tilted behaviour

Late last night, Heath and I decided to play the $200 Teams Event at the Victorian Poker Championships, and consequently I made the boring drive up the highway to donk off.

I arrived early to take care of some things before Heath and I decided to grab a few drinks and some food at Lagerfield. We discussed work, poker and all of the above before being joined by Kirsty, Landon and a few of his mates.

Eventually we decided to make our way downstairs to tackle the gauntlet of the teams event, with me taking the first rotation. Unfortunately the 2,500 starting stack I had received was soon chopped into half as Heath took his seat and topped up another 2,500. I would lose us some chips, he would get us a double; that was the order for the night, which funnily enough was the opposite to the way it happened when we first played a teams event together back in 2008. Nothing went right for me, and inevitably it would be Heath that would bust us when he shoved over Aces with Ace-Jack – and although flopping a Jack – failed to improve to see us bust in about 60th place of the 214 starters.

However, I spent the majority of the night when not playing discussing the upcoming State of Origin, and how it should be fixed for 2011. Consequently, here are my suggestions for how the 2011 State of Origin at the Victorian Poker Championships should be conducted.

State of Origin Committee
Over the past few years, there has always been an issue with the exact formation of each side. Justification for an inclusion or exclusion is always the biggest talking point, followed by the selection of the captain.

To make the State of Origin a premier feature event on the local poker calendar, something has to be done to ensure that the teams selected are not only fair, but also a true justification of the best in the state.

Consequently I believe a Committee should be formed that will pick the squad through mutual decision by sorting through live and online tournament results both in Australia and overseas.

The next point is exactly who should be on the Committee? Well firstly, the members that form the Committee must be unbiased and impartial to the event, and have no chance of being selected themselves. They must also have a sound knowledge of the game, and possess an even greater knowledge of the Australian pool of poker players. I don’t believe that the Committee should be too large either as this will create even more difficulty when coming to a conclusion on final teams.

My vote for who should head up this Committee? Firstly – although I may be a little bias – I would cast a vote for myself. I have yet to meet anyone with a greater knowledge of players in the country, am also independent to the event, and am at nearly every tournament around the world that would influence the team selection; whether it be an Aussie Millions, APPT, ANZPT or WSOP.

My next vote would be for Jonno Pittock who has the influence in the event, as it is in his poker room where the event is run. Finally I believe that Tony Hachem should stay involved in the Committee by the pure fact that it is his creation, but by doing so, he would have to rule himself out of possible selection to remain fair.

Selection Criteria
Obviously the toughest part of the event, I believe I have come up with a simple solution that should please everyone.

First of all Captains will pretty much remain as they are from this year, as most of them are true figureheads in their states. However it is a question of how the seven other spots should be filled, that gets everyone scratching their heads. With a Committee in place, they organise a few hours where they can sit down and discuss the teams. With the State of Origin concept being pitting the best in the state against the best in other states, then that is simply what you do. Taking live results both at home and abroad, online rankings and past form from the period of the 2010 Victorian Poker Championships to before the 2011 Victorian Poker Championships, you should be able to pick the best team.

The Committee will firstly select the six players they believe are the best in the state over the past twelve months and then provide a further four alternates. This list is then handed to the Captain who must contact each of the six players to see if they are available. If not, the first alternate will take his/her place and so on until six available members have been chosen.

As for the final spot, well that will be the Captain’s Exemption. If the captain believes that a player who missed out on the team should have actually made it, then they can be called up for that final eighth spot. They believe that they are a great player for the format of the event or were unfairly passed over, but either way, they have a chance to influence the team in a possibly winning way.

Although New South Wales have persisted with it, I believe that satellite winners shouldn’t be allowed in the State of Origin. I have no major argument for it, apart from saying that the event should be the best of the best from each state, therefore meaning that a satellite winner – regardless of how well they ran in the satellite or in the State of Origin – wouldn’t be in the best otherwise they would have already been selected. The only way this concept would work is if every team decided to have one satellite winner, but in all honesty, I don’t think this would happen.

Event Format
The Shootout format is a perfect way to run the State of Origin, but some tinkering needs to be done so that when the final table starts, it isn’t already game, set, match for a particular side.

Keeping the Shootout format points system of:

1st – 60

2nd – 50

3rd – 40

4th – 30

5th – 20

6th – 10

7th – 0

8th – 0

Like normal, you play down until there is a winner as each team is allocated the appropriate points for where they finished on each table. Each set of 10 points earns your side 10,000 tournament chips, and when you return the following day for the final table, each state will sit down with the equivalent amount of tournament chips in relation to their accrued points (ie 240 points equates to 240,000 in chips) plus the day one starting stack of 20,000 (in case a team fails to accrue any points during the shootout). Consequently when the final table begins, everybody still has a realistic chance of winning the title.

Now for the next twist. The final table will begin with the Captain playing, but at four separate occasions they will be allowed to make four substitutions. Any team member can be subbed in, and team member can play multiple times, and the subs do not have to be used if the Captain wishes so.

Not only will this format make it a little more exciting, but will also mean that for both days of the State of Origin, there is not only a crowd smothering the rail, but also every team member in attendance as they all still have an equal chance of winning.

In all honesty, none, one or all of these ideas that I’ve come up with could be utilised in the 2011 State of Origin, but only time will tell.

So many people have already contributed thoughts and ideas in relation to selection, format etc, and some are good, and some are bad. Heck, I would love to see a Stanley Cup-esque trophy with the winning team and their members engraved on it created so that the pride of crushing your opposition is more rewarding!

We will have to wait quite a while until we hear changes to the State of Origin, but hopefully those with the power to do so, take in what others have had to say on the issue that is obviously very important in our small and close-knit poker community.

Another early start and I was off to the airport to head to Adelaide for the ANZPT. After meeting up with Kirsty at our gate, we were soon joined by Tony Hachem and on our way to the city of Churches via Qantas.

Once on land, we all split a cab to the Hyatt Regency and checked into our rooms before Tony informed me of the $450 Pot Limit Omaha SkyCity Adelaide Championships event that was on in less than 20 minutes. Off we went to register and before we knew it we were getting dealt four cards.

With 30 minute levels and a 4,000 starting bank I started off playing tight until around level three where I loosened up (for no real reason mind you). Faced with four limpers ahead of me I potted to 750 holding A♣ A♦ 4♦ 7♣ and found four callers including Matt, a crown HD in the big blind, who open-jammed on a flop of J♦ 8♦ 5♣. Steve Topakas threw in his last thousand and with the action back on me I gambled and slid the last of my 3,000 in.

With Matt tabling J♣ J♠ Q♦ 9♦ and Steve some rubbish, Eric Assadourian stood up and stated to me, “Watch . . . you’ll win this!” and like a lightning bolt the A♠ fell on the turn and 8♣ on the river. Raking in the pot to send me up to around 13,000 Eric offered a swap of 5% even though he had nearly twice as many chips as me. Similar to how quick that Ace fell, I agreed . . . Me – Omaha donk, Eric – Three Omaha titles . . . pretty fair IMO.

weeeeeeee final table here we come!

I grinded away for a while before doubling up with a turned full-house and then against Crown supervisor ‘Dutchy’. I potted under-the-gun with A♠ 8♠ 8♣ 6♣ and found three callers including Dutchy. He open-shipped on a flop of J♦ 7♣ 5♣, and after 60 seconds or so of looking at my stack and the 25 players that lay ahead of me before a winner would be crowned I pushed all in with Dutchy calling an additional few thousand. I was in absolutely terrible shape against his A♣ A♦ 4♣ 2♥ but would find bingo on the river seeing the 8♦ landing to see me double into a great position as we approached the final table.

Tony got moved to my right and we had some fun until I offered a deal of taking $400 off first and slapping it to the eleventh place bubble boy. With all in agreement we slowly but surely made the final table where action was quick and fast losing three players before the first level was complete. Tony would fall in fifth place but a swap of 5% with each other kept him interested until a very interesting hand came up.

ANZPT Adelaide Pot Limit Omaha final table

With blinds at 2,000 – 4,000 the chip leader limped in under the gun and Raemin ‘The Moose’ Alexander potted to 16,000 from the small blind; leaving himself 15,000 or so behind. I look down at A♣ K♣ K♦ J♦ and am put to a real decision. Now I think that 70% of the time here I’m up against aces and I’m pretty sure that the limper might even have some of my outs. Even though I have a strong hand and sit second in chips with around 60,000, I eventually muck my hand.

The under the gun limper flashes his hand which contained the K♠ and Alexander proves to me I made a great fold by showing A♠ A♦ K♦ 3♠. Whether or not this fold is correct or not four-handed, it made me a further $800 when a player was knocked out a few hands later.

Tim Duckworth eliminated in third place for $2,970 (just taking a dig at how I write bust-out captions for PokerNews and PokerNetwork)

I would go on to finish 3rd for $2,970 before paying out my swaps with Tony and Eric to see me record my first Pot Limit Omaha tournament cash as well as my first cash for 2009. Feeling good about tournament poker it also puts me in the lead of, The Race to 10k; a competition between me and Heath ‘Tassie Devil’ Chick to see who can reach AUD$10,000 in tournament cashes. There may only be $100 on the line, but pride stands between the both of us.

Current Standings
thkcduckworth – $2,970
Tassie Devil – $896.60