UPDATE: No-stakes Dallas Amateur-turned-Vegas small-stakes pro David Pflaster is hanging in there. Has built his stack back up to about 6,000.

“I did stop-and-go,” he said, “the best play in poker … He raised it up and i couldn’t go all-in because I only had like 1,500 more, so I just flat called and bet all-in on the flop.”

“Ah, because in that situation it doesn’t matter what you have or if it hits you — you’re just banking on it not hitting him.”

“Yeah, but it did hit me,” and he folded.

Hmm, so in that case a check wouldn’t have been better? Maybe not. Still, good stuff, DP … back in survivable action … with 520 of 2,317 remaining. Money kicks in at 198.

UPDATE: Pflaster is out. He built his stack up to 8,500 by making moves. First go was all-in with J-3 … tight table, his short stack still big enough to hurt any and all of them … everybody folds.

Next hand: AK … can’t just raise a little bit, so he moves all-in again … no one calls.

Next hand: [cards]9c Tc[/cards]. Same move again … by this point players are getting suspicious, but he still has too many chips for any of them to call … except for the dude with pocket queens. Flopped a 9, but never improved. Totally crippled, moves all-in in the dark in the next hand, late-position min-raises … they’re heads-up, but Pflaster’s Q7s fails to outflop-turn-river the raisers K-J.

CORRECTION: From the cell phone of Pflaster …

Just to clarify though, when I told you that I hit with the stop and go, what I meant was that i had Qh8h and the flop was JT3 two hearts. So even though I had a big draw I still prefer to bet and try to take it down while stillI only have Q high.