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#186 – WSOP #35 – Gunfight in the Amazon Room
I’ll spare you the suspense if you don’t already know: I finished seventh in the $1,500 Mixed Hold ‘Em event. It was worth $22,000, though I was bitterly disappointed. I played really, really well for two long days and put myself in exactly the position I wanted. I even got good cards early. But everyone was so short stacked that every time I put a chip in the pot, I either ran into a bigger hand or someone who hit their draw. I don’t think it was avoidable.
I have a couple good stories to share but they’ll have to wait until I get back to Scottsdale. It’s almost 9 PM Tuesday and I haven’t started the drive yet. I’ll have time to write tomorrow.
Within a couple hours, I should tell you, the disappointment faded. I’m proud of how I did, and everyone else is, too. There was even a fight in the VIP lounge over who gets credit. (Admittedly, part of the fight was whether they were entitled to a percentage.) I give tons of credit to the 12 pros who collaborated on the book. There is no question that I am a dangerous tournament player because of what I learned from them and put in the book (so buy it!).
Chris Ferguson said, “Well, because it’s half limit hold ‘em, I guess I have to share the credit with Howard Lederer (who did the limit hold ‘em chapter).” Rafe Furst said, “Since it’s half limit and half no-limit, doesn’t that make it more like pot-limit hold ‘em than anything else?” Rafe, obviously co-write the pot-limit hold ‘em chapter, with Andy Bloch.
The money didn’t matter at first but later it did. I’m now above $27,000 on “this trip” as the pros refer to the World Series as a whole. That pays for all the events I’m entering, including ones I haven’t yet entered, PLUS the Main Event. So I’m even and freerolling from here on out. And let’s face it, as a guy who plays online under his own name and his own avatar, in a different color than everyone else, it’s helpful that I can say, “two cashes, one final table” when people ask me what I did at the WSOP this year.
Plus some more events AND the Main Event, which I think my performances this year have given me a key advantage in. (I’ll share it with you between now and then.)
I’ll try to write more tomorrow.
For people expecting some great insights on the HORSE, I hereby apologize. Even if I wasn’t on my own adventure, the Series sucked out almost anything special I could provide. They have security guards and floormen at almost every table. My media pass lets me in but the environment is much more formal this year. They spread the event over five days, so the late-late-late desperation that made the entries about HORSE from my previous blog so authentic just isn’t there. It’s like a country club there. And ESPN is filming during the final three days, so they have the area further cordoned off and the ability to get “inside” with my friends is nonexistent. It’s still a great event and it will make for great TV, but the personality of it just isn’t what it was last year.
