a chip and a chair

We finally got seated at the start of the second level. The first seven hands were either a walk or a blind steal. I joined the action with a raise of 98o and got 3bet. I like how that works.

Some donk to my right loses most of his chips and starts shoving every hand. He shoves 900 then 1100 then 1250 over an UTG limp. limper calls with AQ but donk flops a flush. Very next hand - 4 in a row for you that are counting - he shoves 2500 and I find a nice QQ and call. He obv flops an ace and I am left with 250.

So last hand before the break I just shove 92. I really dont want to go on this 20 min break and just want to bust. I get lucky (woohooo) and make a straight and go on break UTG with 550 chips. Level is 100/200 blinds so whatever.

moneyyyy

I finnnally have my WSOP money. To bad the series is almost over. I am playing todays $1500 event, possibly the $1000 rebuy on Monday, and then the Main Event that starts on Friday.

While I am a bit disappointed for missing 3 weeks of the series, I think it worked out for the best. The last 2 week online have been great. I am consistantly beating mid-high stakes and finished the best week of my life last week. I'll post month stats tomorrow.

I am stuck as an alternate again today; Obviously don't learn from my mistakes. There are only a few people ahead of me though so I should get a seat in the first level.

quick one

I dropped down to 3300 before I played my last hand.

There were 3 limpers to me on the button at 75/150. I had AK82ds and made it 800. A bad player limp called utg and the cutoff re-potted it. At this point I was getting way to good of a price to fold so I put the rest of my chips in. Utg and Cutoff both ended up all in for around 4000 each. Utg turns up KQJT rainbow and Cutoff has AKT2. Really not a fan of cutoffs play because we were already committed to call. His hand isn't really that good vs my range. But, if he wants to flip so be it.

Anyway we get scooped by cutoff and I am sent back home. Fantastic.

back playin the wsop

Brandon scored a small cash this weekend at the Venetian, so that gave me a chance back here at the world series. Today we have $1500 pot limit omaha eight or better. I have been looking forward to this event since Harrahs released the schedual. This is the most crazy event you could put together.

We just finished the first two levels and I'm at 4750 on break. I got up to 6000 before bricking some flops.

Most of my table only knows limit O8 so they are way to nitty. 90 percent of hands are 5-6 way limped preflop. Going to see if I can steal a few limped pots and build back up.

reflection from the strip

Vegas is an interesting city. Sitting at the tables everyone has a story. Some people live here, but most of the people you meet are here for a week and then back to their normal lives. Everyone is here to take a break from life and let loose.

It is wierd for me, as I a looking to move here not for a break from life, but to start my life. I have not meet a single local over 40 that looked as if life had treated him fairly. If I do move here perm, it will only be for a few years.

I sat down to play some three card poker at the Mirage. At the table was some fourty year old chick who just reaked of gold digger. She used to live and work in Vegas, but got married and moved to LA. It was obvious that she worked as a stripper, and that she just married some guy because he had cash. All I could think is that I would never want a wife like her. Though, I am not sure how to avoid girls like her in vegas.

No matter, I am ready for Vegas. I can keep straight.

at least lunch was good

Went busto about midway though level 4. Heres how my day went: Raise A5, get three bet, fold. Raise QQ, get the blinds. Play J9 vs J8 in the blinds and lose half my chips.

bleh

So my starting table sucked. Brandon was one to the left and the biggest donkey lost AA to KK right off the bat. David Benny sat down as an alternate in the fishes seat. But we got broken quick and I got moved to a new table.

New table is standard mix of donks, but I am missing every flop. Guy to my right is opening tons of pots, so I will have tons of resteal chances. Blinds going to 100/200 and I have 3000.

six max donkaments

Today is the $2500 6max event. Brandon got seated 2 to my left. This should be interesting.

my world series situation

I've been taking some time off here in vegas, and it all isn't because I want to. The story goes...

In the beginning of May I tried to withdraw a large amount for vegas. After the IRS came and took all my cash, I was left with only $20,000 liquid cash. The site that I withdrew from apparently did not like the 50k payout request and has made me jump through hoops to collect. My account was locked and it was stuck under investigation for weeks.

With this going on, I looked for a backer for the WSOP. A good friend worked out a deal early in May with me, but a week before we were to head to vegas he pulled out on me.

I was devestated. The way it went down I felt was wrong, but I scrambed and found someone else. I hadnt known this new guy that long, but I offered him an unreal deal. I knew I was getting my cash at some point and I just wanted to be stress free in Vegas. Four days before we left for vegas we agreed to this deal: He stakes me into $35,000 of events and I pay him 50 percent of my winnings OR his money back. It was good enough or him to take it, even though I feel he didnt really want to.

But, we got to vegas and he didnt have his money. Something to do with his bank. I dont know the details but he finally called off the deal of on the 10th.

So here I am in vegas with not enough cash to play events. I've put in some time live, but the plan is to just get back on the online grind. Cash should be here soon. I will keep you updated.

lol fat chicks

Was just sitting down at a 2/5nl game blowing some steam off. At the end of the table was a fun chick and we were chatting back and forth. She looked pretty good, but she got up to move tables and I realized that she was at least a 200 pounder.

shit

Thankfully she was leaving, so I didnt think anything more of it.

But what is this? Two hours later she comes over to talk to me; touching my shoulder, clearly flirting with me. What do you do in these spots? I want to brush her off but not look like an ass to the table.

I duck my head and listen to a bad beat story from her. Eventually she gets the message and leaves, but damn she wanted teh sexytime.

shout out to pokernews

Dear Pokernews,

Your coverage at this years world series is terrible. You have 50 reporters, but you cant keep chip counts remotely updated. On top of that, your live updates suck and give no information at all.

Please get a clue.

Signed

Justin

brain explode

Instead of taking home my first cash of the series, I was just eliminated on one of the most ridiculous hands ever.

Clownie opens the button to 3500, I 3bet to 13000 with AK with the king of spades. She thinks and looks like she is going to push, but instead calls. I decide to push the last 20000 of my chips in on any flop. Flop comes T97 all spades. I push and she snap calls with 86o!!
Turn and river come gross bricks and she says "I was going to push you off on the flop" WHAT? There is no way I am 3betting 40 percent of my stack and then folding flop.

puke puke puke

eating food that might still be alive

We are out at the Hamada's asiana restaurant in the Rio. Bond picked another interesting place, but I really dont know anything on the menu. There are 9 2p2ers out with us but the only two I know are stevepa and bond18.

Last hand before the break I doubled up off clownie gowin. She folded on the flop after I CRAI with a set getting 9 to 1. I will try to get the rest of her chips when we get back and I came into dinner with 32000 chips.

at break two

Just chillin through the last 2 levels and ended with 16000. Robinhood in seat 2 was replaced by an even bigger fish. I have been trying to get in pots with him but can't seem to find the spots. Going to keep grinding up my stack looking for a chance to get the chiplead.

robinhood and his merry men

So I am stuck out in the death tent today. I wasn't very happy to see my table number last night, but it turned out to be gold. There was a player three to my left who was opening alot of pots. I had figured that I would be stuck battling him all day, but robinhood came to the rescue. Robinhood raised a gutshot on an ATx board and turned the straight to cripple
the young pro. An orbit later I opened for a 3bet and robinhood min 4bet me. I call with AK and on a Kxx flop I pick up his cbet and win a nice pot. Middle of the second round I call robinhoods UTG open with AK again. On a K high flop he check pushes with TT and ships me the rest of his stack.

I could collectively see the table frown as he got up and left the table.

With my big stack I busted 2 more shortstacks and ended the second level with a healthy 13000.

o/8 over tomorrow is nl holdem

And thank god for that. I fee I have the most equity in nlhe events, and I dont think I will be playing anything besides them in the series.

I was carddead for most of the day and finally was forced to go with a hand. I missed completely again and was sent packing. O/8 is a fun game, but it is a card catching game and if you go card dead you are screwed.

almost died on dinner

Right now there is a massive windstorm in Vegas. We started out in the tent, where they have about 50 tables set up. As you can imagine, the tent did not hold up so well. The rafters were swaying and multiple items fell off onto te tables. The players stuck out there with me started rioting and after about an hour they stopped the tournament early for dinner to get us moved into the main poker room. It is just as well for me. Limits are 150-300 and I'm stuck around 1700.

I'l keep you updated on any deaths.

cont...

I am priced to call and old guy calls. River is J. Old guy bets, I fold, and 4 bettor from turn FOLDS and shows A3. DIE DIE DIE.

dirty deck fish and huck seed

The $1500 O/8 event started today at 5. The first Two levels were very interesting. Huck Seed grabbed a a chair 2 to my left. He's a good player, but it is limit so it is not a big deal.

A few hands in the dealer kills Hucks hand when he is playing eith his phone. He call the floor and media gathered around. His humor is really dry, but the exchange went like this: *Huck throws phone at dealer after she takes his hand* "If I cant hold it then you hold it. FLOOR dealer stole my phone." "What? no he threw it at me and wouldnt take it back" Floor tells Huck to stop harrassing the dealer and we move on.

Later on we finally get our first good dealer. Instead of the ten hands per hours we get 20 just in his down. It sucks for me though, as I go on a sick cold run of cards and lose abut half my stating stack.

Near the end of the second level I notice that our dealer is ending the hand with 5 cards. In O/8 10 handed he should always end the game with 4. At the end of the hand we count the deck and sure enough there are 53 cards. Somehow we were playing with the black deck and the extra card had a red back. How we didnt notice this earlier is beyond me. We finish a few more hands and head to break. I am riding 1700 chips only.

Interesting hand:

We go 5 way to the pot for 2 small bets and I have A3ss46. Flop comes 277ss and there is one bet and 4 calls. Turn is a J and the action goes bet, raise, call, I call,
old guy cr, guy 4 bets.

limitedbusto

I don't think I won a showdown all day. Every draw was the nuts vs me and that made my day short. We are going to relax a bit then go over to the Orleans and play some O/8 to get ready for tomorrow. The O/8 tomorrow starts at 5pm, and the field will be really soft. Should be one of my best shots at a bracelet all series.

i hate limit

But at least its easy. To bad they hit every draw on me.

I was up to 4000 chips by thr second level. Then I had a donk hit runne runner. He raised utg someone called and I 3bet AA in the SB. Three way flop came 973. I bet they both called. Turn came 7, I bet, donk raises, I call. River is K and I cr and he calls shows J8 that just made runner flush. A few small pots later I am down to 2400 at the break.

decided to play 1500 limi today.

Grabbed a seat in the $1500 limit event. I am hearing that the event is megasoft, so I think I'll have a good shot in it.

Also, I'd like to give props to MrSmokey1. I've played with him online at 25/50 and live in tounaments and he's good. He is now the youngest bracelet holder ever at 21 years 10 days.

losr another 66 percenter

I am now 4 for 5 in having to pay for credit card roulette. Running bad everywhere at the moment.

can i please get a break?

Level 6 was going along well. I had just owned a circuit regular on my best hand from vegas yet. It was a limp pot to my BB and we took a flop 3 way. I had T7 and the flop came T53. SB and I checked, the limper bet, then the SB checkraised. I 3bet knowing he will put me on 2 pair+ and he turbo mucked KT face up. Owned.

But then things fell to the worse. I folded for two orbits not seeing an ace or a king. In the sb I finally got 99 and raised. BB calls and the flop came A66. I bet out, and he raised. He shows JJ when I fold. Basically played his hand the worst way possible. Very next hand I get KQs and raise to 1800 over 3 limpers. The SB instantly bet pot and I was again forced to fold. The next hand after that I pick up 77. It is folded to me in the cutoff and I raised it to 1400 leaving me less then 5000. I get 3bet AGAIN. I am steaming at this point, but looking at my table position I didn't know how I could fold. If I fold there I'm fucked anyway as they are just going to run me over. I decide that if I jam and win the pot not only will it put me back up to 12000, but it will slow down the aggression over my bets.

So I jam and he calls with TT. Door card is a ten and I'm back on the rail.

It is positive that I'm building stacks early, but whenever I get to that 10000 mark I just seem to hit a wall. Just gotta keep hammering away...

chillin at second break

Pot limit is definitely slower then no limit. There are no antes, so there is much less incentive to steal blinds. Instead I have been Three betting much more and forcing the loose openers to pay.

I've been super card dead, and have been able to get away with reraising. In the last level I opened maybe two pots, but I 3bet four times. I am headed into the 5th level (200-400) with 7000 chips and plan on staying the course. If they continue to let me come over the top, then I have no incentive to do anything else.

getting a hang of pot limit

I spent te better part of the first level getting used to pot limit, and I feel I understand the game now.

The first few levels were somewhat uneventful. I doubled AK vs A5 all in for 3500, but besides that it was just a grind. I got as high as 8000, but just lost a 4000 pot with a draw to end the 2nd level with 5500.

1500 plhe

I am playing the noon $1500 pot limit event today. Play starts in a moment so I have to get seated.

bustoo

By level 6 300-600-75 I had pushed my stack up over 10,000 and felt like I was in good table position. A bit of colddeck sent me to the rail and most likely to the bar.

I opened the hi-jack to 1800 with 55. The big stack to my left smoothcalled on the button and we saw the flop heads up. Flop came K42 and I led 2600, which he again smoothcalled. From his previous play I was pretty sure he did not have a king, as he would have put me all in. His range of hands was 22-TT or 4x. The turn brought an Ace. I figured this card could have only helped him if he floated me with Ax, and I did not want to check/call and get busted by 66 or whatnot.

So I moved in and he called pretty quicky with A4 and sent me to the rail. Sometimes your reads are perfect and it still doesn't matter.

There is an event everyday this month, but this one still stings.

dinne time

We just made the dinner break, and I'm sitting at 9000. My original table broke and I got moved to a tale that was much much deeper. There were 4 players over 10k so I expected dome action.

I restole all in twice to get my stack to 7000, then I had someone bet 1000 and then fold to my raise with only 800 chips left. He is your definition of dead money.

Right now I get a chance to relax and grab some food. We are on an hour and a half break, and dont get started up again til 9.

blah at second break

The three nits on my left busted right after the break, and were replaced by internet players. My table is now one of the worst I see around.

During the last level the antes kicked in and I was looking to pick up chips. Unfortunatly I went super carddead and was forced down to 4500 chips. Next level is 200-400-50 so I'l have to get something going quick.

playing at first break

At the start of the 2nd level I finally got my seat, but it wasn't what I was expecting. We wew supposed to start on new tables with all new players. Instead we got fucked and Harrahs just moved us into open seats on existing tables. That means we all started at a disadvantage.

I lucked out, though and got the Jesus seat at my table. To my left are 3 huge nits - to my right are 5 huge fish. The only decent player is 4 to my left, so I won't be playing many pots with him.

I am going into level 3 with 6000 chips. The gameplan is the same as always, and I'm going to try to build to the chiplead. So far I've played risk free winning what everyone doesnt want. Hopefully they contunie to let me abuse them.

alternat update

Looks like I'll get a sea within the first hour of play. I'm 260 on the list out of over 800 registered alternates. Play will be pretty fast with only 3000 starting chips so I'll be gambling early.

its a madhouse

We just got here to the Rio, and its crazy in here. There are people shoulder to shoulder across the hall and in the amazon room. I dont know when I'll get a seat, but I'll keep you updated.

wtf harrahs

If you have been following the WSOP at, you'll have heard of all problems with Harrah's management. But, I don't understand why they only have 5 people at the cage registering players.

We came to the Rio at 11pm to register for tomorrows event. The line was still 100s of players long and people were saying that it was a 3 hour wait. There was no way that I was going to wait for that long. We decided to go sleep til 4am and come back to register. No way the line is still long that late at night, right?

WRONG

They had better figure this out soon, as I'm sure they are losing players to these hassles.

and i'm done

The last two levels were more of the same; get three bet, fold, get three bet, fold. Eventually I picked up queens and got it all in vs this terrible asian chick, but of course I'm colddecked and she has KK. Board craps out and gg me.

Tomorrow is the $1500 nlhe event, and while I'm disappointed that todays great start didnt turn out, tomorrow is the day I've waited 4 years for.

from the god table to hell

Level 4 started just as planned. My table was so easy to run over and by half way though the level I was up to 25k. Unfortunately not all good thing last. Our table broke and I got sent away.

On my new table I wasnt so happy to see a few familiar faces. Three of the first four hands were 3bet, and the battle was on. At the 2nd break I'm sitting at 19000 chips and hoping to get moved to one of those juice tables I see behind me.

first break of venetian

I sat down to a great table. I soon realized that 2 seats to my left was a player taking every hand t the flop. Goal: Play as many pots with him as possibe. For whatever reason he started respecting my bets, and I started abusing the tablw playing as many hands possible. At level 3 I have 16000 chips and control of the table.

Interesting hands from these levels:

Two players limp in early pos, I open 97o from the cutoff and we go 4 way to the flop. Flop comes 832 and the callingstation fish minbets. I call for runnerz, and the turn comes a 6. He minbets again and all call. The river is a 10 giving me the nuts. Fish bets 300 and I raise to 2000 hoping he had somthing. He folded.

I open AJo over ep limp and he calls. Flop comes Q32 and we both check. Turn and river are both 6s and I call his 2 bets down. He gets upset and open mucks so I dont even showdown my ace high. thankyou

Play has started so back to the table.

lets start the madness

Today is the begining of what weill be an awesome summer. Brandon, Derek and I got up early and headed to the Rio. I had to grab a lockbox and wanted to check out the Amazon room. The amount of work they did to change it into the poker destination of the year is amazing. ESPNs set was all built, and it is going to be fun playing on it later this month. I decided to play the $550 deepstacked event at the Venetian today, instead of the $5k mixed, to get a warmup in before tomorrows event. First place might break $100k, so it is worth it anyway.

The crowds for the $5000 mixed holdem event were much bigger then I guessed. At 10am the line was already a few hundred people long, so I expect tomorrows $1500 WSOP nlhe event to be massive. I wouldnt be supprised to see 3000 players tomorrow.

Play starts in a bit and I'll keep you posted