Later during all the table changing, when your image is gone is kinda tricky. On the one hand no one knows that you have been tight, so you have less fold equity in terms of image. I find that at this point you really need to let the chips do the talking. When I raise or bet post flop I make very definitive raises (unless I want callers) in order to steal the pot. You need to decide what you are going to do, then really go for it. There is way more risks involved in this stage, and you have to be comfortable playing for all your chips if you are going for the win. You cannot afford to dither in big pots, not much calling on draws certainly unless someone is betting stupidly and pricing you in.

In the later stages, especially after you are in the money, whenever you are deciding wether or not to open raise in late position, you have to look at the size of the raise in relation to the blinds and antes, your chip stack and most importantly the chip stack of the opps left to play. With a hand like an ace with a medium kicker, if you think that you will lay it down if the stack sizes of the opps left behind you are big enough should they go all-in, then you should not make the raise in the first place. Only raise with hands you are comfortable enough calling their all-ins with. This applies mainly to the stage where the blinds and antes are getting large enough that enough if the opps have a pretty big stack – like 6 – 12K, that still means they only have an M of 3-6 or so. That means they are getting desperate and will need to shove with a really wide range. Your range of hands to put them in with should also be fairly wide. You already know that given the strength of your hand and the pot odds you should have called with the A7… My main point is that you always need to think ahead to the possible scenarios after you bet, before you bet.

Unless it is the very beggining stages of a T with small starting stacks (like the 1500’s) then you should be calling limped pots in the SB with just about A2C when the implied odds are that great… like 4-5 limpers. Of course another option is to stick in a nice big fat raise there and steal all those limps. I do that with really junk cards, but 67 can flop nice so calling there is fine.

At the end of the tournament when your table resembles the Wild West with everyone shooting from every angle, you are just going to have saddle up and start firing yourself. You have got to find spots to make steals and /or re-steals yourself. You have to do it while your chip stack is still a weapon, the bigger the weapon the better. If there is a raise in middle position and you pick up J9 suited in the cut-off, go all-in if your stack is bigger than or down to 1/2 the size of the first raisers stack. Don’t do it if his stack is so small that you have no fold equity, or so big he can call you with impunity. The hands I would do that with – KJ KQ J10, 10 9, J9 even 67 or suited gappers if I think the guy will lay it down. If he does call you usually won’t be that big of an underdog anyway. If you do not take these kinds of risks at that point, then you will most likely be blinded down, you finally get a nice hand, and get busted out anyway.
My new motto is “Go out swinging”

It sounds like you are really improving and doing a lot of things right. That is great!! I would also suggest to play the $24 SNG with 45 players. They pay 6 and 1st place is $440. I have been doing really well in those. There are a lot of fish in them, and some good players also, but not the big time good players as the pay out isn’t worth their time. So it is a perfect balance. They usually take about 3 – 4 hours to win one, so the time frame won’t keep you up all night.

Glad you girls had a great time in spit of it all.

You are TOO funny Janice. I can’t wait to see you again in March. If I win some money in the Dominican Republic WPT battle for the season pass maybe I will come to Houston and we can go to one of those casinos. My best friend LOVES to go to Coushatta. She only pays slots but it would be a ball.

I think you played great (not including the KK) but at least you learned from it. I was playing online last night and raised 3Xbb from EP and got 2 callers. The flop was 442 with two hearts. I made a pot sized raise and got a reraise all in from a short stack, the player to my right just called, when it gets to me I shove. Idiot to my right thinks a while and calls with AK (ace fckn high!!!!) Of course he hits ace on the river and I’m out! That made me realize why Mike Matasou threw his laptop in the pool
Just shows that you can play KK right and still loose!

Would LOVE to get to Biloxi…we absolutely love it there (the whole area) and have not been for a few years…is their big tourney stuff in January?? You guys thinking of going?? food for thought…more live tourneys!