Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Great Night

I played some virtual cards last night for the first time in a couple days and it worked out really well. I really wanted to upload some hands to this blog and talk about them but im still having trouble with importing hands into a replayer so that will have to be put on hold for now and ill just see what i can remember.

The night started off with a turbo 2r which i was in for like 8 bucks and a turbo 3r satt to the 50+5 50/50 tournament. In the sattellite i got my stack up to like 2.7k when i pick up aces. I 3bet a villain in position preflop and he calls. He leads out on a Q55 flop and i jam...he calls and tables AQ0 for top 2. Im in great position to chip up to over 5k and be a top 4 stack in the early stages of this ~100 man satt. Obviously having a stack early is no guarantee of success but it does make it far easier to abuse short stacks and pick up small pots in these rebuy satts. Having a 1k-2k stack really limits your ability to play poker as you are forced to try to get your money in good and look for double ups. As a big stack you get be more selective and win many small pots. Anyways another Q fell on the turn for the 2 outer and i couldnt 1 out him right back so im left with a stack of just over 300 chips.

At this point the blinds are about to become 40/80 and i decide that i d0nt want to double rebuy + addon again if i bust. Risking 15 dollars to win 55 is not what i want to do here. I manage to steal blinds twice with shoves and then tripple up to around 1130 chips. At this point we are 2 minutes away from the add on break so i decide to weigh my options. Right now i have 6 dollars invested and i can
a. add on bringing my stack to 3k and having 9 bucks invested-this is a silly plan. A 3k stack after add ons will not be many big blinds and is probably a waste of 3 dollars.
b. not add on and basically give up on the tournament as i will enter the break with ~10bbs and 60 people left with only 17 cashing.
c. Somehow stack down to 1k or less, rebuy adn then add on. This option risks an additional 6 dollars, bringing my total to 12 but will place me in ~40th place out of 60. It will give me a 5k stack which has a number of blinds at the break but will be a short-stack very soon.
After analyzing my position in the tournament and my options i settled on option c. I quickly minraised to 200 and folded leaving myself with just under 1k in chips, rebought and added on. I knew that i would have a lot or work ahead of me as i would become a short stack soon but i was ready.

Entering the latter stages of this satt i had a couple hands go my way. the first was a hand in which there was a real straightforward player on my right who had a couple of very big leaks in my opinion. This opponent limped preflop very often and with what i can only assume to be a very large range. Postflop he played his hand very obviously. If he flopped a good hand (top pair) he would bet no matter what action happened preflop. I did not notice him to get out of line at all postflop.

Well, he limps and i wake up with JJ in mid pos and raise it up to 750. Blinds were 150/300 iirc. he made the call and checked a KQ4r Flop to me. At this point the pot was 2.1k and i had 3.7k behind. The villain had me covered. When he checked this flop to me i immediately removed any and all kings from villains range. Perhaps this was a mistake, but my read of the player told me that he would never check top pair to me on a flop even if he had something like K4s. Eliminating all kings from his range leaves him with suited low aces, suited connecters, small pocket pairs, and various queens like QJ-Q9 and perhaps like Q8s. I made the decision that i am ahead of such a large portion of his range which includes many many hands, and maybe i might be able to push him off a better hand like a queen. Therefore i decided to shove and take the pot down right now. My reasoning was that if he has the part of his range which i beat, he is never putting a nother chip in the pot unless drastically improves his hand. With a small suited connecter i doubt he is putting any chips in the pot if he turns 3rd pair and with an ace/pocket pair if he improves his hand he is now ahead. Therefore i should bet to fold out these hands. After thinking about this hand and talking with some other players i still really like betting in this spot. Unfortunately i think shoving is just dumb. I could risk a small bet like 700-1k for the exact same result as a shove (he probably isnt c/ring me light as a bluff on this board) and if he does have a hand that continues i could fold and still have 10bbs. Luckily for me he was not slowplaying a king and did not have a queen so he folded and i won the relativly large pot to out me at around 6k.

the next interesting hand happened when the table folded around to my sb where i looked down at K7cc. This hand is obviously a favorite against a random hand and my villain in the bb had a paltry 2k stack at this point for 7 bbs. I reasoned that he if i jam here he is calling with any ace/any pair/and a good chunk of other hands too like suited kings and queens and perhaps even a hand like TJs. Sometimes people like to make light calls when they are running out of chips. And also, if villain folds i win his 300 chip blind and the antes. So i jammed. Villain woke up with JJ but i luckily 3 outed him on the flop and rivered a meaningless straight. Winning this hand put me at over 8k approaching the bubble.

AfI dont remember a ton of interesting hands fromt he very late stages of this tournament so i will jump right to the bubble play. With 19 people left (17 payed) i was in 15th place with ~4 bbs and facing the blinds. The big stacks were making life hell at my table as they kept opening my blinds and i was running out of chips. Also shorties on the other tbales were constantly doubling and surviving. Luckily for me my Toots was on my rail and helping me curse out short stacks who survived and keep an eye on where i was relative to the others in the tournament. Thanks for the rail man! After paying my blinds i was left with 2 bbs but other people had even less chips and to my joy two short stacks were eliminated (one was all in blind) to give me the 55 dollar seat. It felt great to win one of these things, especially considering the beat i took early and fighting back from 300 chips.

During the rest of the night i played 4 12 dollar sngs and manged to win one and come in 2nd in all of the others. I also got bad beated on a 6 dollar superturbo a couple times to bust. It was like back to back to back 3 outers. heh. I was just happy that the beats came in my lowest buy in tournament. All in all i ended the night +100 dollars in profit which is pretty amazing for me considering the run ive been having the last couple times i try to play poker. My roll is now comfortably above the 300 mark which makes me feel great and i am excited to continue playing sngs and i know that one of these days im going to hit a nice little mtt score. Im getting close :)

Now i just have to work until 2:30, do some dishes and errands and then i get to go back to sharon for the weekend. Couple pretty exciting things happening this weekend: My uncle is getting married which will be a fun time and im also excited to potentially enjoy some cannabis with a friend of mine who i never thought i would get the chance to partake in that activity with. Hope everyone has a great weekend and good luck at the tables!

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