| The Chronicles | New Orleans Trip Report | ||||||
| |||||||
| |||||||
| |||||||
|
 Disclaimer: The following entry contains a lot of p-game-talk, so many of you may find it extremely boring. I'll try to explain some of the jargon, but if you're lost, you can ask questions. Several months ago, I was looking to get some preliminary p-game tournament experience before the WSOP. Looking through the schedule, I noticed that there was a series of WSOP Circuit tournaments in New Orleans in May...which just happened to coincide with Ray's 21st birthday. I wasn't fond of the tournament structures, but in the days leading up, I figured it'd be a good trip. My dad, brother, and I arrived on Wednesday evening. I registered for Thursday's tournament, and then we headed for sushi near Bourbon Street. My brother didn't turn 21 until midnight, so I went to the resort ahead of them to play some cash games. I signed up for several games, but 2-5 NL opened up before any of the others. The table was a mixed bag: several TAGs on my right, several loose donkeys on my left...with the others mediocre. Having folded a lot more frequently than anyone else, I'd cultivated a tight image. Adding to this image were some gut-wrenching laydowns that I had to make. I'll likely be posting about them in the strat section soon. Towards the end of my session, a talkative young guy sat down at the table and proceeded to try to take over as table captain. I heard him mention that he went by ZeeJustin online. Partially resenting this "intrusion", I attempted to quietly remark to my neighbor that this new guy got caught cheating online (for playing multiple accounts in the same tournament). When I looked back over, I noticed that ZJ was angrily glaring at me. Despite my attempts to apologize, he ignored me for the next 20-30 minutes. I don't like having people dislike me, and I hated that I'd already made an "enemy" this early in my live p-game career. As I was leaving, I leaned over and said, "Hey, I'm sorry for talking behind your back. That wasn't cool. I apologize." He finally acknowledged me and essentially said, "It's cool," and we shook hands. Tournament Time The next morning, we met up with JC (an FCP forum regular), and my brother and I started our first live tournaments of any signficance. I thought I'd noticed John Bonetti (a well-known p-game pro) in the cash games the previous night, but I figured I might've been mistaken. When I took my seat at my table, I was in seat 1 to the left of the dealer, and this guy that I'd seen the night before was in seat 9. Once I heard him talk, I realized that he was JB (John Bonetti). I think several of us at the table recognized him, but none of acknowledged him initially. Personally, I didn't feel like volunteering the knowledge that I knew who he was. (In other p-game celeb sightings, we noticed Van Alstyne roaming around.) Around 6 hands into the tournament, with blinds at 25-25 and starting stacks of 1500, the guy finally arrives in seat 10 just in time to post his small blind. Despite the fact that he won that pot, he proceeds to complain up a storm about how he was an alternate and how he shouldn't have been blinded off. The floor gets called over and he sits out a few hands while he goes to talk to them. Well, another round or so goes by, and there was some sort of blow-up when Seat 10 touched one of JB's cards (I think he was pushing it closer to JB). JB touched the guy's hand as if to say, "Don't touch my cards." The guy blew up with, "Don't touch me!" So this escalated and there was lots of shouting and JB loudly inquiring, "Do you know who I am?" At this point, despite JB's slight arrogance and posturing, everyone at the table is sick of Seat 10. Well, I look down at my cards UTG (under-the-gun) and find KK. I haven't played a pot for the first two orbits, so I don't figure I'll get much action, but I raise to 100. I got 4 callers and felt sick when the door card was an ace. Fortunately, there was a king to go with it. I hit the jackpot. I knocked two players out on that hand. The very next hand, I picked up QQ in the BB. It folded to Seat 10 in the BB who raised to 225. I re-raised to 675. He called. Flop came Kxx. He pushed in his last 700 or so, and I called. He flipped over AQo and complained about my "terrible call with the king on the board". We were glad to be rid of him, and I chatted with JB some...talking to him about the '99 USPC (US p-game Championship) where Daniel Negreanu owned him heads-up. The table broke not too long after that. I might've been the early chip leader in the tournament. Not much eventful happened at my next table. I mostly treaded water and picked on some weak-tighties directly to my left and right. With around 30 tables left, my brother amazingly got assigned to my table. He did surprisingly well nursing a short-stack that was around the size of the starting stack. We played for quite a while at that table, but I couldn't get any momentum. Finally, just as I was getting into a groove, we got moved again. I sat down at my new table, looked down at AKo UTG+1 (position to the left of UTG) and raised to 1,400 with blinds 200/400, antes 50 and my stack of ~5,800. Well, 1,400 was conveniently the amount that CO (cut-off, to the right of the button) had. He was the only one that called. He flipped over a J2o and took the pot when he flopped a jack. Also conveniently, the table was broken right after the blinds had gone through me...so there went a third of my stack...and my M (stack in relation to the cost-per-round) of 4 forced me to wait for a hand to push at my new table. I figured open-pushing A9o in the CO was a good spot. Unfortunately, the BB (big blind) woke up with AK and I busted. Both my brother and I finished with around 100 left. The bubble was 45. Despite not making the money, I felt good about my reads, my play, and the experience that I gained. After the late night before and the draining tournament, we got some dinner and crashed early. I woke up around 6am, got some breakfast, and read some HOH (Harrington on Hold 'Em) as prep for the Friday tournament. I managed to build my stack a little bit in the early rounds, but after a crippling, I got myself back into that M of 4 range and had to find a hand to push. I'd folded around 20 hands in a row, so I finally pushed in on the button for 900 with blinds 75/150 with QJs. BB made the call with A2s, and I got knocked out. Cash Games Afterwards, I ran into Mike (an FCP forum regular) and ate lunch with him after we put our names on the waiting lists at the p-game room. I signed up for 1-2 NL, 4-8 Half HE/Half Omaha, and 20-40 LHE (the next smallest to 3/6). Despite being at the top of the 20-40 LHE list for hours, I ended up sitting down at a 1/2 NLHE table and picked up KK in EP. I raised and got a couple callers. Just like my magical tournament flop, it was once again AKx, and I almost doubled up off of a decent sized ace. Funnily enough, my brother once again got seated at the same table as me...this time directly to my left. There was also a guy at the table that I'd met randomly about a year and a half ago at a wedding. We'd played for a while when my 20/40 seat opened up, so I switched tables. I wasn't quite prepared for what I'd encounter at this table. It started off with a near fist-fight between two players arguing over repayment of a loan. The floor got called over and had to kick one of the guys out. We were slightly short-handed at that point since several players were sitting out. Then, I look down on the second orbit and notice that I had JJ and it's folded to me. I raise. BB re-raises. I cap. BB calls. Flop A87. I bet. BB calls. Turn 6. I bet. BB calls. River 5. I check. BB bets. I call. BB flips over 99 and says, "I got lucky." Bad start. Fortunately, I got paid off pretty decently soon after with AQ when I flopped an ace. Then, the table started turning insane as some new players joined. A solid TAG (tight-aggressive player), nice guy came back from his break on my left. He posts on 2+2 (a p-game forum) and we had a lot of fun talking strategy. Quickly, it became clear that we were the only opponents at this full table with VPIP% (voluntarily-put-into-the-pot percentage) below 75%. (Most good players play around 25% of their hands pre-flop.) Most of them were plastered and were friends with each other. It was pretty common for the pot to get capped (maximum bet in Limit) four ways pre-flop. Capping on the flop and turn was fairly typical too. My guess was that the average pot size going into the flop was $200. I lost a rather big pot with AK when I hit the flop and one of the maniacs turned a gut-shot straight. After that, I went card dead for around two hours...which is painful as hell. Seriously, I went two hours without winning a hand. Oh, and three of them started putting in straddles (an optional third blind) whenever they got the chance. They also resented the hell out of me and the 2+2 guy...since we were playing so tight. They got on this kick where three or four of them would repeatedly and loudly go, "Wooooop! Woooop!" when we'd enter the pot...to signify 'sonar' that they should "Dive! Dive!" to get out of the pot since we "had" to have aces. What amounted to outright mocking got kind of annoying. They'd quip, "You've got to give action to get action." Funnily enough, they couldn't follow their own advice, and most of them still came in against us and would even raise. Oh, they also had this little habit of winning a big pot and then shouting "Redbirds!" (the $5 chips are red) and tossing one to each of the players that they "liked". Needless to say, they didn't toss many our way. I'd dropped back to a little down on the night, but I knew that if I could win one decent pot, I'd be back up. One of the maniacs had raised in EP (early position), gotten three cold callers and I called in the SB (small blind) w/ A7s. Flop A86. I bet. Maniac raises. Two cold calls. I call. Turn 7. I check. Maniac bets, two calls, I check-raise, maniac 3-bets, two calls, and I call. River 7. I check, maniac bets, two folds, I check-raise, and maniac reluctantly calls with the T9o. I think that's roughly 24 BB (big bets) and brought me back to positive at the table. After that, I was pretty worn out, got some dinner, and wrote this up. Anyway, the MTT (multi-table tournament) buy-ins represented my losses on the trip, and I had a positive experience overall. I actually think NO has some charm to it. Granted, I think it's a stupid location for a city and I didn't visit the bad areas, but I liked a lot of the architecture and feel that I saw. I'll get around to talking about the rest of the spring/summer when I get back from Vegas in a week or two. | |||||||
| |||||||
| |||||||
| talk to me |
 |
