Leaving Los Angeles

Another poker trip is about to come to a close. Sadly, I went 0-for-5 in tournaments for the week; 0-for-9 if you count the four online events I played Sunday. These things happen. I hadn’t planned on playing the main event out here unless I had a really good trip, poker-wise. And though I feel I’m playing well (I was essentially a coin flip away from winning my shootout table yesterday), I am going to stick with the plan and pass on the main. My decision not to play seems to be downright shocking to everyone I tell it to. I don’t really see why. We all agree that the players are better than they’ve ever been, that ten thousand dollars is a lot of money, that the last major tournament held in L.A. (the NAPT last year) had an extremely tough field, and that the number of entrants is down in this year’s LAPC. All of which, to me, adds up to the main event not being the greatest investment. Some have countered that historically the LAPC has always had an amazing field. I say, if I could buy-in to the 2006 LAPC main event tomorrow, I would. Times have changed. After I finish making these arguments, my friends tell me they’ll buy pieces of me so that I can play for cheaper. I appreciate their confidence, but I haven’t mentally prepared to play a big tournament this weekend, and there are plenty of great events coming up on the east coast. I’ll stick to those. My next one is the WSOP-C at Caesars Atlantic City, probably followed by the Foxwoods Poker Classic and NAPT Mohegan.

Good luck to all my friends playing the main. LA…it’s been real.

No Dice on Sunday

I managed to blow through five FTOPS entries in time to play the LAPC Ironman event. Somehow I didn’t think they really meant it when they said, “there are no scheduled breaks.” I guess what threw me off is that they also said, “3 Meals included scheduled at 10pm, 6am and 2pm.” In my silly head, a meal necessitated leaving the table. Not so, I found out.

I ran really good in my Ironman debut for the first four or five hours. I was eventually done in mostly by cold decks, although I did have one opportunity to go with my read and possibly bluff my way into an additional pot, but I cravenly went for the “standard” play instead. The standard play failed. Still, I’m pretty happy with how I played, and my bustout happened because a bad player caught a lucky turn card against my two kings, and not because I did anything crazy (as I sometimes do). It was an interesting eight hours for me, and I definitely think my poker endurance (and there is such a thing, I assure you) has been strengthened.

In an hour I’m playing the $2500 six-max NLHE event. I might finally get to play something with more than 100 runners!

Arrival in LA

Well I’m here at the LAPC, though at least for now my wallet wishes I’d missed the flight. I played the PLO rebuys today. In one of the first hands post-rebuy, a very loose raiser opened from the hijack and a very loose caller called. With 75 blinds on the button, I looked down at KK93 and quickly decided that my opponents’ ranges were so loose that I should be three-betting with any kings. I three-bet, the raiser called, the caller folded. The flop came 983 with two hearts and the raiser led out for a near-pot bet. I shoved in and he called with T985. His hand held, and that was that. In hindsight, I think even against the loose ranges of my opponents, and even in position, I should just flat with my naked KK (I had no flush draws even). It’s a pretty bad hand. As played preflop, I think I like my shove on the flop. My top-and-bottom two pair with an overpair redraw is priced in or ahead of a decent chunk of his range, and there are probably even some hands he would incorrectly fold against my shove. Oh well.

I played some 60-120 Limit Hold ‘Em cash games after that. Since I don’t like to talk about bad beats, there isn’t much to say. I’ll summarize: I took more crazy beats in a short span than I ever have, and I’m thrilled I only lost 30 bets.

I’m taking a personal day on Saturday, and then I’m going to start out Sunday playing online. If I bust quick enough I’ll try to play this ironman (no breaks except for three meals) thing, but my east coast body is pretty worn out after one day out here, so I’ll have to really feel up for it if I’m to attempt to be Iron.

West Coast Bound

In case you missed the updates, I had a roller coaster Borgata Winter Open main event. My starting stack of 30,000 fell to 5,000 on Day One. At least 10k of that was lost when I tried to bluff a guy off of aces full (shockingly, it didn’t work). I entered Day Two with 7,600–only 19 blinds–but I managed to run that all the way up to 75k before getting a bunch in with 58% equity and losing, running into AA with AK for another chunk, and then losing the rest in a sort of strange spot with 77 against 99 (I squeezed against a likely steal opener and a caller; the raiser folded, the caller shoved, and I decided to play getting 8-5 on my money).

That’s all done now.

On to the Los Angeles Poker Classic! My first event will be the Pot Limit Omaha with rebuys on Friday. There should be a ton of action in that one. Hope to see some of my fellow east coast sickos out there.