Back to Caesar's Palace for Tourney #8. 259 runners today @ $340 / 15,000 chips, which made for a more attractive prize pool. My friend Hugh had made Day 2 of from the previous Day with 17 left and decided to multi-table this one too given that his Day 2 started in 2 hrs and he was short-stacked in that. Coincidentally, he got sat on my direct left. Altogother it was a fun table:

Seat 1: Young Swiss player in shades: very loose-passive preflop and LAG post-flop
Seat 2: Middle-aged American competent player neither too tight or too loose
Seat 3: Youngish guy played ultra-tight then liked to overbet when he had it
Seat 4: Me
Seat 5: Hugh: reasonably competent player when on his A-game, but can sometimes succumb to his Z-game (as can we all)
Seat 6: 30-ish American LAG
Seat 7: Old nit
Seat 8: Young English guy, reasonably aggressive
Seat 9: Can't remember the original incumbent but busted early and replaced by young Asian-American LAG player
Seat 10: Old German nit who spoke no English and seemed to be a complete novice

With the deep-stacks, I started out, as usual, playing a lot of pots with speculative hands in order to try to hit big hands. It also allows me to evaluate my opponents whille the pots are small relative to the stacks. I soon noticed that Seats 1,2,6 and 8 were in a lot of pots with me, with most of the pots going to Seat 1. He was winning by aggressively attacking pots after the flop without showdowns and soon chipped-up. He'd actually lost 1/3 of his start stack by an interesting live misclick:

My Stack ~15k, Seat 1 ~17k, Seat 2 ~15k, Blinds 25/50, I hold 97o in BB

Five-way limped pot and we see a flop of 983dd. I decide to try to take a stab at the 250 pot with a bet of 150 (1x100 chip + 2x25 chips) and Seat 1 picks up three similar chips and throws them in the middle. Only then does he realise that the third chip he picked up with the 2x25 chips was his one 5000 chip rather than a 100 chip. He tries to take it back, but the dealer says he can't and then Seat 2 announces all-in. I quickly fold and Seat 1 reluctantly folds, but smiles and says "No problem, I'll win them back"

Interestingly he does just that by continuing to play 50% of hands and taking down so many pots after the flop. I give him a nickname, Tricky Dickie, and he says he doesn't mind that name. Meanwhile I have not managed to hit any of my hands and bled off a little. Here's a lol moment:

My Stack ~14k, Seat 3 ~10k, Blinds 50/100, I hold QQ in MP

Seat 3 limps and I make it 400 to go. Folds back to him and he calls. Pot 950, Flop A54hh and he insta-shoves all-in. I'm thinking WTF and LOL as I fold my QQ saying "nice bet, sir". He then proceeds to show me AQ like its the Nuts. More LOL.

Here is a good example of Tricky's style:

My Stack ~14k, Tricky ~20k, Blinds 75/150, I hold AThh UTG.

I open for 375. Folds to Tricky's button and he calls. Blinds fold. Flop 975 rainbow. I c-bet 725 and he calls. Turn blank. I feel like he was floating the flop so I think I need to 2-barrel here to represent that I led with a big pair from UTG. I bet 1525 and he makes it 4100. I reluctantly fold. Of course he could have just hit a set, straight or 2 pair here, but as we never see his cards it's hard to escape the feeling the he's just making moves the whole time.

That dropped me down to ~12k, but we're still deep, when my next big hand comes up:

My Stack ~12k, Seat 9 ~25k, Blinds 100/200/25, I hold Q9o in BB. Six-way limped pot and we see a flop of Q86ss. Checks to Seat 9 and he makes it 1050 into the 1450 pot. He is a young laggy player and had come to the table with a bigger stack, only to have lost ~10k to a SB vs BB A-rag vs AK badbeat. Folds back to me and I feel that he has a draw or a weak Queen, so I C/R to 3350, leaving myself ~8.5k behind. He tank-jams and I can't fold top-pair getting close to 2-1, so I call and he shows me KQ. I say "I can always get lucky" as the dealer turns another Q, giving me some extra outs to the chop. I then river a 9 to take the whole pot and the kid is steaming, but it's all good fun and I'm back in the game. It's my first big suckout of the trip and feels good to finally get some luck. I'd say that 80% of showdowns on this table to this point went to the worst hand, so it feels just like online.

A few hands later:

My Stack ~25k, Seat 6 ~45k, Blinds 100/200/25, I hold 77 OTB.

Two limps and I consider raising in this spot, but feel that turns my hand into a bluff and I have a chance to flop a set in position for cheap so I just call. The LAG guy in the BB, makes it 1200. He has squeezed his BB before and has also played a lot of 3-bet pots and aggressively after the flop. It folds back to me and I figure I have just about enough implied odds to call for set-value, but there's also the thought that I may have the best hand here and I have position, so I could even win the pot without flopping a set.

Pot: 3150
Flop: 962dd

He leads for 1525 and I immediately feel that was weak. I pause for a while and consider my option and decide to call

Pot: 6200
Turn: Jd

I'm not too worried about the flush getting there because it seems unlikely that he had a flush draw. Similarly it doesnt feel like he has a Jack either, so most likely he still has two unpaired over cards to my 77. He quickly checks and I check behind. Obviously my flop call looks like I might have a flush draw and I could bet here to represent it, but I'm happy to keep the pot small. River blanks something like an offsuit 5. He thinks for a while. It just seems so weak and I just know he's going to fire something at the river. I'm ready to snap-call whatever he fires. He finally puts a single 5k chip into the pot and I insta-snap him off. He insta-mucks and I show him my 77. He's quite gobsmacked and he's like "snap call, dude, wow".

After losing a lot of pots early, then getting it in bad and sucking-out, this hand not only gave me a lot of confidence, but also gained me back some table respect. I used this to good effect to open up my game after this point and took down quite a few uncontested pots at the 200/400/50 level with 1025 bets into the 1100 pot. I also started to exploit my opponents tendencies:

My Stack ~33k, Seat 2 ~45k, Blinds 200/400/50, I hold Q6hh in BB

Folds to Seat 2 OTB and he opens for 1100. He has opened quite a few pots from LP and seems to be fairly competent. I also feel he respects my game. As such, I feel this is a good spot to 3-bet, so I make it 3250 and he calls. I'm not so surprised by his call because he has tended to not want to let a hand go preflop, but has done after the flop.

Pot: 7100
Flop AKThh

I observe Seat 2 while the dealer lays out the flop. He doesn't look like he likes it and I take a quick peek. To be honest I barely noticed that I had a flush draw and a straight draw because all I wanted to see was the Ace so that I could represent it. I paused for a while riffling my chips then confidently put out 5025. He quickly folded, but even if he raises here I probably have to gamble with my hand.

Around this timeframe Seat 1 had donked off most of his chips to Seat 2, but although I had rated Seat 2 as a competent player, he then said something that made me re-consider. He had 3-bet a pot versus Seat 6, who called and led the flop, taking it down. After that hand, he said "That was an easy fold. If you had gone all-in preflop I probably would have folded Aces". I was thinking "wtf" but decided not to say too much as I didn't want to appear to be tapping the glass, but my friend Hugh (who by now had finished 7th in the other event) decided to tap and they had a discussion whereby Seat 2 explained that both he and Seat 6 had big stacks and there was no need for him to risk losing all that in an all-in showdown, even with AA. This was ludicrous as there were still 180 players left and they both only had 40-50k stacks at this point.

I then proceed to lose two decent sized pots to all-in short-stacks and find myself in this spot:

My Stack ~25k, Seat 9 ~35k, Blinds 400/800/100, I hold T7dd in HJ.

I open for 2100 and Seat 9 looks at his cards. I can already feel that he is thinking about making a move here. He has successfully 3-bet me before and he told me "don't open my big blind light". While he is thinking I consider the stack sizes and it's clear that I had 4-bet fold equity here. I can smell his weakness as he counts out his 3-bet and finally makes it 7100. That's fine and I insta-shove 4-bet semi-bluff. He tanks.

Let's consider the situation. I have opened light before and folded to his 3-bet. I have sucked-out on him for my tourny life. I have a somewhat aggressive image, but not overly so. The pot is 33.5k and it is 18k for him to call. He needs 35% to call, but perhaps more important than that is that if he calls and loses he is down to 10k. I know he is weak. He does not have a premium hand and I figure it is tough for him to call off that much of his stack with a weak hand, even though the pot odds are juicy. He has to put me on only Top10% of hands to correctly fold here, but in live tourney situations I generally have found more fold equity than online (although not apparently this year, as yesterday's 67o call demonstrated). He eventually makes a hero call with A6o and fist pumps "yes" as he sees my cards. I'm not sure what that's about, I guess the this particular Asian kid is not a math major because he's actually not in good shape: only 54% and I'm pretty happy when I see his cards.

Can I win a big flip one time? I guess not as he flops an Ace. Nevermind, I'm actually very happy with the way I played today and do not regret my 4-bet semi-bluff at all. If I win that flip I'm in great shape to be table captain able to exploit my stack.

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