Now, with my bankroll currently sitting in the low 3 figures (yep, big baller right here!) Even the investment of $80 in three tournaments was a tad daunting, but I sacked up and went over to Brian's last night to sling some cards. Brian is a poker buddy that's been playing my home game for about a year now, Special K brought him over one night and he fell right into out group of degenerates. This was his first time hosting tourneys since I've known him, so it was a few of my regulars, T, Uncle Phil, Special K, me and Brian, plus a bunch of folks that work with Brian and K. A pretty good group, with some pretty wide disparity in the level of play, so it was just like a normal tourney - navigating a minefield.
First tourney didn't go off so well for me, as I remember no significant hands but the insignificant ones ended up with me out 2nd. Not in 2nd place, out 2nd. It was festive, really. I don't remember what I went out with, it just didn't go well. We got a little donkish cash game going, $.25/.50 LIMIT, and I managed to profit almost enough to cover the $20 I'd dropped on the tourney buy-in. Rivering my open-ended straight flush draw didn't hurt. That makes three straight flushes I've had in live play - two at the IP and now one in a home game.
Second tourney started off in rare fashion, with me all-in on the come on the first hand. Aggressive guy who won the first tournament raises from 50 to 200 in early position. I'm in the SB. One caller for the 200, and I look down at AKo. I want the pot now, so I pop it to 1,000. I get a call from aggresso-boy, and the original caller folds. Flop comes all raggedy and I check. He bets out 1,000 and I push.
Here's the thought process. We started with 2500 in chips, so I felt somewhat committed after the initial raise, and frankly was surprised to get a call rather than a push or fold. I missed the flop completely, but figured that with any big hand preflop he pushes instead of calling, so I put him on two face cards, or maybe some kind of draw that he would have developed with suited connectors. The other part of my thinking was that if I win, I'm waaayyyy ahead, if I lose, I can get another cash game rolling and make more money that way.
He turns over 66 for a middle pair, and I'm very confused at the preflop call. I'm also about a mile behind, needing to catch one of six outs to get there. I spike a king on the river, and am on a roll. He seems almost proud of the fact that I got my money in behind, and I don't bother to tell him that it's a key part of my strategy. I fold for a while and then we get down to about 6-handed from our initial ten. It's then that I decide I should start catching cards for a bit, and proceed to pick up a bunch of big pocket pairs, and deal a couple more brutal suckouts, including rivering a two-outer when I had QQ against KK and flopping a Q with AQ against AK. Poker is easy.
It takes a while, but I'm never really short stacked in this tourney, and finally me and the guy who went out ahead of me in the first tourney end up heads-up. It lasts one hand, when I flop two pair, he flops a straight draw that doesn't get there, but he was somewhere like a 6:1 chip dog, so I score a win!
We get a third tourney going for the seven that remain, and I felt like I actually played well there, rather than just farting around and catching a shitload of cards. It was getting late, so I don't really remember any hands, except catching a flush on three consecutive hands to keep me alive. Clarification, it may not have been three hands in a row, but it was three hands in a row that I was involved in.
I wound up short as the blind were escalating, but squeaked into the money with a third-place finish, leaving Special K and a nice guy named Rob that I had played with once before to duke it out for winner. Hopefully K will weigh in on the comments and let me know who won. So I finished the night up, a nice change from the status quo, and decent confidence boost going into tonight's Charlotte Theatre Series of Poker season-opener.
UPDATE: Special K has weighed in with the outcome of the last tourney, and he was also a winner! Woo-hoo! As he said in the comments,
It was three hands in a row that you made a flush, and if I remember correctly, each was a heart flush. I'm sure 2 of the first 3 were hearts.
As for the finish of the third tourney, I got even for the night by taking the win. It took a while as I was very short going heads up, but grinded out a big win.
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I was three hands in a row that you made a flush, and if I remember correctly, each was a heart flush. I'm sure 2 of the first 3 were hearts.
As for the finish of the third tourney, I got even for the night by taking the win. It took a while as I was very short going heads up, but grinded out a big win.
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