Played in the California State Poker Championship last night, $5K buy-in (courtesy of my Dad for his birthday weekend). Sat to the left of David Pham for the 10 hours I lasted, what an experience...the dude literally plays 60-70% of the hands. No matter how many limpers there were, he raised on the button 90% of the time (no exaggeration). I ended up getting busted by Gabe Kaplan at the 10 hour mark when I went all-in with QQ and he called with AK (I was down to 3500 with 100/200 blinds, 25 antes, and someone had already limped--I should have just raised normal and then moved in on the rag flop, but that's a different story).

But the reason I lasted 10 hours was because I laid down KK preflop in the first level of play. Here's what happened, you tell me if I'm crazy:

4 or 5 limpers with the blinds at 25/25, and David is on the button. He says, "No cheap flop!" and raises to 225. I've got KK in the SB--when he said that, I put him on QQ or AA, because it sounded to me like he was making it look like a steal raise. I raised to 800. One guy (a tough pro named Mickey "Mouse") calls. David says, "You trying to bluff me?", which again, makes me think he's got something big. He plays with his chips for 20 seconds, then moves all in.

This is David friggin' Pham. The Vietnamese Gus Hansen. Normally I'd wet myself with joy getting KK against a guy like this. But I just knew he had aces. It's early in the tourney, we've got 10K in chips, and he's a pro going all in against an amateur's re-raise? He knows that because I'm a young newcomer, I'm capable of making a dumb call with AK or QQ, why would he gamble that early when he's the best player at the table?

I thought for about 2 minutes, and he was saying, "Your JJ no good, your 10's no good..." I finally laid down the Kings. Dennis Waterman, another top pro at the table, said he never would have laid those down, especially against Pham--when I told Men the Master and Tuan Le about it later, they both said they would have called in a heartbeat. Pham told me that "top players call me with KK every time because of how I play--they have balls...it was bad that I did that against a scared player." He wasn't being mean; in fact, he was great to me all night, but for awhile he was just thinking that I laid down the kings because I'm weak.

But that's the thing--yes, the top players have balls, but that's sometimes their downfall. I really believed he had AA, based on many factors, and Pham told me a few minutes later he had red aces. And when he explained the logic of how he could only have AA or KK there, it was all the logic I already knew (top player not wanting to gamble that early, etc.).

Am I wrong to think I really made a great laydown, or do I just not have balls?

In other Pham news: Two hands later, I called him down to the river with two sevens with two overcards on the board and took the pot--did the same thing with 9's and two overs a few hours later. Lost two big pots to him, once when I pushed all-in after he check-raised me; I had second pair, I thought he had top pair and would lay it down, turns out he had a set (he checked it behind 4 others with a flush and straight draw on board). I had him outchipped 3 to 1 at the time, no huge deal. Later, when I had 14K in chips, I lost 7K to him when I had AQ and flopped top pair--bet 1500 (size of pot), he called, bet 2K on turn, he called...river came a third spade, I checked, he bet 3K, I called, he had 57 of spades. So overall, I was relatively happy with how I played against him. Called him down with an underpair twice and won it; laid down KK and only lost 800...of course, the two hands I lost to him were worth over 10K total, but I definitely played the AQ correct, he just sucked out.

Hmm. KK preflop; against very aggressive player; making lots of aggressive noise/acting strong; against a nonpro and someone who may be a little awed. His cvomments later xould have been to sooth you--he was acting nice all night. Hmm.

He told me at least 5 times he had AA, and eventually even Dennis Waterman believed him. The more I played with him, the more I was convinced anyway--he never had all his chips in without the best of it. He'll bluff at small pots, he'll make some moves, but he always leaves himself an escape. No way he puts his tourney at risk with AK or QQ against a guy who'd re-raised him preflop in a multiway pot.

Even after I busted out, he swore again he had AA, he had no reason to lie. And by the way, he wasn't "soothing". He kept telling me that no top players would have folded.

It's the three day tourney--I didn't make the 2nd day, no money, of course.

EOM
no exception
NONE

So defensive? Because I'm disagreeing? I'm open to being wrong.

Point is, it was in the first level of the tourney...it cost me 800 chips, and I got that money back and more two hands later when I called him down with 77. I'm just not willing to risk my entire tourney 30 minutes into it with the blinds at 25/25 and 10K in chips without the obviously better hand. And to me, he obviously had the better hand, and I was right. Tuan Le said, "That was probably a good spot to gamble for you." Gamble? How is 30 minutes into a tourney a good spot to gamble?

good laydown if you are happy with it.
what else can i say.
ide go broke before i laid down KK preflop to Pham. As far as top pros not risking it so early, i see the top names from Ferguson, to Ivey to more risky players like Laak and Hansen go out VERY early as in 1st 2-3 hours of tourneys. A lot of them like to get a good stack by middle of 1st day or get out.
but if you are happy with it, then good. For your game and state of mind you made the right decision. I and many others just happen to disagree. OK?
seriously.

To be a good poker player you only need two things. The first is pattern recognition. The second is balls :-) Sounds like you lacking in one department ;-) You won't win major tournies folding KK preflop, JMHO

-TheActionKid

I played with Pham for 8 hours straight at the $2500 WSOP which was extremely interesting. Here is what happened:

Me and Pham were both moved to this table at about the same time. We each had monster stacks, I with 35,000 and him about 30,000. The tourney average was only about 4,500 with 600 players left out of a 1,000. We were both top 5 in chip leaders, I was probably chip leader at that point.

The table we were moved to also had a lot of chips on it, about 3-4 guys with big stacks of 15k or so.

Right away Pham starts bullying the table. From the moment he sat down he raised 3x BB like 7 times in a row. Picked up the blinds most of the time and won a couple of small pots.

Then someone calls his raise and it was like a world war three of raises and reraises down to the turn. Eventually Pham folded a final reraise all in, with 22k in the pot and he only had to call 2k more. He was sure he was drawing dead to a set. I had never seen a fold like that.

From that point on, for the next 8 hours, he was playing very tight aggressive poker. The table was simply full of too many good players to let Pham run over it. Eventually Huck Seed knocked out Pham just inside the money, when Pham raised with with 99 on the button and Seed on the big blind reraised over the top all in with AA.

He is a great player being able to change gears 180 degrees like that. He will run over the table if they let him, but with a player like that it usually takes 5-6 players to stop his play, 1-2 wont be enough.

Another story on the $2000 WSOP. The same thing happened except I had QQ. A super aggressive player made a massive raise. I thought I was good since he was loose and his raise looked like a medium pocket pair. So I called with my medium stack and he had AA so I finished on bubble.

Sometimes laying down QQ or KK isn't about balls, it can be the right fold in the right situation.

well, I will say this. If I have 200 bbs in a cash game I won't go broke with KK preflop unless the game is REALLY wild.

some players will tell you they had the better hand so that next time you will fold to them again,,,,just a thought

I think some pro once said well i got kings if the other guy has aces then he's got aces. Something like that, it was on one of the posts here along time ago.

I've been watching wpt all day and let me tell ya, those guys are the biggest bunch of liars i've ever seen. They always say they folded a good hand and when they show, it's usually the worst of the 2 cards in their hand that they show. I'm just saying the pham thing with folding the KK, of course he's gonna tell you he had aces. He wants you to be intimidated if you get in another hand against him. However, I gotta give you major props for having the self-discipline to fold the KK, even if he only had AK you may have prolonged your tourney by folding that KK early on. Flipside=you also may have missed a golden opportunity to double early.

I think people need to remember this is the first level of a big time live tourney with very deep starting stacks. You can make a big laydown like this. you have to wonder why he'd move all his chips to the middle facing a raise to only 800. Doesn't make sense. I don't think I'd call an all in raise for all my chips that early in a tourney with such deep stacks unless I had AA. THere's no point to it. So you're in for 800, do you call off 9200 more? I think that early, you want to see a flop there before you commit your chips.

"why he'd move all his chips to the middle facing a raise to only 800"

which is why you call, and do it so fast the entire room hears your chips crashing into the middle

you are thinking way too hard about this one.

it's david pham, and he's moving in on you when you have kings. you don't get much better opportunities than that to double up.