19 entries, 10,000 chips per player
tournament duration: 5.5 hours
difficulty: 2/5
variance: 1/5
performance: B+
Jan.2, 2016
First hand I played, minimum raise 98 suited in position. 4 Callers. Flop 567, made straight.
Small blind bets all-in, everybody folds, I call. He had 2 pair. Dealer ships chips. I smile a little and tried to be quiet.
Next hand I minimum raised again with AA in middle position with AA. Flop K Q 5. Small blind bets out every street and I call every street hoping that he does not have KQ. He shows KJ and chips go my way, I have 30000 chips and the early chip lead.
Once I got to that amount of chip, I tried to play tight and be selective of the spots I play. I did not want to get involved too much because there is still a lot of players on the table. I was at 70 big blinds and most of them are playing 20 big blinds or less so no need to rush. They are the ones who are under time pressure by the levels coming up.
I found JJ for my next hand and could not pass up playing it. I bet minimum raise. I get called by 1 player on the button. Flop comes J 8 6. I have top set and I check hoping he has big hand like AA or 88 or 66. Flop is low card. I bet half pot hoping he will raise me back. He just calls. River is a T. I think for 10 seconds acting weak, implying maybe I have AK and no pair. I bet all in hoping the other guy has a big hand but he fold instantly so I guess not. I tried to go big bet because I am thinking he will have very hard time folding AJ or lower set.
Next hand I found AK but no pair on the flop so I fold to button position player on a low connected board.
Next hand I found 77 in early position. I decided to fold it for reasons of protecting my chip lead by not messing around with the smaller stacks who could easily shove on my face. I'd rather keep my chips and reach the next levels cruising with 50 big blinds and watch other players eliminate each other. The fold turns out to be correct as 2 players went all in pre-flop. Flop comes 7 K 9. I flop bottom set if I didn't fold my hand and would've stacked both of them because both only had 1 pair. Anyhow, I was happy with the outcome because I was still chip leader by a mile. I didn't feel it was worth the risk because I am already in a position that is quite indestructable at 50 big blinds deep and most of the other players were just 10 big blinds deep.
I learned most of these players aren't really counting their big blinds because everybody is just waiting for a monster hand like AA and KK or QQ. That's what most of their minds are focusing on, is that "If I can only get a monster" and no one on the table really was trying to steal pots or 3 bet. It was really inactive table. If you are getting action, probably strong range or good connectors like JQ or JT or better.
I tried to eliminate one short stack player by going over the top with 66 hoping he had AK when he called. He had JJ. I hit my set on the flop but he made a straight on the river. I was down to 40 big blinds but then most of them are at 8 big blinds.
There really was no reason to rush as the levels are not so fast and the players are really quite predictable.
I was able to reach last 10 players table by folding garbage hands.
On the next table. I had about 40 big blinds and there were 3 players there with big stacks I wanted to avoid. As the blinds went by, one of the big stacks was down to about 10 big blinds. I learned that they really not paying attention to what other players are trying to accomplish. Everybody was just trying to wait for big hand or fold. This gave me opportunity to try to use my tight table image and steal a few pots unchallenged to those who have very low aggression factors. And nobody tried to fight back which enabled me to slowly vacuum the chips without resistance.
It is nice to know the aggression and 3bet tendency of each player as it gives you an idea who to steal chips from. The others will give way if you project a tight image. That's all they thought about and didn't take notice I was slowly increasing my aggression factor everytime they get notified that the blinds are being raised.
The people on the table just focused how many chips they have and how much the blinds will be deducted to their stack. The important part in a poker tournament is focus your brain processing power in finding instances where chips can be had without a lot of resistance. If you are getting a lot of resistance, you probably are playing against a big hand so pay attention what you have so you can guess intelligently which combination you are up against with. There only a few combinations in poker so it is not very hard to figure out. This enables you to gauge your options if you want to take a chance so you get more chips or you hold back and try to find a better spot next time to vacuum the chips without resistance.
There is also value in not eliminating right away the short stack players in the tournament. With the big stack, I try not to isolate the short stack players and finishing them off early. The reason for this is because you can consider them your storage device for chips. They can still get lucky and win pots against entitled and overly aggressive players that will try to underestimate them because of their table image and appearance. Anybody who is still live in a tournament still has a chance no matter how few chips they have. If these short stack players are not very good at the game, it will be much more easier to pick them off and isolate later on when they have gathered more chips for you.True enough, the shortest stack on the table was able to triple up on this tournament and gather about 15 big blinds which was above average that time. I was able to isolate him and make a pair versus his A high. But he caught an Ace on the river to win the pot. That brought me down to 30 big blinds, still chip lead.
Still the others have not caught up what I was trying to do and I was able to gain back the chips up to 50 big blinds heading into the final 5 players.
The other players basically just let the cards decide their fate by fighting for their tournament lives pre-flop. I was able to make the final 3 players by stacking 2 other players in 1 hand by hitting trips on turn and full house on river.
3rd place got chipped away by my aggressive moves of simply raising to their limp ( just calling ).
Heads up was little exciting for me as the other player has some sort of read on me that I am just acting like a fool. He was aggressive in position and was able to even the chip count from my 2:1 lead.
The prize difference was $50 bucks. We thought it wasn't a whole lot so we will just play the best way we know.
I tried to confuse him by mixing up bet sizes. It was going okay but when I was big blind I could find any combination to the board which makes it hard to continuously bet the streets. Heads up is a very different game from full table play. He showed intelligence for having which hands to play short handed / when there are 4 player or less in the table. I give him credit for his knowledge and I didn't assume he had air with 1/3 stack pre-flop bet sizing when he played his hands. Those are massive bets and I took a chance calling a couple of them to set a mine / trap but they didn't pay off as I could not get a pair or set to detonate it with. That brought the chip count to almost dead even with me just having a 2 big blinds ahead of him.
I notice he was very particular with how much chips he had. I decided to attack this tendency of his. He used most of his brain processing power to count how many chips each of us had. So I decided to steal hyper aggressively by shoving every hand.
Naturally, any person who wants to survive an attack will focus on defending himself. He did that by folding. I was able to gain chips but not significantly due the very slow blinds increase of 20 minutes per round. I was stealing pots but not gaining a lot. He warns me by saying he will catch a hand soon and it will be over if he does and I continue to bet all in recklessly.
I have played a lot of heads up poker online. Each player is different and every player can change gears any minute. I decided it is a good time to tighten because he verbally notified me that he is changing his strategy. That is as much information as you can get in a poker game.
Timing is one of the weapons you can use but if you notify them of your intentions, you give away a clue.
I am sure he thinks I would like the game to be finished because of my hyper aggressiveness. In fact, I did want the game to be over. But that is an image I want him to exploit because he does not know when I will be setting a trap for him based on that fact.
Sure enough, I minimum raised with KK on the button. The small raise was a trap for him to assert his dominance on the table. He was consciously playing the match and I am glad he was because most of the others weren't in it much.
I was getting distracted by dealers and the organizers because they were packing up. Well it was getting late and they were volunteers so not much incentive staying out in the blizzard for two dicks playing chess late in the evening.
I was happy to catch him in my trap and go all in for all of my chips with KK vs A9 in a flip for the tournament. The Ace on the river meant I was going home with $170. I gave $60 to the tip box and got a hug from the nice and lively dealers.
I felt crushed in a way and also delighted and also sweating in the blizzard outside. The game got me feeling several things at the same time.
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