Today I played in a special live SNE freeroll hyper turbo tourney at EPT MC. There were 46 entries, including at least four or five full ringers I've played a bunch with. Nanonoko was there also and was a really cool guy to chat with. The tourney paid $2500 for first with $100 bounties on all players. All final table participants receive a $215 tourney ticket. Should the winner of the event then win a heads up match with Barry Greenstein, his prize money would be doubled and the final table members would instead receive a $530 tourney entry.
Before the first hand was dealt at my first table, all but one of us agreed to flip for stacks. I woke up with KJ and was up against 33, K8, JT, and some other rag hands. The flop came KJ9, turn 5, river K to score me 6 bounties and an additional 6 starting stacks. Awesome. Shortly after I did a quick taped interview for what I believe was a Nordic poker site regarding the flip, why it happened and how I took it down. Maybe I'll find the video online one day.
Unfortunately, after reaching the final table and making it down to four handed play with 10 bounties collected, I lost two 70/30s AIPF both to same person which all but eliminated me. If AT had been > KT one time, there's a very good chance I would have shipped the thing. I guess I can't complain though, as I did score $1k USD in bounties and what will either be a $215 or $530 tourney ticket I can use for a Sunday major or SCOOP event.
Not a bad score given it was a freeroll.
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Reflections
During the 15 minute break between the final two levels yesterday (as I was folding my way into the money), I stood out on a terrace of the Monte Carlo Bay Resort overlooking a bay of the Mediterranean. The cliffs of Monaco which house many architectural miracles loomed in the background. I spent five minutes thinking about where poker has taken me, perhaps spurred a bit from Chris Moneymaker asking me where I thought I'd be had his WSOP ME win not incited the "poker boom" (this conversation sparked by my thanking him for said boom).
In February of 2008 I decided to put forth an effort to not suck at online poker and hopefully earn a little extra spending money. It is barely more than two years later. I've gone pro. I reached Supernova Elite in 2009. I've played three major live donkaments (2009 WSOP ME, 2010 PCA, and 2010 EPT Grand Final Monte Carlo). It's been quite a ride, and I wonder how long its going to last.
Moving on to something a little less emo, tournament poker sucks. It sucks because it glorifies variance to the extreme while almost every structure quickly diminishes the skill levels at play due to typical ranges of stack sizes. The only saving grace I see is that tournament play does introduce a significant amount of situational factors to consider that simply do not exist in cash games. I imagine after putting in a reasonable amount of tournament volume and doing a little learning, identifying and adjusting properly to these situations becomes pretty trivial however.
Live poker sucks too, not because it is live, but entirely because of the hands per hour limitation. I'm really not sure I could make it as a sponsored pro. If my contract stated I had to play ten events a year, I might snap. To clarify, this isn't a reaction to my EPT Grand Final experience, which was decidedly positive (I have ~$19.8k more USD than I came with and a day of chatting with a WSOP ME champion was great).
Thank God for cash games, and thank God for online poker and multitabling.
In February of 2008 I decided to put forth an effort to not suck at online poker and hopefully earn a little extra spending money. It is barely more than two years later. I've gone pro. I reached Supernova Elite in 2009. I've played three major live donkaments (2009 WSOP ME, 2010 PCA, and 2010 EPT Grand Final Monte Carlo). It's been quite a ride, and I wonder how long its going to last.
Moving on to something a little less emo, tournament poker sucks. It sucks because it glorifies variance to the extreme while almost every structure quickly diminishes the skill levels at play due to typical ranges of stack sizes. The only saving grace I see is that tournament play does introduce a significant amount of situational factors to consider that simply do not exist in cash games. I imagine after putting in a reasonable amount of tournament volume and doing a little learning, identifying and adjusting properly to these situations becomes pretty trivial however.
Live poker sucks too, not because it is live, but entirely because of the hands per hour limitation. I'm really not sure I could make it as a sponsored pro. If my contract stated I had to play ten events a year, I might snap. To clarify, this isn't a reaction to my EPT Grand Final experience, which was decidedly positive (I have ~$19.8k more USD than I came with and a day of chatting with a WSOP ME champion was great).
Thank God for cash games, and thank God for online poker and multitabling.
EPT Grand Final - Day 2 Wrap: LOL Mincashaments
After another two plus hours post dinner of Q8s being the absolute top of my range preflop, I was fortunate enough to be able to fold my way through the bubble. At the time it burst, my stack was right around 12BBs. I ended up busting losing a 40/60 jamming KQo from the CO with two hands left to go on the day. This wasn't terribly disappointing, as coming back to play what in the next level would have been a ~10BB stack the next day wasn't a very appealing thought. I guess had I binked I could have tried to nurse my stack to an additional 5k Euros, but I'll have to settle for 15k. That's around ~$19.8k USD for those wondering. Given that the event felt like a freeroll I'm pretty content with the result, though I'll always wonder what could have been had my hand distribution during the entire second day not been beyond abysmal.
The highlight of the event was getting to chat with Chris Moneymaker for a little over eight hours of play on Day2. He is an incredibly personable and down to earth guy, and even mentioned me in an interview he taped during a break, saying that despite being the chip leader (at the time, shortly after he'd lose a few huge pots) he wasn't getting too out of line bullying the table because he had a big stack on his left playing solid (referring to me). At the time I had around 150-180k chips, which was likely in the 60-75bb range, so I wasn't a huge stack but could definitely do some damage. I hadn't really played back at him too much due to the extreme card death, but did cold 4b my one big hand all day after he 3b AQ, and 3b him with 64o from the BTN over his CO open once (he was opening super wide, and folded to both).
Pokerstarsblog also blogged about a trivial hand I played with Chris - though it was neat to see my name mentioned trivial or not. Here's the quote:
'Moneymaker's hand in the till
He's worked his way up to well over 400,000 - and the chip lead - so you can forgive Chris Moneymaker for being "at it" once in a while. On this one he open raised to 5,000 and got a call from Jason Collier.
Both checked the Q♠8♠4♥ flop and also the 4♠ turn. The 5♠ river made a flush likely and Moneymaker bet 7,000. Coller thought for a moment and made the call. "You got it," said the 2003 world champion - and he was right as Collier showed 6♠6♦ to take the pot.
"I had two red cards," Moneymaker said sheepishly.'
Oh, and I did manage to go the entire tourney (~17 hours live play or so), without flopping a single set. I flopped a monstrous two pair once (and nothing stronger ever), losing that hand. GG.
Hopefully Chris takes it down, if I recall correctly his stack when our table broke at the end of Day2 was around 50bb.
The highlight of the event was getting to chat with Chris Moneymaker for a little over eight hours of play on Day2. He is an incredibly personable and down to earth guy, and even mentioned me in an interview he taped during a break, saying that despite being the chip leader (at the time, shortly after he'd lose a few huge pots) he wasn't getting too out of line bullying the table because he had a big stack on his left playing solid (referring to me). At the time I had around 150-180k chips, which was likely in the 60-75bb range, so I wasn't a huge stack but could definitely do some damage. I hadn't really played back at him too much due to the extreme card death, but did cold 4b my one big hand all day after he 3b AQ, and 3b him with 64o from the BTN over his CO open once (he was opening super wide, and folded to both).
Pokerstarsblog also blogged about a trivial hand I played with Chris - though it was neat to see my name mentioned trivial or not. Here's the quote:
'Moneymaker's hand in the till
He's worked his way up to well over 400,000 - and the chip lead - so you can forgive Chris Moneymaker for being "at it" once in a while. On this one he open raised to 5,000 and got a call from Jason Collier.
Both checked the Q♠8♠4♥ flop and also the 4♠ turn. The 5♠ river made a flush likely and Moneymaker bet 7,000. Coller thought for a moment and made the call. "You got it," said the 2003 world champion - and he was right as Collier showed 6♠6♦ to take the pot.
"I had two red cards," Moneymaker said sheepishly.'
Oh, and I did manage to go the entire tourney (~17 hours live play or so), without flopping a single set. I flopped a monstrous two pair once (and nothing stronger ever), losing that hand. GG.
Hopefully Chris takes it down, if I recall correctly his stack when our table broke at the end of Day2 was around 50bb.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
EPT Grand Final - Day 2 at Dinner Break
Quick update. 159 left, 128 get paid. Average stack ~160k, I have 120k with blinds at 2k/4k and a 400 ante. Ridiculously card dead all day, even relative to yesterday. Made friends with Chris Moneymaker who has been on my right for all of Day 2. Real nice guy, incredibly down to earth.
Hopefully I can win a few pots and ride out the bubble, but who knows what will happen. If I could have just picked up one 88+ or AQ+ an hour things would be much different. Pretty sick that I've made it this far without flopping a single set all tourney (also no other flopped gin hands likes straights/flushes etc) - the one time I did flop two pair I lost to a rivered gutter. FML. I expect the bubble to burst about half way through the level after next, the two of which will be played tonight. Run decent one time please.
Hopefully I can win a few pots and ride out the bubble, but who knows what will happen. If I could have just picked up one 88+ or AQ+ an hour things would be much different. Pretty sick that I've made it this far without flopping a single set all tourney (also no other flopped gin hands likes straights/flushes etc) - the one time I did flop two pair I lost to a rivered gutter. FML. I expect the bubble to burst about half way through the level after next, the two of which will be played tonight. Run decent one time please.
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