Vic Champs Trip Report part 2, Online Pokers Rigged, Events 2 and 4

[Bond18]

Vic Champs Trip Report part 2, Online Pokers Rigged, Events 2 and 4
I’ve always thought the Crown Casino tournament directors were smart to attempt to incorporate new tournament concepts and ideas. Crown has hosted some interesting tournaments over the years, tag team poker, speed poker, a ME that becomes 6 handed at one point, etc. However, today’s $1100 buy in heads up tournament turned out to be an absolute abortion of a tournament. When most of us think ‘heads up tournament’ we think a bracket of ‘X’ amount of players playing one fairly deep structured heads up match where the winner advances and the loser is eliminated from the tournament. I’ll try to explain the Crown attempt at a heads up tournament here:

The tournament starts with a locked in 64 players. I found this out the hard way when I attempted to register 30 minutes early but was told it was filled. I decided to put my name down in case somebody bailed out, and lucky me, someone did. The 64 players are broken up into 8 groups of 8, an individual bracket. In your particular group of 8, you play 7 matches, one for each other member in your group. The player with the best record from that 8 advances into the money and the final 8. The biggest problem with this set up is that a player who plays his first 3 matches and loses (like me, again proving that I am an absolute super star of unlimited texas hold them tournaments) is now completely out of the running and has no reason to play his last 4 matches. The tournament staff asks anyone in this situation to please stick around and play, but how the hell do you expect anyone to take their meaningless matches seriously at all in that kind of situation? Even worse is the tournaments structure, starting the players with 2000 in chips at 25/50 blinds that go up every 15 or 20 minutes (didn’t see a clock) to 50/100, then 100/200, then 150/300. Now elaborate the problem the room not having enough tables available and having 2 heats of 8 start at 7:30pm, then 3 heats start at 10pm, and another 3 at 12am. My heat is at midnight, so I’ve got a good 4 hours to kill. I go to dinner and see the Simpsons movie (which if your wondering, is hilarious) making it the most productive day of poker spent in 2 months.

When I get back to the poker room around 11:30pm I look over my bracket and see 3 players I’m familiar with, though I’m vaguely familiar with almost every player in the tournament by face. My first match is versus a guy named Daniel who I’ve never played before. About 10 minutes into the match he has 1700 to my 2300 and raises pre flop to 150. I make it 450 with TT, he shoves and I call. He shows 33, turns a 3, and puts me at 600. I lose my last 600 raising the button pre flop and C betting, which gets called, then jamming an A turn, which gets called again when he turns over top and bottom pair. Blegh, 0 and 1 to start.

My second match is against the absurdly aggressive Sherif, who at the beginning completely runs over me as I totally fail to flop the slightest bit of a hand. When I finally try to station him with 3rd pair Q kicker on a board that reads K8528 with a flush draw and he fires the river, he flips up Q8 to crush me. I’m left with 600, which I get back to 1000, which I manage to push pot and keep around until the 150/300 level. With 900 chips I post the BB, Sherif shoves in the small and I call with ATo (not that it matters, I’ve got 1/3rd of my stack in the middle with zero FE the next hand) and lose to his 43o. Down 0 and 2 to start I am already basically out of the running unless I win out and nobody else has 6 wins.

While waiting for somebody to play me in my 3rd match, I go witness the absolute mayhem that has become Emad Tahtou’s heads up match. He’s playing a guy I’ve never seen before, and there’s about 25 guys surrounding the table including Joe Hachem, Mark Vos, Sam Khouiss, Nathan Bobik, Arul Thillai, Van Marcus, Matt Downing, and why to many others to remember. Mark is sitting at the table bombarding Emad with trash talking insults as per usual, and it comes out that Emad has $5000 in prop bets riding on the game. Various members of the crowd are keeping up the trash talk and trying to hustle Emad into more prop bets, offering all variations of odds. Emad is also drinking heavily and ordering numerous drinks for the increasingly boisterous crowd, who take numerous rounds of Jagerbombs. All in all it’s a pretty awesome time for a simple heads up match. The match seems to last an hour (I think about an hour in total) and Emad continues to drink heavily while the entire crowd cheers against him. In the final hand the two players get it all in at 150/300 with Emad holding A5 vs the unknowns Q2o.

Flop: 865
Turn: Q
The crowd goes wild. Emad bursts into swears. Vos throws a torn up coaster all over the table in lack of confetti. Everyone’s laughing at Emad as he bemoans his luck. The table is so coated in bits of paper that the dealer can barely turn over a river.
River: 9
The Q holds and Emad has to pay out $5000. I tell him to just stay on the table since we have to play our HU match anyway. He runs off to the bathroom, which he’d been holding an hour, and slumps back into his chair. He’s clearly annoyed by the whole situation and somewhat drunk.
“[censored], $5000 on that match, one time, I run so bad. Hey Tony, I’ll bet you 3 to 2 I beat you HU.”
”Your 3 to my 2?”
”Yea, your $2000 to my $3000 but you can’t sell off any of your action.”
”I’m willing to bet but you know I don’t have that cash on me right?”
“That’s fine I know your good for it.”
”Alright, your $3000 to my $2000 then, let’s go.”

I’m not sure if Emad thinks I’m not very good, don’t have much money and it’ll be a lot of pressure, or is just tilted by losing $5000 on the previous match. We’re he sober and calm in a match that started with very deep stacks and slow blinds his bet might make some semblance of sense given the amount of cash he’s played. Unfortunately, in a structure like this that quickly becomes playing 20 and 10 BB stacks, I doubt there’s anyone in the casino whose had more practice at that than me in the last 6 months.

The first hand Emad raises to 150 and I call in the BB with KsJs.

Flop: T Q T rainbow
I check, he checks.
Turn: T
Check/check
River: T
I check, Emad bets 200, I call, and he shows A7 for the nuts.

He starts the trash talk “Haha, I bet you don’t even win a pot over 300 chips!” I shrug.

A few rounds later Emads aggressive play and my general being card dead has the stacks at around my 1500 to his 2500 when Emad limps in the small to 50, I make it 200 from the BB with Ad8d and he calls. The flop comes 8xx and I lead out, which is followed by Emads shove and my call. Emad shows 87o and my hand holds up. The stacks are now my 3000 to his 1000. The blinds soon go up to 50/100 and I begin moving in on him instead of letting him see a flop. He manages to stay afloat and with him having 1100 to my 2900 the following hand develops.
Blinds 50/100, I hold Q2o in the BB.

Preflop: Emad completes, I check.

Flop: Qs Th 8s
I check, Emad bets 100, I shove, Emad calls and shows 3sTs.
Turn: As
Fhuuuuuck. That’s not good.
River: X

Emad now takes a 2200 to 1800 lead and the blinds go up to 100/200. I begin push boting my ~9 BB stack when the following hand comes up:
My stack: 1800
Emad: 2200
I hold Ac7c in the BB

Preflop: Emad completes in the SB, I shove, he calls with AsKs.
Flop: Qs 5h 6s
Turn: 8h
One time?
River: 2c

Oh well, 2k well spent. I tell Emad it’ll probably be a couple days before I ship him the 2k, as I just got to Australia and don’t have much in the way of liquid cash (its all online.) He seems pretty cool with that.

At this point I’m now 0 and 3 and my evening is over. I ask the floor guys if they care if I leave, but inform me they do since it throws off the rest of the matches. I tell them I’ll stay and play, but obviously my heart isn’t in it. All of the matches I play after that but one were at that point meaningless in regards to the standing so it mostly results in both players saying “hey, so all in blind first hand?” and shoving it in there.

My girlfriend comes to pick me up at the casino, interrupting the home game she’s in at my house involving 5 of my friends. When I get home I’m home and sick of live poker to really play, so I decide to take that time to add up all my numbers from the summer. Here’s what I came up with that’s of interest:

Events played: 30
Events cashed: 4
Final tables made (Ha! 102 guys=final table brag): 1
Total cost of buy-ins: $81,150
Total value of all cashes: $20,414
Net loss in Las Vegas: $60,736
[censored], I am so good at this game.

When I go to sleep at about 6:30am the game is still going with all original members. When I wake up at 1:20pm THE GAME IS STILL GOING WITH ALL ORIGIONAL MEMBERS. I step outside my bedroom and find everyone where I left them.
“Morning you [censored] degenerates.”
Everyone laughs but looks like [censored]. The game finally breaks up around 3:30pm and my girlfriend, who’d lost $200 having played all night, falls straight to sleep. Man I wish I had proper Internet so I could actually do something productive with my day. Instead I go down to Crown and waste it away socializing, electing not to play the $230 limit tournament, which sounds as much fun as an evening in a gas chamber. I get to bed early in anticipation of the following days 12:30pm tournament.
This morning is the $240 buy in, $100 rebuy tournament. I’m hoping to get cash off Van for an online transfer but it would appear he’s slept in. Instead James Dodd, Charles Chua, and Gareth (Gaz) Edwards help me out. With Gaz on my table, I’m probably gonna need it.

As I sit down at my table, Gaz informs me that he has a more rebuys bet on with Emad. He begins shoving almost every hand, unless one of the nits on the table has raised in front and he knows its just throwing money away. The third hand I peer down at 99 and jam, Gaz jams blind and flips up 88. The 99 holds and I’m up to 4000 from my starting 2000. Gaz rebuys for $200 more and gets 2000 chips. A couple hands later I jam AQ and Gaz rejams blind again. He flips up his hand, 77, and promptly makes quads. This would be the last hand I’d win for quite some time. The action at the table would normally go in one of three ways:
A. Gaz jams, and some nit calls him and Gaz sucks out, tilting the random nit.
B. I open jam a fairly good hand (any two T and above, any pair, any A) when its folded to me in LP, and Gaz always takes me up on action and rejams.
C. Some random nit open raises, Gaz and I fold, random nit ponders out loud why he doesn’t get action.

Unfortunately for me, Gaz is running incredible. Every time I had to rebuy it cost me $200 and a process began that every time Gaz jammed and I called, or I jammed and he called, HE WON EVERY TIME. After his 77>AQ things kept going:
My AJ<his J9o
My AQ<some randoms AK<his 65o
My 99<his QJ
My 88<his KJ

At one point I get my stack from 2000 to about 9000. It folds to me in LP and I peer down at 88 and jam. The button folds and Gaz with about 18k of course rejams blind. BB folds. Gaz flips up 94dd.
Flop: Jd Th 5d
[censored], I am so screwed.
Turn: Th
One time?
River: Jc
Nice to know the deck got a little creative this time.

This manner of constant losing would continue for a while as the rest of the table got increasingly tilted by Gaz’s constant shoving (at this point, I can’t even remember how much various [censored] happened, though I know I got it in behind 3 times as well, though often with a suited connector in some massive multi way spew shove fest.) At one point he got his stack near 30,000. That didn’t stop him from calling 4 shoves, one of which being for ~9000, with T4o.I’ll give him credit though, he had to think that one over. I luck box picking up AA and getting called in 2 spots when I shove, taking me to 6000. I then get my stack up to 10,000 when the following hand comes up:

The two players on my right are also spewing into the table. The one two on my right because he is badly tilted after having his AA cracked, the other on my immediate right because he just doesn’t seem to care that much. Their open jamming things like Ax, SC’s, or whatever they really feel like, the one on my immediate right being way worse.
CO: 2000
Button: 11000
Me in SB: 10000
Gaz in BB: 2000
I hold AJo.

Preflop: Folds to CO, CO shoves, button reshoves, I reshove, Gaz shoves. The hands are flipped up:
CO: KQo
Button: JhTh
Me: AJo
Gaz: Q6o

Flop: T 8 6
Turn: K
River 3
Fuuuuuck, there went a 16k side pot. I rebuy again and immediately lose another coin flip with over cards to the pair. The floor announces that it’s the last hand and single and double add-ons will be available. They’ve also changed it so you can rebuy up to 3000. I throw another $500 in leaving myself with 5000 in chips going in to the post add on period. In total, I am in for a $240 buy-in plus 19 rebuys and 2 add-ons. I think my record online (outside a manic rebuy fest) is like 11. I am fairly annoyed with the whole situation. Also of note, Gaz, who had almost 30k, and was in for $3200, did not even reach the add on before running out of liquid cash.

After the break the guy on my right begins explaining to the table his theories of online poker.
“I’m telling you mate, a computer cannot be perfectly random. Like in chess, a computer can never know every move in Chess because there are more possible sequences to a game than there are particles in the universe. So what happens is if you have AA 100 times online, you will guaranteed win 85 of those since the computer is basing it on percentages. The best players online know this and have a sense for this, so when they have AT and figure you have 76 and the flop is 679 they’ll always stay in because they know according to pre flop their supposed to win like 60% of the time. That’s why their the best, they have a sense for this.”
I make the fatal error of attempting to interject with logic
”Or maybe they’re just better players?”
”Nah mate, I’m telling you, Imperium Lilholdem, Annette, those people know exactly when their supposed to suck out so they just keep calling and know their gonna get there more than they should.”
Numerous other people on the table begin agreeing with him, sans sarcasim
”Yea mate, I never thought about it like that, I think you’re on to something here.”
So…..much……..stupidity. HEAD GOING TO ASPLODE! I swear to [censored] god next tome some random dude tells me
“I reckon online is rigged, I can’t seem to win on there”
I’m just going to look at him and with a blank face say flatly
”No, its not that it’s rigged. It’s just that you’re not very good at poker and they’re much better than you. Try to understand and not spread misinformation.” Then again will all the current talk of whose cheating and multi accounting, perhaps I’m the one in the wrong?

A round or two into the post add on period I play a hand masterfully when I am dealt AA and another guy gets KK and I double up. Truly, I am a champion of unlimited Texas hold them tournaments. My stack gets up to about 11,000 with blinds at 100/200. The guy two on my right is playing a weird sort of aggressive/passive game (again I’d like to refer back to my quite of “in some mysterious manner, live players tend to be way to loose and way to tight at all the wrong times.”) where sometimes he open raises 3X, sometimes 6X, and I have yet to see which means what. A couple hands after showing my AA and having not played much of anything else, I decide to 3 bet his LP raise of 600 to 1800 with 87o, and have to fold after he makes it 5000. Back to somewhere in the 9000’s. My friend James Dodd gets moved to my table, which gives me someone to chat to in the realm of sanity. Also moved to my table is Mic Guttman, who finished 3rd at Naths 6 handed final table in 2006. He played an interesting hand with James I’m going to post later, as I found the situation James was put in quite confusing. Mic is playing fairly loose with his open raises and after the blinds have gone up to 150/300 the following situation comes up between him, some others, and I:

My stack: ~9500
Guttman: ~20,000
MP3: ~20,000
SB: ~16,000
I hold Qh Jh in the BB.

Preflop: Folds to Guttman in MP1, he raises to 1000, MP2 folds, MP3 calls, folds to SB, SB calls, I call (questionable?)
Flop: 4 8 T rainbow
Checks around, everyone seems totally disinterested. The guy in MP3 is very weak and straight forward, Guttman would C bet a pair every single time on this flop. All I’m concerned about is SB, if turn blanks and he checks, I’ll fire.
Turn: 6
SB checks, I bet 2300, Guttman folds, MP3 folds, SB quickly calls.
River: T
SB bets 2000, I fold.

SB begins bragging that he had nothing, though he obviously didn’t show. I don’t bother to inform his nothing was very possibly better than my nothing. I’m now down to around ~6000 in chips. I fold for a while when the most ludicrous situation that truly sums up everything I despise about live develops:

Preflop: The guy two on my right open limps in MP, I limp behind with 9c8c (not important), the button limps, SB completes, BB checks.

Flop A T 3 rainbow
It checks over to the button, who while reaching for chips, the dealer burns and turns a card.
”WAIT!!” cries the table. The dealer yells for the floor and explains the situation. The floor explains to the table that the button is still allowed an action and the card will be shuffled back in. However, the card is kept face up on the table, though pulled back from the rest of the flop. The button continues with his intended action of betting 2000. It folds to the open limper in MP who begins questioning what exactly is going on with this situation. The floor explains to him that the button is still allowed an action and gets to bet, so MP calls and I fold. The player in seat 1 picks up on the fact that the player in MP seems very confused and re-explains to him what is about to happen. As the dealer picks up the card to shuffle back into the deck MP declares he wasn’t aware that’s what the ruling was. He wants to take his action back and choose something else, he didn’t know the 3 goes back. Seat 1 nods and says “right, see I was pretty sure he wasn’t understanding what was going on floor. What’s the ruling now?” The floor man states that in fairness, since apparently his explanation was not clear enough, the player in MP can in fact change his action.
“Alright then, I’m all in!” MP confidently declares. The button mucks his cards in frustration and MP proudly flips up his absolutely horrendously played AA. The table is a mix of conversation about what happened, laughing, and arguing. I look over at James, and say almost right next to the guy two on my right (though he’s to busy stacking chips and the table is to loud to hear me)
”Holy [censored], that was like the worst abomination of a hand I’ve ever seen. He gets a chance to let the guy blow off chips to him and he shoves when he can never call. These are the people who beat me in tournaments.” The entire altercation thus far has probably taken almost 10 minutes. Just as its about to die Mic Guttman decides to speak up.
“Now wait floor, I want to know, if something like that happens, are they really allowed to take a verbal decision back?”
Another floor person comes over and is in disagreement with the first floor person. The table begins debating furiously what should have happened. The second floor person tells the first that in that situation a verbal declaration is always binding. The table continues to argue about what’s just happened.

The whole event wasted probably half a level of play. All I could muster in response was a brief
”I [censored] hate live poker dude, so rigged.” in James direction.
”I know man, so do I” he responds.

A round later the blinds are up to 200/400 and I have 5200 in chips. I peek down at QQ UTG+2 and the following hand develops.

Preflop: UTG folds, UTG+1 raises to 1200, I think 5 seconds and move all in, it folds to Mic Guttman who flat calls (I look over at James and roll my eyes, I know I am SOOOO dead,) it then folds back to UTG who shoves about 10k total in there and Mic obviously calls.
“I don’t have much” says UTG+1 “you got aces?”
Was there ever a question?
”Yea I got aces” says Mic.

We flip up our hands, QQ for me, AA for Mic, JJ for UTG+1. I guess when you think “I don’t have much” is the best time to move your stack in with no fold equity. The board blanks out and I’m sent walking. Tomorrow is the $1100 6 max tournament which apparently starts us deep stacked, hopefully things go more smooth there.

[plzleenowhammy]

is this ur biggest dry spell, bond/

[Bond18]

[ QUOTE ]
is this ur biggest dry spell, bond/

[/ QUOTE ]

Well in terms of just time, yes. Here's the thing tho, 30 tournaments is less than the amount of tournaments i play in 2 days volume online.

[AC-Cobra]

Great read Bond, I was watching a replay of EC10's Sunday mill FT but dropped everything when u posted. SOrry to hear about your continuing bad luck, thanks for keeping up the writing though it is truly great. Good luck in your 6 max event tommorow.

[plzleenowhammy]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
is this ur biggest dry spell, bond/

[/ QUOTE ]

Well in terms of just time, yes. Here's the thing tho, 30 tournaments is less than the amount of tournaments i play in 2 days volume online.

[/ QUOTE ]

you're a badddd man.. glglgl plz win everything

[uclabruinz]

Can one of these PLEASE have a happy ending? Geesh.

[Yuv]

Bond, to break your luck, I suggest you wear a t-shirt, shorts and flip flops for your next live tourny.

I suggest this t-shirt :



Was nice meeting you in Vegas. I looked up from the table at one point and somehow you were busto. You should avoid doing so for further success.

[plzleenowhammy]

whatever happened what that asian interviewer? she was ready for it.

[Bond18]

I had an Asian girlfriend all along?

[plzleenowhammy]

oh yeah?.. what's that like?