Recent Entries

Archived

SimonStocken

Contact

« Home | LOW-ROLLING BUT RIDING HIGH » | ONE MORE FOR THE ROAD » | MR BULL GOES TO SCHOOL » | INTRODUCING RUSTY STARMAN » | TWO HOURS AND COUNTING, MR. BOND » | BINION'S HORSESHOE - GALLERY OF CHAMPIONS » | THE LAST SUPPER » | WSOP - DAY 1A: MIRACLES CAN HAPPEN » | MR. BULL TALKS POT ODDS » | MR. BULL WRITES » 

Tuesday, August 01, 2006 

LOW AND ROLLING

The Low-Roller is a little bit low and rolling - luckily what goes on in Vegas stays in Vegas. With one level to go before the day's completion I busted out. The killer hand came for me when I flopped a set of 9s (with a board of Q-9-3 with two hearts. So I come out betting, trying to build a pot, having raised initially, he raises me with K-10 of hearts and I pump it up, coming over the top - so he calls and hits a heart), leaving me crippled. With blinds and antes totalling 1100, I go all-in with my stack just under 4000 and my A6 gets called by The Iranian's AK - Bye Bye Low-Roller!
I can not be sure what the next move is, but reaching into the fridge for another Corona sounds pretty good right now. Leonard Cohen just came on the ipod shuffle, and Mr. Bull and I laughed a lot - what's he got to be so miserable about? I am searching the room for that glass half-full, and have discovered the WSOP schedule, event number 40 (now there's a good number ho, ho - third time lucky and all that.) Event number 40 is a mere $1,000 buy-in event on Thursday, lasting we hope for two days.
I feel wiser, and humbler, and there's a lot to this game that eludes me at moments, but then I play some hands like a man possessed. I Started badly when my nut straight got topped by a flush, and I went down to $4275, only to build it back up to $16,000, which was by then an average stack. It would be fair to say I failed to maximise when I did hit - preferring to take down a moderate pot, knowing I had the best hand, rather than attempting to build a bigger pot at the risk of being drawn out on, and going bust. I will just give you two hands to cheer you up - Firstly with me holding 98 of hearts in the small blind, the cut-off, who's quite loose raises to $600 with blinds of $100-$200. I have a stack of $8,000 and am wondering whether to call a sixteenth of my chips - in a cash-game it would be trivial. I think of Positively Fifth Street, remembering that it is the author's lucky hand, and make the call for $500. The flop comes K-K-10 and I think a while, before betting $500 at the pot of $1,400, and I take it down, at very little risk. It seems quite trivial now, but it felt good at the time. The second one was also in the small blind, when I call three limpers with J-9 offsuit. The flop comes Q-10-5, with two clubs, and I check, and the cut-off bets $500, called by the button and called by me. The turn is a four of hearts, giving the board a second heart, and I bet $1,100, which takes down the pot. Right I've done that - just needed to re-assure myself that I can play poker.

The experience has been good, and I am not done yet. If nothing else I have enjoyed the writing above all else. Vegas is quite a place - Lovely Linda escorted me home - now don't get the wrong idea - she was my taxi-driver home, and Linda, I learnt yesterday means lovely in Spanish. She was great and did in fact give me the option to raise all-in with some girls to the room, but I reckon I have been all-in enough to last me... well at least til Thursday.

Don't know how this will read in the cold light of day, but I feel let down, and that the dream is punctured, and your hopes too, but the glass is still half-full, and filling up by the minute - or is that my beer glass? I welcome any suggestions, comments, but sympathy no - not my thing. So here we go, publish and be damned!

1:45 PM | Permalink