Day After Christmas

I played in my usual home game last night (21 players). It went OK. When I got there I really wasn’t feeling too focused. I really don’t know what it was. Could have been a number of things- the table (the actual playing surface) was horrible, the lighting was awful, I was trying out some new ear-buds with my i-pod and I just couldn’t get comfortable. But I guess I can’t complain, at least I was playing.

I really didn’t do anything special- made a couple good lay downs, made a few steals, didn’t really give or take any bad beats (until the final table). I was pretty card dead. I saw more J 2’s and 9 3’s then I think I have ever seen. I just tried to exercise patience. It went pretty good. I felt I was playing boring, straightforward poker. At times I thought my play was transparent, but it seemed to be working. I was sitting on a decent amount of chips.

With 21 players we moved fairly quickly to 2 tables. My table was not the action table. All I heard was cheers and sounds of anguish coming from the other table. Evidently one of the guys at table 1 was calling down every one, and just beating the snot out of them. He had a HUGE stack of chips. Let’s put it this way- 210,000 chips in play. When we got to the final table of 9 players he was probably sitting on about 75,000.

The final table was pretty crazy. Here are my first 6 hands at this table: pocket 5’s, pocket 4’s, pocket 9’s, 9 4 off suit, pocket 4’s, and then pocket 5’s again. Pretty funny, huh? I was able to build up some pretty good chips on those few hands (even though I lost some on my 9’s). I felt 10 times more comfortable at this table than I did the other one. I really only noticed one thing that made me a little weary. The chip leader was calling everyone down. I guess he thought he had to be the sheriff since he had a butt-load of chips. So, if I was going to get in a hand with him I had to have something decent.

Here was my one lucky hand of the night: blinds are 1,000/2,000. I have 21,000. The chip leader limps in from early position. I look down at pocket 6’s, in the cut-off. I make it 8,000 to go. I am trying to send a message to the chip leader, but the guy calls anyway. Here is the flop:

3c 8d 9s

As soon as the flop hits he says, “I’m all in.” This was out of the ordinary for him. He loves to check raise not lead out. I took forever. Some guy calls the clock on me. I start to count the pot. There was 19,000 in the pot before his all in. I have 13,000 left. And the blinds were going up to 1,500/3,000 soon. I felt that I had to call. So I pushed them in, turn up my 6’s and say “I think I need a little help.” The chip leader turns over 9c 10h.

The turn- 10c

The river- 7 d

I just went runner runner for the straight.

The chip leader starts pouting and giving me crap. I just looked at him and told him that’s what he gets for calling me with a 9 10 off-suit, as I rake in my pot.

Here is the hand that crippled me- button raises (and I read him as weak). I look down at AsKs. I push all in. I have him covered by 16,000. He said he is pot committed and calls with a 8c10c. He flops his 10 and I brick the turn and river. I am crippled. It’s 4 handed. I have 16,000 left. The blinds are 2,000/4,000. I finish 4th.

It’s cool though. The monster chip leader…he got 2nd. What an idiot. That’s what he gets for doubling up half the table!