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Part II of this article primarily described the big
pot I played against JC Tran, in which we got all the
chips in on the flop with JC holding a pair of aces,
and I had a flush draw and an open-ended straight
draw with my measly 9-7 of clubs. The turn was
the ace of clubs, which gave Tran a set of aces; but
it also completed my flush. The river did not pair
the board, Tran was eliminated, and I was chipped
up. I had essentially stolen my way up to 80,000 in
chips by the time we were beginning the last level
of Day One. Here’s what happened next.
Allen Cunningham arrived at
my table with a big stack –
about 55,000. Simply put,
Allen is amazing. He is, without
a doubt, one of the best
poker players alive, and he’s a
real nice guy to boot. We’ve
been friends for many years,
and I have tremendous respect for him and
his game. But I play him hard – real hard –
because you have to. Like me, Allen tries to
take control, to dictate the pace and tone of
the game. So I knew it would now become a
battle for control of this table. Like two alphamale
gorillas in the jungle fighting for dominance,
Cunningham and I would have
to tangle. I smiled and welcomed him,
but on the inside I was thinking, “Aw
damn, it’s on like Donkey Kong!”
I had been having my way with this
table. My opponents were letting me
open four or five pots per round, pretty
much unmolested. But I knew Allen
would not stand for it. He is far too
aggressive and savvy to allow me to
pull these moves. To make matters
worse, Allen would be seated two to
my left. I knew I would have to change
gears. So I did. I decided to play a little
snugger. Playing tight doesn’t mean
you can’t still be aggressive; but with
Allen at the table, I knew I had to be
more selective and cautious.
He, on the other hand, wasted no
time and got involved in some pots
right away. Initially Allen retreated a
bit, as he faced some very big bets
from the eight-seat, an erratic, somewhat
wild, unknown player who had
arrived at our table about thirty minutes
earlier. I was pleased that Allen
hadn’t had the benefit of sitting with this
player for any length of time, because he
would likely have called or raised, rather
than folded, in response to Seat Eight’s
huge bets.
Seat Eight had played about 75% of the
hands he had seen in the short time he was
at our table, and was showing his cards after
each hand, whether he was called or not.
Most of Seat Eight’s shown hands were of
the ace-rag, king-five suited, and jack-seven
variety. In a nutshell, Seat Eight had no clue.
He was a total maniac. I wanted to snap him
off so bad, but I hadn’t had a chance, and
here was Allen mixing it up with Seat Eight.
I felt like saying to him, “He’s mine – leave
him alone!”
I was worried that Allen would eat up Seat
Eight’s 50,000 or so in chips. But, like I said,
he was actually losing chips because of the
maniac’s erratic, overly aggressive play. I
was pleased, but nervously so, with what
was transpiring – the way I am when I’ve bet
the underdog and they are barely covering
the points.
Based on Allen’s relentless pursuit of Seat
Eight, I knew it was just a matter of time now
before one of them would meet his demise.
And my money was on Cunningham, even
though I really hoped for the opposite. Sure
enough, less than an hour after Seat Eight
and Allen arrived in the little piece of the
jungle where I was king, there would be a
new leader for me to face – and he would be
pumped up.
Seat Eight opened the pot out of the twohole
(second under the gun) for a smallish
raise. Seat Ten called the raise, and it was
folded around to Cunningham in the big
blind. And of course, you guessed it – Allen
called. The flop came down J-3-4 rainbow
with one diamond. Allen checked. Seat Eight
bet roughly the size of the pot. Seat Ten
smooth called. So did Allen. The turn card
was the seven of diamonds. To my surprise,
Allen now led out and made a half-the-potsize
bet or so. The pot was already quite
large, so this was a healthy bet. Seat Eight
then made a huge raise! “Uh-oh, here we go,”
I thought. Then Seat Ten asked how much
was the total bet he was facing. After a little
deliberation, Seat Ten called. Holy crap!
This was by far the biggest pot of the day
and I was thinking, “Thank God. This looks
like Allen will have to fold here because of
the intense action ahead of him.” Nope, he
moved all-in. I was sick. I knew he had to
have the hand now. But there was still hope
that Seat Eight would fold. Seat Eight
thought for a few seconds, then called! Now I
was really sick. But, the action was now on
Seat Ten. And guess what he did? After about
two minutes, he called!
The pot now had around $120,000 in it
and, with Allen and Seat Ten all-in, the
hands were about to be turned face up. I was
pretty certain Allen had either 5-6 for
the nuts, a straight, or a set, and was
hoping the other two had a flush draw
and a set. Sure enough, Mr.
Cunningham turned up the nuts with
the 5-6. And to my horror, Seat Eight
had pocket aces and was drawing
stone cold dead. Seat Ten, though, had
the ace-jack of diamonds and was
drawing live but slim, with Allen holding
a diamond and Seat Eight holding
the ace of diamonds. The river was a
black card, and Allen Cunningham
now had $120,000.
Allen had indeed arrived, devoured
the weak, and now reigned as the new
king. I tried to remain calm, but internally
I was sick. I took comfort in the
fact that I still had over $80,000 and
was still in great chip shape; and more
importantly, in a short while Day One
would be over and, after a day off, Day
Two would resume with new table
and seat assignments. So it was likely
I would not have to deal with
Cunningham, his huge stack, and his
awesome abilities.
I thought to myself, “Just don’t make any
big mistakes in this final round and everything
will be okay.” Well, in poker sometimes
the best plans go out the window
when the situation calls for it. I kept picking
up my favorite type of hand – suited connectors.
I kept raising or calling in position and
was fortunate that Cunningham pretty
much stayed out of my way while my stack
grew slowly but steadily. I was also fortunate
that I didn’t have to play any big pots, so I
never had a significant portion of my stack
at risk. I was playing controlled small ball, à
la Mr. Hellmuth.
Cunningham, on the other hand, got colddecked
a couple of times in the last twenty
minutes, and that cost him two-thirds of his stack. At one point, he raised from early
position, was reraised by another player
who had nearly $40,000, and immediately
moved all-in when it came back
to him. The other player quickly
called and turned up aces while Allen
had A-K. Moments later, he picked up
two queens and got all the chips in
against an opponent who had about
$30,000 and two kings. Again
Cunningham lost, and was now down
to around $50,000.
On the final hand of Day One, I
looked down at 7.8. in an unopened
pot, two off the button. The blinds were
$300 and $600 with a $75 ante. I raised
about four times the big blind to $2,500
and Cunningham re-raised on the button
to $8,000. The blinds folded and it was back
to me. Now normally, this is a straight fold,
but poker is a weird psychological game; and
so is my thinking sometimes. I desperately
wanted to be above the $100,000 mark by
the end of the day, for some unknown
(and awful) reason. Folding here would
prevent me from doing that, and then
when I factored in that Allen had been
knocked around quite significantly in
the last few hands, I decided to call
his raise and try to land yet another
blow on him.
I was hoping to flop big and
take advantage of the deceptive
nature of my hand in light of the
pre-flop raising. Well, the flop
of 2.3.J. was perfect – not! I
knew if I checked, Allen would
likely put out a continuation
bet, whether he had hit the flop
or not, and I would lose around
$8,000; so I pretty much had to
fold. So, first to act, I decided to
take a stab at it and bet $15,000. I figured
to get away from the hand if he played
back at me, and still be in good shape. On
the other hand, there was a good chance
that Allen would not have hit this scary
flop, and might not want to tangle with me
on the last hand of the night, knowing that
I could easily play it for all his chips, based
on the pot size now; but more importantly,
Allen knows that I have a loose screw in
my head and could have hit any part or all
of that ugly flop. Allen quickly folded.
I ended Day One with $107,600, second
only to Lyle Berman. No one else had broken
the $100,000 mark. I was very pleased.
The next day was an off day for me.
The second half of the field would start
play, and we would all resume the following
day, on Tuesday. I had received a
very cool invitation from the Poker
Editor at ESPN, Andrew Feldman, to
visit the ESPN complex in Bristol. That seemed like a great way to spend my
day off. Jennifer and her sister opted not to
join me in favor of shopping – go figure! So,
I made the one-hour trek to Bristol alone in
my rental car.
I immediately knew when I had reached
the complex, because they have several massive
– and I mean massive – white satellite
dishes around the main buildings. I felt a little
like there might be extra-terrestrial stuff
going on here. Could ESPN be beaming electronic
signals to the tens of millions of sports
fans around the world, causing us to act so
strangely around game time? Hmmm…
Andrew met me right away and gave me a
tour of this huge place. Coach Mike Ditka
was there, taking a catnap on a couch while
waiting to go on the air. Michael Irvin and
Dan Patrick were also hanging around, getting
ready for their segment. I even got to go
on the set of Sports Center where Andrew
had me sit at the sports desk while he took a
few pictures! Now, that was very cool. My
buddies were blown away when I showed
them the pictures. Maybe being a poker player
isn’t so bad.
DAY II
After a fun day at “The Complex,” I headed
back to Foxwoods to make sure I was
ready for Day Two. I went to bed early, but
didn’t sleep well, and woke up a little tired. I
had a light room-service breakfast and headed
down to the Sunset Ballroom again.
I drew another good table, where I had
Young Phan to my immediate right, with
about $42,000 in chips, and no one else that
I recognized. Everyone other than Phan and
one other guy were very short-stacked. Yum
yum! I immediately went to work and broke
the $150,000 mark within an hour. I had
heard that Lyle was approaching $200,000,
and that we were far ahead of the rest of the
pack. Everything was going along swimmingly,
until I was assigned to a new table,
and was now to the immediate right of Bill
Gazes, who had a healthy stack, and Kathy
Liebert, who was two to my right with a lot of
chips, too.
This table was going to be more challenging,
but I wasn’t too worried – I had a lot of
chips and was very familiar with Gazes and
Liebert. Unfortunately, my sense of security
was short-lived and misplaced. Succinctly
put, Gazes tortured me. He outplayed me,
held over me (always had a better hand whenever
we tangled), outdrew me, and never took
his foot off the gas. He seemed to call every
time I opened a pot, and he took advantage of
me (and everyone else at the table) at every
opportunity. Indeed, in less than one hour,
Gazes went from $50,000 to over $500,000!
I tried everything against him and nothing
worked. I tried to bluff him a couple times when the pre-flop action suggested I had big
hand – it didn’t work. I tried to have him pay
me off when I made a straight on one hand
and a flush on another – it didn’t work. I tried
to blow him off a hand and isolate a weak
player when I had top pair-top kicker; he
moved in on me and I had to lay it down.
Gazes had my number, and everyone else’s
for that matter. He tortured Liebert, too, and
got most of the $110,000 or so in front of
her. He was relentless, playing above the
rim. I finally decided I had enough and quit
challenging him. I could no longer enter a
pot without him harassing me with a reraise
or call, and since he was always in
position, he had a significant advantage
that I could not fade any longer. I decided to
try to pick different spots with different
opponents for a while.
Well, I finally picked up a hand in what
seemed like an ideal spot to get back into contention
as one of the mega-stacks. The player
to my immediate right was a young guy in a
baseball cap who seemed to play well, and he
knew me and my online names. He said we
had played together many times in the
$100/200 game on PokerStars. That worried
me a bit because I have seen some awesome
players come from the online space, especially
from the high limit games. Nonetheless, it
was folded around to him in the small blind,
while I was in the big blind. He raised. I
looked down at two jacks. I decided that,
since he knows I am super loose/aggressive,
he would likely be raising with a pretty big
hand like A-K, A-Q or A-J, perhaps K-Q, or any
medium pair for value.
I decided to re-raise, because jacks are vulnerable
to overcards on the flop, and hopefully
I could get him to lay down. And if he didn’t,
it might slow him down and let me take
control of the hand, as I had position. I was
pretty certain my re-raise would take down
the pot. If not, I didn’t mind, because I didn’t
think he was going to give me credit for this
big a hand due to my erratic, overly aggressive
play thus far. He immediately moved in
on me with his remaining $80,000 or so. I
had $100,000 at this time.
I felt very strongly that he had made up his
mind before I had reraised that he was going
to move in on me. He just acted so quickly.
And since this was such a big raise from him,
now I felt like he had either A-K or a medium
pair that he was protecting. I figured my jacks
were, at worst, a coin toss and possibly I was
a 4-1 favorite, so I kind of quickly called.
4-1 favorite, so I kind of quickly called.
Well, I was wrong – very wrong. He had
aces. I guess my frustration with Gazes and
the hits I had taken to my once $240,000-
strong stack had clouded my judgment. Also,
I acted too quickly. In any case, I was now
about to be severely crippled. But sometimes
stuff happens. The flop came down 8-8-7, the
turn card was a 10, and the
river? A NINE! Wow! What a
break. I busted this poor guy
just out of the money. It was
sick, but now I had $200,000.
Unfortunately, that didn’t
prevent me from continuing
my poor play. I quickly tangled
with a guy that had pocket
tens, with my pocket eights,
on a ragged low flop. I paid him
off the whole way when I could
have easily gotten away from it. I
mixed it up yet again with Bill
Gazes, when I raised with K-Q suited
in late position in an unopened pot,
and he called. When the flop came
down A-A-4, I led out; he raised; I bluff reraised
big; and he moved all-in. I took a big
hit there, and before I knew it I was down to
$70k with Gazes sitting at $550,000.
Lyle Berman was moved to our table to my
immediate right when the young internet guy
and his aces went up in flames. Lyle came
with more that $200,000. Yuck!
I felt like crap. I couldn’t do anything
right and the only reason I was still in
with 90 players left was because I had
gotten super lucky. It was getting sort of
late into Day Two and I had convinced
myself that I wasn’t playing my best
poker today and that I was probably
going to be out soon. Well, I was right
about that. It was folded around to me
in the small blind, with Mr. “I Have a
Mountain of Chips” Gazes in the big
blind. Gazes had a huge disheveled
stack and was busily stacking my
chips when I looked down at 3-5 of
clubs. Guess what I did? Raise! Of
course, Gazes can’t have ANOTHER
big hand can he? He re-raised.
I moved in. He immediately called
with his lousy A-K of hearts. I
turned up my hand. The flop
came down A-x-x with two hearts
and I was drawing nearly dead
on the flop. The turn was a blank
and I actually was drawing dead.
Lights out.
I stood in line to collect my
$11,000 and seriously contemplated
just leaving. It was so
painful. I couldn’t stand being in
the room. I wanted out so bad.
Nonetheless, I waited, got my
money, said goodbye to my friend
Mike Ward and to Glenn, and bolted
out. When I got to the room, Jennifer and
Christine already knew I was out, as they
had been following the internet coverage. I
didn’t want to talk; I couldn’t. I had just
blown another huge stack! I just wanted to
get on the next plane back to Vegas.
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