I want to elaborate a little on Monday's session. It was a good night - but not an easy night. I was at a $25 NL table and was able to nearly triple up, but then it leaked away gradually so that, when I left the table, I was only up about $20. I wanted to play a $10 tourney and so decided to hop over to a $1/2 table to 'earn' my entry fee - this is a new discipline measure. If I want to play a tourney I have to 'earn' the fee at the ring games. I did this three times - the first 2 times I was out fairly early from 2 wild tables of limpers and family pots. In between the tourneys, I played a ring game to gain my entry fee back and try again. The third tourney was the one in which I placed 2nd. It was a 'saner' table in that, although there was still a lot of limping, they were fewer multi handed pots and the talent seemed to be fairly evenly matched, if chip count was any judge. On hand #23 I played a hand with my first absolute stone cold bluff in a tourney and was the critical hand of the tourney for me.
Over the weekend I returned to the source, so to speak, and began re-read #umpteenth of the NL section in Super System. There were a couple of principles that I decided to work on in my play. One was to not slow play sets, the other was the raise as added value. Now these don't necessarily have much to do with the bluff in the tourney, but Papa Doyle's experienced voice was whispering at the back of my consciousness, nonetheless, when I was dealt As-9d on the button with T800 stacked in front of me. The table folded to me and I decided to go for the blind steal - with A-9 it wasn't a bad risk, of course. The blinds were still low at 15/30 so I tossed T100 in there. The SB (at T540) folded and the BB (at T1535 - and second in chips) of course called - it was only T70 more for him to do so. I was trying to steal with a plastic water gun. I didn't fire any real ammunition at the blinds - T100 was a weak play against a large stack, I could hear Doyle's admonishment in my ear.
The flop of Ts-Kh-Qh helped me only slightly by giving me a gut shot strait draw. BB bet out T100...into a pot of T215. He under bet the pot. If I've learned anything from playing at Party Poker, it's that an under bet in NL usually means one of two things: your opponent hit big and is setting a trap or your opponent missed or hit small or a draw and, in his inexperience, weakly bets out at the flop. Nine times out of ten, it's the latter that is true. When I've come up against that in ring play, I will usually raise and will usually get the pot right there. This guy had demonstrated this same weakness before, so I called.... yes - called! I clearly had 2 choices here - fold or raise - calling was telling him I was as wimpy as he was. This was a tourney, not ring play, you cannot be passive in a tourney and expect to win - it won't happen!
The turn was 4h and he bet T90 into a now T415 pot - only 90 - a 10% sale on his last bet. I thought a long time on this one. He didn't re-raise me before the flop. He under bet the pot on the flop. He under bet (even less) the pot on the turn. He'd been a passive player all the way to this point from the beginning of the tourney - except when he'd made his hand. I concluded that he did not have KK or the flush, but that he was probably on a pair of QQ or TT or, at worst a draw. But I also wasn't sure that he wasn't just sucking me into a trap. I decided to trust my initial conclusion and so I raised to T180. He called. Not what I wanted him to do.
The river was the 8h. I had done a good job of painting myself into a corner. What started as a steal attempt was turning into a botched robbery. I was ready to stick out my hands for the cuffs when the guy checked. Checked....checked. He checked. I felt strongly that this was not a trap. I thought if he had a pair, the only way I was going to get this pot was to represent the flush and bluff it. And so I did - I went all-in and he folded. After that hand, I changed gears entirely. I got out of weak/passive mode and ramped up the aggressiveness. I trusted my reads and it got me to second place.
This tourney was a great lesson. I plan on continuing my 'play for the entry fee' strategy and do more as they are proving to be good training ground. I want to vastly improve my tourney play and to apply concepts from my study of the tourney play. I do have visions of sitting next to Oprah for the Women in Competition with Men and Winning! show after my win at the WSOP some day. I did tell you I have a healthy imagination, didn't I?
Now let's rewind and play this hand as it should have gone. On button with A-9; all fold to me; I raise all-in for the steal; SB & BB fold. Done.
