Main Event Recap

I'd been dreaming about playing the main event of the WSOP since I first saw the movie Rounders in the year 2000. At the end of the movie the hero (played by Matt Damon) heads to Vegas with $30,000 and dreams of fortune and glory (quite an amazing coincidence that this is exactly how much I went with). This was back when 1st prize at the main event was "only" a million dollars and around 400 players gathered in old down town at Binion's Horseshoe to play the only $10,000 event of the year. Oh how things have changed. These day's there's a $10,000 buy-in event somewhere twice a month and a few tournaments have pushed their buy-ins as high as $50,000.

My dream has changed as well. I was talking to Jen (my wife not my sister who is Jenn with two n's) in the days leading up to the main event about how I wasn't as excited as I thought I might be. After all if you've been dreaming about something for 6 years whether it's a vacation to Hawaii or a new car wouldn't you be excited? She said to me "honey, you're not as excited because you're dream has changed. Your dream isn't just to play it, it's to win it."

Of course the chances of winning the main event are super slim at best for anyone. But then again I’d never have believed that I’d be playing in it against 9,000 other players at the age of 26. I don’t plan on winning outright, but I do plan on going deep. I want to respond to “how did you do?” with “I won a hundred grand” or “I finished 77 out of 9,000.”

Even thought I wasn’t exploding with glee, I was still looking forward to playing and felt a little nervous (and nauseous) as we left the room around 10:30 a.m. On the way to breakfast a group of 4 people joined us in the elevator. Three of them had on matching T shirts with a picture of the fourth guy’s face on it. Also their shirts said “Team Googs WSOP 2006.” While the three cohorts said things like “that’s right folks you are sharing an elevator with Tony Googs,” and “VIP comin’ through” the guy who I assume was the legend himself looked like he was about to puke at any moment. I’m sure this fellow had qualified online and his friends had come out to support him. Clearly this was a huge deal for him if not a once in a lifetime opportunity so it’s easy to understand why he might be on the verge of vomiting all over the rest of Team Googs.

After a nice breakfast at the swamped Studio Café at the MGM we headed to the Rio around 11:15. When we got there, the place was a total zoo. They’d roped off the main hall way to the tournament area so you had to walk through the poker expo to get to the tournament area. As I’ve mentioned before there were tons of super hot girls wearing almost nothing trying to draw attention to various booths and it got old pretty quick. Furthermore, poker players are not known for being attractive and I found it pleasing to see mega dorks blow off hot chick after hot chick. Normally these girls wouldn’t give these ubergeeks the time of day, but this time the rolls were reversed and it was interesting to see the surprise on the faces of these women who are certainly not used to being ignored.

Once we made it through that obstacle course we discovered that they weren’t yet letting anyone into the tournament room. As a result 2,000 players plus a few hundred alternates and probably at least 1 friend per player (as well as a few spectators, just checking things out) all milled about in the hallway. Once they started letting us in it took quite a while because they wanted to see your tournament receipt to get into the room. Finally I took my seat at good old table 138 and that’s where I stayed for the entirety of the tournament.

Seated around the table with me were (I learned these thing about the people as the tournament progressed) a Norwegian who was a strong player, a 25 year old Fidelity stock analyst, a guy from Atlanta who had a 4 year old daughter (who’d drawn him a very nice sign that said “good luck daddy”), a super low limit player who by some miracle had won his way into the tournament, a 50ish fellow who was covering the event for AOL by playing, a French jerk (who was a very strong player), a quiet man in his 60’s, a quiet young kid (who may have been older than me for all I know), and an Argentinean who was also a good player. The gulf between the 4 good players (myself included of course) and the 6 others was enormous.

I was surprised to find out when I got there that the blinds would start at 25/50 not 25/25 and that the limits would last 2 hours and not 90 minutes. We were scheduled to play 6 levels so to make it through day 1 I’d have to play for 12 hours and with breaks we wouldn’t be done until 3 a.m. At another table someone went broke on the first hand of the day when they lost KK to AA. At my table on the second hand the super low limit player open raised to 175. When he put out his chips his hands were shaking like crazy. He won the blinds and even said “I can’t believe how much I’m shaking. I had a good hand, but this is the god damn world series.” I could almost see his heart beating in his chest. Of course I wanted his chips, but I also wanted to tell him to calm down, to take his time and breath a little.

I, on the other hand, felt great, but didn’t have much occasion to get my chips in the pot for the first hour and forty five minutes. I did have a little drama about an hour into the first level. I hadn’t won a chip yet and after the young kid open raised to 175, I was happy to look down at two red aces in the big blind. I made it 425 to go and the kid paused for a moment. I was thinking “raise me you bastard!” With aces I was no worse than a 4 to 1 favorite and I wanted to get as much money in the pot as possible. After some thought, he just called and the flop came down K Q J with two spades. Yuck! If he had KK, QQ or JJ I was in big trouble and it was also possible he could have something like KQ or A 10. But, I still had to bet and I was hoping he had AK or AQ. I bet out 600 and he just called. Now what do it do? The turn was a red 7 and I bet out 700. If he raised me here I could be pretty sure I was beat. But, he just called. The river was a 3 and I checked. I was trying to decide how big of a bet I would call when he also checked. “Good it must have been AK” I thought as I flipped up my hand. At the same time he turned his hand over and showed me the black aces! The chances of getting aces when someone else already has them on a given hand are 270,725 to 1! We split up the pot and I made a net profit of 1 $25 chip.

Other than that one chip I didn’t win a pot until there were only 10 minutes left in round 1. I was getting a little frustrated and after losing a big pot on a hand that might have misplayed against the Argentinean and was down to about 6,500 chips. Then I got aces again and won a small pot. And then I won another one by rebluffing a bluffer (that pesky Argentinean!). After that I picked up 66 at the start of the second level and called behind two people who also just called preflop. The blinds also called and the flop came down K J 6 with two spades. BINGO! I had a set of 6’s. If someone had KJ I might get all of their chips and it was VERY likely that someone had a K, a J or a draw of some kind. After the blinds checked, the stock analyst bet out 200 and was called by the Norwegian. I was next to act and made it 700 to go. I figured they’d both call, which they did and as we went to the turn I was thinking “no spade, no spade, no spade.” I guessed that one had a K and the other had a flush draw and I was happy to see a red 5 fall on the turn. They both checked and I decided I didn’t want to screw around with so much already in the pot. There were already 2600 chips in the pot and if I somehow lost this hand I’d be in big trouble so I bet out big – 2500. They both thought and both folded. After the hand, the stock analyst said he had Qs 10s and that he would have called a bet of 2000 or less and the Norwegian said he had As 9s. I probably could have picked up a few more chips on this hand, but it would have been risky to give either of them a cheap look at the river and if it was an A or 9 I would have gone broke (I would have folded if it had been a spade and I faced a big bet). I won a few more small pots and went on break (half the field went on break at the 2 hour mark while we played the first 20 minutes of level 2 and we went on break at the 2:20 mark while they returned and started level 2) with the same 10,000 chip stack I started with.

I found myself treading water for most of the rest of the tournament. I managed to stay afloat by stealing enough blinds and winning enough small pots to keep myself right around 10k. When I went on dinner break at 6:45 I had made a little progress and found myself with 12,500 chips. Jen came back to the Rio to have dinner with me at Buzio’s Seafood Restaurant. Smartly she had made a reservation and while there were huge lines at other restaurants and plenty of people getting turned away while the 1,500 players left in the tournament all looked for some place to eat, we enjoyed a nice, relaxing meal.

We came back from dinner at 8:15 and around 10:00 I played the hand that was the turning point of the whole tournament. With the blinds at 100/200 with a 25 chip ante, the father of the 4 year old and the Norwegian each called 200 in front of me and I called in the cutoff (one to the right of the button) with 97 of spades. I hadn’t been playing a ton of hands and I thought if I could hit big I’d catch the other players by surprise. The blinds came along too and with five way action the flop came down 9 8 3 with three different suits. Following three checks, the Norwegian bet 1,100 into the 1,250 chip pot. This guy was pretty solid, but not beyond bluffing at the pot so I decided to put him to the test. I raised to 3,000 and the other three players quickly folded. I was hoping to pick up the pot right there, but to my chagrin the Norwegian called my bet. The turn was a 4 which didn’t change anything and he checked. I made up my mind quickly that I was going to check, but I decided to stall for about 45 seconds so it would look like I was thinking about betting. There’s some chance that this act may have backfired on me, because as soon as a 2 came on the river my opponent put all of his 15,000 chips into the pot. At this point I decided to think things through and in fact I spent the better part of five minutes (twice as long as I’ve ever spent thinking about any hand in my entire life) trying to make a decision (10 times as long as the Final Jeopardy song!). First of all, what did I think he had? In this situation it was easier to eliminate the hands I thought he didn’t have that could beat me. I figured he’d have raised before the flop with a pair of 10’s or higher and I thought it unlikely that he’d call on the flop with 22 or 44. I considered that he could have 99, 88 or 33, but I had one of the 9’s, I think he might have raised before the flop with 99 or 88 and I think he would have reraised the flop with three of a kind anyway. That left one pair of 9’s with a bigger kicker which I couldn’t rule out. I thought maybe he had J 10 or A 8 or even QJ. The real problem was I would have to put all of my chips into the pot to find out. The good news was if I called and won I’d have over 25,000 chips which would probably be plenty to carry me through the rest of day 1. What made me want to call the most was the thought “why would he bet so much unless he didn’t want to get called.” If he did have a great hand he’d bet 4,000 or 5,000 and give me room to call with a marginal hand. At the same time I still had a pretty weak hand and if I folded I’d still have 8,000 chips which was plenty to maneuver myself back into good shape. I made up my mind to call several times and then decided to think some more. I actually reached for me chips and put my hands of them to push them in the pot more than once. I was thinking about calling like pulling off a band aid – just do it and it will be over. In the end, I folded and it’s the biggest regret I have for the entire World Series. You’ll hear me say that it’s important not to risk your entire tournament on one hand if you can avoid it, but you’ll also hear me say that you have to have confidence in your reads. If you can’t trust your own judgment or be willing to make a mistake then you’re doomed. I was getting 2 to 1 on my money and I was about 75% sure I had the best hand so clearly I should have called. The good news is I’m sure as hell not going to forget this hand, and rather than let it haunt me I’m going to use it to help me learn to trust my reads. And who knows maybe I was beat and made a good lay down.

The rest of the tournament was all down hill. I hung right around 8,000 for a while and then the limits went up to 150/300 with a 25 chip ante. This meant that every 10 hands I would be putting 700 chips in the pot and if I didn’t do something my stack would quickly get ground down. I was looking for just about anything to be aggressive with, but the other players were doing plenty of raising and I wasn’t getting anything remotely playable. Finally, after my stack hand been ground down to about 5,000 I moved all in with AQ after the stock analyst had open raised to 900. I got called by a player who had just moved to our table (he’d replaced the quiet old man) who only had about 6,000 chips. The first player folded and the new guy showed me pocket 10’s. I was 43% to win the hand at that point, but the first card off the deck was a 10. On the turn the board was 10 J 3 9 so an 8 or a K would have made me a winner, but the river was a brick and I left the table. I finished in what equates to about 4,000th place.

It was about 30 minutes past midnight and the early excitement of the day had passed. Most of the spectators had gone and the poker expo featured lots of closed booths instead of throngs of floosies. I called Matt and asked him to call E.B. and give him the bad news. In the past when I’ve been eliminated from a tournament I’ve felt angry. Angry at the cards, angry at the other players or angry with myself. But this time, I just felt sad. I’d REALLY wanted to do well at this year’s WSOP and this was my last chance. After months of anticipation and planning and dreaming I was done and it was a spectacular failure. A total train wreck. Of course it was a great experience, it was only my second year at the WSOP and my first at the main event and I know I belong at that level, but let’s be honest. I got hosed. I had more than my share of bad luck, but I also could have played better. You’ll hear most players (especially the one’s who lose all the time) looking for something or someone to blame for what went wrong. I try to look at myself first, and if truly there was nothing I could have done differently then I should feel fine about how things went. But, over the course of 10 events I’m sure I could have done something different.


I made it back to the MGM a little after 1 in the morning and Jen and I decided to get out of town. I had a room booked at the Paris for the next four days and Jen wasn’t set to leave until Monday night, but after spending half of the previous month in sin city I was a little Vegased out. I cancelled the room at the Paris and we switched our flights to a 6:35 a.m. flight which would be leaving in about 5 hours. We (actually mostly Jen) packed up our things and rather than going to sleep we went out and gambled and had a few drinks at the New York New York across the street. We both fell asleep as soon as we got in our seats on the plane and before I knew it we were back in the bay area.

Thanks again for all of your comments and best wishes. I’ll be back next year with more experience, more determination and hopefully more money. Check back from time to time and hopefully you’ll find some new blog entries. Don’t forget that you can sign up to get notified via e-mail anytime I update.