December summary, live and online

Live tournaments

Ok, between November 28 and December 17 I didn't play any tournament online, I spent most of that time in Vegas concentrated in the Bellagio 5 diamond tournaments. I played the following tournaments in Vegas:

Wed-Nov-30 NLH $2000+80
Thu-Dec-1 NLH $2500+100
Sat-Dec-3 NLH $5000+150
Sun-Dec-4 NLH $1500+70
Tue-Dec-6 NLH $2500+100
Wed-Dec-7 NLH $3000+100

So, I spent $17,100 for these events, I cashed in two of them, and was out near the bubble on one more. My cashes:

4th place NLH 2.5k Dec-2 $33,830
18th place NLH 3k Dec-7 $2,320 (should have been $6960)

So, I won $36,150 for these 6 events.

I also played two NLH $1500+70 satellites to the main event

Sat-Dec-10 NLH $1500+70
Sun-Dec-11 NLH $1500+70

I was close in the first one, but I didn't win a seat, so I spent $3,140 playing satellites.

And of course I played the main event:

Mon-Dec-12 NLH $15,000+300 WPT

Since I didn't make the money, I spent $15,300 in this one, but I had 2% of SamENole and he cashed in the event, so I won $644 courtesy of this nice Florida boy, who happens to be a hell of a poker player, ranked #2 in the internet poker tournament world

I also spent like $2000 for my almost 3 weeks stay in Las Vegas Strip Hotels, Imperial Palace, Bellagio and the Aladdin.

As you can see, even with a final table at an event full of the best players in the world; I'm about even for the trip !!!
Well, for me, since I consider all the 10k plus events separately; this was a very nice trip (worth like +15k) and I'm glad I decided to go, I won some money and I'm a better player because of the experience.


Online tournaments:

Back home, I decided to play online again, I'm basically an online poker player and I love to play in the internet. These are the tournaments I played between Sat-Dec-17 and Sun-Dec-25

Sat-Dec-17

NLH $640 Party
NLH $215 Party
NLH $1000 Pokerroom

Cashes: 0 for 3
Total : -$1,855

Sun-Dec-18

NLH $215 Party
NLH $215 Stars
NLH $109 Rebuys Stars (I spent $309)
NLH $215 UltimateBet
NLH $200 Paradise
NLH $216 FullTilt

Cashes: 1 for 6

17th out of 364 and won $546, NLH $216 FullTilt

I also lost $1000 on a side bet in PocketFives

Total: -$1824

Mon-Dec-19

NLH $109 Party
NLH $162 Party
NLH $109 Party
NLH Rebuys $33 Party (I spent $273)
NLH $162 Stars
NLH Rebuys $11 Stars (I spent $51)
NLH $150 Paradise
NLH Rebuys $30 Paradise (I spent $240)

Cashes: 2 for 8

1 out of 541, won $13,464 , NLH $109 Party
33 out of 392, won $275.92 , NLH Rebuys $33 Party

Total: +$12,633.92

Tue-Dec-20

NLH $109 Party
NLH $162 Party
NLH $162 Stars
NLH Rebuys $11 Stars (I spent $41)
NLH Rebuys $11 Stars (I spent $71)
NLH Rebuys $55 Stars (I spent $155)
NLH Rebuys $109 Stars (I spent $509)
NLH $55 Stars
NLH $300 Paradise
NLH Rebuys $30 Paradise (I spent $90)
NLH Rebuys $30 Paradise (I spent $150)
NLH $200 Paradise
NLH $57 Bodog

Cashes: 0 for 13 !!! I definitely went crazy this day playing too many tournaments with just 3 hours of sleep the previous night

Total: -$2,061

Wed-Dec-21

No poker at all, we have to take the kids to the doctor.

Thu-Dec-22

No poker again, I went with my wife Diana to the movies to see King Kong and Harry Potter IV. Both movies were ok, maybe I expected a little more from King Kong.

Fri-Dec-23

NLH $109 Party
NLH $215 Party
NLH Rebuys $33 Party (I spent $213)
NLH $162 Stars
NLH Rebuys $11 Stars (I spent $81)
NLH Rebuys $109 Stars (I spent $309)
NLH $300 Paradise
NLH Rebuys $30 Paradise (I spent $180)

Cashes: 4 for 8

44 out of 924, won $739.20 , NLH $215 Party
5 out of 417, won $2,136.75 , NLH Rebuys $33 Party
6 out of 53, won $904 , NLH $300 Paradise
? out of ?, won $207.04 , NLH Rebuys $30 Paradise

Total: +$2,417.99

Sat-Dec-24

NLH $320 Party
NLH $162 Party
NLH Rebuys $33 Party (I spent $243)
NLH $320 Stars
NLH Rebuys $109 Stars (I spent $409)
NLH $216 FullTilt

Cashes: 3 for 6

14 out of 199, won $597 , NLH $320 Party
14 out of 276, won $351.90 , NLH $162 Party
23 out of 368, won $257.88 , NLH Rebuys $33 Party

Total: -$463.22

Sun-Dec-25

NLH $378 Party
NLH Rebuys $270 Empire (I spent $810)
NLH $530 Stars
NLH $380 Stars
NLH Rebuys $109 Stars (I spent $909)
NLH $320 Pokerrom
NLH $109 Bodog
NLH $200 Paradise
NLH Rebuys $30 Paradise (I spent $90)
NLH $215 UltimateBet

Cashes: 4 for 10

141 out of 1891, won $480 , NLH $378 Party
9 out of 118, won $320 , NLH $380 Stars
1*(Chopped when 3 left) out of 181, won $12,668.87 , NLH Rebuys $109 Stars
20 out of 619, won $975 , NLH $215 UltimateBet

I won also a Play Station Portable in UB because they had this promotion and I knocked out Shawn Rice from the tourney.

Total: +$10,503.87 + PSP

Mon-Dec-26

No poker, I decided to rest since I was so drained from the Sunday tournaments.

Dec 27-31

Most probably no poker at all, since we are traveling to visit my sister and mother. I'm planning to play the Sun-Jan-1 tournaments and try to start the new year with a bang.


So, I made the money 14 out 54 tournaments with 5 final tables good for about 20k in this 7 days of online playing, which is pretty damm good.

If you have any questions or comments about all this information, please don't hesitate to ask.

Feliz Navidad !!!!

Espero que todos pasen una muy feliz navidad y prospero año nuevo. Que el 2006 les traiga lo mejor y que todos sus deseos se hagan realidad. Espero que disfruten enormemente estos dias en compañia de los suyos. Para mis compañeros de poker, muchas mesas finales, buenos flops y no bad beats !!!!!.
Disfruten a los que aman, disfruten todos esos pequeños momentos, la vida esta aqui, ahora !!!!

Inducing a call online

This Monday, I won the Party NL $100 with 541 entries for $13,464. I returned to play online this Saturday after like 3 weeks in my Bellagio adventure and it is nice to have a big score this fast. I want to share one hand in the final table that I think was one of the most important ones to win the tourney. This final table was really interesting and I have to apply myself 100%.

#Game No : 3232310675 ***** Hand History for Game 3232310675 *****NL Texas Hold'em Trny:18436110 Level:19 Blinds (5000/10000) -
Tuesday, December 20, 05:03:22 EDT 2005

Seat 9 is the button
Total number of players : 4
Seat 2: sirio11 ( $207824 )
Seat 3: McScott ( $150692 )
Seat 5: RJA34 ( $113274 )
Seat 9: Noodler11 ( $69210 )
Dealing down cards **Dealt to sirio11 [ 6s 6d ]
RJA34 calls [10000].
Noodler11 folds.
sirio11 calls [5000].
McScott checks.
** Dealing Flop ** [ 2d, 2c, 4s ]
sirio11 bets [19000].
McScott raises [59200].
RJA34 folds.
sirio11 is all-In [178824]

McScott will be using his time bank for this hand.

sirio11: "J high no good"

McScott is all-In [81492]

** Dealing Turn ** [ Ad ]** Dealing River ** [ Td ]

McScott shows [ 4c, 8c ] two pairs, fours and twos
.sirio11 shows [ 6s, 6d ] two pairs, sixes and twos.
sirio11 wins 57132 chips from side pot #1 with two pairs, sixes and twos.
sirio11 wins 311384 chips from the main pot with two pairs, sixes and twos.
Player McScott finished in 4 place and received $3646.50
McScott has left the table.


This player had been playing real aggressive, always playing back at me; and I decide to wait and wait for an opportunnity where he was going to overplay his hand.
I bet the flop, he raised me as always, but this time I went all in and he went to the tank; since he was taking long time to call, I was sure he had the 4; so I came with the idea to write "J high is no good" to try to induce a call from him; and it worked, after I wrote that he made the call and he was gone.

Back home !!

De regreso a casa y a jugar torneos online; me siento muy bien despues de mi experiencia en el Bellagio. Siempre estos torneos te ensenan mucho, si sabes aprender, claro esta. Mis proximos torneos grandes seran en Enero en Bahamas y luego Tunica. Por lo pronto a jugar todos los torneos importantes online. Este Sabado el del millon en Party y el de 1k en Pokerroom y el Domingo todos los grandes, esperemos que haya suerte.

The day before

Tomorrow I will be playing my most expensive tournament ever. The 15,300 Main Event at the Bellagio. They are expecting about 500 entrants, and that means first prize could be easily more than 2 million dollars. It was funny to walk to the cashier and register for the tournament with 6 chips, 3 white 5k ones and 3 black $100 ones; the annual salary for so many people; and here I am spending (investing) it for the right to play one poker tournament. The relativism in the value of money; but to be honest that is one of the things I love about being a poker player; the fact that, ironically, money is after all not that big of a deal. Well, I promise in a future entry in my blog to expand my thoughts in this concept.

The plan for today is simple, I'll stay inside my hotel room with basically 2 things to do. Study some general concepts for the tournament, especially some situations that I think I'm misplaying. I also have to input the final grades of my students at UTEP; this week probably will be the end to my career as a professor and the beginning of a full time career as a poker player. I have no regrets at all, this is what I am, this is what I want to do, and my family is 100% behind me.

My family is here, my beautiful wife and my 2 sons, they travelled to be here in Vegas all this week, I really missed them the last week and a half and I'm really happy they are here now.

So, all I have to do now is to play perfect, focus, and try to make the most of my share of luck in this tournament.

Play perfect every hand, enjoy the ride. Life is good.

$4640 lesson

Well, I just talked with Jack McClelland and of course they won't change a thing; but he gave me a comp dinner for 4 though; I guess my most expensive dinner ever.Well, lesson learned, even if it sucked I should have waited for a direct statement from the tournament director at that point before calling with my chips. I'm pretty sure he didn't say a word when I asked because he didn't want to affect the other 2 players, but still I didn't have to act and I should have demanded an answer from him before acting.I'm pretty sure my internet background affected me in this one. When the guy went out in the other table in the internet that's an automatic 20th place and then hand by hand start, since the other guy in my table has almost no chips, that was an automatic 19th in my head, for some reason, I still asked !! but in the heat of the moment and with so many people talking I took the lack of answer by the floor as a confirmation of what everybody was saying; a $4640 mistake I'm pretty sure the other 2 guys in the bubble really apprecciate.On a more important thing, I really need to work in my enjoying of tournaments results; when I'm playing I feel great, but after my 4th place finish and this bubble I felt so frustrated. Twice in the money out of 6 tournaments played and I feel so bummed; how sick is that.

Frustrating bubble Bellagio 3k

Ok here are the facts

20 people left playing in tables A, B and C.

18 places are paid.

18th paid $6,960

Blinds are 1k-2k with 300 ante

I have about a 32k stack

I'm playing at table B

A guy in my table just lost a big hand and announces he's all in in the dark with less than 1k.

I'm dealt 77 UTG, since I want to be sure the AI guy is gone and want to win the blinds, I raise to 8k.

UTG+1 calls and JC Tran in the button calls.

Pot is about 31k

flop comes JJ6

I check, UTG+1 checks and JC Tran bets about 8k

then I started to think and think

I know JC knows the bubble situation and he knows the AI guy has a random hand

I spent like 5 minutes and decided to call

Somebody went AI in table C and lost

19 players left

Hand by hand is announced

Turn card a Q and I check in the dark

Nobody noticed my check and after like 5 more minutes somebody calls the clock on me.

I told JC I already checked.

He then proceeds to bet like 20k

I have like 15k left and the pot is like 65k

18th money and 10th place money are almost the same

The floor is at my table

So, I asked that if I call and lost, Am I the guy with the bubble money?

I'm just thinking about the AI guy (with 1k and random hand and me)

.Somebody in the table (maybe possible even in the rail say yes)

The floor didn't say a word

So, I'm assuming it's true and make the call

JC Tran has TT and bust me out

After some minutes, I'm told that we're splitting 18th money 3 ways !!!!

The guy in table C, the 1k guy and me !!!

I go nuts and I am pretty mad because the floor didn't say a word when I asked.

So, instead of paying me $6960, they are giving me $2330

I'm just so frustrated now

Final Table Bellagio !!!!!

This Friday at 3PM PST I'll be playing at the final table of the 2.5k tournament.

The chip counts are:

J.C. Tran 290,000
David Cossio 199,000
Anthony Reategui 183,000
Scotty Nguyen 159,000
Eugene Katchalov 115,000
Rodeen Talebi 105,000
Jeff Cohen 68,000
Orlando Maldonado 66,000
Bobby Orr 31,000

And the top heavy payout

1st $234,095
2nd $124,030
3rd $62,015
4th $33,830
5th $25,370
6th $19,730
7th $14,095
8th $11,275
9th $9,020