WSOP $2500 Hold'em/Omaha

bell_boy

Made it through to the second day of the $2500 Holdem/Omaha tournament after 8 levels and a grueling 9.5 hours that ended at 2:30am. Starting field of 457 is down to 85. Average chip stack is 26,500. I have 20,500 chips. Mark Davis is also still in with 57,600.

The very first hand cut my 5000 chip starting stack in half. The starting blinds are an unusual 50/75. I was dealt 99 in MP+1. Paul Magriel (the X-22, quack, quack guy) limps in MP. I call. MP+2 raises to 400. Paul folds. I think for a moment and then decide to call and try to flop a set. We're not quite deep enough for this to be perfectly correct (8000 chips would be better given I'm out of possition), but it's early and I'd like to have some chips. Flop is JJ7. No set, but a flop for which I could still be good. I check-call the 600 continuation bet. I could have probed here, but figure I'd stop and go if the turn isn't an Ace. Turn is another 7. I bet 1500 and BB insta-calls. I'm done with the hand and check fold the river.

I'm disappointed and a little uncertain whether this was the right move so early in the tournament. I start to calculate my “M” which is the ratio of my stack to the sum of the BB and SB. I'm partway through the mental arithmetic when I laugh out loud because Dan Harrington named this ratio “M” because Paul Magriel, the guy sitting to my right, proposed it as a way to evaluate where you stand in tournament poker. I'm back in good spirits and ready to find my spot to get back in the thick of things.

I get a substantial amount of my chips back in the 2nd Hold'em level about an hour later when Kenny Phan who has been raising a lot of pots, raises to 350 and gets 3 callers. I'm in the SB and decide this looks like a good time to pull the ol' squeeze play. I check my hole cards and feel more or less indifferent to my pocket 8s. So I raise pot which puts me almost all in. I'm relieved when the play goes as planned and everyone folds.

I double up later from the BB in Omaha when my 7 of diamonds and three over cards outdraws a guy holding 44xx on a 774 flop.

I received a gift when a "clever" play by an opponent became too cleaver. Paul Magriel on the button is short stacked on 1900. He bets pot behind a few limpers to raise to 1200. I call with TJQK no suits in the SB. There are two other callers. This leaves Paul Magriel with 700 chips. Flop is Q92 with two diamonds. I check the flop. MP bets 350(!) into a 5000 chip pot expecting Magriel to raise all in and letting him repot it. MP+1 folds and Paul mucks having missed it all! I call 350. While the concept was a good one, he was only going to make a few extra chips if any of us "fell" for it. Turn is a beautiful king of clubs. I pot. MP goes crazy and then finally mucks.

Play continued for several more hours, but nothing too memorable.

Play resumes later today with 400/800 Hold'em blinds and 300/600 Omaha blinds at 3pm.

Lawrence

mewso

Best of luck. Will sweat it on pokernews.

BigCityBanker

good luck again lawrence

(Table 24)
Seat 1: Alan Vinson -- 25800
Seat 2: Lawrence Cowsar -- 20500
Seat 3: Nick Frank -- 5500
Seat 4: David Bergerson -- 33400
Seat 5: Gabe Costner -- 32000
Seat 6: Jeff Duvall -- 18900
Seat 7: Tom West -- 20400
Seat 8: Zachary Hyman -- 46000
Seat 9: Russell Floyd -- 19000

(Table 28)
Seat 1: Ryan Carey -- 20300
Seat 2: Rolf Slotboom -- 17700
Seat 3: Jordan Morgan -- 46000
Seat 4: Brian Woods -- 13700
Seat 5: Al Adler -- 17300
Seat 6: Daniel Didech -- 23000
Seat 7: Mark Davis -- 57600
Seat 8: Kyle Kloeckner -- 65000
Seat 9: Stefan Rapp -- 13000

bell_boy

Finished 71st. Was happy enough with my play. Used my smallish-but-not-too-small stack to reraise enough to stay alive, and even prosper a little without having to see any flops. Two hands did me in. First was a pot I reraise on the button with kings double suited that crushed the original raiser but fell to aces single suited that the BB had. The other was blind defense with A9o loosing to the buttons KJo. Short of the money, but plenty of fun.