WSOPRookie

2006-07-29T00:15:00.000-07:00

Tourney:

I'm out!

Starting round 4 the blinds were 100 200 with a 25 ante and I had 7,500. about 20 minutes before the end of round 4 I got wounded big time. I had A 10, and the only other player had a A2. the board had a A and a 2, but the board also had a straight. I checked, he bet 1,500 I raised to 3,000. I figured my kicker would be better, and I was playing so tight that a check raise and double his bet would make him fold. It did not and his 2 pair held up . A2, can't believe that. After that I was down to about 2,000, and the blinds got me down to about 1,500 before I started getting some cards and I went All In preflop 5 times in the last 20 minutes of the round 4. I only got called once and I had JJ the caller had 22. I won. So at the end of round 4 I had about 4,000 left.

In round 5 I think I went all in twice. one of the pro's called me the second time. I had the button, he was first to act and bet 1,000. Everyone folded up to me and I went all in with AQ suited. the two blinds fold, and the pro calls me with AK unsuited. The flop was like 567 and only 1 club (my suit). the turn had a K and so I was drawing dead for the river. this guy had just been on the losing end of this at the end of round 4. - He had the AQ and the other guy had the AK and he lost 5,000. So he was a little happier that he wasn't on the bottom end of this one.

In round 5 the blinds were 150 / 300 with a 50 ante so it was eating away at me quite quickly. Luckily I was on the button for the first hand in round 5 so I didn't have to post those blinds till it went all the way around the table.

I went out 20 minutes into round 5. This is after about 11 hours. it was 11:15 and I started at 12, but we got a 1.5 hour break for dinner. At the beginning of round 5 they still had 1210 players. So at the very least I would have had to last to the end of round 6 (the rest of round 5 + all of round 6 would be another 4 hours) to make it to the next day. Even then I wouldn't really have to much to play with (which is why I guess the raise the blinds).

I really wasn't getting that good of cards most of the night. I made a couple mistakes, but don't feel I played badly overall. Our table had the same players from round 2 on. Nobody had gone out since round 2, so we were all pretty much just pushing chips around. Everyone was playing very tight.

All in all a good time and very educational. I took my seat cushion (they told us they were ours to keep), but I didn't see anyone else to that, but when I got on the shuttle another guy had his cushion as well. I wasn't instructed to go anywhere after I went out, so I just walked out the door seat cushion in hand to walk the hallway of shame. At 11:15 that hallway was dead and there were a lot less people watching in the poker room.

2006-07-28T19:28:00.000-07:00

THIRD DAY - GAME DAY!!!!

Friday, July 28

"If you can't spot the sucker in the first half an hour at the table, then you are the sucker." - Rounders, the movie (2000). Well, we all know Mark isn't the sucker. He made it to the Fourth round! I just spoke with him and asked if I could give you all a brief update on the status of his game, so - here it goes...

Currently, Mark has $7,500 in chips and will enter Round Four after the dinner break. At his table is one professional poker player - Tony Chessa.

His entire cheering section has arrived (except for me - sad face), and they are celebrating his success. Mark sounds like he is having a great time. I know you all wish him well, and if you would like to follow the tournament, I found a fantastic website that provides live updates: http://www.cardplayer.com/tournaments/

I think that's about it for now - I'll keep you all posted. :)

Cheers,

- Jill

2006-07-28T01:29:00.000-07:00

2nd day cont.

WOW. that is the best word for the convention and what was going on in the poker room. Convention was packed full of .com poker sites, and some vendors for cards and chips and tables, etc. I signed up for a lot of stuff and the pic below is what I got for handing out my email like candy. (I might also win several cruises and millions of dollars in their giveaways - keeping my fingers crossed!) Apparently there are about 100 companies that are "The ONLY name in online poker".

the best piece was that gold colored coin in the middle - had to fill out a VISA application for that one. It says WSOP on it, and saves me from buying one - nearly did yesterday but it cost $30 in the gift shop. Spun a wheel for the bear, played a hand of texas holdem for the hat, and played a digital one table tournament for the sweatshirt (took about 15 - 20 min.) the rest of the stuff was just laying out - yes even the super glue (next to the hat). The red thing is a little frisbee. I also got a 1GB flash drive for handing out my email, but Slippy was looking at it when i took the picture. Also not in the pic is a blow up inner tube for the pool. I played a one table tournament for that nifty article as well. For you poker players: the blinds would go up every 5 minutes, we each started with 1,500 and blinds started at 200 / 400. the time limit was 15 minutes and at the end of that who ever had the most chips won. First hand I get AA. I go all in and have no callers. I get the blinds. Next hand I get K9 offsuit. I raise, another guy goes all in and has one caller, I fold. My K9 would have lost. Next hand I get AK suited and go all in. I get two callers (the guy who lost the first all in had about 200 left, and the guy who won the first all in calls me as well). The guy who lost the first all in had a 10 4 off suit, and the other guy has a AJ offsuit. Flop turns a 4, Turn turns a J and River turns an A. just like that I was done. but I figured since there was a time limit and it was fake money I would be very aggressive, and I didn't exactly have bad hands when I went all in. The winner may have gotten a sweatshirt.

After the convention I thought I would go back to the poker room and look around. I followed Anthony Michael Hall most of the way back there - he just happened to be right in front of me at the time. In the poker convention I saw James Garner - he was just sitting in a chair in one of the booths. Once inside the poker room I wandered about, and saw a lot of people reading and smiling at my "What Would Slippy Do?" shirt. I tell you what, from the reactions here, this shirt is the new ipod - people were rolling down there windows on the strip and yelling it back to me (I kid you not). I saw a bunch of people crowded around a couple of tables so I went to see who was there.

Penn (or Teller) - the tall one who talks was just finishing a game. He is quite large - probably 6'5'' or 6'6'' at least.

Another table near him was filled with kind of gross looking trashy folks. I couldn't figure out why everyone was watching this table until one of the players I couldn't see went out and stood up. It was Jeremy - no not our Jeremy, Ron Jeremy. yeah, that was a pornstar table - yuck, hope they clean those chairs when that table is done. he looks about as icky in person as one would imagine. Some of the people around me knew who the other players were, but I have no idea. One of them kind of looked like Kathy Lee Gifford though.

In the convention room I did see Antonia "the magician" Esfandiari. He was promoting one of his sponsors or something. (He is one of the pros we see on ESPN). Apparently Phil "the unibomber" Laak, and three or four other high profile players will be around tomorrow in there, so I probably won't see any of them on the first day.

The line for the Will Call was an easy 15 - 20 min wait so I am really glad we did that yesterday. The other line was probably 30 min or so. Very busy area now.

while walking through the poker room I did see a lot of people who looked like famous people. Such as: Harry Potter, Ross the Intern, and Brett Favre.

We went down the strip and had 5.95 prime rib at "The Dam Restaurant", then went to a blues club, then came back to Bally's. I sat down at the poker room, and Slippy went home. I ordered a water as soon as I sat down, and about an hour and a half later when I called it quits the lady still hadn't come back to our table.

anyway, waiting for David and Sonia to come in, they should be here anytime now.

I hope I get better cards than what I got tonight. Hope I used up all the bad luck tonight so I can get to round 2 tomorrow.

2006-07-27T14:55:00.000-07:00

2nd day so far - Thur.

Well after the last post I went to find a buffett. Thought there were a couple down in the Excaliber, Tropicana area, so started walking. Quite hot outside. While I went i took some pics:

PF Changs is at the Aladdin, and the water fountain is in front of you guessed, the Eiffel tower - Paris casino.

As I was walking I stumbled across something I thought Kevin and the boys would like - as well as all you Harley fans out there - and you beer fans.

As I was taking the pictures of the bikes I saw the poster on the window behind the bengal tiger bike and thought - huh, a tower of beer. That would be neat. So I ventured in.

Turns out, the waitress in the picture is just under 5' tall and the towers are actual size relative to her! The short one was $27 and held something like 60 oz, the tall was $90 and held somewhere in the 100's I think. Needless to say I did not get one, but had the bartender put a little one next to the big on one the bar. The big one was about a foot from the ceiling.

The guys at the Harley Cafe liked my "What Would Slippy Do?" shirt. I had a huge burger that I wasn't even able to finish - a double cheesburger and each patty was easily 1/2 pound, plus quacamole, pico-de-gallo, thousand island / mayo dressing, and came with fries. I didn't even get to the fries. This sucker was a mouthful. Batteries in the camera gave notice in the Harley cafe, so luckily I was near the Souvenier strip and there was a Walgreens that had my type of battery - all is well on the camera front for the jaunt down to the Rio. In the souveniour strip there was this guy (did I mention it is hot? Hotter than the vinyl seats in the car when you are wearing shorts!):

good grief man - polyester in the sun when it is easily over 100?

that is all for now, am about to head to the Rio - there is a shuttle that I hope is still running.

2006-07-27T09:52:00.000-07:00

First Day. Wed. 26

Got here around 1 or so and on the way to the hotel called Slippy (friend who lives here as a professional gambler). We met up and went over to the Rio to sign in. I was planning on signing in first, but thought it best not to have to drag my bags around.

It took forever to figure out where to go. My email confirmation from the WSOP people only said they had my $, but not where to go. We walked into the Rio and asked several staff along the way, but the first two didn't respond in a form of English I understood, so I finally asked a guy at an information booth and he said just keep walking that way. We did. We walked for several miles in the casino until we reached the convention center. They were setting up for the poker convention that starts today, and they had booths galore outside the convention rooms, all hawking their wears. Everything from a sitdown 10 minute massage, to several stores of WSOP merchandise. We asked another staff member once we got down in the heart of the WSOP area, and she kindly pointed about 10 feet behind us where there was a big sign that said "Tournament Registration". I guess it wasn't big enough for Slippy and I.

We found the area and stood in line.

This is in the convention center and to my right are games going on, after we left the room and were wandering around we saw that this type of action was prohibited (only Harrah's staff can take pictures in the room). I guess since we weren't taking pics of the players it was ok.

I get to the cashier, and tell her that they should already have my info and $, etc.

(yes this pic would probably be against the rules as well)

The line took about 15 minutes give or take, and when I talked to this helpful cashier her face kind of made a frown (the you poor bastard frown) and informed me that I was in the wrong line. I should have gone to the Will Call booth outside the room since no $ was exchanging hands.

Yes this the actual line - no line - at the Will Call booth. Turns out directly behind me a cashier cage where I originally asked a worker where to go, and she pointed me to the Tournament Registration line, huh, the real line was about 5 feet from me at that point.

No worries we had nothing else to do, not in any hurry.

I signed a photo release, and they gave me three postcard type pieces of paper. 1 is a $10 voucher for food, the other two are my seat and table assignment. I keep one and give the other to the dealer when I sit down on Friday.

Table 23, Day 1, Seat 1. Not the biggest fan of Seat 1 (right next to the dealer so you have to protect your cards constantly), but that is ok.

After registration we walked down to the Palms where Slippy had some reward points we used for lunch. Then we caught the bus back to Bally's to drop off the shirt and camera. The bus was only $2.5 for a 24 period! Not too bad a deal as it goes up and down the strip quite frequently.

We walked through several casinos and finally decided on the Excalibur to play some poker. We sat there from about 7 or so until nearly 10. I ended up $99. Slippy - down about $18.

We then took in a show at the Tropicana. Was pretty neat.

When we got done it was about 11:30 or so and we made our way down to a bus stop and hopped on the bus. Turns out that $2.5 is only for the residential area and the strip is $5 per 24 hour period. I only had a couple 100's (from cashing out in the poker room), so he let me slide - but just this once!

By the time the bus was at Bally's is was nearly 12 and Slippy decided to call it a night. I went up the people mover and saw a marquee for $3.50 breakfast which started at 12. So I turned around and got some flapjacks and sausage. Then went to the poker room at Bally's. Stayed there until about 3:15 or so and cashed out ending up winning $15.

At the first poker room there was a guy playing with us that had played with Phil Laak (the unibomber - a professional who is quite good.) This guy was pretty happy and kept the table chatter up and got everyone shots of Tequila (of course these were free - just tip the waitress). So that table was not only profitable, but quite fun to be at. The guy next to me had entered a $1,500 No Limit tournament earlier, but my guess is he didn't win since he was sitting at the $2/$4 table with us. He was from Nebraska and said his brother was playing in the main event, and is a professional, so good luck to me. So if I end up playing a guy named Nate Hayes, per Chris I will probably lose, but good luck anyway. All in fun and games, he wished me well when we left.

The second poker room at Bally's was a little less talkative. There was a guy 2 seats over from me named Josh from Columbia Missouri. He was out here for a convention. A very good player, who could put people on hands very well, and made sitting at the table a lot more fun. I was holding my own, and then a loud mouth drunk sat at our table, and I was hopeing he would just get put out and leave. No such luck. I won a couple hands and was up $40, when the loud mouth decided he needed to switch chairs. I was already about to leave, but the empty chair he choose was between Josh and I. I had just won a pot so didn't think it would be cooth to get up and leave right after winning so I played a couple more hands.

the players at both tables seemed to stay with just about anything and played fairly loose. I saw a guy raising with 5 9 off suit, and there was one joker who sat down for about 1/2 and hour at Bally's right next to me that won 4 hands in a row. He had the idiot end of the straight twice (when a possible straight is on the board the idiot end is the two low cards that would make the straight). The fourth hand he had held 7 3 offsuit and was raising the whole way through and picked up a third 3 on the river. Then his luck ran out and stayed in too many hands. He was probably up about $300 or $400 after those 4 pots and by the time he left he was up about $200. But it didn't take him long to leave once he started get beat.

After a long day I crashed around 3:30 in my room, and just now got up at 9:30 or so when Slippy called. Jill called right after I got off the phone with Slippy - Love you Jill. When I got in at 3:30 I saw that the message light was on, but didn't check it until this morning. Alan left a message wishing me good luck - thanks.

The plan for the day is to go to Celebrity/Media day down at the Rio, and go through the Poker convention. One of the guys I played with at Bally's was working the poker convention and said it would be a good one to check out. Then I am going to meet up with Slippy later and we will probably go down town or something.

I am taking the camera with me today so there should be a lot more pics tomorrow or later tonight.

So far I am up $115, cashed in $10 worth of chips at the MGM that were easily 12 years old or so (one of my sisters gave them to me when I was 18 or so I think - anyway the guy behind the cashier cage said they were quite a bit more than a couple years old.), and 2 decks of cards (free when I signed up for the rewards cards at a couple casinos).

WSOP Rookie

2006-07-14T09:37:00.000-07:00

This being the first entry I will explain the purpose. I am heading to play in the WSOP at the end of July. This will be my first time in that tournament and I will find myself amungst the 8000 best players in the world. (Either the 8000 best, or the 1000 best and another 7000 with $10,000 to blow!) Since I haven't even played enough poker for real money in casino's enough to qualify as an amateur, I have designated myself as WSOPRookie. (not that there really is an amateur circuit or qualification needs like golf or anything.)

Am I one of the best? Sure, everyone is "one of the best", it is just a matter of how far down on the best list you need to scroll to find my name.

Am I the best in my town? No. I am simply better than about 80 of the players in the satellite tournament I entered, and luckier than the other 16 or 17.

I will be bringing my laptop with me and will try and post my experiences every night as I progress (or stall) through the tournament.

This Blog will give us all a chance to follow how I am doing and ask questions as to what is going on down there.

Here's a broad overview of the way the tournament will work:

First round (4 different days of round one). I will play one of the 4 days. The entire group is separated into 4 groups (ABCD) and each group plays on one of the 4 days. If you still have chips when the tournament reaches a certain number of players for the day, then you advance. (IE if there are 8000 total players, 2000 in each group, 800 will advance from each group. If you still have chips when it gets to 800, then you advance).
The other 3 days of round one you do not play.

Round 2 begins the day after the last of round 1 (Tuesday is first day of Round 2), and the first 2 groups that played will be combined (A & B, C & D). We play till we get to that magic number (700 or so). If you are still one of the players with chips you advance to round 3.
There might be a one day break in the tournament between 2 and 3 to allow all players a full day of rest.

Round 3 starts with all the players left from Round 2 and goes till it hits that magic number (600 or so).

Round 4 starts with everyone in the money! That is right, if you made round 4, you are in the money and should get at least your entry fee back. The last person to go out in round 3 gets a entry to next year. So just to make round 4 you have to be in the top 8% or so of the entrants. You really don't need to beat all 92%, since you don't play everyday, but when all is said and done the top 8% or so leave with some money. Round 4 will begin about a 1 week into the tournament, and from here on out all remaining players are all playing at the same time.

The entrants get withered down to a set number to end each day/round (about 1/2 of the number at the beginning of the day). Each day/round will last until the pool reaches that number. Each day we start at 12 noon and technically could end up playing for days before we end the round, but that really isn't probable due to the size of the blinds. Most days/rounds will end in the wee morning hours of the next day (between 12 midnight and 4 am) according to most people familiar with the tournament.

We get periodic breaks in which all tables stop for x minutes, then all table start back again at the same time. In the satellite tournament breaks were about every hour and lasted 10 to 15 minutes.

The rounds keep knocking people out until it gets down to 9 people. Once there are only 9 people that ends the second to last round and all 9 go to the final table which will start 2 weeks after the beginning of the tournament. So yes, if I am very lucky with the cards I could be down there for 2 weeks playing poker.

There is a tournament schedule and payouts from last year on the WSOP website. worldseriesofpoker.com

According to last year's payouts if I make it to about the top 1% (80th place or so) then I would make about $350,000 give or take $50,000. Not too bad of paycheck for a couple weeks play. Making the final table gets at least $1 million, and the winner will get about $10 million.

I made the settings so that you don't need a Blogger profile to add a comment, but also told the settings to ask for a word verification so I don't get a lot of SPAM posts.

I have also heard tale that the final table will be available to view via Pay-Per-View for $24.95, so if I make it to the final and you can't come out you could still be able to watch the action.