246 runners showed for the $200 Binions tourney today. $6k in chips played much better than the $5k in chips given to a $150 buy in. Early on I suffered a few beats and was down to less than $5k when it folded to my button and I made it $150 to go with T,5. The BB called and the flop came T,5,3. Villain checked and I bet $175. She raised me to $500 and I flatted. The turn brought a 2 and she lead for $1,600. This looked like the time to shove and I pushed in for $2525 more. She called with QQ and bricked the river.
An orbit or so later it limped to my button and I oddly called with 7,3. Normally I’d raise or fold this hand, but decided to be gentle with my button. The flop brought 7,4,3 and before I knew it I was all in against 5,6. Thank goodness it was the shortstack who only had $2k.
My stack was around $7-8k for the next hour. Nothing was happening, but I did notice one player loved to blast preflop. These kind of players tend to never be able to fold a big hand. I limped with 2,2 and two others limped before this guy made it 1,100 to go. In a cash game, this is a fold due to the lack of correct odds with only 7k total in chips. In a tournament, you’ve got to chip up somehow and this seemed like a good shot to take. Nobody else came along. The flop came T,9,2 rainbow. I called his $1,500 bet. the turn brought a somewhat nerving jack and he checked. Here’s hoping I didn’t just get slapped on the turn… all in for ~4k. He takes little time calling with his A,Q and I fill on the river 9. From this point forward, the tournament was mine.
I got moved to a new table and in the first hand picked up KK. 4 called my raise and the BB shoved with TT. I shoved over the top and flopped a king to end his life. At this point I was the chipleader in the tournament and we went to our first break. I had 4x the average stack, but that proved to be awful because my table was in push/fold mode and I could not use my stack for bullying.
Eventually they started catching up in chips, allowing me to change gears on them and I became hyper-aggro. This worked for the last 20 minutes before the table broke and I got moved to a new table. I 3 and 4 bet a few pots and never got called, chipping up to an impressive stack without ever showing down a hand. I amassed a stack of $50k which was certainly top 5 with 50 players left when the following hand took place.
A 30k stack was in the BB and was a pretty creative player. UTG raised the 800/1600/200 blinds to 3500 for the second hand in a row. It folded to me in the cutoff and I flatted with A,J. The button shoved for 5200 more and it folded back to the original raiser who called, leaving himself with about 15-20k behind. I knew I should have shoved over the top here and just had this odd feeling that he had AK or AQ and I’d regret it for the rest of the tourney. I called, too. Flop came K,J,x He led 5k into the dry side pot and I angrily folded. He shows K,Q and button shows A,9. Turn 9. River Ace. I’m so incredibly pissed at this point that I played it so poorly and lost out on a pot the size of an average stack. I played it horribly. Within the next orbit, I had AQ lose to AK and a whiff with KJ against a guy calling my raise and leading into me on a 10 high flop. This took me down to 23k at the dinner break with 41 players left and the money being top 20.
I didn’t get a chance to shove for two orbits and finally got it folded to my button and I shoved my final 13.8k blind and both blinds folded. I looked afterwards to find 8,2 off. The next hand folded to my cutoff and I tried again (dark, of course.) for 18.8k. It folds to the BB who calls and shows A,K. That’s about the worst hand I’m going to see other than the monster pairs. I find Q,7. The flop brought 3 clubs and jack high. Villain had the K of clubs. Turn was the miracle offsuit queen and he rivered a king and I busted 36th for another frustrating deep run gone AWOL.
I look back to that single A,J hand to be the absolute turning point in the tournament. I play that hand correctly and I’m cruising into the money and probably the final table. Wow, how one mistake can kill you in this game.