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#013 – FTOPS #2 – Final Update on the HORSE
With 31 players left, I IMed tournament director Disco Stu and picked my HORSE: Lichti42. Lich had a lot of chips and, according to the web sites that are popping up to track such things, success in the HORSE event. He (keeping in mind that I have no idea whether any of these competiors are male, female, chimpanzee, rock, or lizard) won the Sunday HORSE on January 21 and finished third on December 17.
By the time they were down to two tables, Lichti42 was still in it, but at the very bottom in chips. I was less confident, but noticed two things: (1) the amount of play in these events seems to vary; and (2) experience in the late stages of a HORSE event could be valuable.
I busted out 105th, about 50 short of the money. It seemed like the field contracted rapidly after that, and players continued dropping out fast after they got into the money. If you are low on chips, the tendency in a limit event (especially if you haven’t played a lot of them) is to PUSH. You can’t get all-in immediately, but you raise, or keep raising, to get yourself committed as soon as possible.
I know I do that, and I also know it’s wrong. (Actually, one of the benefits of watching these things is watching others make your mistakes as well as seeing how others avoid them.) I was counseled by some pretty good limit-poker players like Mike Matusow and Ted Forrest about NOT committing yourself to a hand when you are low on chips. Chris Ferguson, talking about short-stack play in no-limit poker, told me that you should try to keep a short-stack player from having a choice between playing for a portion of his chips or playing for all of them. Although you want to give opponents difficult decisions – a recurring theme of what he’s taught me – you don’t want THEM to give YOU difficult decisions: make them move all-in or fold.
In addition, you can live on a much shorter stack in limit poker. At eight big bets, it’s push or fold in no-limit poker. In limit poker, you may not be able to get all your chips in even if you want to.
I bring this up because it was interesting watching Lichti42 – and some of the other players who became short-stacked late in the event – maneuver chips. Lichti42 needed a little luck in a Stud EOB hand – a river card when he had the low to scoop when it gave him a flush to beat an opponent’s lower flush – but he made the final table. He lost two big pots in Stud and finished 5th.
Once they made the final table, suddenly it seemed no one was short-stacked. These players all understood how to combine aggressiveness with the control necessary to keep from getting too committed to a hand. They played 90 minutes at the final table.
After Lichti42 busted, ronancanning was the stort stack and he, too, stuck around awhile. After he busted, philmcgill opened up a chip lead over SGI1fan and PhilGordonsHOTT. He cleaned up in the hold ‘em round, finishing off HOTT and SGI during Omaha EOB.
The final table:
1. philmcgill – $28,450
2. SGI1fan – $18,777
3. PhilGordonsHOTT – $11,380
4. ronancanning – $6,600.40
5. Lichti42 – $4,096.80
6. Motorhead – $3,072.60
7. Getthecheck – $2,219.10
8. Arbol Linda – $1,650.10
Next up: Today’s FTOP #3, $300 + $22 No-Limit Hold ‘Em, hosted by Erick Lindgren. The prize pool is guaranteed to be at least $750,000. I’ll be playing and reporting, and probably playing in the $75,000 Mulligan that starts 65 minutes after we start the big event.
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