The Official KotZ #1 NLHE Thread

[AAmaz0n]

Short stacked I push with KQo and run into AKs in the BB and get crushed.

A lot of fun as always, thanks to everyone who played, and of course the organizers.

I have to take a moment to brag about lasting this long, please indulge me.

1st hand of the tourney, I fold rags, Zam takes the big blind and folds, leaving 1480 chips to my 1500

next hand, I wake up with AA, push all in; Zam calls with AKo and hits four hearts on the board to leave me with T 20

Hand 3, I push my whole teeny stack (which only calls the t 20 blind) in with KQo, and beat 65o with a board of 4c 9c Jc Kd Ad . pick up the SB and BB, so now I have T 50

Hand 4, I go all in with A9o (hey this short stacked is no time to be timid). No one has anything worth calling so I pick up the blinds again and have T 80.

Hand 5, JJ - I go all in. What a surprise! No one calls; another T30 so I'm back up to T 110. Woo Hoo!

Hand 6, I take the BB with K4s and am thinking about what the heck I'm going to do when everyone folds and I save my blind and pick up the SB. T120

Hand 7, SB with J8s, folded to me. I'm either going to have to get very lucky very soon, or go get a beer. Ummmmmmmm, beer. that Guinness icon sitting in the chair to my right is looking awfully g00t right now. All in , BB folds. T 140

Hand 8 K4o, UTG calls. I really don't want to go out on this trash. fold
Hand 9 more rags, maybe I'll at least try to find something not too stupid to get put out on.

Hand 10 raised to 60 in front of me; time to get lucky with AJs. He has presto (55) and hits a set, but I suck out with a diamond on the river. T 310, I can actually take the blinds a few times.

11 and 12 are rags that I muck and I take the blind in hand 13 with X6 and see a Q 9 6 rainbow flop for free with one limper. Maybe no one has a Q or I get lucky; all in gets a fold and T 330

Hand 14; X5o in the SB with one limper so I see the flop for the half bet and the board of 2 2 5 has probably not hit anyone harder than me. All in, fold fold. Up to T 370

Hand 15 was Q5o. With a Granny it would have been an easy all in, but I just fold. 16 and 17 are more rags.

Hand 18 KQo in mid position. I have enough chips to make a legitimate raise to 60 instead of plunging, so I do. Button and the BB call. Flop of 6h 4s Ks looks friendly except for the flush draw, but an all in should get rid of that and it does. T 500 and I'm having thoughts of hanging around for a while.

Hand 19 blinds still 10/20 UTG+1 calls, I limp with AA. My buddy Zam raises to 101 from late position and UTG calls. I raise all in and get heads up with Zam and hold my breath. this time it is TT and my aces actually hold up. T 1131. I might actually last a bit longer.

I hope I didn't bore everyone too much, but this is far and away the best comeback that I've ever made. I had to push hard and get lucky in spots, but it's really true you're never out as long as you have a chip and chair.

I wound up cresting at about T 4400 when we were down to 4 tables and made some dodgy moves that got me in trouble, but I sure wouldn't have made a last longer that I could survive to 15 when I was that short stacked.

Good game, all.

Shauna

[Simon Diamond]

Nice report - it was a truly commendable effort to recover from the start you had. Good game.

[mannika]

After that beautiful story, I almost feel bad for knocking you out. ALMOST. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

But seriously, great run, I was watching the chip count the whole way and was quite impressed.

[Simon Diamond]

GreatAuk, aka UncleDuke beat pasty11 in a really good heads up battle to win the opening event of the 2005 KotZ season. Well done to both players, and all of the other guys who cashed. The tourney lasted just over 4 hours and was really good fun as ever. Thanks to all who entered, thats the best turnout we've had for quite a while.

[nolanfan34]

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GreatAuk, aka UncleDuke

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Simon, shouldn't we get a cut of his winnings since we sent him the password? [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[Simon Diamond]

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GreatAuk, aka UncleDuke

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Simon, shouldn't we get a cut of his winnings since we sent him the password? [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

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[note to self] Ignore password requests at the last minute!

In fairness, there was a really good influx of new players tonight - I counted 20 debutants amongst the field, and they gave the established KotZ regulars a bit of a thumping really (Top 3 places, and five in the money).

[eMarkM]

Sorry I missed the event tonight. Just catching up on the posts here.

I worked hard on this schedule. I laid out some schedules late in '03 and we debated them on this forum. We debated having a 26 tourney schedule that would have allowed for more events in the other categories, but I didn't want people to burn out on KotZ and lose interest. That and it would have been a real admin burden for me and Simon. I didn't want to do just 12 a year, I wanted a bit more robust schedule. So we settled on 18, or about 1 every three weeks. Now how to divide 18 tourneys into the nine basic types of tourneys Stars offers. Yeah, I could have gone with two of each and be very balanced. But it would have definately been frowned upon by the Zoo in general to play NLHE as much as we play Stud/8. Because I think you're right, you probably are one of the few who feel that way about the HE-heavy schedule. The vast majority of players want HE, there's no two ways about it. And most want NLHE specifically. So the schedule is designed around that demand. Contrary to what Simon said, most people welcomed the inclusion of other games to the official schedule, but I think most would have been turned off if I made it truly balanced.

It also has to do with the tradition Simon started. The first year Simon rotated between LHE, PLHE and NLHE. He then threw in couple of non-HE events and lowered the buy-in to $20 for those and they weren't "official". When I took over the TD duties, I wanted to keep to that HE tradition, but I felt it was important to have at least one event in every type of tourney Stars offered. So that's what I did, I make sure we play at least one type of the other tourneys Stars offers at least once and the rest of it is divided up between rotating the three forms of HE. Playing each non-HE once takes up 1/3 of the schedule. The rest we go with that rotation of HE types Simon started the series with and it works out to be a HE event about once a month which is how it was in '03. I go with a little more NLHE as this is by far the most popular with our players. That and I want to kick off each year with this event and end with it in the Championship. So we play one less LHE than we normally would, and most people prefer that as most don't like LHE tourneys as much anyway.

I really tried to strike a balance between making this a test of tournament poker skills in every format while also giving the masses what they want. While turnout waned a bit at the end of last year, I was overall very pleased with how everything went this past year and that's why I'm not changing what I think is working just fine. However, I am open to any tweaks you may suggest.

[Sheriff Fatman]

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While turnout waned a bit at the end of last year, I was overall very pleased with how everything went this past year and that's why I'm not changing what I think is working just fine. However, I am open to any tweaks you may suggest.

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I think the turnout fall is an inevitable aspect of people feeling they're out of contention for the year - the increased numbers last night were a very welcome indication that this was the case.

One thing I did notice last night in the private tourney list was a mixed games event, which would be a fun inclusion - perhaps at the expense of one of the holdem games. One of the appeals of playing KotZ for me last year was it gave me an excuse to try out other games (usually for the first time) and, in general, I enjoyed the novelty of the non-HE tourneys compared to the 'grind' of the holdem ones. There's also a special kind of pleasure to be derived from cashing in a Stud 8 tourney as a hopeless noob to the game!

I believe there was no option to include a HOSE-type format last time around but perhaps this has now changed. If so, it could be a bit of fun!

Sheriff

PS: Busted out in 14th last night, thus continuing a long and fine tradition of 'close but no cigar' finishes which contributed towards the eventual title win last year.

Very ominous too to see Fmonti and ex-champ Lorinda with high places last night - clearly some people are out to prove a point! [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

Congrats to those making the money. Despite the loss of my relative anonymity (need to switch my avatar to a big target area next time!) it was good fun with much friendly banter in the chat! Stars too did not disappoint with the suckout quotient being particularly high from what I observed!

[TylerD]

A Mixed Games tournament would be excellent. Is it possible to drop a PL HE event?

[MicroBob]

Wasn't able to participate tonight but I do anticipate a year of many KOTZ events in my future.


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there was a really good influx of new players tonight - I counted 20 debutants amongst the field

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This is awesome. Terrific news.


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and they gave the established KotZ regulars a bit of a thumping really (Top 3 places, and five in the money).

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Oh....well, never mind maybe. this might not be such terrific news afterall!! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]