The Bat Cave

I actually didn’t know I was going to play this one, but after spending a week back in Washington and spending all my study time thinking about Stud 8 or Better, I saw this on the schedule and realized I could make a deep Day 2 run and still be able to play the Monster Stack if I so desired.

Plus, I wasn’t too fond of landing in Vegas at 12:30 am last night and having a 10 am start for the Monster Stack today. The O.E. tournament doesn’t start until 3 pm. It feels good to have slept in and still have three hours to energize myself.

Cards in the air at 3! I expect this to be a pretty star-studded field. Maybe I’ll finally get to play with a Negreanu, Hellmuth, or Ivey. Leggo.

I don’t recognize anyone at my starting table and that seems pretty fortunate for a $2500 buy in.

I’ll post stack updates on breaks. Starting stacks are 15k with 60 minute levels. Kind of surprised to see the betting limits starting at 200/400.

First Break

Wow. I have an amazing table. It’s 8-handed and I had determined that only one player at the table is tough. I’ve seen some absurd play in both variants from multiple players.

My key pot during the first two levels, I have Qd8d-4d and get the bring in with an otherwise super marginal holding. However, there are multiple limpers and someone with an ace up completes and only the 5d is dead, so I called the 200 extra at 300/600 betting limits.

On 4th street, I catch the Td and the ace pairs his door card. Meanwhile, I’ve seen 14 up cards and only one diamond that wasn’t in my hand. The ace leads out, I call and one other player does.

On 5th street I catch a low non-diamond and the aces catch a big card, and the other player has 9cKxAx showing. The aces lead, I call, and the other player raises! This is pretty shocking. Hard to figure what he has here. AcKc-9c makes some sense but the player with open aces has the ace of clubs showing m, so who knows. The aces just call and so do I.

I catch another low non-diamond on 6th and suddenly it looks like I have the only low draw and a super live flush draw. I check-call and we are still 3-handed to 7th.

I get the 6 of diamonds! That card pairs me so I don’t have a low, but that hardly matters. I lead, they both call and I scoop a nice pot.

A floor came over and high carded to move a player off our table and ended up taking the only good player and he immediately responded with “God-fucking-dammit” because he clearly felt the same way I do about our lineup.

Unfortunately, he was somehow replaced by Sandman. Wtf. Small world?

Still… we are on the far side of the room so hopefully the tables are breaking in the opposite direction because Sandman and I appear to be in a favorable situation.

21,200

Second Break

I have been absurdly card dead. That Stud 8 scooper is still the only real notable hand I’ve played. I’ve picked up some small pots here and there but otherwise I’ve been folding every single hand.

I got scooped by Sandman in a pot where I have AJ32 on K62hhhJh2 and Sandman has K62x, but it was a 6-way limped pot with only one bet on the flop and none on the turn, even though someone flopped the nut flush.

My table did add a poker legend in David Benyamine.

18,400

Third Break

Good couple of levels. No big scoopers but got half of some big multi-way pots. Finally a little momentum!

29,800

Fourth Break

We’re in this thing. One of the torchers at my table is betting out of turn on 7th with three pair in Stud 8 when my board is showing Ah9hQx4h… and the 235 in the hole! So huge scooper for me.

Also, Phil Ivey is sitting directly behind me.

Two more levels tonight.

52,200

Basically scrapped and clawed the last two levels. Dipped all the way down to 30k and rallied back in a big Stud 8 pot where I have a four flush on 4th, David “ODB” Baker is all in, and a third player is in there betting me on the side. I brick my flush, but river a pair of fives and that is somehow good for EVERYTHING. What a nice surprise.

So I busted ODB, which is cool, because he busted me in the 8-Game a couple years ago and I owed him one.

Somehow managed to bag near my peak.

Restart at 2 PM tomorrow. The only thing I know about my new table so far is that Phil Ivey won’t be on it (he’s still in though).

55,000

DAY 2

Here’s my starting table:

Probably not going to be many easy tables from here on it and this one certainly isn’t great. Alex Foxen is #1 in the GPI Rankings so he’s basically the top tournament player in the world right now. But he’s also a big bet specialist (and is double dipping here while carrying a big stack into Day 2 of the Monster Stack) and I’m not sure how adept he is at the mixed games. Chris Bell, Andrey Zaichenko, and Phillip Hui are all accomplished mixed games players though and Hui already has eight cashes and three (!) final tables in the 2019 World Series of Poker.

I’ll start the day 39th in chips with 128 players left and 61 of us cashing, so I’m in pretty decent shape to make the money right now but it would be really refreshing to get off to a fast start today and put this WSOP cold spell behind me.

Sandman is just behind me with 52.3k to start the day.

There are three other Washingtonians still alive and I’m familiar with Daniel Ratigan but don’t know him and Gregory Smith (Everett) and Kristy Means (Vancouver) I don’t know at all. I always like to see people from the PNW doing well here, so good luck to them also!

Ivey and Hellmuth still alive. Would be cool to play with either one of them at some point today.

Cards back in the air at 2 PM.

First Break

What a rollercoaster first two levels. I have a couple of really sick hands but not enough time to talk about them.

The good news is I am still in and I have more chips than I started with and around 40 players have busted already.

Actually… 80 left and I’m a little below average.

19 spots until the money.

60,800

Second Break

The streak is over! I cashed a WSOP event!

55 players are left.

Sandman still in also.

123,000

Dinner Break

Really don’t want to type about poker on my breaks, but the last two levels were really good to me, even though I made a mistake that led to a big loss on the last hand before break.

Real crazy pot with Andrey Zaichenko. He brings it in with 4d, I complete with Ac2c-4c, Chris Bell raises with a short stack, and Andrey raises when it gets back to him. I just call and Chris is all in. The pot is already massive.

On 4th, I get a 6x and Andrey leads with 48 showing. I love this spot, but I just call him with no immediate potential for high.

On 5th, I get the 5c and Andrey gets a jack, so I lead and he calls.

DK: Ac2c-4c6x5c

Andrey: XX-4d8xJ

Yum yum!

Meanwhile, Chris Bell’s board is bricking out. What a spot.

On 6th street, I make a wheel with a 3 and Andrey pairs his 8. I bet and he goes into a deep, deep tank.

Dear God. Is he actually going to pay this off? He does.

Huge scooper.

I think there’s about 37 left and average stack is around 162k.

206,000

Fourth Break

Still in. Didn’t bust like PokerNews said I did for a minute. 19 left. I have over 400k and average stack is 314k.

What a rush.

400k+

End of Day 2

I’m wiped. After peaking around 416k and being on a pretty good rush, things fell completely apart in level 19. I bricked some extremely strong hands and Shaun Deeb really put me in the fucking cage but wound up saving me because Danny Ratigan (Seattle!) ended up making a straight on 7th street. I won’t get into the details of that hand, but it was a brutal spot and Shaun got me to fold half of a very big pot and I would have got scooped.

I fell all the way down to about 130k but rallied back and ended up putting 387k in a bag.

There are 12 players left and I’m currently 8th in chips. Everyone is guaranteed $10k+ but there are big pay jumps starting at the final table and $213k and a bracelet at the top.

Let’s go get that tomorrow!

Day 3

Sorry… I barely had time to write yesterday and my wife is flying in today so I’m definitely not going to have time to write today. Best place to follow along will be on PokerNews or if someone here is updating progress on Facebook.