Make sure to use signup code jhub for 33% rakeback when signing up for Cake Poker. There's also a 100% deposit bonus up to $500.

For those that haven't yet, read these 2 previous posts before reading this. The links to them can be found here:

http://jhub3000.livejournal.com/2008/04/17/

http://jhub3000.livejournal.com/2008/04/22/

I arrived in Vegas late the night of the 2nd w/ my girlfriend Paula. Kenny05 had already went home because he's sick. That left Little Kraut & chiefsfan17 in our house. Our house is really nice. It has a pool & jacuzzi in the backyard, whirlpool in the master bathroom (my room), 5 bedrooms or so, a pool table, a nice size TV, etc...

We spent a lot of the first couple days just chillin in the pool/jacuzzi during the day & sight seeing at night. On Thursday we went out to eat w/ Little Kraut (Bobby), clamface (Doug), DumpingKGB, Playaplz, dpeters17, & a few other players. We went to a steakhouse called The Prime at the Bellagio. Me, Paula, & Little Kraut were late because we called a cab from our house & literally waited for it for an hour before it arrived. This was pretty frustrating since me & Paula had tickets to a show that night. The food at The Prime was really good & I'm pretty it was the best steak I've ever had. We played credit card roulette to see who ended up with the bill & being the luckbox that I am I got stuck w/ the $1K+ bill. Rigged. Paula & I left immediately & went to The Beatles Love show at the Mirage. I'm a pretty big Beatles fan & loved the Fab Four show I went to last year so I had high hopes for the show, especially considering I had heard good things about it. Going in I thought it was going to be a live band singing Beatles songs w/ the show going on at the same time. It turned out to be just a show w/ Beatles music playing. There were a couple good parts but all in all it was extremely weird & I think you either have to be into theatre or dropping acid to enjoy the show. I was neither so I wasn't a big fan.

I didn't do much for the 4th of July because I had to play the Main Event on the 5th. We hung out by the pool during the day & then Paula & I headed to the strip to watch the fireworks. Needless to say we sat there forever & didn't see any fireworks so we went just went to eat & went home. I'm not sure what the deal was there.

When I arrived at my table for the main event there was nobody there & the dealer informed me that my table was the ESPN feature table & I had to go over to the stage. Before I even got through the ropes I had Pokerstars people offering me $10K to wear their apparel for the feature table. This put me in a quandry. I had a free seat from Stars for being supernova elite but had taken cash instead so I could represent Cake in the hopes of having my 1 year deal turn into a lifetime deal. I told them I needed some time & called Chris (VP of Cake) & told him about the Pokerstars offer & asked if Cake could do anything for me. He made a couple calls & got back to me. We agreed that if I wore Cake gear at the feature table my 1 year special rakeback deal would turn into a lifetime deal. Sounds good to me. Ship it. At this point the event had already started. Obviously it was worth it for me to sit out of the event 200BBs deep to get the best deal. The Cake gear I was wearing wasn't regulation for the feature table because it didn't say .net on it. I didn't know ahead of time that I was at the feature table & had just planned on getting regulation gear from Chris at one of the breaks. Chris wasn't at the Rio yet but had some Cake gear dropped of at the bell desk. I then had to walk all the way across the Rio to the bell desk. At that point they were saying they couldn't release the box of Cake gear to me because it wasn't under my name. Great. Finally I got Chris on the phone & got them to release it to me. I grabbed a shirt & hat & headed back to the WSOP room. They got me miced up & I was about 25 minutes late. I sat down & the only player I recognized was Matusow. My originall plan was to play pretty loose aggressive, opening a lot of hands w/ small raises & trying to build a big stack when I hit a big flop & stack a donkey who can't fold top pair. Within about 5 minutes I realized it was a really tough table & changed my plan. I could tell the player 2 to my right was a good LAG, the player to my left was talking about how he plays in Daniel Negraneu's home game, there was a girl at the table that people were saying is some pro, & the whole table was reading hands very well & talking about laying down sets. I have a really tough table in the easiest tournament of the year. Great. I decided that playing ultra LAG might not be the best option against these players & tightened up. I was still playing looser than most people, raising any pair or suited connector in 1st position, but I basically stuck to big hands & good speculative hands & avoided raising hands like 64o.

Nothing too eventful happened for a while. I just won & lost some small pots. I was up about 1,500 at the 1st break. In level 2 (100/200) I opened w/ QQ in middle position & the player to my immediate left tripled my raise. I obviously called & the flop came 10 high w/ 2 diamonds. I checked & he bet. Now against a lot of players I would check-raise this flop but he was a good player & I didn't think he would call my check-raise w/ a worse hand. Moreover, we were still 100 BBs deep & I didn't want to go to crazy w/ this hand. I decided to just call. The turn brought a third diamond. Now a hand like AdKd had me beat. I checked & he checked behind. The river was a blank & at that point I thought there was no point in betting against this particular player. It went check, check & I scopped the pot as he mucked. I'm guessing he either had AK, JJ, or was just making a move. That put me at about 25K. The very next hand as I was stacking my chips I looked down at 5c4c in middle position. After you win a nice pot & are stacking chips most players put you on a bigger than normal hand when you raise because most people will fold weaker hands so they can continue to stack their chips. I like to raise a tad more often than normal in this spot. That said, I'm raising 54s in that spot every time anyway so I made it 600. The SB & BB both called. The flop came A87 w/ 2 clubs. That's a monster flop for me w/ a flush draw & a gut shot. The SB checked & The BB led for 2K. He had 11K behind after leading out & it was decision time for me. I obviously wasn't folding to his bet so it was between calling & raising. Considering the pot odds & implied odds I could just call with this hand. I don't like it though. I prefer to raise w/ a hand like this & keep fold equity on my side. If I raise he will fold the majority of the time & he calls or re-raises I usually won't be much worse than a 55-45 dog. That's a good spot to semi-bluff. W/ my image & the way the table had been playing, I thought he would fold to a committing flop raise unless he had 2 pair or better. I made it 6,000 to go. If he shoved I would only have to call 7,000 more & would have an easy call getting 2.5:1. After I make it 6,000 he has to know he has little to know fold equity w/ only 7K more to come over the top of my raise with. After I make it 6,000 he instantly shoves. I asked for a count & immediately called. The whole table thought I had a set. Nope. Just 5 high here. He flipped over A8 & I obviously brick the turn & river. I was down to about 12K. The whole table was a little shocked at my play but imo they're all just a bunch of nits & my play was completely standard. As I've said, he'll usually fold to my raise & if he doesn't I'm usually not much worse than 55-45. The obvious play is to raise. Matusow makes a comment that he had me pegged as the best player at the table until that play. He then says that he's not willing to gamble for that many chips. I disagree when I'm the one making the committing raise, putting my opponent to the test. Our table was really tough & even if I hit a big hand I wasn't likely to get paid off. Sitting around like a nit waiting for a big hand wasn't going to do you much good unless you were lucky enough to have a monster when someone else had another monster.

I lose a few small pots & my stack dwindles to about 8,000 to 8,500. Matusow makes it 600 to go in the CO & the LAG button calls. The SB folds & I look down at KdQd in the BB. If my stack were a little lower I would have considered making a squeeze play but I just don't like that play w/ over 40BBs. I had an easy call. The flop came 9 high w/ 2 diamonds. I had 2 overs w/ a flush draw. 40BBs deep in an MTT I think the best play there is to make a pot committing check-raise on the flop. You're usually a small favorite or small dog & with fold equity on your side it's the obvious play. I check, Matusow bets a little less than pot, the button folds & I made a check-raise for most of my chips, making it obvious that I wasn't folding. Matusow moved all in & flipped over A9 for top pair. I was a small favorite. Obviously he turns another 9 & I brick the river. GG me. I managed to bust out of a tournament in level 2 when we started w/ 200BBs. Well played. That said, I think I made the right plays in every single pot I played. I'll let you guys know when it's on ESPN.

Me & Paula just did some more sight seeing that night & then her flight left in the morning. Yesterday I played some online. I played a couple hours on Bobby's desktop, mixing Pokerstars & Cake. I normally table select on Pokerstars but Bobby's setup didn't have enough room for the lobbies so I was just signing up blind. The games were absolutely ridiculous, confirming my belief that double VPP week is the most overrated promotion ever & the games are more profitable overall (w/ rakeback) on a normal week. Every game had at least 3-4 good regulars. My favorite was a $235 I played w/ Kenny05, MrCasino, Comma_d, leoc00 (or something like that), & Psimalive. All are good winning players. I started off awful & was down about $3-$4K. I managed to come back though. I played a few more hours 6-8 tabling Cake on my laptop & made a little over $4K on the day overall.

At night we went to some steakhouse (N9ne I think) at the Palms w/ basically the same group as the last time we went to dinner + chiefsfan17. The food was decent & I didn't get owned in credit card roulette again. We then got a limo the Rhino at around 11:45. Most of them only stayed a couple hours but me, Bobby, & Doug stayed til about 7 am. We then cabbed it to Denny's for a nice breakfast before we went to bed.

Today I slept til 3:30 & didn't do much except get a new sprint card & get that setup. Tonight we're going to the Pokerstars party & I better get going cause Doug is gonna be here in half an hour.






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