Hello there blogisphere!

WSOP update:

My flight out here was uneventful.  My rungood started just after I touched down, at Enterprise Rent-A-Car.  Despite reserving the economy shitbox, I was granted a free upgrade to a much-nicer Hyundai something-or-other.  So instead of manual doorlocks and windows that you have to “roll down,” I have a baller’s car that comes equipped with XM Radio and even an iPod jack.  By the way, once automatic windows replace that spinning knobby crank thing in even the crappiest cars, do you think the term “roll down the window” will fade into extinction?  Will my grandchildren snicker at me when I ask them to roll down the window the way I laughed at mine for using words like “mimeograph” and “Fridgedaire?”

So my first order of business in Las Vegas—obviously—was to purchase a bowling ball.  This I accomplished yesterday before the start of the 1k event at Venetian.  Before the tournament I made a beeline to the pro shop at the Gold Coast to engage in the serious business of bowling ball shopping.  I was pleasantly surprised to find that I remembered the answers to the store manager’s esoteric queries about my bowling DNA.  Ball speed, revs, track location, span, grip type.  It all came back to me and I am now the proud owner of a tailor-made, custom-fitted Ebonite Evolve.  This purple bomber will henceforth reside in Jon’s guest room closet and will be my Las Vegas bowling ball.  Look out.

I made Day 2 of the first tourney I played, a Venetian 1k, but brought back only 16 big blinds and busted less than ten minutes into the second day.  At one point on Day 1 I had a big stack, but I dusted most of it doing something super spastic.  It unfolded as follows:

I was humming along nicely then got moved to a new table.  I had about 80k, which was well above average.  I was feeling kind of bossy.  On the second hand at my new table, at 400-800/75a, a kid in his early 20’s opened UTG +1 to 2025.  We had roughly the same amount of chips.  The kid was wearing a hoodie, had on a pair of Monster™ headphones, and had his hair arranged in a purposefully messed-up bedhead ‘do.  He flipped in the chips nonchalantly.  My read:  aggro internet dude.  Opening light.  Poop on him. He got flatted by a tight guy in middle position with 25k and then it’s folded to me in the cutoff.  I had Q7o (computer hand omg!) and decided to go with some outside the box type shit.  I made it 7,025 to go.  The kid responded with a small four bet to 17,300 and the other guy folded.  I considered my options, weighed them briefly and went with the spewiest.  I five-bet to 41,000.  Fun!

Oops, maybe not.  The kid insta-shipped, leaving me with no choice but to surrender.  My read on the player was really bad,for the record:  for the rest of the night, the kid sat there folding.  I blame the headphones.

When my stack dwindled down to only twelve big blinds or so late in the night, I was faced with a classic Vegas-in-June dilemma:  Grind it out or hit the next tourney.  The temptation to just punt off my stack loomed large.  It was 2:00 a.m., we weren’t anywhere near the money bubble and there was a 1500 NL event at the WSOP the next day at noon.  A strong argument for “double up or bust” could be made.  If I bagged just a few chips, I’d be forced to skip that tournament and come back to Venetian at 4:00 pm. just so I could move all in sometime in the first orbit.  Hmmmm….

I ended up doing the conscientious thing, counseling myself to not give up and to play optimally.  I sat there dutifully folding through the end of the night.  Besides, wasn’t skipping a 1500 WSOP event tantamount to saving money?

It ended up happening exactly as I figured it might.  My 2010 WSOP debut was put on hold, then I promptly ran AQ into KK on the fourth hand of Day 2 at Venetian.

I finally made my way over to the Rio last night and proceeded to chop a nice little sit-n-go, so the trip is still off to a decent start.  The sit-n-go wrapped in time for me to do something I had been eagerly anticipating:  take the Evolve out for a test drive.  A few friends and I bowled a couple of games last night at the Gold Coast.  There was some drinking and gambling going on, along with general buffoonery (also spare dancing!), but I was excited to see how my new buddy would perform.  The purple bomber, she don’t hook as much as I figured she might, but I slowly got the hang of it.  She’ll do.  I love bowling!

I’m hungry for my first cash in a WSOP prelim since 2008, and there’s a 1500 PLHE tourney today.  No one likes to play this event (oooh, pot limit scary!) but I’ve made a good run in it before, so I’ll probably give it a go.

Tonight I leave for Vegas for the World Series of Poker.  It’s a big day—as you’re likely aware, in June Las Vegas becomes the undisputed poker capital of the world, with many massive tournaments taking place every day.  Spending the month in Vegas creates a big window of opportunity for guys like me.  While most poker players view departing to play the WSOP as one of the highlights of their year, for me it is a day that brings hope but also sadness and trepidation.

At this stage of my life, I’m happiest at home in Carroll Gardens.  I love being here with my trusty confidantes Janeen and Ruthie, both of whom I will miss dearly for the next month.  My yearly WSOP trip differs from all the others in both distance and length.  I’ll be far away, outside of my comfort zone for quite awhile.  The sudden mid-meet drives home that I’m notorious for will be impossible from the Mojave.

The WSOP presents numerous challenges beyond the obvious fiscal risk.  I know from past experience that a long dry spell will result in a potentially consuming emotional upheaval. Although I’m logically aware that bad runs are inevitable, I’m wired to compete.  I put undue pressure on myself and still don’t handle failure too well.   I’m therefore going to try my best not to let the daily ups and down get the best of me in the absence of my support system.

Speaking of my support system, another serious issue with spending a month in Las Vegas is avoiding social isolation.  I find that playing tournaments out there for a month straight can be very lonely.  I’m lucky to have a great friend who lives in Vegas and a couple of true friends on tour.  Outside of that handful of people, I’ll have no one to rely on.  Don’t bother feeling bad for me though; it’s a personal choice.  I’ve discovered that being alone is better than hanging out with idiots.  There’s nothing worse than spending an entire evening listening to people you have nothing in common with flap their gums.  If you’re not careful it happens a lot in my line of work.

Through trial and error I’ve found a decent salve for lonliness in Vegas.  The following methods help:

-Always maintain contact with Janeen and the real world.  Watch the news, watch Sportscenter.  Read books, listen to the radio.  Hang out with Jon and other non-poker players.

-Rent a car.  It’s important to be able to go where I want when I want.

-Schedule activities.  Never reduce the trip to eat/sleep/poker.  I’m gonna go bowling a lot.

-Don’t tag along for group activities you know you won’t enjoy or hang with people who annoy you.  It’s a recipe for hating life.  Avoid known douchebags.   They’re so not worth it.

-Have fun when playing; don’t be a bitter dickhead at the table.

Although “jaded and cynical” comes naturally to me, I still appreciate what the WSOP is really about.  This is an event that started many years ago as a get-together for the country’s best gamblers.  Today, of course, it has been bastardized and commercialized nearly beyond recognition.  Despite its modest origins, everything about the WSOP—from the brand of playing cards used, drinks served, even the time of year it takes place—is now controlled by corporate interests.  However, when you boil it down, the WSOP remains singular in its scope and prestige.  It is Mecca to the few thousand or so poker players (along with the requisite horse stakers, shot takers, funk fakers, etc. etc.) who can honestly call themselves the world’s best.  As I have a reasonable expectation of leaving Vegas at the end with more money than I came with, I’m proud to say that I am included in that group.

And now for some good news for those of you who read this website regularly:  I will be blogging much more frequently from Vegas this year.  I’m shooting for more of a diary-style blog this June and will likely update a few times per week.  I’m hoping my perspective is a fresh one and will be worth a read.  I also think it will keep me mentally sharp.

I will also be continuously tweeting my tourney progress at twitter.com/SugDpoker.

Since so much of what I’ve written recently is fairly negative, I think I will throw a curveball today. I’ve neglected to mention some of my recent success.

I’ve “outright shipped” (i.e., won) three tournaments in the last month and a half. In the grand scheme of things, each of these tournaments was about as small as a pro poker tournament can be without being irrelevant. However, outright wins are quite difficult to come by, so I will provide a brief recap.

The first was a $500 Bounty Event at Mohegan Sun with just over 100 entrants. I picked up aces on the money bubble and never looked back. The final four players negotiated a save and then we played it out.  In the end it was me who had his picture snapped behind a pile of chips and a trophy.

The second was a $26 tournament on Full Tilt with over 1000 players. This was about as clean a run as one can have; I was the chip leader with around 150 player left, with 15 players left, and with 1 player left. Easy game.

The third tournament took place just a few days ago, a $300 tournament with only 98 entrants at Harrah’s in AC. I’m particularly pleased with this win because I pulled off one of tournament poker’s more badass feats: repeatedly refusing a deal despite being a chip count disadvantage, then systematically dispatching my opponents. (At one point, we were actually on the verge of creating a save, but one player scoffed when I explained that I’d need his name, address and social security number to deal, so we played on).

Some tourney grinders play for the money. Some play for the fame (and will literally buy Player of the Year points from you if you’re lucky enough to chop with them). Me, I play for the doofy “winner’s circle” pics.

Next stop is Vegas.

My good ol’ friend Matt C. and I love to give each other the business. For the past twenty years, we have taken it upon ourselves to keep each other in check. If one of us ever gets a little too big for his britches, the other comes along with a good-natured smack in the head, returning the recipient to cold reality and taking him down a peg. It sounds more ruthless than it really is. We’re both capable of laughing at ourselves and as well as each other.

Today I’m happy to report that Matt and his lovely girlfriend Alfia were recently engaged to be married. This news—in and of itself—opens a veritable treasure trove of Matt-ripping material for me to enjoy. You see, the formerly perennially single Matt has always availed himself of a line of humor that pokes fun at the duties and responsibilities foisted upon me by my commitment to Janeen (“Who are you texting?!?”). It would therefore suffice if I were now merely able to return the favor with similar jokes. But something much greater and more abundantly humorous has arrived. Something irresistible and packed with delicious, oozing irony has been bestowed to me. No, it is not a twelve pack of Hostess Fruit Pies. It’s better.

One of Matt’s favorite topics throughout our little twenty-year war is my mother. I was reared by an energetic and protective woman. Some might say I was coddled. My mother remains interested and involved in my life to this day. Matt certainly capitalizes on this fact with his humorous imitations of my mother’s thick New York accent and constant reminders of our shared adolescence filled with strange admonitions from my Mom (“David can throw up in the basement, but I expect better from you, Matt.”)

One of Matt’s other repeat topics is my alleged materialism. When I proceeded directly from law school into a high-paying job and an upper east side mini bachelor pad, Matt began giving me the business about it, and continued every time I purchased anything he perceived to be a newfangled luxury item. Most famously (and I’m aging us here), he used to give me a very hard time for owning…. (gasp!) a cellular phone. Matt’s preference in consumerism is for the quirky and offbeat (including some hilarious flops like those god-awful Crocs), so anytime I came up with anything he deigned expensive and/or mainstream, he gave me holy hell about it.

Another of Matt’s go-tos is this blog’s existence, and the act of blogging in general. The salt-of-the earth Matt loves to laugh at how pretentious I’ve become. I have the gall to presume that my professional gambling somehow transforms my daily life into something noteworthy to others. Matt has an oft-repeated two-word summation for this sentiment: “Dear Blogisphere!” End of story.

As you can see, I have taken a beating for many years from Matt for a) my mother’s ubiquity; b) being in a committed relationship; c) occasionally enjoying fancy things; and d) blogging.

So without further ado, I am now thrilled to present to you Matt’s future mother-in-law’s handiwork:

REALLY? I’M MOTHER OF THE BRIDE?

I’ve had some trouble conjuring anything to write here. The problem is that there’s no underlying theme to draw from; my thoughts have been all over the map lately. This has been reflected in the way I’ve spent my time.

One day I grind my ass off, the next I’m crafting an outline for a yet-to-be-written book. One day I’m up at the crack of dawn, driving down to AC determined to dominate, the next I lay in bed all day reading. One day I gorge on MTT training videos in an effort to cure my maddening futility in online tourneys, the next day I’m pondering some business opportunities and thinking my old life as a suit wasn’t really that bad.

For those keeping score, my bottom line this year is about break even. I’ve had success in fits and starts—I won a small tournament at Mohegan Sun and came fourth in a big $500 event at Borgata (neither of which got any play on this blog), so it’s not all doom and gloom—but I’m used to having more success than this. The upcoming summer-long WSOP is likely not only to have a disproportionate impact on my 2010 income, it may also shape my future in a larger sense. My summertime plans were just solidified. I leave on Memorial Day.

The last time I was having the proverbial “bad year” at the start of the WSOP, I ended up hitting for what remains to this day my biggest score, so perhaps history will repeat itself. But perhaps it won’t, which would be okay too.

In the immediate future I’ll probably tune up for the WSOP with a couple of Foxwoods and Harrah’s events. And I’ll probably continue to get drubbed online, I’m a glutton like that.

There’s a lot of complaining in poker. We poker players are inured to the constant whining around us, but taking a step back and looking at it objectively, there is a grotesque and epic amount of bitching and moaning in this little world I reside in.

It doesn’t take a degree in psychology to decipher the reasons for this. We humans are prideful creatures, and we invariably crave validation when we fail. In tournament poker, you fail a lot. In fact, you fail pretty much every day. With failure comes self-pity. Show me any tournament poker player and I will show you a man who spends half of his life feeling sorry for himself.

People who are capable of rationalizing their need for self-pity are of course not immune to it. Nor are those of us who try to avoid all the wallowing because we ultimately believe it is destructive. I need to commiserate too.

And so, please pity the fact that my yesterday sucked:

I was 17th out of 295 players headed into Day 2 of the Borgata Spring Open’s Event #1. 100 players were to be paid and I was sitting pretty with 210,000 chips. Once play started, I managed to build my stack to around 270,000 without incident. And then I got pooped on. Repeatedly.

I iso-raised a short stack’s shove with Ac3c. He showed me 10-9 and hit a 10 on the turn. 250,000.

I called a short stack’s shove with pocket jacks. He held pocket eights. Eight on the flop. 220,000.

I reshoved on a 12 big blind shorty’s ship with QQ and found myself matched up with 22. Deuce on the turn. 160,000.

And then one final travesty. A player open limped, I raised the button to 20,500 with KK. It folded to the big blind who decided to cold four-bet jam all in for 150,000. I called, he turned over 99. Nine in the window.

These beats came in rapid, mind-boggling succession within a period of maybe 40 minutes. I rarely lose my composure at the table, but the last one proved too much for my battered constitution (it also happened to be a one-outer, the gentleman to my left gave me the pointless but obligatory “I folded a nine” before the flop rolled out). Unsure of how to properly express my exasperation, I collected all my chips with two trembling fists and forcefully slammed them down into the center of the table, then released them there for the dealer to corral and redirect. Two days of poker down the drain. Good game!

I was still feeling the sting of that tragic and unjust turn of events when I sat down to play a multitable satellite for a seat in today’s $7,500 buy in high roller event. There were 37 players in the satellite. Enough for three seats, with $4500 cash for fourth place. The tourney started at 7:00 PM, and the structure was outstanding for a satellite—almost too good. The tournament was a long, drawn out, endurance-testing grind. I found myself sitting there with 10 big blinds halfway through, but I was able to pick spots and chip up, hanging around long enough to reach the final table. Eventually I found myself sitting in fourth place on the bubble with five players remaining. It was 3:30 AM. I was so tired that I could barely see straight, but I was one bustout away from a good score, and I really wanted to get the bad taste from earlier in the day out of my mouth and pick up a seat in the $7,500 tourney.

If there’s one thing in poker that I understand completely, it’s ICM push/fold/call-off ranges. This stuff was etched into my memory during my days grinding sit ‘n go’s online. I seriously know that stuff backwards and forwards. And I know that if we’re on the exact bubble and I shove 20 big blinds from the button, and the other short stack is sitting in the big blind with approximately 17 big blinds, he isn’t supposed to call it off with A-8 off. But that’s what my opponent chose to do, and I couldn’t win a flip with pocket threes. Good game and good night.

Cliffs notes: April 12, 2010 was Kick David In The Balls Day. I lost three consecutive pair-over-pair dominated all ins to blow through a huge stack and bust out of Event #1, then played an eight-hour MTT satellite and finished on the exact bubble. So yeah, I’m running pretty good down here so far!

I’ve taken a pretty long break from poker and plan on resuming live tournament play tomorrow at Mohegan Sun.  This cannot stop me from sharing with my loyal readers my observations about poker fashion.  Oooh child, it’s time to dish! Let’s tawk about what’s in and what’s out. *snaps*

Poker In:  Monster™  Headphones.

Look around any large poker room and you will find a shitload of kids wearing the same exact set of headphones with a “9” or a “6” (or is it a “q” or “b”?) on them.  There has been a noticeable and rapid proliferation of these things in pokerland.  Mildly annoying!  It seems that no one wants to use their crummy old ipod earbuds or any other headphones, they’ve gotta have these.  I’ve asked people why, and have been informed either that “Monster headphones are the best!” or that “Monster headphones are endorsed by Dr. Dre!”

I happen to know a lot of true audiophiles (even some who work in the business) and I’ve now asked them about this product, and I also did a little bit of research on my own.  These headphones are actually demonstrably not the best; most experts have given them lukewarm reviews and some call them overpriced.  That leaves us with the second theory:  that a West Coast rap producer who was last seen either jacking every hook in the P-Funk catalogue 18 years ago or “discovering” a white rapper 11 years ago is the driving force behind the popularity of Monster headphones in the modern poker community.  Okay.  I’m convinced that a third theory must hold the real answer.  Perhaps Tom Dwan or some other young poker demigod served as a trendsetter?

Poker Out:  Ed Hardy gear.

In a development as surprising as the sun rising this morning, heterosexual men have grown tired of bedazzled mesh caps.

Poker In:  Facebook Spew.

Facebook status updates are fascinating.  And by fascinating, I mean morbidly fascinating.  Car wreck fascinating.  I’m sure that some good sociological studies on them have already been done, but allow me to state the obvious:  these spur-of-the-moment ramblings are an enlightening glimpse into the minds of your “friends,” and Facebook doesn’t discriminate.  Even your dumbest, weirdest and most deranged acquaintances are allowed to share with the class, and the burden’s on you to either “hide” them or remain exposed to the spew.  I prefer rubbernecking.  I stay exposed.

I have accumulated a lot of poker friends on Facebook.  And this has been a rewarding experience—poker players love to update their status!  I’ve been reading them religiously for some time now.

My primary finding is that there is no correlation between skill at poker and the ability to type coherent thoughts.  And I’ve noticed that there are certain character profiles.  Here are a few:

• Mr. Itchy Fingers.  This guy updates his status four times per tournament level.  He does this well before the money bubble in $300 events.  Who are these updates supposed to appeal to?  The other poker players could care less and everyone else has no idea what the hell you’re talking about.
• Mr. Amnesia.  This guy wins $250,000 in a weekend, then waits less than 48 hours before resuming his daily vitriolic “fuck my life!  OMG aces cracked again!  I hate poker!” rantings.  Classy.
• Mr. Birdseed.  “I’m at the final table of the $7 rebuy on Absolute!!11!  Plz come root me on!  I’m gonna ship this one!  Run good one time!”
• Mr. Fame Whore.  This dude’s is so desperate for the world to recognize his accomplishments and superior skill level that all he does is complain about being under-promoted.  He may even dream up a bizarre, unintelligible motto and spam you with it every few hours.  Awesome!

Poker Out:  Humility, a Sense of Perspective.

I can’t recall if it was Al Alvarez’s book or Anthony Holden’s, but there is a telling passage about playing poker in a Las Vegas card room on the day Ronald Reagan was elected president.  The author (an Englishman) announced that the United States had elected a new president, and the only remark made by another player at the table was that the odds posted on Reagan winning the election a few months earlier turned out to be good value.  The game moved forward without further comment.

This is an accurate depiction of the world unto itself that poker exists in.  The day after the heath care reform bill—which is likely the most controversial and far reaching political event the US has seen for some time—was passed, my facebook page was filled with commentary thereon (some frightening in its own right).  But then you had the poker players, who littered the page with the usual updates about relatively stupid shit like running kings into aces again.  I don’t think other professions work this way.  Obsessed much?

Poker In:  “Muppet,” “Monkey,” et. al.

Poker players devote a lot of time to coming up with new ways to describe morons.  These are just two of the terms of art that are currently in favor.  I have always loved the Muppets, so that one’s my personal favorite.  It is of course roughly synonymous with:

Poker Out:  “Donkey.” 

Poker players are finally giving the time-worn “donk” a rest.  You’ll still hear it quite often, but it’s no longer on the tip of everyone’s tongue every freakin’ hand.

Poker In:  The Intimidating String Call.

You’re a live tournament poker pro doing what live tournament poker pros do:  playing a live tournament.  You could be at The Borgata, The Rio, a cruise ship in the Caribbean or in your cousin’s basement.  It really doesn’t matter.  The buy in could be $100, $1500 or $10,000.  It really doesn’t matter.  The blinds are 300-600.

The bad guy opens under the gun for 1700.  The bad guy could be an internet kid wearing Monster headphones, an obese Italian-American in a sweatsuit, or a woman with monstrous tits.  It really doesn’t matter.  It folds to you in the hijack, cutoff, button, whatever (it really doesn’t matter).  You decide to call.  You’re heads up to the flop.

The flop comes 10-6-5 rainbow.  Or it comes K-J-10 of diamonds.  Or maybe it comes 7-2-2.  Or it could be three aces.  That’s right, it really doesn’t matter.  The bad guy bets 2800.  Now the stage is all yours!

You are gonna call this bet.  You may be calling because you have top pair. Or possibly a flush draw.  Or maybe you’ve flopped the nuts and are gonna trap the bad guy.  Or maybe you’re attempting the old double float river bluffraise with eight high and no draw.  It really doesn’t matter!  What does matter is that you are about to execute the coolest, most amazing, fantastic move in the book, and you’re going to relish every second of it.

You look at the bad guy, then you look at your stack of chips.  Gee whiz, there’s a lot of ’em.  Now you start to dig in.  Do you pull out 2800—two yellows, a purple, and three blacks?  Nope.  Here comes the really sick part.  You  remove only three black chips from your massive stack and fling them into the pot.

Three hundred? What the fuck is this?  Have you been daydreaming?  Are you retarded?  Color blind?  Hell no!  None of the above!

It’s… an Intimidating String Call!  You’ve now stated your intention, looked incredibly suave, and maybe even scared the living shit out of the bad guy using merely three black chips!  You will get to the purples and yellows when you’re good and ready. WOW!  SICK!

Poker Out:  Chip Tricks.

And good riddance.  The standard flipping and riffling that most of us do subconsciously will be with us for the forseeable future, but that’s not what I’m talking about here. I’m talking about sophisticated chip dance routines that take weeks of practice to master. You used to see a lot of that, but I’ve noticed very little David Copperfield stuff lately.  Maybe people are actually concentrating on playing well?  I dunno.

I am still trying to digest what I witnessed this weekend.  My alma mater’s basketball team just reached the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament.  Cornell University is part of the Ivy League, which means no athletic scholarships and teams that trek across large swaths of America’s Northeast by bus to play basketball in small decrepit gymnasiums.  The games are never scheduled on weeknights and are not televised.  There is relatively little fanfare, the rivalries are extremely insular, there is no conference tournament, and critics rightly claim that it barely resembles Division I basketball.  However, Cornell’s current squad is senior-laden and has been building momentum  and chemistry for years.  This was their third straight trip to the big dance.  Still, a total dismantling of Temple and Wisconsin, two serious basketball schools?!  Unthinkable.  I’m over the moon.  They play Kentucky—probably the biggest powerhouse of them all—next.  Wow.

When I was in college, my friends and I treated NCAA tournament games with reverence but also open resentment.  For my money the NCAA tournament is America’s most captivating sporting event, particularly in its first weekend, when the games fire nonstop and strange matchups abound, giving kids from even the most obscure schools a moment in the sun.  The telecasts are filled with shots of students and alums from these varied institutions going absolutely bonkers.  Being a huge fan of this event and going to one of the Ivy League’s perennial bottom-dwellers has always left me with bittersweet feelings about it; I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve looked at the crowd and thought to myself “I want to be them.”  The frustration is captured nicely by the plight of my good friend Sherm, who was my freshman roomate at Cornell and has been my NCAA Tourney watching partner for nearly 20 years now.  Sherm has always despised Duke University even more than the rest of us, because Duke is the perfect school for a kid who loves hoops—perennially ranked as one of the country’s top schools both academically and in basketball—and they rejected him, relegating him to a lifetime of interested but non-fanatical observation of March Madness.  Until now.

It’s finally our turn!  I appreciate the fact that this will likely be the only time in my life that I will be able to say that, and it makes it that much sweeter.  GO BIG RED!

the slipper fucking fits!

See you in Syracuse.

Okay, so I’m back from Las Vegas.  The trip was a bad one overall, and I’ve been doing some heavy meditation about things since I returned.

When you take repeated trips to the same city you (should?) end up making some choices about how to shape your life while you’re there.  Vegas is a town with two separate and distinct economies:  tourist and local.  If you add up all the time I’ve logged in Vegas I’m practically a local, and I’ve now reached the same conclusions that they have.  Namely, one should eat, drink and sleep in places that offer some semblance of value and/or sanity and one should avoid the strip at all costs.  I do this by renting a car (my sole contribution to the tourist economy), then staying away from the so-called action, either at a “locals-friendly” hotel or at my friend’s house in Summerlin.  For someone who lives 3,000 miles away I’m now fairly expert at navigating my way around Las Vegas; if someone tells me that a restaurant is located on Spring Mountain and Rainbow, I know exactly which way to point my Ford Focus.  I also know where I like to eat breakfast, buy toiletries, gas up my car, go for a jog, find decent iced coffee, and I know where I like to go when I invariably get sick of being around other people.  I guess this means that I’ve reluctantly adopted Vegas as a second home town.

On this trip I purposely stayed in two distinct modes:  poker and non-poker, with nothing in between.  I therefore experienced a few things I’d never considered before, such as taking in a movie, excursions like Hoover Dam and Red Rocks, and I also went bowling.  I go bowling once every couple of years and each time it reminds me of how much I love it.  I grew up making frequent trips to my local bowling alley, and I turned out to be pretty a pretty decent bowler.  I ended up doing three years of competitive high school bowling, a college bowling course and two years in a pretty tough NYC league after that.  At times my average has crept into the 180’s, which is pretty serious biz.  Compared to what I’m used to, the bowling alleys in Las Vegas are amazing—massive, immaculate and very cheap.  When I velcro’d my red and white rental shoes at The Orleans I was transported to a very happy place.

Alas, for the serious bowler, there are problems with bowling far from home—it’s a sport where personalized equipment is vitally important.  I’ve already bored you with a lot of bowling chatter, so I won’t go into the details of why serious bowling is impossible without your own stuff, particularly your own ball.  Suffice to say that it becomes an entirely different game.  In the end, because I find bowling to be such a pleasant diversion, and because traveling with a sixteen pound sphere stuffed into your luggage is a major drag, I have resolved to visit a pro shop during the WSOP and buy myself a serious Vegas-only bowling ball that I will store in my friend’s closet and use frequently.  I will then have my own nerdy special escape from poker when I’m out there.  Dropping $150 on a Vegas-only bowling ball may strike you (pun intended) as strange, but I will quickly earn that money back in the form of tilt and boredom reduction.  Woot.

plastic hard hat = baller.

Now let’s talk about poker.  First how about some good news.

Pokerstars’ NAPT is an obvious smash hit and a boon to tournament poker.  872 players showed up to play the 5k event at Venetian last week, which is a very big turnout for a $5,000 buy-in event during any time other than the WSOP.  Consider that last year’s non-NAPT February Venetian Deep Stack main event was a $2,500 buy in and drew only 263 players.  The direct-online entry aspect of the event was an obvious shot in the arm, as was the excitement generated by the new NAPT brand.  Plenty of big names turned out to play and the field was remarkably tough for its size.  I had the opportunity to play against a host of big names.  At my tables alone, the draw included David Benyamine, Jon Turner, Vanessa Rousso, Paul Wasicka, Andrew Robl, Burt Boutin and “PhilDo” Collins.

Now for the bad news.  I achieved nothing for the entire trip.  I had zero (0) positive sessions.  No MTT mincashes, no second place finishes in sit ‘n go’s, no $80 wins at 2-5 NLHE.  Zero positive sessions.  I went to bed a loser every single night.  Some days my stack withered away and died.  Some days I got drilled with a two-outer.  Some days I committed hari-kari running elaborate bluffs.  On one day I even suffered the cruel injustice of finishing on the exact bubble of a live tournament (a $500 event), a catastrophic feat I had never before accomplished.  The effect on my psyche of this ultramagnetic critical beatdown was predictable.  On a couple of mornings I arose in my hotel room and found that I was truly disappointed to be awake.

My main event went like this.  I got off to a nice start on Day 1 but then stumbled, paying off a river check-shove from the kid who eventually finished second.  A rivered full house over flush.  It was a stupid call.  I spent the rest of the day regulating with a small stack, painstakingly regrouping, waiting for a spot to get my money in good.  One never materialized and I went into Day 2 with a short stack.  On Day 2 I doubled up on the second hand, AK > A9.  This left me with a still below average stack, but I was able to turn up the heat at that point.  This included a well-conceived cold 4 bet jam with K-10 against Robl’s button 3-bet.  This gave me some gamblin’ chips, and I was able to play more aggressively from there, and I was just below the chip average with 300 players left when my bustout hand occurred.

I suffered the indignity of busting out against a player who is well known to many casual poker fans, owing to his appearance on a televised WPT final table back when people watched the WPT, in the show’s first or second season.  His name is Paul Magriel.  For 20 years he held the title of the greatest backgammon player in the world, and he has authored several books on that topic.  He is also credited with conceiving of the concept of “M” (named for him), which famously appears in his buddy Dan Harrington’s seminal books on tournament poker.

All of this is really beside my main point, which is that Paul Magriel is an absolute loon.  Extremely unkempt with a tumor-looking fleshy little friend connected to the side his left nostril, he suffers from some sort of neurological disorder that makes his movements choppy, abrupt and sometimes scary.  This includes the constant flopping of his tongue, which meanders back and forth and doesn’t confine itself to its home in Paul’s hygienically-challenged mouth.  The best I can do in describing Magriel’s overall look is “nutty professor on a meth binge.”  Magriel also slows the game down to a crawl by painfully agonizing his way through every decision posed to him at the table.  When it’s his turn to act he exhales sharply, pulls at his hair, mutters things to himself, stares into space and flops his tongue around.  Only then does he actually fold his cards.  Probably my favorite part of the act is that he only bets in multiples of 22, owing to his backgammon-world nickname “X-22.”  Now, a deuce in poker is sometimes referred to as a duck and a duck quacks, so 22 becomes “quack-quack” in Magriel’s world.  When he bets “quack-quack” it means 2200, “double quack-quack” means 4400, and “triple quack-quack” means 6600, etc. etc.

My initial double up on Day 2 (AK>A9) was actually at Magriel’s expense, and when the flop rolled out 6-6-2, he began begging the dealer for “quack” (another deuce, for a chopped pot) as I protested by chanting “no quack, no quack!”  Back to my bustout hand.  Burt Boutin raised under the gun to 4500 at 800-1600 (200 ante), and I held two black kings.  I elected to flat UTG+3 because I had determined that while Burt is a good player, he has a slight bet sizing issue and I probably would be able to get my entire stack in against him on a favorable board.  It folded over to Magriel in the cutoff, who also covered me, and he sized Burt and I up for a few moments before announcing “double BIG quack quack,” which of course meant a massive bomb of a reraise to 44,000.  I did my best to hide the erection rapidly forming in my pant leg as Boutin mulled the bet over.  When he eventually folded I announced that I was all in and Magriel concluded that he had to call.  I dumped my kings onto the table and he looked at me sideways and said “oh well, I need an ace.”  As he turned over big slick I replied “yes sir, you do.”  When the flop came J-9-4 I began chanting “quack quack quack” but I was quickly silenced by an ace on the turn.  Oh no.  Standard.  Except for Magriel.

I suppose I’m now officially in a rut.  This drought doesn’t approach the magnitude of the No Haircut drought of 2007, but a drought it is.  The really bad news is not the drought but my reaction to it.   Past ruts have made me hungry and determined; this one leaves me pondering my future.  I continue to be visited by bouts of boredom, even in the midst of my poker battles.  I’m pretty tired of the scene and of poker in general.  I’m tired of the same conversations about tournament structures, who the hottest players on the circuit are, and whether I should sometimes be checkraising top pair to balance my range.  I’m tired of telling bad beat stories, of hearing bad beat stories, of the same fifty faces popping up in the same eight venues over and over again.  I’m actively considering making some changes.  Also, the answer isn’t to simply start winning.  History suggests that I will eventually pull through and end this drought, but winning isn’t a cure-all this time.  Even as I was making deep runs in the two January Borgata tournaments I (sort of) final tabled, I found myself half-jokingly asking friends if they’d like to play my stack and wondering when those tournaments would be over already.  I’ve lost a bit of my mojo.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not looking to go back to a square job.  I’m not that deluded.  I know that I would suffer from a deep and desperate despair on the very first day that an “honest day’s work” was asked of me.  I just want to diversify—not just financially but also mentally.  In the end, grinding tournaments gets boring just like anything else, and truthfully it’s not where the big—the really big—money is.  I’ve made plenty of money at poker tournaments and I’ve got a bunch of it in the bank.  I’m not going to commit the stupid error I’ve watched so many of my colleagues commit by reinvesting poker money in poker.  The top of poker’s economic pyramid is a long, long way from guys on my level.  Trying to get there is a great way to go broke (and look stupid to boot).  What I’m looking for is something new to hold my interest, and if it’s something I can make money at, that would be nice too.

Some people have told me that I’ve got a great book in me.  I like the idea but I’m not convinced.  I see myself as a decent writer, not a gifted one.  If I was truly gifted this blog would not only come effortlessly but would have reached critical mass by now.  Sitting down to write a book about my experiences in poker would require a greater leap of faith than the one I made in 2006 when I started all of this.  I don’t think I’m ready for that.  Instead I will probably invest a chunk of my savings in some sort of side business(es) and see where it goes.  Right now I only have vague ideas about it, but I’m serious about doing it.  I’d like to make some moves soon.  Open new doors, find new challenges.

It’s all gambling in the end.

I depart for Las Vegas tomorrow.  I’m feeling quite dispassionate about this trip; going out there for the first time in seven months arouses nothing in the way of excitement.

The purpose of this trip is to enjoy the possible fruits of the grand return of the direct-online-satellite entry tournament to the poker scene.  It arrives in the form of Pokerstars’ newly minted NAPT, which debuts at The Venetian on Saturday.  ‘Stars has located a handful of US-based entities who are less squeamish about them than Harrah’s Inc. and taken the bold step of forming a tournament tour in the States that will compete with the WSOP and WPT.  This means attendance that will be heavily fortified by players who have won non-transferable seats online, theoretically creating a larger, softer 5k than is typical in the post-UIGEA/post-recession poker world.  My attempts at winning a seat online were laughably futile, so I will either win a live satellite or peel the five dimes.  I’m a baller like that.

I have less than zero interest in experiencing the Vegas-y side of Vegas right now.  On this trip there will be no gluttonous steak dinner, no limo rides, no Spearmint Rhino, no Drai’s and no wandering about the Strip in goofy blue sunglasses at 6:30 am.  I will probably spend nearly all of my time away from the poker table alone.  I’ve purposely selected The Orleans as my home away from home for this trip.  A relatively sleepy casino hotel that caters mostly to locals, The Orleans is located a couple of miles from the strip, on a stretch of road populated mostly by strip malls, gas stations and fast food joints.  (It’s also a testament to my abstinence from pit gaming:  it’s the last casino from which I can still wrangle a comped room).

My itinerary, roughly, is:

1.  fly in

2.  rent a car

3.  set up shop at the Orleans

4.  report for work at the Venetian poker room every day

5.  profit

If the NAPT event goes poorly, I may hop in my rental car and drive to LA to make my LAPC debut.  I’ve never done the fabled LA/Vegas desert drive.  It will give me the opportunity to see Barstow in February, which I hear is quite lovely!  It will either be very Fear & Loathing or it will be something more dull and lonely.  If I were a betting man I’d put a few bucks on the latter.  As it turns out, I’ll be lacking the insane cohort and the trunk full of exotic drugs on this journey.  Yes, definitely the latter.

I’m not sure how many more of these trips I have in me.  This could be the last cross-country sojourn for awhile (until the WSOP at least), but we’ll see what kind of tune I’m singing in a couple of weeks.  A score of some kind would be welcome.