Another final table

But no cash. Not really much of a performance either.

Played the Fitz tonight and to be honest never really got going. Got very little to play with early doors and then couldn't connect with flops. So I basically just drifted back and back from starting stack to 1K (5 BB's) before there was a suckout led short stack recovery that saw me get to the final table with 9K, shortish but playable. Started with Ace 8 in the SB, three limpers, all in, first limper reraises allin, other limpers dive out of the way. I'm thinking big pair or ace, but no, she turns over 7's, happy days, specially once I hit my Ace on the turn. Then a button raise gets through, then another double up when I suck out with AJ against the same lady's AQ, and then another courtesy of the only really decent play I made all night.

Young guy playing like an escaped lunatic raises 1200 (3 BB) UTG blind, I'm sitting with 4850 so looking to move again so if it's passed round to me I figure any hand above average is an allin hand, I have K9 suited so off we go. My rocky image helps ensure nobody else decides to get involved, my opponents calls blind (!), turns over J8, and my hand holds.

Unfortunately that was my high point. I played my first FT hand terribly weakly. Monster stack UTG min raised, guy just next to him flatcalled, Denis Reyes in the small blind completed, and I have AJ. Think about pushing but a little bit worried about the UTG min raise so instead I elect to see what the flop brings. In retrospect, hard to know what I'm hoping for flopwise other than some miracle like two pairs and KQ10. It's actually Q82 rainbow. Nothing for me there so I check expecting to be folding when someone bets, but it's checked around. Jack on the turn. I figure there's probably no queen out there since a queen should have bet the flop with 4 people in the pot to protect against J10, so my first instinct is all in to protect. But then I think no, I'm only getting called by a queen or better, so I'll just check, see what the river brings, and maybe someone will bluff at it and I'll make more if noone has the queen (and lose less if they do and I just have to call a value bet on the end). River's a relatively innocuous looking 9 (only slightly worried about J10) so I check, and the guy at the end (most obvious bluffing position) bets 2K. I figure with pot odds of 7 to 2 I have to call and guess what, he has pocket 9's so he rivered a set. If I'd gone with Plan A and pushed the turn, he'd have been gone and I'd have been up to over 14K instead of down to less than 5K. Given the tournament situation (blinds 400/800 and about to rise to 500/1000) I had to just ignore a slowplayed queen (or set, or 109, or QJ etc.) and just hope my J was good. If someone was slowplaying something better, then good luck to them, but more than 50% of the time my AJ would be good on the turn and I was pushing 7K to win 7K (and more importantly give myself a proper shot at doing something at the FT other than push or fold), so it should have been a no brainer push.

Few hands later, I came over a limper with pocket 10's in the cutoff only to have him call with Jacks. Nothing wrong with that play, the damage was done the previous hand.

Sean played too and just died the slow death of a 1000 cuts, or rather bad hands.

Other than that, was in town on business all day so didn't play online.

Posted in: