9 SNG $5 + .50 End 5th 41 hands

Discouraging end to this one. I had been playing well, but not picking up many chips. By hand 21 we were down to 5 players and I was 5th. When I had good pocket pairs I'd bet 2 BB or 3 BB and not get any callers. Last hand I got sucked out on on the River.

Hand 18. Six players. Pocket Q's, HJ position.  UTG folds, I bet 3 BB (150), everyone folds.

Hand 25. Five players. Pocket 7's, CO position. UTG folds, I bet 2 BB (120), everyone folds.

From here till my end it's always five players.

Hand 28. Pocket K's, SB. Action folds to BTN who bets 2 BB (120), I raise to 360, BB & BTN fold. This hand I could have just called and maybe the BTN would have something small and maybe I'd have been able to pick up a few more chips.

Hand 35. Pocket K's, CO position. UTG folds, I bet 2 BB (160), everyone folds.

Hand 41. Blinds 40/80. I'm UTG w/pocket 9's (9s 9c),  I open w/2 BB bet (160), CO & BB calls, rest fold. Flop 6h 4h 5d.  At least all the cards are undercards, but I don't like the straight possibilities. BB checks, I bet about 1/2 the pot (240/520), CO folds and BB goes all-in. Why? For some reason I  don't feel he has a straight or a bigger pocket pair, less certain about a set. I only have 835 chips left and have top pair at this point, so I call. He shows 6d Jh. Only a pair of 6's, much weaker than I expected and I feel good about my call. Turn Ah. Don't like that as he now has a flush draw. Next card though, was the killer. River 6c. He hits trip 6's and I'm done. :-/

As I said I don't feel bad about my play, only unhappy about the end result, but if I keep playing pretty much like I did here and my past couple of SNG's I expect to see good results over the long term.

TOUR 54 End 50 FTP End 46 hands 2 Sat to $750K

Well this is quick to write up. Hand 2 I have Ac Ks. I'm MP. UTG+1 limps in w/30 and I raise to 90, action folds to BB who calls and UTG+1 calls. Flop Qs 4s 7c. I hit nothing. BB bets the pot, 285, UTG+1 folds, and I decide to challenge the BB and raise to 570. BB goes all-in w/1410. This is where I should have folded. I'd be a bit crippled chip wise but still in the session. His all-in to my raise basically told me what I wanted to know ... did he hit something good in the flop..... and if he goes all in he likely hit the Q and/or has a set, so yes, as I said, that was my notice that it was time to give up my AK. I call. He shows Kd Qd. An Ace or two spades would be nice. Turn 10c, River 10s.

If I had been lucky and won it would still have been a bad call on my part and not good poker play.

TOUR 180 20FTP 3 min blinds End 30 Sat to Sun Brawl Sat

Only 1 entry, 2-4 pay FTP points (50, 30, 20)

Overall I played fairly well. More comments latter.

9 SNG $5 + .50 End 2nd 105 hands

Overall I played well. I'll cover the next to the last hand now and comment on others later.

Hand 104. We are HU, blinds 120/240. I'm SB w/Ac Js and 6990 chips. BB has 6150 chips. I bet 2 BB (480) and BB raises all-in w/6390. AJ is not the best hand for this situation, so I think about it and decide to give it a shot and call. He shows 10s Qd. Not the superior cards I was expecting. Not feeling so bad about my call now. Flop Jd 8h 9c. I pair my J BUT he flops a straight. :-/ At least I still have some outs. Turn 9d. A 9 or a J would be really nice on the River. River 2s. Oh Well. I have 720 chips left.

Rush 9 player 05/.10 251 Hands Down $31 Blinds ate $3.90 Rake $1.84

Poor Rush session, small wins with major losses, some my fault, some suckouts. Will post details later.

9 SNG $4 + .40 Tier One End 2nd 86 hands

The Tier One SNG only has two prizes: 1st $26T and 2nd $10.

Hand 16 Seven players left, blinds 25/50. I'd built my chip stack up to 2110 chips, on the BTN w/2c 4h. Action folded to me and I decided to try a blind steal and bet 3 BB (150; both SB & BB call. So much for the steal. Flop 7d 10d 2d. I do have bottom pair but no diamonds, so what do you do when you find yourself in this position and the SB & BB check to you, well you bet 225 into the 450 pot suggesting I have something, like maybe a diamond flush. SB folds but BB calls. Hmm, are they on a flush draw? Turn 10c. The board paired making a FH possible. BB checks again, and well, now is not the time to back down and hoping they aren't just slow playing me. I bet 450 into the 900 pot and this time BB folds. Phew!

Hand 30 I get knocked back. Six players, blinds 40/80. Action folds to me and I bet 2 BB (160), only SB calls. Flop 4s 6h 5c. I pair my 4 and there is a possible straight showing. SB checks and I bet 200 into the 400 pot. SB calls. Turn 2c. I have a gutshot straight draw. SB checks and I bet 400 into the 800 pot. SB calls. River 7h. Open ended straight showing. This time SB bets 320 into the 1600 pot. A modest bet but I only have a pair of 4's so I fold.

Hand 35, five players. I'm the BTN w/pocket Q's (Qd Qh). Action folds to the CO who is short stack and goes all-in w/475 chips. I call SB folds and BB calls. Flop 9d Js 4s. SB checks and I go all-in w/1275 chips. BB folds and CO shows Ah 4c, one overcard. Turn Jh,. River 8s. I win and we are down to four players. Will finish rest later.

9 SNG $5 + .50 End 1st 86 hands

Well this one went much nicer than the previous one. :-) Had one interesting player who had around 400 chips much of the time we were at four players. He would go up a bit and go back down a bit but managed to hang in there in spite of the blinds getting up to 80/160,. On hand 74 after he posted the SB he had 160 chips left. UTG w/5000 chips opened w/a 400 bet, I & SB folded, BB w/2610 chips called. Flop Qd 4s 9s. BB checked and UTG bet 640 into the 880 pot and BB called. Turn Kd. BB checked again, UTG went all-in w/3960 chips and the BB called. BB had Ac Ks, having paired his K and UTG had Kh Qh having top two pair. I'm sure the Short Stack w/160 chips was smiling now. River 2h. BB is gone and Short Stack made the money. I feel it was a tough call for the BB as it would have been for me., I'd likely felt UTG to have something like AK or AQ, though I do recall when he got into pots he usually had the goods and I should give serious thought to what he might have that could beat my AK, Anyway back to my play.

Hand 2. It could have been all over for me right here. I'm the BTN w/As Qc. UTG opens w/a 4 BB bet (120), action folds to me, and I give out a sigh. I didn't want to have to call or raise a 4 BB UTG bet, I could easily be out carded here. I think about it and decide to call and see what the flop brings; SB also calls. Flop 5h Ah 10c. My Ace pairs w/a decent kicker. UTG bets 150 into the 390 pot, I opt to raise him to 300 to see if he is serious about this, SB folds, and UTG re-raises all-in w/1380 chips. Darn. Big decision. Why did he decide to go all-in? Could he have AA, KK, QQ, JJ? There's a lot of ways I can be beat and all too often when a player bets like that they do have the goods as I've found out the hard way. I think now, I mixed up the country he was from when I decided to call, though the actual country, I might have called as well as they can be aggressive with an Ax card when they are not the best. He shows  Ad 6d. Paired Ace with a much weaker kicker than my Q. Now I wait and hope he doesn't suck out. Turn 9d. River 3c. Phew. Actually double Phew!! One for not sucking out and the other for not having pocket cards that had me beat when I called his all-in. Lucky hand and I can relax a bit with a 3120 chip count to start out this session.

BTW that player I just beat had only 15 chips left and he is the same player who ended up 3rd some 70 hands later. :-)

Hand 12. Eight players. I'm CO w/pocket A's (Ah Ad). UTG+1 opens w/a 40 limp, MP raises to 140, HJ folds, I re-raise to 340 and all fold. I could have slow played that and maybe won more chips but opted to see if anyone else was willing to bet or challenge me pre-flop. I'd have been happy if they did.

Hand 16. I'm UTG w/Ad Jc. Not strong cards but I decide I'd like to see the flop and open w/a 2 BB bet (100). UTG+1 & MP fold, HJ raises to 300, CO & BTN fold, SB re-raises all-in w/1110 chips, BB calls and I say "later folks!" and fold. HJ re-raises all-in w/1395 chips and BB calls. Phew. Definitely looks like one my AJ wouldn't have fared well. They show: HJ pocket Q's (Qh Qc), SB pocket 8's (8d 8h), and BB Ah Ks. Flop 8c 4c 4d. SB hits their set and has a FH! Turn Ac. River 2d. Pocket 8's to a set hold up and two players are severely chip challenged.

Hand 20. Seven players. I don't often get into raise/re-raise situations but did this hand and it paid off. I'm HJ w/pocket 10's (10d 10c). UTG limps in w/50, action folds to me and I raise to 175, BTN, SB, & BB fold, UTG calls. Flop 3s 6c 8h. All undercards to my 10's. UTG checks and I bet 225 into the 425 pot. UTG re-raises me to 525. Oh dear. What should I do here? My 10's certainly look the best, UTG only limped in. Could they have a set from the flop cards? I don't know. I like my 10's so I re-raise them to 825 and hold my breath waiting to see what they do. They fold and I exhale!! Whatever they had, they decided wasn't worth one more bet or call.

Hand 35. Five players. Blinds 40/80. I'm SB w/pocket 9's (9h 9d). UTG folds, CO opens with a bet of 2 1/2 BB (200), BTN folds, I raise to 400, BB folds and CO calls. This is the same player I was up against in Hand 20. Flop 7d Ac 5d. My 9's do not like seeing that Ace. I bet 440 into the 880 pot and the CO folds. Apparently he didn't have Ace's.

Hand 36. I give up a few chips thinking I might be able to take out the short stack who has 675 chips. I'm the BTN w/10c Jc, action folds to me and I bet 2 BB (160), SB folds, and short stack BB goes all-in w/675 chips. Darn. Oh well, I jumped in this far, lets go all the way and I call. He shows Ks Kd. Nice cards for him, bad for me! Flop 10h 5c 7c. Some hope here for me. I've paired my 10 and have a club flush draw. Turn 7h, River Jh. I doubled him up!!

Hand 44. Four players left. I was hoping to get a litte action out of this one, again with the same player in hand 20. He is big stack w/4910 chips, I'm 2nd w/3980, 3rd has 3370, and short stack 1090. I'm BB w/Ah 8h. UTG folds, BTN bets 3 BB (300), BB folds, and I call. Flop 2h 8d 8s. I have trip 8's w/an Ace kicker. I bet 350 into the 650 pot, hoping BTN's open bet was more than a blind steal. BTN folds. At least I got his 300 chips.

Hand 76. Three players. Blinds 80/160. One more time I have a chance to try and take out the short stack. I'm BB w/As Jh. Short Stack opens all-in w/480 chips, SB & I call. Flop 2d 10h 2c. SB & I check. Turn Jc. That pairs my J. I might have the best hand. SB checks & since we are trying to remove the short stack I decide to check as well., River Qh. We both check again and the  moment of truth is upon us. Short Stack shows Ks 8s, hitting nothing. SB shows Ah 9d hitting nothing as well. My pocket J's carry the day. We are now HU. I have 6290 chips and the other player has 7210. Not a big difference.

Hand 79 I give him some chips. I'm SB w/3c 4c and open w/a 2 BB bet (320), BB calls. Flop 7s Qd 2d. No help to me. BB checks and I bet 320 into the 640 pot, BB calls. Turn Ad. BB checks and I decide to do the same. The best I might do is hit a straight if a 5 hits on the River, but that could be up against a diamond flush. River 7c. I have nothing. BB bets 880 into the 1280 pot and I fold. It's now 7610 to my 5890.

Hand 85. Blinds 100/200. This turned out to be nice hand for me. I'm SB w/6h 5c. I bet 2 BB (400), BB calls. Flop 6d 5c 8h. I hit bottom two pair, but it looks like the flop has straight possibilities. BB checks and I bet 400 into the 800 pot, BB calls. Turn 2c. That's ok for me and it doesn't look like it hit the BB. BB bets 1100 into the 1600 pot. Uh oh, did I miss something? Has he had the straight? Did he hit a set that would beat my two pair? Well there's only one way to find out and I decide to re-raise him all-in w/4150 chips. The worse that can happen here is I end up 2nd if he calls & I lose. He calls showing 7c 3c. Boy does he have OUTS!!! Open ended straight draw and club flush draw. If I counted right 17 outs!!! Best I could do is a FH with only 4 outs. I didn't fully realize, at that time,  how fully challenged my two pair were at that point. River 10s. I hold and now have 9900 chips to his 3600.

Hand 86. I'm BB w/Ks 3c. SB opens w/ a 3 1/2 BB bet (700), I decide to call. Flop Kh Jc 9h. My K pairs but I have a very weak kicker. I decide to go all-in with top pair and SB calls. They show Ad Jh. They have middle pair and an Ace overcard. Turn 5c. So far so good. River 7c. Yeah I win!!

9 SNG $5 + .50 End 6th 37 hands 4/6/10

After playing well for 36 hands, with a VPIP of 14, PFR of 5, and AggF 67 this session came to a screeching halt.

Hand 37. Six players. I'm UTG w/Ah Jd, 1500 chips. Blinds are 60/120. Though I wish I was in a later position, I'm not, and open w/a 3 BB bet (360). My M is below 10 and if I hit a decent flop I could increase my chips; if they all fold I at least have the blinds that I'll need the next two hands. All fold to the BB. He's been making a lot of opening bets of 3 1/2 BB's for awhile. Two hands before this one, as UTG+1 he opened w/a 2 BB bet (200) w/4d 5d. The flop in that hand was 10c 7s 4s; he paired bottom pair. The SB checked and he went all-in w/2755 chips. SB calls showing 7h 10d, top two pair and wins. So I'm not expecting him to have the best of cards here.

The flop Ad Js Kh. I flop two pair, top and bottom. BB checks to me and since I could use a boost in my chips I decide to go all-in w/my last 1140 chips. I don't expect he could beat my two pair, and doubt he has something like AK. I was correct on the latter. He calls and shows 10d Qd. He flopped a straight. :-/ Turn 9h. River 8c. It's over.

Rush 9 player 05/.10 51 Hands Up $0.53 Blinds ate $.95 Rake $.22

I played a short Rush session to get one of the five days playing I need to earn the $5 in the Take 2 promotion. No spectacular hands.

My best hand, pocket J's, the flop was Qh 6h 8c,. There were three of us left, I was SB and bet .35 into the .94 pot, both called. Turn  3s. This time I decided to just check, UTG bet .30, BTN called, and I decided to fold. Turns out I'd have hit my set on the River (Jc); UTG bet $1 into the $2.48 pot. If I had still been in the hand I'd have been able to bet 1st and a good bet might have won me the pot. But with the Q showing on the flop I didn't want to risk more money at that time. It felt ok getting off that hand.

Not much else to say. I tried to play aggressively the hands I chose to play, folded poor hands, and considered position when deciding to play modest hands.

2 HU $2 + .15 End 1st 121 hands

It took a lot of hands but I got the win in the end. I let him build his chip stack back up a couple of times but he played sufficiently non-aggressive, with lots of folding, that I was able to knock him back down. His folding made it hard to build any big pots with him as betting him pre-flop and post-flop he'd fold. The plus side of that is when he did jump in I knew I had to be careful because he likely had some good cards. Twice I got caught with him catching a flush on the River, and even worse for me, I didn't look at the board close enough to notice the flush possibility those two times.

Hand 77. I'm BTN w/1525 chips and As Jc, BB has 1400 chips. I bet 3 BB (150)  and BB calls. Flop 2c Ad Qc. I hit my Ace, but did the BB hit AQ? I'm assuming he called me because he had an Ace. BB checks and I bet 150 into the 300 pot. BB calls. Turn 4s. Looks harmless enough. BB checks and I bet 300 into the 600 pot. BB calls again. River 10d.  Possible straight showing. BB checks and I decide to do the same in case he has something like AQ. BB shows Ac 6c. Looks like he was going for the nut flush draw. BB now is back to 850 chips.

Hand 93. I'm BTN w/2150chips and Jc 10s. BB has 775 chips and has been as low as 550. I bet 3 BB (150) and BB goes all-in w/825 chips. I wanted to see a cheap flop and expect he has something like AK AQ and decide to go for it and see if I can take the win here and call. I'm hoping to see two live cards. He shows pocket Q's (Qd Qh). Gulp. Does not look good for me. Flop Jd 5s 2c. Turn 6h. River 9s. He wins and I'm down to 1350 chips.

Hand 99. I'm the BTN w/950 chips and Jh 9c. I bet 2 BB (120) and BB goes all-in w/2020 chips. I don't know why after that QQ loss I decide to call him; he has not shown me when he acts aggressively that he doesn't have good cards.. He shows pocket 5's (5h 5c). At least I have two overcards this time. Flop 6d 9h 10d. I pair my 9 and it looks very encouraging. Turn 2h. River 10s. I win and am back up w/1960 chips. I was lucky that hand.

Hand 108. This hand the possible flush was so glaring I couldn't miss it,. I'm BB w/Ah 10h. BTN limps and I call. Flop Jc 3d Ac. I pair my Ace and decide to just check, BTN does the same. Turn 8c. No help to me and board shows possible flush. I bet 60 into the 120 pot and BTN calls. River 10c. I have two pair but A flush is even more likely now. I make a small bet of 60 into the 240 pot and BTN raises to 210. Not having any good reason to doubt that he has the flush I fold.

Hand 121.I'm BTN w/2990 chips and pocket J's (Jc Js). I bet 2 BB (120) and BB goes all in w/980 chips. I decide to go for it and call. BB shows pocket 7's (7c 7h). I was glad to see a smaller pair. Flop Kd Qd 10c.  I now have an open ended straight draw. Turn 6d. River 9h. I win!

TOUR 44,290 Won Entry End 6519 Hands 89 $1 Main Event Seat Qual

We started with 2000 chips, Turbo 5 min blinds. Itr took them some 23 minutes to load up the tables and start the tournament.I  made it through the 1st break (about an hour) and overall was satisfied with my play. I didn't make any costly major mistakes. Blinds sneaked up on me faster than I realized after I came back from the break and found my M down to 5 and the blinds with ante's rapidly increasing.

Hand 66. This one I wasn't sure how to play when I met some resistance. I'm the BTN, blinds are 120/240, I have 4870 chips and pocket 10's (10d 10c). Action folds to MP1 w/5960 chips and they open with a bet of 599, rest fold to me and I debate about what I should do. That's about 2 1/2 BB bet. Do they have some really good cards or what? I opt to call, SB & BB fold. Flop 6s 6c 4c. Pairs the board but my 10's still look the best. MP1 bets 960 into the 3708 pot; only about 1/4 the pot. I decide to call one more time. Turn Qh, 1st card that's an overcard to my 10's. This time MP1 goes all-in w/4401 chips. Reluctantly I fold. It probably would have been better if I had folded on his post flop bet and saved myself almost a 1000 chips. I also wonder if I'd raises his bet pre-flop if maybe I could have got him off his hand,.

Not a lot happened after that. I did get pocket A's hand 81 and hand 87 that got my chips count up to 6864 but the blinds had now gone up to 300/600 w/75 ante, so my M was not very good. Hand 89 looked like a chance to pick up some chips. I'm the BTN w/6789 chips and Ad Kd. Action folds to me and I go all-in. SB w/9150 chips calls and the BB is Sitting Out as is UTG. UTG put their last 65 chips in for the Ante and the BB did the same for the Ante & BB.  We now see SB w/Kh Qh, BB w/Kc 9s, and UTG w/7c 5d; not a bad pre-flop situation for my AKs.  The following picture shows you how it played out.

As you can see the worse starting hand ended up the best w/a FH and the SB ended up with a flush that took me out. That's poker. If the SB hadn't called my all-in which I feel was pretty gutsy on his part with just KQs and would have cost him 2/3rds of his chips if I had won, I'd have only won  260 chips from the other two players who were blinding out.

As I said I felt pretty good about my play overall and I needed to pay closer attention to my chip stack in relation to the blinds then I did, so I don't get caught by surprise when my M is hitting 5. My chip count was above average but that wasn't good enough at that point in the session.