[MicroBob]

Haven't been able to get to sleep yet. Schedule is all messed up for some reason.
So I'm stopping by to say hello as I also help my girlfriend send her e-mail to her parents.

I'm still alive in the tournament after 1 very long day. 67th out of 280 (started with 740 players).
I have 35000 in chips and when we resume play Tuesday at 8p Mountain Time the blinds will be 500/1000 for another 30 minutes and then we have an hour of blinds 1000/1500 with stakes 1500/3000.
So....the placing is pretty nice of course...but doesn't exactly mean too much as far as making the money is concerned (180th gets $5200, 55th-145th gets $10400, 54th gets $16000 or so).

If I lose a couple of hands in there I could easily be down to 23000 or so in chips and hovering around 150th to 180th out of 280.
And, obviously, it's not too hard to lose just a couple of hands.


Good news is that I don't think I am playing with any spectacular players tomorrow. Amazingly, I'm the chip-leader for my table tomorrow. Everyone else is 28000 or lower....with a few in the 8000 to 15000 range.


Today I started with a World-Series limit champion to my immediate left. He says (and I believe him...strong player imo) that he won a $500 buy-in WSOP event in 2002 for $48000. He actually PREFERS limit tourneys and says that's more his specialty. Geez....but I held my own in some blind-battles against him. He also lost twice against quads in the first couple hours and once against my set of 7's that I picked up on the turn against his high pair. I believe he got knocked out...didn't see him after our table broke although he had made a nice comeback.


I eventually got moved to a table with chip-leader Chip Jett 2 seats to my left. He finished the day with $101k in chips and was a blind-stealing and defending machine. Bullied me around twice (just like everyone else) and it was incredible watching him work. I got a hand back from him later on that I will post later.



So I'm 67th at $35k out of 280 and trying to make it to 145th preferrable...and then I'll be more focused on moving up higher of course. The blinds will move up fast enough that nobody will be able to coast.


We play from 8p until 1a or 2a I think (mountain time) Tuesday night. I think they end it earlier if they get it down to 27 players. So those 5-6 hours will tell the difference between making the money or not obviously.


Haven't met Daryn or Eugene or anyone else 2+2 yet.
But both names are on the first page of the chip-standings.
Daryn was about 25th or 30th with $50k I think.
Eugene was about 50th or 60th with $40k.
not positive. Somewhere around there.


Gavin Griffin is still hanging around....probably $20k or so I think.
I'm $1000 or $2000 or so more than Darden.
Greenstein and Ferguson both bowed out on the first day. So did Scott Fischman.
Kathy Liebert has about $31k.
Katrina Jett had a pretty small stack but is still in it.

I'm just behind cardplayer's Barry Schulman in the chip-standings. His wife was trying to steal my blinds quite a bit in the first 4 hours or so of the tourney on our first table. Very aggressive...but showed down legitimate hands. I got lucky a couple times against her...and her stack eventually came back to earth.

There are some other people I recognize from WPT final-tables but can't recall their names. The guy who won the WSOP event that had Ellix Powers at the final table is here but I can't remember his name off the top of my head. I think he was in the top 20 in chips.


Lots of fun obviously.


Bus tour of Mazatlan tomorrow. Then the tourney at night...hopefully a nap in-between.
Walking tour of Puerto Vallarta on Wednesday...and maybe, if I get lucky, I'll be in the final 27 and will still be playing in the tourney (anything is possible....especially when you no longer have Chip Jett check-raising the crap out of you).



Okay, I'm still awake...so here's the hand.

Chip had run-over me a couple of times.
A hand two orbits earlier went something like


Bob open-raises in CO with A7d.
Chip Jett in SB calls.

Flop comes 679 (2 suits)...
Chip Jett checks, Bob bet, Chip Jett C/R's, Bob calls.

Turn is 8 (2 clubs, 2 spades)
Chip Jett bets VERY quickly and pushes me out of the pot. He bet so quickly that I actually thought he was TRYING to bully me and that my 7 could actually be good. But it's obviously not worth messing around with there.
This was the 2nd time he had run-over me but I don't remember the first one. It might have been an A-high flop or A on turn against my KQ or something.


2 orbits later (I think) and I'm down to $21k in chips I believe.
Bob open-raises in CO with JTo (hadn't played in awhile I believe).
Chip Jett in SB calls (it might have been button and BB...but I think it was CO and SB).

Flop comes something like K64.
Chip Jett checks.
Bob bets.
Chip Jett check-raises.
Bob calls.

Turn comes A.
Chip Jett checks.
Bob bets.
Chip Jett folds.



My impression was that he had read me as weak-passive...because, frankly, I had kind of been playing as such since I had arrived to the table. Thus, I suspected he would respect my bet there if he DIDN'T have the K or A. He had been betting and raising so much that he OBVIOUSLY didn't have it ALL the times he did so....but he hadn't had to show many down since I got there.

Anyway, it was gutsy bordering on VERY stupid. But my read was that if he really DID flop a K he actually might have waited. And he certainly could put me on a potential Ace (or K) when I tried to steal.

Sigh...I don't know...it worked out okay.
It was really educational watching him push everyone around while building up his big stack.