Pechorin

Vegas Recollections, part 3: pros and cons

by Pechorin on 09/08/07

Wow, I'm a pretty big slacker when it comes to updating the blog. Of course, I've been traveling, so that explains some of it. So, I'll recap what's happened recently.

EPT Barcelona: I got there, got drunk, stayed hung over for two days or so. Luckily, I started the main event on Day 1B so the hangover was only a nuisance rather than an all-out incapacitating "I feel like grim death please kill me now" deal. I doubled up the second hand when my opponent thought bet-shoving the river with a 9-hi flush was a good idea on a AJTTK board (I had KK). Then, I blasted off most my stack shoving top-top into a set (I situation where I could often fold, because the guy was kind of a nit), ground it back up to average, and finally lost a flip for a 2.5x average pot. Whatever, AK is the nuts preflop for 50 BBs (especially against a Scandinavian).

A few days later, I played an 1100 euro tournament and got 6-outered for a big pot early on. Standard. I was also nervous as hell because my boy Adam Junglen was at the final table of the Main Event. About every time I got utg+1 I'd go over to the Main Event area and check up on Adam (besides, who wants to play UTG or UTG+1 at a 9-handed table anyway?). Big congrats to him for getting 6th, and congrats to Funkii for 3rd.

Amsterdam: This is one cool-ass city. I probably don't need to elaborate. Big thanks to Hein for putting me up here and showing me around town. Good times. I also ground out 10k or so hands 6-tabling 5-10 on FTP, and actually showed some profit while here! Maybe I am finally becoming non-horrible at non-cake cash games!

London: I'm heading to London later tonight to play the WSOP Europe. I don't know if I'm really going to play it, because a couple things have to work out. Specifically, I have to sell around 35% more of myself, as I wouldn't take a shot at 100/200 NL without some backing (unless it was the best game ever), so I probably shouldn't take a shot at a 20k tournament with 100% of my action. I also have to find a way to get 10k GBP in cash, hopefully there will be people willing to trade for online money. But from what I hear, it will be the softest $20k tournament around, so I should try to play it.

So yeah, over the course of the WSOP I played with some pros and celebrities. Here are my impressions of them, in no particular order:

Jennifer Tilly: Wow, she played pretty weird/spewy at my table in the $3k event. Most noticeably, she donked (i.e. called preflop from a blind, then bet out the flop) into multiple people waaaaay too light. For instance, 33 into 4 (!!!) people on something like a 668 flop.

Chris Ferguson: Seemed like a very, very good tournament player, albeit a tight one. Seemed to pick up on things and make reads. For instance, he jammed over a J. Tilly flop donkbet with a weakish flush draw on a KJx flop. I mean, she folds there so often that jamming is perfect (even though she actually had KJ for top 2 that couldn't hold up).

Greg "FBT" Mueller: I had played with him in Vancouver, where he berated me for squeezing light and spite-called me with 87s. Here I got moved to his table in the 3k event, where we both had decent stacks. He played position pretty well, almost never letting me see a flop in position if I opened his button or cutoff. He made a pretty borderline shove into me later on in that tournament to bust. I opened and Greg shoved A8o for not many BBs; he had no FE, so it presumably could have been a value shove, but my stack was also kind of at an awkward size for opening the pot, so my range has to be pretty narrow there.

Hoyt Corkins: Seemed super aggro, though I didn't play many hands with him (then again, it's live, so I didn't play many hands with anyone). I fired two barrels into him as a semi-bluff in position with a 6-hi flush draw (and I think a gutshot on the turn, too), and rivered the flush. I bet again, and he called again. I dunno what he had, but I probably cracked his top pair or something.

Clonie Gowen: I still giggle when I think about that one FTP chat where some railbird addressed her as "Clownie." I had earlier played with her in some Borgata $1k event where she two-outered some dude like 3 hands in, then eventually busted my shortstack. She seemed ok, I guess; fairly straightforward, though in our conversation she seemed to imply that she thought your "tournament life" had some intrinsic value (she didn't seem to play that way, though). This summer, in some $1500 tournament in the WSOP, she showed up at my table (Nath was also at this table, so it was obviously a fun table). She proceeded to get 2/3 of her stack in by the flop and fold to a shove. Nath and I exchanged a knowing glance, and I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing out loud. Clownie indeed!

Jamie Gold: I got moved to his table near the bubble of the $1000 rebuy. I had just won a flip to get near the average stack, and then I won a big pot with AA vs. KK all-in preflop to get above average. As an aside, there's nothing quite as fun as this sequence:

1) Sitting down just in time to play the small blind, watching as UTG raises, MP 3-bets, and the button 4-bet shoves.

2) Thinking "how sweet would it be to look down at my cards and see aces here?"

3) Looking down at my cards and seeing aces.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, Jamie Gold. He was spewy for sure! Made a bunch of funky cold-calls preflop, and sure loved to bluff postflop! For instance, I open the cutoff with JJ, Jamie cold-calls in the SB. Flop is something like Q72. He checks and I check behind (not because I'm really scared of a c/r, but because he has at most four outs here and will probably fire the turn and river with a ton of hands that would fold to a c-bet). He (quickly and silently, hello live tells) fires a 2/3 pot bet on the turn. I call. He does the same thing on the river. I think for about 3 seconds and call. Before I can table my hand he angrily mucks his two cards, and the pot gets shipped to me. He then proceeds to loudly swear at (or perhaps with) some woman who was sweating him.

A few hands later, I open A8s from some too-early position (by this point I had a top-5-in-the-whole-tournament stack, so I was trying to pound people as the bubble approached) and Jamie thinks for a little while and shoves from late position. As the action gets to me, and I'm counting the pot trying to see if the pot was laying enough to get me to call, Jamie starts talking. "Hey, cmon buddy, double me up. I really want a call here, I really do." So, I fold. He shows AA. Hooray for live tells (even though I probably give off more than I perceive).

I'll probably add more of these player impressions later, when I don't have to pack up and catch a train to London. Anyway, I'll leave with some words of tournament poker wisdom from 2pac: "I'd rather die like a man than live like a coward. There's a ghetto up in heaven and it's ours, BLACK POWER!" The last sentence doesn't really have anything to do with poker, I just like the way the way it sounds. I guess the first one didn't really have much to do with poker either, but it's a pretty good thing to keep in mind when playing a tournament. Given the choice between "dying like a man" (i.e. doing something like 3- or 4- or 5- betting because you KNOW HE CANNOT CALL and potentially busting out) and "living like a coward" (i.e. folding at any point EVER in ANY TOURNAMENT because folding is for PUSSIES and you're not a PUSSY are you?) I'll take the former every time. Because sometimes they fold and sometimes you suck out. You don't accumulate chips by folding.

Yeah.

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