My 200+15 NLHE Report

[AleoMagus]

As suggested, I am reporting this here because I won my entry from this forum's sng qualifier.

Well... I didn't win so you won't be getting your $14 dollars back. I placed 485th out of 1376 players

Truth be told, I think I had really dismal cards throughout this tournament but it was a lot of fun to play. In the future, I would never hold it against anyone to win a qualifier and keep the money, but I think it was a good experience and I would recommend playing.

Anyways... The tournament...

All start with t2500

About 4 hands in I get AA. I get two callers on a 3xBB preflop raise. Flop is 9J5 with flush draw on board. I bet pot and both fold.

After this I see nothing good for about 1/2 hr. I limp once in a big multiway pot with AJs to no avail. otherwise I have no playable hands

Finally in rnd 3 I get AKo. Unfortunately, the pot is raised and re-raised before it gets to me. I fold the AK grudgingly

rnd 4 I am still hovering around 2500 chips. I manage to limp in CO with 44. flop is K26 and checked. I bet pot and all fold.

by rnd 5, tournament avg is ~3400 and I am still around 2300. I am getting a bit restless and need to see some better cards. My flops seen is 7% at this point

near the end of rnd 5, I get Q4o in BB but all fold except the SB who just completes. Flop is TAK. SB checks so I bet the pot here. SB raises all-in. I fold

I am down to t1710.

By rnd 6 I am really just looking to move in as soon as I find a hand. Blinds are 100/200 and I have less than 1700.

I find ATo in middle position and this is the best thing I have seen in a long while. I push. All fold. I'm up to ~t1800

the string of hands that follows is terrible.

85o
67s - folded

47s in BB. Bad hand for me. 2 limpers and a min raiser in CO. I call the min raise and see the flop in a multiway pot. Face cards flop and the flop is bet and raised. I fold of course and am down to t1085.

43o in SB - folded
47o - folded
23o - folded
48o - folded
Rnd 7 - blinds 100/200 + 25 ante. I am now at t960
83o - folded
t4s - folded
29s - folded
75s - folded
AK! in BB. All fold but SB. I push. He folds. I am at t1285 now
A6o in SB - folded
TKo on button which I push with. Blinds fold. I am at t1635
67o- folded
J2o - folded
J6s - folded
25o - folded
55 in BB. All fold except SB again. I push against him again and he folds again. I am at t1910
39o - folded
A6o - folded
rnd 8 - Blinds 200/400 + 25 ante. I am in trouble
A2o - folded
4Qo - folded
47s - folded

And then - POCKET KINGS! Yay! About time.

Before it gets to me I am raised. I of course push. He calls
He turns over QQ. I smile

I forget the flop. I only remember the turn. Yes, a Q falls.

That's it for me.
My t3570 goes to the other guy and I am out in 485th place just a few minutes before the 2nd break.

That's life I guess. t3570 was still barely over 1/2 the tournament average at this point so I had an uphill climb even if I did win that pot. Still, it would have been nice.

Some observations.

I didn't get very many good cards this tournament, but I think I should have been more agressive with the cards I did get. Very few pots were limped into though and whenever I did get a marginal hand that I wanted to play agressively, it seemed to be raised in front of me. It is pretty difficult to play so many agressive players.

I was almost starting to prefer early positions because then I could get off the raise first. By the Button, I always had to fold becasue it had been raised already and I never really had enough to call. A couple of times early on I wanted to call or reraise with hands like J9, but I was just getting desperate (and I kept my composure and didn't).

Still. I am glad that I played. Truth be told, I am also glad to have beaten most of the field AND to be knocked out when I seriously had the best of it. Those guys ain't so good!

I am sure I'll play this tourney again sometime.

Another thing that I would say is that it might have been a better idea just to watch this one closely and then play next week instead. I looked a lot at how the blinds would increase and all the details about the tourney last night but today gave me a new impression as to how big the stacks would get, and when.

Thanks again to everyone for the support.
We should definitely play these qualifiers again and get some more of us into this event.

Regards,
Brad S

[TylerD]

Good stuff dude. Slogging my way through 1300+ players is the reason I now play very few multi-table tournaments and stick to SnGs.

[Utah]

Good post.

Is this the same tourney that Fossilman won $40,000?

[AleoMagus]

Yeah, same tournament, but fossilman's finish was last week. This report was from the event today.

[ClemsonAce]

Glad you had a good time, I played and got knocked out within 20 minutes when my jacks ran into kings. I did have a good time for the 20 minutes though, well as good as can be expected.

I agree, let's do the qualifier more often and get more of us in without having to fork over the full 215.

[Bozeman]

Sometimes you can't force things. No doubt you missed some opportunities, but they were likely marginal. Just remember, you won't win every tournament you're in, and with 1000+ players you will not even win 1/50.

I would not be nearly so concerned about being below average stackwise. I think as long as you have 1/2 average you are still in fine shape. More worrisome is the size of the blinds with respect to your stack, but there will be very few players that can afford to tangle with your stack as an underdog even if it is 1/2 ave.

I don't like the bluff on the AKT board, but heaven knows I've done it. If you think this board is likely to have missed him, I'd raise it preflop.

Good report,
Craig

[McMelchior]

Thanks for the report, Brad ... I recognize the hardship of surviving in multi-tables with mostly <font color="red">very </font> aggressive players and somewhat mediocre cards.

Except for calling from the BB w/74s, which I think is a mistake at that point (how would you feel about a flush draw?), I don't see anything I would have done differently ... perhaps except for considering a 1,700 stack a "must move in" position with 200/100 blinds ... for me the panic point is when I'm down to 3 times the cost of sitting one round, and though close you're not quite there yet. Of course this depends on how aggressive the game is.

Too bad you cowboys didn't hold up; with 3,500 you would have had at least 10 - 15 more hand to look at before it got real tight again, and - again depending on the aggressiveness of the game - chances for bullying some of the smaller stacks (not necessary smaller than yours).

Anyway, who am I to talk with only one genuine big money finish under my belt, it sounds like you're on the right path, and I wish you the best of luck next time!

Best,

McMelchior (Johan)

[eastbay]

[ QUOTE ]
Sometimes you can't force things. No doubt you missed some opportunities, but they were likely marginal. Just remember, you won't win every tournament you're in, and with 1000+ players you will not even win 1/50.


[/ QUOTE ]

Craig,

Just curious where the 1/50 comes from? Seems high to me. As in, I would think an outright win would be less frequent, even for a stellar player.

eastbay

[Stoneii]

Good reading Brad

I jumped on the rail for a few minutes (when you were about the T1700 mark), dropped you a wee good luck message and watched. I did spot the guy to your immediate right who'd got to about T6000ish was taking every opportunity to make sure you wouldn't see a flop cheap.

Anyways, 2 hours worth, I'm glad my contribution bought you a few hours experience /images/graemlins/wink.gif

G'Luck and well played

stoneii

[Bozeman]

My monkeys throwing darts at stock listings estimate of the absolute upper limit on how good one could be at these. Note that I did not say it was achievable, merely that one would do worse than that.

[t_perkin]

Sounds to me like you played very well.

Something I would say that I read somewhere (other than Bozeman's post!) but can't remember where is not to worry about the average stack.

From my own very miniscule experience in multis I seem to always end up just scraping along the bottom of the board.

For example I played a 30+3 at stars last week and I remained below the starting T1500 for the first 100 hands, and I remained below the average stack until the final two tables.

For example: blinds 150/300 - me on T700 average stack T3000. I get AK and move in, one caller and another guy moves in over the top, middle player folds and I win against QQ. I now have T2500, and double up again in the next hand.
So in two hands you can go from almost dead well above average stack. The average stack really doesn't mean much when the average stack is only 10-15x BB. I try to avoid looking at the lobby at all.

I ended up 7th and here were my final stats:

292 hands played and saw flop:
- 7 times out of 38 while in small blind (18%)
- 10 times out of 37 while in big blind (27%)
- 9 times out of 217 in other positions (4%)
- a total of 26 times out of 292 (8%)

Pots won at showdown - 7 out of 9 (77%)
Pots won without showdown - 23

Like you I didn't see many good cards. Or to be more accurate I didn't see any middle and low PP or any AJ/KQs type hands. This meant I didn't really have any decisions to make, which in hindsight is probably exactly what I want being an average to poor multi table player with no patience.
You just don't need to win that many hands, I've played SnGs where I have won nearly as many hands as this!

Good game, you got knocked out with a huge fav. that is the best way to go.

Tim

[eastbay]

Fair enough.

eastbay