Running into the Painkillers

Sorry on the delay of the report on my first taste of the home tournament I played in last Friday night. It's a great game, very well run, populated by players who run the gamut of experience. For instance, two to my right was a pro player who regularly plays very high level games at the Borgata in Atlantic City. Then, a few seats over from him was a woman who had virtually no poker experience and zero hold 'em experience. Stepping in as a new player into this tournament, which has been regular and ongoing for a number of years, put me at an immediate disadvantage since I needed to figure out who was who in terms of experience, aggressiveness and skill, as well as make my decisions with regard to the structure and blinds, which was one of the most vital aspects of the game.

Chip and clock management was so vital in this game because while the blinds and levels were manageable with relation to opening stack size (1500), each player was allowed 2 rebuys, making for some very aggressive play. At any point, in any level, you were at risk of playing a hand for all your chips. Anytime your stack dwindled even a little below its opening count, you were better to start shoving with any decent hand (and sometimes with anything, period) and hope to pick up pots or get called and get lucky. Of course, being new to this game and structure, I wanted to be aggressive but found that most times I was beaten into the pot or had nothing to play if I wasn't. I did succeed in following my plan to stay aggressive from position in all instances and picked up some pots when my preflop raises drew other players' warning flags and my c-bets finished the pot off. However, in such a delicate structure, without having amassed a great deal of chips (some raises were re-raised or shoved upon and a couple of bluffs got sniffed out) I found myself just over my starting count when I looked down at 6,6 out of position. I raised, was re-raised all in and rather than play with a small amount of chips against growing stacks, made the call, hoping to be in a race against a big ace. Well, I was against a big ace. Two of them in fact, and I was left behind like Macaulay Culkin. I had him outchipped by a 25 chip so I tossed that in the next hand, waiting to lose it so I could rebuy. Well, of course I look down at Q,Q and inwardly bemoan my luck to make the move one hand too early or not to have been able to rebuy just yet. Well, as it turned out, I would have lost that rebuy immediately as two other hands shoved, one with 9,9 and another with K,K that held up.

So I rebuy and only a few hands in I look down at 5,5 in the BB. I raise the limped pot and only the small blind calls. The flop brings me a set with two diamonds on board as well. SB bets and I shove all in. He mutters to himself what a bad call it would be if he makes it. Then he revises his previous comment and now says it would be a terrible call. Of course, he eventually does make the call and is on a diamond draw. Not a terrible call in this structure, especially since he had the chips to make it but I manage to fade any diamonds or backdoor straight possibilities and double up.

At this point, the blinds moved to 100-200 and I began to try to make things happen and ran into some roadblocks. Raises were shoved back at by smaller stacks looking to double up (or possibly to give them a chance to rebuy) and some of the bigger stacks were now formidible, having gobbled up small stack shoves themselves. So picking spots was very important, but after getting caught stealing a couple times, I was able to snag blinds with shoves UTG with Qc10c and Kh9h in consecutive rounds. However, I needed to make something happen quickly, so upon looking down at 4,4 in an unopened pot, I shoved out of position. I was immediately called by the player to my left, not a good sign since she too was out of position. Everyone else folded and once again I had picked the wrong moment to shove and had come face to face with the Painkillers, aka A,A. I again did not catch up and at this point in the game the 100/200 level was only seconds from ending and with the next level at 200/400 and the BB about to hit me, I chose not to use my last rebuy since I would have had to shove in the first 2 hands and then likely again in the next several if I did not double up immediately. So I was left slightly lamenting that I didn't push earlier in previous rounds where I might have been able to double up or take down a pot or rebuy if I didn't, whereas now I found myself with the last rebuy worthless to me.

I plan to try and play regularly in this game, and as the skill levels are so wide but with the majority of the players seemingly above average, I think it promises to provide a lot of good experience in a wide variety of situations.