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#057 – FTOPS Main Event – Final Table – Part I – “The Wine and Clonie Slowed Me Down”
The gated community in which Robert Williamson III and his wife Cate live is so new that my navigation system, named Elle MacPherson because it shares an accent with the Australian supermodel, can’t find it. I am racing to watch Robert, under the nom de plume “Miss Lulu,” play the final table of the FTOPS Main Event.
It’s 2:01 AM and if my calculations are correct – and they are, because I have watched the end of almost all these tournaments – the break has just ended and ten players remain. But I have reported the end of the other events from the comfort of my office, and here I am at a neighborhood gate that is not accepting the entry code.
I call Clonie Gowen, who turns the phone over to Cate. She confirms the code, so we conclude I am parked in front of the wrong gate, in the wrong neighborhood. She carefully explains how to get to their neighborhood nearby, and how to navigate my way through its cul de sacs, courts, and other nicely-named dead-ends to get to their house. The reason I have Elle MacPherson riding shotgun is because I am directionally addled and the process is excruciating for me and probably worse for her.
But I make it.
The Williamson study is crowded. Someone playing online poker late at night would find it cozy, wedged in behind the double-sided desk, the rows of bookshelves, and the credenza, all containing hints of the fame and success of the owner. But on this occasion, in addition to Robert, there is Clonie Gowen, Cate, me, three computers, the last dregs of an excellent bottle of wine, and an assortment of tankard-sized wine glasses.
I sneak in over Robert’s left shoulder. There are still ten players left so his table is five-handed. He has 4-3o in the small blind.
“Woo-hoo! Look, that guy limped under the gun. You know I’m calling. Any two. You know, I might flop 3-4-4.”
Another player moves all-in for 600,000 and still another makes it 2,000,000. All talk about flopping 3-4-4 ceases and we all cheer as the shorter stack loses and Robert “Dallas” Williamson makes his first Full Tilt final table.
Here is how it looks at the start of the final table, in clockwise order:
Miss Lulu 1.7M
MychCumstien 2.3M
traheho 2.4M
CoinFlip 800K
Boosted J 2.1M
bokpower 879K
Balforios 1.7M
THEOLDLION 730K
Tsarrast 3.2M
Blinds are 30,000-60,000, with a 7,500 ante, for a little while more.
The chip leader, tsarrast, finished fourth in the $300 + $22 buy-in FTOPS NLHE event a week earlier. Robert told me that he’s played THEOLDLION and he’s a “tough, tough player.” Several others, I learned, play pretty big online in cash games.
Cate notes, “Lulu’s the only girl at the final table.” We try to decide if bokpower’s icon is male, female, or trangender. I suggest Manga.
“A lot of animals, though,” says Robert. He counts five.
On the second hand at the final table, Miss Lulu picks up Q-3, the hand known as “the gay waiter.” When THEOLDLION raises to 277,000, Lulu folds.
“I hate laying those name hands down.”
“You could have flat-called the 277,000 and tried to make something of it.” Dallas acts like he’s nutty enough to try anything, so why not?
That’s a bit of a tricky-looking move, the short stack betting more than 1/3 of his stack, but not the whole thing.
traheho moves all-in for over 2,400,000. THEOLDLION calls with A-A, beating traheho’s 8-8 and doubling up to 1,500,000.
Miss Lulu gets no cards in the early going. I see Lulu fold T-5. “That’s a name hand, too. Woolworth. Five-and-dime.”
I start to tell Robert that the expression “twenty-three skidoo” originated in front of the Woolworth Building in New York, I think the better of it. I don’t want to be responsible for him playing T-5 in the future or, worse still, 2-3.”
Besides, at that exact moment, Robert’s connection to the tournament goes down. It has happened several times during the course of the evening and Robert has Clonie’s computer operating on a separate connection and another computer in a different part of the house trying to access the internet through a third means. Cate takes a computer outside to the very back of the property – it is 2:15 AM and pitch black in the Arizona night – to see if that improves the connection.
Within a couple anxious hands, the connection returns and is not an issue the rest of the night. (These problems aren’t always resolved so easily. Robert mentions one night when he lost a $90,000 pot with the nuts when he got disconnected.)
Right after jumping on to Clonie’s computer, Miss Lulu gets pocket sixes in middle position.
“I could do anything with this. I could raise it, I could muck it.” Clonie is pleading for him to muck it. I want him to raise.
The equation changes substantially when tsarrast, the chip leader raises to 270,000 immediately to Robert’s right. He folds.
With a connection finally restored, Lulu gets 5-5 in the big blind. “Whoo! This could be it! With these chip stacks, I’m moving all-in. I know that.”
“Wha-at?” yells Clonie, rebooting her computer to try for a fresh internet connection. (Notice how homemade remedies to internet connections bear a resemblance to eastern European home cures of a century ago.)
A player in middle position raised to 280,000, so this is not a hypothetical situation, not a matter of Dallas rousing himself in the middle of the night with false bravado to help finish the tournament.
It’s all or nothing with Presto.
Lulu decides to fold, and Robert and Clonie have a spirited discussion about it.
“He’s a good player,” Clonie says, “You have to give him credit for a hand, raising in middle position.”
“But he’s a good enough player where he could have made a move out of position.”
Then why not push? I asked. I wanted to see Robert be DALLAS, make the bold cowboy move. (Of course, I busted from this tournament early enough to enter and bust out of three more tournaments. And Clonie, though she, too, busted a long time ago, went out with A-A when all the chips went in before the flop in what was probably one of the biggest pots of the first three hours of the tournament.)
“I was re-raising, Mike, but the wine and Clonie slowed me down.”
As Robert folds hand after hand, I notice that Clonie is measuring her waist. There is a skinny tape measure in the study, so what better to do while watching your friend wait for cards than to take your measurements?
I see her peering at the tiny numbers. “Whatya got, Clonie?”
“Well, what should I do, my waist?”
“Whatever you want. I’ll put whatever numbers you tell me into my report.” Full coverage! I insist on it, and the folks at Full Tilt would accept nothing less.
“My waist is –“
We are momentarily distracted from learning Clonie Gowen’s measurements by word that Mike Matusow has made a surprise appearance.
An observer at the final table, Matusow announces that he is contacting support to see if there is a reason why several players at the final table have gotten disconnected.
Clonie calls out one of her measurements as 30. She says it’s her waist but it looks more like her rib cage, and she also has a sweater on. Clonie Gowen having a 30-inch waist makes about as much sense as Mike Matusow working for tech support.
Meanwhile, CoinFlip tried to make a move by pushing in with J-6. Boosted J calls in the big blind with K-J, but CoinFlip flips a 6 and doubles up.
Clonie takes her bust measurement and announces 34.
Hips? “About 35. 35-30-34. Seems a little weird, doesn’t it?”
“You DO NOT have 34 hips!” Cate calls out from the other room, interrupting her kitchen-internet-connection duties.
In a recount, Clonie’s waist measurement comes down to 28. American men can rejoice! Clonie’s waist is only 28!
At this point, Miss Lulu’s run of lousy cards includes 2-8o in middle position, the hand instantly known as Clonie Gowen’s Waist. “This is a perfect hand …” Robert says, sliding the bet-amount bar to the far end, 1,500,000, “… to fold.”
Cate’s still not satisfied with the accuracy of Clonie’s measurements. She grabs the tape measure and slides it around her hips as a control measurement. Cate is a very attractive woman with a nice figure, a matter of record because she has been photographed and filmed with Robert at numerous tournaments.
When Cate announces 37, Clonie says “maybe subtract an inch for the jeans.”
Everyone is jabbering about internet connection issues and body types, but we all shut up when Robert yells, “Ace-king in the big blind! Get it on, get it on, like Donkey Kong! ‘Cuz it’s goin’ in, goin’ in to the middle!”
There is a raise by Balfario. “240,000? I don’t think I have a choice just to call.” Miss Lulu pushes in for 1.47 million. Balfario folds.
As Dallas sings, “Let’s get this party started …” Miss Lulu is dealt Ah-Qh in the small blind.
It is folded around and Miss Lulu merely calls the big blind. MychCumstien in the big blind takes the bait, raising to 220,000. Miss Lulu comes over the top for everything.
Dallas is yelling at the screen. “How do you like that, two deuces? Two sixes? Ace-jack offsuit?” Mych folds.
As Dallas fills the room, Cate and Clonie are yelling for him to calm down. But that’s impossible when Miss Lulu picks up Kc-Qc on the button. Cate says “Calm down!” seven times in less than a minute. “He’s giving me a heart attack!”
Balfario raises and Miss Lulu does, in fact, calm down, and folds.
In the cut-off, Miss Lulu gets Ac-2c. Before Dallas can even open his mouth, Cate says, “Calm down.”
“Don’t worry. This one’s going up-scope.” Miss Lulu raises to 240,000.
traheho takes some time in the small blind and I predict he is moving in.
Dallas: “Yeah, he’s raising. But I’m ready for ya. I’ve got my glass of wine and I’m feeling gutsy.”
“Calm down.”
The only move traheho has shown is to push all-in and, in fact, he pushes all-in just before he would have timed-out.
Robert is quiet now, watching the illuminated screen as CoinFlip contemplates what to do. “I hope CoinFlip in the big blind moves all-in so I can fold and feel good about myself. I almost folded A-2 in that situation because I’ve been playing so many hands.” CoinFlip times-out.
In a voice barely above a whisper, Robert explains during his fifteen seconds of decision time, “I don’t know why but I think –“
Clonie: “You think you fold. That’s all you think.”
Cate: “Fold. Fold. Fold.”
Somebody yells, “Fucking fold!” (I’m not sure but it may have been me. I do recall saying, “You’re not a big favorite over anything.”)
Robert pushes the Fold button. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding.”
