Vegas #3: more Wynn and 1st WSOP tourney

I'm exhausted. I'm averaging about 4 hours of sleep per night, less last night. I stayed at the Wynn last night until about 5am and had to start today's $5k 6-handed WSOP event at noon.

Anyway, last night at Wynn was insane again. May as well call it the Lamont Jordan show (Oakland Raiders running back). He decided he wanted to go drink with his wife for a bit and says "These are my last few hands, it's gonna get off the hook. Like I mean insane". His last 10 hands of the night took over an hour to play there were such big decisions to make and he was goofing around and taking him time (of course, no one said a thing about it). Picture this....all-in.....blind.....$15,000. It was absolutely disgusting. I had about $11k on the table.

Unfortunately for me, I ended the night about 4-5k down, sort of lost track. I wasn't too concerned about this because I simply didn't catch a damn hand during all the craziness and got coolered a couple times by a couple of other players. 4k down was nothing in this game anyway. My biggest decision was Lamont looking at his hand, quickly announcing "all-in" and I find A9 of spades in the big blind. I didn't know what the hell to do. If it were for 2k, no problem, snap call. But 11k, I dunno. I'd also feel very stupid if he showed up with AT or better which is totally possible. I folded. As it turns out, he had 87, they ran the board, and he would have hit a 7 and busted me if I had called.

I don't think this was a bad laydown by me though, I can find a better spot. Some people might say I shouldn't be playing in that game if I'm too scared to call that hand, but I don't agree. It's really cheap to sit there and fold (we're only playing 10/20 after all), and we got opportunities to limp and see if we flop a monster, then hope Lamont did something goofy. Like this one: the whole table limps. Flop is Jh4h4c (I flop a flush draw which is irrelevant because I miss). Swedish kid bets $80 and the whole table pretty much calls. Turn is 3c. Everyone checks. River is Jc making running clubs. Lamont goes all-in for $12k into a $400 pot. Swedish kid says "Ugh, call" with his JT. Lamont says "Full house is good" and flips over Ac8c for the nut flush on the double paired board. Holy freakin' Merry Christmas sweden.

Me and one other guy were pretty much the only ones who didn't cash in on the stupidness. But that's okay.

I am very disappointed by how I played the tourneys today. I didn't play very well. I didn't get very lucky either, but I didn't deserve any luck anyway. In the $5k 6-handed WSOP event I started out real nice and built a decent little stack of 12.5k (starting stack was 10k). I was getting great value from my hands and making chips from 2nd pair, etc. My table was so terrible, I really lucked out. Then who sits down in the one open seat that was being blinded? PHIL IVEY! This was super cool and I really enjoyed playing with him. It was pretty surreal staring across the table at Phil Ivey. The only hand I played with him I flopped a huge open-ended and flush draw and semi-bluffed him off the pot. He was pretty quiet, busy on his phone, and got coolered early on for half his stack by an really obnoxious kid who wouldn't shut up about beating Phil in a hand. Phil didn't last very long and was the first off the table (knocked out by the same obnoxious punk, I sure hope he didn't get far). Then, I proceeded to donkey bluff away a huge part of my stack. So stupid. I have no excuse. I bluffed the wrong players with bad cards on terrible board textures. I'm pretty disappointed with myself. I hit a few hands early, had a real aggressive image. I could have sat back and waited for hands and got paid by the 3 idiots at the table.

The hand I get knocked out on I have just under 5k in chips left. I haven't played a hand in almost an hour because I decided to wait for my spot this time. One of the donkeys limps on the button and I decide to raise Q7 hearts out of the small blind and try to take down some dead money (I know I just said I was waiting for my spot, but I had already dwindled 2k and I was getting too short). I raise from 200 to 1000. The donkey calls which actually surprised me. Flop is 224 which is perfect for me to bluff since I know he's not trapping (he's not smart enough for that). I push all-in, he says "sorry" and rolls over 24 offsuit. Unbelievable. I know I was making a move and I hate going out with a stupid hand, but geezus. To make it even more hilarious, the turn is a 4 and the river is a 2 making a 22244 board. Can you please find anymore cards for him in the deck?!? I don't really regret this short stack move too much since this would work 95% of the time, but my previous moves were stupid.

Then I played the Caesar's $330 and played horribly in that too. I doubled up early on, then made a stupid fold which would have made me huge early on. I guess it wasn't stupid because I thought I was beat, but in hindsight I should have made the call because I was getting more than enough equity from the unknown Texan. It's a long story and not that interesting, so forget it. Point is: I sucked in the tourneys today. The end.

I have the $2k WSOP event tomorrow and plan on being way sharper. No donkey moves against bad players. I've been playing so much cash game that my tourney game is weak and impatient.

Tonight I went back to Wynn and sat in the "must move" 10/20 NL table, waiting for a seat in the game that had Elky, Lamont, crazy asian kid, and a couple other action players. Honestly, I'm not sure I even felt like that crazy game and ridiculous swings, so it was okay I never got on. I did pretty well on the other table though. Made almost $4k on my very first hand with a KK full house, and ended up almost $6k which pays for my tourneys for the day. I was very satisfied with that, and very tired, so I decided to pack it in and enjoy one cash night with minimal stress.

This Vegas trip has been an interesting experience so far. I've spent a huge chunk of it alone. Besides hanging out with Quentin and Angst a little bit, I've pretty much been with my own thoughts in a strange, weird, town for 5 days. I'm around people all the time, but feel very alone. I have met a lot of very cool folks though from all over the world, I love that aspect of poker. This is all very hard on the body though: weird and irratic eating habits, tons of walking around in blazing heat, very poor sleep. Plus, I've got a chest cold and can't seem to shake it. But, when I wake up in the morning I'm ready to go and excited. This is the World Series, and this is my two weeks out of the year where I live and breathe poker (though I won't play as much when my family arrives on Sunday). I feel like I'm in a completely different world out here, it's sort of eerie sometimes, but exciting too. I'm not really partying it up and all that, but just taking it all in...

I really miss my wife and son. I walked around Caesar's forum shops for over an hour today trying to find a Grover doll for Owen (he loves Grover!). No luck yet, but will check Fashion Mall tomorrow. I want something to give him at the airport on Sunday. Sarah tells me about the stuff he's doing and saying while I'm gone. I can't wait to show him around Vegas, he'll love it. Sarah really likes it in Vegas too, so we should have a blast.

Anyway, that's enough for now. Thanks to everyone who has sent me encouraging comments, I really do appreciate it. Feel free to email me any questions you have about Vegas and I'll respond as soon as I can.

I'll try to start getting some tourney results, I simply haven't deserved any as of yet. My luck has been crappy too, but I can't blame bad luck when combined with bad play. I'm going to really try and last a while tomorrow in the $2k WSOP event.