$5,000 PLO8 WSOP Event

So, I flew down to Vegas to play the $5,000 PLO8 event last weekend. This would be the biggest tournament that I have ever played, aside from the WSOP Main Event that I played a number of years ago after winning my seat. This is the first time a $5k PLO8 event had ever been offered. In the previous two years there was only one $1,500 PLO8 so this was a brand new addition. I really didn't know what to expect for number of entrants but I was guessing in the 250 range. It turns out we had 198 players. The field was absolutely loaded with all the big name pro's. There weren't a lot of other major events right around this event so it drew a good chunk of top tier talent. If this were a hold'em tournament the field would have probably been pretty intimidating. But, for me, I know I have put in a lot more hours of PLO8 than any of these guys I watch on TV so I felt quite comfortable.

My initial table started out well. I picked up some early pots while being able to watch Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final on a nearby TV in the tournament room. Before the series had started I tossed some coin on Pens in 7 so needless to say I was quite happy with the result. My table had a few obvious weak players that overplayed hands but for the most part it was what I expected. I had Layne "back to back" Flack three seats to my right and Chris Reslock to my immediate right. Flack busted out quite early after he took a nasty beat for half his stack and then proceeded to try and force the action and win it all back which didn't work for him at all. I was lucky enough to have a big hand hold just before the first break and more than double up. I couldn't have asked for a better first two hours of play.

Over the next 6 hours of play I wasn't able to get much rolling. I held steady with my stack as the field caught up to me average chipwise. I had a number of table moves at the end of the night and played with guys like Erik Lindgren, Scott Clements and Daniel Negreanu for short sessions. The day of play ended at 3am with 59 of the 198 entrants remaining. We would resume play at 2pm the next day with 18 people making the money.

On day 2 I drew a table with Andy Bloch, Mike Sexton, and Jason Mercier. I was quite happy with my table draw because everyone was relatively short stacked which made it less likely that someone was going to just run over the table. About 10 minutes into play Andy Bloch took over 10 minutes on a single hand. It was absolutely beyond ridiculous. If it wasn't such a well known pro people would have called the clock on him 5-6 minutes earlier. I swear he just sat there knowing he was going to fold but didn't do it just to piss off the entire table. Eventually a tournament director was called to give him one more minute to act. Then the tournament director disappears to break another table so we again must wait for the director to come back to force Bloch to act. All this time Bloch just sits there like an absolute douche bag, taking a sip on his Arizona Green Tea bottle periodically. Finally, Bloch folds which I knew he was going to do at least 8 minutes ago.

Anyways, I am not getting much for cards at all and what I do get aren't connecting with flops. I make a raise with a very suspect hand in AQQJ and end up busting out Mike Baxter and his AAxx. Roland De Wolfe gets moved into his spot. This completely changes the table dynamics. De Wolfe comes in with a stack at least double anyone else at the table and is ready to force the action. I don't think he has a lot of PLO8 experience but he certainly has played his share of Omaha and was very dangerous. He took control of the table and was involved in most pots. Mike Matasow got moved immediately to my right and De Wolfe busted him fairly quickly.

I am unable to hit anything worthy of getting my chips in for a couple of hours and have dwindled to a stack of a little over 25,000 chips with blinds at 1,000/2,000. Anytime you are getting to near or less than 10x the big blind you are really getting in danger and need to find a hand to go with. I decided to limp on the button with A478. The flop comes 256rainbow and immediately fall in love with the flop. I have flopped 2nd nut low and a wrap straight draw. Andy Bloch leads out at the pot, a shorter stack deliberates and pushes all in. At this point I should have taken some more time and thought about the hand. It is most likely that both of these guys have a 3 in their hand, either a3 or 34 which means it is really unlikely for me to take the whole pot. It also means that if either of them have a3 I am drawing to 2 or 3 outs for the low and trailing the high unless I hit a straight. I should have just got out of the way but I decided to push my chips in a 3 way pot. Andy Bloch turned over A3K6 and the short stack turned over A387. So, not only am I down to 2 scoop outs but the short stack has a number of the same cards I need to complete my straight and will make the same straight as me when I do a number of times. So, I got my money in poorly and the turn and river didn't bring any help and that was the end of my day busting out around 40th.

Overall my tournament experience was actually enjoyable. It is very weird to think that I played a big buyin event and didn't cash and actually enjoyed myself but I did. I got to play with the best players in the world, both the recognizeable tv pros and the internet guys I have played for years at this very game. I would say on the whole I played my B game. I was a little too impatient with preflop hand selection and the last hand I just didn't take enough time to analyze the situation. However, it is nice to have the feeling that if I had my A game going I can certainly compete with any of these guys at this game. Tournament poker is going to be mostly disappointments so I just need to try and play my best possible game and let the chips fall where they may.

The rest of my trip was quite succesful. I played a good cash session at the Rio where we ended up changing the game from PLO8 to 5 card PLO8. What this means is we dealt everyone at the table an extra card to play with. This completely jacked up the action in the game and really made it a ton of fun to play. Maybe I enjoyed it a little more because I was making plenty of cash once we switched it to 5 card.

My next tournament will be June 22nd. John and I will be playing the $200 PLO8 event at Binions. Next update will be from Vegas.

2009 - Revive the Blog

I have had some requests to fire up the blog again for this year's Vegas adventure. I'll do my best to post regularly while I am away. I will also be twittering some updates while I am in tournaments for anyone who is interested in updates as they happen. My twitter ID is QqJjKk. Last year's blog was quite poker heavy so I will try to keep the twitter account more poker driven and the blog as more of an overall wrap-up for all my Vegas happenings.

I have had a great year of poker over the last 12 months. By far my best year as a "professional". Over the past year I have really become a cash game player. Last year at this time I was still making the transition from playing mostly multi-table tournaments and sit 'n go tournaments to getting involved in ring games. I have had a real mindset change insomuch as it is tournaments that frustrate me now and cash is my comfort zone. There has always been more money to be made in cash games but with more money comes more volatility. I just think I finally got to the point where I had myself properly bankrolled to handle the swings and from that point on I just continues to excel. Most of my play has been on Party Poker. The site doesn't get nearly as much traffic as Poker Stars or Full Tilt but the games are softer and I seem to fair extremely well there. Instead of butting heads against the regulars on Stars and FTP I have been doing nothing but putting in hours and hours on Party and reaping the rewards.

I just recently went to Vegas for a weekend to play in the largest Pot Limit Omaha HI/LO (PLO8) tournament that has ever been offered. I will make another post to sum up my experiences for that weekend. This Sunday the 21st I am headed back to Vegas with my buddy John and we will be staying until July 5th. John and I will be targetting a bunch of tournaments over the course of our stay with our main focus on the $1,500 PLO8 WSOP event that starts June 25th.

If anyone has any requests for the blog please feel free to comment. Hopefully this year's blog will be a little better spirited and have a lot more success sprinkled into the recaps. Appreciate those who read the blog and hopefully this year's shorter trip will be a little sweeter.