Gyla and I had planned a trip to Biloxi this weekend but in the end changed our plans.  We decided to go to Coushatta instead.  Coushatta is a great Indian Casino in Central Louisiana.  It’s about a 3 1/2 hour drive for us so we decided to go Friday afternoon and spend the night.  Friday night they have a rebuy tourney and Sat is a $200 buy in Freeze Out.

 

We arrived about 4:00 Friday night.  We registered for the Rebuy tourney and went to play 3 card poker.  I was holding in there but Gyla wasn’t so she wandered off to play video poker.  I played 3 card awhile longer then went off in search of Gyla.  I couldn’t find her so I sat down to play video poker.  It wasn’t a few minutes that she showed up with $1,000 shed just won in a VP machine.   Go Gyla!!!!  We played a little while longer then went to see what low carb entree’s we could find on the buffet.  After a dinner of salad, boiled shrimp, and boiled King crab we went to the poker room for the tourney.

 

There were a little over 100 players.   They were paying 10.  The structure was $20 entry free.   You could do 2 buys of chips for $20 each.  Thats what everyone seemed to be doing so that is what we did.  We were in for $60.  I found my table and I have to say that this was about the softest table I’d ever played a tournament with.  One guy was even calling with Ace high.  There were a couple who seemed to know what they were doing.  One was really really tight.  A couple more were total donks.   The guy on my right seemed to know what he was doing.  I thought so anyway until her raised like 10 times the bb one hand and everyone quickly folded.  He folded his cards face up.  Aces of course.  I guess he didn’t want to get them cracked.  Everytime he had a really big hand he’d raise real big.  He might as well have a neon arrow flashing down on him saying MONSTER HAND.   It wasn’t long before I had the table pretty well sized up.  I was able to small ball myself into a nice stack.  I don’t really remember any notable hands.    I made it to the end of the rebuy period and did the $60 add on and dealer special as everyone else was. 

 

I found Gyla at the break and she hadn’t faired so well.  She had a guy pushing all in on almost everyhand.  Whenever he won he’d tip the dealer $15.  He was also in the hot seat.  Gyla’s rebought a couple of times but she was pretty card dead.   She went out a little while after the break.

 

We started again after the break and I kept building my stack.  Soon they broke our table and I was directed to what was described as “The Table of Death”.  Groan.  Apparently they had already knocked out a number of players.  Where my first table was very passive this was livelier.  A couple of the guys had pretty big stacks.  I started playing and before long I had cleaned out one of the big stacks.  The other was in the hot seat and couldn’t miss.  I was doing well.  The blinds were going up and I was staying ahead of them.  Everything was rocking.

 

We took a break and they colored up some chips.  I came back to find less chips than I thought I had.  I don’t know if it was my mistake or theres but I’ll be sure to verify my chip count with the dealer before going to break next time.  We started playing again.  I was feeling good about making the money until I hit the Dead Zone.  My cards absolutely fell apart at the worst time.  People were going all in on every hand.  There was little opportunity for a steal.  I couldn’t even get connecting cards or overcards to push with.  I sat and watched as my beautiful stack was blinded away.  I did get an AQs.  I called the big stacks 3,000 chip raise but flopped nothing and folded.  In hindsight I realize I should have reraised him all in.  I doube he would have called.  I had fold equity at that time.  I didn’t think about it then.

 

We finnaly were down to 2 tables and I was looking for an all in hand.  I started to push with a K7 of spades.   (Yes my cards were that bad.)  My head overruled my guy and I folded.  I should have listened to my gut.  I would have tripled up.  Instead I went out 13th when I was in the SB and the BB had Kings.   3 from the money.

 

We played some more Video Poker then some Let it Ride.  I mananged to win some at Let it Ride.  It got late and we went to bed.

 

Saturday we went over and registered for the tourney then had breakfast.  The tourney started at 12.  There was a smaller group for this tourney.  We had about 60 players.  They were paying 10.  That sure sounded good to me.  My table was pretty good.   Again I started picking up post playing small ball.  These guys were tight calling stations for the most part.  There were a couple tourney savey players but that was all.  Of course that isn’t always good news.  It’s hard to play against calling stations.  There was one guy at the table I couldn’t get a read on.  He rarely showed down a hand.  I couldn’t tell if he was a donk or an experienced player. 

 

I was sitting in the 9 seat.  (We were playing 10 handed.)   We had a hand that the 8 seat was in.  At the end he thought everyone had folded after the river and he mucked his cards face down on the table.  The dealer says to wait because there is another player in the hand.   It was the one seat and he started hollering that the hand was mucked and it was dead.  The dealer explained that the cards weren’t dead until they hit the muck.  He kept grumbling so much that the floor was called.  The floor explained the cards were still in play and the hand continued.  Lots of tension.

 

One round later I was sitting in the BB with 59o.  No one raised so I got to see the flop.   I hit 2 pair on the flop and had little doubt my had was good.  I bet and got callers.  The turn didn’t scare me so I bet again and I thought everyone had folded.  I said “Big Blind Miracle” and flopped over my cards to show the 2 pair.  Then I heard the dealer say that there was another player in the hand.  Yep.   Same guy.  There was an obvious problem that the guy next to me and I made the same mistake.  I appologized.    I went ahead and bet.  He called.   And I won the hand.   He made a big stink about it and called the floor over again.  Guess what…………  I got my first one round penalty.   I didn’t kick up a fuss but as I left the table I said to the guy that it was a pretty chicken sh*t thing to do to call the floor.  The floor heard me and said the dealers are required to call the floor when that happens.  I looked at the guy and said “I’m sorry sir.  I thought you had called the floor.  I should have realized you wouldn’t do that for something that was so obviously a mistake.”   The dealer nodded to me to let me know that he had insisted that the floor be called.   My penalty drug out because they were playing slow and they colored up the chips.  Finally I got back to my seat. 

 

Warning…..to continue reading what transpired next may be painful to the skilled poker player.

 

Everything was just fine when I got KK in 2nd positon.  UTG raised.  I was getting ready to make my obvious reraise when at that exact moment my IDK (Inner Donkey) decided to come out and play.  I’m not proud of what transpired next.  I’m hoping to purge the awful memory by reporting it all here.  Maybe someone can learn from my mistakes thereby creating me some good Poker Karma that I can use for PLAYING THE WORST HAND OF MY LIFE.  It pains me to recall the details.

 

I’m sitting there with a preflop raise to 3x the big blind……1200 chips.  My obvious and only move with all the calling stations around was to reraise to about 4,000  chips.    I was just about to do that when my IDK stated CALL.  Oh no.  Did I just call that raise.  My IDK said that we want to build a bigger pot.  Right.  You see where this is going right?

 

We end up with about 4 or 5 players in the pot.  The flop comes 10xx two diamonds.    Good flop for me.  It’s checked to me.  (Even the preflop raiser checked.)   I bet out an appropriate amount.   I don’t want him drawing to a flush.   (I don’t remember the counts.  Wish I’d written them down.)  I only got one caller so we were heads up.  Of course it was the guy I couldn’t get a read on.  For some reason I put him on a set of 10’s.   He could have AA JJ or QQ.  I had bet enough to bet out any flush draws I thought.   I did think that my KK were hidden by the fact I didn’t reraise.  It did occur to me that without a read on this guy he could have anything.  That is the one problem with playing there.  There are really a lot of inexperienced players and it makes reading them hard.  My biggest problem was I didn’t know what he was……experienced or inexperienced.  He could have been a calling station calling me down with any pair. 

 

The turn comes An Ace of diamonds.  There are 3 diamonds on the board.  I have the Kind of diamonds so that is the nut flush draw.  He checks……

 

I wish I could say that I took the free card and hit the diamond for the nut flush and took the pot.   Unfortunately it didn’t end up that way.

 

TAKE THE FREE CARD YOU IDIOT.   You have to remember My IDK had shown up.  Did I take the free card?………………HELL NO.   I bet out.   Did I think that I was pot committing him?  No.  I just bet out like it was the best thing to do.  What did he do?   Pushed in all his chips.  Now I’m sitting there wondering if this was a check raise or he was just betting because he was pot committed. 

 

again  STUPID STUPID STUPID.

 

Then…..not caluculating the great pot odds I had…….I did what all WEAK AZZ players do.  Looked at my chips and decided that I still had enough to come back from and folded.

 

I’ll never know what he had.  I’ll never know if I would have gotten the diamond.  I COULD HAVE SEEN THAT RIVER CARD FOR FREE.

 

Sigh.  It will take me a long time to get over my total stupidity in that hand.  I didn’t know you could make so many mistakes in one hand but I sure did it.  I can’t even explain why I didn’t raise preflop. 

 

On the bright side I learned a lot from it and I think in the end it will pay off greatly.  Some things you can read in books but it desen’t hit home until you actually experience it yourself.  Believe me  I made a number of errors in this hand and I’ll remember it in the future.

 

Okay…..at this point I’ve had a penalty and played the worst hand of my poker life losing about 3/4 of my chips.  I wasn’t in a happy place.  A few hands later I was again in the blind and hit 2 pair.  At the turn I was no reason I could be beat and went all in.   I just didn’t happen to notice a little think like the BOARD HAD PAIRED 4′S ON THE TURN.  Again……STUPID STUPID STUPID…..The same guy that took my money previously called and flipped over his hand.  Quad 4’s.  I was out.  My biggest regret is that I never did find out if that guy was a donkey or a player.  I guess I’ll never know.

 

Some days it would be better if you had just stayed home.  I was having one of those days.     LOL

 

I was out before the first break.  How humiliating.  It was terrible.  I went and told Gyla I was out and saw she had a nice stack going. I wished her luck and I went to play more 3 Card Poker.

 

Gyla played a couple of hours more.  I kept playing 3 card poker.  I wanted to go check on her but so many times I’ll do that and suddenly something will happen and she’ll go out.  I decided to sit and wait.  Gyla finally came to tell me she was out  5 from the money.  The same thing had happened to her that happened to me the day before.  She went card dead after the 2nd break.  She fianlly pushed with an AJs and got beat.

 

As she stood there telling me about busting out I hit 3 flushes in a row in 3 card poker.  Nice.  I decided it was time to up my bet but in conversation with her I put out my same bet.  $10 in the front and $5 in the back.  The cards were dealt and I picked mine up to find a beautiful KQJ of hearts.  Can you spell Str8 Flush. Woo Hoo.  40-1 on the front bet.  I won a total of $450 on the hand and cashed in for $775.  That covered all our buy ins.

 

We headed back to Texas.

 

It was a great weekend.  Mostly I learned that I need to play more live tournaments.  Hopefully we can go back sometime soon.  We both know we can win that tourney.  We also know that there is some good experience to be gained there because there is such a wide variety of players.  We are looking forward to going back.  Next time I’m leaving my IDK home.