Trip reportish: AC 4/7-8, Caesars, Taj, Trop, Taj

[sirpupnyc]

<u>Summary</u>: No drunkenness, no debauchery. Not even really good poker stories. Far too much money lost. Caesars sucks. Bring your own coffee to Taj tourneys. 2-4 kill O8 is fun.

Finally managed to coordinate with casino-going friends with better access to a car, drove down late morning Friday.

I'd been in favor of leaving earlier to arrive for the Taj 12:15 tourney, but got talked out of that and we agreed to start at Caesars for their 3pm tourney instead. We've never been there.

Arrived around 1, registered, got on a new 1-2NL table. Dealers seemed competent enough, players soft as expected with a few who seemed to know what they were doing. Since it was a fresh table, everyone got to pick their seat, and two old guys with accents who seemed to be regulars took the 1 and 2 seats. They were either idiots or colluding. Big bets, 1 bet-2 raise, generally odd play that seemed meant to benefit one or the other of them, and sometimes the trashiest of trash shown down. (If they were colluding, I'm not sure they were very good at it.) Probably worth a mention to the floor, but if they were regulars (they seemed chummy with the dealers) it probably wouldn't have done much.

One floor intervention was needed when the 6 seat raised preflop, 10 seat called, 6 seat says "Hey, where are my cards?" (Or else it was the 1 seat asking "Who raised? Where are his cards?") So there's debate about what happens since the dealer mucked his unprotected cards. Floor lets him take his bet back.

Mostly crap cards and good ones that missed cost me a $200 buyin, part of which I manage to recover by sending a second one after it. Cashed out -140 at tourney time.

Tourney time lasted 20 minutes for me, so I don't have a whole lot to say about it. $80+15, don't think it got to 20 players. The dealer on my table seemed less competent than those I'd seen at 1-2NL...not terribly fast or dextrous, but not actually bad. Players didn't seem especially noteworthy, maybe a little heavier on the any-two (no, not any-two-suited, any-two) than you might see in a larger field or a less-sucky casino. Just at the end of the first round I get AA, raise preflop and get called by the blinds. Nondescript Q-high flop, BB bets, I raise, he pushes, I call, he shows Q9o for top two, no help comes and I say good riddance to Caesars.

Lovely day for a walk up the Boardwalk to the Taj. Fresh air, sunshine, view of the waves. All those things we don't necessarily associate with AC.

No wait for 1-2 at the Taj. I get on a table that seems to be having a good time. Up a little, down a little, nothing of particular note. I fortify at a down a little point with another $100, peak around $450 (up 150), then take a hit with AQ against what turns out to be flopped quad 2s.

The guy I drove down with has arrived at the Taj after taking 2nd (~$425) in the Caesars tourney, his girlfriend has arrived by bus, and we decide on dinner somewhere in the Quarter followed by a visit to the Trop poker room. Cash out about -120.

Dinner good. PF Chang's.

No wait for 1-2 after dinner. I get on a so-so table from which I really should have asked to be moved at some point. At my end were three guys who were all there together, drunkish and having a good time. At the other end were three guys who seemed to have been there a while. The shark-to-fish ratio wouldn't have been so bad if we hadn't had two guys who'd go off for half an hour or more at a time, leaving too few revolving-door seats. (One of these guys moved around next to me later on and treated me to tales of the hookers he was off picking up in the slots while he was gone from the table.)

More up a little, down a little, not so many chances to make a big score. Now and then I'd pick up a pot and someone would announce what I had, completely wrongly, and I'm pretty sure I got a couple better hands to fold, so I guess I seemed TAGgier than I was actually playing. About even at around 3 or so, getting on toward either time to go or time to get a table change and commit to not sleeping. AcKc comes along and gives half my stack to KK, I cash out -80 around 4am.

Super 8 on Tennessee, convenient, adequate if non-fabulous, seemed acceptably clean. Not as cheap as Absecon, cheaper than everything else on the Boardwalk. (We weren't sure we'd all three be going between hotel and poker rooms at the same times, so we wanted to avoid something that required a drive.)

Wide awake at 9, decide the day calls for a shot at the Taj 10:15 tourney (80+20). Register, breakfast sandwich from upstairs eaten with an ocean view. The tourney was in that bit of hallway-turned-poker room down past the arena, rather than in the poker room itself. One waitress for 150 people = bring in your own coffee. 140 entries, I think they posted, around $4500 for 1st. Not much of interest in the way of hands. Managed not to lose (but also to not win much) with AA. QQ around the end of the 25/50/100 level, raised to 400 ahead of me with one call, I reraise to 1100, both call. Flop raggedy-rag-rag, check-check-I bet 1700, fold and call. Turn another rag, check-I push. He calls and shows 3d2d for a straight.

At this point, I should have gone for a drink, a smoke, a change of venue, some ocean air, anything. But no, straight into the poker room where a new 1-2 table was opening with a seat in which I embarrassed myself terribly, donking off $200 in short order.

So I try the $65 SNG. Wow, those 1000 chips go fast. I was about 5th or 6th, I think.

After lunch we decide to play a bit longer and head back to NYC around 3. They have an 8pm dinner in the Village. All three of us get on the 2-4 O8 list, and after a bit of waiting decide to grab 2-4 LHE seats to pass the time. Got an AA paid off nicely by 99, and suddenly O8 opens up and we all get called. Mostly old folks having a good time, and a surprisingly lighting-quick game. It's 2-4 with a full kill, which we didn't know beforehand, but no problem. Much Omaha fun. (I posted about it in last week's O8 thread.) Cash out +55.

Lesson learned: don't waste time at a bad table.