing a no-limit holdem tournament, and I may very well be partaking in such offerings during my stay in Sin City in a few months.

Kicking the buyin level up a notch, on each of Wednesday, June 15 and Saturday, June 18, the Venetian is also hosting their standard larger-sized $550 buyin nlh tournaments, which is the buyin where I had my biggest ever poker tournament score a few years back. All things equal, I tend to prefer the events that are above the minimum DSE buyin of $340 for any of their deep stack events, as the $340s therefore will attract the lowest level of poker player, and as a rule I have had somewhat better success playing against that next-level-up opponent than I have at the cheapest buyin level. This is true both in my live play as well as online, where I have logged numerous big mtt scores, but very few of them at the $10 and $20 level, much more focused instead on the $50 to $200 buyin mark for the most part. There is also a $550 buyin PLO tournament in the afternoon on Wednesday, June 15, which is intriguing to me as PLO has always been one of my favorite poker games to play, especially in a tournament format. The only issue there is that it is a re-entry tournament, which means people who are already donking it up in a chase-happy game like PLO will likely be donking it up even more than usual, which can be frustrating unless I am truly willing to drop a couple of buyins getting chasemonkeyed all over the place for a couple of hours. Still, it's yet another nice option to have at the Venetian while the World Series runs on at the Rio.

But it is the higher buyin level still where most of my focus lies, as I look at the DSE schedule during the time I will likely be in Vegas to participate in this tournament series. For example, on Tuesday, June 14 is an interesting $1070 buyin nlh tournament, which frankly may be the perfect buyin level for what I am looking to play in while in the desert, and not one I have had the opportunity to play before at the Venetian. And meanwhile, on both Monday the 13th and Monday the 20th are fatty $1590 buyin tournaments, also no-limit holdem, which is also a buyin level I would give serious consideration to playing as I imagine the prize pools for those badboys could get pretty large depending on the number of players, which should be significant at this time of year. There is even a $2100 buyin tournament on Friday, June 17th, which is attractive for the reasons I stated above, but which I would probably not be as likely to play as I might opt to take a stab at the more prestigious WSOP if I'm going to be shelling out over 2k to run in a big nlh tournament while I am in town.

And make no mistake, this decision ultimately comes down to prestige, and not a whole lot else, at least not for me. Because, as you've probably seen written about in various other forums such that I don't need to rehash it here, there is no doubt that, all other things being equal, I would probably opt for the beauty and comfort of the Venetian over the Rio, and the more favorable buyins, and the more favorable tournament structures and game choices of the DSE over the WSOP every day of the week without much thought if it weren't for the prestige of the WSOP. In particular the tournament structures are not close between the two tournament series, as the lower-buyin WSOP events provide only three or four hours of what I would call solid, deep-stacked play before the tournaments basically turn into all-in preflop luckfests -- believe me, I've been there several times -- whereas the DSE will offer a full day of pretty great structured poker on Day 1, before they come back and ream like you it's a WSOP donkament on Day 2 to get things over with as quickly as possible. But it's that prestige -- that allure of the gold bracelet -- that keeps me considering playing once again in the World Series of Poker this year. I could chop up another five Venetian DSE events and it simply wouldn't mean as much as even final tabling at the WSOP. I mean, can you imagine, cashing in a televised WSOP tournament some year, and when they put up my picture on tv, it says underneath "This is Hoyazo's fifth WSOP cash and third WSOP final table"? Hah! A final table at the World Series of Poker is itself a resume builder that no one can ever take away from you and that everybody in the world of poker immediately knows to respect. And you win one gold bracelet, and your name is suddenly known all across the poker world, and you will forever be enshrined along with the names of all the greats of the game's history who have ever joined you in claiming one of those elusive gold bracelets. I mean, the last time I checked, nobody really cares that I've made a final table at the Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza.

Well, nobody except my bankroll, that is.

WSOP 2011 Schedule

As most of you probably know by now, this week Harrah's officially release the schedule of events for the 2011 World Series of Poker, to be held once again at the Rio Suites and Casino in Las Vegas, starting on May 31 of this year. We are up to 58 events in this series, as Harrah's just keeps chasing the extra rake at the expense of whittling away at the value of winning a World Series bracelet a little bit at a time, year after year after year, and once again we've got the one big buyin (25k) heads-up event in the earlygoing of this year's Series, we've got the 50k Poker Players Championship event near the end in early July, and peppered throughout once again are the regular bracelet events, and the "Championship" events, each of which sports a $10,000 buyin, including the well-known no-limit holdem Main Event that will start this year with Day 1A on Tuesday, July 7. Due to some time constraints, I am basically looking at mid to late June as the best time for me to be making my pilgrimage to the desert this coming summer, so I have highlighted in red those events below that I have some interest in playing as I look to plan this year's poker trip:

Tue, May 31st, 12:00 PM, 2-Day Event Event #1: Casino Employees NLH $500
Tue, May 31st, 5:00 PM, 4-Day Event Event #2: Heads Up NLH Championship(256 Max)
$25,000
Wed, Jun 1st, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #3: Omaha Hi-Low $1,500
Thu, Jun 2nd, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #4: NLH $5,000
Thu, Jun 2nd, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #5: Seven Card Stud $1,500
Fri, Jun 3rd, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #6: Limit Hold'em $1,500
Fri, Jun 3rd, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #7: PLH Championship $10,000
Sat, Jun 4th, 12:00 PM, 5-Day Event Event #8: NLH $1000 -- This event has 2 starting days. Day 1A on Saturday, June 4 and Day 1B on Sunday June 5, both at 12pm.
Sat, Jun 4th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #9: 2-7 NL Draw Lowball $1,500
Mon, Jun 6th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #10: NLH / 6max $1,500
Mon, Jun 6th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #11: Omaha Hi-Low Championship $10,000
Tue, Jun 7th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #12: Triple Chance NLH $1,500
Wed, Jun 8th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #13: NLH Shootout (2,000 Max) $1,500
Wed, Jun 8th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #14: Limit Hold'em $3,000
Thu, Jun 9th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #15: Pot Limit Hold'em $1,500
Thu, Jun 9th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #16: NL 2-7 Draw Lowball Championship
$10,000
Fri, Jun 10th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #17: H.O.R.S.E. $1,500
Sat, Jun 11th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #18: NLH $1,500
Sat, Jun 11th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #19: Limit Hold'em / 6max $2,500
Sun, Jun 12th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #20: NLH $1,000
Sun, Jun 12th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #21: Seven Card Stud Championship
$10,000
Mon, Jun 13th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #22: Pot-Limit Omaha $1,500
Mon, Jun 13th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #23: Eight Game Mix $2,500
Tue, Jun 14th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #24: NLH Shootout (2,000 Max) $5,000
Tue, Jun 14th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #25: Seven Card Stud Hi-Low $1,500
Wed, Jun 15th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #26: NLH / 6max $2,500
Wed, Jun 15th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #27: Limit Hold'em Championship $10,000
Thu, Jun 16th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #28: NLH $1,500
Thu, Jun 16th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #29: 10-Game Mix / 6max (NLH, Razz, Limit Hold'em, Badugi (Limit), Seven Card Stud, NL 2-7 Draw Lowball, Omaha Hi-Low Split, Pot-Limit Omaha, 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball (Limit), and Seven Card Stud Hi-Low) $2,500
Fri, Jun 17th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #30: Seniors (50 or older) NLH $1000
Fri, Jun 17th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #31: Pot-Limit Omaha $3,000
Sat, Jun 18th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #32: NLH $1,500
Sat, Jun 18th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #33: Seven Card Stud Hi-Low Championship $10,000
Sun, Jun 19th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #34: NLH $1,000
Mon, Jun 20th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #35: Pot-Limit Omaha / 6max $5,000
Tue, Jun 21st, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #36: NLH $2,500
Tue, Jun 21st, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #37: H.O.R.S.E. Championship $10,000
Wed, Jun 22nd, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #38: NLH $1,500
Wed, Jun 22nd 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #39: Pot-Limit Hold'em/Omaha $2,500
Thu, Jun 23rd, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #40: NLH / 6max $5,000
Fri, Jun 24th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #41: Limit Hold’em Shootout $1,500
Fri, Jun 24th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #42: PLO Championship $10,000
Sat, Jun 25th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #43: NLH $1,500
Sat, Jun 25th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #44: Seven Card Razz $2,500
Sun, Jun 26th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #45: NLH $1,000
Mon, Jun 27th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #46: NLH / 6max Championship $10,000
Mon, Jun 27th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #47: Omaha/Seven Card Stud Hi-Low $2,500
Tue, Jun 28th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #48: NLH $1,500
Tue, Jun 28th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #49: 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball (Limit)
$2,500
Wed, Jun 29th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #50: Triple Chance NLH $5,000
Thu, Jun 30th, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #51: Pot Limit Omaha Hi-low Split-8 or Better $1,500
Thu, Jun 30th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #52: Mixed Hold'em (Limit/No-Limit)
$2,500
Fri, Jul 1st, 12:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #53: Ladies NLH $1,000
Sat, Jul 2nd, 12:00 PM, 5-Day Event Event #54: NLH $1000 -- This event has 2 starting days. Day 1A on Saturday, July 2 and Day 1B on Sunday July 3, both at 12pm.
Sat, Jul 2nd, 5:00 PM, 5-Day Event Event #55: The Poker Player's Championship (Limit Hold'em, Omaha Hi-Low Split-8 or Better, Seven Card Razz , Seven Card Stud, Seven Card Stud Hi-Low Split-8 or Better, NLH, Pot-Limit Omaha, 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball) $50,000
Tue, Jul 5th, 12:00 PM ,3-Day Event Event #56: NLH $1,500
Tue, Jul 5th, 5:00 PM, 3-Day Event Event #57: Pot-Limit Omaha Hi-low $5,000
Thu, Jul 7th, 12:00 PM, 13-Day Event Event #58: NLH Main Event $10,000

So preliminarily it seems like I am looking at a trip out to Vegas sometime between Thursday, June 16 and Sunday June 26 -- which could mean I would need to stay out for another couple of days if all goes perfectly. Based on past experience, I would probably end up being out in the desert for somewhere around half of that window -- four or five days, with the possibility of tacking on an extra day or two at the end if necessary. Now, for the past two years, I have ended up playing just the one WSOP event (two years ago, no WSOP event actually -- long story), and then at least one other tournament elsewhere in town among the many tournament series that now proliferate while the donkey masses swarm into town for the WSOP. The Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza looks like it does not have its summer schedule posted yet, but suffice it to say that I am confident based on past experience that they will have more than enough appropriately-sized buyin nlh events on hand while I am there to make that a realistic option.

For some reason, that Event #34, the Sunday 1k buyin nlh tournament looks like a good option to me -- it is right in the middle of my window, it's a cheap buyin and yet will only give me barely a worse chance than in the $1500 buyin tournaments to get lucky early and make a little run. And the best 1-2 combination of events on successive days is that Saturday and Sunday, June 18-19, with the $1500 nlh event on Saturday at noon, and then the 1k I mentioned above scheduled for Sunday. Both are three day events, and for a total of $2500 I could play if I so choose in two WSOP events for the minimal amount possible on consecutive days. But as I mentioned above, with the Venetian DSE -- a tournament series that will always have a soft spot in my heart for obvious reasons -- as well as various other casinos' tournament series likely in full swing that entire time I am looking at above, playing one WSOP event that I really like is probably just as good as aiming for that one period when I can spend more money than I otherwise would just to buy in to two separate WSOP tournaments.

Anybody else out there reading this planning on being out in Vegas between June 16 and June 25? As always I would love to meet up with readers and especially fellow WSOP participants who read this corner of the Internets.

WSOP 2011

With the WPBT winter gathering now come and gone, it's time for me to start focusing on my own annual poker trip out to the desert, to play in the WSOP and to live it up in sin city for a few days. After recording my biggest ever poker tournament score of just a hair over 50 grand back in 2009, and then following that up with a win of around 8 or 9 grand in 2010 on a mixture of poker tournaments, cash games, sports betting and even some horses thrown in for good measure, it seems like a return to the sands of Las Vegas in the summer of 2011 is all but assured. The WSOP claims to have released the schedule for the 2011 WSOP this week, but in reality they have only so far announced the start date (May 31, 2011) and stop date (the WSOP Main Event will run from July 7 through July 19 when the final table will be determined), and the location, which will be slightly off-strip at the Rio for the seventh consecutive year despite rumblings that Harrah's might be readying for a move back onto the strip to one of its other Harrah's / Caesar's properties. The full list of the actual WSOP events for 2011 is slated for release some time in January.

Once again I have no plans to play in the Main Event itself, due to constraints of timing but also the buyin, as I've played more than enough poker tournaments in my day to know that I don't want to plunk down 10 grand on something as fickle and luck-based as any poker tournament. Probably someday I will take a crack at the Main Event, but frankly it's just not something I have any desire to do these days, and I'm not sure I ever have really. But I definitely would like to make my annual appearance in the Amazon room at the Rio and sit down for one of the preliminary events, most likely no-limit holdem but there are always options on that front. I feel competent enough to play most of the games spread at the WSOP, be it no-limit holdem, pot-limit Omaha or pot-limit O8, any of the shootouts, or heads-up tournaments. Just about the only games I would not really consider playing in the World Series are limit holdem -- I was once a pretty solid limit tournament play but I long since decided that no-limit was more the game for a guy of my temperament and skill set -- as well as 2-7 lowball (no real experience playing this), Razz (I'm not an effing clown with a rainbow wig and a squishy red nose) and any limit Omaha game (again, not a clown). But this leaves most of the preliminary events as options, and although in general I tend to prefer the lower-buyin $1500 events where possible, I am fortunate to have the financial freedom to be flexible with the buyin, easily willing to play a 2k or $2500 buyin tournament if that is what works best, schedule-wise.

So, I'll know more once the official WSOP schedule is released next month (next year!), but suffice it to say that I do plan to make my annual trek again next summer, and I do not expect much resistance from Hammer Wife as I have not had for the past few years. I live in a beautiful new home that was purchased more or less with poker winnings, my wife drives a beautiful new car which is paid for monthly out of poker winnings, and things like that tend to go a long way towards easing the tension about me taking a week off in the sun to party like a rock star and try to win some money while I'm at it. Ultimately, my annual trip to Vegas isn't even about the money though -- it's really about me having a hobby that I love to do but never really get to do in a live setting other than at most three or four nights a year in Atlantic Shitty. So taking my week in the desert each summer has become kind of an anthem for me, my chance to do what I love to do in far and away the best setting in the world to do it, to get a break from a job that I work at probably harder, longer and with more dedication than anybody I know, and most of all, my chance to remember and delight in my (dwindling) youth for a few short days on a somewhat regular basis.

I can already taste that hot, arid air as I emerge from the baggage claim area and into the taxi line at McCarron airport. Is it summer yet?

BBT, Can It Be?

Did I hear correctly this weekend that all three people who won the WSOP Main Event prize package in the BBT5 this past spring all took the $T on full tilt instead of playing in the Main Event?

Do people even want there to be more BBTs and more free stuff for us?

I mean, can this even be possible?

The best part about this is that people blew their effing tops for days on end when Al first announced earlier this year that the BBT Invitational was going to be just that -- an invitational -- extended only to those people that full tilt felt were a good gamble to actually use the money they graciously hand out to ungrateful bloggers every year to actually play in the actual World Series of Poker. Full tilt wanted the invitational because in the past people just would not use full tilt's funds to play in poker tournaments. They also wouldn't blog about the tournaments, even the few times when past BBT winners did actually play in the events they won prize packages to in the BBT.

One of the things I always try to teach my kids and the others around me is ownership of your decisions. If I decide to take a big risk and willingly don't use my seat belt whenever I drive 5 miles or less from my house, then you won't hear me complaining that my car was unsafe when I do get into an accident close to home and suffer worse injuries than I would have if I had chosen to wear the belt. If I decide I'm going to make a bunch of flagrantly racist or homophobic remarks in front of mixed company, then you won't hear me getting mad at someone who gives me legitimate crap for what I said being hateful and bigoted. And it's just as true in a poker context by the way -- if I decide I'm going to try to get it allin preflop automatically any time I find a pocket pair 66 or higher, and I do just that by pushing in 100 big blinds early in a big tournament and I lose a race to AK or AQ, you won't hear me complaining. I make a decision, and then I own that decision, for better or worse. This notion of personal responsibility is one of my defining qualities and something I focus on regularly, be it at the poker table or the table of life.

All of you people who gave Al endless, interminable shit for what was originally I think only around 50-60 players in the first BBT5 Invitational, you as a group need to learn to own your own decisions. It's gone on for years at this point, and I personally cannot believe it. We're bloggers for crying out loud, and the only reason full tilt ever came to us with prizes the first time around was for the marketing possibilities of paying for bloggers to play in and write about the biggest poker tournaments in the world. Instead, we as a group have repeatedly, consistently -- for several years now, amazingly -- given a huge, fat middle finger to full tilt and made them sorrier and sorrier each year about the money they have largely wasted on the BBT winners. Shit, bloggers have even won the money from full tilt in the BBT, and gone to Vegas and played with that money, and they still don't blog about it, not one whit! And don't get me wrong, I'm not judging anyone for any decisions they have made with respect to money won from full tilt or any online poker site -- but you're damn right I am judging those people for not using the money they won, and then for complaining to Al that they were not included in the Invitational the next time the BBT comes around.

Own. Your. Decisions.

If there is ever another BBT tournament series, full tilt should definitely, obviously, undeniably use an invitational format, at least for a big part of the determination of who wins the WSOP prize packages. And most of the hypocritical whining we'll inevitably see about it don't even deserve the time of day. Dickheads will post on their blog about not being included in the Invitiational like it's their job, but damn when they actually win the money, they and their blogs just vanish like a fart in the wind.

Without a doubt this is one of the most pathetic aspects of poker bloggers today.

Random Musings

There's been so much going on lately, but with the whole Vegas trip things at work and in life have been even more hectic than usual. While I have some time today I wanted to post some thoughts on a number of issues.

1. The Lebron James saga took an interesting turn this weekend in my mind, with word came down that even as of Monday morning, Tom Izzo has "not been able to get in touch with" Lebron James regarding Izzo's decision about whether or not to take the Cleveland Cavaliers coaching job. Not been able to get in touch with him? After all this public exposure now, for days on end? I'll tell you what: if you're a Cavs fan right about now, the fact that Bron-bron hasn't even taken a single call from Tom Izzo all this weekend is just about the worst possible news you could hear, and I think it speaks volumes about James' motivation and what he is thinking at this moment about his future. I mean, James could have at least spoken to Izzo (cuz how the hell can Izzo possibly make this decision without knowing knowing if it includes or excludes Lebron?) and could easily have given him some kind of comfort that the two could go together to Cleveland in 2010, that he would need one more big star on the team first, something, anything if James was feeling all lovey dovey towards the city of Cleveland right now. But clearly he is not. Izzo is now in a ridiculous position, because on the one hand he can't leave his school and his players hanging for weeks on end here, but on the other hand, if he takes the job and Lebron comes back, Izzo has a championship-ready team immediately on his hands and that's what his expectations are going to be. But if Izzo takes over the Cavs and Lebron decides to go elsewhere, well then what Izzo is taking on is a 100% completely different job in every way, one where he will be lucky to even make the playoffs and where his success will be measure perhaps in games won over successive years but not at all by championships or even post-season performance at all. So Izzo of course has desperately been trying to reach Lebron now for what, four days on end, and so far, nothing. Lebron's head is elsewhere right now, it's as easy as that, and as I said that is the worst sign yet I've seen for Cavaliers fans.

2. I finally saw on espn.com sometime on Sunday night that the U.S. managed to come back and tie England in the World Cup on Saturday. Not that I personally care, but that late U.S. goal has got to be the best thing that ever happened for espn or whoever is making money off of the popularity of the World Cup telecasts in the United States. I still don't know who that is because lord knows I'm not watching those matches. Nobody needs to wonder why soccer has never made it in this country when all these matches so far cumulatively have totalled about 8 goals scored. But in any event, I don't know who our next opponent is or when we will play them, but I'm sure I will hear about it via the various media outlets I am bombarded with on a daily basis because we managed to tie that first match against England. After giving up a goal to the Brits just four minutes in to the match, we could very easily have given up hope and then I can assure you, nobody in America who is not a first- or second-generation immigrant would have given two craps about that game or any other soccer matchup left this year. Instead though, we Americans can continue our every-four-years delusion that this time maybe we have caught up and will finally get to hoist the World Cup trophy in 2010. Dream on.

3. The Philadelphia Phillies have flat-out lost the eye of the tiger, it's as clear as a bell and you could see it after about two weeks into this season. It's like they came out this year, started winning a few games, and then decided that they were already in the World Series for a third straight year so they just needed to coast until they got there. You need to hear proof that this team is grossly under-performing on offense right now? The Phillies are dead last in the National League East with just 272 runs scored in 61 games this season. This team that led the National League in runs scored each of the past two seasons -- and didn't really lose anybody of note in the offseason (if anything, we replaced the defensive-minded Pedro Feliz with the far superior offensively Placido Polanco) -- now has scored seven fewer runs than the Nationals, 11 fewer than the Mets, 24 less than the Marlins and 40 runs fewer than the division-leading Braves. The Phillies deserve every inch of the deep, deep hole they have dug for themselves this year, and it's a shame too because Roy Halladay has been just about as good as advertised with an ERA under of 1.96 and a stellar 1.02 WHIP (plus a perfect game) through now 13 starts as a Phillie, and Cole Hamels looks to be bouncing bad pretty decently from a crappy 2009 as well. J. Happ's been on the injured list all season and is looking to get healthy soon as well, so from a defensive perspective the team is faring ok. But on offense it's like this juggernaut with Rollins (albeit injured much of this year so far), Victorino, Utley, Howard, Werth, Ibanez, Polanco et all is simply a different team entirely. And I can't help but notice the correlation between our offense really sucking and our team allegedly getting caught stealing those signs from the bullpen in the outfield a few weeks ago. I still think it sounds silly to suggest we would possibly sit a guy in the bullpen with bino's if we wanted to steal signs, but I've never been one to deny the facts either, and the timing of the stealing signs thing obviously matches up more or less exactly with now this month-long streak of offensive ineptitude for the Phils.

4. Hey, are there any bloggers out there cashing yet in the 2010 WSOP? I certainly did not pull my own weight in this regard in 2010, that's for sure, only playing the one event and never putting up much of a fight. I know Columbo was in my event as well and fared far better than me, but I believe busted also short of the money, and I think I heard as well that Garth, LJ, Blood and a few others have fallen short of the money as well. It feels like just a few short years ago that we had like 5 or 6 bloggers making it decently into the money in WSOP tournaments. Maybe that's happening again this year and I just don't know it, I don't know. But otherwise, are we getting worse as poker players the longer we blog and play poker together?

5. With Las Vegas 2010 now just a fading memory, it is already just a few weeks until the Hammer Family's annual July 4 beach trip. And with how things have been at work lately, that shizznit cannot come fast enough. With the July 4 holiday coming on a Sunday this year, we are now in the last year before a several-year jag where the placement of the holiday will make travel and work plans very annoying. But this year, Sunday is perfect, my office is closed on Monday so it will definitely make the travel and traffic planning much easier on everyone this year. But enjoy it while you can. July 4 will be on a Monday next year (not the end of the world), but then a Wednesday, Thursday and Friday in the three years after that, which can always kind of suck for those of us working stiffs.

Fully Wallowed

Well, I ended up doing much the same thing on Wednesday night as I did after my first-night debacle last year at the cash tables at the MGM -- I essentially spent the few hours immediately following my bustout from the WSOP yesterday ratholed in my room, reflecting. More like wallowing, actually. I know Tom was asking in my comments yesterday, but it's hard for me to put a finger on exactly why I was so bummed about how things went in my first WSOP event in nearly two years. I think it's a lot of things, really. First and foremost, it's the result. I don't mind busting out far from the money in any poker tournament, WSOP or otherwise, and I know all too well how big of a role luck plays (in all its different forms in poker tournaments) in any tournament, especially no-limit and double-especially in a donkament like this that is chock full of players who are not going to be playing optimally in many cases or even close to it. It's one thing to be a poker pro, or to have a lifestyle that allows you to travel around the world, to spend weeks at a time in Vegas during World Series time, etc. If that were me, I guarantee you that busting out so badly on Wednesday would not have bothered me nearly so much. But for a guy like me, this is basically my once a year chance at making a big score, and wen you are as Type-A as I am, I tend to build this up as a result, which is just a horrible thing to do with the relatively little ability of anyone to overcome the luck factor in any one individual event.

So the result is the major thing that has me feeling so down about my performance in WSOP #8. But it's more than that. It's not just that I did not cash. My bigger issue is that I was never even a factor. I fell below the starting stack early on pretty much a bullshit play against the idiot to my left when I called his short-stack allin with my AQo and of course this time he had pocket Queens for the second out of three hands even though he had been allin with anything several times before that. The only time I was even ever able to get back above the starting stack was when I raised allin on the turn and my opponent folded at very long odds on the turn, and even that did not last long. It was just one of those days when ultimately my timing was completely and totally off. Just about every single time I got involved in a pot, I ended up getting pushed out by someone because ultimately my hand was not strong enough for the action I was putting in with it. On a couple of those occasions, I made things worse for myself by c-betting on a flop that was not great for my hand and probably was ok for my opponent. In one hand I raised on the flop when I flopped middle pair plus a flush draw -- getting probably a third of my stack in the pot on the process -- a third player very confidently pushed allin for a huge stack, and yet again I had to fold after correctly putting him on bottom set. I don't know that any of these were "bad plays" by me per se, but the end result after several hours of me betting into pots either preflop or post but then folding to action, I am left with the clear impression that my own aggression shortened my time in this event, pretty much dramatically. I don't feel like I pushed too hard in the individual poker decisions I was making, but in the aggregate that is exactly the feeling I am left with. I know that my game is an aggressive one, that I have had success with that strategy, and frankly that there is no other way to really win big mtt's without such an approach, but for whatever reason the way I implemented that strategy on Wednesday totally did not work.

Anyways, after a night of self-pity I do feel a bit better here on Thursday morning, and I'm already setting my sights on my next poker tournament. And it's a good one. I'm thinking that in a few hours I may head over to the Venetian today to play in the Deep Stack Extravaganza. Obviously I have not stepped foot in the Venetian since my big win last summer there, so it would be fun to go back for that reason, not to mention how much I love the poker room there in general as a place to hang and play this game that I love for the day. Thursday's event is a $340 buyin no-limit tournament, a bit less than my score last year in a $540 buyin tournament, but the same general idea and of course the same game in no-limit holdem. I guess I am not 100% sure on this yet, but when I looked at the DSE schedule late yesterday, this tournament immediately jumped out at me. All things equal, I would much rather play a series event like this, and one with the $340 buyin, than instead playing one of the $80 or $100 regularly daily tournaments that most of the casinos in town run. So, these plans could change, but right now I am liking the sound of returning to the scene of the crime of my biggest ever poker tournament win and trying to regain some of the good karma that flowed all over me almost a year ago in the Venetian poker room.

More updates as I have anything to report this week. I am at the MGM now and hoping to meet up with Columbo who is also staying here sometime today, and with CK as well who I was too busy wallowing to find yesterday in the cash games at the Pavillion at the Rio.

Las Vegas 2010 Here I Come

My return to the desert for another shot at poker fame and fortune in 2010 is official.

Departing Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Departs JFK (NYC) 7:30pm, Arrives LAS 10:43pm
Delta Air Lines Flight # 1029
New York, NY to Las Vegas, NV


Returning Sunday, June 6, 2010
Departs LAS 7:00am, Arrives JFK (NYC) 2:59pm
Delta Air Lines Flight #198
Las Vegas, NV to New York, NY


The plane tickets are bought. I originally looked for JetBlue of course -- easily the most comfortable, roomiest, generally best experience one can have with an airline -- but the times are just not great for me on either end. JetBlue could not get me out of New York City on a direct flight to Vegas on Tuesday the 1st anytime late in the day, and I am not planning to have to take a fourth day off from work that week just to be able to be in Vegas by early Wednesday morning. And coming back home, again JetBlue had a morning flight but not nearly as early as the one I will be on via Delta. As much fun as these trips have proven to be every year, I know that come Sunday I will really be missing Hammer Wife and my beautiful kids, and since in four annual trips to Vegas since 2006 I have yet to sleep a wink during my last night in the desert, the plan this time around will just be to pull my usual all-nighter on Saturday night, get on a plane very early on Sunday morning, close my eyes, and wake up on the runway at JFK, in plenty of time to be home for dinner and to spread some cheer among the people that really make me happiest in my life.

So, the plan will definitely be to play in WSOP Event #8, $1500 buyin no-limit holdem at noon local time on my first morning in Vegas. I'll get in fairly late at night on Tuesday, but several factors will help ensure that I register in time to actually be admitted to this event this year as opposed to last year's snafu (that ended up being the best thing that ever happened to me poker-wise). First, this year I'm heading out at the very beginning of the WSOP, so there will be less demand in general for the tournaments than there is likely to be near the end as the Main Event approaches and people are feeling the squeeze of their last chance to play for a coveted bracelet in 2010. Second (really this is a corollary of the first point), this year I will be playing during a weekday, and in one of the first of what are known at the Rio as the "donkaments" -- the $1000 and $1500 buyin tournaments, which are the lowest buyin available for any event at the World Series of Poker. Last year, the big problem that caused my planned WSOP event to sell out early was that it was a Saturday, and it was the very last donkament of the 2009 WSOP, so everyone who wanted one final shot at poker immortality came into town after work that Friday for their last great chance. This year, none of that should be an issue and I expect little trouble registering on Tuesday night for the Wednesday event.

Lastly, I am planning to stay at the Rio on my first night this year, just to make things even easier on myself. Last year my brother was already in town at the MGM Skyloft so I headed over there first to drop off my bags and clean up after long plane ride across the country, but this year I'm going to be arriving a day ahead of my brother so for my first night I will plan to get one of the nice Rio suites, which -- despite all the bad things I've heard said about the rooms there -- are actually quite nice if you are willing to upgrade a little bit. So rather than landing at 10pm, heading to the MGM, catching up with some friends, doing some shots, etc., and then eventually finding my way over to the Rio at 3am like last year, this time I'll plan to head straight to the Rio after I land, check in but then head right downstairs to get in to WSOP Event #8 with what I imagine will be little trouble or hassle. Famous last words I know, but that's the plan.

What I do after Wednesday is still very much up in the air. One of the reasons I picked this particular week is that, if I want to, I can play in the $1500 nlh donkament on Friday in WSOP Event #12 as well if I so choose. As it gets a little closer I will figure out if there are other tournament series in town at the time that I might want to play like the Venetian Deep Stack from last year.

For now I'm just excited to have the flights officially purchased, and I'll be calling the Rio later today to reserve a suite for around $80 to take care of my first night's accommodations in Sin City.

WSOP 2010

I've been strategizing about this for going on eight months now. Ever since chopping out the prize pool in the Venetian Deep Stack event last summer in Las Vegas, I've been pondering my chances of making my next poker trip to the desert in 2010. Having had a new baby a couple of months after last summer, I knew the odds were low that Hammer Wife would be readily willing to see me off again on my way to a weekend of gambling, smoking, drinking and other vices while she plays the unenviable role of single mom for half a week. As the months have ticked by, eventually rolling on into 2010, I knew it was getting close to time for me to start thinking about either shitting or getting off the pot, as my life is not such that I can just pack up and head out to Vegas on a whim one Friday like those of you on the West Coast and/or with unemcumbered family and other life circumstances. As I said, I've thought about it about a million times since then, but I just haven't had the nerve yet to bring it up to Hammer Wife, fearing not the severity of the reaction but more just the swiftness and the finality of knowing that I might not be visiting the land of the sand and sun for the first year since my initial foray at the WSOP back in 2006. The longer I didn't mention it, the longer I could go on believing that I might still actually be in Las Vegas this June, making another run at a five-figure score and partying like it's 1999 yet one more time.

And then a strange thing happened this weekend. We were talking about our plans for the annual Hammer family trip to the beaches of the Delmarva penninsula when, out of nowhere, Hammer Wife asked me "Are you going to go to Vegas again this summer?"

I was floored. I mean, she didn't have to bring it up at all, opting to take the same tack that I've been taking so far of just putting off the conversation for another day. At the least, I would've bet you dollars to donuts that if Hammer Wife were the one to first broach the subject, it would have been phrased more like "I hope your heart wasn't set on going to Vegas again this year", or at least "You weren't thinking of going to Vegas again this summer, were you?" or something like that. And I wouldn't have blamed her, really, given our family situation and the fact that I've been out in the desert the past four years running while my wife takes no similar trip herself (though it's been offered to her, many times). But instead, she said it just like I wrote it above. "Are you going to go to Vegas again this summer?" I could not believe it. And with that, the subject had been raised, and more than that, I already knew the outcome of the discussion given the way Hammer Wife phrased it to me from the beginning.

Amazingly, Hammer Wife is cool with me going to Las Vegas this year. I dare say even that she wants me to go.

I guess winning 50 large in Las Vegas last summer has its perks.

So the planning is just starting today, but I've already taken a quick look at the 2010 WSOP schedule to start focusing on a couple of dates. I've put a call in to my brother to try to convince him to join me for the third straight year, which hopefully he will do as having that guy around always makes a Vegas weekend about 100 times more fun and luxurious. Not having spoken with my brother or any other possible companions yet, my initial reaction is that the first week of June is looking like the early frontrunner, at least for me, World Series-wise. Check out this six-day stretch near the beginning of this year's WSOP schedule:

Wed, Jun 2nd
12:00 PM
3-Day Event Event #8: No-Limit Hold’em
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now $1,500

Thu, Jun 3rd
12:00 PM
3-Day Event Event #9: Pot-Limit Hold'em
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now $1,500

Thu, Jun 3rd
5:00 PM
3-Day Event Event #10: Seven Card Stud Championship
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now $10,000

Fri, Jun 4th
12:00 PM
3-Day Event Event #11: No-Limit Hold'em
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now $1,500

Fri, Jun 4th
5:00 PM
3-Day Event Event #12: Limit Hold’em
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now $1,500

Sat, Jun 5th
12:00 PM
4-Day Event Event #13: No-Limit Hold’em
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now

This event may take 4 playing days & 5 calendar days to complete depending on field size. $1,000

Sat, Jun 5th
5:00 PM
3-Day Event Event #14: 2-7 Draw Lowball (No-Limit)
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now $1,500

Sun, Jun 6th
5:00 PM
3-Day Event Event #15: Seven Card Stud Hi-Low Split-8 or Better Championship
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now $10,000

Mon, Jun 7th
12:00 PM
3-Day Event Event #16: No-Limit Hold’em / Six Handed
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now $1,500

Tue, Jun 8th
12:00 PM
3-Day Event Event #17: No-Limit Hold'em
Structure Sheet Pre-Register Now $5,000

I could see playing in Event #8, #9, #11, #13 or #17, all of which go off during that same one-week stretch. Clearly I will not be in Vegas for a full week, but I can probably pick almost any four-day stretch in that window and make it happen. There are plenty of other tournaments during the Series that I could play in, and I haven't even looked at the Deep Stack Extravaganza schedule for the Venetian to see when that is running during the WSOP as well.

Anybody else planning to be in Las Vegas during World Series time in June?

A New Era

It seriously is a new era for us poker bloggers.

Five years ago when I first started really getting into poker blogs and eventually poker blogging, we were basically a bunch of misfits and geeks who had a good time getting to know each other while talking and thinking poker. Very few of the guys heavy into poker blogging back in the day were really what I would consider to be any kind of truly serious players. Most people didn't play every day, many didn't play every week even, and there really weren't many stories out there of significant blogger scores in big poker tournaments. Hell, five years ago I don't even remember any of the blogger crew even playing in the World Series of Poker, let alone running deep. I'm sure it happened, don't get me wrong, but it was such a rarity to even have one of us playing in a big spot back in the day, which frankly is why I always loved what Al as able to do, and what Iggy did once back in the day, to organize the group to find a way to send some of us to the WSOP.

Things changed over the ensuing couple years, but very slowly. I remember when I cashed in the WSOP what, two full years ago now, there were at least four bloggers playing in the very event that I played in. Pauly cashed in a later event in the Series, and several other bloggers took a shot as well along the way in the various events. And I know at least three or four who played in the Main Event that year as well. If I had to guess, two years ago we probably had a good 20-25 blogger attempts in WSOP events. That would have been unheard of to all of us who had been blogging for a while already just a few years earlier, I assure you.

My how things have changed.

Just one week ago, sprstoner went on a sick run and finished 3rd in Event #13 of the WSOP. He took home a not-too-shabby 202 Large for his efforts. Two hundred two thousand dollars. Thousand dollars! I have to say, when stoner went on that run, I felt pride at "one of us" going the distance like that in such a big spot. I've never talked to stoner, I've never met him and I don't even know if I've ever commented on his blog (though I do enjoy reading it from time to time), but I still couldn't believe it. I remember when Ryan of absinthetics won the first event of the LA Poker Classic or whatever it was, probably four years ago now at this point. I think he won somewhere around 116k or something, it was sick. And this felt a whole lot like that, only moreso because it was a lot more money and it was at the WSOP (not to take anything away from Ryan, who won his event outright don't get me wrong). The point is, one of us in a large way was out there on the big stage, playing 3-handed for a m'er f'ing bracelet. When the eff did that happen?

And now look at what's happened just since then. CK, fresh off winning 2k from full tilt in the BBT4 Tournament of Champions, rips into the $1500 OE event at the WSOP (Event #25) and plows through more than 90% of the field on her way to her first WSOP cash. And then from Sunday to Tuesday this week, LJ set the blogger world seriously abuzz with an incredible run to m'er f'ing 10th place in WSOP Event #31, in $1500 HORSE. I freely admit it was the only thing I could think about last night. What a run. And in a lot of ways, this hits most of us a lot closer to home even than stoner's news from last week, despite the cash not being for as much from a pure dollars perspective.

Stoner is a blogger, he has a blog, he writes about poker sometimes, and he's played a few blonkaments with us over time. Maybe 5, maybe 10, probably not a whole lot more than that I would guess. But LJ, LJ is a whole different story. She is seriously one of us. She's played a million blogger tournaments and has played cash and chatted on the girly with most of you out there. She's come to multiple blogger get togethers and has met many of you personally, in Vegas or otherwise. She blogs (fairly) regularly and has taken the time to comment many, many times on many of your blogs about all different kinds of topics. She's a "homegrown" as anyone in our community these days when it comes right down to it, in a way that stoner is just not. And LJ just went and ran to 10th place in the WSOP.

I am speechless. Seriously. Those of you who have been around a while I imagine would have to agree with this. To think that in the span of three weeks we would have a 3rd place, a 39th place and a 10th place in WSOP events for people who are basically "regular bloggers", it is just mind-numbing to me. Has the skill level of our group as a whole actually been progressing all along to the point that the best of our group these days seriously are that much better than we were just a few years ago? Shit, a blogger in 3rd and another in 10th place? At the friggin World Series of Poker?!!

In about five years involved in this community, never did I ever think I'd see the day when I could run through 1300 donks on my way to a 27th place finish in the WSOP next week, and it would be pretty much ho-hum at this point. I would be whacking off but the rest of you would be sitting there wondering why I couldn't get past the final three tables in the WSOP and how I managed to donk off my stack that had been so much bigger an hour earlier.

This is going to be a strange visit to Vegas as compared to my last few pilgrimages to the WSOP. I'm sure I'll spend more time on this topic over the next week or so, but where my expectations would probably have been to cash and to make a Day Two for the first time in my life, now the bar has just been set so much higher, by people who admittedly have had more poker tournament success than me already as it is. But if bloggers can really run to the last ten of major WSOP events and be in position to run over the final table with a little bit of luck, then that changes everything, doesn't it?

Bloggers Score at the WSOP, Take II

LJ finished in 10th place tonight in WSOP Event #31, $1500 buyin HORSE. Holy shit!!

More on that tomorrow.

Live Bloggin the ToC

12:25 pm ET: It's over!! Ck pushes allin for 20k and actyper hesitates before calling with Q8o and a massive stack. An 8 on the turn and ck's WSOP Main Event dreams are history. JJok and actyper will win the 10k prize packages, and karmarules and ck31 take down the 2k scores. Congrats to all involved in the BBT4 and the Tournament of Champions!

12:20 pm ET: karmarules was gone in 4th place before I could even open up the window to see how she busted. It's actyper with a sick chip lead, jj at 46k and ck at 20k, with the top two finishers winning the 10k seats.

12:19 pm ET: I busted on the bubble in 5th place when I took ATs, easily the best hand I received in the past three hours, and ran it into a flopped set on a QT4 flop where I just couldn't put actyper on a Queen. actyper, jjok, ck31 and karmarules will share in the 24k in prizes being put up by full tilt for the BBT4 ToC.

12:14 pm ET: actyper has opened up another big chip lead, up at 79k to jj's 41k and my 39k. All five players remaining are reasonably close other than actyper, with even the last place stack sitting currently at 22k. It's still wide open folks.

12:06 pm ET: ck's AT turns broadway and bests big chipleader actyper's QQ for another double up for ck. as actyper drops out of the chip lead, one hand later he is allin with AK vs the A7 of qrs, and AK holds. qrs is out in 6th, and we are up to the cash bubble in the ToC. I'm still at 39k, but that is now 4th of 5 after all the sucking out going on at this table.

12:06 pm ET: ck doubles up again with 55 against kickyourace's KQs. kick is out, we are down to 6. actyper remains out in front with 72k, and I am still second with 43k, with jj right behind me at 40k.

11:55 pm ET: Fourth break is here. Here are the chip counts:

actyper -- 60,230
hoyazo -- 43,423
jjok -- 41,032
karmarules -- 29,402
qrs1 -- 26,172
kickyourace -- 10,624
ck31 -- 9117

Still anybody's game as I've been saying. Blinds will resume at 800-1600 with a 200 ante after the 5 minute break.

11:52 pm ET: I just took out smboatdrinks after karmarules sucked out against him with Q9o over boat's AK. Down to 7 left, and my stack rises slightly to 40k, still 3rd place of 7 remaining.

11:50 pm ET: actyper's KJs outlasts iaatg's A5o allin preflop and iaatg is the first player out of the BBT4 ToC final table. Meanwhile, actyper's stack has swelled to the large chip lead, sitting at 73k while jj remains in 2nd place with 41k and me with 37k. Break time coming up again shortly.

11:37 pm ET: Massive postflop suckout by ck after smboatdrinks correctly instacalled ck's flop push with 93 on a 972 flop. CK immediately nailed a second 7 on the turn to double through smboatdrinks. Still all 9 of us remaining at the final table, with me at 38k in chips, back in 3rd place behind jj and actyper.

11:32 pm ET: I drop to 34k in my biggest chip loss of the night when my 33 runs into the final table short stack's AA. That puts me in 4th of 9, behind jj and actyper in the mid 40s, and now SmBoatdrinks at 35k as well. Still anyone's game, but if the short stack did not pick up AA again at the final table I would be ok with that too. ;)

11:28 pm ET: Heffmike is out on the final table bubble and we are down to 9 remaining. Unfortunately it was once again jj who recaptured the chip lead from me when his TT bested heffmike's AJ, putting jj now in first with 49k and me in 2nd place as the final table begins with 41k in chips.

11:22 pm ET: I just eliminated F-Train when he reraised me allin and I opted to call with my A9o after seeing F-Train push allin a few times in the past half hour or so. He flipped up A8o and my kicker held to bump me up to 42k and back into the chip lead. Seconds later, smokkee lost his first race of 2009 and we are down to 10 players remaining. I am in the lead with 43k, with actyper in 2nd with 39k and jj at 38k. Still anyone's game, but we are now just one player away from the ToC final table.

11:16 pm ET: Shabazz Jenkins is out in 13th place after KQ flopped a boat against him allin preflop. 12 runners left, all of my top 5 in odds are now eliminated. I've been stealing like a banshee, haven't had a good hand in over an hour at this point, and am happy to be clinging to my third place position with still 27k in chips. jj and actyper still each hold 37k for the top two spots on the current leaderboard.

11:07 pm ET: Update: I understand that stoner has just busted in 3rd place in WSOP Event #13, when his AK could not beat KK and he loses to the tough loss to swallow 3-handed. That said, I'm expecting that the $202,000 stoner just won will help him to swallow the loss, at least just a little bit. Congratulations sprstoner!!!

11:03 pm ET: sprstoner is down to 3 left in the $2500 nlh WSOP event #13. And I have lost my lead in the BBT4 ToC, as jjok calls down jamyhawks allin push with a short stack and with jj's 88. The 88 held and jj moves to 36k vs my 29k, and as I write this, actyper eliminates Snarf as well, jumping his own stack up to 35k and placing me now in third place.

10:55 pm ET: Third break, down to 16 players remaining in the ToC. As mentioned, most of the heavyweights from the BBT4 leaderboard have been eliminated at this point, although for the first time in a couple of hours I have a guy right on my ass at the top of the leaderboard. I am still in first, with 29,935 in chips as we break for 5 minutes, but jj has now climbed to 29,070, while actyper is a close third with 26,597 in chips. It's still anybody's game, but obviously I can't complain about where I'm at with just 12 spots left until the money positions in this badboy.

10:50 pm ET: Whoa! Somehow I missed this, but Jordan is also gone, out in 21st place, so that is yet another of the "Tier I" guys that won't be winning WSOP packages in the BBT4 ToC. The only guy left that I had in that first group is Shabazz Jenkins, who currently sits in 13th place out of 16 remaining.

10:48 pm ET: I elim LJ when I make the mandatory call of her short-stack raise preflop when I hold 66 utg. I hold against A5s and move to 32k, with 2nd place still jj at around 22k in chips.

10:41 pm ET: And another early favorite goes down. Chad is out when he pushed allin from the small blind with K2s, and was instacalled by Vinnay who woke up in the big blind with QQ. Chad is out in 23rd place, and Tony Eusebio goes just a minute later leaving 21 blonkeys remaining. in the ToC. My 28k is now ahead of jj in 2nd place with around 22k in chips.

10:33 pm ET: And another early favorite bites the dust. 1ueensup1 is out of the Tournament of Champions in 25th place of 44 who started 2 and a half hours ago. I didn't see how it happened, but it doesn't really matter I guess. So far TJ and Queensup are both out in the top half of the field, leaving this a wide open race for the 4 wsop prize packages and the two 10k seats. Meanwhile I just raised with, won and showed my fourth hammer of the night. Eat it.

10:26 pm ET: Over 30k and still comfortably in first place after knocking out mclarich who pushed the turn with just an oesd and two unders on a K89 flop (he held 67). I could not find a reason to fold 97o to his stack that is barely a dent in mine, and I dodged 8 outs once for the big jump. Second place is now smboatdrinks at around 15k, so I am still sitting pretty way ahead of the pack with 25 runners left.

10:14 pm ET: Up over 25k as my Q9 outflops ck's TT and I withstand one bet from her before we both wisely check down the river. With 30 runners remaining, I'm just over 25k with second place (still ck) just a shade over 14k. Meanwhile I am out of the 40k per my earlier post. Right now it's just the ToC open on my pc, though that is likely to change as this thing wears on.

9:55pm ET: Second break, and I sit with 21,730 chips, still good for first place with 32 bloggers remaining in the BBT4 Tournament of Champions, about 4k ahead of second place which is ck31 at the moment. My stats through 159 hands in the ToC are pretty effing amazing if I don't say so myself -- I have won an astounding 24 hands preflop (15% of the total hands dealt at my table!), plus another 2 on the flop, 2 on the river, and an equally incredible 10 out of 12 showdowns, which is a testament to my having had AA and KK already tonight in addition to making two straights and a flush all in the first two hours of this thing. That means a total of -- get this -- 23% of the total hands dealt at my table have been won by me, and this at an event that's had 7 or more players at each table throughout and which has been mostly 9-handed. I'm suuuuure that will continue as the ToC rolls on!

9:46pm ET: I just elim'd pushmonkey when he pushed allin on a reraise with what turned out to be AJo against my TT. I got some chips from Snarf in the process as well, but could not get him to commit fully when I flopped a set on a scary JT9 board. The 8 on the turn prevented me from betting, but luckily I held against pm's flopped TPTK and I shot up over 22k in the process.

9:42pm ET: I just took another sickass beat to get essentially eliminated from a poker tournament, this time in the 40k where I got allin with QQ against 77 and A8s, and watched 77 make its set on the turn to send me essentially to the rail. It's hard to believe I still play this game sometimes. Although, I did just double back up and am now only about a third of the average stack with about 200 runners left until the money. Meanwhile, in the ToC I am just over 18k and still in 1st place wth 33 runners remaining.

9:24pm ET: Just elim'd dueyv when he bet half the pot on the flop and I called with an oesd. My oesd filled on the turn, he checked to me and I opted to bet out 2/3 of the pot, which duey quickly raised allin for another 2k more. Holding the nuts, I called of course, expecting to need to fade some outs to a boat, but instead duey showed ATo unimproved and was drawing dead. That bounced me up to 14k and second place, and then the very next hand saw Aposec push allin on a reraise to my pf raise from middle position, which I felt I had to call with AKo. He showed AJo, and somehow another favorite held up, vaulting me over 16k in chips and into first place on the leaderboard with 35 left out of 44 runners who started about 90 minutes ago.

9:20pm ET: Over 10k and into 4th place overall after F-Train instacalled me on the river with his 77, third pair on the board, and lost to my pocket Aces. At the moment the Asshat Frat Crew is representing in a really big way, with Chad in 1st, Don in 3rd and myself in 4th. Goooooo crew!!!!

9:04pm ET: Booom Tuscaloosa Johnny becomes the first of the Tier 1 favorites to be eliminated from the BBT4 Tournament of Champions. TJ flopped bottom set, but lost to flopped broadway. That's brutal. But what a run for TJ, over not just this BBT series but the last two of them overall.

8:56pm ET: First break. I have 8455 in chips, good for fourth place after 55 minutes of play. Meanwhile, at the second break of the 40k, I am 274 out of 480 with just under 5k in chips. Chad is in the final 20 of the Sunday Brawl on full tilt, already in place to win well into the four digits, and sprstoner is in 3rd place with 5 players remaining in WSOP event #13!

8:52pm ET: Up to 8600 in chips after I turned 12 outs, called a 2/3 pot bet against Aposec based purely on implied odds, and then rivered the nut flush. I raised aposec's river bet and he correctly folded with the runner-runner diamond flush showing on the board. I am currently in 2nd place on the leaderboard, but right above me in first with more than twice the starting stack is Chad, who I already had at 6 to 1 as one of the favorite to win this thing. Love that he has that sized stack early.

8:40pm ET: I just nabbed the rest of lucko's 540 remaining chips when he pushed allin ahead of me when I held QQ. He flipped T9s and somehow the biatches held, bumping me over 6000 chips for the first time and into 6th place and simultaeously eliminating one of the toughest players from the ToC field.

8:25pm ET: I got down to 4100 before caling a blind steal from lucko on the button with my K2s. I flopped two more 2s and just smooth called two bets from lucko on the flop and turn, including when I made quad ducks with the case 2 on the turn. On the river I bet out big for the full pot, and lucko called for most of his stack with 73o for the rivered boat. Up to 5900 just like that, good for 10th place out of 43 left as Julkeus has become the first player eliminated from the ToC.

8:07pm ET: First fucking of the night came early, and I managed to minimize the damage in any event. I called a 2/3 pot bet on the flop with a hidden flush draw, made my flush on the turn, but failed to get it allin thank god. The river made a 6-outer boat for aposec and I could have easily been allin there with a massive lead for the early double-up as my opponent held A and was n0t about to fold. Down to 4700 from 5000 starting stack in the very earlygoing.

8:02pm ET: Stole first hand dealt to me on the night with a 3x open-raise from middle position. That's always a good feeling.

8:01pm ET: Shuffle up and deal! I got Al, Snarf, Aposec, duey, F-Train and shipfaced at my starting table. GL to everyone who is playing!

7:48pm ET: Well so much for my nice stack in the 40k. QQ < KK on a Ten-high flop vs. a short stack took care of that one. Ahhh typical, dirty, poker. T minus 10 minutes on the BBT4 ToC!

7:32pm ET: Sprstoner (Shawn Glines) is in the final 8 at WSOP event #14!

7:26pm ET: Just doubled up early in the full tilt 40k, which started at 7pm ET. Called preflop raise with T9s and flopped flush, eventually getting the lone Ace of the flush suit allin on the turn and fading the 8 outs on the river. Gotta love full tilt mtt players.

7:05pm ET: T minus 55 minutes until the BBT4 ToC. Meanwhile, sprstoner is down to the final 10 of WSOP event #14.

5:35pm ET: 44 runners and counting have signed up for tonight's BBT4 Tournament of Champions. Get out here and let's see if we can break 50!!

Just kidding. This is a freeroll and you are only registered if you "earned" your way in by "winning" a BBT4 tournament over the past three months. But you can still come out and watch the junk-kickery!

4:20pm ET: Well, the day is finally here. T minus 3 hours and 40 minutes as I write this until the biggest day of the year in poker blogdom, as far as I'm concerned. Two lucky bloggers will walk way after tonight's BBT4 Tournament of Champions with $10,000 prize packages to the 2009 World Series of Poker Main Event. Two more of the 44 runners in tonight's freeroll will snag $2,000 WSOP prize packages for their efforts, with just worse than 1 in 20 odds for everyone to win some kind of cash for the WSOP this summer.

Over the past few days I have done a little writeup on each of the 43 other runners who will be joining me tonight at 9pm ET on full tilt. You can go and read those in my previous three posts before this one. Here is a quick recap of my odds of each player to win, in alpha order as best as I could do in my current state:

125Will -- 20 to 1
1Queensup1 -- 5 to 1
actyper -- 23 to 1
AlCantHang -- 35 to 1
Aposec72 -- 28 to 1
Asphnxma -- 30 to 1
Bone Daddy -- 19 to 1
Buddydank -- 14 to 1
chiefroger -- 35 to 1
ck31 -- 32 to 1
columbo -- 16 to 1
cracknaces -- 7 to 1
Dr. Pauly -- 15 to 1
dueyv9 -- 28 t 1
ElSnarfGrande -- 10 to 1
heffmike -- 9 to 1
highonpoker -- 6 to 1
hoyazo -- 15 to 1
iaatg6296 -- 14 to 1
inguri -- 35 to 1
jamyhawk -- 22 to 1
Jimdniacc -- 17 to 1
jjok -- 27 to 1
Joanne1111 -- 15 to 1
Julkeus -- 20 to 1
karmarules -- 28 to 1
kickyourace -- 24 to 1
lucko21 -- 11 to 1
mclarich -- 24 to 1
Miami Don -- 11 to 1
nightranger -- 22 to 1
pushmonkey72 -- 35 to 1
pvanharibo -- 15 to 1
qrs1 -- 20 to 1
rake feeder -- 29 to 1
rubbishat -- 40 to 1
Shabazz Jenkins -- 9 to 1
ShipFaced -- 18 to 1
SmBoatDrinks -- 18 to 1
smokkee -- 12 to 1
tgrazz -- 33 to 1
Tony Eusebio 20 to 1
Tuscaloosa John -- 7 to 1
Vinnay -- 25 to 1

I'm looking forward to starting up the action in just over 3 and a half hours. In the meantime, go think about sprstoner who is right around average with just 20 runners left in WSOP Event #13, the $2500 nlh tournament that started with 1088 runners and pays out $506,000 and change to the winner.

Einhorn the Whippersnapper, and Exploring the Stop and Go

Watching this Tuesday's WSOP coverage on ESPN -- only the second time I have done so this year btw since televised poker became so ungodly boring -- I was cracked up a bit by Mr. David Einhorn, who was at one of the featured tables with two other well-known pros. I forget their names, I wasn't watching that closely, but one guy was the hispanic guy with the same name as his father, and I think the other pro there was none other than Chris Moneymaker himself. Anyways if you can't tell, I wasn't that interested in the coverage itself -- which to me is at its absolute low point ever as far as substance goes and has really degenerated into just showing some allins and not even any interesting hands anymore -- but I was very interested in seeing this David Einhorn for the first time. Although I knew he had finished in the final two tables of the WSOP Main Event a couple of years ago, I had never actually seen what he looks like before, and I have a bit of personal involvement with Mr. Einhorn.

You see, David Einhorn runs hedge fun Greenlight Capital, and has been very successful for some 10 years at that. Late last November, Einhorn spoke at the Third Annual Value Investing Congress in New York, and in his speech, he mentioned out of nowhere really that he thought Lehman Brothers was a good short sell candidate. Mind you, this was with the stock trading just over $60 a share. Many people at Lehman paid no attention to this, or didn't notice it at all -- despite being a large global investment bank, one of the funny things I always throught about working there is that once you leave the trading floor, most of the employees don't know (or want to know) the first thing about finance or investing -- but I saw the story and read it with interest, mostly because I thought this guy was some kind of dick. Back then I still believed confidently in Lehman management, and when they told me Einhorn's claims were the baseless, self-interested whines of just another short-seller, I took them at their word.

As the months wore on, though, Lehman shares continued to weaken, then Bear Stearns collapsed, and all the while this little prick David Einhorn kept shelling LEH shares every chance he could get in the media. After a while, the head-butting between Einhorn and Lehman senior management became quite well known, and by this past summer, even the New York Times was reporting on the story. Obviously there is a picture of him right there in that article online, but I don't recall seeing this picture when I read up on what he had to say then. In my mind's eye, I pictured an old, stodgy man with white hair and a red hankie sticking out of the breast pocket of his blue pinstripe suit. Anyways, suffice it to say, most Lehman Brothers employees over the past year or so came to really hate David Einhorn, and I can't say that I was any different, even once I had accepted much of what he had been saying as true, which I am happy to say happened for me long before it happened for most Lehman employees.

Anwyays so there I am on Tuesday night, I'm flipping through the tv on my way to watch the Mets hopefully blow another game (they won actually, now only one game behind the Phillies in the loss column), and I see the WSOP coverage so I stop for a minute. And before I even know what's going on, there is Lon McEachern introducing David Einhorn at this featured table. And I'll be damned if that guy isn't some little kid. I mean, a young whippersnapper like that is the guy that hurt Lehman shares this year more than any single other individual (other than maybe Lehman CEO Dick Fuld himself, but that's another story)? I watched in amazement, hoping to see him get his child-looking ass busted out on some donkey play just to make myself feel good, but alas it was not meant to be. He was behind and drawing dead on a couple of occasions in this Tuesday night's episode, most notably a hand where he had a flush draw and two middle cards on a raggy-looking flop against Chris Moneymaker, but both times he managed to sniff out the situation and get out with a minimal loss. I may actually have to tune in next week just to see if they'll show me his bustout hand, although my sense is that the likelihood of seeing him again is probably fairly low, and given how boring the tv coverage is these days, I doubt I'll be back. But actually getting to see what a young guy he is -- he is just a kid, really -- was quite an eye-opener. To think that someone who looks like that could see through the opaqueness of Lehman Brothers' books and their strategies so easily, and so long ago at that, is really a telling statement about a lot of things I think. I still think there is a special place in hell for these guys who go around shorting stocks and then talking them down as much as they possibly can after taking a large short position -- probably somewhere on the same level of hell as the Don't Pass bettors at the craps table -- but I guess I have to give the little boy some credit for being able to figure this out and for sticking his neck out there and going public with his convictions long before anyone else in the marketplace was saying boo about Lehman or any of the other large investment banks.

So on to today's topic, which is maybe a simple point but one which I am writing down here because it's something I know I need to focus on better myself in the poker tournaments I play. Arnold Snyder is a big fan of the stop and go, a move which I rarely if ever use in my own tournament play. Snyder basically explains that a preflop allin move from a shortish stack is actually perceived by many larger stacks as a fairly weak move, and one that they are often likely to call with a somewhat wide range of hands. Snyder far and away favors the stop and go, where you just call preflop when you have a shortish stack, and then push allin on the flop no matter what falls.

Now, it's not like the stop and go is some new move that Arnold Snyder has thought up all on his own. Of course it's been written about and talked about and used by successful poker players for years and years. Centuries even, maybe. But, it's not something which I myself have incorporated into my game at all. And I know I need to. Because I've seen several successful tournament players use this ploy on tv to much success, Arnold Snyder believes in it as well, and I personally know at least one or two guys I play with somehwat regularly myself who swear by the stop and go, in the right spot at the right time.

Snyder himself gives a very convincing argument for the stop and go, especially from out of position, essentially arguing that sometimes you are actually "giving free cards" to your big-stacked opponent when you reraise his preflop raise allin and you are not on a particularly large stack. Say you have a hand like pocket Tens or AK, you have 50k in chips late in a large-field mtt where the average stack is more like 100 to 150k. So you're pretty short, and a guy with 200k in chips raises a standard amount -- say to 18k or something -- from middle position, and you're in the small blind. If you push allin now, it will be 32k more for this big stack to call into a pot with 74k in chips in it, assuming 3k-6k blinds at this point in the event, so he is probably going to call with almost any hand that he would have put in that first raise with before the flop. And now the guy is going to have five cards with which to hit his AK or his set of 6s against your TT.

Now think about what would happen if you just flat called his 18k raise preflop. Yet this only leaves you with 32k behind into a pot of 45k. but say the flop comes down Q94 with two to a suit, a fairly standard flop. Now you push allin from the small blind, and even though this player has a nice stack of still around 180k, does he really want to call off another 32k -- more than a sixth of his remaining stack -- with just pocket 6s, or AK? Probably not. And that right there is the strength of the stop and go play. When you push (on just about any flop, mind you), he is likely to lay down most hands in this spot, and your stack will grow from 50k to 92k. That right there is a huge move for you, getting you much closer to average in a spot where you really need to add to your stack pretty desperately, and you did it in a spot where had you pushed allin before the flop, you would have gotten called and given the 66 or AK a much better chance to draw out on you.

As I said, I don't mean to suggest that this is anything earth-shattering at all, as I know it's not, but it is something which I personally do not use nearly enough in my own game. I am much more apt to push in that spot before the flop, get called, and then go to sleep muttering about my bad luck of losing a race or, if I'm playing on pokerstars especially, getting 2-outered at the river to lose to a set. In reality, I can probably increase my chances of survival and of chipping up in spots where I really need to chip up if I raise a little less and call a little more before the flop when I do not hold a big pair, and then just push in more or less blind on any flop that falls. Snyder considers the preflop push here giving up your post-flop utility in a hand, and in his eyes doing so is almost always a mistake. Giving your opponent a chance to fold after the flop where there is very little chance he will fold before the flop is the much smarter, more effective move from a chip utility perspective in many cases.

This is something you can expect to see me do tonight at the final table of the Mookie. For those of you who do not know, tonight is the last night for Waffles to make good on his self-challenge to surpass LJ in annual Mookie winnings, and although Waffles has made a good go of it, in order to be able to catch LJ at all tonight, he is going to need something like 80 people to play in the Mookie. 80 people. It's doable of course, but absent the BBT this is not a number we have seen too many times even for the greatest blogger event of the week. So what I'm hoping to see tonight -- and frankly I would enjoy an 80-person Mookie in its own right probably as much as I would enjoy Waffles having one more longshot of a chance to win his bet -- is as many of you as possible come out to donate your $10 to the Give-Waffles-a-Chance prize pool for the Mookie. Maybe you have never played a blogger event before and have been reading here for a while and have always kicked around the idea. Maybe you've played many times but have kinda gotten away from the blogger events since the last BBT ended. Maybe you think you might miss the first 20 or 30 minutes due to work or whatever but otherwise wouldn't mind playing with your blogger friends tonight. Whatever the situation, I urge you to come out tonight and get that field size up as high as we can to Give Peace Waffles a Chance. As always, the Mookie is on full tilt at 10pm ET, under the "Tournament" and then "Private" tabs, and the password as always is "vegas1". For $11 you can know you made a difference in the life of one of the game's great ambassadors, and the Mookie is basically always guaranteed to bring fun and enjoyment to everyone's life to boot. So please come out if you can. I know I will be there.

Math Shootout Take II, and All Good Things Come to an End

Yes, I'm sure most of you are already well aware of this but everyone's favorite poker dwarf Iggy did bust from the World Series of Poker Main Event, I guess it was late on Friday, several hours in to Day Four of the world's largest poker tournament. As the title says, all good things must come to an end, and I guess in that sense I am getting over it after a few days to relax. In the spirit of vengeance against the WSOP gods for not spiking Iggy his two-outer or whatever he needed on the river once he was forced to push his last 100k in more or less blind under the gun, I did not take one look at any WSOP updates over the weekend after Iggy busted. Not one. I don't know who busted, I don't know who's alive, I don't know who made the final table or if there even is a final table yet. I don't even know if Hellmuth busted and went crazy on everyone yet. I imagine I will check in for all the updates sometime today, but for now I am mired in the bliss of WSOP ignorance following the elimination of Iggy somewhere just north of 400th place, a finish in the top 7th percentile or so of one of the greatest minefields in the history of tournament poker.

So don't forget, Mondays at the Hoy is back tonight on full tilt, and this will be the second MATH tournament that will feature full tilt's new Shootout format. We're once again going to be playing shorthanded tables to keep the action going and the energy high, and we will for the second straight week play down to winners at each of the full shorthanded tables, and then those winners will meet up at the final table for a balls-out battle royale to see who can be the back-to-back winner that it will take down this week's Hoy title. We had a very respectable 23 runners come out for the first Shootout event last Monday, and I would say that the tournament went over very well and seems to have been quite well received as the shootout structure really seemed to spice things up a bit for all the players. Hopefully this means we can get a nice turnout going again tonight, as a shootout really works better with the more people involved, at least at the relatively low levels of participation that we tend to see outside of the BBT-enabled events. So come on out and play -- you know how much we love first-timers at Mondays at the Hoy as well, so even if you've never played with the group before -- the tournament goes off tonight at 10pm ET on full tilt, the buyin remains at $26, and the password as always is "hammer".

OK I can't take the suspense....I'm going to go and read up on the rest of this weekend' WSOP Main Event action now. See you tonight for Mondays at the Hoy on full tilt!

The Magical Run Continues

Blahblahblahblah. Blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah. Blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah. Blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah.

That's what the past three and a half years of drivel I've posted seems like to me right now compared to this. Our beloved little man Iggy is still alive heading into Day Four of the WSOP Main Event!!!! As of Friday's action, there are 474 people left out of a field of 6844 entrants. Per Pokernews, Iggy ended Thursday's action with 160k in chips. By very rough estimate, Iggy looks to be about 92 spots from the bottom, or 376th out of 474 remaining.

Play ended on Thursday night apparently just before 1:30am Vegas time. Wow. That means they played 13 1/2 straight hours of what is -- believe me -- high-pressure, high-tension no-limit holdem. I've gone for that length of time a few times before, but never with anywhere near the stakes or the pressure that every single player in that room understands right now. I remember just playing twelve hours down through that horrible bubble period -- an extended one of which Iggy also had to endure at this year's Main Event last night -- in my WSOP cash a year ago, and my back and my head were killing me after just six hours in that stuffy room, in those uncomfortable chairs, and with all that tension going on. To play for three straight days like this, mega-session after mega-session, with the pressure only increasing with every increase in the blinds and antes, I am just beside myself with excitement for the little guy.

If my calculations are correct, 20k starting chips times 6844 starting stacks, divided by 474 remainng stacks means the average chipstack is around 288k. So Iggy is sitting with about 55% of the average stack, which ain't bad considering that he's already made it to the money positions in the WSOP ME this year.

The first player to be eliminated on Friday, which will be 474th place, will get $27,020 for his or her efforts. That is awesome, considering that Iggy could bust right out of the gate on Friday and still win nearly 30k for what was just a few hundred dollar investment as I recall before Iggy won his ME seat in the large multi-seat ME guarantee on pokerstars I think it was. Quite a return on investment.

The next jump in the money payouts is to $28,950, but that won't happen until the player who finishes in 414th place. So it's gonna be $27,020 for the next several eliminations, and believe me when I say, having played deep in many large mtt's in my life (admittedly nothing like the WSOP ME), the elims are likely to come fast and furious in the early action on Friday as the short stacks will really be feeling the pressure at this point to get moving due to the large blinds and antes. I believe Iggy is sitting on an M of around 14 if I recall correctly, so he's not in desperation mode yet per se, but there are a good 100 players or so left who have Ms of less than 15, so believe me when I say the action will be hot and heavy right from the getgo among the short stacks today.

Wondering when the big money starts rolling for these 2008 WSOP ME finishers? Well, what's "big money" to you? 50k? 99th place will receive $51,466. Or is big money 100k? That is 63rd place, which pays $115,800. The 27th player left to be eliminated will be the first to cross the quarter-million mark ($257,334), 12th place is where the half-mil boundary is crossed ($591,869), and unlike last year, not the entire final table will win a million from the prizepool. 9th place this year will pay a paltry $900,670, with the rest of the final table each winning more than a million dollars for their efforts, topping out of course with the first prize of more than $9 million, the second-largest payout for any poker tournament, ever.

Here is the final table and the payouts:

1 $ 9,119,517 -
2 $ 5,790,024 -
3 $ 4,503,352 -
4 $ 3,763,515 -
5 $ 3,088,012 -
6 $ 2,412,510 -
7 $ 1,769,174 -
8 $ 1,286,672 -
9 $ 900,670

So dear old Iggy outlasted 1307 runners on Day 3 of this year's Main Event. Someone named Jeremy Joseph is the current chip leader, entering Day 4 on Friday with 1,470,000 in chips. Several big-name pros were eliminated on Day 3 to go along with the masses who had already been among the 5500 or so knockouts in the first couple days of play, with names like Gus Hansen, Phil Hellmuth and Johnny Chan still lurking among the 474 players remaining, and of course our little dwarf.

The action on Day 4 will start Friday at 1pm local time, an hour later than the usual noon starting time since the action ran so late into the evening yesterday as the bubble bursting took longer than anticipated. I don't know about you, but I'm having trouble thinking about almost anything else while I know Iggy is alive and kicking in this thing, so I will be following Iggy's specific chipcount on Pokernews' chipcounts pages all this afternoon and evening. Hopefully he can get some big hands early and double up to give him the wiggle room he's going to need to survive another 12 hours of this shit today. Lord knows I will be pulling for the little tyke.

Iggy = My Hero

So I was going to do another post like yesterday's and just write all about my trials and tribulations last night in the week-long mtt bender to top all mtt benders. But you know what, the simple fact is how could you guys care about the pointless pokerings of a bozo like me when Iggy has lasted to Day 3 of the WSOP Main Event! For those of you who have never had the pleasure of meeting him, Iggy is one of those genuinely good guys that no one in their right mind could not like. Especially for an A-Lister! And one of the many secrets about Iggy that you might not know is that he is actually a very solid poker player, and even in tournaments the little man can hold his own. Anyone who's played in the various BBT series with him if nothing else will know how easily Iggy can kick it up into high gear, and yet he also understands the importance of playing tight early. For this reason I had picked Iggy and Lucko to last the furthest of the four bloggers in our group in the ME, and with Loretta busting on Day Two, this leaves just Iggy as the last blogger standing. I'm lovin it.

Anything else I would have to say today just pales in comparison to Iggy lasting to Day Three of the Main Event. The Main Fucking Event!! Iggy!!! Just. Awesome.

Also awesome was Weak Player, another great guy I have met a few times out in Vegas, reraising me allin on the flop with just a nut flush draw in the Mookie, me calling allin from ahead and then the river suckout to eliminate me I think about halfway through Hour 2. But then I keep reminding myself of how many suckouts I have come up with in big spots over the past few days that have helped me to make a lot of cold hard cashish this week, and it's all good. Plus at least Weak had the good sense to raise with his hand instead of calling off with it like most bloggers seem to enjoy. In any event, that's how my night ended early in the Mook, what else is new.

Similarly, in the Dookie PLO Omaha event, eventually won by Mr. Aussie Millions jeciimd, I was quickly reminded of why I had stayed away from playing this tournament over the past few weeks: the suckouts. I am not sure that I've ever been eliminated from the Dookie in other than a suckout, almost always by hands that had no business even being in the pot at the time of the turn of the key card. Last night was no exception, I got in ahead and lost. $10 PLO with blonkeys though, in a way I've come to see that buyin as me paying for the suckouts and the comraderie, not to have the best hand hold up. I'm cool with that.
JJ < TT ai pf 2 hours in to stars 5050. cashed ftp 5050 but went out right after bubble burst.

Ahh, why not just mention the rest. So beat by the river flush draw filling in the Mookie. Suckout-eliminated by not one but two bad beats laid by the same player in the Dookie. JJ < TT allin preflop to eliminate me from the pokerstars 50-50 when the man flopped a boat of T44, in a spot where I would have had my first nice stack of the night about two hours deep. And I played the full tilt 5050 as well, cashing once again as my luck in that tournament just continues to persist. Funny enough, I ended up busting on the bubble in this thing in my attempt to use the bubble for a quick jump when I pushed allin against a guy I read as being weak. I was right about him being weak, but of course he could not lay down the Jackace and it held up to knock me out (natch). But, some other shitheads had busted on that same hand as well, and since I had more chips heading into the hand, I ended in 152nd place when 153 spots paid out of 1070 or so in the field. So another nice run there, but otherwise Wednesday was a night of bad beatage for me. After the performances I've had this week though, like I said, it doesn't faze me.

That's all I got for now. Lots of fun hands to post about, but Iggy has stolen the show and stolen my heart for the day by lasting to Day Three. How can you not love that shit?

Riverchasers tonight, 9pm ET on full tilt. Password as always is "riverchasers". I should be good n liquored up by that time as my mtt bender heads into the home stretch here tonight. I'm also hoping to hit up the nightly 35k, the 32k, maybe the 65k again, and both 50-50s if I am able tonight in addition to another deep run at the Riverchasers. See you then!