Tuesday, December 05, 2006
EZAKEE: its easy when you get hit by the deck
So, the last weekend was another of the awesome Deep Stack tournaments in Schenefeld, and since I did well, seems like I have to put my thoughts on the tournament into words.First it must be mentioned that the whole tournament setup was fantastic. The tournament area was nice enough, they used their best dealers which have come a long way in the last few years and are now certainly among the best in Germany, the tournament fee was only €40 (the buy-in was €500) and you got free non-alcoholic drinks and (an actually good) buffet on sunday for it, too ! They also had a champagne special - a glass of Moet & Chandon was only €5.60, so if you had a lady with you (as it happens, I did) you could afford to keep her happy :)
The tournament was supposed to start at 7pm on saturday, and at 6:15 I was in Hannover, exhausted from a soccer game which started late, with no intention of playing in this tourney and instead planning to meet with soccer pals at the christmas market. I was then instructed by Marco to get my ass over there (etc), and elevated by finally keeping a clean sheet (soccer) decided to make the drive as fast as possible. The fact that apparently my buy-in would not be refunded if i no-showed made that decision a lot easier, too.I arrived at 8:30, halfway through level 2. The structure was great, 45 minute levels, starting stacks of 5000, with the blinds starting at 20/40 and several intermediate levels (such as 140/280 between 100/200 and 200/400). The only thing that could have (should have ?) done better is introducing antes sooner. Antes did not start until 700/1400/100, which IMO is far too late for a deep stack multi. On the other hand, you have to be real pleased to see antes at all in Germany.
Anyway, I had about 4600 left when I took my seat, and was seated at a reasonable table, including martenJ and Michael Keiner, later on Thomas Michalski from Dresden, and (Ferry) Vafa, Peyman and Eskimo (10/20 PL regulars in Schenefeld), as well as some guys I didn't know. I managed to double up to 8300 through one of the less experienced players by betting my kings on every street of the 86266 board against his nines. Other than that, I did not play many hands on day 1, my raises often drew folds. Late in the day I raised AKs to 340 after Peyman limped 80, martenJ coldcalled, and Eskimo made it 1k in the button. It was folded to me, and I just folded along (martenJ folded his TT as well). Eskimo is not exactly a loose cannon when it comes to three-betting, so I felt (and still think) that calling here (and hitting a pair) would be a recipe for disaster unless i managed a flush or straight or some other miracle. R.I.O. anyone !? :)
I ended day 1 with 7600 chips (average was just over 8k), and day 2 would start with 200/400 blinds at the same tables. I had intended to be 'ready to gamble' since I didn't particularly wanted to hang around with no chips, have to spend another night in a hotel, and then not make it. As it turns out, I was all-in for all my chips twice within the first hour, but i could hardly help those. First, I raised AsQc to 1400 in EP and was called by only Michael Keiner in the small blind. He had KK and decided to slowplay and the checkraise me on the Qs9s5s flop, which I could hardly get away from, so I doubled up to just over 15k. An orbit or so later, Thomas Michalski limped 400 utg and was followed by another player, so I made a reasonably big raise to 1800 with AA. Eskimo in the SB and Michalski both called, and we saw a flop of Ts 4d 3d. Eskimo checked, Thomas bet out 2000 into the 5k pot, I raised to 7k, Eskimo folded, and Thomas moved me all-in (he had about 30k). I obviously couldn't fold, he showed QdTd for top pair and flush draw (15 outs), the turn was the Ad, but a river 4 gave me a full house so I became the chip leader with 30k chips. I was fairly quiet for the next hour or two, only playing one significant pot in which I basically bluff-induced 10k chips with KQ on the Q628A board from Thomas who had rebuilt his stack again.
When we were down to 20 players I was moved to a table with what I (and the rest of the crowd) considered the two toughest/best players left in the tournament, Thang Nguyen and Dr. Jalali, both of whom have been very succesful in large tournaments. I don't know if that is what caused it, but I feel like from this point on, the quality of my play suffered. I was entirely card-dead for most the time, but I didn't do enough stealing when the situation was right - I did do some stealing, but TWICE, I folded in the SB when it was folded to me, the blinds were 500/1000 and the big blind had about 8-10k left with me at ~35k. Obviously I had 83o type hands each time, but it just underlines that I felt my play was a little weaker than it should ideally be. Anyway, I did bust Peyman when I found KK in the button and he had a small stack with 66 in the BB, along with slightly improving my stack along the way. Down to ten players with five on each table with 1000/2000 blinds and 200 ante, I raised KTo from 2nd position to 7k and was reraised all-in to 8.6k by the SB who held A6o. Dr Jalali called the raise with Q9s and I called as well. We checked down the board of 367KQ, and I think I might have ended up costing myself the tournament here by following 'etiquette' and checking down rather than making a 6k value bet on the river.
Anyway, I took a stack of 68k to the final table, which was still almost 2x average, and finally played well again, at least for a while. I took down blinds and antes (which by this time totalled 7500) with hands like 77, QTs and A9o, busted Michelle when I had KK (again!) in the SB and she tried to steal from the button, then was called all-in on raises twice, first busting Eskimo with K9s vs A6o and then taking out the guy to my left with QJs vs his AK.Soooo, by the time we were five handed, I had a stack of ~120k when the total chip count was only 315k. The remaining players were Thomas Michalski, Thang, Dr Jalali, myself, and a player I didn't know, in that order. The unknown guy had come to the final table with almost no chips, but somehow managed to turn that into a 60k stack by winning a few lucky showdowns. After a while, I played the following hand with him : I had A6o in the SB and it was folded to me. At 1.5k/3k/300, I raised to 10k and he called. The flop came Ad As 5d, I checked, and he bet 5k into the 23k pot. This bet surprised me, I was expecting him to either make a real bet allowing me to check-raise allin or check behind, which would have fine with me as well. Anyway, I didn't think calling would get me anywhere closer to accomplishing my goal of extracting as many of his chips as possible since he would probably be done with the hand; so I check-raised him all-in. I'm not sure if this was a bad play or not - I figured he might actually be more likely to call me with a 5 than if I made a small raise to 20k. Anyway, he quickly called, and turned over A5 for the nuts..
Duh.
That was certainly a cooler.
I was down to under 60k and when Jalali busted Thang in 4th place, the chip counts were roughly as follows : Me with 55k, unknown with 110k and Dr. Jalali had the remaining 150k. Within two hands, I was out. Dr Jalali had raised the button to 15k when the blinds were 2k/4k with 400 ante, so I decided to push QJs from the SB, but the BB woke up with AKo and called, and even worse Jalali had JJ and moved all-in, and when the board came 6QK32 I was out and Jalali was crippled. Certainly an anticlimactic finish to a really cool and well run tournament, but considering that I felt my play could have been improved in lots of spots, I guess I can't complain about 3rd place worth 4420 Euros !
So long and thanks...
The tournament was supposed to start at 7pm on saturday, and at 6:15 I was in Hannover, exhausted from a soccer game which started late, with no intention of playing in this tourney and instead planning to meet with soccer pals at the christmas market. I was then instructed by Marco to get my ass over there (etc), and elevated by finally keeping a clean sheet (soccer) decided to make the drive as fast as possible. The fact that apparently my buy-in would not be refunded if i no-showed made that decision a lot easier, too.I arrived at 8:30, halfway through level 2. The structure was great, 45 minute levels, starting stacks of 5000, with the blinds starting at 20/40 and several intermediate levels (such as 140/280 between 100/200 and 200/400). The only thing that could have (should have ?) done better is introducing antes sooner. Antes did not start until 700/1400/100, which IMO is far too late for a deep stack multi. On the other hand, you have to be real pleased to see antes at all in Germany.
Anyway, I had about 4600 left when I took my seat, and was seated at a reasonable table, including martenJ and Michael Keiner, later on Thomas Michalski from Dresden, and (Ferry) Vafa, Peyman and Eskimo (10/20 PL regulars in Schenefeld), as well as some guys I didn't know. I managed to double up to 8300 through one of the less experienced players by betting my kings on every street of the 86266 board against his nines. Other than that, I did not play many hands on day 1, my raises often drew folds. Late in the day I raised AKs to 340 after Peyman limped 80, martenJ coldcalled, and Eskimo made it 1k in the button. It was folded to me, and I just folded along (martenJ folded his TT as well). Eskimo is not exactly a loose cannon when it comes to three-betting, so I felt (and still think) that calling here (and hitting a pair) would be a recipe for disaster unless i managed a flush or straight or some other miracle. R.I.O. anyone !? :)
I ended day 1 with 7600 chips (average was just over 8k), and day 2 would start with 200/400 blinds at the same tables. I had intended to be 'ready to gamble' since I didn't particularly wanted to hang around with no chips, have to spend another night in a hotel, and then not make it. As it turns out, I was all-in for all my chips twice within the first hour, but i could hardly help those. First, I raised AsQc to 1400 in EP and was called by only Michael Keiner in the small blind. He had KK and decided to slowplay and the checkraise me on the Qs9s5s flop, which I could hardly get away from, so I doubled up to just over 15k. An orbit or so later, Thomas Michalski limped 400 utg and was followed by another player, so I made a reasonably big raise to 1800 with AA. Eskimo in the SB and Michalski both called, and we saw a flop of Ts 4d 3d. Eskimo checked, Thomas bet out 2000 into the 5k pot, I raised to 7k, Eskimo folded, and Thomas moved me all-in (he had about 30k). I obviously couldn't fold, he showed QdTd for top pair and flush draw (15 outs), the turn was the Ad, but a river 4 gave me a full house so I became the chip leader with 30k chips. I was fairly quiet for the next hour or two, only playing one significant pot in which I basically bluff-induced 10k chips with KQ on the Q628A board from Thomas who had rebuilt his stack again.
When we were down to 20 players I was moved to a table with what I (and the rest of the crowd) considered the two toughest/best players left in the tournament, Thang Nguyen and Dr. Jalali, both of whom have been very succesful in large tournaments. I don't know if that is what caused it, but I feel like from this point on, the quality of my play suffered. I was entirely card-dead for most the time, but I didn't do enough stealing when the situation was right - I did do some stealing, but TWICE, I folded in the SB when it was folded to me, the blinds were 500/1000 and the big blind had about 8-10k left with me at ~35k. Obviously I had 83o type hands each time, but it just underlines that I felt my play was a little weaker than it should ideally be. Anyway, I did bust Peyman when I found KK in the button and he had a small stack with 66 in the BB, along with slightly improving my stack along the way. Down to ten players with five on each table with 1000/2000 blinds and 200 ante, I raised KTo from 2nd position to 7k and was reraised all-in to 8.6k by the SB who held A6o. Dr Jalali called the raise with Q9s and I called as well. We checked down the board of 367KQ, and I think I might have ended up costing myself the tournament here by following 'etiquette' and checking down rather than making a 6k value bet on the river.
Anyway, I took a stack of 68k to the final table, which was still almost 2x average, and finally played well again, at least for a while. I took down blinds and antes (which by this time totalled 7500) with hands like 77, QTs and A9o, busted Michelle when I had KK (again!) in the SB and she tried to steal from the button, then was called all-in on raises twice, first busting Eskimo with K9s vs A6o and then taking out the guy to my left with QJs vs his AK.Soooo, by the time we were five handed, I had a stack of ~120k when the total chip count was only 315k. The remaining players were Thomas Michalski, Thang, Dr Jalali, myself, and a player I didn't know, in that order. The unknown guy had come to the final table with almost no chips, but somehow managed to turn that into a 60k stack by winning a few lucky showdowns. After a while, I played the following hand with him : I had A6o in the SB and it was folded to me. At 1.5k/3k/300, I raised to 10k and he called. The flop came Ad As 5d, I checked, and he bet 5k into the 23k pot. This bet surprised me, I was expecting him to either make a real bet allowing me to check-raise allin or check behind, which would have fine with me as well. Anyway, I didn't think calling would get me anywhere closer to accomplishing my goal of extracting as many of his chips as possible since he would probably be done with the hand; so I check-raised him all-in. I'm not sure if this was a bad play or not - I figured he might actually be more likely to call me with a 5 than if I made a small raise to 20k. Anyway, he quickly called, and turned over A5 for the nuts..
Duh.
That was certainly a cooler.
I was down to under 60k and when Jalali busted Thang in 4th place, the chip counts were roughly as follows : Me with 55k, unknown with 110k and Dr. Jalali had the remaining 150k. Within two hands, I was out. Dr Jalali had raised the button to 15k when the blinds were 2k/4k with 400 ante, so I decided to push QJs from the SB, but the BB woke up with AKo and called, and even worse Jalali had JJ and moved all-in, and when the board came 6QK32 I was out and Jalali was crippled. Certainly an anticlimactic finish to a really cool and well run tournament, but considering that I felt my play could have been improved in lots of spots, I guess I can't complain about 3rd place worth 4420 Euros !
So long and thanks...
# posted by dirkb : Tuesday, December 05, 2006
