Harrah's AC Trip Part 1
3/10: Day 1
I head to Borgata with my girlfriend mid-day Saturday for a day of fun and lax gambling. I had originally planned to play the Monster Stack to kick off the circuit but get down too late. I check in, (comped room on a weekend always coming in clutch) hit up the Amphora lounge and go to the $10 Blackjack tables with the gf and we have a pretty fun time.
3/11: Day 2
Poker time! I check out of Borg, and me and my girlfriend take the nice scenic 30 second drive to Harrah's. I check into the waterfront, unload my computer and immediately head to the tournament room to start my circuit event.
I busted both bullets after level 9. Was very standard play and just lost 2 40bb flips (AKss<JJ and AQo<55) to finish off the day with little fanfare.
On the brightside, key battle (who has posted here previously and new BTS student) makes a deep run finishing 4th in the Monster Stack as I was able to sweat him briefly. Big congrats to him.
We soak up the victory before heading to Borgata for some cash games, we sit at 5/10 after a short wait (plays relatively deep). He stacks me 5 hands in and I'm in a $-1400 hole very quickly. The table was pretty good though and I'm up about 2k when a silly hand occurs vs reg who won Event #1 at Borg about a year ago (don't know exact name)
UTG reg opens 35, Button villain reg calls, and I squeeze K
K
to 175, Button calls, we're about 2.3k effective.
Flop: Q
J
7
($400)
Could cbet here but I elected to check at a deeper stack size here, he stabs $200 and I call.
Turn: A
($800)
Doesn't change much tbh. I check and he stabs $500, not really sure what the plan is on river but given he's repping an extremely thin value range, I call.
River: Brickkkkk ($1,800)
I check, he takes about 7 seconds before jamming for $1,600. I had a very serious internal debate here as I think calling is usually good here, I block K10 significantly, I expect villain to 3b AQ at some frequency 7 handed vs reg open. Not sure if he will stab AJ or something silly or defend K10o. Rounding it out I gave him about 15-18 value combo's. On the other side, I feel this is an extrememely underbluffed spot, I also think my hand looks like AK quite a bit here and feels like it's an optimistic spot for someone to blast a reg off of it.
I go back and forth and decide to fold. He asks if I want to see and I nod yes. He smiles and shows 88. I nod my head, tap the table, and immediately tag him as a bad reg.
Not much happened after but I scraped out a decent win.
3/12: Day 2
This tournament went much better. I actually think I played my best poker of the series here despite no cash. I was able to chip up significantly in the early levels before losing a flip and 70/30 to drop to 25bb's. I get to around 20bb's when I ship AKss (was shipping wider than I would online due to getting called much lighter at this table). I'm called by ATdd. I fade the flop, but a T turn has me drawing thin, the river brings me no help and I'm eliminated.
I decide to not head to Borg. and stay in Harrah's and play 2/5. Was a very fun game and even met some people I play with. I played veryyyy splashy but ran good and booked another pretty decent day, just a very lively game with a lot of back and forth. Reg started the table by asking, "is the big blind sick?" when I'm in BB, always nice to know people are reading this thing!
Regardless, it was a fun time but I leave relatively early to focus on the tourney I've been waiting for.
3/13: Day 4
6 max time!
My table is very good and I'm quite active, prob VPIP 35/30 early on. I lose a few silly hands before getting in a marginal 70bb flip spot AKo>QQ to end the 1st bullet.
Bullet #2 doesn't go much better. Flops are going 3-4 ways quite often and I bleed. I eventually lose AJ<KT for half my stack before jamming A8o vs CO jam and do not win against 77.
Bullet #3. I busted bullet #2 quite late so I sit down with about 28bb's. I flop a set my first hand and get value to get some breathing room.
I then play a hand where I open KQdd, reg 3bets. Flop is 974ssx, I stab small (not great combo) but think it's ok in this spot. Turn Ax and it goes check check. River is Kx. Villain bets about 70% pot, I've played with him online before which plays a part, I make the call and beat his 66.
Now rocking a 65bb spot I use my experience to just pick up a ton of small pots, people we're not defending appropriately and cbetting close to 100% of their range.
I lose one flush vs cooler hand before getting quite lucky. I limp AJo SB vs reg BB. I miscount his stack and think he has 24bb's (He had about 30) I have him slightly covered. He raises 4x. I tank and rip and he nitrolls me calling JJ after 30 seconds. Ace on the flop leaves me in good standing and I hold.
I start to pick up big hands and have a top 10 stack although I will freely admit I picked up extreme heat in the middle stages to bubble time of this tournament. Anyway, the bubble is approaching and I'm being relatively active.
I have a sponsored pro limp SB vs BB, I rip his 20bb's and he takes quite awhile before folding (in hindsight maybe splitting a raise/call and raise/fold range may be better) He asks what I had and I deflect and ask if he had a very weak ace.
He laughs and say's "I'm never folding an ace to you and then goes on to say it's amazing what you hear in these tournaments". I can't lie it did get me a bit heated dealing with condescendence. I bite my tongue and we break the table next hand.
I start racking my chips (subtle brag:takes awhile) and I'm the last one to get my stack off mostly cause I'm a live fish and not used to handling all these chips. Anyway, I'm still at the table racking up when the same pro starts berating me from a table away telling me that I'm essentially stalling and messing up everyone's equities in this tournament.
I'm taken off guard and honestly a bit flustered, but also pretty ticked off at this point. I tell him to worry about himself and the floor has to come to tell us to knock it off. Internally, I'm thinking that I'm most likely the best 6 max player in the room at a 70bb stack depth and that me not playing is helping other people's equities. I bite my tongue and don't say that mostly due to how arrogant that sounds, although I believed it to be true.
Back to poker, there's 21 left and I defend 44 about 75bb deep (130k) vs. a 65bb deep stack.
The dealer about to spread the flop and the window card is the 4
and all I'm really thinkin' about is Vegas and the... you get the idea.
Flop finishes: 4
7
8
Villain fires out 5k and I C/R to 20k. He thinks close to 2 minutes before calling.
Turn is the K
I fire out 30k , villain takes about 10 seconds before jamming all in for 65k more.
My first instinct is this is kind of gross since we're on the bubble and I don't think most villains are bluffing here. That being said not folding a set here so I call and we're up against 7
9
. We fade river and boat up and all of a sudden we're CL.
Fast forward to the final table, I've bled to about middle of the pack and have Greg Fishberg on my left who had been aggressive and a nice guy rec on my table.
After 1 orbit of nothing going on, I open ATo in the HJ off 26bb's, Fishberg 3b's in the CO, I rip pretty quickly and he folds after about 5 seconds.
A few hands later, I defend 65dd in the BB off about 35bb's. Flop comes K23dxx. Checks to PFR who bets about 70% pot, SB folded and I tank and call, turn is 2d and it goes check check. River is the Js, I lead about 33% pot and get a frustrated fold.
Eventually a bunch of the short stacks bust out, I'm now 2/5 with about 47bb's and feeling very comfortable and have a pretty large edge on remaining players. I have been opening quite wide. Eventually SB rec limps off 29bbs. I iso AQo. And he snap rips it.
Maybe I'm a nit but felt like another gross spot with 2 short stacks 15bb eff and the rec playing very straight forwards. I take a look at other stacks kinda knowing I'll never fold. I call and am pleasantly surprised to see A7o.
Win this one and I have about 60% chips in play. Flop bricks through but the turn brings the 7 from heaven and now I'm the shortstack of 5.
Thankfully, I had Dan (Redsoxnets5) sweating me and he brought me some Mcdonald's to give me a 2nd one. I chip up to about 18 bigs when SB rec opens 3x and I rip A4ss. He tanks and calls with K2o and once again we get outflopped.
Flop: K
10
6
Turn: J
Bink! And we're right back in it.
The other 2 short stacks are eliminated and soon it's just me, Fishberg, and the nice rec left. We trade the chiplead a bunch before I chip down to about 315k at 5k/10k. I limp SB vs Fishberg who was now playing about 800k and getting very aggro. He iso's to 35k and I 3bet to 110k, after some deliberation he calls.
Flop K
6
2
(200k)
I lead for 55k, and Fishberg rips it all in covering me. I knew I was calling but never fun to call off for your tournament life.
I call and flip over 88, I get the beautiful sigh of disgust from him as he rolls over 33
I hold through turn and river, and am now the new chipleader, at this point it's almost 3AM and play is winding down. I win a few more small pots and play is halted before the chips are bagged and tagged.
I have about 728k of 1.6mil in play, Fish has about 290k and the Rec has 600k. I go to bed content with my play but mostly just having a complete blast playing the game I love. Restart is at 1PM and I go to sleep knowing I have a great chance at winning my first circuit ring.
Part II Tomorrow.