I was going to do a full update of these two days, as well, but as it turns out, I actually played a full day today so that will have to go on the backburner. Besides, it's all over the Internet. The short list of my roommates that have done stuff in those two days:

Pechorin won the 100r on Stars for 31K;
Mlagoo/gobboboy split the 1M Guaranteed first place prize of 315K;
AJunglen finished 3rd in the FTP 1K Monday for 33K.

All of them played well and definitely deserved it. Congrats, guys.

As I wrote earlier, I had a small part in Matt's 1M win when I took over for him in the tournament early on. While he was out, I played a few hands in odd ways and got him to an early chiplead. The hands:

-EMP (no reads) raises to 200 at 25/50 and I make it 700 with AA in the cutoff. He calls and we're heads up to a Q86r flop. He leads for 500 into the ~1500 pot and I choose to just call. The turn is a jack (yuck) and he leads 1300 (ergh?), so I just call one more time. The river is a T, basically making this the worst board possible, so when he checks, I briefly think about value betting but check behind. Somehow, he only had AQ and we won the least, or something.

-I stacked him anyway an orbit later, though. He raised 4x again in MP; I just called QQ in the BB, checkraised him on a Txx flop and bet big on the turn/shoved the river. The 'he goes too far with/overvalues top pair' read I had on him from the last hand paid off, as he stacked off with ATo.

-Now with 20K, I got someone else's stack on a standard 'call a 4x EP raise with JJ on the button, flop top set, raise the flop bet, bet the turn knowing I'll get CR'd by his overpair' hand. The line he took is known as the 'stack a donk' line, and it works well solely because it's the standard way to get a horrible player to stack off with QJ. Hint: when playing against somebody decent, this line sucks.

-With 30K, I raised QTs in LP and got called by the BB, who led into me on a T 6 2 flop (I had diamonds.) I thought about raising, but a 3 bet here sucks, so instead, I called and looked for a blank turn to come off. It came the 8, the BB led again and now I raised, representing a big hand but essentially trying to get a free showdown if he called. He did call, I checked behind on the blank river and won another nice pot from 7 7.

Matt got back at this point as the chipleader and said that I'd get 3K if he won. Ship the 3K. Seriously, I'm incredibly happy for him - he had this one coming for a long time and he's a much better player than anyone really gave him credit for. Now he's got the bankroll for bigger and better things. I'm sure we'll be hearing more from him.

There's too much stuff for me to put into one post, so I'll just start off with the trip report from Saturday's 1500.

Most of us coming from the SA house/Nath's place actually got there late and wound up as alternates. We had a wait of about an hour to get in the game and basically all missed the first level, meaning we'd start off at 50/100 with 30 BB each - almost push fold poker right from the get go. At first glance, my table looked tough, with Humberto Brenes (already familiar with me from playing 9 hours of razz) and Phil Laak both seated opposite me. That turned out to be very wrong, though - it was the easiest table I've ever played at live, by a mile. Unfortunately, I just couldn't capitalize on it due to a total lack of cards at the right time, but some of the play was completely unbelievable.

I got involved with Laak early when I raised K J in MP and he called from the small blind. Phil was basically playing his PSP for 15 straight minutes thus far and was completely ignoring the table, so when he called I knew he had a real hand. The flop came 6 6x 6x and he checked, so, like a true Internet donkey, I took a stab at it anyway. He called, of course (the reason this is a bad cbet is that he probably calls 100% of his range here) and the turn was the Q . We checked it through (now that I at least had a draw which 'might' be good this is a super easy check, especially since the Q hit a bunch of hands he was floating with), the river was another Q, and he overbet shoved. A lot of the time, that queen counterfeits his small pair and we chop, but it's just not a spot I can profitably call him in [I have to split something like 80% of the time to do it], we both knew it, and so it was really an easy fold. Sometimes there's just nothing you can mathematically do (or even represent) in poker to win the pot.

I chipped back up with an uncalled PFR or two, then had another weird hand. An Asian player who'd been pretty call stationy so far but dressed like a professional (basically, something like a doctor or lawyer who was there to gamble) open limped in EP and I raised A K in LMP to 400 to isolate. He called and the flop came 9 5 2. It was clear he had 'something' but didn't like it very much and checked. After thinking a couple of seconds, I decided that he'd fold enough for me to bet my completely worthless hand anyway and bet 600 into the pot of 800. He visibly agonized over it but finally called. The turn was the K, he instachecked, I was obviously done with the hand and checked behind, we both checked the 2 river as well, and somehow my hand was good at showdown. Whoops. Thanks to that hand, I finished the second level with 3600 or so.

Immediately after the break, the blinds went to 100/200 and everyone at our alternate (ie, shortstacked) table had 10-30 BB and were starting to shove. This led to the following 3 hands in a row:

1)Phil Laak, who'd just got caught bluffing, had ~800 chips and visibly didn't care about the tournament at all, shoved from the cutoff. BB, who looked pretty young and aggressive, decided to pot odds call 1/3 of his stack with the mighty 85o. (Whoops again - make that 'young, aggressive and bad'.) Phil's Q9s held up and he chipped up to around 1800.

2)Next hand, I got TT UTG and raised to 600 of my 3.6K. Someone called in MP, and then the SB, the bad kid from the last hand, shoved 1500. I, of course, reshoved and got it heads up with the kid's A3s (he obviously crushes my UTG range there, right?) Board: 632AA. I run so hot.

3)Next hand, some terrible player limped and Phil Laak shoved his now 1800 chip stack in MP. I looked down on A8s in the BB with ~2600 and actually had a decision to make - it's a subpar hand, but it sure seemed like I was ahead of Phil's 'shove to get the limper's free chips' range here. Eventually, I figured I may as well shove (the 'double up or busto fast' idea played a role in that) and got HU with Phil's KQ as a nice 60/40 favorite. Door card: K. I run so...wait, there's an ace in there too. Sweet, I finally busted somebody recognizable.

That got me to 4600. I then proceeded to float between 4K and 7K for two hours, getting exactly one premium hand and basically stealing to stay alive, while the people around me - all massively bad at poker - moved mountains of chips around with awesome hands like:

100/200: Humberto Brenes raises to 500 of his 2650 chips in the cutoff. The button calls and the two of them see a TT6r flop. HB bets 600 of his 2150, the button makes it 2K straight, HB shoves, and the button...folds rather than call HB's last 150 chips getting about, oh, 20:1. HB shows something that isn't quads.

Regardless, HB busts shortly thereafter anyway after restealing from someone likely to call him light with the awesome K2o.

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100/200/25: Someone limps in EP. The cutoff, a gigantic calling station most of the time, makes it 1K. The button, who's definitely good at picking up the phone himself, calls the 1K. The SB, who actually seems to know what he's doing, shoves exactly 2K, the EP limper folds, the cutoff calls (raising to isolate is not an option at this table) and the button overcalls.

Flop Axx. Check check.
Turn T. Check check.
River J. CO checks again. The button shows KQ, checks behind and says "I couldn't bet, since you let me get there. Anyway, at least we got the SB out." I can't make this stuff up. Has anyone ever told these people they're trying to win a poker tournament?

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100/200/25 again: The unfortunate loser from the last hand is now UTG+1 and makes it 800. MP calling station calls, as does an old nitty looking guy in the CO. (I'm the BB in this hand with 4500 and determine that I'm shoving any two cards with reasonable equity against the old nit's range before looking at my hand. Immediately after that thought, I look down, find 85o for the fourth time in the last two hours, and quietly fold.)

The flop comes T95. UTG+1, who has about 4K behind in this nice 3K or so pot, checks. MP also checks, at which point the old nit, with visibly shaking hands, quickly puts out 3K, a sizable chunk of his stack and a slight overbet. (In other words, he has jacks, or maybe queens if he's feeling extra cautious.)

UTG+1 now instashove CR's for a grand total of 4100. MP folds, meaning the nit is now getting roughly 10:1 to call an all in with an overpair. He agonizes for a full minute or so, then finally makes the call with (of course) jacks. UTG+1 turns over A9o and completely seriously says "nice call". Turn 5 (that's just to make sure I know how good I run.) River x. Nit has a mountain of chips. I /kill self.

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I bust at 150/300/25 with 4500 chips after raising on the button with A 3 and getting called by both blinds. I'm planning to shove something like 80% of flops if checked to, and the K Q 2 flop that I actually hit for the second time in four hours certainly doesn't hurt that plan. SB folds, but the BB instacalls with - of course - KQ. I actually make my flush on the river, except that it also gives the BB quads. Sigh.

So much for that particular tournament. Sunday went a little better, though...

...but my roommate, Matt, just won the 1K Sunday Million for 315K while playing and running very well. Ship 3K for getting him the chiplead while he was out for the first 15 minutes :)

Big update coming up, I'm just unavoidably/obviously delayed tonight.

Nothing going on the last two days (other than me lasting exactly two hours before losing a big coinflip in the last 1500) since I needed to move into the second house I'll be renting for the rest of the Series. Well, nothing is a relative term - there've been some crazy mixed game sessions at the house the last couple of nights (it looks like I'm the Chinese poker champion of the circuit or something), and Vivek, my housemate, just took sixth at his 3K limit final table. 4 cashes in 6 events in the 9 days since he's turned 21...the man is both very good and running awesome, a nice combination.

Tomorrow's event is another 1500, but I would ideally like to play the Sunday tournaments online, too. So it looks like I'm going to go for a double or nothing strategy the whole day - I'll either be surfing the net by 5 or sitting on a monster stack. Let's see how that works out.

It turns out I had just enough time to go to the Rio and play one satellite, which I won outright. I'd asked for a chop twice - once at 100/200 when I had 6K/big stack 11K/shortie 3K, and again just before the final hand at 200/400, when it was 4K/8K/8K. Both times, the big stack refused; after the second time, the shortie wound up pushing AJ into the big stack's AK when, as it turns out, I had kings. Ballgame, ship the 5 grand, etc.

This makes me want to post about making deals in general. Most of the "A+" online elite either don't make deals at all or won't accept anything that isn't wildly in their favor. When I'm playing my best, I think I'm up there, and I definitely don't give up much in shorthanded tournament situations (my final table record proves it) - but I definitely do make deals, and in fact, will sometimes take slightly the worst of it (giving up a couple of percentage points, though not more) to make one stick. Two or three thousand dollars is significant to me, but it's not a huge number or anything. And yet, I'd probably be okay with giving up some fraction of a c-note to take it down.

Why is this? I think most of the pros around the net these days greatly underestimate variance. I'll fess up right now and say that two thirds of my net profit last year came from a whopping one tournament. So did Nath's. Taking the first couple of 2+2'ers that come to mind, after making his deal for 400K 3 handed at the WSOP, Jurollo's going to be around there, as well; Rizen is an absolutely ridiculous tournament player, but does anyone think he made more than 500K last year if you don't include his WSOP result? Gobboboy's second place is probably pushing 80% of his roll...etc., etc., etc.

All of these big wins have one thing in common - suckouts. I had 3 big ones in mine. Gobboboy hit a one outer (among many others) in his, Nath, Jurollo and Rizen doubtless had quite a few, and so on. Even playing your best, it's very difficult to play so well or get hit by the deck so hard that you never get your chips in while behind. What's important about this is that it only takes one time where your 25% or 33% shot doesn't hold up to turn 2/3 of your profit for the year into a loss. You can argue that in the long run, that's irrelevant, because even tournaments full of suckouts factor into a good player's expectation, but the long run in poker is somewhere between the cockroaches inheriting the Earth and the Sun going supernova; in addition, there's no such thing as a tournament these days where shorthanded play doesn't consist of "push top X%, get called by top Y%". I firmly believe that when you get to a final table and are in line for a significant payout, you should do what you can to lock it up, rather than winding up in a "who can run the hottest 3 handed with 20 BB" game. Of course, this doesn't apply when you have a significant edge, but those aren't that easy to come by - and are somewhat cancelled out by the utter monkey tilt that I'd go on if I passed up a huge deal and then lost a coinflip.

The A+ league, especially the 18-22 crowd, has an easier time ignoring variance than I do. A lot of that has to do with the fact that they don't care about money management anyway, which is actually an advantage in nosebleed stakes poker. I, on the other hand, do care about money, and I have to admit this causes me to give up a step to guys like sbrugby that have no problem with dropping 1 million a week. Maybe I'll get to be enough of a degenerate gambler to stop caring about that, but I'm okay with where I am for now...and it sure looks to me like chopping tournaments, especially with short stacks in the endgame, is a much better idea than playing them out*.

*of course, if you're playing live and they don't call with a push with anything but aces, it's another story.