#127 - Two to Savor

I am honestly not writing this to brag. At least, I am not writing it ENTIRELY to brag.

For the second time in four days, I won the $13,000 Guarantee on Full Tilt. I want people to know about this for the simple reason that I spent a year learning how to play tournament poker from a dozen of the best in the world. My education is being published in book form and on June 1, when Warner Books releases THE FULL TILT POKER STRATEGY GUIDE: TOURNAMENT EDITION, everyone will have a chance to learn what I learned.

When you think about it, with that kind of education, the surprising thing would be if this DIDN’T happen sometime. I’m not saying I know everything those pros know, or that the things they taught me I completely understand and apply. But I got a big leg up on the online tournament poker world and the results bear that out. Naturally, I’m hoping to take my game to the Series and do some damage on a bigger stage.

Each of the wins was interesting in its way. To start, I have to recognize that I was the beneficiary of a lot of good luck. You can’t possibly win one of these things - much less TWO in such a short time - without both getting lucky and opponents not getting lucky against you at a key moment. In fact, I took a ton of chips from the same guy near the end of BOTH tournaments by getting lucky. In the first tournament, it was after the chips were in the pot. Last night, it was calling a raise from the big blind with Q-7 and catching a flop of 7-2-7. The guy lost a lot of chips with T-t on that hand, and later said, “No offense but I can’t explain how much I hate you right now.”

The most interesting thing about the first win was that, with 90 players left (we started with 307), I was 90th in chips. I had 500 chips and the blinds were 120-240 with a 25 ante. It took me about 30 hands to get off the mat and build a little bit of a stack, including a couple hands where I got all-in with the best hand and lost.

This is what I owe succeeding through that situation to: (1) understanding the simple business of the hand values and the odds when you are short-stacked; (2) getting lucky (the two times I “got unlucky”, it was after I had built a few chips and was facing all-in opponents with even shorter stacks than mine, like having A-7 and getting called by Q-7; winning some coinflips; tripling up in a three-way pot with Q-Js against A-5 and K-T; and usually having the best of it when I was called and having my hand stand up); and (3) other players making crucial mistakes. For example, when the blinds were 150-300 (plus a 25 ante), I had just 1,100 chips left. On the button with Q-7s, the only action in front of me was a call by a player with 1,700 chips. I pushed all-in. I didn’t necessarily think I’d have the best hand or that I wouldn’t have to show it down. I figured the big blind and the short-stacked limper would both have the odds to easily call. My hope was not to be dominated and to take my unpremium hand and triple up or be done. My biggest fear was that the limper was slowplaying a monster. I’ll never know because the big blind and the limper folded.

In the second tournament, Full Tilt announced that it was going to close down the site at 6 AM EDT for maintenance. There was about an hour and a half left in the tournament, and we had just gotten into the money. I was besieged with questions about what would happen. Like I know ANYTHING about what goes on. I don’t know how many times I said “Tournament Rule 31.3″ and pasted the URL for the tournament rules. It was mostly the rail, but I was asked numerous times, “What does the rule say?”

Essentially, everyone left standing gets paid the next-place money. Then everyone gets their buy-in back. Then they divide the remainder of the prize pool pro-rata by chips. I got some good cards at the final table and also noticed that no one wanted to play a hand as we got close to closing time, so it became easy to steal. When the site shut down, I had over 300,000 of the 723,000 chips in play, and there were seven players left.

I’m reluctant to call something a “win” when there are still seven players left, but I had such a big chip lead that I actually received MORE than first place money according to the Rule 31.3 formula.

I’m not making more of these tournament wins than they are worth. First, I benefited from tremendous advice, and I am sharing that advice with the poker world on June 1. Second, I got the balance of luck, as the tournament winner always does. Third, to go from 500 chips to winning is probably the most remarkable single tournament feat I’ve accomplished, though everything had to go right during a crucial period for that to happen. It’s my payback for busting out of the $400,000 Guarantee last Sunday with A-Q when, after I raised, the big blind moved all in with 6-2o and hit a six and a deuce. Fourth, when it’s not going well, I play so many tournaments that it REALLY doesn’t go well. Between March 23 and May 4, my buy-ins and juice totalled $11,000 and my cashes totalled $3,000. In that time, I cashed in 11 of 120 tournaments, less than the average you’d expect from a winning player but not ridiculously so. I finished in the money in the $750,000 Guarantee and finished second in a WSOP Bracelet Race event. But still, $8,000 loser.

And if I get a swelled head, all I have to do is play some more $50 SnGs. There is always someone at those $50 tables who has unlimited energy for telling me what a terrible poker player I am.

On the other hand, I hope you’ll sign my petition to have the $13,000 Guarantee Tournament renamed “The Michael.”