As many of you know I've been running real bad in 2006. Well tonight it looked like the stars were aligned as I was doing very well in the Super Monday $162 tournament on partypoker. 1343 entered and we're down to about 40. Then this gem happens.

***** Hand History for Game 3509296431 *****
NL Texas Hold'em Trny:19929316 Level:14 Blinds (1000/2000) - Tuesday, February 07, 01:48:44 EDT 2006
Table Super Monday(590519) Table #4 (Real Money)
Seat 8 is the button
Total number of players : 10
Seat 1: RefiNow ( $23840 )
Seat 3: PJRED454 ( $4490 )
Seat 7: Xaston ( $52939 )
Seat 8: hobbesy ( $18064 )
Seat 10: SamENole ( $40702 )
Seat 4: adadfasdfdsa ( $38867 )
Seat 5: MurphysLaw21 ( $18069 )
Seat 6: keeper00 ( $67243 )
Seat 2: AAPOKA ( $34591 )
Seat 9: jjbenb ( $25408 )
Trny:19929316 Level:14
Blinds (1000/2000)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Xaston [ As Ad ]
RefiNow folds.
AAPOKA folds.
PJRED454 folds.
adadfasdfdsa raises [5000].
MurphysLaw21 folds.
keeper00 folds.
Xaston calls [5000].
hobbesy folds.
jjbenb calls [4000].
SamENole folds.
** Dealing Flop ** [ 7d, 6s, Ks ]
jjbenb checks.
adadfasdfdsa bets [6000].
Xaston raises [16000].
jjbenb folds.
adadfasdfdsa calls [10000].
** Dealing Turn ** [ 9s ]
adadfasdfdsa checks.
Xaston is all-In [31939]
adadfasdfdsa is all-In [17867]
** Dealing River ** [ Kc ]
adadfasdfdsa shows [ Kd, Qd ] three of a kind, kings.
Xaston shows [ As, Ad ] two pairs, aces and kings.
Xaston wins 14072 chips from side pot #1 with two pairs, aces and kings.
adadfasdfdsa wins 84734 chips from the main pot with three of a kind, kings.







I don't know how much longer I can continue to run bad, then get my hopes up that things are about to turn around, only to get spit on by the deck when it really counts. That would have vaulted me into the chip lead and great position to win $42,000.

[hijack]
I was close to chip leader of a 10+1 on Sunday morning on the bubble when my in-laws' ISP went down. I fired up the laptop, went wardriving, and it took me about 35 minutes to find someone with an unsecure network and cable - the whole freaking neighborhood lost DSL. I could have made it to the internet cafe in 25 minutes. UGH. I get back seated and find that I have 4x the big blind, the first hand that I see is 77, so I push, and get called by CO with AA.
[/hijack]

Man, I feel your pain, albeit on a much smaller scale (1.9k vs 42k, but still. . .). The tournament gods must be frowning on BTP.

If I re-raised pre flop my EV would have been about 7000 tournament chips. Smooth calling had an EV in the neighborhood of 30,000.

This is the kind of BS that makes me not play tournaments. I play well for 3 hrs to get Ko'd all in preflop with AK vs KQ or AQ.

Xaston I agree that you got your money in with best of it and that is obviously the goal of any poker player, but I avoid playing tricky at the end of tournies especially when I'm in good chip postion. I would have reraised preflop and been ok taking down his 5000 chips and not risking getting sucked out for the majority of my chips.

Your opponnent is deep enough that he's only calling an all in with a type of hand that you're likely to get it all in against anyways if you see a flop.

While he didn't provide you with this information, I was sweating him and this player had been fairly active preflop, meaning KQ, AJ, KJ, A10 type hands were all very possible for his range.

Against a guy who raises one out of every 3 orbits.... you might be alright raising it here hoping to get JJ, QQ or AK all in preflop. Against a more active player, you want to let him hit a flop, since the odds are much higher that he'll simply fold to a re-raise.

Being happy with 8k here is NOT an option. This is your opportunity.... seize it.

You're never going to amass a huge amount of chips stealing risk-free. If you make 3x standard raises..... the odds of you stealing the blinds are about 66%, or exactly the amount you're risking to steal the blinds (6k if blinds are 1/2k) You're going to have to take a risk at some point.... and rarely will you ever find a situation where you're going to be 80% to gain chips. Rockets are pretty much the only one.