On to Day 2 with 30900

On to day 2 of WPT Biloxi with 30900. Average is in the neighborhood of 39000, as half the field was eliminated today. I drew a pretty nice starting table recognizing only WPT winner Bryan Sumner. My hat is off to Sumner. He played with class and played almost flawlessly for 7.5 hours of poker. Early in level one he did manage to get in for a 40000 chip pot with 65dd vs two black kings in a reraised pot on 6c 4d 2d. The guy with the kings was an old amateur player, so I was rooting on Sumner not to catch up in the hand. The river was the Ad, and I knew my day would be tougher even with position on BS. Later, Matthew Hilger joined our table as the only other player I recognized all day. I got up to around 31000ish in level 3 by playing small ball poker. I did play a lot more aggressively today than I did in Los Angeles, and I think it kind of helped. At 1/200 (25) a crazy hand came up that sent my stack down to around 20000. Sumner raised to 625 in MP and an older guy named Steve called right behind him. I called in the cutoff with KQcc. A lot of times I'll show up with a raise here but not this time. The button also joined and four of us took a flop of Ac Jc 3h. They checked to me, and I bet 1500 into 3000. The button folded, BS folded, and then Steve checkraised me to a tiny 3500. He had 16200 behind, and this definitely is not a reraise spot for me in a tournament. I obv called and the turn was the Ad. He checked, and I checked behind. The river was the 5c making me the nut flush. Steve checked, and I bet 7300 into 10000. In retrospect, I think I should bet more like 5800. I've been playing cash games lately though, so I guess I made a greedy bet. Steve thought for 15 seconds and then gave me the speech, "Did you make that flush on me?" Just as he had counted out the chips to call he said, "I'm going to raise it," and then threw in his last 8900 in chips. I was sick. Hollywooding for his last 8900 is kind of out of line in a pot of 24600. I thought for 5 long minutes and finally folded faceup. He later told me he had AJhh. I actually thought it was more likely that he had four aces than AJ in this spot. I could've laid the hand down a lot quicker on the river (it's a pretty easy laydown given the circumstances), but I felt like punishing him for his Hollywood speech. We talked after the tournament though, and he seemed like a nice enough guy. I was down to 19000ish now and I stayed right around there as we went to dinner break. My Mom, Dad, Stephanie and I ate dinner at a Japanese Steakhouse which was good but not great. I came back from dinner and got AI on a semibluff with KJdd when a guy raised my flop bet on Qd 7d 3s. He folded. I was up to around 22000 and slowly dwindled to 17000. Then, an older live pro who played pretty well raised in second position. It was folded to me in the BB, and I found the magic AhAc. I decided with my stack that I was just going to call. It's unlikely he would give me action from anything but QQ or KK preflop if I reraised with my stack in this spot. The flop came Qxx with two hearts. I checked. He bet 2200. I raised to 7000. He moved me in for 15500. I instantly called. The dealer had a 5 and a T on the turn and river almost before we turned our hands up. He showed AQ, and it was obv no good. I was at my highest point of the day now at 33500ish. I lost a pot and was down to 25000. I decided to play hyper aggressive and raised 82o, J4o, and Q5hh (UTG) all within the last 20 minutes and got my stack back up to 30900 to end the day. Hopefully I'll draw a nice table and double quickly tomorrow. 130ish players left with 27 getting paid.

SS