|
|
#1
11-16-2004, 09:15 PM
|
|||
|
|||
Vegas trip report 11/5 - 11/13 (long)
Friday, 11/5
My flight left Minneapolis about 15 minutes early (9:15 PM) because all the passengers were on time and boarded the plane early. We landed in Las Vegas 30 minutes ahead of schedule. At first I thought this was great but alas, the pilot told us that our gate was still occupied by a plane. We had to taxi for the entire 30 minutes while we waited for the other plane to leave our gate. I finally got checked in at the Imperial Palace at about 12:40 AM. Let me just say right here, the Imperial Palace is pretty much a dump but for it’s price it is in a great location. My goal for this trip was to start out at $2-4 and then move up a limit every day until I had played $15-30. The highest I had played in any B&M is $6/12. I had taken $3000 from my online account and decided this was the trip I would give the higher limits a shot. So, I throw my bags into my room and head back down to try and look for the poker room. I sat down with $100 at a $2/4 table just to enjoy the atmosphere and celebrate the long anticipated trip. Shortly after I sat down, a couple guys (obviously gay) showed up. They were dressed very nice and you could tell they had money to throw around. Anyway, almost every pot was raised two or three times before the flop. I suffered from bad cards and was unable to capitalize on this situation. My review on this poker room is pretty bad. Obviously the players were not very good but the room is tiny and the felt on every table was worn. The cards were flimsy. They felt like the kind of cheap card you could buy at a grocery store for $0.50. I played for 3 hours and lost $18. Saturday, 11/6 Now it was time to move up to $3-6. I headed to the Mirage, got on the list, and was seated by 2:00 PM. This was a day from hell. Talk about bad cards. I played for 12 hours. In that time, I got pocket kings once, pocket queens once, and pocket tens six times. I lost with ALL of them. A nice lady sat down to my left at 7:00 PM. We had fun. She listened to me complain about bad cards, etc. When she left at 12:30 AM, she made the comment to me that she never saw me win a pot. She was right. I had gone the entire 5.5 hours that she was there without winning a single hand. The table was great too! I just didn’t get any cards to work with. When I did, the flop was a HUGE miss. The lady to my left liked to lead out with a bet when she hit any part of the flop. The guy to her left would raise no matter what to try and get heads up. It didn’t take long to figure out that if he was re-raised, he would call if he had something and fold if he didn’t. He did very well for the first 30 minutes until everyone caught on. Anyway, I played 12 hours and lost $260. It was the second day in a row I had terrible cards. Sunday, 11/7 Today the plan was to play $4-8 at the Bellagio. I decided to make a slight adjustment to plans. It was raining outside. I decided not to make the walk to the Bellagio in the rain. I also had only 3 hours of sleep that first night and only 5 hours of sleep on this night. I decided today I would take a break from Hold Em and walk across the street and watch the NFL games at the Mirage. I had 8 solid plays I wanted to make. I placed $100 on the Chargers and $50 on each of the other 7 teams. I ended up winning the Chargers bet and going 5-2 on my other bets for a nice profit of $250 for the day. At this point, I went back to Imperial Palace and proceeded to feed the slot machines for a while. I wanted to build some points so maybe they might offer me free hotel stay in the future. I lost a couple hundred playing slots but earned enough points to have free buffets for the rest of the trip. I made sure to get some decent sleep tonight to catch up. Monday, 11/8 Now I pick off where I left off with my plan and head to the Bellagio for some $4-8. On this day, the cards finally came. I was dealt a lot of multiway-type hands and the flops were smacking me. I don’t remember much about the competition on the table on this day but I don’t think it mattered the way the flops were coming. I played for 6 hours and won $314. Tuesday, 11/9 On this day, it was back to the Mirage for some $6-12. This would equal the highest limit I have ever played. Despite that fact, I had plenty of money with me and played without fear. I felt very comfortable and before I knew it, I was up a couple hundred. This was the type of table I had pictured Las Vegas to be like. None of the players at the table were terrible. There were rarely 3 bets before the flop. When there were raises, most gave respect to them and the flop would be with 2-4 people. So, I guess most would consider this a tight table but I think the way I play, I am better suited for this type of game. After about 6 hours, I started thinking more and more about how I had not really gotten great starting hands the entire trip. In fact, I had gotten pocket aces only once so far the entire trip. That leads me to my bad beat for the trip. I guy had just sat down in the BB. We had to listen to this guy complain about people chasing him down at the $10-20 table and hitting miracle rivers. Then, in his second hand with us at the table this happens: The cards were dealt. UTG raised. I re-raised from MP3. SB called 2.5 bets. UTG raised again. I capped it. SB called 2 more bets. The flop came J 9 5 rainbow. UTG led out with a bet. I raised. SB called 2 bets. UTG re-raised. I raised again. SB called 2 more bets. UTG capped it while the SB and I called the final bet. The turn brought a 2 of the fourth suit. UTG bet. I raised. SB called 2 bets. UTG just called this time muttering something about me having pocket aces. I heard him mutter it and knew he had pocket kings. The river paired the board with a 9. UTG checked. I bet. SB raised. UTG and I just called. UTG did indeed have pocket kings and SB flipped over Q9. Half the table gave this guy a look that went…pot…kettle…black…and he noticed it. He responded with, “I just had a felling”. He left about 5 hands later. I decided I better quit for the day too because I was pretty much ready to tilt and didn’t want to give back my profits on this day. This was the second time on this trip. I had received pretty bad cards on this trip so far and this happens. I played 7.5 hours and won $161. Wednesday, 11/10 Despite the way the previous day had ended, I was proud of myself to still be ahead. IT was now time to continue with the plan and head to the Bellagio for some $8-16. On this day, I had a guy sitting to my right who was playing like money meant nothing to him. He had two $1000 chips and a big wad of bills on the table. He would straddle every round. He would bluff and call to the river almost every hand. If I thought I had bad cards on the two previous days, it was nothing compared to this day. I am not exaggerating when I say my most popular hand on this day was 74. I am not joking when I say I got this hand about 25 times on this day. I even started showing the guy next to me when I would get it back to back. Everyone was telling me to loosen up and I told them it was impossible to do so with the cards I was getting. I didn’t want to leave the table because the guy to my right was just throwing his money away. The problem was, I couldn’t play with the cards I was getting. I got blinded away for most of the day. I played for 10.5 hours and lost $428. Thursday, 11/11 Today it was back to the Mirage for some $10-20. After yesterday, I was really starting to question whether I should go any higher. I decided to bite it and go for it. I had a plan for this trip and that was to gain some experience at some higher levels. I had taken money I could afford to lose, so I went ahead and got on a list. Let me just say right now, this was the best day I have ever had playing Hold Em. The table was full of players that would respect a raise except for 1 or two people that would sit down and lose their money to us for about an hour each before getting replaced by another. I didn’t get pocket aces on this day but I did get pocket kings, queens, jacks, tens, you name it. And with the table the way it was, it was easy to control . When the flops hit me, the chasers would call it down. When the flops missed me, the tight players would fold to my bets. I won a couple large pots early and quickly earned table respect that never went away the entire 6.5 hours I was there. Before long, the table broke up. A couple of the guys sitting next to me were very nice to talk to and were also holding their own. They told me I would have absolutely no problem playing at higher limits. In fact, they told me to skip the $15/30 game and go directly to $20-40. They told me my game was better suited for the blind structure the $20-40 game has to offer. They told me I would get blinded away at the $15-30 game because of the $10 SB. Anyway, due to reasons I do not wish to explain right now, I had to check out of the Imperial Palace and check in to the Hampton Inn on Tropicana. I like this place because they have free shuttle rides to the Bellagio and when I return for the night there is no temptation to play slots or other games. I had played for 6.5 hours and won $1091 and decided to leave to take care of my lodging when the table broke up. After checking in to the Hampton Inn, I decided to catch a shuttle to the Bellagio and just relax for the rest of the night at the $4-8 limit. Nothing eventful happened. I played for another 3.5 hours and won $35. Friday 11/12 Despite the advice given to me by the people I had played with the day before, I decided to not play over my head. I decided to sit down a $15-30 game at the Bellagio. This ended being my biggest regret for the entire trip. Once again, I didn’t get any good cards to work with. In 3 hours, my best hands were JJ, TT, and AK. All of these hands missed the flop and lost. The rest of the time I pretty much got blinded out, just like those guys told me would happen. I won two decent sized pots with 87 and 98 in the BB when I hit straights on the river. The rest of the time I was miserable. I didn’t know how to handle the small blind. 5 players limp and I have 82 in the small blind. Do I complete for the additional $5? I didn’t do it. But, those were the types of decisions I was faced with the entire time. I kept telling myself I needed to loosen up but I didn’t think that was the right way to do it. I played for 3 hours and lost $607. At this point, I just wanted to stay up but I didn’t want to quit playing. I jumped on a $4-8 table and proceeded to lose another $147 in 5 more hours of play. One thing I should note here. On this night, Gus Hanson was playing the $1.5K-3K table. At one point I got up just to take a look and he had about $700,000 sitting in front of him. I asked the dealer what the minimum buy in for that table was. He said the minimum was $40,000 but most sit with at least $100,000. My flight was supposed to leave the next day so I decided it was time to head to Déjà Vu and relax for a while. That was one of my better decisions on this trip. Saturday 11/13 I had time to play some $4-8 for 3.5 hours before I headed back to Hampton Inn to catch the shuttle for the airport. I won $57. The flight was only half full so each of us pretty much got our own row on the plane. That was nice. ----------------------------------- Looking back…..I regret playing $15-30 and wish I had given $20-40 a shot. Not just because of the blind structure, but because the Mirage seemed to have a different type of player the entire week. The Mirage seems to have tighter players which, as I explained earlier, seems to suit my style of play better. Also, I played a total of 60.5 hours. In that time I won a grand total of $177 playing Hold Em. I won $250 on the NFL. After paying for taxis here and there, meals, Déjà Vu, and losing some on slots, I came home a little down for the entire trip. It was still a great time and I think I gained some valuable experience playing at the higher limits. I found out I am every bit as good as those who I was up against. They simply have more bankroll than to throw around than I do. In 60.5 hours I had been dealt pocket aces 3 times. 
|
|
#2
11-16-2004, 09:37 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: Vegas trip report 11/5 - 11/13 (long)
Nice post, it was fun to read. It actually made me jealous as you had so much time to play poker and watch NFL games it just sounded great. Way to stick to your guns and try the higher limit games. I understand your frustration with cards, last time in Vegas I expected to mop up and watched poor play for 3 days but could never catch the cards to take advantage of it. It is so tough to sit there and watch. OK you had to know this was coming...
[ QUOTE ] Anyway, due to reasons I do not wish to explain right now, I had to check out of the Imperial Palace and check in to the Hampton Inn on Tropicana. [/ QUOTE ] Maybe in a day or two you will change your mind and elaborate on this a little... [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] -Mack
|
|
#3
11-16-2004, 10:12 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: Vegas trip report 11/5 - 11/13 (long)
Nice post. Funny how when you run bad live, you start getting paranoid about the tight image. What happened at Imperial Palace?
[ QUOTE ] Anyway, due to reasons I do not wish to explain right now, I had to check out of the Imperial Palace and check in to the Hampton Inn on Tropicana. [/ QUOTE ]
|
|
#7
11-17-2004, 12:40 AM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: Vegas trip report 11/5 - 11/13 (long)
[ QUOTE ]
Quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Anyway, due to reasons I do not wish to explain right now, I had to check out of the Imperial Palace and check in to the Hampton Inn on Tropicana. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Maybe in a day or two you will change your mind and elaborate on this a little... [/ QUOTE ] This looks bad. This was not my intention. Truth is, my brother was supposed to travel with me on this trip and he had FREE rooms lined up at the Stardust for four of the days during my stay. The plan was to organize hotel stay for each weekend and then then stay for free in the middle. I booked the first weekend for Imperial Palace and the second weekend for Hampton Inn. Well, my brother then found out he was expecting an addition to the family and decided it was best to stay home. I went alone and had to fill in those days we had planned that were going to be free at the Stardust. When everything settles and the baby comes, we will head out there again the second half of March for March Madness and A LOT of Hold Em once again!
|
 |
|
|
Linear Mode
