May 31 2009

WSOP 2009 is underway!


Here is what a landmine looks like after cracking your aces and stacking your chips.

Played my third tournament today… the $1k donkament. There are bound to be a lot of bad beats this year, so it’s only fitting that I run into a random landmine. This time, the landmine took the form of Peter Feldman, a Full Tilt red pro who plays online as “Nordberg”. The hand went as follows :

Blinds are at 25/25. Starting stack is 3k and after winning a few small pots, I’m up to 4500. Nordberg is in the BB and has lost a few pots, so he’s down to 2500. I’m in middle position and look down to see two black aces. I limp in hoping that someone will raise behind me… the SB does that… makes it 150. Nordberg makes it 450 and I’m a little unhappy because I know when I call there really is only one hand they can put me on. I call and the SB wisely gets out of the way. Thought about shoving, but didn’t want to give Nordberg a chance to get away from his hand in case he had something like tens or jacks or queens.

The flop came QJ3 with two clubs. I didn’t love it… but when Nordberg bet out 650, leaving himself with 1400 behind I figured he didn’t flop the set. And I was very confident that my hand was good after I pushed all-in and he tanked. But he was pot-committed, I guess… the pot was laying him 3:1, so of course he has to call with his AKo (sarcasm). The ten hit the turn and he stacks up a 5500 pot while I’m left with right around 2k. I float for about an hour and finally raise preflop after a limper with AQo… the blinds had jumped to 25/50 and the BB himmms and haws and raises. We had exactly the same amount of chips and I was pretty sure I wasn’t dominated, so I put the rest of them in. He flips tens, and the board stays clean for him. Good game.

Seriously… there are going to be a lot of land-mines in this tournament and a lot of them are going to be wearing online cardroom logos. :) Michele told me she heard a couple of older guys talking in the sauna today about how most of the top name pros don’t know how to play poker. What they should have said to be more fair is that most of the top name pros don’t know how to play poker WELL.

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