Cold decked, card dead, and sucked out in Las Vegas ... with a few good momentsI had been sailing through December on a major heater that extended into January. Then, Neteller problems, more online poker uncertainty ... and I was certainly looking forward to my Las Vegas trip on Feb 4-7.
I arrived at Excalibur a few hours before the Super Bowl. Wanting to check out the action the poker room, I sat down at a $1/2 NL table. I could not believe how terrible some of the players were: calling raises with total shit hands, staying in hands way too long, chasing anything to the river ... I had one guy beat all the way but he refused to fold his baby flush draw, even going as far as going down to his last $10. As you might guess ... the river gave him his flush, wacking me on the ass pretty hard. More of this followed -- more garbage poker with unbelievable river cards rewarding terrible play. I left to watch the Super Bowl and was already down 1 1/2 buy ins.
Went to the Luxor after the Super Bowl and quickly got bored at my table as one player took an enormous amount of time to make any decision. I lost a big hand as my TPTK got busted by someone slow playing Cowboys. I decided that I was not going to catch up there with the $50 buy in, so I decided to take my shot at MGM.
My past experiences at MGM had not been good. One was from when I was still relatively new to casino poker, and one was from when someone chased his "favorite hand" and crushed my set of Cowboys with a flush.
This time, however, I did extremely well at MGM. My table had a few good players, a few clueless ones, and a few who were just reckless. I was cruising along up over 1 1/2 buy ins when a butthole sat down. He was apparently a regular at MGM and usually played $2/5 NL. He immediately started in on the dealer, who promptly called for the Floor. The floor manager came over and was immediately greeted by a smart remark, so he told the player to cash out. Wow - I was shocked that they actually did something about the guy. However, the manager showed that he had no balls and eventually let the guy stay. Soon, a different player started complaining about the dealer, and I had had enough. I requested to be moved to another table, where I was immediately hassled by the dealer and a player because of my stack. Yes, I was at a $1/2 table, yes I moved by management at my request, ...
It was late and I didn't feel like putting up with any crap, so I cashed out. It was a good night that just ended kind of poorly.
On Monday, I played a twelve-hour session at the Venetian. The players were certainly better than the previous places I played, but I could never get up very much. I had some idiot raising and raising on a flush draw, which he unfortunately hit on the river. I also got creamed in one hand when my K-K went up against A-A. All in all, it was a fun session, even though the chip level was huring the last two hours.
On Tuesday, I went to Caesar's and was put on a waiting list for $1/2 NL. Unfortunately, I stepped out to use the restroom and missed getting seated at a new table. Instead, I was seated at a shark-infested table that had one idiot who raised EVERY hand. Everyone was getting pissed and waited for the chance to get him with a monster. He finally got busted and left, and I unfortunately once again ran into K-K vs A-A -- the second time in twelve hours. I didn't like the atmosphere in Caesar's and decided to leave.
After Caesar's, , I went back to MGM and saw
CarmenSinCity sitting at a $1/2 table. I got seated next to her and decided to have a little fun. Carmen wrote an interesting
account of it on her blog. Alas, I was up a little, then got cold decked once or twice, then was card dead for a few hours. I was getting pretty discouraged since I had been so used to winning in Las Vegas.
I decided to get in a tournament before I left -- the Caesar's 11:00 pm. Early on I had Cowboys and doubled up on a flush chaser. I played my usual tournament game and was soon looking at the final table. There were 48 people in the tournament and it paid top six. Once we got to the fianl table, the Caesar's folks were giving us the chop figures, but being one of the big stacks, I wasn't looking to chop until we got rid of several at the table. I had a run of hot cards and took out most myself, and got lucky when my J-J bested A-A. I brought up the chop when we were down to four, but one guy made it clear that he didn't want to chop. The chop would have given us all just short of second place money. Needless to say, the short stack was not happy. Soon he went out, and while on break I asked the other remaining player, Caesar, if he would chop if Mr. No-Chop went out third. He said he would, and I was willing to do so since it was getting really late.
Key hand: I had 6-6 and was raised by N0-Chop. I went all in and he called -- with J-J! I was expecting to go out in third when the flop brought a lovely 6. Just to really rub it in, the turn was a 6. Mr. No-Chop then seemed to go on tilt and soon was out. By not chopping, he lost a few hundred dollars. The other player, Caesar, asked me if I would chop, I nodded, and it was over. Maybe next time I'll play it out, but I just didn't have the desire to that late on my final night. I was hoping to get at least a little sleep before we checked out of our hotel.
So ... even though I chopped first and second place in a tourney, I lost some major hands in the cash games and actually ended up down a little bit for the trip. I guess it was bound to happen since I had such a great streak going in Las Vegas for the past year.
