FULL TILT POKER BLOG

#291 – Full Tilt Prose

Posted by Editor | Filed under Uncategorized

Today, November 26, is the one-year anniversary of my breakthrough tournament on Full Tilt. I finished fifth in the first running of the $350,000 Guarantee and earned $20,600. (It’s now the $750,000 Guarantee, though fifth pays just $33.200.) It’s my biggest cash on Full Tilt and, though I’ve won a lot of tournaments during the year, my weakest results have been in the biggest events. I wanted another big score; the time seemed right.

I noticed a higher than usual contingent of Full Tilt pros in the $750,000 Guarantee, which got me thinking ….

First, I figured there REALLY is NOTHING to do on the Sunday after Thanksgiving if you don’t like mobs at the shopping malls. 27 Full Tilt pros signed up for the Big Game.

Second, how are the pros doing these days? As you know, I’ve documented the pros’ performance during the previous two series of FTOPS and it hasn’t been pretty. (See posts ## 229, 290) Because I hung around a long time in the Guarantee, I saw enough to be pretty pleased with how the Full Tilt pros performed. Out of over 4,000, 19 made it through half the field. I noted that with 1,348 players left, there were 12 pros left. After 3 hours, with 1,000 players left, the same 12 were still standing. 9 pros made it into the money. (I think it’s pretty impressive that the tournament paid 585, or 13% of the field but 33% of the Full Tilt pros made the money.)

The best finish was by Paul Sexton, 57th place, worth $1,449. (Paul eliminated me with 2-2 after a 2-4-4 flop; I had A-A.) All three Sextons cashed, with Matt finishing 515th and Keith busting 126th. I had my run-in with Keith, too. In the HORSE, he was on my left and very low on chips. We both had garbage hands in a blind v. blind situation and I made trips and got him all in on the turn, only to have him it his flush draw on the river. After that hand, I said to Keith, “From now on, if I see any member of your family on the street, I’m going to just going to cross to the other side.”

It’s ironic how the Sextons stomped me at the key times yesterday. A year ago, Keith was the first Full Tilt pro I busted when I knocked him out of the $350,000 Guarantee on the bubble. I had a bunch of chips and raised in late position with Q-To. He moved in from the big blind with A-K. I was getting about 2-to-1, called, and hit. There was a big and active rail watching Sexton and some of those people heckled me for the next three hours.

In the end, the pros came close to cashing for the collective buy-in, but didn’t exceed it. Total buy-ins for 27 players came to $5,832. Total cashes were $4,945.20. It was actually a good result considering no Full Tilt pro came close to the final table. But obviously, not a profitable one.

This leads me to question the benchmark for performance. Clearly, profitability is the goal, but it’s just as clearly an elusive one. My Full Tilt buddy RaidenRadio developed a relative benchmark and the results surprised me. He posted about it on PocketFives.com and I recommend you look over the details.
http://www.pocketfives.com/f7/ftops-events-ft-pros-vs-p5s-part-ii-47232/?postid=47232#post47232.

He decided to compare how the number of Full Tilt pros entering each event of FTOPS VI compared with the same number of top-ranked PocketFives.com players did. (He also did this for FTOPS V.) For example, if 15 Full Tilt pros played a particular event, he would compare their performance with the top 15 PocketFives.com players who entered.

The thing I found interesting about the results was that the top-ranked PocketFives.com players also lost money. I mean, Full Tilt could be choosing its pros for reasons not correlating to performance – like an author or a UFC personality, or even someone whose live tournament or cash-game results make them one of the best in the world but could have little to do with online tournament performance. But any decent ranking system of online tournaments, and I’m sure they have a good system, chooses its best by the sole criteria of online tournament performance.

The Full Tilt pros outperformed the PocketFives.com best players, but that’s not even the point. The point is that you have to win or come close several times to be a successful tournament player if you play a lot of tournaments. And even if you’re a Full Tilt pro or one of the best players based on a performance-based ranking system, there’s a good chance you’re not going to get there.

The other thing I thought was great about RaidenRadio’s thread on PocketFives.com was a reply from GambleAB. GambleAB is Aaron Bartley, who single-handedly elevated the pros above the Fivers with his fifth place in the $2500 + $120 event. GambleAB wrote: “I take back everything I said. This is an incredibly fair system and clearly shows which group has the most skill.”

All of which proves my point: It’s hard to succeed in tournaments and figuring out how after the fact is deceptively and misleadingly easy.

SHOUT OUT TO YUVEE04

My man, Yuval Bronshtein finished second in the HORSE last night. Congrats to the guy who beat him. You really gotta be on your game[s] against this guy. There were 176 entries – was that a record for the Sunday HORSE? – which again shows that there wasn’t much to do yesterday if you don’t like crowd. I think the cold front suits Full Tilt well.

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