WBCOOP Main Event Live Blog

After a full week, we've reached the 2010 WBCOOP Main Event on PokerStars. I was only able to play two preliminaries due to my travel schedule. I could whine, bitch, and gnash my teeth about the WBCOOP being scheduled during the first week of the LAPC. And I probably will. But that won't stop me from live-blogging this sucker one more time.

11:45am - I drove home from LA last night, arriving back in Vegas at 4am. This after spending most of the day hungover due to extracurriculars on Friday night in downtown LA. Since a pounding head is not conducive to playing stud games, I skipped the $545 HORSE tournament and spent 90 minutes asleep in the back of my car. Not kidding.

In addition to my lack of proper hydration and sleep yesterday, I have an appointment at 2pm today to go make sure that plumbing contractors haven't done shitty work (highly likely in this instance). Somehow I suspect that my effort in today's Main Event will not be my best.

At least this time around I have a proper mug of tea and a lonely cat to keep me company.

11:57pm - We're on one of my "poker" playlists for musical accompaniment this morning. It's a combination of up-tempo selections (a mash-up of NIN and the Ghostbusters theme; Prodigy's 'Smacky My Bitch Up'); feel-good "candy" music ('Celebration' by Kool and the Gang; 'Don't Stop the Music' by Rihanna); and vaguely inspirational music ('Die Another Day' by Madonnna; 'One More Time' by Daft Punk; 'Eye of the Tiger' by Survivor). Obviously I mean inspirational in the poker sense, and not inspirational in the "Get Giggity with God" sense.

12:01pm - Queens on the second hand. I really hate getting strong hands at the start of tournaments. I feel like it uses up my run-good at a time when I won't expect to get much value.

Anyway, Jason Spaceman is on my left with the button and flats my raise, then raises my c-bet on an ace-high flop. I know he can be highly aggro but decide (for now) to find a better spot. It doesn't t stop me from some good old-fashioned trash-talking in the chatbox though just to try to keep him in line. A futile effort, to be sure. Jason has some gamboooooool.

12:05pm - This tournament may be shorter than I expected. I pick up tens in early position and am heads-up to the flop with the button. We get to the river on a king-high flop and he turns up queens. Down to 2,000 of the 2,500 starting stack; an inauspicious beginning.

At least if I bust early I can go back to sleep before my 2pm appointment.

12:11pm - Down to 1,880. You know, in LAPC Event #1 I won one pot in 3.5h of play. Today we may be trying to beat that record. Though there's no way I'll be able to last 3.5h without winning a pot. Not at this rate.

12:20pm - The set-flopping drought continues when ducks don't set-up three-handed for a min-raise. Unicorns, the Tooth Fairy and flopped sets. Part and parcel.

12:22pm - Back to the starting stack. AhTh from late position for a raise gets one limp-caller. I flop one ace and river another. Basically this means I wasted the last twenty minutes and am now that much closer to having to leave for my appointment with a middling stack.

Better make it Round 2 on the tea. (Earl Grey. Hot.)

12:31pm - I've developed "flat-a-raise-in-position, flat-a-flop-bet" disease. So far it hasn't killed me but it certainly hasn't made me much healthier. T2,795.

12:33pm - Hey! I finally won a pot off of Spaceman! My goal for this tournament has been reached. Shortly after that I took another unraised flop with treys. Guess what didn't happen? That's right. No set.

At least I eschewed the "no set, no bet" approach and took the pot down with a bet. If only it were always that easy.

12:36pm - This morning my real estate agent called me at 10am to confirm we were meeting today. Then he asked me what time. When I told him we agreed to 2pm, he asked if we could move it to noon. This is the second time in a week he's asked me to move our meeting to noon and I already told him I can't.

That should tell you everything you need to know about the competency of my real estate agent. I tell you this story not because it relates to the WBCOOP Main Event in any way but only so that you can imagine what my frustration level will be if I'm still in the tournament when I get home from our meeting.

12:41pm - When you're running bad you tend to see monsters under the bed. I limp-call with pocket 4s and flop Q-4-J, making me momentarily believe that there really is a Santa Claus. I check-raise the pre-flop raiser's continuation-bet and am unhappy to see him respond with a min-raise three-bet.

You see where this is going, right? I actually called for time here. All I could think was, "I finally flop a set for the first time in two weeks and..."

I sigh and jam. He snaps. He does not have queens or jacks though. He has aces. Ship the double-up to 130 Pounds of Fury!

12:46pm - It's always good to see your friends hit a piece of run-good (and put other people on tilt in the chat box). There's a guy at our table who's been making some crazy raises. Spaceman ships from the blinds with 99 against one of those raises but the other player wakes up with KK. It's looking grim for the all-in Spaceman until he binks a 9 on the turn.

Hilarity ensues. Chat-box tilt FTW!

By the way the scream you just heard was that player punching a wall in frustration and breaking his hand. Two hands later Spaceman flops AAx with AJ and the same guy has A9. More hilarity. For us. Not for him. He's now out.

12:51pm - I have GOT to take the Red Army Choir's "Farewell of Slavianka" off of this playlist. It's stirring and patriotic but it just doesn't work as poker music. The only thing it does is make me want to go out and defeat the forces of Hitler.

12:59pm - We're at the first break. I am one hour closer to having to leave. And if you think it's odd that I'm leaving my house at 2pm for a 2pm appointment, then you didn't read the anecdote about my real estate agent above.

1:08pm - Spaceman and I have decided that "Take your beat and leave" will henceforth be added to the TDA Rules. I wanted to add the parenthetical "(on your bike)" but that probably defeats the spirit of the rule.

1:13pm - The player two to my left, who has about 14k, has started raising every. single. hand. This should prove profitable for me.

1:22pm - On the positive side of things, I'm still in. On the negative, I'm treading water. If I'm really planning to play after I get home from my appointment I'll need chips. So far I've only been able to take advantage of Mr. Raise once.

1:27pm - Never underestimate the value of position kids. Especially when the player two to your left raises 85% of hands pre-flop. Position turns just about any hand into the nuts (especially when that player shuts down at the first sign of resistance). Let's hear it for betting with the lock low!

1:32pm - My image against Mr. Raise was just shot to hell. We check-checked a queen-high flop; previously he was c-betting 100% of the time. A bit odd but it didn't stop me from raising an ace on the turn after he bet. Bad move, Bobo -- he snap-called. That was all I needed to immediately slam on the brakes. We check-checked the river, where his A5 was waaaaaaay good against my total airball. Now I need to play real hands against him. Blech.

1:34pm - Spaceman busted a player with a solid draw and our table broke. That solves my image problem.

1:40pm - Down to 5k and leaving in twenty minutes. It's gamble time. There's a min-raise in front of me to 200 and then a re-raise to 500. I play like a donk and flat on the button with AhQh (sooooo pretty!). Min-raiser calls and then donks a queen-high flop. Re-raiser.... raises, to 1,200. If you're me and you need chips before you leave you ship there. Which is what I did. Unfortunately everyone folded.

Drat. I really wanted to double up or go home there. Taking the pot uncontested to climb to T7,600 is the worst outcome.

1:45pm - Spank my ass and call me Charlie. I flopped another set. The only action came from one of the blinds. I waited til the river to raise him on a non-scary J-6-8-2-T board (no flush). He called with T-5. Hmm.

Perhaps he is not as strong as the Emperor thought. T8,800.

1:48pm - DEFINITELY not as strong as the Emperor thought. He limps in from MP before I raise the button to 500 with the nizzles. (That's pocket aces for those of you who've never spent any time hanging around 22-year-old internet poker players.) The big blind calls and my friend from the last hand calls for some hot three-way action. "Good board," I say to nobody on a flop of 2-3-4 rainbow. Big blind checks, then my friend opens all in for 4,000. I re-raise all in, having his 99 crushed. No bink for him.

With 14,000, I can go to my appointment feeling ok about my stack. By the time I come back I'll probably be trying to hang on for a "ghey min-cash".

1:59pm - I cruise into the second break in 91st place out of 785 remaining. Time to go look at drywall. Here's hoping I have chips left when I get back!

2:55pm - Lafayette, I have returned. Drywall looks good and I still have 42 BBs in my stack. With an average of 55, that's a win-win.

3:06pm - Honestly, I thought I'd have lost more than 3,500 in an hour. I wonder if anybody folded to my big blind but I'm not curious enough to check. Things are starting to pick up at 150/300/40. I've got 35 blinds now.

3:10pm - We're at the part of the tournament where medium pairs should become my bane. On cue, I'm dealt 88 in MP. An early-position player raises 4x and I fold like the true tight-weakie that lurks in my soul.

Next hand I open 3x with 99. Two callers, who both go away to 3/4-pot on a 2c-6h-3h flop. Nice! Poker is easy! Except when one of them calls there. Then poker sucks.

3:23pm - Hanging steady. Win a few small ones, lose a few small ones. Table seems to be trending towards the "bat shit" side of crazy so I may need to hunker down and play super-tight.

3:32pm - I've never understood the obsession with average stack. It doesn't mean much. What means a lot more is (1) how many big blinds you have, and (2) the size of your stack compared to the other stacks on your table. I have 34 big blinds and, given the other stack sizes, am in a good spot to pressure some of my opponents.

3:39pm - That pressure I was applying earlier surely helped me to a double-up. The small blind, who I had made my bitch last orbit, opened again for 3x. I shipped 26x with AK and he snapped with AQ. Lately my record in these 75-25 situations is horrible, but here my AK held. I guess I'll die another day. 26k.

The next two hands... eh, we'll just forget about those. 22k.

3:45pm - If you want to find out how much your cat loves you, go out of town for 8 days. The cat will be permanently attached to your lap when you come back.

3:50pm - Limits up! 35 big blinds for me. I'm just below par. For the record, that means nothing. 223 players left. Gonna be a while yet before we're ITM. I'm still listening to the same playlist. Might need to mix things up.

3:55pm - Settled on James Zabiela, live on BBC Radio1's The Essential Mix (Feb 22, 2004). I have maybe a dozen Essential Mix sets and this one is by far my favorite.

4:00pm - I put this set on the stereo at a Blue Parrot home game once. One guy (total douche, for what it's worth) started making lame cracks like, "Where are the glow sticks?"

Last I heard, he was serving time in Massachusetts for vehicular manslaughter DUI. True story.

4:12pm - A player at my table has gone min-raise crazy. I've wanted to mix it up with him a few times but a big stack in between us keeps flatting the raises. He already flatted one of my re-raises in that situation. Still snug with about 25 BBs. That's not a ton. Patience...

4:17pm - Apparently the second big stack lost his patience. Big stack guy (70k) min-raised again. Second big stack (55k) shoved from the big blind. Big stack called with AQ against 4s3s. Ace on the flop.

Really? Kind of a head-scratcher from both of them.

4:22pm - We're at the point of the tournament where I'm rolling out the creativity. That's never good. I see you nodding your head. You know. You've been reading these live-blogs for the last week.

4:27pm - I'm about to be sick. Remember the guy from 4:12pm who kept flatting the min-raise guy, and then flatted one of my re-raises? If he disappears in the next few days, it wasn't me.

I'm dealt AcAd. Shorty moves AIPF for 9k, then Flatty Flatterton, who has 18k (we're at 350/700), flats for half his stack (?). Of course I shove my 18k and Flatterton calls again, leaving himself 150 behind. We get to the reveal:

9k - QhQc
18k - Ah8c
me - AdAc

Flop 3c-9c-10c is a GREAT flop. I'm looking good for the double-up until the board goes 6s-7s to give the donk with A8 a straight. I didn't even see it and couldn't figure out why the pot was going to him since I thought he was drawing dead after the turn.

Utterly sick. Just the worst kind of bad play imaginable. At least if a queen had hit it would have sucked but I could just shrug and say "Shit happens."

Sigh. LOL Donkaments.

4:40pm - That was a 182nd-place finish. More than 2,000 runners, 153 paid. Basically, win that pot and I cruise pretty deep in this thing. After the flop I was 97% to win the side pot (break-even) and 88% to win both. Absolutely crushing.