tilted behaviour

After a regretful day off, I was back behind the computer covering day two of Event 35: $10,000 Heads Up No Limit Holdem Championship with Eric.

Returning with 64 players and the aim of playing down to eight, we both thought that it would be a very long day. Fortunately however it was completely the opposite as players punted their stacks off to see matches end extremely early over the three rounds of play. Eric even had time to go home for a few hours! Since each round had a designated starting time, DK and I spent the hour-plus downtime between each round walking aimlessly round the Rio before having to return back to our event each time.

The final eight were a tough group of players including the online stars of Jason Somerville, Faraz Jaka and Ernst Schmejkal, Europeans Alexander Kostritsyn and Ludovic Lacay, along with the tournament veterans of Kido Pham, Ayaz Mahmood and Vanessa Rousso.

Returning for the final day, the first three matches were over fairly quickly, but it would be the Rousso / Schmejkal match that would take over four hours until the German got the better of the French-American.

Taking a short break for dinner, we returned with a final four only to have that cut down to three once Kostritsyn exited when his Aces were run down by Schmejkal’s trip Kings as the final match between Somerville and Mahmood took an additional two hours before Mahmood proved victorious.

Both Mahmood and Schmejkal were given thirty minutes before they would sit down to battle in a best-of-three format for the coveted gold bracelet and $625,682 in first place prizemoney!

Unfortunately for both Martin and I the run-good that had been experienced during the whole event had been all used up as the first match between the two went for over six hours before Mahmood finally claimed the win around 6am before play was paused for the night so the players – and us – could get some much needed rest.

Although it was my day off, I of course was obligated to return to the Rio to cover the extended final day at 7pm.

With Elaine joining me at the desk, our fingers were crossed that the day would be quick, but unfortunately it would be another long one as the second match made the five-hour mark. Fortunately however Mahmood would be victorious meaning that a third match wouldn’t be needed after the most see-sawing heads up battle that I have ever witnessed!

My friend and fellow PokerNews blogger Rich made an interesting tweet today.

Just peed next to durrrr. Over/under 1,000 2+2′ers would have looked?

A few hours later while on my way to dinner I headed to the bathroom, and as I walked towards an empty urinal, I noticed a unique group of individuals surrounding the one I was about to use.

From left to right there was Alexander Kostritsyn, Kiril Gerasimov, Alexander Kravchenko, ME, Greg Raymer and then Michael Binger!

That line of people that were answering nature’s call hold an amassed US$21,380,278 in tournament earnings that also include 85 WSOP cashes, 24 final tables and 2 bracelets.

And before you ask . . . of course I included my statistics!

Another day at the WSOP saw me covering Event 26: $2,500 No Limit Holdem Six Handed with Rich behind the computer and DK and Greg on the floor.

Jerry Yang soared up the leaderboard early on before the field started to catch up on him, but he is still around for day two and I – along with many others – are rooting for him to buck the trend and ship a second bracelet.

One of the other positives of the day was the fact that I managed to snap a few photos for the first time at any World Series that I’ve covered. I managed to grab a headshot of Jerry Yang for one of our break posts, but my favourite one is this one.

Easily the biggest highlight of the day was the encounters that I had with Daniel Negreanu that mainly occurred after the following hand.

courtesy of PokerNews
Oh Brother!
With around 14,500 in the pot and the flop reading 8♠ K♦ J♦ Daniel Negreanu was faced with a bet from his opponent in the small blind totalling 12,000.

Negreanu shuffled some chips, adjusted a few of his chip stacks before checking his cards once more only to announce he was all in and slide his 79,000-chip stack into the middle.

“Allright I call” stated Negreanu’s opponent for his 41,400 total.

Negreanu: 6♦ 5♦

Opponent: A♦ K♣

“I’m testing a theory . . . I haven’t made a flush all tournament!” added Negreanu as the dealer dealt the 7♥ on the turn to give Negreanu additional outs to make a straight.

The river landed the K♥ and immediately Negreanu stood up and began a Phil Hellmuth-esque tirade.

“No straights, no flushes, no nothing!”

“This is like the thirtieth in a row this World Series!”

With Negreanu’s table based on the rail and at least twenty people watching on, they all remained dead silent as he continued.

“Oh brother!”

“Never going to happen for me!”

“This is just unbelievable!”

Negreanu however is still alive with around 38,000 in chips.

Now I of course left out some of the stuff that he was saying due to the fact that I couldn’t write that fast, my memory was full and it may have been a little offensive, but I think you’ll still get the feel for the hand.

Both he and I had a discussion during a previous event about the quality of our (PokerNews) coverage of the series, and when we had finished, things seemed to be at a good point.

Returning from one of the breaks Daniel walked past our desk and we said hello before I asked him to get me a chip count for table three, seat three (about ten metres or so away) as a joke.

“1,700″ he stated after taking a few steps closer

“That’s all good, but now you gotta find out their names!” I laughed off as he ran to his chair.

Then after the above hand occurred I was walking past his table and he quickly jumped up and asked me if I saw what happened.

“Yeah I think I did you justice in the blog” I responded.

“Oh so it’s on PokerNews . . . I’ll have to check it out” he added before discussing more about his WSOP run bad.

Then a little later on in the evening we had this discussion.

“Did you not shave properly or something this morning?” he asked.

“Yeah pretty much, but also I get a Mr. Miyagi-type moustache”

I returned to write some hands and prepare for the end of the night before returning to the floor. As I walked towards him he quickly propped up out of his chair.

“You’re a fighter aren’t you? I can see it!”

“Nup. You look like a fighter and I’m sticking to it!”

It was a very odd day, but an extremely funny one thanks to Daniel.

Oh . . . and for the record . . . Chip Counting Challenge 1: Distance . . . Negreanu 0 / Duckworth 1!

While playing the ladies event yesterday Elaine fell sick (insert pregnant rumours) and consequently couldn’t work her shift covering day two of Event 23: $2,500 Limit Holdem Six-Handed.

Replacing GeorgiaPeach will beeeeeeee thkcduckworth!

Well . . . that’s what the announcer should be saying . . . but alas it was no more then a schedule swap and exchange of emails to see me vacate the Hard Rock pool for the blogging desk.

Although we worked for twelve hours, Eric and I crushed the blog busting out post after post at an incredibly fast rate until we hit that 1am mark where everyone just wanted to past out. That includes the players too because once we hit the last three tables play slowed right up as we struggled to get anything decent to write about.

Play eventually finished just after 3am with twelve still remaining as a car load of us returned to the Hard Rock.

Greg, Mickey and I decided to pop into Mr. Lucky’s 24-7 to grab some pancakes as the degeneracy soon began.

Playing some Chinese Poker soon switched to me and Mickey doing a nine-card Omaha flop for the bill as my trips held up against his el oh el King-high. He soon discovered that my side of the bill was more than his and he flipped out . . . the result . . . we started high-carding for dollar bills as Greg soon joined in too.

It then became Razz flips before Mickey upped the ante and put all his change on the table so we could play a 2-7 Draw Lowball hand. Unfortunately for both he and Greg, I made a pat ten-seven perfect after we all were all-in predraw as I took Mickey for all the money he had in his wallet.

Unfortunately however this run good is the first I’ve experienced in the near three weeks I have been here in Las Vegas!

Not a single thing is going right. I’m losing every prop bet, getting two-outered in poker, crapping out and pai gowing to be down like something ridiculous. Here is the current tally of my run bad – well the stuff that my brain hasn’t blocked out as yet – and you will only see one profitable session!

$1-3 NLH at the Rio = $236
$1-2 NLH at the Hard Rock = $35
$2-4 Dealers Choice at the Hard Rock = $240
Prop Betting (Remko) = $10 (was -$180 about a week ago)
Prop Betting (F-Train) = $10
Prop Betting (Heath) = $10
Prop Betting (Donnie) = $50
Prop Betting (Ben) = $10
Craps (Hard Rock) = $700
Craps (Binions) = $100
Craps (Fitzgeralds) = $100
Roulette (Golden Gate) = $200
Bonus Texas Holdem (Hard Rock) = $150
Slots (Hard Rock) = $20
PokerStars Cash Games = $50
Full Tilt Poker Cash Games = $100
Betfair Sports Betting = $200

Hopefully Mickey has flicked the switch for me and things will turn round on all fronts!

Returning to the blogging desk I was fortunate to be on a championship event with Martin as we covered day two and the final table of Event 19: $10,000 2-7 Draw Lowball Championship.

One of the things I really enjoy about working with Martin is that even though we don’t talk a whole lot during an event, we just work hard doing the best job we can pumping out as much stuff as possible. There is no nonsense with him and we just work well together as everything always runs smoothly. Throw in the fact that he is an English professor (I believe) and it always makes me more careful when posting hands and blogs, and also gives me the confidence in asking him any writing questions, as I know the answer is always going to be spot on.

Like most of the $10,000 buy-in events in the series, the field was spectacular with an incredible array of talented players making day two. Unfortunately we lost player after player until just ten remained including Erik Seidel, John Juanda, Daniel Negreanu and Andy Bloch.

Negreanu did manage to score his first cash of the series, but it also resulted in a final table bubble when he was unable to improve on his seven-wheel draw by catching a King.

The final table was highlighted by some slightly intoxicated Germans singing and chanting loudly for their countryman George Danzer. Supportive chants for Danzer and teasing ones directed at David Baker and Tom Dwan put everyone into bursts of laughter; especially the one “where is your bracelet Tom, where is your bracelet?”

The rowdy but highly entertaining crowd would vacate the final table arena when Danzer bowed out in third place before David Baker captured his first bracelet after entering heads-up play with a near five-to-one chip advantage.

After jumping on day two of the Event 10: $10,000 Seven Card Stud Championship with F-Train, I finally would work my first full event with the Event 14: $1,500 2-7 Draw Lowball.

The corresponding event last year was a $2,500 buy-in and attracted a 147-player field with Phil Ivey beginning his magical run of six WSOP cashes, three final tables and two bracelets with victory for $96,367. Unfortunately Ivey, along with five-time lowball Bracelet holder Billy Baxter, and many others all hit the rail as only 67 managed to bag their chips with Nick Binger sitting on top coming into day two.

Probably the highlight of the day was having Mike Matusow and Daniel Negreanu approach me at the blogging desk to apologise for their tirades on Twitter at PokerNews as they didn’t really understand the whole issue of Harrah’s forcing us to import all players into our chip counts page meaning that it was impossible to keep all 3,000 NLH donkament players updated. They knew it wasn’t my – or any other blogger or field reporters – fault, but it was a Harrah’s issue . . . so consequently we hope things go a lot smoother now with some of the high-profile players.

Sigi Stockinger (25th), Jose-Luis Velador (24th), Tommy Hang (21st), Chris Viox (18th), JC Tran (15th), Erik Seidel (14th), Chris Bjorin (13th), Scott Seiver (12th), Bryan Micon (11th) and David ‘Chino’ Rheem (9th) were some of the incredibly talented players that had a crack at making the final table, but inevitably fell just shy as a final seven would be formed following the elimination of Daniel Nicewander on the bubble.

One of the enjoyable plays of the day I saw was when Sigi Stockinger opened to 1,800 from the cutoff only to have Dario Minieri three-bet from the small blind to 5,850. Stockinger made the call and both stood pat before Stockinger folded to Minieri’s roughly 9,000 all-in bet. Minieri tabled his A♠ A♥ A♦ 10♣ 4♠ to get a good laugh out of the table and me.

The final table was expected to be a long lasting affair with some high-class players looking to capture their first (well second for Mike Wattel) WSOP bracelet. However it was completely opposite as the action kicked up into full pace as we witnessed double ups, outdraws and eliminations until play was heads-up. Both Wattel and Yan Chen slowed things down until play was paused for dinner, only to return into three-bet city until Chen proved victorious!

The one thing I did enjoy about the event was that it furthered my desire to play single draw instead of triple draw 2-7 Lowball. I think that single draw is better for beginner players as it teaches you a little more about strategy then in triple draw where you basically just keep calling and calling and calling.

Sorry that this blog entry has been so boring, but there hasn’t been much going on since I’ve been so busy working.

However I would like to share a picture with you that one of the Dutch PokerNews guys named Remko shared with me the other day which made me el oh el . . . literally . . . because I burst out laughing on the media stage while everyone was dead quiet typing away on their computers.

The ‘Real’ Australia

Two days off felt great, but it’s also enjoyable to be back behind the computer for PokerNews after starting the WSOP on the floor as a reporter.

Unfortunately it also means that I will be enduring a seven-day stretch of work that includes four different events, two final tables and three different games!

Tuesday saw me work with Rich covering the Event 6: $5,000 No Limit Holdem Shootout. The 358-player field formed easily one of the toughest collection of starting tables that the World Series will witness this year, and consequently it was no surprise that the thirty six players that made it through to round two were of the highest calibre in the shootout format.

Just try and pick a winner out of James Akenhead, Dario Minieri, John Duthie, Chad Brown, Tom Dwan, Joseph Elpayaa, Christian Harder, Blair Hinkle, Eugene Katchalov, Faraz Jaka, Justin ‘Boosted J’ Smith, Chino Rheem, Max Pescatori and Chris Ferguson!

Another day and another event saw me tackle all the day one action of Event 8: $1,500 No Limit Holdem with one of our new bloggers Chad.

It was just the standard [i]donkament[/i] with over 2,000 players being eliminated from the starting 2,341, and if you read the coverage – which you should – you will realise that it has a very Jean-Robert Bellande and Phil Hellmuth feel to it.

How could it not really as these two guys are some of the most entertaining poker players to ever walk the hallways of the Rio. Hellmuth obviously sits in a class of his own with eleven bracelets and the ability to run his mouth in a way that attracts droves of people to sweat his every action three rows deep on the rail. Bellande – via his twitter account BrokeLivingJRB – details his crazy swings in poker and in life as he attempts to live the dream running up a million-dollar bankroll from nothing.

Late in the day Hellmuth got moved to Bellande’s table and that’s when fireworks between the two sparked continuously. They did both manage to survive the day to be placed in the top twenty, with this hand being one of the highlights.

courtesy of PokerNews
Bellande Playing Perfect, JRB Training School Soon To Open!
Jean-Robert Bellande opened to 3,000 from middle position and Phil Hellmuth made the call.

On a flop of 9♦ Q♥ 9♣ Bellande fired out 5,000 and Hellmuth quickly made the call to see the 7♣ land on the turn and a check follow from Bellande.

“How much you have left?” asked Hellmuth.

Bellande sat there looking blankly at the board before parting his hands so that Hellmuth could view in full sight his chip stack.

“What’s the total?” Hellmuth asked the dealer as the dealer cut down Bellande’s stack to total 25,400.

“Small bets mean nothing” stated Hellmuth as he tossed in a 3,800-chip bet which Bellande called before both players checked the 2♦ on the river.

Bellande tabled his 8♠ 8♣ and Hellmuth asked, “what he have?”

Hellmuth nodded his head and flashed his 4♥ 4♠ before folding to slip to 54,000 as Bellande began to rake in the pot to climb back to 48,000.

“Your small bets mean nothing Phil” Bellande added.

“All those guys that watch poker VT are wasting their time. If they want to play perfect poker they should just put a camera behind me. I couldn’t of played that hand any better,” Bellande finished off much to the amusement of the rail and fellow table combatants.

My first final table of the series saw me return to Event 6: $5,000 No Limit Holdem Shootout with Rich.

The six remaining players – Joshua Tieman, Stuart Rutter, Brent Hanks, Neil Channing and Joseph Elpayaa – were all starting seventy-five big blinds deep with 1,500,000 in chips, but the final table amazingly lasted only four hours as Tieman crushed souls to be crowned the Event 6 Champion and $441,692 richer.

Since me and Rich were out early – for probably the only time this series – we wondered aimlessly round the room checking out some of the other events before heading to dinner with the PokerNews head honcho Matt.

We headed to McFadden’s and enjoyed a burger before I made my way back to the Hard Rock. I showered and watched some TV before deciding that it would be a good idea to go gamble and play some Craps.

Bad idea.

I quickly was up $200 or so on my roll as I kept rolling sixes and eights while hitting the occasional point. I eventually did crap out, and that started a bad roll from the whole table as that $200 profit was wiped and then the $300 I had in my wallet was wiped too.

The final result for the night . . . I have just five bucks in my wallet and an assortment of nickels, dimes and quarters on my bedside table . . . I love Vegas!

The chips are being riffled, the cameras are rolling and the prop bets have began . . . and so has the 2010 WSOP!

The first day of the Summer saw me on the floor covering Event 2: $50,000 Poker Players Championship (8 Game Mixed). Obviously the field was stacked with the likes of Ivey, Negreanu, Hellmuth and Brunson, but it was the unlikely starters that pondered us to ask how many of these players actually had a $5million bankroll – which would be the expected amount needed to play this event – to sit down and battle with some of the best in the world?

During the two days I spent on the floor I enjoyed some great banter between the players including this gem from Mike Matusow as players were discussing breaking things while playing online.

“Yeah I’ve thrown about five mouses [mice] though my wall . . . they don’t really count though as it was during the whole Ultimate Bet scandal when I was getting cheated out of millions”

Another interesting thing that I witnessed was a play made by Phil Ivey during a 2-7 Triple Draw (a game in which the low poker hand wins – straights and flushes count against your hand unlike in Razz and Aces are high) hand. Abe Mosseri raised in early position and Ivey made the call from the button holding 3-2-2-2-x. Mosseri drew two and Ivey drew one before standing pat after Mosseri called his bet. Mosseri again drew two but instantly folded to Ivey’s next bet.

The one thing that nearly every one of the 116 players were talking about was a Fantasy Poker draft that they had started where several players drafted and bought players for their team and insane prop betting followed. This follows closely to the PokerNews WSOP Fantasy competition that I have put into place amongst fellow workers and friends.

It’s a $100 buy-in and is split amongst two prizepools – one for most cashes and the other for most winnings – with each team being made up of ten players under ten different categories. Here is my team.

Female: Annette Obrestad
Previous WSOP ME Winner: Phil Hellmuth
USA nationality: JC Tran
Canadian nationality: Sorel Mizzi
European nationality: Bertrand Grospellier
Other nationality: Jeff Lisandro
Online: Andrew Lichtenberger
Full Tilt Poker sponsored: Phil Ivey
PokerStars sponsored: Daniel Negreanu
Other sponsored: Brandon Cantu

I really wanted to squeeze Alexander Kostritsyn, Andy Bloch, Chris Ferguson and Nam Le in the team, but simply there wasn’t enough room!

One however I would gladly drop two players for is Kirk Morrison.

Kirk who? you may be asking, but he is the first friend that I made when I arrived in Las Vegas back in 2007. Having spent time in New Zealand with one of my mates that I was in Las Vegas with – who was also playing the Main Event – we soon got to know each other. He is an Aussie/Kiwi at heart with a love for a good beer and fondness for the word mate, and after a hot few months that included a second in the WPT Championship to Carlos Mortensen, five WSOP cashes including a final table and a deep run in the Main Event he just disappeared off the radar.

He turned down a PokerStars contract and probably has played no more than a dozen poker tournaments since his hot WSOP run of 2007 . . . but after the previous two days, I’m glad to say that he is back!

Spending some time with him yesterday as he slowly crept up the leaderboard to eventually sit on top, Kirk detailed that he is planning on playing a decent schedule of around twenty events.

Everyone out there reading Tilted Behaviour today, tomorrow or in seven weeks time when the WSOP is over . . . Kirk Morrison is going to have the hottest WSOP of anybody . . . and is going to kick it off with victory in the $50,000 Poker Players Championship.