Daily Tournaments in Atlantic City

[PokerMatt]

This is the first time I've decided to post, but I've lurked for a little while and have found these forums to be very helpful.

Anyway, I'm posting to find out what others have observed playing in the various daily poker tournaments offered in the poker rooms in AC. More specifically, what kinds of players can I expect to be up against in these tournaments? I've played online quite a bit with some success here and there (won a party 30+3 with almost 1000 people, and several other top 20 finishes in the same tournament) but obviously there's always room for improvement. Probably a dumb question, but should I expect to see tighter, tougher players in these live AC tournaments? I'm expecting to but if anyone else has experience in these their insight would be greatly appreciated.

I was thinking of entering the 100+20 tourney at the Tropicana tomorrow (10/10). No rebuys/addons, players start with T5000 and the blinds start at 25/25. The website doesn't say how quickly they escalate, but the levels change every 20-30 minutes. Not knowing anything about the players, should I just play my typical tight-agressive poker and adjust as needed?

Any comments are appreciated. Or if someone can point me to another thread on these tournaments that I may have missed, that would be great.

[McMelchior]

I haven't played the new no-rebuy, but I played the $50 rebuy a couple of times this spring.

If it's the same crowd (and I don't see why it wouldn't be, except perhaps for the fact that it's Columbus day, and the number of clueless tourists will be higher than usual) expect gamblers, goofs having watched way too much poker on TV - and a generally high level of aggression.

Not saying that they couldn't be there, I haven't seen any strong players.

Good luck & post a tournament report!

Best,

McMelchior (Johan)

[PokerMatt]

Well, here goes my report.

I ended up 80th out of 177. The cards just weren't coming my way. My two best hands the entire time I was in (2 hours) were AKs and 33. A few other decent hands here and there, but the 33 was my only pocket pair and the others didn't pan out.

After the first break, I was up to T6200 (from T5000 to start). The 2nd hour was one bad starting hand after another. With the blinds at 200/400 and the ante at 75, I raised the aforementioned AKs to 1200 from the big blind. The two others in the hand folded, and that was the only hand I would win that hour (maybe I shouldn't have raised so much given all the hands I had folded before???). By the 2nd break I was down to T4200. I had been looking to push before the break to hopefully double up but nothing worth playing came.

The 3rd hour started with blinds at 500/1000 and the ante at 100. I was UTG and pushed in with A3o. A loose player next to the button called, and turned over 44, which held up and ended my tourney. I stil feel a little wary pushing in with that, but if I had folded and nothing came up on the blinds I would've been severely shortstacked and doubling up at that point wouldn't have been very helpful. Agree, disagree???

As far as the quality of play in the tournament, it was pretty much what the previous poster said. Fairly loose, especially in the early going. The aggression level wasn't that high, and there was quite a bit of limping preflop. Lots of all-ins, though. 2 of the players at my table were good and one of them got QQ 3 different times and won with it each time. The rest were average to below average, IMO.

As a whole I think I did the best I could, except for maybe the last hand (any comments on that would be appreciated). The cards weren't coming my way, and when I did have a hand the flop wasn't favorable at all or I didn't get many callers. Oh well, chalk it up as a learning experience. /images/graemlins/laugh.gif