Rob Herd was kind enough to host the July 2014 tournament in the beautiful suburbs of Pasadena. This is Rob’s first hosting and very much appreciated. It was a great setup and I personally thank him for his hospitality. We had 24 players come out for a night of poker. Our average tourney size over the last 10 years is 20.5 so this was an above average turnout and more so because July usually sees some tapering off of players.
In uncommon fashion, the July tourney saw 3 new players enter the archives of the RPTDB: Karen Perticone, Don Berry, and Ken Boles. Karen is the “lady friend” of our own loved Voldemort who, in the literary sense, never had a “lady friend”… and yes, I googled that to be sure. I am not as up to date on my Harry Potter trivia as you might think. This was Karen’s first poker tournament ever I believe so congrats to her for taking the plunge into the degenerate world of poker and welcome to the RPT. Don Berry is a friend of Rob Herd and, unlike Karen, has played some poker before. Ken is a friend of Tony Huckestein and from his email address, I assume he is a beer brewer as well. We are certainly cornering the market on poker playing beer brewers. On behalf of the RPT, I welcome you all to our poker playing family.
As with all tournaments, we had to have a Beer Bitch and Brandon Smyth was the unlucky recipient this month. This was Brandon’s first ever Beer Bitch finish. His career at the RPT has been short with only 7 tournaments played but Brandon has shown himself to be a pretty consistent player, finishing in the top half or higher of 5 of his 7 tourneys. Don’t worry Brandon: it happens to all of us eventually… oh, except Tony who has 7 wins and has never been Beer Bitch (but has two 2 point tourneys).
As far as some hand highlights in the tournament, Don Berry’s first ever RPT hand ended up giving him a full-house on the turn… which turned into quads on the river. Don had some players in the hand with a nice flush draw showing on the board and was disappointed that he didn’t win more… but that is a great way to start a tournament.
Another hand had two players all-in before the flop and they both showed… POCKET ACES. Aces vs. Aces in the same hand pre-flop. The odds of this happening is roughly 0.013298% or 1 in roughly 7,520. That is pretty amazing but horribly not profitable as there is a 95% chance of a split pot. You have to love it when these super rare events happen in live play. I wish I had a picture of it… but I don’t… (Thanks to Schilling). J
I would be remiss to not point out just interesting turns of fortune throughout the tournament (and more of that later). I watched Craig Bare (AKA DJ Leko) burn through a very sizable chip stack in 3 straight hands. Craig lost a big hand calling Ken’s all-in who had made a flush on the river. The next hand, Craig then called Rob Herd’s all-in with K-Q against A-J. Craig even said “I am behind” before he called I believe and then the next hand Craig was all-in and lost to be out of the tourney. They always talk about “Going on Tilt” and I would have to say that was a pretty good example. Craig is a hell of a player though and I doubt this one incident will change that.
Our final table for the evening consisted of: Newcomer Ken Boles, Dan Ferris, Rob Herd, Me, Voldemort, Glenn, Tony Huckestein (shocker), Jason Trueman, and FedEx.
Voldey was the first one to leave the table. Trueman called Ostendorf’s all-in and Voldey knew he was behind as soon as Trueman called. Earlier in the night, Voldemort was saying that he never does well in a tournament if he is an early chip leader. Voldey had lost about half his stack early and then one a little pot and said “this is where it begins.” Throughout the night, we kept referring back to that statement whenever he won a pot and he was playing solid poker. When Trueman put him out, Voldey goes over to the sign-out sheet and simply says “And this is where it ends.” Good stuff and a classy way to leave a tourney. Voldey sits in third place in the RPT standings – one point behind Nita.
Yours truly was the next one out and lady luck has decided to stick it to me two tourneys in a row in a very similar fashion. Blinds were 150-300 and I have A’s. Dan makes it 900 pre-flop. If he thinks his hand is good for 900… maybe he will think it is good for more… I go all-in with a raise of roughly another 1800 or so on top. He calls. I have Dan covered by 25 chips. He shows 9’s. The best part is that he has the two red 9’s and I have the two red A’s so a flush draw can’t hurt me. Pre-flop, I am an 81% favorite to win the hand. The flop comes out 7c-6h-8h which now gives Dan an open ended straight draw. With this horrendous flop, I am now a 62% favorite to win the hand… The turn brings the 5h giving Dan a straight. Jesus. I am now have a 16% chance to win the hand because I need a heart to give me a flush. No dice. Js. I get my 25 chips back and I am out soon thereafter. The real kicker is that I lost the same way to Grover last month when my 10’s got beat by his 8’s. Just a real bummer but I take solace in knowing that I am playing smart poker and getting all of my chips in the pot when I have the best chances to win.
The next two people out of the final table is Rob and Glenn in a mammoth pot that gave Dan Ferris more chips than everyone else left at the table… combined. Dan was going into the final 5 with a HUGE stack of chips. Since the tournament only paid the top 4, someone was going to be on the bubble. We were now left with Dan, Trueman, Tony, FedEx, and Ken Boles. FedEx was the short stack but after pulling out a few all-ins, Ken was now left with the short stack and ended up getting knocked out on the bubble in 5th place. A solid finish to his first ever RPT and hopefully we will see more of him and the other newcomers in future months.
The next player out was Tony Huckestein in 4th place and finishing in the RPUs. It must sound like I am a total fan boy for Tony but his numbers this year are just amazing. Out of the 7 RPT tourneys, Tony has finished in the RPU’s in 5 of them and in the top 3 in 4 of them. He has a commanding RPY POY lead and has become the de facto best player currently in the RPT. Congrats to Tony.
This now left Dan, FedEx, and Trueman in the top 3. Remember when I said Dan had more chips than the entire table combined? Well that all changed quickly. FedEx was going all-in on top of Dan’s raises and Dan was folding. Trueman was raising into Dan almost every hand and Dan was folding. There has not been a collapse like that since the fall of Rome. Dan was almost in shock as he watched his riches turning to rags. I guess this must be what MC Hammer or OJ must feel. Dan’s pain was finally ended and he finished in 3rd place. A solid finish but oh, what could have been… This was Dan’s first top-3 finish since he won the tournament back in August of 2008. Good job Dan.
We were now heads-up between Trueman and FedEx. Trueman had probably 75% of the chips. They jockeyed back and forth until FedEx found himself all-in with his Ad-6d vs. Trueman’s Ah-4s. Pre-flop, there is a 33% chance of a split pot and then FedEx is a 43/23 favorite to win the hand. The flop comes 3h-2d-Qs and this now makes it an 18% chance of a split pot and FedEx is up 56/25 to win. Historically, Trueman does not win when he is behind in a hand… this changed tonight. The turn gives him a 4d and a pair of 4’s… however, FedEx now has a flush draw. Trueman is a 66/34 favorite now. The river brings a 8s and Trueman is the latest RPT champion.
This was FedEx’s first Top3 finish since October, 2013 and his first 2nd place finish since September, 2012. Congrats to FedEx on a solid performance. FedEx has moved up to 9th place in the RPT Standings.
For Trueman, this was his second win of the year. Trueman has been all or nothing this season. Of the 6 tournaments he has played, he has 2 wins and the other 4 tournaments have seen Trueman earn no more than 7 points and 21 points total. Trueman currently sits in 15th place in the RPT standings but if continues to play like he did last night, he can make up solid ground in no time. Trueman now is in a tie for 2nd place in career RPT Wins. He also sits in third place for career Top-3 finishes. Trueman is one of the original RPT members and was the first ever Beer Bitch way back on 1/21/2005. It still amazes me to think that this thing is still going after all that time. And you were right Trueman, your other Beer Bitch finishes that year were in April and May.
Thanks again to Rob for hosting and I will see everyone next month.