TOC Monday at Bullfrogs

Ok, I’m never going to get this updated if I don’t do it now. First I want to talk about this week while it’s fresh in my head and then I’ll go back and write down some of the details I remember from Vegas. So this week was Tournament of Champions. I qualified at all of the bars I play: Bullfrogs, OT, CJ’s, Airway, and Shorty’s. Monday night I started out at a table with Brian, Pat, Liz, and John. Normally I don’t like playing at a table with so many people I know but it worked out. Brian gave me chips the first hand when I raised with K,J and hit the K on the flop. Matt and Kyran came over to the table and a few hands later Brian went out. I doubled up nicely with pocket A’s through Matt and Liz. Blinds were 200/400 and Matt raised to 1200. I thought about re-raising but decided to trap him so I call then Liz raises to 3600 and Matt calls and I said ok, now I’m all in. It was only another 2100 or so over the 3600. I look over at Liz and say hey I was just trying to trap Matt. She knew what I had but still calls with her Kings. I hit an Ace on the flop and boat by the river. So that was a nice pot I took down. Turns out both Liz and Matt had pocket K’s. So I triple up to a healthy stack and then fast forward to the final table. We have Pat, Jim V, Sadot (sp?), George (not Cline), me, and hmmm I can’t think who else. Anyways blinds were 5/10k once we hit the white chips I stop referring to the thousands and start looking at it as chips again so blinds were 1/2 and I’m in for 2 in the big blind. George pushes all in for 4. It folds around to me and of course I’m chip leader so for a min raise I have to call with any two cards. I call with 8,4 and end up doubling George up. A couple hands later Jimmy pushes all in for 4 and I look down at A,6. I’m thinking man it’s only 2 times the blind but if I continue to call I’m going to start losing chips. I think it was going to be about a ¼ of my stack to call. I look over and see Pat in the blind for 2 with 1 chip left so I knew he was pretty much going to be force to call. So I’m thinking ok a chance to take out 2 players yet my Ace was weak so I folded. Jimmy flips over K,Q and Pat flips over 8,4 or something like that and first card out is an Ace. Pat ends up hitting one of his pair but I would’ve taken them both out with my Ace. Very next hand I get K,Q clubs and throw out 5 chips and Pat pushes all in for 3 or 4 more which means I have to call. He then flips over Aces and doubles up once again. After that I was stewing. I was so mad I didn’t call with my A,6 and take Pat out. A few hands later I get pocket 7’s and was going to push with it but Jimmy goes all in for 5 chips and dummy me I just call. I should’ve pushed and it would’ve been like 10 chips to pat but instead it’s only 3 so he calls. He had K,J and hits one of those cards. I asked if I pushed all in if he would’ve called with K,J and he said probably not. So I screwed up that hand too… From then on I was short stacked and we got down to 3 players, Pat, George, and me. I push all in with 7,8 diamonds pre-flop trying to steal the blinds but it wasn’t much more to call so both George and Pat calls. I flop an open ended straight but hit nothing but the 8 on the river which beats George but George had more chips then me, and we both lose to Pat’s Q. So I go out 3rd, with George 2nd, and Pat 1st. It was funny because George Cline wrote down odds on people and he gave me the best odds. 5 to 2. So if someone bet on me they would only get 2.5 to 1 on their money. Pat was 5 to 1. I can’t remember what the others were. I should’ve won that game but those 2 hands cost me. After that I was like ok, that’s fine. I’m glad Pat won and not one of the other guys I didn’t know. I said ok, that’s ok I’ll just win Wednesday now. I knew Tuesday was out, but Wednesday I knew I would win and I did.