Cards at Crestline 1/21/08

Went and played in a tournament and cash game tonight in Crestline, Oh at Shenanigans Pub. The tournament was profitable as I agreed to split the prize three ways with the two people left in. It was a bounty tournament so you got extra money for every person you knocked out during tournament play. When you start the tournament you get a bounty chip and then when you get knocked out you have to give the bounty chip to the person that knocked you out. You collect these as you knock people out and turn in the ones you have collected from other people when ever you get knocked out. So potentially you can make money even if you do not win. I knocked out four people during the course of play, so I got to collect four bounties plus the prize money for winning the tournament.

The tournament was going pretty slow and I was not getting very many good hands but I was able to grind it out and make it to the final table. When the final table started I only had 3000 in chips and the blinds were 500/1000 and I drew to be the big blind in the first hand of the final table. This meant that I would have automatically put in 1500 in chips during the next two hands, leaving me with only 1500 in chips if I did not win one of the hands. They announced that the top eight people would get prize money and there were ten people left. Most people would have just gone all in only having 3000 in chips left while the other nine people had 5-10 times that many left. I decided to make a different play and try to get lucky. I folded the big and small blind hands so it would get to my deal. I wouldn't have to give up any chips until it got all the way back around. That is 10 free hands I got to look at to try to pick up a good hand or pick a so so hand and try to get lucky. It worked out well because the other people at the table were so aggressive that they knocked out people and let me sit there with just 1500 in chips. As more people got knocked out I was going to get a bigger prize. It worked out that five people got knocked out and I still had my original 1500 in chips left. I jokingly said to the other four people "want to split up the prize five ways?" and they just laughed and said no way. I won a few hands and then asked it again. They said no, no, no. Then I knocked one of them out and proposed a four way split and they still said no. We kept playing and one of them got knocked out and we kept playing. It was three handed and I had turned my measly 1500 chips into a big stack and the other two were asking me for a three way split. I agreed and we split it up and that was the end of the tournament. It was good time and the guys playing couldn't believe that I survived with that little stack of chips so long.

I then went over to play in the cash game. On Wednesdays, they play a bigger cash game so there is more money on the table and the players are really loose and crazy. This can be a great game to get in if you are catching some good cards you can make a lot of money. It didn't play out very well as I was not getting very good cards and bad beats kept hitting me all night. I ended up losing what I bought in for at the cash game and as my buddy I went with wasn't getting very lucky either we decided to drive back to Walsh. It was still a fun night and I'm sure I'll be back there next Wednesday.