jdock99
04-03-2005, 07:42 AM
Obviously we did not see most of the hands that were played at this final table, but from what we did see, it seemed most of the big hands involved players making fundamental situational mistakes. Obviously, the most glaring example of this was Hoyt Corkins play, which consistent with his other appearances, consists of him way overbetting his hand and trapping himself and then relying on the deck to save him, which it invariably did until he got down to 3 handed. In addition to this, we have Hollander whose strategy seemed to be to call, call, call in an apparent strategy to induce the other players to overplaying their hands against him. This worked well against Agostino's semi-bluff/bluff against the QQ (As an aside, I have a feeling if Agostino had hit his flush he would have made a much larger bet and Hollander would have called it), but caused him to lose all his chips on the river in a pot that was nothing before the river with only top pair (I am assuming he was hoping the other guy was overplaying a weaker ace because Hollander played his hand so slowly) Finally, when it got heads up the young guy who got second was just asking to be trapped by overplaying marginal hands and making large bluffs into small pots, allowing the guy who won (forgot his name) to trap him and take all his chips relatively easily. I am sure there is more, but I am too tired to think about it right now. Ironically, the person who it seemed played the best game was Agostino, who lost every pot he played regardless of whether he got his $$ in with the worst of it or the best of it and busted out 7th. For whatever reason, despite the excellent job done by ESPN and its commentators (way better than Travel Channel and Fox) this seemed like a very sloppily played final table, which in its own way is good I suppose because it gives hopes to all us wannabes who admittedly are not the best players in the world but have our own hopes of grandeur at a large poker tournament final table.