Mixing it up

"I just received another text, this one from Pennsylvania!"

Gary, the coordinator of the pub tourney, was sitting to my right and cracked a little smile. I remarked, “You know I keep a blog, don’t you?”

“Yeah, I seem to remember Sarah telling me about it.”

“Well, guess who made it into the next post.”

Not the next post, exactly. The one after, and there’s a reason: keywords.

It’s been well over a year since I played poker with these folks, and it mostly because I can’t keep my mouth shut. The last time was when Sarah felted me with K3off making a call no one in their right poker mind would make. Slightly steaming after the beat, I said, “Guess who just made it into tonight’s blog post.”

In that post I gave less than flattering appraisals of play and behaviors. And even though I haven’t divulged my moniker, my real name exists out there with links back. I guess they’re not too hard to find, as SiteMeter readily showed me the path she took.

I may have very well been fooling myself that all would be forgotten or at least forgiven when I convinced myself to hit the game again last night, but at least everything seemed cordial on the surface.

A lot of familiar and just as many new faces. And much the same style of play one comes to expect in such a venue: a naked Ace or King, and any small pair demands a call no matter the size of the bet. Yet, I know deep in my heart that sort of play should be welcomed and I won’t belabor it aside from recounting some fairly remarkable hands.

I have splashers on both sides of me at one point (Gary, a decent player, has been knocked out). Bet big or go home, right? I am in the BB when everyone amazingly folds around to the SB. He flat calls. I have pocket fives and raise it 3XBB. I have him well-covered relatively early in the game, but he says, “Well, I might as well go all-in.” I’m getting 3 to 1, so I call. He flips over A7off. The board plays out 89TJ. I recover and felt him in the next level.

I recovered  two hands later by raising all-in with AQoff from the Button. Only the SB called with pockets sixes. He has very little left that he throws in on the flop. Two Kings and two Tens makes my Ace high ugly good. He’s gone.

I made it to the final table in pretty good shape as second in chips. I made a fatal error by making a pot-sized bet with pocket 8s on the Button after four limpers. The young gun big stack called with K5off and hit a King on the flop. I knew he had the K when he raised my continuation. I could have folded, but to tell the truth, I could care less. I preferred to go home.

I said I’d return next week. Not a very quick study and prone to repeat errors, I have an idea. We’ll see.