Atlantic City Week - Part I

The schedule for two recent tournaments on the East Coast, the United States Poker Championship at Trump Taj Mahal and the Borgata Poker Open at the Borgata, offered a very unique opportunity. Usually when you play a championship event, you have to wait a month or so before you get another chance to make up for your mistakes or mishaps. With the Borgata Poker Open championship event commencing immediately after the conclusion of the United States Poker Championship, it offered players the opportunity to win not one, but two championship events in the same week!

I was really psyched up about the week – maybe a little too psyched up for my own good. I flew in the night before the U.S. Poker Championship and felt great about my chances. Everything in my life had been going very well: I had a nice rush at Bellagio, felt good about completing some projects I'd been working on, and my social life was better than ever. All of these things should have added up to having intense focus, pure determination, and great drive to play well at the Taj.

So, what happened, then? I got a great night's sleep and felt fresher than ever, but I was playing sloppy, sloppy, sloppy. The Taj started us off with $20,000 in chips and blinds of $25-$50, and that's what I call poker heaven. I enjoy playing pot- and no-limit hold'em with deep stacks more than any other game. It offers me the opportunity to be "really out there." I can dance around in pots, manipulate my opponents, and hopefully force them to make a mistake. Unfortunately on this day, I was way out there. I don't know what planet I was on, because on earth you simply can't win a poker tournament by playing hands like the ones I was playing.

Since when do I call a first-position raise with the 8 3 on the button? It really boggled my mind; how could I appear to be so prepared and be so unprepared? Then, it hit me. I was too cocky. I was ignoring all the fundamentals of the game, expecting to outplay everyone regardless of my holecards. I was bluffing recklessly, calling raises with junk, and reraising with junk. You name it, I was doing it.

Coming into the tournament, I was on top of the world. I was on the rush of my life in the side games, as well as online. I felt like Midas: Everything I touched seemed to turn to gold. However, not even that Midas touch could save me from myself on the first day of the U.S. Poker Championship.

I'd totally lost control of my focus and patience. I'd flown all those miles to play in this tournament, and now, just three hours into it, I didn't even want to be there. From the picture I've painted of my play, I'm sure you have some idea of the types of things I was doing. For fun, I'd like to share with you some of my ridiculously bad plays that actually worked (the majority of them didn't work, but they are all hazy to me at this point):

1. I called a $350 raise, which had been called in one spot already, from the button with the 8 3. The flop came A-K-7 and both players checked to me. I bet $1,200, they both folded, and I showed it.

2. Again on the button, I called a $500 raise that, again, had been called in one other spot, while holding the 8 4. This time the flop was 9 8 2, and I somehow ended up putting in all $12,000 of my chips against the raiser. Luckily for me, he folded. I showed the 4.

3. A middle-position player made it three times the big blind, and one other player called. I decided to make it $1,500 from the big blind with J-3 offsuit. Both of them folded, and again I showed my hand.

By the time three hours had gone by, I'd shown a total of six bluffs. If showing bluffs had been the object of the tournament, I'd have been the leader. Unfortunately, the object was to increase the size of your stack, and after two limits, my $20,000 stack had dwindled down to about $13,000. It seemed like I'd lost all of that money $300 to $600 at a time. I never really lost a big pot, but I never really won one, either.

It was just yucky poker. I had all these traps set up for my opponents, but I was never able to reel one in. I felt very silly. Instead of splashing around in every pot, I could have played like the other "normal" tournament players: wait for the nuts and protect my stack. Of course, I would never go that far, it's just not in me. I at least could have played the way I normally do and made my usual big laydowns, like folding the 8 3 without batting an eyelash, sending the J-3 offsuit to the muck, and tossing away the 8 4 to an under-the-gun raiser. Normally, I have the patience and discipline to lay down such monsters – but not on this day.

Before I go any further, I have to make one confession. There may have been something else that affected my mindset. I'm not a coffee drinker at all, but on that day I drank a Grande Cappuccino. And I had eaten only half a croissant since waking up. That's not all. I took some natural herbal vitamins that are supposed to help increase your energy. I guess I should have read the label, as those vitamins were supposed to have been taken on a full stomach. Now, I'm pretty skinny, but half a croissant doesn't exactly fill my stomach.

I know, I know – excuses, excuses. That's why I didn't even want to mention it. I mean, seriously, after playing poker professionally for as long as I have, I would expect myself to have better control over my mind. News flash: I guess I don't! I'm usually able to recognize when I need to adjust my strategy, but on this day, none of my emergency alert systems were working. I was in a total funk, and the only thing that was going to save me was the final bell for the day.

Ding! "Tournament players, this will be the last hand of the night," the tournament director announced. Phew, I'd been saved. I was left with just $6,025 in chips, a net loser of $13,975 for the day. The chip leader, Ted Forrest, had more than 10 times as many chips as I had. Dismal. Pitiful. What a terrible display.

Ah, but tomorrow was a new day, and I'd been in worse shape than this before. Before I went to bed, I promised myself that I would put in a better effort the next day and not give up, as I had done so many times on the first day.

So, here came day two, and deep down inside I really felt like I was going to make a comeback. I won an ante or two, and held my own for a little while. Then came my big chance:

With the blinds at $300-$600, everyone folded to the button, who decided to limp in. Erik Seidel raised from the small blind, making it $2,500 to go. With about $8,600 in chips, I looked down at J-J. I decided that Erik didn't necessarily have me beat here, so I reraised all in. Erik quickly called and we had a classic confrontation: my J-J versus his A-K. I was golden going to the river. One last card and I was back in the hunt. My stomach was full of food, I had no caffeine running through my veins, I'd been humbled the previous day, and I was ready to play like I knew I could.

Then, bam! An ace on the river sent me to the rail. Oh, well. "Look on the bright side," I thought, "the Borgata starts in just two days."