I’m gonna give you everything I got, now what are you gonna do?

Jim, Jim, Jim. Nice try on the Jack Johnson song, but yesterday's post asks for a movie title! The correct answer is "White Zombie", starring Bela Lugosi. The fact that nobody got it most likely means that Jeff, Cecile, and MK didn't catch yesterday's post, since I've forced them all to watch the movie, and listen to the music of the band by the same name. Also, Jeff and I use that exact phrase from the movie semi-regularly in our weekly card nights (not poker BTW).

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Apparently my mom has started watching a little bit more of the 8 bazillion poker broadcasts, since I've been doing this Vegas thing, than she had in the past. She's talked about the extreme situations that the players put themselves and their opponents into, and how nerve-wracking the whole thing can be. And poker has been described, very aptly, as hours of boredom interspersed with moments of sheer terror. Well, Mom, it's a good thing there were no T.V. cameras in the Caesar's poker room last night, or you might not have made it.

I went in to the cardroom with a pre-game pep talk from Amy and a good overall disposition. But it wasn't long before that went completely out of the window. I lost yet another AQ to A3 with a A83 flop for a $200+ pot. Luckily (I guess) I'm so gun-shy of my big aces anymore I lost the minimum on this hand by simply calling the bettor down. I also dropped a large hand with JJ to 88 when my opponent flopped his 8. Combine that with a large failed (but reasonable, IMHO) bluff attempt, and a couple of plays that were ill-advised in everyone's humble opinion, and 7 hours into the night I found myself with less than $80 of my total $600 buy-in.

This was around 3 a.m. And I was angry. And I decided, right then, that I was not leaving that casino until I got my money back plus at least $1, or I busted out. Enough is enough. I was determined to leave with a win or die trying.

The approach I ended up taking was to tighten way up, bluff with reckless abandon once I started, and very occasionally push hard on a pre-flop situation where I thought I might have the best starting hand. And somehow, it worked. Over the course of the next 5 hours, I waited and waited for good hands, and forced the issue with absolutely nothing when I needed to. By 0700, I had worked my way back up to $500.

For the next hour, I just kept looking at my stack as it fluctuated around the $500 mark. The table I was at consisted almost entirely of very tough players. In fact, at one point in the evening/morning, I looked around at everyone, and thought in general terms about the game, and realized that it was being very well played - perhaps the best overall table I've ever been at. It was something of a pleasure to watch, actually. I remember feeling that way sometimes in the midst of really good beach volleyball games - in between points in these games, sometimes I would become aware of the quality of the contest. But this was the first time I have ever felt that way playing poker. The difference is I want to be in those beach volleyball games, but I most certainly did not want to be at that table. I wanted a win on the night so badly, but I'd been playing for 11 hours straight, and I was really tired and really hungry, and not in the best frame of mind to begin with. So a tough table was the last thing I wanted.

This brings us to the Hand of the Day. But before I talk about it, I want to relate a conversation that I had with one of the dealers that rotated through our game. I wasn't playing many hands, and this guy was tired and bored, and he welcomed the diversion. Anyway, we got to talking about several aspects of poker when he said that at one point, he had gone for 4 straight months without a winning session - and this was playing 5 days/week. I had a hard time believing it, but he stuck with his story. Note - I hadn't told him anything about my recent struggles; he offered this information on his own. Also, he mentioned that a professional player had decided to bankroll him, so that basically means he, the dealer, was a good player. This confession put things into a little more perspective for me. I suppose if someone who is around poker all the time as a dealer and has enough skill to be sponsored by a professional can run bad for that long, it can happen to a lot of people. Of course, I already knew that, but it helped to hear it from a real person whose game was likely much better than mine.

So without further delay,

HAND OF THE DAY
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As mentioned above, my stack had been percolating around $500. For some reason (mostly because I didn't want to be pushed around) I called a guy down to the river with AQ in hand and nothing on the table - in fact, a K on the turn. The river brought an A and an end to this guy's betting, and he turned over AJ. That took him down to about $30, and shortly thereafter I again had AQ and made a modest $10 raise. He made the desperation all-in, everyone folded, and I got the rest of his stack when two As hit the board (he had JT suited).

So now I'm looking at my chips. I have $570 - $31 short of my goal. It's so close I can taste it. The table is now short-handed - maybe 6 players. I'm in the big blind and I wake up to AK. Ohboyohboyohboy! This is my chance.

And then Fate throws me this huge, tempting bone - UTG raises to $10, and gets two callers. There is now exactly $30 in that pot that was not mine! I want that pot so badly, just the way it is right now, and I am 100% certain I have the best hand. Plus, I have not made a raise larger than $15 for 5 hours. And one of the $10 is short-stacked...maybe $35 left. It's likely he'll call any raise, considering the pot.

So I make it $50 to go. And here's where things get all mucky. The original raiser, whose stack roughly equalled my own, called. This was most definitely not part of the plan. This guy was a really good player and did not relinquish pots without a fight. The short stack I was counting on to call folded, as did the other player, leaving me heads-up against the guy I least wanted to be heads-up against.

Add to that one of the worst possible flops for my hand: Qxx, two spades. I have no spade at all, and no Q either, the last time I looked. Plus, my opponent has position on me.

But in re-raising such a large amount pre-flop, I have represented aces or kings. There is no way I can now check. So I come out firing with $100 into the roughly $120 pot. Without much hesitation, I get called. And now I am very, very worried.

The turn is another rag - I think it actually paired the board, but I dont' remember. I looked at my stack, now in the low $400s. I looked at the pot, now in the low $300s. And I knew that I didn't have the heart/stamina/ability/situation required to climb back to $600 from where I was now. And my opponent had not re-raised me at any point.

The only thing to do was to push all-in, so I did. And Mom, this is where I'm glad you weren't able to watch this. My opponent did not fold. Instead, he started thinking out loud, and talking to me. He was trying to figure out if he was actually beaten or not, and mentioned that he thought it was likely I had AJ. Honestly, at this point I didn't get it. Considering how tight I'd been playing all morning, even his pre-flop call did not make sense. There is no way anyone could put me on anything other than KK or AA, unless I was giving off some tell.

Regardless, he was not folding. I suddenly realized just how hard and fast my heart was pounding, and started concentrating on relaxing and looking as neutral as possible. I leaned back in my chair a little, a la the Domination post, but not so obviously. Then I realized that, as tired as my eyes were and considering how relaxed I was forcing myself to be, my face almost certainly looked sad. Try it yourself sometime - look in the mirror, and completely relax all of your facial muscles. Then imagine that face at 0800 after 12 hours of playing poker. It would look pretty darn defeated, don't you think? So I started ever-so-slightly turning up the corners of my mouth, partially in an attempt to hint at unconscious satisfaction with my position, but mostly to keep my face from hanging off my skull like a damp washrag.

Eventually, finally, the guy folded. His talk during the hand indicated he had a pair and a flush draw, although that would have required him calling with two spades, neither of which was the Q because that one was on the board. The other cards were rags, so he would have had to call a $50 bet with at least one rag spade. So I am not at all sure what he had, and in fact all of his talk may have been just that. I didn't care. I didn't care about anything except the glorious pot which brought me up to $725, for $125 profit on the session, after a low point of less than $80. I stayed for one more "courtesy" round so that it didn't completely look like I was hightailing it out of there after winning a big hand. And then I hightailed it out of there.

Today, I'm going to take my first day off. It's overdue. I would have really liked to skip either yesterday or Friday, but those two days are the highlight of the insanity that is March Madness. Looking back, I think it's possible that my expectations of hordes of inexperienced b-ball bettors at the poker tables was unfounded. The majority sit in the sports book areas and watch the games. Of the few that venture into the poker rooms, most of those play limit, and those brave enough to sit at the no-limit tables have a much higher level of skill than I had anticipated. The tables were crowded, but probably the toughest I've faced in Vegas.

Any, this post is too long and I need food and more sleep. Play well, everyone.