I Should Listen to my Woman's Intuition

I was thinking about a hand I was involved in during last Saturday's tournament at Joker's. I had K-10 offsuit and there were no raises before the flop. The blinds were 100-200. The flop was 7-2-10 with 2 hearts. I was first to act and had top pair with 2nd kicker. I bet 400 to see where I was at and I found out in a hurry exactly where I was at.

The next player (don't know his name) raised to 1200. Gary raised to 2400. Good grief! My little invisible poker demon whispered in my ear that someone had two pair and someone else had a set. My woman's intuition told me to call. I thought about this for a good 60 seconds and folded my hand, even though my intuition was screaming at me to call. AT THE TIME it was the correct fold because, as I found out later, player #1 had flopped a set of sevens and Gary had my favorite garbage hand in the blind (7-2) and had flopped two pair.

Anyway, player #1 called Gary's reraise. The turn was another 10. I sat placidly fuming, but at the same time I knew that if someone had a set of sevens they now had a full house. The turn was a king. Inside I almost jumped through the roof. Outside I sat fuming again. I absolutely could not believe this amazing runner-runner that would have won me a HUGE pot. It was very difficult for me to remember my favorite saying - if you're not folding winners, you're not playing right - because I was just really upset with myself for not listening to my intuition. Yikes!

Pro player and author Susie Isaacs says that woman's intuition is definitely worth listening too and I am beginning to believe her. This is NOT the first time by a long shot that this has happened to me. Oh well.

Taking A Short Break

This is just to let my plethora of readers know that I am taking a short break from poker to regroup as it were. I think two or three weeks should do it, so I should be back in the swing of things on June 15-20 or so. I am not bored with poker, but I really feel like I do need a break from it or I might begin to get REALLY annoyed with it. It's a long story and I will not bore you with it. I just want to let you know that I probably won't be writing anything for a little while. I wish you luck at the tables!!

Aces Make Me Crazy!!

What to do - what to do!! How does one play aces correctly? I will never begin to know the answer to that one. In Sunday morning's tournament at the Crazy Moose, I was enjoying a very nice chip lead of almost 11,000 (we start with 5,000) not even one hour into the tournament. I looked down and saw those pesky aces. Blinds were only 50-100 at this point. Mike raised to 300. I raised to 1,000 and got called by Diane and Mike. The flop was K-9-3 with the king and nine being diamonds. Normally, I would play pretty soft here trying to get some extra chips, but I did not like the 2 diamonds on the flop, especially when I had 2 callers and one of them could easily have A-Q of diamonds or some such thing. (Obviously, I did not have the ace of diamonds.)

Mike checked and yours truly got stupid and went all-in. Normally, this would not be a problem because most normal players and maybe even most abnormal players would fold because I had them covered, but, golly gee, would you fold a set of kings??? I think not. That's what Diane had. I knew it instantly too because she called so fast that I didn't even have time to think to myself, "Please be ace-king!!". Drat! Mike folded and I was stuck.

Luckily, I still had about 3,900 left after this fiasco, but on the other hand, I was never able to gain any traction after that and went out about halfway through the tournament. Phooey!!

I have been thinking about this particular case for awhile and I really don't think it would have ended up any other way, unless I slow played and another diamond came or another straight card and then I could have folded my aces without too much damage. (Yes, I am a player who can fold aces when necessary.) In hindsight, I guess I should have just made a bet and waited to see what Diane and Mike did.

How do you play aces? I just don't know. Most of the time, I think it's OK to push hard before the flop, which I did because I reraised the original raiser. Sometimes, such as when there is only one player left in an unraised pot, I think it's OK to limp and trap. I think there are about as many ways to play aces as there are players and that's just too many darned ways if you ask me - ha! Live and learn. That's what I love about poker more than anything else - thinking of new strategies.

An Experience at the Tournament of Champions

I've been thinking about a hand that was played at May's TOC at the Cable Bridge between myself and another woman. We had just started the tournament, so the blinds were still 25-50. I had J-7 suited in spades on the button and no one raised, so I just called. The small blind called and the big blind (the only other woman in the hand) checked. The flop was 4-6-10 with 2 spades. Small blind checked, big blind bet 100, 2 players folded and I called with 4 spades and one over-card.

The turn was a blank, I think it was a deuce, but don't remember. Small blind checked again and big blind bet 200. I called again. The river was the jack of diamonds, so I made top pair. She bet 300 this time. I felt very comfortable calling with top pair. Small blind folded. She turns over the 8-5 of spades and says, "I missed everything." I turned over my cards and took the pot. Almost immediately, she started getting nasty.

First, she says, "Geez, why couldn't I hit my straight or my flush?" I replied, "Your flush draw was no good. I had a higher flush draw." She replied, "Well, I had a straight draw and you didn't." So, I said, "Yes, you did, but it was an inside straight draw." Then she says, "Well, I guess I will just have to bet huge amounts to get you to quit drawing to crap." This annoyed me quite a bit, but also made me laugh a little because who had the crap here after all? I smiled and said sweetly, "You do what you have to do." She said (and not very kindly), "I WILL!!"

After that, it was a classic case of tilt on wheels. I could not believe it. She just fell apart before our very eyes. She played almost every hand just trying to make something happen and she was gone before the end of the second blind round. Good grief. I'm still shaking my head over this one. I have played with this woman on several occasions and I quite frankly don't understand her attitude, although I have seen her get slightly emotional before, but nothing like this. It makes me want to try even harder to never go on tilt. It's an amazing thing to watch.

I got knocked out of the tournament about 30 minutes later (with the best had as per usual) and she was playing Texas Shoot Out. I sat down next to her and said hi and made a couple of nice comments about her wins, but she virtually ignored me. I just went home. Sometimes, there's just no point in trying to be nice - you know??

Sort of a win

I played the Cable Bridge tournament Wednesday at 7:00 and had what I refer to as "sort of" a win - ha! I paid $33 to play and ended up with a total of $40. The other players decided to pay fifth play $30 and I knocked out 2 players for two $5 bounties.

I just know that I would have won the darned thing, but I got beat badly on two separate hands by A-8, which is my actual favorite hand, whether people believe it or not. They all seem to think it's 7-2. Can't figure out why. :) Anyhow, with about $12,000 in chips I raised to $3,000 with pocket queens and a guy went all-in for $4,000, so it was a "no brainer" to call him, right? Right! He had A-8 offsuit and caught an ace on the turn. Bummer. I still had $8,000 but the blinds were $500 and $1,000, so I wasn't too thrilled about it. After about six more hands, there were two minutes left before the blinds were going to go up again, so I pushed all-in with A-7 suited in hearts and got called by A-8 suited in clubs. He flopped A-8-3. Ouch!

I do believe I shall relegate A-8 to the bottom of the heap for awhile. 7-2 is looking better all the time!!

Home Game Tournament Fun

I've been sick for a couple of days (nothing serious) so will need to catch up with my posts in sections - ha!

Saturday was just way too much fun. I was invited to participate in a local home game tournament for the first time. This was held in the host's garage and was more "high tech" than I expected it to be. They had a computerized system with a timing clock just like in the casinos. Goodness. There were four tables of 8 players, lots of drink and snacks and a great prize pool. The cost was $65 for 10,000 chips with 30-minute blinds and 40-minute blinds at the final table. There was even a bracelet for the winner!! The host was the winner of the last tournament, but she went out about halfway through and joined the live game.

There were six people there that I had played with before, but the others were totally unknown to me, so I was happy to make it as far as I did. Everyone was very friendly and made everyone else feel right at home. There were designated player/dealers and everyone got to shuffle the previous deck when they were on the button, so there was always a deck in play without waiting. It was very well organized. Everyone at the final table got paid, with first place being $700+ and the coveted bracelet.

I played for many hours before going out on the bubble - gak! I did receive a prize, however, a nice little "anti-stress therapy" gag gift. It is a tin plate that you can bang your head against until you are unconscious or you forget the reason for your stress - ha! I really enjoyed this experience and hope to participate in many more.