PLO Tourney... Great run, TERRIBLE exit.

So I'm just going to write quick notes here and fill in the blanks later.

Played in a $1,500 guarenteed PLO tourney with near 1000 runners. Out in 38th. Had trip 7's, made full house on the river. 7s full of 5's. River gave my opponent QUAD 5's.

I wish I had taken a screenshot of the hand, but I closed the box quickly in disgust.

I realize this is PLO, but it was my first PLO tourney, and I had a huge chip stack and was playing well, so it was a tough loss I must say.



Now I'm railing my buddy Norman "Thieveryhand" L who is playing in a $2.20 ($1000 guaranteed) with a total prize pool of $9,668.00

The tournament is 6 hours old, and Norm currently sits in 6th. He's been floating around in the top five, moving up and down a few spots depending on a certain pot. He took a 200K + hit right before this screenshot, effecting his position.

More to come on his run.

"Thieveryhand" has seen quite the rollercoaster since the previous update. Thats what you've got to love about poker. It's been 50 minutes, and "Thieveryhand" has been playing good poker.

He did double up "etrain469" when the train rolled in with pocket aces, but quickly doubled himself back up with the hand seen below. "Thieveryhand" got his stack all-in preflop with AQ, and was snap-called by the A10 of "POOOOOPER". Neither player hit the flop, and when fourth street and the river ran dry, it was "Thieveryhand" who was smiling, doubling his stack to 1.1 million, propelling him back to the top 5 of the leaderboard.



After the double-up, "Thieveryhand" was not letting up. He continued with the agressive play, constantly applying the pressure, and raising in key spots. Simply by applying pressure, and not getting into many races, he has been able to build his stack up to 1.65 million with eleven players left. I will add another screenshot of the leaderboard once the final table is determined.

Watchin' some poker....late night.

The above picture is of the final two tables of "The Nightly Hundred Grand".

There aren't too many runners left here who I can honestly say I'm familiar with, with the exception of "ImDaNuts". "ImDaNuts" was last weeks winner of the TLB(tournament leaderboard), which calculates TLB for every multi-table tournament that Pokerstars runs. So needless to say, "ImDaNuts" has been running very well lately. I will take more screenshots if any interesting hands come up in the final table.



2:15 am -- Starting the final table...



The above picture outlines where the chip stacks stood as we entered three-way action.



It didn't take long for action to pick up, as "metadonk" raised with A5 suited on the button. "viksha" as he had been doing for as late as I'd been watching him, called his raise out of position. In the near future, I will talk more about the theory of calling re-raising out of position late in tournaments, and what sort of range you are looking at in a position similar to this.



"metadonk" correctly got all his chips in after fourth street.. He had to think that his was as good as gold when flop came 9(C)10(C)5(D). When the 5(S) came on fourth street, making both players three-of-a-kind, you knew the money was going in, with "metadonk" WAYYYYYY ahead of "viksha", looking poised for a double up.



However fate had other plans for "viksha" and brought the 3(S) on the river to give him the full house, and setting ablaze the chat of fallen final tabelers, and supporters alike crying foul. For having watched the entire final table, I'd have to agree with the masses and say that it surely had to be "viksha"'s night. From start to finish, "viksha" didn't miss a beat, and ran extremely well, often coming from far behind to win massive pots.

The Super Tuesday on Pokerstars. 8PM EST LIVE BLOG!

As of 8:05 there are 278 Entrants, and 276 Players.

As of 8:43 there are 347 Entrants, and 321 Players. Interesting fact, the always respected Barry "barryg1" Greenstein was the second player knocked out tonight. I wonder if he got dealt pocket AA's, to suffer the same fate as in Bahamas when he lost with AA to eventual champ Harrison Gimbel who held 4/6 suited.... PREFLOP ALL-IN!

9:00 -- Registration is closed. 363 Entrants, 316 current players. A massive $363,000 prize pool!

9:37 -- People are dropping like flies. 235 current players. Some of the notables include Connor "Blanconegro" Drinan, Gavin Griffin, and Will molswi47 Molson who is coming off his impressive performance in the Bahamas main event.

10:35 Back after a break for food. Players are dropping at a crazy rate. 118 players left, at 150/300 blinds. Players knocked out recently include Havad "Rain" Khan, Vanessa Russo, and 1$ickDisea$E.

10:40pm --

Top 15

TranquilMind - 29600
TLWPB - 27600
kalixalven - 27700
Mara10 - 27200
bbs99 - 24400
daniel616161 - 23900
LeoFernandez* - 22600
wywrot - 22100
Ericb09 -19700
thechips55 - 18000
pddickens - 16700
PURPLE"K"99 - 16700
woft - 16600
dj_ponytale - 16500
sacrosane - 16300

11:00 - The third break. 93 people remain in what remains a star-studded field. Names near the top include Zackattak13 in 15th, D1rtyRiv3r in 17th, and x JDKILLERx in 21st.

11:40 - With 58 players left, and blinds at 400/800, the action is moving fast. "hanitz" is leading the way with 52300, and Dan "djk123" Kelly is up at the top in 7th with 38500 chips.


12:30 - The bubble has burst. 4 and a half hours in, there are 33 players left, with the average stack at 33,000 chips. "hanitz" is still leading the way with 73,00 chips, followed by USCswimmer with 65,500 chips. Andre Akkari is the lone Pokerstars pro left in the field, with 10,200 chips in 31st out of 33 runners left.

12:40 -- Akkari out in 26th place for $2,722.50 for his troubles. The last of the Stars crew to exit. Nice showing.

1:00am -- We enter play of hour 6 with 19 players left. The average chip stack is 57300, and STILL "hanitz" with 141,000 chips. He's having quite the run in this tournament here tonight. Second place "kleath" had the lead for a while before he was passed again by "hanitz". "kleath" sits at 118,000 chips.

2:00 -- It's on into the 7th hour of play we go, and on to the final table. The final table is as follows.

1st- kleath 215,700
2nd- hanitz 197,000
3rd- kalixalven 197,000
4th- thechips55 142,000
5th- 3s4o5r 82,200
6th- smokeysi 77,400
7th- jus2awsum 70,000
8th- bdubs3737 62,400
9th- D1rtyR1v3r 37,500

"kleath" and "hanitz" really have been trading this lead back between themselves for quite a while, and ironically enough have been sitting next to one another for the better part of an hour. "hanitz" has applied constant pressure throughout, reraising frequently, putting "kleath" specifically to difficult decisions on a number of occasions.

2:25 -- The first casualty of the final table. D1rtyR1v3r out in 9th, shoving preflop with J-10 offsuit under the gun. Somewhere my friend Wayne Lau is smiling. He was called by the pocket 10's of bdubs3737 and didn't catch any of the flop or turn cards.

2:40 First HUGE pot of the final table. "thechips55" went all in preflop with AJ and was called by the AQ of "hanitz". Dominated, "thechips55" somehow managed to spike a J on the flop to take the lead. The board would remain dry for "hanitz", losing out on a 254,650 chip pot, and leaving him with 120,000 chips.

2:45 Big pot do always seem to come in bunches, don't they?! Our second big hand also leads to our second casualty of the final table. "3s4o5r" got it all-in pre-flop with A10 off and was snap called by the pocket 77's of "kalixalven" sitting just to his left. The board didn't hit either of the over cards of "3s4o5r" and a 140,300 pot was shipped to "kalixalven" leaving him with 266,900 chips.

2:50 Third casualty. "jus2awsum" was all-in preflop with kj suited and was called by the pocket jacks of "kalixalven". No king came on the board, and "jus2awsum" was out in 7th, shippign 164,400 chip pot and a total of 369,500 chips to "kalixalven" for the big chip lead.

2:51 They are dropping like flies. "bdubs3737" went all in with Q-10 suited on a flop of 8-7-9, and as called by the K-9 of "hanitz". No J or Q came, and it was "bdubs3737" out in 6th taking home $16,000. Not bad for a night's work. "hanitz" now has 214,000 chips after that pot.

2:55 Players are on a break. Chip counts are as follows:

1st kalixalven - 399,100
2nd hanitz - 214,300
3rd thechips55 - 211500
4th smokeysi - 153,000
5th kleath - 111,100

Blinds are at 4k/8k with 800 ante.

3:05 The action really picked up before the break, but I figured with the money getting a lot bigger that things would definitely tighten up and start playing out at a slower pace. BOY WAS I WRONG!!!! It wasn't five minutes in before we saw "kleath" with A8 off-suit, against the AJ off-suit of "thechips55". Trip 8's came on the flop for "kleath" and he didn't look back, taking a huge pot, and crippling "thechips55". "kleath" would finish the job the next hand, knocking "thechips55" out in 5th, collecting over $20,000 for his efforts.

3:08 Less than three minutes later we would see another knockout when "hanitz" and his A10 off-suit did battle against the KQ of "smokeysi". It wasn't to be for the short-stack when the ace came on the flop to seal the fate of "smokeysi", out in 4th collecting just under $30,000 for a job well done. What an excellent display of playing the short-stack. He seemed to always be one wrong move away from elimination, but kept making the right plays. WELL DONE SMOKEY!



3:09 We were now three handed. The chip stacks were:
kalixalven- 453,530
hanitz - 374,820
kleath - 260,650

The stacks would really mean nothing as we would only stay three-handed for ONE HAND! Truly breakneck speed since the final seven, its been fantastic to watch! On the first hand three-handed the AJ suited of "kleath" would go up against the QQ's of "kalixalven". They both got it in pre-flop and the flop came 9-K-4 rainbow. Fourth street was a 4 which was no help to "kleath" as he would need an ace on the river to avoid elimination. The river came off a 6 and "kleath" would walk away with JUST under $40,000 in 3rd place.


hu- kalixalven 706,200... hanitz 382,800

3:17 After seven minutes of heads up play it was over. Having entered heads-up play with a serious chip advantage, "kalixalven"(706,200) really too the play to "hanitz" 382,800, never taking his foot off the gas pedal.

In what would turn out to be the final hand, "hanitz"(200,400) really put on a clinic of what not to do heads-up when he checked his pocket 10's after the limp-in. "kalixalven"(869,400) had Q3 of spades and when the flop came 7(S)2(C)A(S) he had to be happy. They managed to it all-in then and there, with "hanitz" not believing his opponent had an ace. He would be right, but would eventually succumb to defeat when a 10(S) came on the river, giving "kalixalven" the flush, and leaving "hanitz" to think what could have been. "hanitz" is taking home $52,635 for an excellent night of poker. He was up at the top of the leaderboard for quite a while tonight!

The champion "kalixalven" takes home $70,240 for just over seven hours of work. Thats basically $10,000 an hour to play the greatest game on the planet. Pretty amazing the thrills poker can bring to the best.

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So the tournament is still 10 minutes away while I write this, and yet already the field is stocked with the creme de la creme of the Pokerstars Elite.

To name a few:

1$ickDisea$E 9:45 Not much from him here tonight, never got it going. Out in 214th place.


aakkari* 9:10 -- Andre "aakkari" Akkari is in nice position with 5100 chips.

blanconegro 8:12 -- Connor "Blanconegro" Drinan up 3800 chips early. Nice start for him.
9:30 -- OUT!

ChadBrownPRO* 8:26 -- Chad Brown is down to 1880 chips early on. He has some making up to do.
9:00 -- Chad Brown knocked out just before the break.

D1rtyR1v3r 9:50 -- Quiet night so far for one of the best tournement players out there. He still has chips to play with (3750).

DuckU 9:53 -- At a super-tough table including some of the best out there, (Moorman1, Grey Poopon) Greg "DuckU" Hobson still has a stack to play with at 6800 chips.

GavinGriffin* 8:49 -- Gavin Griffin is at 5255, leading the way for the team Pokerstars pro's early on here.
9:17 Gavin just took a big 3300 chip hit. He held KK against AQ and an ace came on the flop.
9:30 -- OUT!

lilholdem954 8:05 -- Chad "lilholdem954" Batista just took a big hit early, and is down to 1500 chips.
8:22 -- He's back up to 2300. Fighting back like the champ he is.
9:35 -- OUT!

Princesa* 8:30 -- Veronica "Princesa" Dabul is at 3370 chips, sitting at the same table as ChadBrownPRO and blanconegro.

PureCash25 9:41 -- Still around in good position sitting with VARICO, at 5550 chips.

VARICO* 9:41- Sitting at a table with PureCash25 at what seems like a tough table. Doing well with 8350 chips.

x JD Killerx 8:40 --He has done well early and is currently in first place with 8400 chips.

Zackattak13 9:55 -- Zackattak13 continues to quietly build his stack and stands at 5550 chips.

I will keep a live tally of all of these players throughout the tournament, as well as the top 15 in chips.

As for my picks, I'm going to choose two players. One has been running very well lately, the other not up t his usual standard.

Greg "DuckU" Hobson hasn't been seen much late in the big tournaments. After a stellar end to 2009, it's only a matter of time before one of the best online tournament players turns it around, why not tonight.

My pick to take this tourney down who has been playing well lately is 1$ickDisea$E. The kid has simply been one of the best online lately, across all four main poker sites, but especially on Pokerstars.

The asterisk (*) symbolizes a team Pokerstars pro.

Posting the big blind, throwing in the ante, deal me in.

So I've decided to start a poker blog (if that wasn't already evident), but I'm hoping it will be more than that.

What I'm looking to get out of this is simple.

I'm looking for a place to be able to document my adventures in the game of poker so that both friends, and potential new friends will be able to keep up with my exploration of the game, and game theory.

I'm looking for a place that will allow me to keep track of my results in cash games, tournaments, and sit-n-go's, and hopefully help others in realizing what works and what doesn't in terms of profiting from the game.

I'm also hoping that by maintaining this blog that my creative writing skills will improve, allowing me to vividly describe to whoever may choose to stumble upon my blog, what is going on in my life, both inside and out of poker.

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Of all the influencing factors, the Pokerstars WBCOOP events were really the thing that pushed me over the edge in deciding to start this blog. I'd always thought of starting a blog, but I didn't really know what to use as my focus. I don't live an exciting enough life to use that as the basis, but when Pokerstars advertised this, I thought EUREKA! I am passionate about poker, and feel I have enough of an opinion and knowledge of game strategy, that poker would be the perfect "crutch" for my blog, this starting my career as a blogger.

By no means am I a pro poker player, but I do consider myself quite the enthusiast. I often find myself staying up until the wee hours of the morning (EST) to watch a tournament in it's entirety.

The one thing I will be very excited to do is to provide live blogging of tournaments of all structure and all size. I think I will start tonight with the Pokerstars "The Super Tuesday." This tournament has a gigantic $250,000 GUARANTEED! The tournament starts at 8PM EST, and with a buy-in of $1050, it's sure to attract some of the biggest names that play on Stars!