WSOP 2010 Trip Report: Part 3

2010 WSOP Trip Report: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

Day 5

I really lucked out with my table draw for Day 5. My opponents were split roughly 50/50 between good players and weak players, which for so deep in the tournament is about the best you can hope to get. Even better, the weaker players were the ones with the bigger stacks, and there were several instances early on where they won big pots from their more skilled opponents.

The players seated two and three seats to my left were actually both amateurs playing in their first WSOP. The first of these two was in a wheelchair and wearing a cap that read “Team MS.” I overheard him explaining to the guy next to him how he ended up playing the WSOP: “I won sort of a satellite that my local league put on. When I won, I had the option of either taking $8000 in cash or a $10,000 WSOP seat. It’s always been a dream of mine to play in this thing, and my health has taken a turn for the worse, so I thought this might be my only chance.”

Yeesh, at least we were already in the money this point, so I wouldn’t be faced with the prospect of crushing this guy’s dying wish to cash in the WSOP. In my very first WSOP, I ended up eliminating a fan-favorite who lost the use of his arms in a motorcycle accident but could play cards with his toes. I suppose it makes sense that poker attracts a disproportionate number of people with disabilities or physical limitations, as it’s a largely mental competition. Online poker especially is quite accessible to people with a wide variety of capabilities.

The other amateur on my left had won his seat online, not from a satellite but from a promotion sponsored by an energy drink company. He’d apparently clicked a banner ad, filled out a survey, and forgotten about it until weeks later he got a phone call telling him he’d won a seat in the WSOP. He told me that he nearly hung up, assuming it was some sort of scam or sales pitch, but now here he was having parlayed one fortuitous click into more than $30,000. He also got eight free cases of the energy drink, which he was all too happy to distribute to the table. I never drink the things myself, so I couldn’t tell you how it tasted.

Off to a Great Start

Early on, I played a pot with this guy that, while small, highlights quite well the gap in skill between an amateur and a professional. The action had folded to me in late position. With only three players left to act behind me, two of them the aforementioned novices, I felt like I could profitably raise any two cards. So I made a small raise with T4 off-suit. Sure enough, my first two opponents folded, and the energy drink guy called out of the big blind.

The flop come K22, and my opponent quickly bet about half the pot. It was very transparent to me what was going on here. He knew that I could be raising with almost anything from my position. He knew that this flop was very unlikely to help me, and so he was trying to stop me from stealing it by bluffing at it himself.

The problem for him was that I could tell exactly what he was up to, and I wasn’t going to make it that easy for him to take the pot away from me. I was pretty sure the flop was no help to him either; if it was, I’d expect him to check and give me a chance to bluff at it. The only reason he would bet into me would be to beat me to the bluff, so to speak.

I called his bet, holding no pair and no draw. Sure enough, the turn card was something irrelevant, he checked, I bet, and he threw his hand away.

A bit later in the day, a different weak player raised from early position. I called with a pair of 2’s, and the big blind called. The flop came 7 [spade] 4 [spade] 2 [diamond], and both players checked. I believed that the original raiser at least would have bet if he had flopped a draw, and the BB’s range was wide enough that I wasn’t too worried about giving him a free card either.

I checked, and the turn was the 3 [spade], making a lot of straights and flushes possible. The big blind checked, and now the original raiser bet 25,000. I stuck with my read that my opponent would have bet his draws on the flop, though, and I raised him to 90,000. The big blind folded, and the other guy called.

The river was another 3, giving me a full house. When he bet 100,000, I moved all in on him for another 250,000. He folded, and my slightly risky flop check earned me 190,000 chips.

Soon after, I picked up a pair of Jacks against one of the better players at the table, who was relatively short-stacked. He had Ace-King, we got all in on what is essentially a coin flip, and I came out ahead. Not only did I collect a nice-sized pot, but I got rid of one of my tougher opponents at the table.

I also won a big pot from a good online tournament player seated on my right. He open-limped his small blind, and I checked my option with Q [spade] 3 [spade]. The flop came Q [diamond] 8 [club] 6 [diamond], he checked, I bet 7K, and he called. The turn was the 3 [club], he bet 16K, I made it 60K, and he called. I planned to bet virtually any non-diamond river anyway, but the river 3 [heart] was the perfect card for me. He checked, I bet 200K, and called and mucked.

Skill Can Be Expensive

All of this occurred within half an hour, less time than it took me to write it all up for you. It was a great start to the day, one that skyrocketed me from 500,000 chips to 1.2 million. Best of all, I felt like a lot of my chips were coming from skillful play, and that did a lot for my confidence.

Interestingly, there are also situations where skillful play can cost me chips that a less good player would not have lost. One such spot occurred later in the day, against the same good player on my right. He was first to act before the flop and raised. I called with a pair of Tens, and everyone else folded.

The flop came 842, with nothing in particular for my Tens to fear. My opponent checked, and I made a small bet of 20,000 into a pot that already had nearly 60,000 chips in it. I think he’s often going to just check and fold here, but unlike with the three-of-a-kind 2’s, my hand is too vulnerable to let him see a free card. In this case, though, he called the bet.

The turn was a 3, he checked, and this time I bet 75,000. He called again, which was interesting and definitively contradicted my initial read that he was just giving up on the pot. Now I had to re-assess whether my pair of Tens was really the best hand. I didn’t think my opponent would play a really big pair like Queens, Kings, or Aces this way. I also didn’t think he would just check and call if he had flopped three-of-a-kind. It seemed to me that he probably had either a pair of Jacks, a pair of 9’s, or a pair of 7’s.

The river was a 4, which as far as I was concerned didn’t change things at all. I still expected him to have one of three hands. He checked, and I had a decision to make. I settled on a rather large bet of 200,000 chips. My opponent called and showed me two Jacks, and I lost a big pot.

I believe that many players would not have bet in this situation, where there is a fair chance they do not have the best hand. To me, though, betting is clearly correct. One-third of the time I will lose 200,000 chips, which of course isn’t pleasant, but two-thirds of the time I will win 200,000 chips. In the long run, I come out way ahead by betting.

I’m also happy with my decision to make such a large bet. There’s a temptation to bet smaller when making a thinner value bet, but that makes sense only if your bet size is going to influence your opponent’s calling range. In other words, if I thought that my opponent would call anything up to 150,000 but no more with 77, then it would be a mistake to bet 200,000. In this case, though, he was only calling to beat a bluff, and I figured a big bet would look at least as much like a bluff as a smaller bet. Two-thirds of 200,000 is still more than two-thirds of 150,000, even if in this case the loss hurt that much more.

As my opponent collected the pot, I explained my reasoning and asked whether he would have called with 9’s and 7’s if he’d had them. He confirmed that he would have, which took the sting out of losing that pot.

Ordinarily, I don’t talk poker at the table. I made an exception in this case for a few reasons: (1) Our table was going to break soon, so I didn’t have long left to play with these guys; (2) This player was both smart and friendly, so I enjoyed talking to him and valued his opinion; and (3) I didn’t mind letting my opponents see how knowledgeable I am, since I thought if anything it would intimidate them and make it easier for me to steal pots.

New Friends

Just after I returned from dinner break, my table broke, and soon I was introducing myself to the eight players with whom I’d be spending the last few hours of the night. The table break itself I didn’t mind too much, since my starting table had gotten a lot tougher over the course of the day. These new opponents looked pretty tough in their own right, though.

Only one player had more chips than I did, but he was on my left, which was bad. Even worse, he looked very good. Specifically, he was quite young, probably 23 or 24, and looking fashionably disheveled and totally bored. He idly shuffled his chips while receiving a massage, frequently shifting his body just enough to toss a raise into the pot. I found this cool air of detachment totally intimidating and resolved not to get too out of line at this table. I’d had a very good day, and now I just wanted to coast through the next few hours.

Since I knew nothing about any of these players, I was even more attentive than usual, watching every hand for clues as to how each person played. A few middle-aged guys sitting on my right seemed to be the weaker players at the table, not bad but a little too risk-averse. I quickly determined that the cool operator on my left had been bullying them for a while now.

There came a hand where one of them made a few quite reasonable calls, given that history, and ended up catching the kid in a bluff. To my surprise, the young hotshot started berating his opponent, asking indignantly how he could call and what he put him on and just generally getting very huffy. This behavior instantly destroyed the aura of intimidation that had initially surrounded my tablemate. No one who truly understands poker, no truly great player, would act that way. I knew then and there that I could beat him after all.

Also of interest was the weaker player’s reaction. There was still an hour left to play, but as he raked in the pot, he started talking about how excited he was and how he would sleep easy tonight knowing he had a big pile of chips.

He might as well have painted a bull’s eye on his forehead. In his mind, the night was over, and he had a lot of chips. That meant that I was free to bluff him. If he wanted to win a pot against me, he was going to have to put that precious big stack at risk, something he’d just made clear he wasn’t going to do. Even better, the other weak player sitting next to him was in the same place, and the two started celebrating together. I was salivating.

I was in the big blind when the first of these weak players raised and the second called. I knew before I even looked at my cards that I would be re-raising. I looked anyway and found Q6o. Nonetheless, I stuck with the plan and re-raised. The first player folded, and the second called very quickly. That wasn’t ideal, but I knew he couldn’t be too strong. In his current state of mind, there was no way he would risk sandbagging with a strong hand.

The flop was 842, no help to me. I bet big anyway, and my opponent quickly folded, saying “Nice overpair. I missed my set.” I smiled; my plan had worked to perfection.

Old Friend

The only thing that could make the day sweeter would be taking a pot off of the little pissant to my left, and soon enough, I got my chance. I raised with A [diamond] K [club], and he called from his big blind. The flop came 7 [spade] 5 [heart] 4 [spade], and we both checked.

The turn was the A [club], he checked again, and I made a small bet of 25,000 into a pot nearly three times that size. He raised, just as I expected he would if I bet small, making it 90,000 to go. I called.

The river brought the 9 [spade], completing a possible flush. He checked, which made me pretty sure that he didn’t have a flush. And since I had checked the flop, I didn’t think he would give me credit for having a flush either. Now it was time to let him be a hero.

In this spot, a pair of Aces isn’t a particularly strong hand, but my read was that this kid expected a bluff from me. I hoped to confound that expectation by squeezing a big value bet out of my marginal hand. I lined up two towering stacks of orange chips, 200,000 total, and pushed them into the pot.

To my surprise, he folded instantly and started ranting. “So sick. It’s so sick that you got there. I had to get tricky on the flop. What do you do if I bet the flop? What do you do?”

Wow. I ignored his question, but smiled to myself. Based on his reaction, I may have just bluffed him off of something better than AK. He continued with his obnoxious questioning, and I regretted having already tossed my cards back to the dealer. It would have been so sweet to show him my hand and watch his brain explode.

The day got even better when I spotted Jamal, whom some of you may remember from past years’ adventures, standing on the sidelines. I played with Jamal on Day 4 of the WSOP in 2008, and he remains to this day one the nicest guys I have ever met at the poker table. We ended up meeting for coffee the next morning, where he told me about the poker scene in Jordan, his home country. I ran into him during the 2009 WSOP, and he seemed as excited to see me as I was to see him.

After a grueling day at the tables, and especially the last few hours stuck next to the jerk on my left, seeing Jamal’s big friendly smile was like coming home. “Aaaandrew!” he cried with genuine excitement, stretching out the first syllable of my name as was his wont.

I explained that I was still in the tournament, but that my table today wasn’t nearly as fun as the one I’d shared with him. He smiled wistfully. “We did have fun, didn’t we?”

“Yeah. These guys are no fun. The guy on my left hates me.”

Jamal looked shocked and horrified. “Oh no. He hate you, Aaandrew?”

My mistake. I forget how casually Americans throw that word around, and how strong of a word it can be in other cultures. “No, no, I’m sure he doesn’t hate me. He just gets frustrated.” It was touching to see how appalled Jamal was at the idea of anyone hating me.

We spoke for a few minutes, and I learned that he hadn’t played the main event this year but was here cheering for several friends who were still in. That’s just the kind of good guy he was. Now, he assured me, he’d be cheering for me as well. I swelled with pride to be the recipient of this very kind man’s attention.

It was a great finish to a great day. My stack of 1.2 million chips was actually only slightly ahead of the average. Still, I felt like I’d played very well, and I’d had more opportunities for my skill to make a difference today than I had on any previous day. So many of chips had come from catching a few lucky cards that it felt good now to have a stack that felt hard-earned. It was just the confidence boost that I needed going into Day 6.

Day 6

My Day 6 felt like what the World Series of Poker is supposed to be about: a battle of wits and will amongst the poker world’s elite. Of the 7319 people who entered the main event, only 205 of us remained. My 1.2 million chips put me right around the average.

At times, the final table felt so close I could taste it. After all, I’d already outlasted thousands of players, and I was a good player with a lot of chips. I was practically there!

Except not really. To make it to this point, I had outlasted 97% of the field. To make it to the final 9, I was going to have to do the same thing again. Only 9 of the 205 of us, or 4%, would make it there. There were quite a few good players remaining, many of whom had even more chips than I did, and all of whom wanted to be there just as badly as I did. I’d come a long way, of course, but there was still a long way to go and a lot of great players to go past.

More than a few of those great players were at my table. On my right was David Baker, a relatively old-school professional who, to my knowledge, doesn’t play much online (i.e. he is not Bakes from the 2+2 forums) but has had considerable success on the live circuit. Further to the right was Adam Levy, who is accomplished both live and playing online as “Roothlus”.

There was Russell Rosenblum, a fellow Marylander who final tabled this event way back in 2002, when it was a much smaller and more elite affair. I was hoping he might be on the weaker side, but in fact he knew what he was doing and wasn’t making life easy on anyone.

I also recognized Brian Jensen, a Danish pro with whom I’d played on Day 3 of the tournament. He was quiet but friendly and quite good. Not to mention that he knew a lot about how I played due to our time together earlier in the tournament.

And to my immediate left, the worst possible spot for him, was Eric “basebaldy” Baldwin, Cardplayer’s 2009 Player of the Year. Eric is like the posterchild for the virtues of a wholesome upbringing in the American heartland. He’s good-looking, friendly, smart, and athletic. He won the college world series of baseball (Division 3, but still), is easy in conversation, and is quick with a joke. It would be a pleasure sitting next to him if he weren’t also so damn good at poker. The only upside was that he had among the smallest stacks at the table. Unfortunately for me, it didn’t stay that way for long.

The only truly soft spot at the table was Breeze, an Israeli-born woman who was the last female player still in the tournament. She’d actually been playing poker for just a few months, and while she played well for a beginner, she simply wasn’t of the caliber of the rest of our table. My hope was that I could get away with some steals when she was in the blinds, but Russell, Brian, and Eric were sitting behind me with short stacks ready to re-raise all-in any time I tried to get away with anything.

The only brightside to drawing such a stacked table was that we were chosen for the ESPN secondary feature table.

Poker Face

As I mentioned earlier, Eric quickly grew the meager stack he’d begun the day with and used his newfound chips to put considerable pressure on me from my left. Despite starting the day with barely 300,000 chips, he had a million a few hours later, which was barely less than my own 1.2 million.

He had already re-raised me a few times and was generally making life difficult when I picked up AKo. I raised to 40,000, and Eric re-raised to 100,000. Despite my very strong hand, this put me in an awkward spot because of our stack sizes. Any re-raise on my part would effectively commit a million chips to the pot, showing considerable strength and probably enabling him to get away from most hands weaker than mine. Then again, just calling his re-raise would let him see the flop relatively cheaply with a lot hands that could easily draw out on me, not to mention that I’d be playing a big pot with the considerable disadvantage of having to act before him.

After some thought, I decided that moving all-in was my best option. I was putting a lot of chips at risk to win a barely medium-sized pot. On the one hand, I could expect him to fold pretty often. On the other hand, if he did call, the best I could hope for would probably be a coin flip.

I announced all-in, and now it was Eric’s turn to think and stare at me. The mere fact that he was thinking was already good for me, as it meant that he didn’t have the dreaded Aces or Kings. Then again, it also meant that he didn’t have a weak hand, which would have folded by now.

I did my best to keep my face impassive and eyes fixed on the felt, but I could feel myself growing uncomfortable beneath Eric’s probing stare. Since I mostly play online, I don’t have that much cause to practice my poker face, though I do believe that it’s improved considerably since my first trip to the WSOP four years ago.

Until now, I’d generally felt comfortable staring my opponents down aggressively, locking eyes with them, and giving away very little with the small, unconscious movements of my face: blinking, swallowing, fidgeting, itching, all of the little things my body is always doing that I’m never paying attention to until another player is himself regarding them with his full attention, straining to glean some clue about my emotional state and thereby about the cards resting face-down on the table in front of me, at which point all those little unconscious movements become all I can think about.

Now it was different, though. For one thing, Eric’s got a hell of an intense stare himself. I quickly realized I was better off staring at a neutral spot on the table rather than locking eyes with him. He is a far more experienced live player than I, and if anyone had an advantage in such a battle of who-can-show-less-and-read-more, it was he.

Then there was the fact that the stakes now were bigger than ever, and it was getting harder and harder not to care about them. This may sound odd, but I believe that the best attitude to have at the poker table is one of utter indifference to the results. There are so many factors beyond my control that influence the outcome of a hand that it’s best not to worry about actually winning or losing and just focus on making the best decisions I can and letting the chips fall where they may.

Of course, that’s easier said then done when there’s hundreds of thousands dollars on the line, and my heart was pounding through my chest as Eric continued to stare and think. It helped that I didn’t actually know what I was hoping he would do. If he had a pocket pair, maybe 9’s or T’s, then I wanted him to fold. But if he was thinking about calling with Ace-Queen, then I didn’t want to discourage him.

At last he folded, and I was happy enough to collect the 200,000 or so chips that were in the pot. As I was hauling in the pot, I heard a familiar voice shout down from the viewing area above, “You can breathe now, Aaandrew!”

We were sitting under harsh camera lighting, so I couldn’t actually see into the darkened spectator area, but I smiled and waved in the general direction of the voice. “Hey, what’s up, Jamal?!” I cried excitedly, once again flattered that he’d taken some time out from following his close friends who were still in the tournament to check in on how I was doing and shout a few words of encouragement.

Big Draw

That was exciting, but what really got my heart thumping was the next big pot I played. A new player had come to our table, a member of Team Poker Stars named Gualtar Salles. I’d never heard of him, but apparently he is a stock car racing celebrity in Brazil. I was hoping that would mean he wasn’t much of a poker player, and while he wasn’t one of the best at our very tough table, he was plenty talented.

Gualtar’s journey through this tournament had been a particularly compelling one. Apparently on Day 5 he lost a pot in which he’d invested all of his chips save for a single, yellow 1000 chip, just enough to pay the next round’s ante. Well, he won that pot, instantly undecupling his stack, and apparently won a few more as well, because here he was sitting with us now with nearly a million.

Gualtar is relevant to our story because he started the whole mess by raising from early position. David Baker called the raise, I called with A [club] J [club], and the player in the big blind called.

The flop was a beauty for me: J [spade] 8 [club] 6 [club], giving me top pair and the best possible flush draw. That elation was quickly tempered when Gualtar confidently bet 120,000. Strong as my hand was, I still had a lot to sweat about, as Gualtar needs a pretty strong hand to raise from early position and then bet into three people on a flop like this.

To make matters worse, David raised to 400,000. With two opponents showing interest in this flop, it was unlikely that my pair of Jacks was the best hand. However, the combination of the pair and the flush draw made it too good to fold. I moved all in for a little over a million chips. The big blind folded, and Gualtar had himself a good think. After some time, he folded, and now it was David’s turn to sigh loudly and try to figure out what I could have.

Since I was already all in, he didn’t need to worry about keeping a poker face, and indeed he started talking through his decision out loud: “Wow. A set? I don’t think I can get away from this. Yeah, I think I might have slowplayed myself into a disaster here. How much is it, 600,000 more to me?”

He sighed again and gave me a good long stare. My eyes were glued to the felt, and all of my energy was concentrated on keeping my breathing shallow and even. It was easy enough for me to deduce from David’s monologue what had happened. He had gotten tricky by just calling rather than re-raising Gualtar with a big pair, hoping that one of the many aggressive players left to act would do the re-raising for him. I’d foiled that plan by just calling with my AJ, and now he was afraid he’d committed too much to the pot to get away from what no longer looked like such a strong hand.

If he had Queens or Kings, I would actually be a very small favorite, though given how large the pot was I’d much prefer that he fold and give it to me uncontested rather than make me essentially flip a coin with him for my tournament life. No such luck, though. With one last sigh, he threw 600,000 chips into the pot. “Call,” he announced with considerable resignation.

There was no need for the dealer to shout, “All in and call!” as would have happened at a regular table. We were at a feature table, and the cameras were already recording every detail of the hand. We turned over our cards, and I saw that he had two Queens. It was indeed a monstrous coin flip for 2.4 million chips.

There were two cards left to be dealt, and any Ace, Jack, or club, 14 cards total, would virtually guarantee me the pot. Or so I thought. “I folded King-Queen of clubs,” Gualtar commented.

“Don’t say that,” I muttered, grimacing. If he was telling the truth, which he probably was, then two of the cards I was hoping to see wouldn’t be coming on the turn or river.

The dealer wasn’t allowed to deal those cards until the cameras had established their shots and the ESPN producer gave the go-ahead. I did my best to sit patiently. It was all out of my hands now. I’d played the cards to the best of my ability, and now it was all up to fate. Still, I was in a hurry to see what fate had in store for me.

Finally, the producer tapped the dealer on the shoulder, and she revealed the turn. It was the 4 [spade], no help to me and therefore good for David and his Queens. My face fell. With only one card to come and with Gualtar having presumably folded two of my outs, my chances of winning were less than half of what they once were.

During the interminable wait for the final card that would seal my fate, I mentally prepared myself for elimination. It was an honorable way to go, and quite probably I’d be on TV for this pot. I believed I’d played the hand well, and if it wasn’t meant to be, then it wasn’t meant to be. That’s poker.

The producer tapped the dealer, and she dealt the river card. It was a beautiful 5 [club], giving me a flush and the winning hand. I exhaled a long, sharp, audible sigh of relief, but otherwise there was no obnoxious celebrating on my part nor grumbling or berating on David’s. “Nice hand,” he said, tapping the table as the dealer pushed me the pot.

“Thank you,” I answered, trying not to rub it in by smiling too broadly as I scrambled to gather hundreds of yellow, orange, and green chips into manageable stacks of 20. It was no mean feat, as my hands were shaking, and the chips had to be arranged precisely so as not to obstruct the table’s built-in camera.

Out of the Limelight

At the next break, they moved us off of the secondary feature table and back onto the convention center floor with hoi polloi. The mics came off, but our table stayed together, much to my dismay. In fact, the table got even tougher.

Breeze got all in with Kings against Adam’s Jacks, but he flopped a Jack, which meant the weakest player at our table was going home and one of the strongest had just picked up some chips. Worse yet, the player who replaced Breeze was Scott Clements, armed with at least 2 million chips.

Scott, playing as “BigRiskky”, was one of the first breakout stars of the internet poker tournament scene. He was a bit of an online celebrity even when I was just starting out. I’d played with him a few times online and found him to be plenty good but nothing out-of-the-ordinary for a tournament professional.

In person, it was a different story. Scott is a big guy, tall and muscular with a sharp jawline accentuated by one of the least ridiculous looking soul patches I’ve ever seen on a white person. He looks like he could be a professional athlete, and his poker stare is as intimidating as they come. He radiates competence and confidence, and between his table presence and his stack of chips- which was actually below average but enough to give him the lead at our table- no one was tempted to mess with him.

Meanwhile Eric, on my left, was once again short-stacked, leaving him in a spot where any hand he chose to play could be his last. Blinds were 15K and 30K with a 5K ante, and he had around 330K in the big blind when the action folded to me in the small blind. I held Ace-Four of diamonds, which was plenty good enough to move all in on him. Even if I showed him my cards, there would be nothing he could do to take advantage of this play. I am risking 330K chips to win the 90K in the pot, and he simply won’t be dealt a hand better than Ace-Four often enough to call me.

Of course, I didn’t actually show him my cards, and he called me with King-Jack. He was slightly behind my A4, but I would have made the same play with quite a few worse hands, so his call was a perfectly standard and good one. He caught a King on the flop to double up and take a small bite out my already-dwindling stack.

Just in Time

I haven’t introduced him yet, but there was yet another French Canadian at my table on Day 6 (my fourth of the tournament, I believe). David Assouline was his name, and he was a character. He wore a bright orange-pink sweater, matching pants, oversized dark sunglasses, and his hair pulled back in a crazy pony tail/topknot thing.

He had a boisterous cheering section on the rail and occasionally shouted back and forth with them in a combination of French and oddly accented English. “One time for the good guys!” was among his favorite cheers after taking down a pot. He was also quick to boast of his online successes, which included wins in several of the biggest weekly tournaments, anytime anyone asked him about his online screenname, “a$$ou”.

He was almost ten minutes late coming back from the dinner break, which at this stage of the tournament is simply absurd. He probably lost 5% of his stack to blinds and antes while he was away from the table. I remember commenting to Eric, “If you had told me that someone at this table was going to be late returning from dinner, I would have taken even money that it would be that guy.”

When David did finally return to the table, he was entirely nonplussed. “Just in time,” he quipped as the dealer mucked his cards for about the sixth time in a row.

He was late coming back from the next break as well, which ended up creating a weird and ultimately expensive situation for me. David was in the big blind, but since he wasn’t back yet, his hand was dead, and there were 40K chips sitting out there undefended. Six players had folded, and the only thing standing between me and those chips was Eric Baldwin in the small blind.

I looked at my cards, found Ace-Eight of hearts, and made the smallest possible raise, to 80K. I probably would have done this with any two cards, and I expected Eric to realize that, so I didn’t see any reason to make a bigger raise. He had about 800K chips, and being out of position, his only real options anyway were to move all-in on me or fold.

After a few seconds of thought, Eric did in fact announce, “All in.” Ordinarily, this would have been a close and tough decision for me. A8 isn’t exactly a monster hand, and my opponent had put a lot of chips in the pot. David’s absence from the table was enough to turn this into an easy call, though. As I said, I would have raised almost anything in this spot just to steal, and I expected Eric to know that. That means that he could himself be re-stealing from me with a much wider-than-usual assortment of hands. My A8 suddenly looked quite strong indeed.

I called after a quick count of his chips, and sure enough he showed me Jack-Ten of diamonds. I was ahead, but not by much. A Jack on the flop and a Ten on the turn locked up the pot for Eric, and just like that I was the one who was short-stacked.

New Table

Ironically, not long after that hand, I finally got the seat change that I’d been praying for all day. I was leaving behind about 2 million chips that had once been mine, but I was glad to be gone nonetheless.

My new table looked at least a bit softer than the terrifying one I’d just left, but I didn’t have long to appreciate it. I was in “Hail Mary” mode, meaning that my stack was short enough that all I could do was pick a good hand and go with it. After ten hands or so, I was dealt A7 in late position. The players in front of me folded, and I moved all-in.

The player immediately to my left called, which was bad news. Sure enough, he had a pair of Queens. The dealer announced, “All in and call!”, and we had to wait for the cameras to set up before we could see the flop, turn, and river. I knew it was over, though. When everything was ready, the flop was dealt, and it was no help to me. The turn was a Queen, which was the nail in the coffin. Even an Ace on the river couldn’t save me now.

I quickly packed up my bag, wished everyone at the table good luck, and went to collect my check. I’d finished in 87th place, which is nothing to complain about. The last few hours didn’t go my way, but I certainly had more than my share of luck in the tournament. There were three occasions when I was all-in with a 50% or less (in one case far less) chance of surviving, and I managed to come out ahead all three times. No matter how well you play, and I was happier with my play this year than in any of my four prior appearances in this tournament, it still requires incredible luck to make it all the way.

Although my former table was relatively chip-poor, there were so many good players there that I predicted it would produce at least one of the November Nine. The prediction proved close but wrong. Clements and Levy both went extremely deep. David Baker ultimately recovered from his nearly devastating loss to me and finished much deeper than I did.

None of them made the final table, though, which just goes to show how long of a slog was left even from the point at which I made my departure. Finishing in 87th feels like just a stone’s throw away, but truthfully even surviving the day would have given me perhaps a 15-20% chance of final tabling. That’s nothing to sneeze at, of course, but it’s hardly a lock. There’s nothing easy about winning this tournament.

2010 WSOP Trip Report: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3