VG: Why do I sometimes feel so small?
Awesome Andrew and Random Dave hit East Fremont and the Arts District for some First Friday non-poker fun, then go home to sign away all future affiliate value sign up as beta-testers for the real money WSOP software … but not before yours truly donks off 1.4 million in play money Omaha on the EA Sports app, and somehow pays $3 in real US currency to reload!
Meanwhile back in the VG studio, we bring in Tournament Dave to report from the daily tournament tables of Venetian and Aria, where he keeps chopping up the top-heavy tournament cash and finishing ITM 2/3 of the time. Up for high-quality discussion here: the allure of tournaments with buy-ins over $100 … why early events offer more value to regs … the rationale of cutting deals at a final table … unique emotional swings of tournament-structured tilt … and was that a creatively appropriate way for floor to pull cards out of the muck?
All that and you’re ready to enjoy some hand porn. This week we look at a man who’s not afraid to get a little sexy in position with a relatively big stack and J-9s on the bubble.
Vegas Grinders 1.9
[audio: https://pokerati.com/podcast/VegasGrinders/VegasGrinders_13-04-10.mp3]
Mondays and Tuesdays are arguably the worst days of the week for poker, which is why I often take those days off.
The tourists have donated their Vegas dollars to the grinders over the weekend, and even the L.A. crowd has headed back to their movie studios and plastic surgeons.
This meant that for the final two days of my week-long experiment in playing Las Vegas daily tournaments, I would have to hit some of the bigger casinos — Caesars Palace and Bellagio.
The 10,000 starting stack at Caesars Palace's nightly tournament.
With a WSOP-circuit event being held at Caesars, I didn’t have trouble finding a comfortable-size field for their nightly 7pm tournament on a Monday. With a $110 entry fee, this event has a $5,000 guaranteed prize pool (Mon-Fri only). The staff and one local at my starting table who had already worked out the math said they would need at least 63 entrants to reach that figure. Caesars’s nightly tournaments sometimes start with even fewer players, offering a healthy overlay.
Of the buy-in, Caesars took $20 as a “maintenance fee” and $10 was for the staff toke.)
Grinders and well-known pros filled the room — the 2008 WSOP Main Event third-place finisher Dennis Phillips sat a few tables away playing a cash game and Jeff Madsen, the rapper who also won 2006 WSOP player of the year, was at the final table of the main event in the elevated area nearby. I didn’t recognize anyone at my table who should have given me trouble.
A Week of Whiffs?
I was due for a nice run, having missed the money in my first 5 tournaments. The 10,000 chip starting stack and 20-minute levels felt comfortable out of the gate. I’d have to beat out 59 others to earn the $1,914 first-place prize.
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