The
day of the latest tourney fell on one of the couple of Sundays that I
work each year. I’d had a really nice half-hour walk around Regent’s
Park at lunchtime, part of my new keep fit regime, and then down
Parkway in Camden, buying a fab chicken and salad lunch from
touchy-feely organic munchers’ hangout zone Fresh and Wild, then the
copy of The Big Issue (!!, gave away where it was! Okay it’s outside Fresh and Wild but like the life-restoring pods in the pool in Cocoon,
you must keep it under your hat). Then I went back to work for the
afternoon and off home at 6, just in time to make the $3 rebuy, which
I’ve started playing every night, frankly.
My strategy in this tourney (surely the softest MTT on the internet,
or anywhere) varies wildly according the table and my mood. I once made
21 double rebuys, which took me to second in chips at the break but
meant I barely recouped several hours later. Anyway, I’m a bit more
careful with my poker cash these day and try to limit myself to five
double rebuys, max, plus the add-on.
My usual strat is play all suited and non-suited connectors, 65 and
better, KQ, AT and better. Not a fan of playing flops either, and like
to shove pre every time. When you do get called you’re rarely in
terrible shape unless someone has a big pair, but really you want to
get called and gamble as you’re not looking to win the blinds, you’re
looking to double or treble up.
It’s a brilliant strategy because everyone gets pissed off and
starts calling you a lot, which again is what you want. So it’s a
gambly style but one that’s meant recently that I’ve always had at
least 10k going to the break.
On the night in question, I lost my first 2 x 1,500 when I raise
pre-flop with tens, got called, then shove on a low flop. Get called by
a pair of sevens, which then hits a set on the turn. Whatevurrrr.
I then drizzle away half my next 3k and then all of it when I call
an all-in with A5 (these all-ins are usually people wth low pairs and I
was obviously in a gambly mood/on tilt/you guess which).
I reload, immediately gets eights (v lucky hand for me, in the way
that sevens are really unlucky) and shove pre-flop. The blinds are only
25-50 but again, I like this tactic of going all in with hands I like
as I don’t want to win the blinds of 75, I want to flip. Which is
exactly what happened, when I get a call from the button with AQ.
Everyone else gets clear, I flop a set and now we’re up and running
with over 6k.
Except not really because I then pick up AJ UTG, raise 3x, get
reraised all-in by the SB and then by the BB. Wtf?! I call and am up
against jacks and queens! In the blinds?! I mean, be reasonable. I fail
to hit and lose 3.8k. At least things couldn’t get much worse – until
the next hand, that is, when things got much worse.
I pick up QQ in the BB, mid position raises 3x, late position goes
all in, I call, as does the initial raiser and I’m up against JJ in mid
and AQ in late and of course my friend with the fish hooks firms up his
hand further with a jack on the flop. Brilliant. Felted again. If I
were a nit I guess I might fold QQ to that much heat but that’s not the
way I like to play the $3 rebuys.
So then, 3k in chips again. Very next hand: AK suited in the SB.
Something’s got to come off... UTG limps, cutoff limps, I push all-in.
It’s just the way I like to play the rebuys, keep pushing and
eventually people will start calling you down a bit light, whatever the
table dynamic. My friend UTG has me owned with KK and what do you know
it, there goes my 3k. What’s a guy got to do to get six thousand chips
around here?
Two hands later in the cutoff I get AK again, and remembering how
nicely it had lost me all my chips, decide to again play it to the max.
Very simple hand – UTG+1 shoves all in preflop with no raises ahead of
him and I call, he has A8 and I double up. Finally.
I then haemorrhage 2k of them off again (CUE: CANNED LAUGHTER) and
left with 4.3k decide to gamble for a double up and throw in my last
3.6k with A5 and run into AA and another pair. Never flops well, A5.
Clearly on tilt I then shove over the top of the UTG’s 3x raise and
he calls. My A3 vs KJ, neither of us improves and with a few minutes
left to the end of the rebuy period I’m back to the mythical $6k.
I play tight for first half hour after the break, then add nearly 8k
to stack with AJ and KJ on consecutive hands. I’m well into Meet The Parents
now; always watch a film to stop me playing too many hands (I didn’t
have one on in the rebuy period, which might account for the Wild
West-style bloodbaths). I take a few steps back when I decide to call a
4k all-in with AQ and run into a pair of fours, which hold up and take
a third off my stack. Bit loose, that.
In this tourney, good and bad hands seemed to come in pairs, and two
good ones come along, starting with a pair of threes. I stick out a
probe bet when three hearts flop (I don’t have any), villain calls, we
check the turn, I suck out with a straight on the river but check it
down, scared he might be trapping with the flopped flush as he went so
quiet on the flop.
I dodge bullets the next hand when the button shoves on my SB, I
call with A4d, he has 97d, neither of us improves. Now I’m up to 15.8k,
with blinds 250/500-60, so bobbing along nicely.
Ten minutes later there’s yet another pair of biggies, when I pick u
the worst hand in Hold ’Em (AA) in mid position. UTG limps, I limp, one
other limps and the SB shoves for 4.4k. Everyone else gets out the way,
I call, he has a pair of deuces, miraculously fails to hit a third one
and then I’m filing his 4.3k away under ‘M’ for “My chip stack”.
Next hand, KQ UTG, simple 3x raise, everyone folds. Stack: 22.5k.
Things take off in a battle of the blinds when I flop a queen-high
flush draw and call silly-sized bets from the SB which suggests he
might be on a flush draw, too. The draw hits on the river, and now that
there is the A and the K of spades on the board I know my queen is
good. Villain checks, obviously scared how good his flush is, and I bet
all-in, he calls and my stack jumps from 18k to 38k.
I then go on a rampage, winning two big pots without showing, and one with a final hand of a pair of aces.
My policy of not splashing around like an amateur in tons of pots
seems to pay off because I then just keep winning great chunks, with
losses small and few and far between. Most of the wins came from not
showing down, which is good in that it suggests I’m not just blindly
shoving all in and hoping for the best, which used to be how I played
too much of the time.
By this time Meet the Parents has run out and I’m on to the
director and producer’s commentary, which seems to be just as
talismanic as the main feature so I stick with it. I start to look
around my room for my copy of 21 (which served me so well in my win at Christmas, not that I’m superstitious) but can’t find it.
I must have been starting to get a bit concerned by this stage at
the 2500/5000-400 blinds and a 47k stack because I shove UTG with A7;
luckily I don’t get called. On the next hand, UTG+1 raises to 20k, gets
two callers and I call in the SB with K8; not a seemingly EV+ move but
I was getting 4.7-1 on my money and lo and behold the flop it did come
288 and the Lord said you shall slow play this or I shall inflict a
terrible plague upon your chip stack.
SB and I check the flop, pre-flop raise sticks his last 20k into
85k, UTG+2 and I call. I check the turn, hoping he’ll go crazy, he
checks too, I bet another $20k into a $147k pot for value, thinking he
might stump this up as he’ll still have 2/3 of his stack left if he
loses, but he folds, and now I’m up to $166k, which should relieve some
of those M worries.
Stand by for part two.