Final Table Takedown: Fausto Valdez Captures Mystery Bounty At California State Championship

Fausto Valdez was dealing with a bout of boredom one day when he happened to catch a poker commercial featuring Chris Moneymaker. He figured that if some accountant from Tennessee could do it, anyone could.

It wasn’t long before he found out that poker was a hard way to make an easy living, and that perhaps there was more to the game than he initially believed.

Of course, Valdez was no stranger to unusual professions, as he had at one point been a professional paintball player, touring and competing in events across the United States with his team.

It was clear that a traditional 9-to-5 wasn’t going to work for him, so he decided that he would take poker more seriously. He began to study and play the local $1-$2 games, eventually working his way up to $5-$10 and beyond, never looking back.

In recent years the cash game grinder has devoted more time to tournament play, and the move has paid off. In 2021 he made his first WSOP final table, and then followed it up with big scores at the L.A. Poker Classic, L.A. Poker Open, and WPT World Championship. Most recently, Valdez made a deep run in the record-breaking WSOP main event, finishing 119th for $67,700.

The poker coach also scored a win earlier this summer at the California State Poker Championship, taking down the mystery bounty event for the trophy. Card Player caught up with Valdez to talk more about that victory and break down a couple key hands he played on his way to the title.

Event: California State Championship
Mystery Bounty
Buy-In: $400
Entrants: 551
Prize Pool: $190,820
First-Place Prize: $21,950

Craig Tapscott: A lot of players start out frustrated with the game. How did you get yourself out of that mindset and become a winning player?

Fausto Valdez: That is definitely very common and happened to me a few times trying to get a handle on the game. Ultimately over the years between poker and life, you learn to be brutally honest with yourself. You must know your strengths, but also weaknesses as an individual and tirelessly work on those areas until they become much stronger.

It doesn’t have to be perfect, but more than enough to be able to compete. It also doesn’t have to be strategic. The mental side is extremely important as well.

A bonus for me was realizing that poker doesn’t care about how you feel or what you’re going through. You either take the time to work on your craft or you don’t. I made sure I looked up many books, videos, and software to help me. Eventually I started working with a few coaches that were able to fast track the learning and help guide me.

CT: What was the most difficult part of moving up in stakes?

FV: The most difficult part of moving up is just mental. It’s not tricking yourself into thinking that something extra special is happening. It’s adjusting to the new sizes and swings monetarily speaking. It’s trusting that you are able to figure it out if things go wrong. It’s allowing yourself to learn, whether it goes well or not, and grow from there.

It’s so easy to focus on the bad and what can go wrong, but if you’re able to break out of that cycle and focus on what will ultimately help you in the long run, then you have a really good recipe to potentially win.

CT: What made you decide to give tournaments a shot?

FV: The way I got into tournaments was realizing that cash games can have a ceiling beyond stakes of $10-$20 and upwards. Games unfortunately become less available and more private. The truth is that it becomes more political, and you have to give up a lot as far as playing winning poker for the sake of being fun for the game.

I realized there were so many extra variables for MTTs relative to cash games that I wanted to speed up my learning. Every coach has a coach. I’ve worked with a lot of resources but my main one is Matt Berkey’s Solve for Why Academy. I also work one-on-one with Matt Hunt, their lead MTT instructor, which has helped tremendously. With all that being said, you still have to put in a lot of self-study off the tables which is irreplaceable.

CT: What advantages do you believe you have coming into tournaments with a long history of success in cash games?

FV: In cash games you’re constantly playing deep stacked and it’s really important to know how your decisions compound not just preflop but all the way to the river. So when I enter the pot, I’m already planning for future potential runouts given my stack size, and how that would impact my strategy.

Stacks: Fausto Valdez – 625,000 (25 BB)
Villain – 1,250,000 (50 BB) 
Blinds: 10,000-25,000 with a 25,000 big blind ante
Players Remaining: 18

CT: Set this hand up for us.

FV: We were down to the last two tables. I had been moved to what I considered the tougher of the two, which also had way more chips. I realized two younger guys had the bulk of the chips and after a few hands I could tell they were very active players.

Villain raised from the button to 70,000. Valdez called from the big blind holding K 10.

FV: I called knowing that this was a very active player preflop and post-flop. And also as a side note, the preflop raise was definitely on the bigger side of basically 3x the big blind, which would force me to call less hands, but my hand was way too good and his bigger size relevance was diluted by the fact he was doing this with way too many hands. In fact, I could three-bet my hand, but it was way too good to waste it in case he jammed over the top.  

Flop: Q 10 7

Valdez checked, and Villain bet 110,000. Valdez called.

CT: What did you make of the Villain’s big sizing on the flop?

FV: I kept in mind that by putting in this bigger sizing that he is already polarizing his range. He most likely already has nothing or something very big. Which is important because most times a marginal hand won’t go this big.

That was also important for my specific hand because it can only really call, and I need him to have bluffs. Luckily for me he was an active person so I was either going to be really wrong and likely to bust or I was going to gather a lot of chips for a potential final table at this point.

Turn: 4

Valdez checked, and Villain checked behind.

CT: After he checked, were you able to further pin down the Villain’s hand range?

FV: A lot of times when players bet this big on the flop, followed up by a check, it’s very indicative that they have a capped range. Meaning he was unlikely to be trapping and leaning more on the side of having something showdown worthy, or has complete air. When we consider he had been very active with a lot of big sizing, it’s more likely that he is leaning on air. So I was keeping this in mind going forward.

CT: What rivers did you not want to see?

FV: I mostly didn’t want to see an ace, or a straight or flush completing card. However more on the straight side because a lot of his showdown hands will revolve around these cards making it more likely that I will fall behind. The flush was not too big of a concern since a lot of these holdings will bet the turn.

River: 2

CT: The flush did come in, but otherwise it was pretty much a blank. What was the plan?

FV: I could’ve definitely gone for value, but knowing that the Villain was very aggressive, I would have put myself in a very tough spot if I led out and then he raised me. More importantly, he was polarized having bet the flop and checked the turn. That was a big indication he was very likely capped and only had garbage.

Valdez checked, and Villain bet 330,000.

FV: I wanted to allow him to bluff. He could have backed into a flush, but I was holding the 10 in my hand, which made it a little less likely. If he was slow playing a big hand, it is what it is.

Valdez called and Villain showed Ax 6×. Valdez won the pot of 1,045,000.

FV: I felt I had to call even though it was for basically my entire stack. I would have been left with around eight big blinds if I was wrong. This pot sealed the deal for me and got me to the final table where I would have a good stack to battle.

Stacks: Fausto Valdez – 2,500,000 (50 BB) Villain – 2,750,000 (55 BB) 
Blinds: 25,000-50,000 with a 50,000 big blind ante
Players Remaining: 15

FV: Now at this point I was second in chips with about 50 big blinds. 

Valdez raised to 100,000 from the button holding A 3. Villain called from the big blind.

FV: The caller was the other younger player that I’d seen being very aggressive. In fact, he was the chip leader.

Flop: 5 3 2

Both players checked.

FV: It wasn’t a particularly amazing flop for my hand. I didn’t want to open the window for him to check-raise me and let things get murky down the road. Especially when I was second in chips. I didn’t want to go overboard against the only guy that covered me.

Also, my hand had the potential to simply showdown and win versus random high cards, or more excitingly depending on the runout, it could turn into a bluff. This is where having the experience in cash games helped me because a lot of these spots are almost automatic.

Turn: 10

Villain bet 85,000, and Valdez called.

FV: He bet about 33 percent of the pot. I called since I still had very reasonable equity with my particular hand. But most importantly, I could turn my hand into a bluff pending the river card and his action. I’m basically calling vs a lot of his air in his range that has to bluff like queen or jack high along with gutty or straight draws that have a 7, 6, or 4 in his hand which is very reasonable from the big blind’s perspective.

River: Q

Villain bet 140,000.

FV: He bet 33 percent of the pot once again. 

CT: What were your thoughts on being able to take this pot away after this river?

FV: Now in theory when you bet small and small again, you’re supposed to do this with marginal or thin value hands, but it also has to be protected with some nutted hands. However, basically no one, other than really conscious good players do this. So, this spot becomes an easy exploit in understanding that he only has something marginal.

CT: You certainly can’t win at showdown.

FV: No. My hand is very likely to lose to all of the Villain’s marginal hands since I have the second-lowest pair. I didn’t think that he was at the top of his range, but I had to think it through just in case I was wrong. I was blocking sets, two pairs, straights, and the strongest pairs like A-Q or A-10 if he had that. 

CT: So, what sizing do you go with to get him off his possible marginal holdings?

FV: I 4x raised his size, which was one-third of my stack. He thought about it for a while and eventually…

Villain folded. Valdez won the pot of 560,000.

FV: Once I was able to strip a bunch of chips away from him, I went into the final table as the chip leader and never let it go until I eventually won the event.
To learn from Valdez visit BluePrintPokerCoaching.com or follow him on IG @fausto_valdez. ♠