In what I hope to make a standing tradition, I headed to LV for a second year in a row to play in the Friendship Cup soccer tournament. The Friendship Cup is an all-mens soccer tournament played on very shitty fields with poor officiating but it met the all-important criteria of being in Las Vegas.
Last year I decided (was given permission to go) on the Wednesday before flying out on Friday. That was when I had one child. This year, with a 3 year old and 4 month old, I told my wife months before (before child number 2 was even born). So far in advanced that she forgot completely that she had agreed and began to question the wisdom of her decision. But by then it was too late as I already had made my reservations and was going regardless.
As I did the previous year, my cousin and I flew into Vegas Friday morning in time for me to play in a 12:00 tournament. Last year I played the Venetian 12:00 and managed to chip chop for 5th place money. This year, based on the sage advice of the Black Widow of Poker and Missing Flops I decided to play the smaller, softer, but equally well-structured Aria 1:00 tournament. After lunch at In-N-Out -- my cousin went to school in LA and likes to reminisce-- I made the tourney just in time. With 73 runners the top 7 spots paid and first place took $2,600.
Interesting side note: on Sunday I played the 1:00 again (let's not talk about it) and arrived about 10 minutes late. When I sat down a stack was sitting in front of me and had been blinded down. After 15 minutes the dealers were instructed to pull in all stacks for empty seats. About 5 minutes later a new player sat down and was given a full stack. After some questioning by the players the TD informed everyone that this was how it's done. I wasn't too upset since I had only lost T75 of my starting T8,000 stack but an interesting fact to remember: if you're going to be late for the Aria poker tournament you might as well be 15+ minutes late.
As play began I could only detect one soft spot in a woman from Vancouver Island (that's in Canada) who seemed to be calling a lot of spots in the first few rounds. Unfortunately she seemed to tighten up after losing a few pots. The atmosphere at the table, especially our end seemed friendly and social-- no wanna-be pros or grinding rocks to be found. It was hard for me to get a sense of the other side of the table as I was in seat 10. Nothing much of note happened for a while: I chipped up slowly only to lose a large chunk with a three-barreled bluff gone wrong.
Right before the first break in the BB I called an early position raise by my Canadian friend with Q6o. With around half our starting stack and blinds about to go up I was in one of my fatalistic "double-up-or-go home" moods. Long story short (because I can't really remember all the details), I hit the 6 on the flop, check-called the flop and turn and shoved when a Q hit the river. She called and turned over aces. Crrrrrraaaaaaacccccckkkkk!!!
Now, to be fair, had I known that she had aces I wouldn't have called pre-flop and had she put me all in on the flop I probably would have folded. But by the turn I was pretty sure I was going to make a move and shove on the river. Looking back now I realize that I didn't have a stack big enough to move her off her hand and that she probably wasn't capable to make a big lay-down and just lucked out.Needless to say my table image was pretty shot after that.
Realizing that people had pretty much pegged me as the fish at the table I tightened up and just played my cards with a few positional bluffs to keep me around average. Around the 8th level (600/1200/100) I began to start dwindling down again when I decided to raise in late position with TJo. The BB raised it to T9,000 (probably around 1/3 of my stack) and I called. Flop came 9 Q x rainbow and I raised all in. BB called and flipped over aces.
I would just like to point out that I had been up at 4:30 in the morning giving our son a bottle and by the time I had finished it was time to get ready for the airport so at that point in the tourney was pretty tired and a little slap-happy. I will be the first to admit that I was playing less-than-optimal poker at this point. Once again with this decision I clearly remember thinking "well, if I lose, I can go back to the room and take a nap."
Crrrrrraaaaaaacccccckkkkk!!!
Binked a K on the turn and the BB stood up and left the table in disgust even though he still had about T300 left after doubling me up. Now if there was any doubt in anyone at the table's mind that I was a complete luckbox I think I managed to put those doubts to rest.
Now as one of the table's big stacks I caught a rush and managed to eliminate three players in an orbit with QQ, AKh and AJ v A5. Down to two tables I got moved to the other table where I was able to put pressure on the smaller stacks. Once we were down to 13 players we went almost an hour without losing a single player. Down to 11 the following hand came up. With a little over T100,000 I was the big stack in seat 1 with the 2nd biggest stack in seat 10. Limped to me in the BB I raise it up with 66, only the SB calls. Flop comes 876 rainbow. I lead out for a pot-sized raise and SB calls. K on the turn and I check behind. River J and the SB goes all in and I snap call. If he has KK, JJ, 77, 88, 45 or 9T, well god bless him. Instead he turns over A5s and I am the monster stack going into the final table.
Can't really remember much once we got to the final table. I know I continued to pressure everyone else at the table and hovered between having 30-40% of all the chips in play. Down to 8 I was given a hard time for not wanting to kick in some for the bubble. While the guy in the 3 seat asked me incredulously why I wouldn't want to take $200 from the first place money and give it to the bubble a short stack got knocked out and the discussion became a moot point.
Now I don't know where I learned this, but somewhere along the line I was lead to believe that the chip leader should be the one to propose a chip chop and not a short stack. Apparently no one else got that memo because as soon as we were down to 7 the short stacks were proposing a chip chop. Luckily for me a medium stack on the other end said she didn't want to chop thus saving me from being "that guy." I was actually pretty close to agreeing when were down to 6 until the shortest stack, who would have gotten $460 for her share said that she wanted $500. Now I should say that this woman was very easy on the eyes and had a sexy Slavic accent thing going for her, but when she tried to pull that shit it turned me off very quickly. In less than an orbit we lost her and I agreed to a 5-way chip chop for a little less than first-place money.
As has been my MO for the last three trips to Vegas, I was basically on a free-roll for the weekend and proceeded to give back to the local economy via the pai gow tables, although this trip I also tried to channel my inner Phil Ivey and played craps and made the sentimental Seahawks sports bet.
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