Thinking Poker

A few months ago, I was invited to a meeting at Harvard Law School where a group of academics, journalists, medical professionals, and poker players discussed whether and how to go about legitimizing the game of poker in the United States. Here's the trip report from that meeting.

A few weeks ago, one of the coordinators of that meeting informed me of a follow-up luncheon in Las Vegas. I invited a few 2p2'ers I thought would be interested and interesting, and while LearnedFromTV accepted, Jurollo elected to play the $2K NLHE event that was starting at the same time. What a degenerate.

Anyway, I ended up having a pretty interesting lunch with LFTV, Howard Lederer, Andy Bloch, and Andrew Woods, who was representing Harvard Law School and specifically Professor Nesson, who was the force behind this whole thing. The focus of this meeting was on the creation of what Nesson et al are calling a "Poker University". Something alone these lines was brought up at the first meeting, but I didn’t really understand what was meant at the time and kind of dismissed it. Listening to Andrew talk about it, though, I now think it sounds like a very good way to go about legitimizing the game of poker.

The germ of the idea was formed from the observation that poker seems to have strong appeal among university students, from undergraduates and law students. Professor Nesson was curious to know why this game held such strong appeal for the extremely bright students he knew from Harvard Law School.

The idea now is turn the legitimacy of the academic eye on the game by focusing on its relationship to mathematics, business negotiations, computer science, wall street, venture capitalism, and even FBI hostage negotiation. With the help of Full Tilt Poker, Harvard Law School is going to start a small student organization dedicated to using poker as a teaching tool.

Teams of three or so students will play each other heads up on FTP. In different rooms, they will discuss each decision out loud, with microphone running to record their conversations and decision-making processes. FTP will provide large time banks to allow for extended discussion. After the session, a transcript and/or recording will be made available to a panel of academics or other experts from the fields listed above, who will comment on how the thinking parallels elements of their fields.

Andrew identified three objectives for this initiative:

1. To separate poker, in the mind of the general public, from the pathologies of gambling. The goal here would be to demonstrate all of the skills that go into playing the game of poker and highlight their applications in both the academic and "real" worlds. Certainly, starting the first of these clubs at one of the world’s most prestigious academic institutions will be a big step towards that goal, but ultimately the intent is to create a kit that would enable such clubs to be replicated at colleges and universities around the world. Then, there could be inter-scholastic and even inter-continental competition.

2. To get the academic community involved in poker. There was a consensus that Chen and Ankenman’s book, "The Mathematics of Poker", could easily be the focus of a graduate-level mathematics course for students with no intrinsic interest in poker. That is, the most advanced mathematic concepts are sufficiently interesting to be worthy of study as an end in themselves rather than a means of improving one’s poker game. There was also talk of developing a poker-based elective course, but concern that this would meet overwhelming institutional resistance in the current climate.

3. To generate a body of academic evidence supporting the predominance of skill over luck for use in future litigation. Howard said that Full Tilt Poker has given celebrity economist Steven Levitt access to a random sample of unbiased, anonamized hand histories from their records and that he has already begun the number crunching. Although Levitt had already been collecting data from voluntarily submitted hand histories, these were inevitably going to be biased towards the results of winning players.

This led to a more general discussion of current litigation strategies and the familiar long-term versus single hand debate. The lawyers and would-be lawyers at the table suggested that, since poker player is a viable profession vis-a-vis the IRS, one could argue in court that playing more than one of poker is a common business practice. Thus, courts would need to consider whether skill predominates in the long term rather than in a single hand.

Howard was not convinced, and claimed there was confusion created by conflating ‘skill’ and ‘edge’. Skill is the cause of an edge, but they are not the same thing. As he puts it, skill is the betting, while luck is the cards. He argues that since so few hands go to showdown, and often the hand that would have won at showdown ends up folding at some point during the hand, the skill (betting) is predominating over the luck (cards). He credits Sklansky with developing a hypothetical game, dubbed ‘lucker’ by Levitt, in which there is no folding. The divergence of results between the same hands played in lucker versus poker would be owing to skill.

I like the idea of using academia as a diving off point for legitimizing the game, both because poker really does seem to hold such tremendous appeal for many students, and because the corruption of these youth seems to be a concern for poker's opponents. Focusing on the benefits of learning the game might help to neutralize that argument and give legitimacy to the common (but flawed, in my opinion) belief that the majority of losing poker players are knowingly engaging in an exchange of cash for entertainment. I know people tend to get all up in arms about 'educating the fish', but personally I would find the profession of poker player less ethically questionable if the fish were a bit better educated, at least about the extent to which there really is a skill element to the game.

And if any American academic institution carries legitimacy, it's Harvard University, so where better to get something like this off the ground?

Oh, and for those who don't know, Jurollo went on to chop the $2K NLHE event three ways for something like $350K!

On Monday, I played my first WSOP preliminary event, a $2500 6-max tournament. This is a little beyond my bankroll, but there are so few opportunities to play 6-max tournaments, and I'm not playing many other events, so I decided to go for it.

The dealer at my first table was a bit of a character himself. As I sat down, he was talking with a dealer at the next table over about Ben Affleck (who, for those who don't know, is an avid poker player and at the WSOP). After finishing that conversation, he explained to us that he had a movie script that was going to "make millions" and he just needed to get it under Affleck's nose to escape the drudgery of poker dealing forever. Someone asked him, sarcastically, why he would want to leave this job, to which he replied, "I am so sick of getting cussed at and having cards thrown at me and all that bullshit. It's like, why are you getting angry at me? I dealt the cards, but I didn't tell you to call that raise with 76s."

To the dealer's left, in the 1 seat, is a young surfer dude with blond, spiky hair, dark sunglasses, and a goatee that juts out several inches below his chin. "Gnarly", as I’ll refer to him, worries me a bit just because guys our age don’t usually have the disposable income that would allow them to play a $2500 poker tournament with a negative expectation. He isn’t bad, but he does play very straight-forwardly, and his table talk demonstrates a rather shallow level of thinking about the game.

To his left, and my right, is a black guy in his early 30's. For reasons I’m not going to speculate about here, there are very few black poker players. I’ve played with only a handful (that I know about- obviously I usually have no idea about race when playing online), and with one notable exception, they’ve all been quite bad at poker. However, the ones I’ve played with have almost all been flashy, wearing expensive sunglasses, big jewelry, etc. In this way, they’re like a lot of the young Italian guys who play at Foxwoods, fundamentally gamblers looking to splash around and show off how much money they have. The only talented black guy I can recall playing with is also much more conservative in his dress and mannerisms, so I think this is primarily a sample size issue. The guy at this table is both quiet and dressed in a subdued fashion, wearing a black sweatshirt that says “Dogtown” in small letters on the sleeve, so I’m not prepared to assume he’ll be a weak player based on his demographics alone, the way I would if he were, for instance, an old white man.

I’m in the 3 seat, which at a 6-handed table, puts me in the center, across from the dealer and slightly to his left. To my left is a young, pudgy guy in an ill-fitting Izod shirt. He talks quite a bit about what’s going on, and from the things he’s saying, I’m able to gather that he’s pretty knowledgeable about tournament play and poker in general, almost certainly the best of my opponents at the table. We’ll call him Izod.

To his left is a guy I’ll call Vinny. Vinny looks straight out of the cast of the Sopranos: track suit, gold chain, slicked back hair, etc. Then again, I say that about every poker playing Italian from Long Island, so that says something either about me or about Long Island Italians. Regardless, Vinny actually turns out to be a pretty even-tempered, friendly guy.

Next around the table is an older gentleman who shall henceforth be known as Gramps. In my experience, old guys are almost always tight passive (meaning they play very hands, and rarely bet or raise when they are playing) or loose passive (they play a lot of hands, but still are almost always checking or calling other people’s bets rather than forcing the action themselves). Gramps turns out to be of the latter variety, and is no worry to me whatsoever.

Despite my reluctance to assume he will be, Dogtown quickly makes clear that he is, in fact, not only a fish, but one of the worst poker players I’ve ever played with. He hates to fold, will play almost any two cards pre-flop, call almost any raise, rarely fold if he catches any piece of the board, randomly bluff in awful spots, and make it very obvious when he has a good hand. In short, I love having him on my right, and love watching him get lucky over and over again against the better players at the table. In particular, he takes a lot of chips from Izod by rivering a lucky two pair.

Izod was very vocal in criticizing Dogtown’s play, and finally, in his own defense, Dogtown said sheepishly, “If you concentrate, you can feel which cards are going to come.”

That just fueled the fire. Now Izod and Vinny are both openly mocking him, laughing and making jokes about his play while he’s sitting right there. He’s taking it well, but it’s annoying the hell out of me. For one thing, it’s bad for business to make fun of bad play. The old agage is, “Don’t tap the glass,” a reference to a common aquarium warning against disurbing the fish. Professionals make money based on the mistakes of bad players, so we benefit from an atmosphere where mistakes are accepted and encouraged, not mocked.

More importantly, though, this is just rude. Guys like Izod give all internet poker players a bad reputation with their lack of class. It's ironic how many pros will justify their profession ethically by saying that losing players are compensated for their money with entertainment while at the same time behaving so rudely to someone who is clearly a losing player.

After reducing him to 500 chips, Dogtown doubles up Izod up by calling his all in (with blinds still 25/50) with 98 offsuit. Izod’s AJ holds up, much to my dismay, but he goes out fairly soon anyway.

Early on, I’m not getting much in the way of cards, and with Dogtown on my right calling everything, I don’t have a lot of room to steal pots. He does eventually donate most of his chips, though, and finds himself with only about 1700 at the 50/100 level. He just calls the big blind, and I look down at A5. This is far from a great holding, but I’ve been looking to get involved with Dogtown before he loses the last of his money, and just the Ace is enough to put me well ahead of his range right now. I raise to 300, and he, of course, calls.

The flop of 842 is a good one for me, giving me a inside straight draw. However, there are now 750 chips in the pot, and 1400 in Dogtown’s stack. He checks, but I know he’ll never fold better hands, and he’ll occasionally put me in a tough spot with worse. I don’t want to get all in with him right here, but I don’t want to bet and fold what could be the best hand, either, so I check as well. Awkward spots like these are why I shouldn't make plays this like this.

The turn is an Ace, giving me top pair, though with one of the worst possible kickers. Admittedly, Dogtown doesn’t much like folding, but given how scary this Ace ought to be to him, I think he’s more likely to bluff at the river (or call a river bet with worse) than to call the turn with a worse hand than mine. So, I check again.

The river is a T, and now Dogtown announces, “All in.” Ugh. I wanted him to bluff, but he’s just bet twice the pot, and all I have is top pair with a weak kicker. Whatever, I can’t fold now.

“Call.”

“Good call,” he says, looking unhappy before he's even seen my cards. He turns over KT as he’s exiting the table. Wow, now that is beyond atrocious. On the river, he picked up a hand that could very possibly be good, and then he turned it into a bluff by moving all in for two times the pot. I’m not going to call that bet with worse than KT, and he knew that, because he knew he was beat before I turned over the winning hand. With his hand, he ought to make either a smaller bet that I could call with worse, or check and give me a chance to bluff. Oh well, I guess that’s just the kind of thinking that bad poker players can’t or won’t employ.

The best hand I see at this table is AJ, which I raise to 300 first to act. Vinny calls on the button, and then Gramps reraises to 850 from the SB. A reraise from loose passive Gramps? Even with AJ, it's time to get out of the way. I fold, and Vinny grumbles to me good naturedly, "300 and fold? You put me in a helluva spot. I call."

Flop 643, Gramps bets 2000, and 1500, and Vinny calls, telling me, "You owe me 2300 chips."

I'm tempted to respond, "I didn't tell you to call a raise with 76s," but I catch myself, realizing that speculating about his hand, even in reference to the dealer's earlier comment, would be inappropriate.

Gramps moves all in on a Q turn, and Vinny deliberates for a while before folding 76s face up! Heh. Gramps, of course, shows him a pair of Aces. This is why I say I'm not worried about him: certainly he can be dealt good cards, but he'll never give me a tough decision, because his play is just too straight-forward.

This table breaks, and I'm moved to another, slightly tougher looking table. There are a few more young guys here who look like they could be competent and no obvious fish. On closer inspection, though, there are two white guys in their early 30's who give signs of being little more than ardent enthusiasts with lucrative careers that enable an expensive hobby. One in particular is wearing a corporate polo shirt with a World Series of Poker visor. Come to think of it, I'm not sure I've ever seen anyone wearing poker clothing (except for gear worn as part of an endorsement, obviously) who was any good at the game. Only amateurs wear tee-shirts that say "I went all in at the World Series of Poker!"

But I digress. The three players on my right, the aforementioned pair included, turned out to be pretty loose passive, so I was raising their limps with a lot of medium-strength hands. Generally I'd win the pot with a flop bet, whether or not I hit anything, and sometimes I'd fold if they played back at me. Nothing complicated. Once, the guy to my immediate right just called the big blind of 200 first to act, and I raised to 900 with A9. One of the corporate amateurs in the big blind called, as did the limper, which was not the result I wanted.

I got a flop of A87, which is actually kind of tricky when I have A9. If I bet the flop, I'm pretty much only going to get action from people with two pair or top pair and a better kicker. So, I check, reluctantly giving a free card to two players. The turn brings a T, potentially making more two pair hands for others but giving me an open-ended straight draw. They all check to me again, and now I bet 1700, prepared to call a check-raise, though I wouldn't be happy about it. The BB calls, while the other guy folds. We check it through on a K river, and my A9 prevails over his A2. Excellent, that's exactly why he shouldn't be calling a raise with an easily dominated A2.

I'd just been thinking how nice it was that I was able to get away with all this raising because even when the table thought I was bluffing, all they would do was call me pre-flop and then give up if the flop missed them, which is exactly what I wanted them to do anyway. Then I got dealt a pair of Kings, and thought how nice it would be if someone did re-raise me, and sure enough I made my standard raise to 600 and the button, who'd been giving me the stink-eye every time I raised, made it 2500. Niiiiiice. I had about 16,000 chips to start the hand, but I was worried he'd fold most worse hands if I moved all in preflop because live poker tournaments are like that, so I just called his raise, deciding to check-raise all in on the flop.

The flop was a lovely 852, and I figured it was very unlikely my opponent could get away from another overpair. I checked, he asked what I had left, and then bet 5000. I moved all in for like 7000 more, and he folded. Oh well, it was still practically a double up.

A little while later, though the same guy gave me some actual trouble. After winning that pot and getting up a nice stack, I was playing more aggressively than ever. I raised 6s 5s, the kid (Jewish, with stylish sunglasses and clothing and such) called in the SB, and one of the corporate amateurs called from the BB. Flop Qc Jc 6d, and they checked to me. Bottom pair not good enough on this board, I check, too.

Turn 5h, they check to me again, and I bet 1200. Now the kid in the SB check-raises to 2500. Blech. I have the worst possible two pair, and the size of his raise, barely the minimum possible amount, suggests that he's got at least a better two pair. However, there aren't a lot of ways for him to have that. QJ is the most plausible, then 65, but my holding makes that unlikely. I doubt he'd play Q6 or Q5, I think he would have reraised QQ or JJ preflop, which makes high three of a kind unlikely, and again, with me holding 65, it's unlikely he has 66 or 55. I had seen him raise before on a draw, but in that case he was in position, which he isn't now. Our effective stacks were over 20,000, so even though I thought he could have a draw, I didn't want to 3-bet him and commit my entire stack to this pot. So I called.

The river was an ugly K, improving hands like KQ and KJ that I was beating on the turn. Now he bets 3200, which is like half the pot. I only have to be good about 25% of the time, and I decided he could be on a missed draw or even value betting like KT or something that he had semi-bluffed on the turn and then made top pair with. So I called, and he showed me QJ. Nice hand.

We had our second break of the day, and then the guy to my right was busted and replaced by a pudgy dude with a short stack. My Jewish friend asked how much the guy had, to which the man dejectedly replied, "Like $5." I eyed his stack myself and counted only about 3000 chips. Blinds were now 150/300 with a 25 ante, so he didn't have a lot of room to maneuver. He moved all in from late position a few times to pick up the dead money and grew his stack to about 4000.

He was moving in with such frequency that, combined with his pessimistic statement when he first sat down, I knew he was ready to give up and I was going to have to call him with a somewhat wide range if the opportunity arose. Sure enough, he shoved all 4000 chips second to act, and I looked down at 99. I only had about 12,000 chips, so I was a little reluctant to flip a coin with him if he had two overcards to my pair. However, based on my read, I had to figure him for a wide range that could include smaller pairs and stuff like A8 that I was way ahead of. So I moved all in over the top of his raise. I turned over my 99, and to my delight, he turned over 75s. With more than ten times then big blind and four players to act behind him, that's a pretty bad move, and I'm in great shape with a pair higher than either of his cards.

Buuuuuuuut a 963 flop is not good new for me, even though it gives me three of a kind, and I groaned audibly when I saw it. The turn, of course, is a 4 to give my opponent a straight. I could still improve to a full house if the river pairs the board, but that doesn't happen, and I'm down to 8000.

Next hand, the same player open raised to 1000. I had AQ, and moved all in for my last 8000. He folded, and after that the table broke, and I was moved to my toughest table yet. There was one mustachioed old man to my left who was quite bad, but then there were two young Asian guys and a pretty competent Brit.

One of my first hands at the table, the Brit opened for 1000 on the button and folded when I reraised to 3000 with AKo in the SB. I only had like 6000 behind, but there are plenty of live players who will and fold to a flop shove, so I figured that would be more +EV than shoving pre-flop.

On my first button, I raised to 850 with QJo, and one of the Asian kids called from the BB. He checked and called a bet on an A34hh flop. I caught a J on the turn and checked it back, but the river blanked, and I folded to a bet.

Next orbit, I opened with KJo and folded to a reraise from the other Asian kid. Then, first to act, I opened to 850 again with AJs, and again got reraised, this time by the first Asian. I had like 7500 behind, and thought for a while about what to do. It was annoying to get reraised again, but I felt like the fact that I'd just been reraised actually made it less likely that he'd be doing it light here. I ultimately folded, but I wasn't happy about it, and I'm still not sure it was correct.

After paying another round of blinds and antes, I was getting rather short, and started looking for a chance to reraise all in over someone's open. The Brit on my right, probably the most aggressive player at the table, made a small raise from middle position to 800, and I decided I was going to move in with anything halfway decent. I found K9 and shoved for 5400. He stared me down and kept shaking his head. "I just don't think you have anything. I haven't got much," he said apologetically as he called and turned over KQs. Ugh. Q on the turn puts the nail in my coffin.

Today I played my second preliminary event in the 2007 World Series of Poker. The game was pot-limit, rather than no limit, Texas Hold 'Em, with a $2000 buy-in. As the name implies, a player may not at any point bet or raise more than the amount in the pot. The game still plays very similarly to no limit hold'em, especially given the relatively shallow stacks we get to work with. The most important difference is that antes are never used in pot limit games, so that the forced blind bets drive the action exclusively. This means pots are smaller pre-flop, and therefore a tighter, more conservative strategy is generally correct. That's not a 100% good thing for me, because although I'm capable of adapting, that's not my preferred style of play. However, smaller pots also mean there are more decisions to be made in any given hand, and since I expect generally to make better decisions than my opponents, that's a source of profit for me.

On the way to the Rio, I had to stop at Bank of America to get some cash. I hate Bank of America. Unfortunately, I got stuck with them after they bought out Fidelity, with whom I'd previously had an account. They constantly mail me credit card offers inside envelopes labeled "Important Account Information!" Jesus Christ, you are a multi-billion dollar financial institution, why are you resorting to fly-by-night, Publisher's Clearinghouse scam tactics?

Anyway, I go up to the teller, swipe my card, enter my PIN, and tell her I want to withdraw money from my checking account. "Would you like to open a Nevada account now that you live out here?"

What in God's name are you blathering about? "I don't live here, I'm just out here for about a month." I made one other withdrawal a few days ago, and I have no idea, even if the teller knew that she would conclude that I now live in Vegas. And even if I did, why would I want to change my account? Because I've always wanted a Nevada routing number on my checks?

"Oh, are you visiting family?"

What? Why do you care, just give me my money. "Kinda, my girlfriend."

She smiles. "Have you heard about our blahblablah credit card?"

Ugh. "Yes." Any chance that will spare me the spiel?

"Great, well you can get blah blah blah APR..."

"Not interested," I interrupt her.

"Maybe just for overdraft protection?"

"No thank you."

"OK, I'm just going to have to get my supervisor to authorize this, one moment." As we are waiting for the supervisor, she looks at me with a smile that tells me more inane badgering is on its way. "Can I ask why you're not interested in the credit card."

Good @#$% God, enough with the credit card! "I'm really not interested."

"It's an $8500 line of credit," the supervisor interjects.

This is unbelievable. I'm a very level-headed guy, and it takes a lot to get an abrupt response out of me. "Seriously, I don't want the credit card."

"OK, then, here you are, sir." The bitch finally signs the form to authorize my withdrawal, and I leave with my money.

My starting table in the tournament was fairly solid, with at least two other young, appropriately aggressive players. The softest looking spots were a middle-aged man with a big brown moustache and an older guy in blue sunglasses. The older guy largely fit my stereotype of loose passive play, but he turned out to have a bit of crazy in him.

We started with 4000 chips and blinds of 25/50. With fewer than 100 big blinds in the starting stacks, this is a pretty shallow structure that doesn't allow a lot of room for mistakes or bad luck. The first pot that I played, a few people still had not taken their seats, and one of the empty spots at the table was in the big blind. The action folded to the old guy, who just called the blind in late position. This is generally a weak play, but even more so when there's no one in the seat to defend the big blind. I decided I was going to raise with any two cards, but then i turned out I had Ace-King anyway. I raised to 275 and took it down. As I was planning on raising thiis guy quite a bit, often as a bluff, I showed him the Ace-King, hoping it would buy me a little credit next time.

Next orbit, one of the better players on my immediate right open raised to 150. This was the first time action had folded to him in late position, and I had a feeling he was going to be opening a pretty wide range. I was prepared to reraise him light, but then found Ace-Queen, which against a late position open is a legitimate reraising hand anyway. I made it 450, and he folded.

A few hands later, the old guy raised to 150, and the kid on my right reraised him to 400, which he called. On a flop of Q94, all different suits, the guy checked and called a bet of 600. The turn was something irrelevant, the old man checked, the kid bet 1000, and then the old man put him all in for 2500 more. Wow, that kind of action from a loose passive old man is usually a pretty strong hand. The kid must have the same thought, because he thought for a long time before calling with a pair of Aces. And the old man has... King-Ten, for nothing more than a gut shot straight draw! Like I said, he had a little crazy to him. The river paired the board, and the kid took down a nice pot.

Soon after, the old guy, who still had a fair number of chips, called the blind bet of 50, the same young guy called also, and I raised to 275 with Ace-nine of spades. The old guy was the only caller, and we saw an AK5 flop. He checked, and I decided to check also and give him a chance to launch some crazy at me. He bet 500 on an 2 turn, which I called. The river was a 3, and he checked. I thought it was unlikely he'd call a bet with anything worse than my top pair weak kicker, so I just turned over my hand, and he mucked.

Next orbit, I opened from late position with a raise of 150 holding Ace-King. A guy on my left who'd been quiet and pursed his lips like a duck bill whenever he played a pot called, and one of the more aggressive players in the small blind reached for some chips. I don't think I had a particularly aggressive image, but nonetheless, some players will often reraise light in this spot with what is called a 'squeeze play.' Basically he is hoping that I will fold often because I'm worried about the guy left to act behind me, and that the guy behind me will not often have a strong hand since he elected not to reraise me the first time. With the blinds plus my raise and a call already in the pot, that's a lot of chips to take down without a fight.

Given that Ace-King is a strong hand in its own right, and that there was some chance the kid was just on a squeeze play, I was prepared to come back over the top of his raise. However, he ended up raising very small, making is just 400. This made me suspicious, because the fact that he's offering such good odds on a call suggests he could have a very strong hand like AA or KK. I opted just to call his reraise after all, as I could get away cheap if I was behind and might be able to keep dominated hands like AQ and KJ around, whereas they would probably fold if I put in another raise. On the right flop, those hands could lose a lot of money to me. The flop was all rags, though, something like 753, and I folded to a bet. Oh well.

Despite his occasional crazy tendencies, the old man was still my best source of chips, so I kept hammering at him, raising his next call with a pair of 9's. The flop was KQ9, all clubs. Trips 9's is a very strong hand, but with all those clubs out there, slowplaying is too risky. I bet 400 into a pot of about 600, and much to my disappointment, he folded.

At this point, the table broke, and we all got moved to empty seats at other tables. Blinds went up to 50/100, and I didn't get much in the way of playable hands. I did open to 300 once with a pair of Queens, and an Italian (actually from Italy, not an Italian-American) called out of his BB. The flop was 7c 5d 2c, he checked, I bet 400, and he raised to 1000. It's pretty unlikely I'm beat here, but there are a lot of scary cards that could fall on the turn, and even if I just call, my opponent may slow down with worse hands than mine anyway. So, I moved all in for about 4000 more, and he folded.

On the last hand before our first break, the action folded to me on the button. I opened for the maximum, which was 350, holding a pair of 4's. The thing is that with a pair of 4's, I probably have the best hand, but anyone holding two overcards, even something as weak as 65, has the odds to call. Hence, I raised a little more than my usual 300. The big blind called anyway, and then he led into me for 500 on a Td 5h 2d flop. Hmmmm. When people call out of position pre-flop, they almost always check to the raiser on the flop, because the raiser usually bets the flop whether he hit it or not. Then the out of position player can raise if he likes his hand. The fact that this guy did attempt to check-raise me made me think he could be trying to steal on the cheap, and although there are two cards higher than my pair on the board, I felt I could still be ahead, so I called.

The turn was the 7h, putting two flush draws and several straight draws on the board. The guy bet 500 again. The pot was now 1750, and he was betting less than 1/3 of that, which gives me good odds if I'm on any kind of draw. This could mean that he himself is on a draw and wants to prevent me from making a larger bet, or that he is worried about the strength of his hand, or that he is bad at poker and trying to 'trap' me. Unfortunately, with about 5000 chips in my stack, I was in an awkward spot. I felt that if I just called the bet, it would be clear I was weak (since I'd passed up two opportunities to raise on a board where a lot of draws are possible), and he'd be able to bluff me on a lot of scary river cards. I also felt that even a small raise could be threatening to some of his better hands, because he will then be in the same situation on the river: even if he suspects he's ahead now, unless he wants to risk 5000 chips to find out, he'll be out position and potentially facing an all in bet on a scary river card. So I made a small raise, to just 1500, prepared to fold if he moved all in.

But he just called, and the river was the Ad, completing the flush that was the most likely draw for him to have had. He checked, which is actually bad to do if he just made a flush, but live players do this all the time anyway. There was about 5000 in the pot, and I had 3500 left in my stack. I contemplated moving all in to represent the flush and possibly knock him off some mid-pair hands that were beating me, but I decided the turn raise wasn't very consistent with me having a flush draw, and so I just gave up and checked. He turned over Ace-five offsuit, exactly the kind of thing I was hoping I could make him fold on the turn. Oh well, he probably would have snapped off my river bluff anyway. Not a great way to start the break.

When we came back, blinds were 75/150, meaning I could afford only 12-13 more orbits if I didn't pick up some chips. I stole the blinds once with A2 in late position and with KQ first to act. Then when I was in the big blind, the A5 guy made a pretty weak raise to just 350 from early position and got one call. I decided I was going to make a squeeze play with any hand that had sufficient showdown value, something like a pair or two big cards. But then I found a pair of Aces, the best possible starting hand! I reraised 900 more, but they both folded. At least that validates my feeling that it would have been a good time to bluff.

That put me back around 5000 after paying the blinds. After another orbit at the table, the first player to act just called 150, and I was next with Ace-Queen. I raised to 600, everyone else folded, and he called. The flop was Ah 3s 4h, giving me top pair with a good kicker. To my surprise, the other player led into me for 1000. There was now 1425 in the pot and about 4500 in my stack, so at this point my only objective is to get as much money in the pot as I can. If I'm beat, there's nothing I can do about it- we're too shallow for me to fold a hand this strong.

So how do I do that? Even my opponent was bluffing or semi-bluffing, there's a good chance he'll give up once I call that big bet unless he improves to a hand that beats me. This is what poker theorists call "reverse implied odds"- if he has this kind of hand, I stand to lose the rest of my chips if he does improve while winning nothing further if he does not. That's an argument to raise now, just to keep him from improving on a semi-bluffing hand.

If he has top pair with a worse kicker, I also think raising is the best way to get paid off, as there are a lot of turn cards that could scare him, and he may think that I am semi-bluffing if I raise. If he has a better hand than mine, well, then he is just going to win a big pot, and there's not anything I can do about it. So I raised, he moved all in, I called, and he showed me pocket 4's for three of a kind. The turn put another heart on the board, and since I had the Qh, this actually gave me a chance to win on the river, but alas, it was not to be. I lost the pot and was eliminated.

This last hand actually presents a very interesting situation, because although I was never the statistical favorite to win the pot, not pre-flop and certainly not on the flop, I believe that the way the hand as a whole will play out results in me showing a long-term profit. Allow me to explain:

When my opponent calls the raise to 600 pre-flop holding a pair of 4's, he is hunting for that third 4 on the flop to make three of a kind. He knows I'm likely to have fairly strong hand to be raising him from early position, and the times that he catches trips, he'll have a well-disguised monster and expects me to have something strong enough to pay him off. This is what poker theorists call "implied odds"- although his 44 is actually a slight favorite over my AQ, he has to realize that I could easily have a pair bigger than his 4's, in which case rather than being a slight favorite, he's going to be a big dog. He is not counting on the strength of his lowly pair winning the pot unimproved. Rather, he is speculating, making a small investment pre-flop with the intention of either winning a big pot when he makes his trips or getting away cheap when he doesn't.

But does he actually get paid off often enough for this strategy to be profitable? I think that he does not. Since he has already called 150, my raise charges him 450 more to see the flop. The times that he doesn't flop trips, he's generally going to have to check and fold to a bet, and I'm going to bet most flops, whether or not they improve my hand. So for example on a K85 flop, he will be folding the best hand, but he has to fold, since I could easily have AK, KJ, AA, or many other hands that have him drawing nearly dead. He'll only hit that 4 only about 15% of the time, which means that he'll be checking and folding about 85% of the time.

I have 4500 chips left in my stack, so if he wins all of them the 15% of the time that he does hit the 4, he'll come out alright. However, he isn't going to get my stack anywhere near that often. If the flop had been K84, he would have gotten one bet at most out of me, because once he bet or called a bet, I would have given up on my AQ and kept the rest of my money. He got a "perfect storm" flop that gave me a strong hand and him an even stronger one. Much more often, he'll miss and get bluffed out, or he'll hit, but I won't have a hand that can pay him off. In short, the implied odds aren't there for him to make that call pre-flop, even though he happened to win a big pot this time simply because the stars aligned in his favor.

Although this is analysis of the situation is a little rough around the edges, I think it illustrates an interesting point. Even though 100% of my money went into the pot when I was behind in the hand, I'm actually the one who stands to make money in this situation long term. Having won a big pot, however, my opponent will likely never realize that he was in fact making a marginally losing play. That's the magic of poker, and what makes it such a difficult game to master: losing plays work often enough to deceive players into thinking they are winning strategies. And winning players often find themselves playing Monday morning quarterback from the sidelines.

WSOP $5000 6-Max Trip Report

After the $5K yesterday, I played a $512+13 ten-handed satellite. It was winner take all in tournament lammers, but since this was live poker, my understanding was that deals were almost always made.

The play was predictably bad. Tons of limping pre-flop, no one ever raised without having AK or TT+. Oh except one guy who raised A8 then stacked off on a 764 flop, losing to a set of 6's.

Half the table was comprised of a group of Mexicans who were all friends with each other. One lady was concerned about collusion, but I think she was just a racist, cuz the guys only spoke English at the table and weren't like constantly getting involved in the same pots or anything. One of the Mexicans, a kind of fat guy with a goatee and some badass tatoos, got into a little spat with some European donk who was insisting that a guy who called all in on the river (European wasn't involved in the pot) had to reveal his cards even though he mucked when the better turned over the nuts.

The Mexican guy seemed mostly to be messing with the European, who was taking it way too seriously. They called over the floor, who confirmed that the hand should have been shown. The Mexican made a big show of apologizing for questioning the European.

A few hands later, once again a pot the Euro wasn't involved in, some guy who barely spoke English through in a five hundred chip and held up five fingers. The dealer announced a raise, and the European asked if it shouldn't be a call, since the guy didn't say raise. The dealer ignored him, but the Mexican guy laughed and said, "I bet you were the hall monitor at your school. Always run to the principal's office and tell him when people are smoking in the parking lot." Whole table laughed at the fuming European.

Still at 25/50 (2000 starting chips, 15 minute levels, shit structure), the funny Mexican opens for 250. I flat call with QQ cuz from what I've seen he's capable of reading hands and can probably play pretty well against a 3-bet when he's opened so large to begin with. Two other guys call, whoops. Flop T 8 5, check to the Mexican, he bets 850, I shove 1600, guy to my left (the one who doubled with set of 6's) insta-re-shoves, and I know I'm toast. I'm sure any of these donkeys is capable of calling my all in cold with worse than QQ, but they'd have to think about it. The insta-call is scary.

THEN, the Mexican starts going on about how sick this is and how he's got a big hand and finally he shoves in too and I have to be just smoked. But nope Mexican has JTs, other guy has 97 for an open-ender, and my hand holds up.

We get down to four-handed, and I've got half the chips in play, though blinds are humongous. The 97 guy to my left is second in chips, then there's some white kid and one of the Mexicans both kinda short. 97 guy proposes a 500 chip save. Are you insane? The kid has 2 BB's and no idea how to play a stack that size, we would just be giving him $500 for no reason. I decline the chop, and instantly win some enemies at the table.

I bust the kid with A2s on my button v his last BB, and again decline a $500 save, since I still have half the chips in play. Mexican open completes from the SB, I find AK and shove, showing it when he folds (since I'm going to be shoving a lot). "Thought so," he said. "I folded A9." Wow, how terrible to open complete that and then fold to a shove. No way I am dealing with this guy still in it.

Amazingly, he shoves at his next five opportunities, and every time, he shows an Ace. Must be nice. At this point I'm blinded down to just below average, and I tell the guys I'm now willing to do the $500 save. "Why now but not before?" 97 asks.

"I had a lot more chips then."

He stares at me like I just raped a nun. "Oh, so now that you have less chips, you want to make a deal?"

"Yes," I tell him very simply.

They both agree, and we play on. I shove A3 from the button for 7 BB's, and the Mexican tanks. What now? He finally calls with AJ (tough spot there, amigo), but I spike my 3. "Why you put all those chips in there with A3?" he asks me disgustedly.

"It wasn't really that many chips." We play on, he keeps picking up shoving hands. I correctly muck A9 when he standard raisies the button, and he shows us AJ. Must be nice.

Blinds go up again, I shove A3 for 6 BB from the button, now 97 insta-calls. Christ, how do these weak-tight nits get dealt premiums every fucking time? He's got KK, and I'm down to 500, which is only half the BB I now have to post. 97 open limps the button, Mexican completes, and on the flop they agree verbally to check it down and have the dealer just put out the board all at once. Blatant collusion, but whatever. I make two pair to triple up.

Next hand, Mexican min-raises the button, I've got 1/3 of my stack in the pot blind so I try to call as confidently as possible with 94o, but BB calls the min-raise anyway. Board is 875, BB is going to check, but then Mexican bets out of turn. BB is a little offended Mex wasn't going to check it down with him, but then decides he's going to do the betting. He bets, Mex shoves 66, he calls with K7. Mex spikes on the turn to eliminate me and collect 75% of the chips in play.

The second I'm eliminated, they agree to a 50/50 chop. I mean, they agree instantly, no haggling or anything. My head explodes thinking about how much equity the Mexican is giving up here. Each of them pays me 250 from his half and they both leave happy.

Oh, and just to be clear, 76 was not one of the Mexicans. These guys weren't buddies or anything, just live players who enjoy making awful deals. The atrocious deal making in these things alone is probably enough edge to justify playing them, never mind that the play is terrible at all stages. The only problem is that I had to stand in line for like 45 minutes to get a seat in one.

Oh the low rake is a sweet deal, too. Factor in a $10 meal voucher, and you're only paying $3 juice.

Went out to the Rio last night, primarily to meet Nate from 2+2. Traffic was atrocious, so it took me like twice as long to get there as it should have, but I still had about two hours to play. I got a seat in a new game, and when I got there, there were like five people at the table and three other piles of chips with no player in sight. The dealer asked if we wanted to get started, and I was of course all for it, but this thirty-something Jewish dude on my left who looked like a giant prick said he wouldn't play until a sixth got there. He sounded like a giant prick when he said it.

Table didn't look too wild, mostly solid-looking guys who weren't smiling or talking or laughing or anything. A few were in for as little as $500, but there were a couple with $1200-$1500, and the prick on my left (the only guy at the table wearing sunglasses, and they were prick sunglasses) had bought in for $4000.

The table played like a tight/standard live game, plenty of limping and calling, not a lot of betting and raising. Easy but not especially profitable or interesting. The prick on my left was mostly folding and not saying anything, occasionally he would he would grumble quietly to me about the limpers, but unlike me, he never raised them light. He seemed to think I was the only decent player at the table and wanted to have a bitch session with me about how bad everyone else was, but he seemed like a giant prick and also kind of bad in his own way so I just kind of nodded.

On my right was a Brazilian guy in headphones who didn't like how tight the table was playing and kept initiating deals where the entire table agreed to straddle for an orbit. On my straddle, there were a few limpers, and I raised $100 on top with whatever two cards I was holding. Everyone folded, and the Brazilian complimented me on my steal. I smiled and mucked.

Later in the orbit, I raised his limp, he called and check-folded to a bet on a TT9 flop. He asked what I had, and I told him an Ace, which was true.

A few orbits later, everyone folded to him in the BB, and he completed my straddle. I knew he expected me to raise, and I was prepared to do it with a wide range, but I decided just to check 76o. Flop KQ8cc, we check it through. Turn offsuit 5, he checks, I bet $35, he raises to $75. Easy call. River offsuit 4 that's gin baby! He checks. Now there's very little chance he's bluffing with such a small turn check-raise, and all the most obvious draws missed, so I know he's checking cuz he thinks he's good and wants me to bluff at it. So I oblige and bet $250 at a pot of like $190. He tanks for a minute, calls, and mucks when I table the nuts.

A little while later, I completed 98o from the SB after a few people had limped a straddle. Flop 567r, I lead for 100, some dude raises to 250 with 150 behind, and calls off the rest. A 7 on the river worries me, but he shows 65, and I scoop the pot. The prick on my left, who had played like three hands in the last hour, complained that all the donkeys were giving me their money. Can't win if you don't play, sir!!!!

The table still sucked, and I was up like $850 at this point, so I called Nate to see if he wanted to go early for dinner. He did, so I cut out before my next BB, and we went over to the Sao Paolo Cafe.

The Sao Paolo isn't anything spectacular, but they are close to the Amazon Room and will give you a pretty tasty meal fairly quickly and cheaply. I haven't been many other places in the Rio, but none of them look spectacular, so Sao Paolo is a solid staple. Highly recommended for WSOP dinner breaks.

Nate is hands down my favorite 2+2 poster. There are plenty of people who have won a lot more money than he has and are probably better at poker, but few of them have his range of expertise (he can discuss betting strategy after the second draw in Badugi as intelligently as he can re-stealing at a MTT final table) or his ability to express ideas in a clear and concise way. It was a pleasure to meet him, as he seemed to be an interesting guy in real life as well.

After dinner we got coffee at Starbucks with his roommate, 2+2 poster Pete Fabrizio (sorry, Pete, despite asking you twice, I forgot your real name), who had been sweating the $10K PLO final table. Pete is apparently a PLO genius.

We didn't get to talk much PLO, but he did say something interesting in response to my complaints about the tight prick at my 5/10 table who inexplicably bought in for $4000: "The last $1000 in his stack is usually going to go in as a big dog." This concept isn't revolutionary, but I'd never thought about it in that way before. A super tight player usually gets his money in good for the first few bets. I mean, if I'm open raising 50% of hands from the CO and this guy is only calling top 10% on his button, then obviously he's going to be ahead pre-flop the times he calls me. But with the cards he's playing, he's not going to make a lot of 400BB hands. When that much money goes in on a 9QK flop, for instance, it's likely that I've made a straight against his set.

Anyway, I watched the final three of the PLO tournament for a little while, but it was moving pretty slowly, so I went and got myself on a 5/10 NL list. It was a long list, though, and while I was waiting, I heard them call open seating for a $1030 single table satellite. That'll do.

This guy who looked like an Arab Andy Bloch organized a $300 last longer, and I thought about getting in on it, but decided it would be in my interest to have other people at the table concerned about busting so that I could shove into their BB's. It certainly didn't affect Arab Andy's play, because while the rest of the table was tight to a fault, he was making absurd calls and shoves left and right and sucking out pretty consistently.

We didn't lose a single player until the 200/400 level, which with 5000 starting chips is unheard of. Across the table from me was some bearded dude in his 40's who was pretty consistently in a grumpy mood. He complained about the dealer exposing cards, the speed at which we were moving, the way others were playing, etc.

The second player to go out was this kid on my right shoved 4600 with T9o on his BB when Arab Andy opened for 1600 at the 300/600 level. Andy thought for a while and ended up calling with QJ. Obviously he should have been calling any two, but Beardy made fun of him for that call. A few hands later another guy shoved 3600 or so and I snapped him off with AA which put me second in chips behind Andy.

Then Beardy opened for 1600 and the SB shoved 2200 more. "Why do I feel like I'm dominated?" he started hemming and hawing over the most straight-forward call ever and nearly folded. He looked at AAB and said, with an air of superiority, "I've got the same hand you had, it's half as much for me to call, there's three times as much in the pot, and I'm still thinking about." Well sir that just makes you six times as much of an idiot, doesn't it? Finally he called with QJ and beat A6 (which he criticized the guy for shoving).

When blinds hit 500/1000, we were 6-handed, and I shoved KQo UTG for 8500. The guy to my left called pretty quickly, and then the guy to his left tanked and finally called. Whoops. First guy shows AK, second shows... 55!!! Well that just pads the pot for my inevitable suckout. Flop JJT, turn 9, BINK! I dodge a Q or 5 river and bust two players to take back the chip lead. A few hands later, with blinds capped at 2000/4000, the guy in last shoves, Beardy calls all in, and Andy calls them both with KJs. First guy had A3, Beardy had TT, and Andy makes the flush to bust them both.

As soon as we got heads up, I offered a 50-50 chop. I had only 40% of the chips, but the last satellite I played, the last two standing chopped 50-50 when one dude had 75% of the chips, so I figured it was worth a shot. AAB wanted 60-40. I proposed 55-45, but he wouldn't take it, so I just took the even chop. Even though he had been the worst player at the table, his stupidly loose aggressive tendencies were probably going to help him play well with huge blinds, and I didn't want to flip a coin for $10,000. I would have expected a skill edge against Beardy the old nit and probably insisted on getting an edge in a chop, but with AAB, I think it really was going to be a crapshoot who won.

 

Don't Make Your Girlfriend Watch You Play Poker

I am sitting in a 5/10 game at the Rio when this giant tool takes a seat next to me. He's got the sunglasses, the hair gel, fashionably unbuttoned shirt, and a ball cap that reads "Philly" in what I guess was supposed to look like graffiti letters. He clearly thinks he's hot [censored] as he takes a fat roll of bills from his pocket and peels off twenty. Then, in completely unballer fashion, he thinks better of it, puts half the bills back, and buys in for $1000.

Meanwhile, his girlfriend is pulling up a seat slightly behind him and to the right. Note that this still takes up some space at the table, as the guy is sitting considerably closer to me than he otherwise would be, and because he is lefthanded, he jostles me several times as he stacks his chips.

The girl didn't have to be unattractive. She had blonde hair, blue eyes, and large breasts. But she was a thickalicious girl in a very short skirt that highlighted her thunder thighs. Her plunging neckline revealed quite a lot of cleavage, but her completely unsupportive bra gave her a bad case of pancake boob.

I was not happy with this guy for depositing his stubbly face and his busted girlfriend in my peripheral vision, and I resolved to make him regret it.

He posts $10 in the CO, and another new player at the table has already posted $10 as well. Action folds to the tool, who raises his post to $50. I resolve to pop him with any two from the button. I find 72o, but a deal's a deal, so I make it $150. He glances at my stack, ponders a moment, and calls.

The flop comes 444, and immediately he asks me "Did you make a full house, too? I made a full house. I check." I hate it when people run their mouths during a hand. After a few moments of thought, I bet $180, and he calls.

Turn is a T, and he checks. [censored] Zeebo Theorem can I really get this tool to fold whatever [censored] full house he has? If I really had a big pair I'd just price him in on the turn and river since he's only got a pot-sized bet left in his stack and probably no understanding of what "pot odds" actually means. But that's exactly why I can't run a bluff that way, and if I just shove now, he'll probably put me on AK like the live "pro" tool that he is. So after much thought I check behind.

The river is a K, and I get as excited about this as I would if I really had AK. "Damn," he says with deliberately, conspicuously bad acting. "I let you get there. You got AK. I should have bet the turn, huh? OK, I check." As I am pondering, he keeps mentioning AK, and every time he does, I have to wait a few more seconds before I can bluff. Finally he shuts his stubbly mouth long enough for me to announce a bet of $350. Dickface turbo-mucks and sneers at me with an intolerable air of superiority, "Do you think I'm an idiot?"

I flip my 72o, and his face drops like a rock as the implications of this hand become clear to him. Here he has taken his filly to come watch him own this "high stakes" poker game, and not only has he lost, not only has he been bluffed, but some kid took one look at him and decided that it would be profitable to play the worst hand in poker against him. It's not like I missed a flush draw and had no choice but to bluff the river. Having never played a pot with this guy in my life, I took one look at him and decided to run a multi-street bluff from scratch with seven-deuce off-suit.

His girl starts consoling him with thigh stroking, but of course her pity is the last thing he wants right now. She is supposed to be in awe of him, not feeling sorry for him. "I wish you had flopped two pair. I would have taken all your money," he tells me. 77 I guess? Yeah, if the case seven and a deuce had flopped, you probably would have stacked me. Congratulations. I kind of half shrug but still have not said a word to him.

Now he puts $1000 more in bills on the table and is on mega-tilt, limping into every pot, calling any raise, and firing at lots of flops. Amazingly, the table is letting him get away with it, and I can't pick up anything to play against him. Finally a nice guy on my left cold calls a reraise from the kid with A's in the SB, leads a rag flop, and shoves over the kid's raise. The kid calls but mucks when the dude flips his hand on the river and storms away from the table with his woman tripping after him in her skinny heels.

I left the house around 11AM on Friday bound for the Rio and the main event of the 2007 World Series of Poker. Vegas is experiencing record highs for the weak, with the thermometer topping out near 120 degrees. It's enough to leave me sweating after a two block walk to the car. As I cruised up I-15 with A/C on full blast, George Thorogood came on the radio. I'm not generally the sort to sing out loud, but this seemed like a good way to get pumped up, so I declared along with him that I was, "B-b-b-b-b-aaaaaad. Bad to the bone!" Then, sadly, an even more fitting song came on: Elton John's "Don't Go Breaking My Heart".

This year, 6000 people are expected to enter the $10,000 poker tournament. If that number proves accurate, then there will be 5999 broken hearts. No one enters the tournament without a dream of winning it, and in fact, everyone has a chance, no matter how slim, of actually taking home the bracelet. One of the keys to poker's appeal is that it blends elements of skill and luck. The best players win often enough to show a profit, but they still lose often enough to give everyone else a chance. Even though I believe I had a substantial edge over last year's field, I was still very fortunate to finish in the money. There were many players better than I who did not do as well, and many players worse than I who did better. That's poker, and heart-breaking as it can be, it's also the beauty of the game.

In the last year, I've improved a ton as a poker player. Nevertheless, it is more likely than not that I will win nothing in this year's tournament. After all, only 10% of us will win anything. A top player, and I am not quite in that echelon, might have a 25-30% chance of taking home a prize. This is why it is so important to focus on winning the largest prize possible, even if this means slightly increasing your chances of winning nothing at all. Since you will cash infrequently, it is crucial to make the most you can when you make anything at all.

After reporting on the three preliminary WSOP events that I played without cashing, I got a few concerned e-mails or phone calls asking me what was wrong. Not to say that I played flawlessly, but there's really nothing at all out of the ordinary about losing several tournaments in a row. I've played hundreds of poker tournaments on the internet this year and finished in the money in only 17% of them. This includes streaks of a dozen or more tournaments played without winning anything. Nevertheless, I've seen a return of about 35% on the money I've invested in this way. That's just how poker tournaments work: you lose most of the time, but occasionally you win big. Really big. The winner of the 2006 WSOP main event took home $12 million, the largest cash prize in sports history.

So that's what's at stake as I slide into my seat just before noon. When the tournament director announces "shuffle up and deal", four of the ten seats at my table are still empty. This is not a good sign. Only very good players can afford to be blase about showing up on time for a $10,000 poker tournament.

This year, we start with 20,000 chips, and the blinds begin at 50-100. I try to size up my table immediately. I identify at least two players who, though unknown to me, seem to know what they are doing. Thankfully, they are both to my immediate right, meaning that they will almost always act before I do when we play pots together, which gives me a tremendous information advantage.

My goal is to avoid playing pots out of position against these guys, but as it goes with the best laid plans, this one was quickly laid to waste. The guy two seats to my right was very young, probably younger than I am, and very aggressive. He was opening literally 50% of the pots with a raise to 350, which meant that if I wanted to play any hands at this table, I was going to have to tangle with him. Early on, he raised to 350 on the button (meaning he was last to act before the blinds, and could therefore raise an even wider range of hands than usual), and the other good player called in the small blind. In the big blind, I had Ace-Queen, which is a huge hand relative to the stuff these guys could be playing. Still, I'd be happy taking the pot down pre-flop, so I made a pretty large reraise to 1500. Thankfully, the button folded. The small blind called, but that was less worrisome, because I had position on him.

The dealer spread a flop of Q95, all different suits. This gave me top pair with the best possible kicker, which is a monster hand in this situation. There were so few draws on the board that I felt comfortable checking as well when my opponent checked to me, figuring that he'd be more likely to pay off with worse hands if I didn't bet the flop.

The turn was a 3 and put a possible diamond flush draw on the board. My opponent bet 3500, which I called. The river was the 8 of diamonds, and he checked to me. I contemplated betting my pair of queens for value, but his turn bet was so big that I think it's almost impossible for him to put me on a worse hand than the one I have. If the diamond draw had missed on the river, I could bet hoping he would put me on a busted flush draw, but here, I just turned over my hand. He mucked, and I won my first pot of the 2007 WSOP, and a sizeable one at that.

The young guy two seats to my right kept up the aggression, and I reraised him once pre-flop as a bluff. His constant raising had not gone unnoticed by the rest of the table, either, and they started playing back at him as well. Around this time, I found myself holding pocket Tens one off the button and staring at yet another raise from this guy. I should have reraised him, but for whatever reason I elected to just call and play a pot in a position. A Danish guy who had been quiet and seemed like a solid player also called in the SB, and the three of us saw a 8d 6d 3h flop. The aggressive guy bet 800, I raised to 2500, and then the Dane, whom I expected to fold instantly, started counting chips. That's not good. Finally he put out 2500 for a call, and the other guy folded.

Wow. I stared at him, trying to figure out what he could have to call that raise from out of position. He wasn't getting the right odds to play just a flush or straight draw, and he seemed smart enough to know that. But with so many draws possible, I'd expect him to put in another raise with a monster hand like three of a kind rather than give two players a chance to outdraw him on the turn.

It seemed to me his most logical holding would be either 86 for top two pair or something like 9d 7d for both a flush and a straight draw. Based on that read, I should have bet the 9h that fell on the turn, but his call scared me so much that I feared a check-raise and declined to bet. The river was the 7d, making the final board 36789 with no flush possible. My pair of T's had suddenly turned into a straight, the second best possible hand. The Dane bet 3000, and I raised to 11,000. On the one hand, this is a really big raise that I can't expect him to call very often. However, when I raise here, I am representing either a straight or a bluff. Whether he calls with worse hands depends on the frequency with which he thinks I am bluffing. If I make a smaller raise, it will be harder for him to think I am bluffing, and consequently easier for him to fold. Thus, I raise big because that is the only way my bet could plausibly be construed as a bluff. He folded 9d 7d face up, and I won another big pot.

Just as I was starting to feel good about things, a young guy in a Cardrunners sweatshirt sauntered over to take one of the empty seats. Cardrunners is a subscription-based website where you can watch instructional videos, with commentary, of some excellent internet poker players as they do their thing. This sweatshirt already identified the new player as one of a few individuals, and now I just needed to figure out which he was. I watched as he passed his seat card to the dealer, and I saw the name I was praying not to see... Brian Townsend, AKA aba20, AKA sbrugby.

Brian is the best poker player you've never heard of, and if you have heard of him, well then he may just be the best player you have heard of. He's a regular winner in the largest poker game available online, which is a no limit hold 'em game with $300 and $600 blinds. The buyin for the game is $60,000, and readers of Brian's blog (http://www.cardrunners.com/fusetalk/blog/index.cfm?forumid=31) know that it is not unheard of for him to win or lose hundreds of thousands of dollars in a day. This guy voluntarily plays nosebleed stakes heads up with Phil Ivey... and wins.

I was not thrilled to be at his table. Thankfully, he was playing very tight, and I was able to stay out of his way. Nevertheless, I decided to investigate a rumor I'd heard that you could request a table change at the WSOP. I stood up from the table, found a floor man, and asked him if this was true. He looked at me like I had two heads. Oh well, guess I'm stuck with these guys.

To my great joy, however, our table was one of the first to get broken down so that we could be redistributed into recently vacated seats. My new table looked much less scary, populated primarily by a bunch of middle-aged small business owner types. These guys are great because they are usually poker enthusiasts with substantial non-poker income who can afford to play the main event even though they often cannot count on having a positive expectation.

To my left was a young, very tricky, loose, and aggressive player who was either Mexican or from the Mississippi Delta, I never did figure out which. He knew a bunch of the staff at the Rio and was almost certainly a professional poker player. He gave me a ton of headaches at this table, and I left with a lot of respect for his game.

To my right was one of the strangest looking men I have ever seen in my life. I think he was either an oil tycoon, a pirate, or both. He was a short, rotund, well-dressed, heavily-jowled older man sporting a large white Stetson hat and, I kid you not, an eye patch. This wasn't one of those temporary deals you get when you have eye surgery, this was an honest-to-goodness shiver-me-timbers pirate patch. Here's a picture, though unfortunately the patch is a little tough to see: http://www.printroom.com/ViewGalleryPhoto.asp?userid=worldseriesofpoker&tcount=26&scount=7&gallery_id=753475&image_id=6.

To his right was a guy from Eugene, Oregon with a shaved head and goatee who looked eerily like a tall, white version of my friend Dave. Also like Dave, this guy was a Raiders fan. Unfortunately, Tall White Dave didn't last long, and he was replaced by a kind of annoying guy named Cory. I didn't play many hands at this table, but still managed to go into the first break with over 30,000 chips, an increase of 50% from my starting stack and a great spot to be in relative to the average, which was only like 22,000 at this point. I even heard a rumor that the chipleader had less than 40,000, though that seems unlikely.

After break, blinds doubled to 100/200 and things went downhill quickly for me. I finally got dealt a pair of Aces and raised to 600 from early position. Two guys who both owned car dealerships called me, one from late position, the other from the small blind. I bet 1500 on a Tc 7s 5c flop, and only the small blind called. He checked and called 3000 on a 6d turn. The river was an ugly Qc, completing a possible flush draw. My opponent bet into me for 7000, and I reluctantly folded. He later got caught bluffing in a similar spot, so I may have folded the best hand, but it seemed reasonable at the time. This, combined with a few aggressive moves that got snapped off by the tricky guy on my left knocked me down around 20,000.

Not a whole lot more happened in this level, and I went to break with a slightly below average stack of 22,000. I came back to find that blinds had doubled again to 200/400. This Cory guy I mentioned who had replaced Tall White Dave at the table seemed like he was going to be annoying. There were two car dealers at the table, and although Cory wasn't one of them, he sure looked like a man who could sell you a used vehicle. Here's a picture: http://www.pokerstarsblog.com/2007/07/2007-world-series-more-glory-for-cory.html. As soon as he sat down, he started running his mouth about nothing in particular, just kind of trying to loosen up the table and saying stuff like, "Who's having fun? Everyone's so serious. Eh, look at this guy, he keeps looking at me like he wishes I would shut up. Hahaha." He was talking through even really straight-forward decisions every time he played a hand and generally wasting everyone's time.

Most of that stopped after a little while except when the cameras were around. I didn't know this at the time, but this Cory guy made the final few tables at the 2005 main event and went deep in a few other tournaments (there's a little bio of him in the link above). For whatever reason, ESPN was always checking in on him, and even though he mostly quieted down at the table, he'd always start yammering again when they were around. I tried to call him on it but to no avail.

I spent most of this level pretty card dead, and the few times I did make a play at the pot, nobody believed me. Then I finally got a pair of Aces, raised, and everyone believed me.

There was this Frenchman at the table who was intermittenly reading a book (specifically I think it may have been a Star Wars novel!) while at the table. He'd shown down some weird hands after raising from early position, so I wasn't giving his raises a ton of respect. He opened to 1100, but from what I could tell, though he didn't have his book out at the time, he wasn't paying much attention to the hand in question. A kind of loose, middle-aged guy from Washington State called the raise, and the action folded to me on the button. I was holding King-Queen and sitting on a stack of 16,500. This seemed like a good spot to make a squeeze play, because I'd be putting in 25% of my stack against an early position raiser, which looks very strong, and although I would appear committed to the pot, I'd actually have room to fold if the Frenchman moved all in.

I raised to 4500 after some thought, and the Frenchman folded quickly, as I believed he would. Then the Washingtonian stared me down and called. Those who don't play tournament poker may not grasp the significance of this, but it is very odd just to call a big bet like this out of position. At this point the size of the pot is about equal to the size of my stack, so I would expect the guy who is going to be out of position post-flop either to fold or to move all in on me rather than putting himself in an awkward spot.

Based on how he's played the hand, it looks an awful lot like he has a medium pocket pair. Pre-flop, my hand is essentially a coin flip against any pair Jacks or worse, so I would have been willing to call his all in. I would rather not flip a coin for my tournament life, but at this point there was a lot of money in the pot, so it would be worth it. However, the flop came out J83, and only then did my opponent bet into me. While I could have gotten all in pre-flop, with five cards to come, I now had only two chances to hit my King or Queen and consequently had to fold to his bet. It really sucks to have to fold at this point, leaving myself with only 12,000 chips, but I do think it's the correct play, and it's what I did.

If he's going to call my reraise with a medium sized pair, then this is actually a really good way for him to play it. However, I think he should be folding to the reraise, which is why I made it in the first place. If I have two high unpaired cards like KQ, AQ, or AK, he's got 50% equity in the pot, so given the hand I actually had, he played well. However, the problem for him is that I might also have a pair higher than his, in which case he has only about 20% equity. I could very easily have JJ, QQ, KK, or AA with this preflop action, in which case he is going to lose a big pot. But in this case, he was fortunate that I had indeed missed the flop with my overcards, and he won the pot.

So I went into the dinner break with 12,000 chips and a bad taste in my mouth. It was really frustrating, after getting off to such a good start, to find myself short-stacked so quickly. On the plus side, though, my dad and brother had come out to Vegas to watch me play and generally to hang out, so it was good to see them. We got dinner at the Sao Paolo Cafe. Well, actually, just I ate, as they'd already eaten, but I bought my brother a beer, because he is now 21. When they came to watch me last year, he kept getting carded and kicked out of the Rio. He was like three months shy of 21 at the time. This year, now that he's legal, no one's carded him yet.

Blinds were still 200/400 after dinner, but now every player had to ante 50 chips every hand as well, which made stealing the pot pre-flop even more important. My chip stack would afford me barely ten times around the table, meaning I wasn't quite desperate, but I needed to get some chips soon. I folded for the first orbit or so, then got dealt the King of hearts and the Queen of clubs in middle position. I came in for a raise of 1100. The tricky guy on my left called, and the Frenchman called in the small blind. Man, I am just getting no respect at all. I raise 10% of my stack and get called twice?!?!?

The flop came out J84, all hearts. Holding the K of hearts, I was satisfied with this. There was now 4200 in the pot and 10,000 left in my stack. My goal in this situation to get someone to take a stab at the pot, at which point I can raise all in. I may get the better to fold a pair, and even he does call, I'll probably have an almost 50% chance of winning the pot. The Frenchman checked, and I checked, hoping the aggressive guy would bet. He did not oblige, but the turn card was a King, giving me top pair with a good kicker and also the second best possible flush draw. I checked again, as the pain in my neck on my left seemed almost unable to keep himself from bluffing after getting checked to twice. But still, he didn't oblige. The river was something irrelevant, and possibly I should have just bet my hand for value at this point, but I checked one more time hoping against hope that the guy might bluff. No such luck, though. He checked, and I won the pot but no further money. It's really the hallmark of a good player that he was always betting and raising when I didn't want him to but that I couldn't induce a bluff from him when I needed it.

Captain Ahab on my right got eliminated and was replaced by a pretty well-known tournament player who's had success both live and online. I don't know his real name, but he plays under the online moniker UGotPzd. One of the car dealers at the table recognized him and pronounced his screen name "You Got Pezzed." Uh, sir, I don't think that's what he was going for, but it's cute that you thought that.

The car dealer, it turns out, was none other than internet player brsavage, who has in the past been ranked the number one tournament player online by both Poker Stars and an online site called Pocket Fives that tracks such things. Brsavage has recorded some videos for PokerXFactor, a site similar to the Cardrunners one that I mentioned before. I actually stirred up some bad blood with him by publicly questioning some of his advice in a kind of flippant way on an internet forum, but quite a few very strong players agreed me about the content of what I said, and Savage himself didn't even really dispute it. He's got no idea who I am, but I've got some idea of how he plays, which is nice. He certainly held his own at the table, but I didn't think he was anything special.

I also had a bit of history with UGP. From what I know, he is a smart and courageous player who is very willing to make a heroic call if he suspects you are bluffing. Though he had no idea who I was, just from the fact that I was wearing a Poker Stars hat he could probably make some informed guesses about how I play. He was open raising quite a lot pre-flop, but I knew he knew that with my stack I was going to be looking for an opportunity to make a move on him. The implication was that I needed to play a wider range of hands for value and not look to bluff him.

Fortunately, I got dealt a pair of Aces on one of the many occasions when he opened to 1200. I very rarely slowplay a hand, in part because it's unnecessary and in part because I am so aggressive with weaker hands that I can usually get action on my monsters. With about 14,000 chips, however, it was going to be awkward to reraise here. Even UGP's penchant for heroic calls might not be enough to get me action if I raised. So, I just called. We went heads up to a flop of 7h 4s 3s. He bet 2200, and I moved all in on him. This was going to be a key hand for me. If I could get a call here, I'd be a huge favorite to win and double my stack, which would get me back to average and buy me a lot of breathing room. I knew UGP was expecting me to make a move on him, and this was a great board for it, as there were a lot of draws I could be semi-bluffing.

As he stared me down, I did my best to remember how I felt, and hopefully therefore how I looked, when I made my unsuccessful bluff against the Swede in the 5K event. I planted my face on my hands, which were balled into fists obscuring my mouth. Through my dark sunglasses and under the rim of my black Poker Stars hat, I stared hard at the felt. My heart was legitimately pounding, because although I knew I had the best hand, I was nonetheless putting my life on the line for the first time. If my opponent did call and got lucky, he could eliminate me right here. And even worse, there was the risk of him folding when I so badly needed the double up. I just hoped that UGP, seated next to me, could feel the heavy, rhythmic thumping through the table.

Author Mike Caro, known as the mad genius of poker, argues that players have a "calling reflex." It's more exciting to call than to fold, so everyone looks for excuses to call. If you suspect your opponent is about to fold, he suggests, you might as well do something to trigger his calling refles. If it doesn't work, well, he was going to fold anyway, so no harm done.

I swallowed hard and shifted in my chair. "Call," UGP announced, tossing 10,000 chips defiantly into the pot and flipping over a pair of 9's. I turned up my Aces, and he nodded. "I was afraid of that." When the money went in, I was a 90% favorite to win the pot. Only if the turn or river was one of the last two nines in the deck could my opponent pull ahead. It is very, very rare to get your money in this good. I was fortunate both that my opponent had a pair as good as 9's and that we got a flop with no cards higher than his pair, making it easier for him to make a big call against me.

My hand held up, and suddenly I was back in good shape. Still, you can see what a role luck plays. Even after a lucky pre-flop match-up and a lucky flop, there was stil a 10% chance that I could have been eliminated from the tournament right there. And to win an event like this, a player will need to survive much worse than 90% odds many times. So there's a lot that can go wrong to cause you to get your money in bad, and a lot that can go wrong even after you've gotten your money in good.

But I digress. I was rolling now, and when I got another chance to play a pot with UGP, I took it. He open raised to 1200 from the small blind, and I called 800 more with Queen-Jack in my big blind. The flop was a very favorable KQT. He checked, and I checked also. The turn was an 8 and put a second spade on the board. He checked and called a bet of 2000. The river was the Qs, giving me trips. It also completed a possible flush, but there wasn't much reason for me to worry about that. UGP checked, I bet 6000, and he called and mucked his hand disgustedly when I showed. I'm thinking he probably made a pair of Kings.

Next orbit, I reraised one of his raises with a pair of Tens. He looked at me, said, "Oh you're going to be trouble, aren't you?", and called. The flop was a beautiful Kh Th 7s, giving me three of a kind. There were way too many draws out there for me to trap, and with him already suspicious that I was bluffing, no reason I'd want to trap anyway. I guess he didn't have anything, though, because he checked and folded. Oh well.

I got moved away from the table before UGP could take any revenge on me, and the new table looked pretty favorable for me. There were a lot of short stacks and only one guy who had more than my 50K. That guy, however, had well over 100K and was probably at that time the chipleader in the entire tournament. Everything I observed about his play in the next few hours suggested that he completely deserved it.

Adam was in his early 20's and wearing an old Ramones t-shirt that hung shapelessly on his skinny frame. What really struck me about him, though, was the intensity with which he focused on everything that happened at the table. He didn't excessively waste time on any decision the way Cory had done with his grandstanding, but Adam always took a second or two to consider his options before doing anything. Often, his brow would furrow and his eyes narrow as he pondered all of the facets that might affect how a hand plays out: which players are involved, from which positions, how many chips do they have, who looks uncomfortable, who's been playing tight, who just lost a pot, who seems to have what level of poker knowledge, and on and on. I've just never seen someone so intensely focused on a poker table before (thought I've heard Phil Ivey has a very similar table presence), and it was really impressive/intimidating to watch him. The term 'shark' was invented to describe poker players like Adam.

For the most part, I was staying out of his way. Early on, I took a few flops against him when I was in position since we were the two big stacks at the table. I won most of these pots, but he got away cheaply every time I had a strong hand, so I didn't take him for much. When two good players clash, losing the minimum can still be considered a victory for the player who is out of position, so I did not take great pride in outplaying him, though I was glad to have the chips.

I went into the fourth break with high spirits and 50,000 chips, more than four times what I'd had two hours ago and the most I'd had all day. When we returned, blinds were 300/600/75, and this is when things started to go downhill again. I wasn't doing much steal raising, but nonetheless, I was getting called or raised almost every time I opened the pot. My good starting hands kept getting bad flops in multi-way pots where I pretty had to give up.

I wussed out of making a big river bluff against Adam in one hand. I had gone for an early position steal with Td 8d, as early position raises usually get a ton of respect in live poker and I wasn't having much luck from late position. But no such luck here, either, as one guy called in position and Adam called from his BB. The flop was 994 with two clubs, but I bet at it anyway, because my early position raise represented a big pair. The first guy folded, but Adam called. This is a tricky spot here because Adam could have a 9, a pocket pair, or a club draw, and he would play all three differently on the turn. The turn was an off-suit K, and we both checked. This is a good card for me to represent, but not on the turn. If I had hit the K, I'd probably check it because of the chance that Adam has or chooses to represent (since he knows I will rarely have) three of a kind. The river put a third club on the board, and Adam checked it again. A bluff here was going to cost me 25% of my chips, and of the hands that I put him on after the flop call, I felt he would only fold the pocket pairs, not trips or a flush. So I checked, and he showed me 66 for a winning hand.

The bluff probably would have worked, but even that isn't a guarantee, and just because it would have worked doesn't mean it would have been a good idea. I have to play against a range of possible hands my opponent could have, not just the one that he turns out to have, and in this case, I felt like there were a lot of ways for him to have hands that were not going to fold to a river bet. That's what makes good players so tricky to play against.

I was card dead for the entire two hour level, and between the blinds and antes eating away at me and a few aggressive moves not working out well, my stack got ground down to around 28,000.

An interesting dynamic can occur on the last hand before a break. For this particular one, we were going to get only 15 minutes, so a lot of people were looking for an excuse to fold and cut out a few seconds early to dodge lines at the bathroom or food store. Because of this, smart players will often steal raise very aggressively, expecting that no one will play back at them without a stronger than average hand, electing instead just to give up and go to the bathroom.

The first six players all folded and stood up to leave. Adam open raised to 1700, his standard raise size, with only three players left to act behind him. I was one of those players, in the small blind, where I held King-Jack. I contemplated my options. King-Jack is a good but not great holding, but I felt like Adam could be raising almost anything here. If that's true, then I'm going awfully easy on him by just calling and letting him see a flop in position rather than reraising and putting some pressure on him. But if I do reraise, I open myself up to getting re-re-bluffed if Adam suspected what I was up to. Finally, I decided I didn't want to play out of position against him and that it had been so long since I had played back at him that my reraise should command some respect. I announced, "re-raise" and pushed 5500 chips into the pot.

Adam stared at me for a few seconds, and then grabbed a tall stack of orange chips, worth 5000 each, and deposited it into the center of the table. He was putting me all in. While it's possible he was bluffing here, I also think he would play most if not all of the hands that dominate mine, such KQ, AJ, AK, JJ, QQ, KK, and AA, like this as well. The presence of those hands in his range meant that I couldn't call off the rest of my chips here. I sheepishly folded and left for break with just 22,000.

It was more of the same when I returned, except blinds now were 400/800/100. I managed to steal a few pots to keep my head above water, but all in all it was an awkward stack size to play, as I couldn't afford to open pots without a legitimate hand but was a little too deep to reraise all in on a semi-bluff. Plus, there were a lot of shorter stacks at the table getting desperate and moving all in at the drop of a hat, so mostly I was just hoping to get dealt some cards that would enable me to snap one of them off.

That never happened, but the experience of sweating out these last two, grueling hours (the round began at about 1:30 AM) helped the table to bond a bit. Also, since we knew we only had a few more hours of playing together, we were less guarded than we'd been earlier in the night. Across the table from me were two Mexican guys, one a real friendly and funny middle-aged man named Javier, and the other an older guy who didn't say much, in part I think because he didn't speak English very well. The rule is that only English can be spoken at the table once cards are in the air, so Javier would be talking in Spanish with the other guy while the dealer was shuffling, and then as soon as he picked up the cards, Javier would transition seamlessly into English without missing a beat and continue his story. He amused the table several times with this little trick.

I wasn't aware of any stereotype about old Mexican poker players, but this guy turned out to play just like most of the old white men and the only old black man I've every played with, which is to say that he was very very tight pre-flop. Consequently, I was not thrilled to find Ace-Queen after this guy had already open raised to 3200. However, the raise was coming from middle position, I had a good stack size to shove on him, and Ace-Queen was the best hand I'd seen in four hours (that last point shouldn't matter, but psychologically, hands start looking stronger than they otherwise would when you've had nothing but garbage for hours). If he was really tight, he might even fold something 99 or TT that would have 50% equity against me. So I moved all in for about 22,000, and he stared at me for a moment before pitching his hand. Phew.

After that, I got away with another steal or two, including taking a pot away from Adam on the flop, and ended the day with 31,100 chips, less than I had at the end of level 1 and about half the average stack. That was a little discouraging, but at dinner I didn't even think I was going to make it through the day, so I can't really complain. I had a good time, got to play with a wide variety of players, met some interesting characters, and played solid poker. The first day was a real roller coaster ride, where some times everything went my way and other times I couldn't catch a break. On the whole, though, I don't feel I made any big mistakes, and I've lived to fight another day.

I play again tomorrow, at which point two thirds of the field will already have been eliminated. Blinds will start at 500/1000/200, so with a stack of 30,000 chips, I'll be in jeopardy from the get-go. A lot will depend on how things go in the first few hours. If I can get off to a good start, I could easily double or triple up and be right back in contention.

It was 4AM when I left the table, and 4:45 by the time I had parked the car and begun walking down the street to the house where my girlfriend is staying. Even at night, Vegas in July is stiflingly hot, easily in the high 90's, but it can also be quiet and beautiful. The desert sky was crystal clear, with rarely a cloud in sight, and the sun, just beginning to rise, painted the distant horizon a brilliant bluish pink.

I ended my Day 1 report by bemoaning my measly 30,000 chips but predicting that, “A lot will depend on how things go in the first few hours. If I can get off to a good start, I could easily double or triple up and be right back in contention.” Let’s just say I got off to a good start.

I was in the 1 seat, to the immediate left of the dealer, at my starting table. In the 2 seat was a young, pretty woman of Indian descent named Jigna. She was a little too loose, especially from out of position, but she was also tricky and kind of aggressive, which actually made her kind of tough to have on my left. She was generally very friendly and made the table fun.

To her left was Barry Greenstein. Many of you will recognize the name, but in case you don’t, Barry is one of the best and best known poker players in the world. He’s a regular in the largest cash games played anywhere in the world (I overheard him telling a guy he’d played with the night before that losing “twenty” wasn’t even worth mentioning), which is where he makes a very nice living. When he plays tournaments, he usually donates anything he wins to charity, which has earned him the nickname, “The Robin Hood of Poker”.

In the last year, I’ve developed a healthy disrespect for anyone whom ESPN tries to convince me is a good poker player. I’m not going to name names, but a lot of the people you see on TV are actually rather bad at poker, or at least far from world class. That is definitely not the case with Barry, though. I’m not thrilled to have him on my left, but it is an honor to play with him, and he’s a very friendly, humble, classy guy, which is much more than can be said about a lot of TV pros.

The only other person of note is a young guy who turns out to be internet player ‘goleafsgoeh’. We’ve played together online a few times, and he recognized me as soon as I told him my screen name. Also a very nice guy.

The first big pot I played, a kind of doofy looking guy opens for 3000 from middle position, and I reraise to 10,000 from the SB with Ace-King. He calls quickly, which worries me a little, but then I get a great A83 flop. The problem is that there aren’t a lot of hands that call my reraise and continue to give me action on this flop. He had previously folded an Ace face-up to a raise on an Ace high flop, so I didn’t think he’d pay off with a lot of worse hands here. If I bet now, I think he’ll correctly fold a lot of the time. I decided to check after a long pause, hoping to make him think I have a big pair like QQ or KK and am afraid of the Ace. He bets 15,000, which I call after a minute’s thought. The turn is a 6, and we both check. I checked again on a T river, figuring he was more likely to bluff than to call with a worse hand. He bet 15,000 again, I called, and he showed me A5. Oh wow. Calling my reraise with A5 is beyond awful. This guy is going to be good to have at the table.

Winning that pot put me back above average and gave me enough chips that I could start playing aggressively again. The next orbit, I raised to 3000 with AT in early position, and Greenstein called. Ooooh, my first pot with Robin Hood. Nothing fancy, he folded to a bet on a Q76 flop.

A little while later, the doofy guy raised to 3000 and got called by three players. Seems I wasn’t the only one to notice how bad he was. It was pretty clear those two didn’t have big hands, or they would have reraised him. Why not, if he will call with A5? And if he’ll open with A5, he clearly doesn’t need a big hand here either, which means this is a good spot for a squeeze play. I reraised to 16,000 with A4o on my big blind, and everyone folded.

Barry must have been quite card dead, because he was playing very tight, which is not usually his style. Then again, every time he did get enter a pot, everyone got involved, so I guess there wasn’t much else he could do. In the best example of this, he raised to 3000 first to act, and got called by no fewer than five different people. Having already made one squeeze play, I wasn’t going to attempt another in such an obvious spot, but then I found a pair of Jacks in the small blind. I re-raised to 20,000, prepared to call an all-in (unhappily) from anyone because I knew it would look like I was just making a play at the pot.

About ten minutes before the break, goleafsgoeh lost well over half his stack to a guy who made an unlikely three of a kind on the river. I felt kind of bad for him, but that’s poker. “I need the break, but I kind of wish it weren’t coming so soon,” Jigna whispered to me. I stared back at her, puzzled, and she nodded in GLGE’s direction. I looked over, and his face was bright red. He was actually on the verge of tears, but it kind of looked like he was, and he was clearly very upset. “He’s ready to tilt away the rest of his money now, but he’ll calm down during break,” she explained.

I’ve heard a lot of speculation about why there are so few female poker players. In my opinion, the rampant sexism in the poker community is a big part of it, but one common explanation is that many women lack the aggressive drive that’s so important to playing good poker. Clearly not Jigna’s problem, huh? Talk about a shark sniffing blood in the water. Conversely, some women have told me that they feel they have an advantage because they are more adept at reading and interpreting people’s emotional state than men are. It wasn’t hard to tell GLGE was upset, but Jigna certainly noticed it before I did.

After the first break, blinds were up to 600/1200/200. A guy in early position called the blind, I called with Qs Js, and then Jigna raised to 6000 in position. The first guy called, so I did too. The flop was all low cards, something like 853 with only one spade. We both checked to Jigna, who checked as well. Should have taken it when you had the chance, J. The turn was the As, giving me a flush draw and a good scare card to represent. The first guy checked, I bet 10,000, and they both folded.

By now I was up around 100,000 and feeling great. I opened to 3500 with a pair of 5's in early position and got called by both the A5 guy and the big blind. I fired 7500 at a Q73 flop and only the first guy called. The turn was another 7, and remembering the top pair I’d seen him fold, I thought maybe I could knock him off of pairs better than mine but lower than queens or even off of a pair of queens with a weak kicker by betting 21,000. Well, he either hit the 7 or didn’t believe me, because he shoved his last 60,000 into the pot, and I had to fold.

On the one hand, it certainly sucks to bluff off 30% of your chips. But plays like these have hidden payoffs down the line, especially at a tournament like the WSOP where you play with the same people for hours on end and most everyone is paying careful attention. A little while later, a pretty active player came in for a call of 1200, and a few others called as well. I had a pair of Queens in the small blind and raised 7000 more. Jigna folded her big blind, but the first caller quickly announced, “All in.”

Everyone else got out of the way, and I had a decision to make. Queens are a very strong hand, but some players do like to get trappy by just calling the blinds when they have Kings or Aces. This was a really big bet, something like 60,000 chips. If he wanted to be trappy, wouldn’t he have made a smaller raise to 20,000 or so? Ugh, but if I’m wrong, I’ll be crippled. Losing this pot would leave me only about 10,000 chips. Visions of the 2006 main event, where I ran Queens into Aces pre-flop early on day 4, danced through my head. “Call.”

“If you can call, you can win,” the guy told me with a frown, turning over a pair of 4's. So far so good. I’m an 80% favorite to win the pot, but still I hold my breath as the dealer turns over the flop. KT8, still ahead. No 4, no 4, no 4... my heart freezes in my chest as I see a small card come off the deck... thank God, just a 3. One more now, fade the 4... uh oh, another little one... but it’s another 3. My hand is good, and I take down my largest pot of the tournament so far.

A little while later, a kind of weak player called 1200. I raised to 6000 with a pair of Aces. To my delight, Jigna called on the button, and then Barry in the small blind started counting out chips. He reraised to 33,000. And I am holding the best possible hand. Pinch me, I must be dreaming.

I asked how much he had left. He moved his hands so I could see, but I really needed an exact count to figure out how to play my hand, so I asked him to count it. He seemed annoyed by that but kind of half complied. He had about 50,000 behind. I felt like at this point I was going to get all his money whether I called or re-raised pre-flop, so my thoughts turned to Jigna. I’m representing a ton of strength whether I call or raise, and she’s probably going to fold almost anything no matter what I do. But I had to at least give her a chance to make a mistake. After much thought, I just called the raise. Jigna folded instantly.

The flop was JT7, not exactly what I wanted to see. If Barry had Jacks or Tens, he’s now a huge favorite. And my call of his reraise is so suspicious that he might be able to get away from Queens or Kings despite the size of the pot, since he can no longer count on being ahead of Jacks or Tens himself. Ugh, why didn’t I just reraise him pre-flop and get all the money in then? I got greedy. “All in,” he announced.

“Call!” I blurted out. The die was cast.

“You make a set?”

I shook my head and flipped over my Aces. He turned up Queens. Wowowowowow, there were nearly 200,000 chips in this pot, and I was an 88% favorite to win. Things got a little hairy when an 8 fell on the turn, as now a 9 or a Q on the river would give him a win, but it came a 7 and I eliminated Barry Greenstein from the tournament. He took it very well, shook my hand, and gave me an autographed copy of his book with his bustout hand illustrated inside the front cover. It’s a very nice troph... er, memento. I put up pictures at http://www.thinkingpoker.net/Bookpics.html if you want to see for yourself.

I want to emphasize here that I in no way outplayed Barry. In fact, I may have misplayed the hand and almost given him a chance to escape. This was just an unlucky spot for him, what poker players call a cold deck. If I had had Queens and he Aces, the hand would have gone down the same way, and I would have been the one to lose a monster pot. It was pure luck of the draw that I got dealt the best preflop hand when he was dealt the third best.

Here’s what Barry had to say about the hand on his blog:

“The very next round someone limped and the player in the cutoff raised. The button called. This time in the small blind I had Q Q. It was $6,000 to me and I had to decide to play them fast or slow. I decided he had been raising enough and had a good stack. He had been a decent player, and usually showed good hands. So I decided to play it fast. With three people in there I didn't want to call and see and ace or king come off. I raised big and he just called, which made me think he was trapping with aces. I was hoping he had A K. I just decided if an ace or king didn't come I would have to go for it. It was a bad flop - J 10 7. Now if he had jacks he also beat me. I kind of got myself stuck in the pot. I moved in my last $60,000. He did have aces. AND that was it.”

He says I was “a decent player”, so that’s kind of cool. But he also confirms my fear that on certain flops, he actually would have gotten away from his Queens. There’s no way he folds them pre-flop, so I think I really screwed up by trying to sucker Jigna in. And in fact, I’m lucky that I failed to rope her in, because she told me she folded 99, which would have made a straight.

Barry and GLGE were the two players who most concerned me at the table, and with one gone and one crippled, I was ready for total table domination.

Except that we didn’t get to play even a single hand after the second break. No sooner had the tournament director announced “shuffle up and deal” than a guy known as the Grim Reaper, because he walks around breaking tables, deposited an armful of plastic chip racks in the center of our table and started passing out new seat assignments. I will say, though, that it was a pretty cool feeling carrying four full racks of chips across the convention center floor and feeling the envious eyes of every player in the room burning into my back.

There was no one I recognized at the new table and several weak looking players to my left, so I decided to carry on with my plans for domination. Blinds were now 800/1600/200, and a guy who seemed pretty aggressive moved all in for 24,000. Not on my table! I called with a pair of Tens. He turned over a pair of Jacks. Whoops. A flop of J55 left me dead to running quads, which I did not catch.

But no worries. A few hands later, I raised to 4500 with AA. The big blind raised to 12,000, leaving about 25,000 behind. Hoping to look like a bully, I grabbed a stack of orange chips and shoved it into the pot. He shrugged and called with KK. My hand held up, and I took down another good-sized pot and eliminated my third player of the tournament.

Next orbit, a hotshot looking British player raised to 5000 first to act. He had a stack of about 75,000, and I decided not to reraise him with my pair of Jacks because if he moved all in, I would feel like throwing up. We went heads up to a 5s 5h 4s flop. He bet 10,000, and I grabbed the trusty stack of orange chips (there were twenty of them in the stack, so this single pillar of my mountain of chips was worth 100,000) and moved it into the pot. He thought for a long time before folding. I may have lost some value here with the big raise, but there were a lot of turn cards I did not want to see (ie I did not have the Js), and I wanted the whole table to get the message: if you play a pot with me, you may well be playing for all of your chips.

I got to talking with another Poker Stars qualified at the table who turned out to be internet player Teacuppoker. His real name was Casey, so that’s what I’ll call him. Then a clean cut middle aged guy got seated to Casey’s left. The man glanced at my Poker Stars hat and asked me what my screen name was. I told him and asked him his. He pursed his lips. “Yeah, I don’t so much give that out.” What the [censored]? That’s fine if you don’t want to out yourself, but don’t ask for my screenname and then refuse to give me yours.

“So you’re one of those guys?” Casey asked him, seemingly bothered by the same discourtesy I was.

“Well there’s only a small pool of people who play 200/400, and game selection is a big part of my game.” 200/400?!?! This guy is big time.

“Am I at least allowed to know your real first name?”

“Adam. Adam Richardson.” That made him Admo from the 2+2 internet poker forum. I still didn’t know what name he played under online, but this was enough info for me that I didn’t feel slighted any more.

We talked a bit about the highest stakes poker games online, and I asked him if he ever played Brian Townsend, the high stakes player who showed up at my first table on Friday. He shuddered and laughed. “I quit Brian almost a year ago. You can ask my wife, I have a recurring nightmare where there’s a glitch in the software so that I can see his cards, and I still lose!” Good Lord, I am glad I got off that kid’s table.

I never played a big pot with Admo, but he did get me into some trouble. He opened for 4500, I reraised to 15,000 with AK in the small blind, and then the old man in the big blind, I think he was Greek, started counting his chips. He looked annoyed, and, and this was important, I don’t think he knew I was looking at him. I was in the 9 seat and he the 1 seat, so the dealer was between us. If he knew I was looking and looked annoyed, there would be a chance that he was acting with a monster holding like KK or AA. If he is genuinely annoyed, he’s more likely to have a slightly less strong hand like JJ, QQ, or AK. “All in,” he finally said.

Now Admo thought for a minute or two before folding. That still wasn’t enough time for me to make up my mind. There was now about 40,000 in the pot, and it was going to cost me 75,000 more to call. Although I’d have an above average stack if I called and lost, this was still the single biggest decision I’d had to make so far in the tournament. My gut was telling me to call, but in general you don’t make money by calling big bets from unknown old men with Ace-King.

I closed my eyes and recounted the pot. I took a deep breath. I opened my eyes and looked at the old man. He was staring straight back at me over his bulbous nose. It was an aggressive stare, another sign of weakness. When people want a call, they will try to look non-threatening or nervous. This time he definitely knew I was watching him, and now he was trying to look strong. I sighed and stood up. “Call.”

“Let’s see ‘em,” the dealer said. I turned over my Ace-King. The guy kept his cards face down. This is an annoying thing about live poker, no one ever wants to show his hand and at showdown there is always this big production over who is going to show first. Just turn your [censored] hand over. “Sir?” she prompted him.

He grunted something.

“What was that?”

“Keep them low,” he said in a heavy accent, and flipped TT. I breathed a sigh of relief. I had made the right call. Against a pair of T’s, my AK has 43% equity. I needed 39.5% to make the call correct. Flop Q85. Turn 5. River 7. TT is good.

The Greek beamed and shook my hand. “Nice hand,” I told him, nodding sagely and returning the hand shake. I sat back down, remarkably unflustered. So this is what it feels like to flip a coin for $100,000. And lose.

A few minutes later, I went over to talk to my girlfriend, who was standing in the spectator area about fifty feet away. “I just lost a monstrous flip.”

She gave me a sympathetic frown. “I saw you stand up, so I knew it was something big, but I couldn’t tell if you won or lost. The guy sat back down, so I didn’t think you eliminated him, but you were smiling.”

I took that as a big compliment. One of the toughest things about being a serious poker player is learning to deal with bad results. The goal is always to focus on making the right decisions, because in the long run, the money follows the odds and the best players win. In the short run, things can and do go wrong all the time. I can control my decisions, but I can’t control the cards, so there is no sense in getting upset over them. If I can accept a bad outcome in a gigantic pot at the World Series of Poker so well that my girlfriend of six years cannot tell from my body language whether I won or lost, then I am in the right mind set.

Hopefully, the table got another lesson: I’m willing to make a big call if you play back at me. Soon thereafter, I opened Qd Td against a weak player’s big blind, and he called. The flop came 8h 6h 3d, and he bet into me for 7500. When someone bets into me on a board like this, it’s often because he’s unsure of his hand and wants to take the pot down before you put in any more money and get more committed to your hand. Hell, I’ve two over cards, a backdoor flush draw, and a read. I call.

The turn was the Ad, a scare card for my opponent and a flush draw for me. He checked and folded to a bet of 15,000.

Despite losing the huge pot, I went into break with 280,000 chips. I’m 90% sure I would have been chip leader for the entire tournament if an Ace or King had fallen.

After break, a French player named Paolo was seated at our table. Blinds were now 1000/2000 with a 300 ante, meaning that there were 5700 chips in the pot before cards were dealt. I was really looking forward to stealing from the tight players on my left, and was already envisioning all those chips getting pushed my way when I heard a little French voice on my right say, “Raise.”

Whaaaaaaaaaat?!?!? Those are supposed to be my blinds to steal. We can’t have this. Paolo had put 7000 chips in the pot. I pretended to look at my cards and then announced, “Re-raise”, shoving 21,000 chips into the pot. Someone needed a lesson in etiquette.

The action folded back to Paolo, who quickly said, “All in.” Damn it. I looked at my cards, praying to see Aces. Instead, I tossed a Nine and a Seven into the muck. Paolo must have had a monster hand, to risk all chips like that against an unknown player with so little thought.

My next aggressive re-raise was against Casey, who raised to 5500 when I was small blind and the Greek was big. I made it 16,500 with King-Queen, and he folded.

Dominance at the table finally (and expensively) established, I started stealing like mad and meeting very little resistance. Only Casey showed a willingness to play back at me, and he had really bad timing such that I usually had hands when we tangled. Somehow, I finished the level with barely more than the 280K I had when it started.

After break, blinds were 1200/2400/300. My plan was to tighten up for the last level of the day and take advantage of my aggressive image to get paid off on any big hands now that the antes were smaller relative to the blinds. Unfortunately, my plans were once again spoiled by an untimely table break. On the plus side, this meant I got to run over a new table that didn’t know how aggressive I was.

Once again, I was already envisioning the pot getting shipped my way when some annoying guy on my right beat me to the punch, raising to 7200. Annoyed, I made it 21,000 with 54 off-suit on the button. Even if he suspects I’m up to something, this is a rough spot for my opponent. I’m brand new to the table, he’s got no idea how I play, he’s out of position, and his entire stack of 150,000 is at risk if he makes a bad read. He folded.

I put the same guy in another tough spot about half an hour later. He opened for 7200, and I just called with Ace-Jack offsuit. The flop was 965, all different suits. He bet 9000, which is a pretty weak bet for a board that coordinated. I had no piece of the flop, so I raised to 32,000. I’m representing two pair or better here, and if my opponent decides not to believe me, he’s either going to have to call and risk a big bet on a scary turn or shove his stack in a spot where he’s only going to get called by monster hands. There weren’t even any good draws on the board for him to semi-bluff all in with. After a long session of irritated chip shuffling, he folded, and I finished the day with 344,100 chips. Quite a long way from the 30,000 I had at the start.

There were 6,358 entries in this year’s main event. We stopped for the night with 351 remaining. Day 2B will probably have a few more than that, but when everyone plays together for the first time, there will likely be around 800 competitors remaining. First prize is $8.5 million, and I honestly feel I have as good a chance as anyone at winning it.

Oh, this will probably be meaningful to some of you. I later found out that the guy I bluffed in those last two pots was Robert Mizrachi, brother of Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi.

I should be on my way to the Rio right now, preparing to nurse a sickly stack into a monster as I did on Tuesday. Instead, I am sitting in front of my computer trying to decide how to explain to all of you how it all came crashing down.

Yesterday morning, I felt on top of the world. I had undecupled my chips on Day 2 of the World Series of Poker and put myself in great shape to go deep at the biggest poker tournament of the year. Within a few hours, I’d have $20,000 locked up and a shot at much more. My starting table was going to be tough, with at least two strong players I knew fairly well from an internet poker forum. Nonetheless, I had 80,000 chips more than the next largest stack at my table, and my seat position was good as well, with the strongest players and biggest stacks on my right and the shorter, unknown players on my left.

Like any self-respecting white man in America, I am constantly seeking out ways to appropriate black culture for my own financial gain. Listening to some Jay-Z in the car, I hoped, would get me pumped up and help me perform my best. This morning, I intended to bring a knife to a fist fight and hold triggers to crews... metaphorically... at the card table.

I started the day in the 6 seat, which is right in the middle of the table and afforded me a nice view of all the action. Justin Rollo, a moderator of the 2+2 poker tournament forum and a really fantastic tournament player, was in the 2 seat. Matt Sterling, another 2+2 member and one of the top-ranked online tournament players, was in the 4 seat. A mid-stakes cash game player named Andy had the most chips after me and was seated to my immediate right in the 5 seat.

We were rapidly approaching the money bubble, the point at which the lowest cash prizes are awarded. This year’s payout structure is less top-heavy than it was last year, meaning that there is more money for the lower places. The top 621 finishers were all guaranteed about $20,000, which isn’t a lot relative to the $10,000 entry fee, but since many players won satellites into the tournament and didn’t actually invest $10,000 in it, I knew that quite a few would be very worried about busting out in, for instance, 625th place and winning nothing.

With my big stack, I’d hoped to get a table full of scared players whose blinds I could steal with abandon. There were a few at the table, but unfortunately I had to compete with Justin, Matt, and Andy, who all also recognized and wanted to take advantage of this dynamic. My plan for the day was to come out of the gate with guns blazing. I was going to be the one stealing blinds, and if the other good players at the table wanted a piece of the action, they’d have to get through me.

I knew that Justin in particular was pretty aggressive, and I planned to reraise him at the first opportunity. As it turned out, his first raise was against my big blind, and I had Ace-Queen, so it was how I would have played the hand anyway. He folded, though later told me he was contemplating a re-re-raise with Jack-Ten, and if he had, I would seriously have considered moving all in. That’s just how it goes when two aggressive players with a history lock horns.

Reraising Matt didn’t go over so well. At the 1200/2400/400 level, he opened to 6000 from late position, and I made it 20,000 to go with A9 in the small blind. He called and called a bet of 30,000 on Ks Ts 5d flop. I checked and folded the turn, my stack suddenly 50,000 chips lighter.

Stacks were still pretty deep though, so I took a few flops in position with speculative hands like small pairs and suited connectors, but I never connected with anything and had to keep folding to flop bets.

Andy, on my right, had also been playing a very loose and aggressive style. He was calling a lot of raises from Justin and Matt, and I’d been looking for a chance to punish him. Finally, at the 1500/3000/500 level, Justin opened for 9000, Andy called, and I reraised to 35,000 with Q4 on the button. They both folded. “Nobody can read you dudes like we do.”

On my next big blind, Andy raised to 8000 from the small blind, and I called with Js Ts. He was very aggressive post-flop, so I knew I could win a big pot if I caught well against him. The flop was Kd 6s 5s, and sure enough he fired a big bet of 18,000. I called with my flush draw, counting on either winning another big bet if I hit or maybe taking the pot away on the turn if he showed weakness. Unfortunately, it was a blank, and he fired 64,000 at me. I really felt like he was just pushing me around on a board where it would be tough for me to have a big hand, but at this point I wasn’t even sure I had enough chips left to make him fold if he had anything. There was also the danger that he was semi-bluffing with a better flush draw than mine, in which case I’d be in terrible shape. I threw away my hand angrily, leaving myself with only about 200,000 chips.

Desperate to pick up a pot, I raised to 9000 with 66 first to act. Not surprisingly, Andy called on his big blind, and we saw a flop of QT5. He checked and called a bet of 15,000. The turn was a J, and he checked again. I couldn’t expect my 6's to be good here, but this is a board where I, as an early position raiser, could easily have a monster hand like QQ, JJ, or TT for three of a kind or even AK for a straight. Since Andy didn’t reraise pre-flop, it was rather unlikely that he had a hand this strong. So I fired 35,000 at him, and he thought for a long time before finally folding. “Your reach ain’t long enough, dunny.”

Blinds jumped again to 2000/4000/500, and I was planning on slowing down with the reraises, which I probably should have done, but I found myself in kind of a weird spot. Matt raised the blind of a pretty weak player to 10,000, and Andy called. I had Ace-Nine on the button, and I felt like I could have the best hand here and regardless it was a decent spot to squeeze. I made it 40,000, Matt called instantly (that was very worrisome), and Andy folded.

I got an AJ7 flop, which gave me top pair, but my nine kicker meant that most likely any action I got on this board would be bad action, so when Matt checked, I was happy to check as well. The turn was a T, he bet 40,000, and I called. I would have been very unsure of what to do if he bet the river, but thankfully he checked. I checked as well, and he looked disappointed. I was hoping that was because I had caught him bluffing on the turn, but it turned out he was hoping to induce a bet from me on the river, because he showed me TT for a turned set. Ouch, down to 140,000. I’m lucky he played this the way he did or I could have lost even more.

At this point we were about 10 players away from the bubble and playing hand for hand, which meant that the dealer had to pause after every hand we played and wait for all 70 other tables to finish playing the hand as well before we could deal the next one. This was to ensure that the right players got paid, but it made the game move at an excruciating pace. I think we played maybe 15 hands in two hours before the bubble finally burst.

I had come into the day thinking that I was virtually a lock to make the money, but now I found myself with a below average stack and a bit of a conundrum. I wanted the $20,000, but I also wanted to take advantage of the many profitable situations that the bubble created for players willing to take risks. Andy had accumulated a ton of chips with his aggressive play and was now raising every single hand, so I wasn’t going to be able to steal cheaply from the scared players. My best bet to pick up chips was going to be to turn Andy’s aggression against him, but that would mean putting my neck on the line and risking elimination myself.

Hand for hand was so boring that Andy would sometimes get up and leave the table for a few minutes, since that was how long we generally waited between hands. He once failed to make it back to the table in time to steal, which meant I finally had the opportunity. I raised to 12,000 with Qc 3s, and a loudmouth kid from Florida named Randall called from the small blind. D’oh.

The flop was Jc 5c 2c, giving me a decent flush draw but not much else. Randall bet out 16,000. I felt like he was just trying to steal cheaply from me and didn’t have a hand that could call all in. But if I was wrong, it was likely to cost me $20,000. “All in.”

“Nice flush draw,” he commented as he threw his hand away. Phew. ”Don’t let me do it to you dunny cuz I overdo it.”

A minute later, Andy returned to the table. I told him he missed a hand and that I got to steal the blinds for once. He seemed genuinely upset about this. The very next hand, it was back to business as usual, with a 12,000 raise from Andy. Except this time, I had a pair of Jacks. The safe way to play them would be to move all in for about 140,000 now. Andy would almost certainly fold, and I could win about 20,000 chips with very little risk of getting knocked out on the bubble.

But Jacks were the best hand I had seen all day, and I really needed to win more than 20,000 chips with them. The smart thing to do was to give Andy some rope and let him hang himself, so I just called the raise. I was going to call a bet on any flop, even if three overcards to my pair came. Thankfully, I got a very safe 854 flop. He bet 24,000, and I moved all in. “I have a pair,” he told me. I stared silently straight ahead. “I think you were trapping me with a big pair. Were you trapping me” I’m behind. I’m sure I’m behind. But I want the table to know they can’t bluff me. I’m going to call if I’ve got a pair,” he told the table at large. “I call.”

“All in and call, table 26!” the dealer shouted for the benefit of the camera crews. Reporters from ESPN and various internet sites, plus random players from other tables, swarmed around us. We turned our hands face up, but had to wait for ESPN to set up the shot before seeing the turn and river. Andy showed K5 for middle pair, making me a solid 79% favorite to win a 300,000 chip pot. This also meant, however, that there was a 21% chance I would be eliminated right here, agonizingly close to a $20,000 payday, and go home empty handed.

The ESPN producer finally gave the signal, and the dealer showed us the turn, a harmless 9c. My odds of winning just improved by 9.5%. I breathed a sigh of relief when the river was neither a K nor a 5, giving me the best hand and a much needed double up. “No, you’re not on my level, get your breaks tweaked.”

“Do you think we’ll be on TV?” Andy asked me a little despondently.

I shook my head. “Only if you had caught a 5.”

Undeterred, Andy was right back at it next hand, raising to 12,000. This time I called with Js Ts. The flop was Qh 9h 6d, giving me an open-ended straight draw. Andy bet his usual 24,000, and I called. The turn was the Ac, he checked, and I bluffed him out with a bet of 55,000.

The hand after that, he called a raise from Matt, called a flop bet, bet 90,000 on the turn when Matt checked, and folded to check-raise all in. Just like that, he went from table chipleader with 500,000 chips to having barely 150,000. “Had a spark when you started but now you’re just garbage. Fell from top ten to not mentioned at all.”

Finally, the bubble burst, and the room erupted with cheers. I visited the restroom during the ensuing break, and a man at the urinal next to me remarked, “Nothing like a $20,000 piss.”

With their money locked up, the previously scared short stacks were suddenly very willing to double up or go home. We busted out a couple people from our table very quickly and got some new faces, including a somewhat well-known pro named Chip Jett. Chip had an artificial tan, frosted hair slicked back with a heavy gel, and a complete inability to sit still. He was constantly rocking from side to side in his chair, stacking and shuffling chips, and glancing nervously around the table. Despite all this, he actually turned out to be a pretty friendly guy.

To my left was a white guy in his early fifty’s who lived in Seoul, South Korea. He had won some Korean championship with like 600 players, but I have no idea how, because, though a hell of a nice guy, he was the most predictable player ever. He only played really big hands, and he always came in for huge raises that generally resulted in him winning nothing more than the blinds and antes. If he ever flopped top pair or better, or ever had Ace-King pre-flop, he would instantly move all in without regard for the size of the pot relative to his bet.

Naturally, this guy was a prime target for blind theft, but infuriatingly, he kept getting dealt the 1% of hands he would actually play whenever I raised him. On three occasions, he reraised my steal, ultimately showing me KK or AK. The fourth time, he just called me and then moved all in on a Q-high flop, showing me AQ. Damn it, man, how do you always have big cards?!?! He was very apologetic and kept showing me his monster holdings, assuring me he wasn’t trying to pick on me. Well you should have been, sir, because it was certainly my intent to rob you blind.

I gave him such a hard time about catching well against me that I’m pretty sure he let me steal from him once just out of pity. It was the fifth time I’d raised him, and before I did, I warned him, “If you have AK again, I might have to call you just out of spite.” He looked at his cards, smiled, and folded an Ace face up. Piece of advice, sir: if a guy raises you five times in a row, your Ace is probably good.

The entire 2500/5000/500 level was bad for me. Having to back down to the Korean constantly was costly, and Justin re-raised me twice as well, once showing Ace-King. I was pretty sure he was bluffing the other time, but I had 5-4 and didn’t feel like putting him to the test for all my chips, so I just folded. I never had any big hands and lost some money at showdown with JT versus AJ on a J high flop in a blind battle.

By the time we got to the last hour of the day, where stakes were 3000/6000/1000, and I was back down to about 220,000 and in a bad mood. I felt like I had played pretty well for most of the day, taken some big risks when appropriate, and still I had lost more than 100,000 chips. Everyone else was catching cards and hitting flops and I just kept getting dealt garbage or getting bad flops for whatever promising hand I held. Finally, I got Ad Qd in first position. It was the best hand I’d seen in ages, and I decided that since I was in first position and had been pretty tight for a while, I was going to represent an overpair post-flop if I got called. I raised to 16,000, and only the big blind, a young guy in Full Tilt Poker gear who had been pretty quiet, called. The flop was Ts 4s 2h. He checked, I bet 25,000, he raised me 25,000 more, and I moved all in for his last 175,000 chips. He called so quickly and so eagerly that I knew not only was I beat but that I couldn’t win even if I caught an Ace or a Queen.

“All in and call, table 26!” the dealer shouted, but now the bubble was over, and ESPN was no longer rushing to cover every all in confrontation, so thankfully this embarrassment was not preserved for posterity by video camera.. My opponent turned over 44 for three of a kind. He was a 99.6% favorite to win. My only hope was to catch either a 3 or a 5 on the turn, followed by the other card on the river to make a running straight. A 6 on the turn cut my odds down from .4% to 0%, and just like that, I had 27,000 chips, barely enough to pay the big blind of 6,000, which hit me on the next hand.

Action folded to Matt in late position, who raised to 16,000. The small blind called, and I threw in the last of my chips without looking at my cards. There was already 46,000 in the pot, so I was getting better than 2:1 on my money ,and it was very likely that Matt would re-re-raise to knock out the small blind get the pot heads up with me. If I could win at showdown versus him, I would triple up and have a workable stack again. “All in and call!” the dealer went through the motions of muttering, but it was such a small pot that he knew no one would care.

Matt showed Ace-Jack, and I turned over my hand to find King-deuce. Not bad for a blind hand. I had about a 35% chance of winning. My Korean friend patted me on the back. “King is coming. Just watch,” he told me. Sure enough, the flop was K85, and suddenly I was way ahead. The turn was a T, but an Ace on the river crushed my comeback.

“Nice hand,” I told both Matt and the guy on my right. I shook hands with my friends at the table, wished them luck, and stood up. “Get zipped up in plastic when it happens that’s it.”

Except that wasn’t it. I would have preferred go like Tony Soprano, a sudden black-out and then roll credits. Instead, I had to stand beside my empty seat like a rotting corpse while the dealer tossed the next round of cards to those still playing until a floorperson arrived to escort me to the payouts area.

It was after midnight, I was tired, disappointed, frustrated and angry at myself for making a stupid move. So what did I most want to do after busting out of the main event? If you guessed, “Spend an hour filling out paperwork and waiting in queues,” well, you were wrong, but you may be qualified to work at the Rio.

I’ve played enough tournaments to know the importance of patience, especially when it comes to my last few chips. The old adage is that ’a chip and a chair’ are all that is needed to win a tournament, and I had so recently made a big come back after getting short stacked that I really should have known better than to make a crazy, desperate bluff.

Now I had to sit, back against a wall, shoulder to shoulder with all the other losers, to wait for some crocodile-skinned bureaucrat to call my name. “Anthony Brooks?” It took me a minute to figure out that meant me. I was somewhat consoled by the fact that a fairly strong player showed up on bust out row right around the time I did. Although his name will be well-known to most poker enthusiasts, to the career paper shuffler behind the scenes at the Rio, he was just “Robert... Miz-arky?”

I finished 361st and won $34,664, showing a tidy profit even after deducting the $10,000 entry fee, which was itself a prize I’d won in another poker tournament. By any account, I’m very fortunate to make this kind of money playing a card game, and it’s always my goal to do something valuable with the money and free time that poker affords me. In the next month or so, I’ll be organizing and teaching at a free summer debate camp for public high school students and teachers in Boston, and then traveling to Chicago for a week to volunteer at a similar camp.

Thanks again to everyone who’s followed along and offered your encouragement and congratulations. Hopefully we can do this again next year!