So concludes the 2008 WSOP, after another two weeks out in Vegas after I last returned home for a quick break. I played Day one of the main event on the 4th of July, which turned out to be a good decision since I thought the field seemed amazingly weak and a majority of the pros who are in Vegas the whole series opted to not play on the 4th for obvious reasons.

I'll keep my main event summary pretty brief: I was at good tables, and my stack's peak was 37,000. I managed to lose 30,000 chips to John Duthie in one pot where I've talked with several NL and tourney players and they've had conflicting views on what the right move would've been. It was 150/300 level with 25 ante, and I was the SB. The BB was walking so his hand got automucked. Duthie opened from the CO to 1100. From the SB with AsQs, I reraised to 3300 (now would've made it about 3600 if I replay it and decide to reraise). He then reraised to 9300. So, yeah, kind of a large reraise. I thought he was pretty capable of being aware of the circumstances and what I'd think of them, so, I figured he was more than capable of making a pretty light 4 bet here. Part of me wanted to push all in (he's got about 20k left), part of me wanted to fold simply because I still had a decent amount of chips and the table was good, and part of me wanted to call and see what happened on the flop (while basically being willing to probably commit all my chips if I hit something). I ended up calling, perhaps the worst of the options but oh well, I didn't really want to jam and be wrong about his hand strength and be crippled that way. The flop came Q74 with two diamonds, I checked, he went all in, and I called. He had 74o and I didn't improve. I busted awhile after that, rather uneventfully.

Cash games, on the other hand, have continued to treat me amazingly well. Here is how the rest of my cash game play has went live since my last blog:

I landed in Vegas for part 2 of my WSOP on June 25th, and between the 25th to 29th I did a lot of drinking and activities with friends. It was a nice little mini vacation to help get my prepared for the remainder of my playing. After the 300/600 broke on the 6th of July, I decided that I'd give Vegas another day or two to see if any more black chip games got going. None did, so, here I am typing up this blog while waiting for my flight in the airport.

I have a few hands to talk about from the cash games, but I'll save a few of them for the next blog. Anyway, here is one now that most of my LHE playing friends think I played badly, but my NL friends think I played well: 300/600 full table, CMO raised UTG, one cold caller in mid-late position, and I called in the BB with 7s5s. Flop Q75 with two diamonds. I check, CMO bet, the cold caller called, and I called. Most everyone would probably checkraise this flop in my spot, and I think most everyone would be wrong to (albeit not by much). A few specific variables in place make me think calling is better:

1) The preflop raiser is CMO, and he is under the gun, and this is 300/600. Now he might have a cheeseball occasionally, but most of the time, his UTG opening standards in this game are going to be pretty strong. Therefore, it is more likely than normal that he will in fact c-bet the turn too.

2) I don't think the cold caller is just peeling the flp with a KT or KJ or something. Now, he might be, but I really didn't think it was too likely, he wasn't that type of guy. That means he has something, and he will likely call with that something on the turn too. If I think he might have KJ or something like that, checkraising the flop then obviously becomes preferable because he'll for sure put in one more SB closing the action.

3) Given one and two, my bottom two pair really isn't that huge of an equity edge vs both the other player's hand ranges. There are tons of cards that can come off on the turn that I might hate, and I may as well wait till I see a safe turn card where I'll have a much better equity edge and can still probably get two BBs from two players.

4) Since CMO is UTG I probably wouldn't even be checkraising this flop with a flush draw unless it was 9d8d. So, I may as well not be checkraising with this hand either. Plus, he will not be expecting me to show up with a hand as strong as this if I check/call this particularly semi-drawish flop.

So I did call. The turn paired the 5, and I did get to checkraise both players. The river brought a 9d, I bet, CMO raised, I 3-bet, he thought for a long time while thinking outloud, "I can't think of one hand you could have except maybe 95 [and then he was looking at the board to see that of the 95 suiteds, there were either one or zero of them I could possibly have... don't remember which]." He ended up folding what was either an overpair, AQ, or a flush.

I honestly still believe my line is the best way to play the hand, even if occasionally I miss out on the times I checkraise the flop and CMO 3-bets, and then I get to checkraise a safe turn again.

Flight time... I can't wait to get back to Minnesota and my "normal" life, even if it isn't particularly normal...