Vegas Trip Report, 4/1-5 (ridiculously long, likely boring)

[CMP]

Disclaimer: many of you will find this boring, due to the lack of debauchery. All we did was gamble, drink, watch sports, eat, and sleep.

We left Chicago on the last flight out, Friday night, April 1st. First annoyance of the trip, since it was the last flight out, we had to hold at the gate for about 30 minutes to accommodate some late connecting flights – boo, although, if I were in the connector’s shoes, I would definitely appreciate getting to Vegas that night instead of spending it at the O’Hare Hilton.

They build in enough extra time to the listed itineraries, though, that we arrived close to on time, possibly a few minutes late, but nothing significant. Picked up a blue Dodge Stratus from Thrifty – note: I’ll probably not rent with Thrifty again because they were SO adamant on the selling of the insurance and upselling the next class of car – I was first in line behind the folks getting helped at the counter, and I heard the whole spiel from the line, then heard the exact same pitch to me – so annoying.

We headed down Trop to the Orleans and checked in. We requested a room with 2 double beds, but all they had were king rooms, so we took it and got a rollaway – nice room, it seemed bigger than I remember the double-bed rooms being. It was about midnight when we arrived at the Orleans poker room. Being a little road-weary, and just wanting to log some hours, my buddy and got seats in the same $2-4 HE game. Note: I’m getting married in July, so the gambling budget was on total lockdown this trip – I actually wouldn’t play higher than $2-4 all trip (except 1 short $100 NL session).

We played 2 hours, not much memorable, and I left +$8 (that’s worse than minimum wage, right? Lol). We headed for some $5 blackjack to unwind, and left there about 90 minutes later +$19 – going to bed to the positive! For the last time, unfortunately, lol.

Woke up around 10? Saturday and had breakfast at the Orleans coffee shop (decent food, -$4 at Keno). Decided to play an hour of blackjack (-$45) before heading to Cashman field to watch the Cubs play the Mariners. In addition to being Chicagoans, we also all attended Illinois, so we knew we’d be leaving the game early to catch the Illini’s national semifinal. We enjoyed the beautiful weather and the scenery (mountains and beautiful baseball fans) and 5 boring innings of ball before heading out. Later, we heard that the Cubs won an exciting finish in the 9th. We had vague plans to head for the strip/Mirage to watch the game, but since we were downtown, we decided to hit the Golden Nugget instead. They had a bunch of flat-screens and one huge projection TV set up in a ballroom with plenty of 10-seat round tables and a couple of temporary booze and food setups (both for purchase). It was actually just what we were looking for. The first game drew a large crowd, and was heavily pro-Illini (including plenty of MSU fans who were rooting on the Big Ten). Watching that win was probably my personal highlight of the trip. The room cleared out for the second game, but we stayed and rooted along with our new MSU friends. Sad to see them go down, and we split our bets on the games, but the Orleans was offering reduced juice on straight bets for the FF (-105). Between the games, I lost $10 in about 2 minutes in a quarter VP machine. I railbirded the $1-2 NL game at the Nugget which looked pretty good – lots of $12 raises to open.

Hit In-N-Out Burger for the first time this trip – so good – on the way back to the Orleans. We had to get our hours in for the poker room rate, so I sat at the $2-4 again, and my buddy chose the $4-8 Omaha/8 with a ½ kill. I remember getting stuck, then getting even, then I had racked up and looked at my “final” hand UTG, found AK and raised, called in 1 spot and wound up losing to trips on a board that looked like K-9-9-x-x, as he had called heads up with 89s. *sigh* Lost another with top pair to bottom pair who hit her kicker on the turn. Okay, I got the hours in, I decide to roll on to blackjack. Checked in with my friend at the Omaha game and he’s crushing it, up $200+ in the same 2 hours. I get some free drinks at the blackjack table and wind up paying $65 for them – this whole trip, my 11 doubles would frequently seem to catch an A for the mighty 12. Anyway, back to sleep around 4, slightly frustrated at the day’s gambling.

I wake up early again, see no signs of life from my roommate, so I decide to slip down and start working on the hours for the day. There’s only about 3-4 games going – one $2-4 with a list, one $4-8 with open seating – I take the $4-8 and come in in MP with my name on the list for $2-4. I get called for $2-4 after 2 hands. My last hand, I’m UTG and it’s a kill pot (can you guess where this is going?), look down and find red AA. Raise it. Only the killer calls. He fills a gutshot straight on the turn and raises me, and I’m down a quick $51 as I move over to $2-4. Well, I’ve got some grinding to do. Fortunately, I finally have some hands hold up, not too much memorable, but I get in my 4 hours for the room and finish +$77 (was +$110 at one point, but obviously gave some back).

We head out to Memphis Championship Barbecue, way off the strip at Eastern and Warm Springs (approximately) – so good, this is now a must-stop on our itinerary each year. After stuffing ourselves with BBQ, we drop by the Sahara and sign up for the 7pm tournament. We’ve got some hours to kill, so I decide to check out the NL game at the Aladdin I’ve heard so much about.

We walk 1 million miles from the Aladdin parking garage to the casino. They have open seating, so I grab one – good game, $7, $12, or $15 was the standard opening raise. Friendly table, included 2 other guys (separate) from Chicago. This sparked a discussion about how everyone visiting Vegas was from Chicgao, Texas, or someplace else (I forgot).

I misplay AQ early – raise pot out of the small blind, and check the flop I missed, checked around. I continue with a check after missing on the turn, but one of the callers hit a pair and bet. I dropped but got to see 2 hands at showdown, and I’m assuming none of them would’ve called a ½ pot bet on the flop. I lose a little trying to draw too – sometimes even the $7 pots would find 6 players. I’m down to about $45 when I limp with 77 and hit a set. I more than double up off flop drawers and top pair who called my turn all-in. I catch AA and my “standard” raise gets called only by a short stack with about $30 – I get that too and I’m up a little, maybe $20. I’m on a time limit to get back to the tournament, though, and I give a little back before leaving and wind up -$11. Very fun table and game, though, it’ll definitely be on the visit list when I return. I didn’t mind the slots in the adjacent room and they had cookies out for the players.

Back to the Sahara for the $42/20 (1 rebuy/add-on) tournament. I thought this was a pretty good value, it didn’t feel like a crapshoot until about 2 hours in. I got a good amount of my play for the money, but my relative card-deadness continued. Only hand I won was AQ in the BB, called a min-raise and flopped an A. Checked around, I bet the pot on the turn and everyone folded. I went out with 97s in the BB. Flop was Q-4-4 checked around. I went all in on the turn 7 and got called by a weak Q. My friend lasted a little longer than I did and lost with AK vs. 99 (he caught a K on the flop and thought he might be good) and AA (d’oh). While waiting for him to finish, I lost $25 playing blackjack at the Sahara.

‘Round midnight, we hit the graveyard special at the Orleans and then got working on Monday’s hours in the $2-4 game. Most memorable hand of the trip for me (I wasn’t involved). Flop is multi-way and comes out all spades. Guy on my side of the table is leading the flop and the turn and getting called in a few places. River is a 4th small spade. The guy to my left disgustedly checks and it’s bet and raised at the other end of the table. He holds up his cards so our entire end of the table can see – 2 small spades. He thinks he’s counterfeited, but he doesn’t see that the river filled a gutshot straight flush. Everyone on our end is biting their tongue. One local probably crosses the line by saying “you’re going to throw that away?” But he still doesn’t see it. He mucks. The 2 guys at the other end were going at it with the A and the K of spades. The guy racked up and left soon after that (after someone let him in on what he’d done). It was a 2 card straight-flush too, so the A wouldn’t have gotten suspicious for a while. After 2 hours, I leave up a whopping $7. I enjoy some drinks at the $5 blackjack table and this time take home an extra $25 for my effort.

Monday, I wake up and we’re playing in the noon Omaha tourney at the Orleans. I sit down at a $5 blackjack table to bide some time and the table soon disintegrates. The dealer actually advises me to go to another table, he’s so hot. I don’t listen and I soon give him what’s left of my $60 buyin heads up. I do go to another table and give in $40, -$100 at stupid blackjack before the tournament even begins. Upon registering for the tournament, we find out that this was the last tourney at $30, starting Tuesday they’re going to $40. Once again, my cards suck and I suck at playing them. One key hand, on the turn I have top 2 pair and an A-high flush draw. The river gives me top 3 pair, but doesn’t complete my flush. After I call and lose to the other flush that DID come in, I decide my head’s not in the game and don’t even take a rebuy after going all in. I’m UTG with 4 cards below 6 and the flop comes K-T-T – I just throw in my cards and leave.

While my friend finishes up the tourney (he busted out an hour or so after the rebuy period ended), I try to get some back at the blackjack table and manage a $15 win – enough to pay for lunch at the Mexican place at Olreans – pretty good food, but it had plenty of appetite sauce to help it along (was starving at that point).

We’re off to the Mirage to watch the finals. When we arrived, the race side had horse racing up on their big projection TV, so everyone was crowded into the sports side. We took some open racing booths, though, and before long, they put the game up on our side as well, so we wound up with prime seats. What can I say, bad time to play their worst half of the year. If we shoot our season average % for 3s, we probably win or at least don’t get into such a deep hole to climb out of. This loss was the lowlight of the trip, even though we didn’t have any money on it.

We enjoyed our “west of the Mississippi” status and bought a six pack of Fat Tire and watched “24” in our room at Orleans before heading out again. Some went to see the late show of “Sin City,” I went to gamble again at the blackjack table. This time, I finally had a nice session, and if I’d been pressing when winning, I could’ve recouped the whole weekend’s cost. But I stuck at $5 even and won 24 units, +$120. I went to the poker room to square the room rate and they were very cool about it. They had said 3-4 hours per day, could be combined with a roommate’s play, and I’m not sure they even checked it – they recognized me from the prior night when I asked about it and just filled out the slip without checking any hours while I was there (maybe they checked after I left).

Tuesday, we woke up and watched a freeway chase in LA on CNN (weird), checked out (poker room rate saved us $190 on the room for 4 days), ran to In-N-Out one more time (the under came in with only 2 meals there in 4 days), then back to Orleans for a final hour at blackjack. -$35.

This year wasn’t as good as last year, where I didn’t have to visit the ATM the entire trip, but based on my card-dead run, the nature of $2-4 suckouts, and the amazing # of 12s I hit when doubling down, I felt okay about the results. I lost $210 gambling for the weekend ($90 each at blackjack (9 sessions) and poker tournaments (2), $10 at live poker (6 sessions), and $20 at sports/keno/video poker).

[parade]

You have a leak in your game, blackjack. I have the same leak, but I am learning to live with it! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[ShadowBJ21]

Dump Black Jack or learn the basics of card counting!

I played +EV Black Jack for several years but decided to focus on Poker now because I'm tired of the "Hit&Run" approach.
But I will still play BJ for comps - you get much better comps than in Poker!

But I am amazed about one thing:
The first thing an Advantage Player in BJ learns is that you should only play +EV games. This includes (besides Poker) Craps (if you do it for comps) and VideoPoker. But it definitly isn't Casino War, Roulette or any other carnival game like "6:5 Single Deck" etc.

After I went deeper into Poker I realized that it is an entire different game to BJ but the basic principles (the math, the "long run" approach etc.) are very similar. I think that made it much easier for me to understand Sklansky, Mamuth etc. quite fast.

So I expected that the "+EV Game principle" is an important rule in Poker too. But I came across so many people that have good or at least decent knowledge about the game of Poker (so they will most probably win in the long run) but burn their hard earned money on -EV games.

Shadow

[CMP]

[ QUOTE ]
You have a leak in your game, blackjack. I have the same leak, but I am learning to live with it! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

Lol, I knew that would draw some attention here.

I play blackjack only once a year, in Vegas, and usually only after poker (to wind down with something social) or when I only have an hour to play (I don't like playing poker on a time limit, if possible). When I'm not "vacation gambling" it's only poker for me. :-)

MP