How I got broke

Okay, everybody is always saying I should write poker stories. So I will describe how I came to be on the rail three hands after dinner break on day one of The Main Event. This way I dont have to tell the story anymore either, since everyone who cares should be reading this blog.

They broke my original table within an hour of the start and the next table I was at was pretty tame and easy to read, but I had a miserable run of cards and was down to 20k form the starting 30k when that table got broke about three hands before dinner.

When I arrived at the new table I was seated two seats in front of a kid with 160k which was, as it turns out from checking the updates now that I am home, the chip lead. So I have no idea who he is and he is a little late coming back from dinner and the other players at the table tell me he is playing every hand and three betting almost every hand, I take this with a grain of salt and assume he will give me a little respect even if he is pushing around the amateurs at the table.

About third hand back from dinner I am the button, he is BB and there are three or four limpers before me, I hold A-10 off. I have no reads on anybody at the table yet so perhaps I make my first mistake of the hand and just call.

Flop 10-4-3 rainbow, checked around to me, I bet 1,000, chip leader calls everyone else folds. Ace on turn, checks to me I bet 3,000, he calls (A-10-4-3 no suits). River pairs the 3(10-3-4-A-3) and he checks I consider checking but can’t resist trying to get value thinking that he wouldn’t be chasing with a three and if he had a set or straight I would have heard from him on the turn. So I bet 5k he thinks a minute and goes all in. I have slightly more than 10k left. I will be more or less crippled and psychologically tormented if I muck, so I call and look at 3-4.

I looked at the updates after I got home and found out his name was Tyler Smith and he has some good results “down south” where he lives, including back to back final tables at the WPT Southern poker Championship, maybe I should have done that on dinner break.

He played that hand extremely well, in my opinion, and I look for him to be an exception to the chip leader of day one never doing well. Watch out for him!

I guess my biggest mistake was trying to extract value against an unknown but obviously dangerous opponent in that spot, especially in the ever so juicy Main Event. I had no idea where he was, but value bet anyways.

I could have avoided going broke, but he also earned my chips with nice play.

Good luck to Tyler and everyone reading this, I’m out.