Tuesday, May 03, 2005
Monday Night (Tuesday Morning) Poker
*yawn*
It's 4:45am and I'm just laying down to sleep. I'm stretched out in bed and replaying a few of the nights events before I finally pass out. I finally finished in the money again after quite a long drought and overall was very pleased with my play. Nothing I can do about how the night ended for me, felt like I needed to gamble... *I bolt wide awake*
10:30pm
I roll up to the weekly game and it's a packed house. There are 13 of us, far and away the most we've had for this weekly sit n' go. Buy in is $40 so there's a decent payday for the top three. I get seated at a table with a whole range of players. One complete maniac, one moderate maniac, one rock, two guys I've never played against before and a guy who is a very solid player. First hand the total maniac gets into it with the rock, my buddy Matt, and they trade three pre-flop raises and re-raises. The flop comes ten high, and Matt moves all in with Jacks, unfortunately Ryan (Maniac) has Kings. Matt is out in one minute and thirty seconds, thankfully it's his house so he can move on to other things. That set the tone for the first 45 minutes or so, some very aggressive preflop action, but solid post-flop play was taking down a lot of pots from aggressors. I manage to get up about 50 bucks during that time.
The other table was made up pretty much the same as mine and at one point we hear a lot of commotion and then to quick all-in calls. We stop our hand to watch the play unfold. The guys turn over the cards and it's Kings versus Queens, and one of the other players turns up his hand and shows his King-Queen. The flop comes AQ5 and the room goes wild, man hits his case queen to take control of the hand. The guy with the Kings turns and starts to get ready to leave and I pat him on the back and say, "Hold on buddy," as the Jack comes on the turn, "all you gotta do is ask nicely and the ten will come," as the Ten comes on the river. He hits his runner-runner for the straight and knocks the other guy out. I have to say, I have a certain knack for talking the straight runs out of a deck lately, even if I'm not doing it for myself for some reason.
Play slows down for a while after that as we wait for one more elimination to move to a single table. I deal out another runner-runner to demolish a higher pair and we consolidate to our final table. That's where I went absolutely card dead. It was ugly and it last for about 35 minutes. I didn't play one hand that entire time and then finally got disgusted and tried to play. I had a shortstack to my left and I raised his blind with K8 of hearts (best hand I had seen to that point). Naturally he came back over the top all-in and I had to call. So I doubled him up and sat another ten minutes or so before the cards finally came back around. There were a couple big Aces that I took down pots preflop with, or caught top pair with after the flop and got no more action. The in the big blind I look down and I've got Eke and Ike. Sweet, sweet Aces. The shortstack on my left limps, middle position calls, and I raise. Shortstack moves all-in, guy across the table moves all-in and I can only too happily call. I'm up against KJ offsuit and AK spades, flop comes with a spade so I ask the dealer to put a red two and three on the board. The turn and river were a duece of diamonds and a three of hearts. The dealer and I shared a look at how that turned out.
Now I'm sitting pretty and a few hands later I took out a pretty sizable stack when I flopped top pair with AQ and he pushed with the nut club draw but didn't make it. Now I'm just waiting people out and we get down to four handed play with me the chip leader, Don with a pretty big stack, Bob Grizzle and Britton both playing shorter stacks compared to the two of us. After a half hour or so Don knocks Britton out and we're in the money. I have two plans going in my mind. One, as soon as Bob as out I'm gonna chop the pot with Don and go to damn bed. Two, I've been setting Bob up by consistently raising him. A couple times I was able to move him off the best hand and showed him my trash to get him to play back at me. Finally with Bob down to about 150 in chips remaining he limps in to my big blind. I look down at two Cowboys and raise him again. He immediately pushes all-in and I call. He turns over A9 of spades. He seemed very surprised I actually had such a big hand and even though he had plenty of outs, I felt good. Flop comes Q92, one spade. Turn, Jack of spades. River... 5 of spades. MOTHER OF GOD!
I fold away for a bit while I wait for my demeanor to come back to normal. Now it's 3:15 am, I'm tired and I look down at A3 diamonds, I raise, Bob folds and Don calls. Flop comes Jack high rainbow and I lead out for 150. Don immediately reraises me 150. I look down at my stack (very pissed that I'm in a pot with the other real chip stack at the table) and it leaves me with about 215 in chips if I fold. Blinds are going up to 30/60 very shortly and I'm thinking my Ace might even be good. I decide what the hell and reraise him all-in after thinking it over for a few minutes. It cost him another 123 chips, and I could tell he was calling only because he was pot committed, but he certainly didn't like his hand that much anymore. He turns over J7 offsuit and I never improve and I'm out. Still made $60 for the efforts and I head home pretty pleased.
3:48 am
I bolt pretty much wide awake as I'm replaying that last hand and realize I made a monumental error. I had just combined a few of my stacks into three big towers. So what I had said was 150 dollars when calling Don's raise was actually 300. So my re-raise was actually 273 chips not 123, which would have been almost all the rest of Don's stack. At 3:50 am I'm faced with two realizations, I had enough chips to fold and make second still or I had enough chips to put the pressure back on Don and possibly even make him fold. Hands down one of the most boneheaded things I've done because I don't think Don had me covered in reality. And that's what happens when you're in the sixth hour of a poker game during the middle of the night. Stupid boneheaded mistakes.
I'm not so pleased with my play from last night anymore.
It's 4:45am and I'm just laying down to sleep. I'm stretched out in bed and replaying a few of the nights events before I finally pass out. I finally finished in the money again after quite a long drought and overall was very pleased with my play. Nothing I can do about how the night ended for me, felt like I needed to gamble... *I bolt wide awake*
10:30pm
I roll up to the weekly game and it's a packed house. There are 13 of us, far and away the most we've had for this weekly sit n' go. Buy in is $40 so there's a decent payday for the top three. I get seated at a table with a whole range of players. One complete maniac, one moderate maniac, one rock, two guys I've never played against before and a guy who is a very solid player. First hand the total maniac gets into it with the rock, my buddy Matt, and they trade three pre-flop raises and re-raises. The flop comes ten high, and Matt moves all in with Jacks, unfortunately Ryan (Maniac) has Kings. Matt is out in one minute and thirty seconds, thankfully it's his house so he can move on to other things. That set the tone for the first 45 minutes or so, some very aggressive preflop action, but solid post-flop play was taking down a lot of pots from aggressors. I manage to get up about 50 bucks during that time.
The other table was made up pretty much the same as mine and at one point we hear a lot of commotion and then to quick all-in calls. We stop our hand to watch the play unfold. The guys turn over the cards and it's Kings versus Queens, and one of the other players turns up his hand and shows his King-Queen. The flop comes AQ5 and the room goes wild, man hits his case queen to take control of the hand. The guy with the Kings turns and starts to get ready to leave and I pat him on the back and say, "Hold on buddy," as the Jack comes on the turn, "all you gotta do is ask nicely and the ten will come," as the Ten comes on the river. He hits his runner-runner for the straight and knocks the other guy out. I have to say, I have a certain knack for talking the straight runs out of a deck lately, even if I'm not doing it for myself for some reason.
Play slows down for a while after that as we wait for one more elimination to move to a single table. I deal out another runner-runner to demolish a higher pair and we consolidate to our final table. That's where I went absolutely card dead. It was ugly and it last for about 35 minutes. I didn't play one hand that entire time and then finally got disgusted and tried to play. I had a shortstack to my left and I raised his blind with K8 of hearts (best hand I had seen to that point). Naturally he came back over the top all-in and I had to call. So I doubled him up and sat another ten minutes or so before the cards finally came back around. There were a couple big Aces that I took down pots preflop with, or caught top pair with after the flop and got no more action. The in the big blind I look down and I've got Eke and Ike. Sweet, sweet Aces. The shortstack on my left limps, middle position calls, and I raise. Shortstack moves all-in, guy across the table moves all-in and I can only too happily call. I'm up against KJ offsuit and AK spades, flop comes with a spade so I ask the dealer to put a red two and three on the board. The turn and river were a duece of diamonds and a three of hearts. The dealer and I shared a look at how that turned out.
Now I'm sitting pretty and a few hands later I took out a pretty sizable stack when I flopped top pair with AQ and he pushed with the nut club draw but didn't make it. Now I'm just waiting people out and we get down to four handed play with me the chip leader, Don with a pretty big stack, Bob Grizzle and Britton both playing shorter stacks compared to the two of us. After a half hour or so Don knocks Britton out and we're in the money. I have two plans going in my mind. One, as soon as Bob as out I'm gonna chop the pot with Don and go to damn bed. Two, I've been setting Bob up by consistently raising him. A couple times I was able to move him off the best hand and showed him my trash to get him to play back at me. Finally with Bob down to about 150 in chips remaining he limps in to my big blind. I look down at two Cowboys and raise him again. He immediately pushes all-in and I call. He turns over A9 of spades. He seemed very surprised I actually had such a big hand and even though he had plenty of outs, I felt good. Flop comes Q92, one spade. Turn, Jack of spades. River... 5 of spades. MOTHER OF GOD!
I fold away for a bit while I wait for my demeanor to come back to normal. Now it's 3:15 am, I'm tired and I look down at A3 diamonds, I raise, Bob folds and Don calls. Flop comes Jack high rainbow and I lead out for 150. Don immediately reraises me 150. I look down at my stack (very pissed that I'm in a pot with the other real chip stack at the table) and it leaves me with about 215 in chips if I fold. Blinds are going up to 30/60 very shortly and I'm thinking my Ace might even be good. I decide what the hell and reraise him all-in after thinking it over for a few minutes. It cost him another 123 chips, and I could tell he was calling only because he was pot committed, but he certainly didn't like his hand that much anymore. He turns over J7 offsuit and I never improve and I'm out. Still made $60 for the efforts and I head home pretty pleased.
3:48 am
I bolt pretty much wide awake as I'm replaying that last hand and realize I made a monumental error. I had just combined a few of my stacks into three big towers. So what I had said was 150 dollars when calling Don's raise was actually 300. So my re-raise was actually 273 chips not 123, which would have been almost all the rest of Don's stack. At 3:50 am I'm faced with two realizations, I had enough chips to fold and make second still or I had enough chips to put the pressure back on Don and possibly even make him fold. Hands down one of the most boneheaded things I've done because I don't think Don had me covered in reality. And that's what happens when you're in the sixth hour of a poker game during the middle of the night. Stupid boneheaded mistakes.
I'm not so pleased with my play from last night anymore.
