As you might have read in my previous post on this subject, I've been trying the PS steps to get my seat this year. I made it to Step 6 and flamed out really quicky finishing last.

I took a two week break after the disappointment of my flameout and tried again. I began at Step 3 and won it so I immediately played in a Step 4 and Step 3 at the same time. I won the Step 3 again and was cruising along in the Step 4 when with about 5 people left to go my KK ran into AK and met a nice little A on the flop so I was out.

I had some time so played the second Step 4 and won that one pretty routinely and then had an interesting ride in the Step 5. I kept on going up and down and somehow managed to hang on until 3 handed. With 3 to go, you are basically freerolling since, at worst, you can still play the Step 5 again which is pretty nice since it's a $700 tournament. I played standard push-bot poker and never got into the lead, but always managed to stay close to 3rd and then was lucky when the leader took out the 3rd player so it was a very fast ride to my second Step 6.

Step 6

I was feeling good and saw no need to wait 2 weeks with my ticket like I did last time so I immediately registered and it only took a few minutes to seat all 9 players. Barry Greenstein didn't join me this time but the lineup looked pretty solid.

One of the players had a connection problem and it was agony for the rest of us. PS has a very lenient policy at these high buy-in games (the seat to the game cost $2.2k). They give the player 240 seconds to act when disconnected before sitting them out. That's fine, but the guy kept on reconnecting for a few seconds and then disconnecting, so almost every hand we had to wait 4 minutes for him to time-out. This went on for about 30-40 minutes and then he finally fixed his connection.

So I had 3 hands that did me in:

- 88: called MP raise from LP. One overcard, guy bets, I call. I give it up on turn.

- JJ: raised from button, SB calls. Flop comes with a K. SB bets, I call. SB checks the turn, I check too. SB bets the river, I call and he shows KJ. Great!

I won a few minor hands of note, but nothing much so with one player out and blinds at 75/150 and me down to around 1800:

- AK: Two limpers I push, get called by BB who turns over QQ. Flop comes TJx so now I have 2 more outs but it's not to be.

What fun!

- S

It's that time of year again. The WSOP is just around the corner and need to decide on my plans. Three years ago I won a seat into the Main Event by winning a double shootout on Stars. On my first attempt I came in second out of the 81 entrants and on my second try I won. The past two years I didn't even bother with the online sats. I just played a few preliminary WSOP events and some live sats. This year I decided to give the online route a try.

PS is running step tournaments. These are one table tournaments. In most cases if you finish in the top 2 you advance to the next step, 3-4 you can play the same step again, and you step down and anything else you lose (each of the 6 steps are slightly different, but they are all the same principal). Step one is just a few dollars, step 2 around $25, step 3 around $80ish, etc., etc. I deposited $500 into my account and started with step 3's.

At first I was very, very successful. I almost always finished in the top 2 and advanced to step 4. I made it to step 5 3 times and of these I made it to step 6 once and had some horrible 2-3 outer beats in the other 2 when I was just on the bubble.

The step 6 ticket is worth $2k, so I decided to hold off a bit before playing. I wanted to scout at thIt's that time of year again. The WSOP is just around the corner and need to decide on my plans. Three years ago I won a seat into the Main Event by winning a double shootout on Stars. On my first attempt I came in second out of the 81 entrants and on my second try I won. The past two years I didn't even bother with the online satellites. I just played a few preliminary WSOP events and some live sats. This year I decided to give the online route a try.

PS is running step tournaments. These are one table tournaments. In most cases if you finish in the top 2 you advance to the next step, 3-4 you can play the same step again, and you step down and anything else you lose (each of the 6 steps are slightly different, but they are all the same principal). Step one is just a $7.50, step 2 around $27, step 3 around $82, etc., etc. Here's a link to the information:

Link to PS STEP INFO


I deposited $500 into my account and started with step 3's.

At first I was very, very successful. I almost always finished in the top 2 and advanced to step 4. I made it to step 5 3 times and of these I made it to step 6 once and had some horrible 2-3 outer beats in the other 2 when I was just on the bubble.

The step 6 ticket is worth $2.1k, so I decided to hold off a bit before playing. I wanted to scout at the step 6 action to see who the regulars were. To my surprise there were 4-5 people who played these things over and over again. My initial strategy was to avoid the better players if I could, but since they play all the time, it didn't seem possible. Plus, I tracked their results one day and it didn't appear that they were doing anything special or finishing strong consistenly.

I kept playing other steps to try and save a few step 6 tickets, but my luck started to change. When in the past I had been winning my fair share of flips and remaining in the lead the vast majority of the time when I put my money in as the favorite, I hit a brick wall one day. I was losing every flip and couldn't seem to ever win an all-in, even the overpair/underpair variety. Oh, well, I still had the step 6 ticket. I waited a few days to get the bad luck out of my system and one morning clicked the join button when I found a table and I didn't recognize any of the names of the 5 players who were already seated.

Finally play the Step 6
I did a little work while I waited for the table to fill. When it finally filled I was a bit surprised when I noticed that Barry Greenstein had joined the table after me. I really wasn't too worried. I have played many 1 table live sats at big events with all of the best live players and I have never found them too tough to deal with. In fact, it's the young, super aggressive internet players who always are the toughest competition in these 1 table tournaments.

I won't bore you with all the details given that there weren't many. My strategy in these things is to be careful with my big hands early on and try to play a lot of 'suck out' hands to early raises when the blinds are low -- hands like small pairs and suited connectors. I hit trips in the first orbit and didn't get paid off. Then I hit top two pair on a limped pot, but the board read 9TJ. I ended up losing about 35% of my stack when my opponent turned up 78 at the end. It could have been worse I suppose.

From there I hunkered down a bit but made my one bad mistake. I had A8 from the SB and raised when folded to me. The BB called. I missed the flop but bet about 2/3rds of of the pot and the BB called. The turn blanked and I only had 1200 or so left so I decided to give up and check folded. Not terrible, but given my awkward stack size I might have been better off trying to play a small pot. I still had 12 BB's.

Barry wasn't doing any better. He was on my right and had been playing a tad too aggressive and got shorter than me. On one hand I was in the BB with AJ and he was in the CO. He only had 900 so I really expecting him to push if folded to him with most hands. However a guy in MP made a 4xBB raise and he had a big stack. It was folded to me and I needed to make a decision. Given that he hadn't played many hands and would be pot committed to call if I pushed, I just felt it was too likely that I was dominated. I had a full orbit to get a hand and double up and I much rather be the one pushing than calling when my best case scenario was a coin flip and it was too likely he had AQ/AK/JJ+. I reluctantly folded. If he was in later position I would have definitely RR all-in.

A few hands later I pushed with AK, got called by 99 and lost. I was 1st out. The bummer was that the Step 6 pays the top 6. 6 gets $500, 4-5 gets 1000 and 2 gets 1.5k. The winner gets the $10k seat plus a few thousand dollars.
e step 6 action to see who the regulars were. To my surprise there were 4-5 people who played these things over and over again. My initial strategy was to avoid the better players if I could, but since they play all the time, it didn't seem possible. Plus, I tracked their results one day and it didn't appear that they were doing anything special or finishing strong consistenly.

I kept playing other steps to try and save a few step 6 tickets, but my luck started to change. When in the past I had been winning my fair share of flips and remaining in the lead the vast majority of the time when I put my money in as the favorite, I hit a brick wall one day. I was losing every flip and couldn't seem to ever win an all-in, even the overpair/underpair variety. Oh, well, I still had the step 6 ticket. I waited a few days to get the bad luck out of my system and one morning clicked the join button when I found a table and I didn't recognize any of the names of the 5 players who were already seated.

I did a little work while I waited

Edmond and I made plans to "bring our home game to the Commerce" this past Monday. The Commerce has a great program where they will host your regular home game. They provide the dealer, will furnish snacks and will even offer instruction on some new games if you need it. There is no extra fee; they only take their normal rake depending on the stakes played. No crazy wildcard games allowed. You need to stick to the basic games offered at the Commerce, but that does leave you with lots of options (click here to learn more). We were planning on starting with a basic $300-500 stakes NL game and throw in some H-O-R-S-E games if everyone was up for it.

We were pretty excited to play and Dave Mosikian, head of player relations was set to play with our group. However, Dave had some bad back issues Monday afternoon and had to pass. Could it be that he was channeling Kobe Bryant’s back pain from Sunday’s Lakers game? Dave is a big Lakers/Kobe fan and controls the keys to Commerce’s great luxury box at the Staples Center , so that close link to the Laker great is a real possibility.


Dave hosting a bunch of us at the Commerce box

We were all looking forward to playing with Dave so decided to reschedule for the near future when Dave (and Kobe) feels a bit better. Dave, please get some rest. We’ll looking forward to some future donations at the tables! (note: I’m writing this from a plane ride to NYC the night after game 5 and Kobe’s back is getting better so Dave, there will be no more excuses!).

Alternative Plans at the Huslter ‘s Monday Night Tournament
Since my beautiful wife had already given me a poker pass for the night I decided to meet a few of the guys over at the Hustler for the Monday night NL tournament. It’s a $100 buy-in with one optional $100 rebuy. I arrived about 10 minutes late and was seated right away. My very first hand did not start off good at all. I hit tptk with A9, but my opponent turned two pair and took about 600 of my starting 2000 stack. I immediately requested my one optional rebuy ($100 for another 2k in chips) and proceeded to win my $600 back on the very next hand when I turned the nut straight against my opponent’s middle pair.

Crazy Dealer Mistake Costs me Down the Road
Towards the end of the first level a crazy dealer mistake followed by a questionable floor ruling ending up costing me (indirectly!). Two players are in a pot and by the turn the board reads:

AAQx

The woman to the left of me who is fairly active and aggressive goes all-in and is called by her opponent. She turns over QQ for the full-house and her opponent puts his cards down in front of him without turning them up and says "you got me." The dealer starts moving the cards toward the muck, but given that it’s a tournament and the cards need to be shown I stopped him (I was sitting in the 6 seat and the cards were right in front of me) and asked to see them. Here’s the important part – the cards never hit the muck so there was zero doubt what the cards were. The dealer turns over the cards to show Q rag, for two pair. He also claimed to touch the muck with his other hand indicated that the cards were mucked. Of course the river was a third A! The dealer starts moving all of the chips towards the woman but everyone at the table tries to stop him since this should be a split pot. The losing player seems a bit embarrassed and does nothing to stop him, but we all insist on a ruling.

The floorman comes over and the dealer explains what happened. The floorman rules that yes, this is a tournament and the hands need to be turned over and the player cannot muck his cards prior to the river. This is actually important and is used to prevent collusion. However, the floorman says that it is too late to reconstruct the hand so there is nothing he can do. Too late? He didn’t even ask if they had identical stacks because if they did it would be trivial to reconstruct. If the losing player had more than the woman then at worst, they could split the pot and the woman would be BETTER off. In reality the woman had a bit more, maybe 300-400 but he never asked, and the losing player didn’t protest so no attempt was even made to figure it out.
So how did this effect me? Let me explain...

Down to two Chips, but still alive
For the next level or so I fluctuated a bit between 4-5k when a hand came up where I bet the flop against one player (I’m out of position) with TPTK and a backdoor flush draw. My opponent took a long time to call which told me that there was a good chance he had middle pair. The turn paired and brought me 4 to a flush. I’m concerned that he made trips and if I bet he will raise me and I’ll have to fold, but I really want to see the river. I think of just check-calling, but what if he didn’t have middle pair he would probably fold if I bet. I do decide to bet and he does raise me. I take a while to fold and am visibly upset that I bet. This is important because...

On the very next hand I look down at JJ on the button. Blinds are 50/100 and there are two limpers to me. I make it 600 and am very conscious of the fact that it probably looks to anyone who is noticing that I’m steaming from the last hand. It’s a perfect spot for one of the blinds to raise me and the SB obliges by raising to 1400. She is the active player who won an extra 2k because of the floor decision I previously described. It’s folded to me and given that I was expecting her or the BB to raise and have no reason to believe she has me beat, I go all-in. Oops, she immediately calls and shows KK.

Her stack is fairly close to mine and once the count is made we learn that I had her covered by two chips! Looks like it will be an early night, but wait...

Never Count me Out
I get dealt TJo on the next hand and am tempted to just throw in the two chips, but I’m now in the CO and have a full orbit until the blinds hit me so I decide to just wait and see what happens. My patience is rewarded with AQs a few hands later. I toss my chips in the middle and a few people come along. My AQ holds up for the side pot and I’m now up to 250. It’s a start.

I fold a few hands and now I’m UTG and have a decision to make. I only have K8s, but on the next hand I’ll be in the BB and will basically have to play any hand. Also, if I put my chips in now there’s a chance that everyone will fold to the blinds so I’ll only have to beat 1-2 others. If I wait there could be a limped community pot and I might have to outlast a ton of players. Looks like playing my K8s makes the most sense so I do. A few players join in the pot, but a flopped K gives me hope. When the dust settles a paired board on the turn actually killed my chances of a substantial win, but I do split the sidepot with my opponent’s K3 and I’m now at 400.

On the next hand the blinds go up to 100/200 and I’m in the BB. An EP player raises to 600, a few players call and the button pushes. I have A9 and call and 2 other players call. Believe it or not I have the best hand PF. The button was trying to muscle everyone out with KQ and the other players called with suited connectors. I don’t pair my cards but neither did anyone. I win a pretty nice sidepot and am now up to around 1800. Pretty nice orbit.

Three Strikes (mistakes?) and You’re Out
Not sure if any of the next three hands are serious mistakes but I have second thoughts about all of them. Here’s how they went down:

1) Two hands later I’m on the button with AJo and push. The BB is contemplating calling me and while I’m 99.9% sure that I have a better hand I am so happy to be back in the game that I really don’t want to be sucked out on and would rather just take down the pot right there so I open my trap and tell him that I have a really strong hand and will show him if he folds. He says he has a good hand too, and I say that "you’ll need to suck out, but if that’s what you want to do, you should." After a minute or two he folds KQ face-up. I really should have invited the call and I’m almost certain that he would have called if I just shut up. Of course it would have been about a coinflip, but at that point I should have welcomed the call; especially given that his range likely had an A or J so I would have been a nice favorite to his range. Stupid!

2) I get moved to a new table and find myself UTG with AQ and about 2200 in chips. A standard raise isn’t an option here since I will be pot committed on any flop. I could limp and push against any raiser or just see the flop for only 200 if nobody raises. I decide to push, which is standard of course, but again, I need to be taking a little creative risk here. I really didn’t like the push once I thought it through, but that’s what I did and I won another 300 when everyone folded.

3) On the very next hand the HJ makes it 1k (BB still 200) and it’s folded to me. I look down at TT. I don’t know anything about the HJ’s game but my quick read is that he is a regular and knows what he is doing. He had a called a few players by name and he is in his mid 40’s-early 50’s.

My thought process here was way too quick and missed a lot of the necessary factors. I decide that he’s aggressive and I just cannot fold TT when I’m short-stacked. I called, he turns over AA and I’m out.

Here’s the problem... If I would have spent a bit more time thinking it through and tried harder to put him on a range I probably would have realized that I could narrow it down given his 5xBB bet. What could he possibly have that I would want to see? The only hand in his range that I really want to see is 99. AK is possible and wouldn’t be too bad, but that’s it. When he makes it 5xBB he almost certainly has 99+/KK. Maybe 88 or AQ, but unlikely.

Do you agree?
The good news is that it was not very costly, the Hustler is only 30 minutes from my house and I got home relatively early. I have to say that it was a fun time. What more could I ask for? Perhaps a final table finish and check?

** BTW, during the break I approached the floorman and discussed his decision on the all-in. His first reaction was that he couldn’t reconstruct the pot at that time, but when I pointed out that he never even asked any questions of the players so how would he know -- he reconsidered. He told me that he was tired and having a bad day and that everyone makes mistakes. He further pointed out that the player never protested and defended himself. If the player did he probably would have come around and tried to split the pot in an equitable manner.

So the lesson here is to always fight for your rights when you believe in your position! I admire the floorman for admitting his mistake. I have always been impressed with the Hustler’s staff and this night did nothing to change my opinion!

I played in the weirdest Sit-n-Go ever. It was a Stars step qualifier to the WSOP Main Event. I was just fooling around at Step 1. The entire SnG took 10 minutes and 23 hands. We just played 1 hand at the 25/50 blind level. Has anyone ever seen a 9 handed tournament go from 9 down to 2 players in less time? Here's how it went down:

This one guy, ussro, kept on going all-in from the very first hand. It didn't matter if he was the first in the pot at the 10/20 limit of if he was pushing after a standard raise. He just kept on going all-in. On a few hands he did fold, but not normally.

On the 5th hand ussro RR all-in and is called by two players. He has jh8h and the other players have QQ and AK. He turns quad 8's.

On the 9th hand he goes all-in with QT and gets called by AT. He flops a Q!

On the 14th hand a guy goes all-in, he calls and another guys calls. ussro had kc4c and the other hands were AhQh and AdJd. Of course the flop comes all clubs so we're down to 7. That brings us down to 3 players in 14 hands!

At this point I decided to just stay out of his way and let him take down the 3rd player unless of course I'm in a very favorable spot and either then it probably won't make much sense unless I get very short.

Finally on the 23rd hand ussro goes all-in wiht KhJh, the 3rd player calls with 77 and ussro turns the K to make us both winners.

Thanks ussro. Even if it was just a fun little Step one tournament. It was memorable!

Click here to read the tournament hand history and discuss it on our forums.