I'll just pick this one up right where the last post left off. So after getting my new found chips the BB from the AA hand looked at me and said, "I thought you had a big hand. I had MP on the flop, woulda rivered two pair." Now in most of the cases where someone has said this to me in a live event, I've just brushed it off. This guy however isn't trying to lord anything over me, he actually is just making conversation. He and I had about the same chip stack with now around 45 players remaining in the event. That's when the fun started.
The dude in the BB was Brandon, a 40/80FLHE grinder at Foxwoods (all the dealers verified this for me during the breaks). He was maybe 30 years old but if I was setting a line I would say the over under would be 27. He's a funny dude to talk to and play with and from 45 players on down to the final 20 he and I started dueling back and forth. He would KO someone, then shortly after I got it all in with TT vs 77 and held. Then he busted a shorter stack, and a few hands later I called a nutball shortie with 33 and held vs his A3 after the KJJ flop. Brandon looked at me afterward and chuckled, "Every single time I get some distance you just match me." We actually started keeping score at the table of how many big pots we raked in.
Play like this continued until we were left with 20 players and the floor had us redraw for seats. I had around 290K when we got to this point, with the average stack around roughly 190K. Play resumed until we had 13 players left at 2:10AM. We were supposed to play until 2AM or until the final 10 were reached. Brandon, the chip leader Ryan, and I all combined at this point for over 1/2 the chips in play (all sitting at the same table no less). I had about 450K in chips at this point when all of the players agreed to play on for another 20 mins to try and reach the FT tonight. That decision almost cost me my tournament.
With 12 left Ryan raised UTG 6-handed to 31K with the blinds at 1K/5K/10K. Brandon raised to 80K with about 275K at the start of the hand. I looked down in the CO at 9c9s. I thought about it for a bit, Ryan is only going to call a 4-bet shove here with AA or KK, for certain he folds QQ jut by the way he was playing. I didn't feel like Brandon was all that strong so I decided to ship my stack for 450K. Ryan tanked asking how much, which was the first time so far in the MTT where I was legit nervous. After a few minutes he smirked and laid his hand down, Brandon then snapped off with KK and I lost a big chunk of my stack. Looking back on it I feel like this was a big mistake. This was Brandon's first three bet, but since it was 6-handed and he has proven to be a competent player I figured he could be making the move with 77 or something here just as easily. Ryan later said he had TT, which I didn't figure him to be that strong either. I then licked my wounds and went back to work with my 175K remaining.
About 5 minutes left before the end of the day and still 12 players remaining I saw 44 UTG+1 (6-handed remember) and shipped it for my last 150K or so. The guy to my left reshipped all in and flipped his AA proudly. Flop came down KQ2 rainbow. The turn was an 8, and then the river I binked the 4 to ship the pot. I wasn't even really excited to be honest, I was just pissed at myself for getting involved in the 99 hand and then being coolered like that. We ended the day with 12 players and I had about 329K left behind. We would come back Thursday and play the 30mins left on the clock at the 1K/5K/10K level. All I could think was that I needed to put the shitty hands out of my head, I made it to day 2 and the FT was in reach. Anything can happen when I get to the FT, I just had to hold on from there.
SPOILER ALERT AGAIN: I obv made the FT and even had a very Phil Ivey moment involving an apple, a nearly 1million chip pot, and an older woman on the rail who became my only fan. Part 3 I'll wrap this up then it's back to the old grind stone.