By
AawwNutz |
Published
Jun 28 2005, 04:27 AM
Part 1 of a 2 part series about my first trip to the World Series of Poker.
I had been playing poker for almost exactly 18 months when I made my first trip to WSOP to play a $2,500 NL and a $2,500 PL event. After reading about the turn-out for the first couple of events, I decide to wire my money to the Rio to be sure that I won’t get there and have the event be sold out.
The night before my trip I purposely stayed up late to ensure that I would sleep on the plane and kind of get a head start on acclimating myself to the time change. I jump on a plane about 8:00am Dallas time and arrive in Las Vegas at 8:45am. I make my way to the Rio and walk about half a mile to get to the poker room – the room doesn’t do justice to the enormity of the place. There were over 200 tables in this room, but at 9:30 in the morning there wasn’t much action.
I walk to the back corner where there are probably 8 active tables. The floor person keeps yelling that there are two seats available for the $275 satellite to today’s event. I figure I’ve got time to kill, and it would be nice to sit down and get loose. I sign up with my whole goal being to make it down to the final two and chop about $1300.
I draw seat 10 next to a guy that you can just tell is going to be a wild man based on his conversation and his bling bouncing off the table every few minutes. He’s one of those guys with a gold bracelet that looks surprisingly like a WSOP bracelet, yet the face of it has only his name on it. I notice a couple of average 35 year-old guys, a few 25 year-old poker pro wannabe’s, a 55 year-old gentleman who I have seen at WPT events, and a guy in seat 1 in a black poker stars shirt sitting up very forward in his seat anxious to get started.
It took a couple of orbits for me to make assumptions about each player at the table. Seat 1 fancies himself as a very good player, yet probably is a little over-aggressive. I respect the older gentleman in seat 3 as he has yet to play a hand and I have seen him before. Seats 2 and 4 are rich guys judging by the Rolexes and the $120 country club shirts probably just having a good time checking out the scene. I actually think seats 5 and 7 may be local poker pros trying to get in cheap. Seats 6 and 8 are dabbling in several pots, but play a little weak. Seat 9 is definitely my first target as he plays every hand aggressively. Seat 10 is the biggest sucker of all – me.
Very first hand out of the box I get JJ UTG. Quite a difficult combination of hand and position to start the day with. Nice to get dealt a pair of faces on the first hand, but JJ is still JJ. I raise to 3x BB and get called by guy on button. Flop comes low, I lead out about ¾ of pot and take it down. Woohoo – good start. Next hand I play is an orbit later with A9s in BB when everyone folds to bling man who raises it up. Because he is bling man, I re-raise him from 75 to 225 and he folds. On the button I pick up QQ and smooth call a raise from the pro in seat 5 because it’s the first hand he’s played and I’m in no hurry with the blinds so low. Flop comes AxQ – it’s going to be a good day based on the cards so far. Unfortunately, seat 5 doesn’t have an A to give me action.
A few more hands here and there, and before you know it, I’ve got 4,000 in chips with only 4 players left. Nothing real eventful happened except for busting out bling by checking my AK w/K on board to him twice to let him bluff at it. He pushed all-in on the river with only QJ, and I gladly called. With 4 players left, seat 1 was down to only 900 chips and the older gentleman to his left had maybe 1200. I get J9 of clubs on the button and go all-in because the blinds are 100/200 and I would be committed to either player if I raise and they play back at me. The poker stars guy in seat 1 stands up, slams his chips in the middle, and makes a comment about how much he loves fishies. The older gentleman folds and poker stars guy flips over Ak of clubs. His hand holds and he is back in the game. I’m now down to 3000 so I have to slow down a bit. The older gentleman busts the guy in seat 7 and proposes a 3 way chop when I have a very minor chip lead. I’m willing to chop because the other two guys are solid players. Seat 1 flatly denies telling us that he owns (I’m guessing in a Gank way, not in a stock way) Poker Stars and that he would be dumb to chop with us. The older gentleman and I make an agreement to chop heads up if we get there.
After I bust out the older gentleman, I have 5100 in chips to stars stud’s 4900. He tells me “I’ll chop with you now, but I can only offer you 1100, you tip the dealer for both of us, and I’ll take the 1600 balance.” After explaining to him that I have the chip lead, but would be glad to do a 50/50 chop, he tells me to “take the 1100 or I’ll rip you a new one and you’ll get nothing.” “Hmmm… I guess we better play then.”
I figure the best way to beat this guy is just to let him be the bully. I play really timid and weak trying my best to look terrified. I purposely want him to bully me out of the pots when I don’t have a hand and show him my good hands when I actually bet and take a pot. When I don’t have a hand, I quickly check, reach for the chip covering my cards, and quickly muck at any bet he made. Every victorious hand, he would turn and smile at his buddies shaking his head telling them that it wouldn’t be long now.
After a miserable run of cards he actually had me down to $3,600 in chips and offers me $800 to quit. I told him “no, it’s ok, I’ve already paid for my entry to the tournament, so I am fine getting nothing.” The real excitement started when I picked up A5 in the BB. He completes the SB and I check. The board comes A85 and he checks it to me. I quickly check and uncover my cards. Surprisingly, he checks which just makes me realize that he’s got a hand. After the harmless turn card, I put my chip back on my hole cards and make a feeble 1x BB bet to let him feel proud about tricking me with that check. He starts stacking chips, and I uncover my cards again while he is stacking. He says “All-in” in a loud macho way. I respond “oohh, I think I call.” He jumps up and turns over JJ. I flip my two pair and he starts cussing dropping F bombs. The dealer is definitely perturbed by the guy and threatens to enforce the WSOP F word penalty. I told him I didn’t want to win like that, so please let him play.
The very next hand was the end of it for him as I picked up J8s in the SB and raise it to 2-1/2 x BB. He calls. The board comes all smaller than 8 but with two of my suit. I check and he pushes all-in. I call in nano-seconds with overs and a club draw. He flips over two rags that missed everything and my jack high wins. He proceeds to tell me what a bad player that I am and how poker sucks because the best player seldom wins.
On his way out the door, the dealer says something like “is that what you call ripping him a new one?” Stars boy got mad and called the floor person over, but didn’t stay long after she got there. I told him at $2500 bucks a pop, he could rip me a new one anytime he liked.
This is how my story goes: I won the very first WSOP tournament I ever played in. I’ll probably leave out a few of the unimportant details regarding field size and maybe put the decimal in the wrong place.