After that sick run of bad luck I was basically down to the felt, not playing unless staked. I had a few people back me in a few small events, but they didn't work out.
But last night I made the decision to wake up early and play a low buy in, you-have-to-get-lucky-to-win tournament. $40 buy in at the Green Valley Ranch, the closest poker room to my house. Start with 4500 in chips, and the blinds exactly double every 20 minutes. It gets pretty crazy. This is quickly an all-in or fold tournament. If you dont pick up the right cards at the right spot, you can lose very very quickly.
Fortunately for me I made a lot of good moves in a lot of great spots. I made a lot of disciplined folds and waited for better spots. I stole the blinds in great spots to keep me in the game.
We went from 6 tables to the final table in about 2 hours. I was very short stacked at the final table, but I patiently waited for the right moment to get it all in. But, looking back, I was never actually all-in at the final table. none of my all-ins were called, and so I built my stack from 19k to 68k all by stealing the blinds. But one time I called someone else's all in for less. someone went all in for 12k on the button and I had 6k in the big blind already out there.
With his 12k shove, the small blind with 3k, and me with 6k out there, thats 21k in the pot. It only costs me 6k more to call. or 3.5-1 on my call. If I win 1 out of 3.5 times I will break even here. So I called his 6k without even looking at my cards - they dont matter. Even if I had 72 and he had AA the math is still almost breakeven.
I had a J2. he had a 45, and my J2 held up to win. :D haha but other than that I got it in when I had the best of it.
1st was $613. 2nd was $357 and 3rd was $293. When there were 3 of us left I had about 68k in chips, big stack had about 240k, and little stack had about 45k. We decided to chop up the prize pool, give the big stack $513, and we took $375 a piece. It was better than 2nd place money and with the blinds at 6k/12k I could have lost any hand. In hindsight, I kinda wished I woulda played it out and at least got 1v1 vs the big stack, and then chop it like 500 and 700 or something. But I just needed to win one for my confidence - I was on like a 9 tournaments in a row slump.
So I got a little money under my belt, a little chance to play a few more events and try to grind it up some more so I can get back into the swing of things. I also got my tax returns, so.... thats a little bit of added income. Thats more going toward bills, but it also means that my win money today can all go in my bankroll.
Tonight Im just playing in a $25 buy in home game with my dad at a friend of mine's. Nothing too fancy, first is usually like 150-200. Tomorrow I will probably try my luck at the Mirage again. That always seems to pay out 3500+.
There are a lot of events going on right now that I would love to partake in but I am not rolled for it atm. The Venetian has a "deep stack extravaganza" going on right now with tons of tournaments every day ranging from 300-2500 buy in main event. there are some satellites into the main event I would like to play in, but even those are a couple hundred bucks. Also Caesar's has a WSOP Circuit Event going on too where a $500 buy in goes a long ways in a huge tournament and I heard 1st was around 300 grand last time. If I can get a big win this weekend to properly roll me for some of those events, I will be playing for some huge money next week.
Any given week, my life could be forever changed.
-ATR
No comments:
Post a Comment