From: "Bob Jones" Date: Tue, 9 Aug 2005 17:37:44 -0600 Subject: [BARGE] Virgin Trip Report I finally made it to the Plaza around ten o'clock Thursday night and got to the poker room a few minutes later. Next year I definitely need to plan to come out sooner. I quickly got into a $2-4 hold 'em game and signed up for $4-8 HOE. The first person I tracked down was Scottro, since I had a virgin t-shirt for him I went over and introduced myself. I also got to meet Russ Fox and Sean McGuiness. They were all in the NL game. Once I got called to the HOE game, I made my first fish mistake and actually sat in the HORSE game by accident. It took me until the Razz round to figure it out, since HO is the same no matter how you spell it. I'd never played Razz. I had only a vague idea how it worked from watching it on ESPN last year when Dutch Boyd took 2nd to TJ Cloutier. Yes, I was what sharks dream of, the player who's never played the game and only seen it on ESPN. Luckily the craps crawl was starting, so I escaped without giving away too many chips. The first person I met at the crawl was North Shore Mike. Then I met fellow Coloradan ADB OZ, then ADB Foldem, and some other ADBers. All welcomed me to BARGE. What a great group! Craps table was not so nice. Binions was brutal for everyone but the darksiders, so we moved on. I finally made some money back at el Cortez. What a beautiful place! I vaguely remember that at some point I got a "phone call" from Patti's tequila filled cellphone. By the end of the night, we had to find a Golden Arm at Main Street Station or I was going to be starting the trip with a big hole in my bankroll. Lady Luck was our lover and a pretty young woman had a great roll that brought me a long ways towards even. What a blast. Virgins David Low, Bryan (I've forgotten your last name), their non-virgin friend Tim (who's last name I've also forgotten, Showalter maybe?), and myself bid adieu to the last of the ADBers (foldem, IIRC) and headed over to the Golden Nugget to end the night with some 4 am breakfast. Yes, that's right we virgins outlasted the ADBers ! Pussies. :-) Friday morning it was time to play the TOC. It should be called the Sleep Deprived Tournament of Champions. I played poorly. I suck. But, I'd never played stud aside from home games and had played Omaha exactly twice, the second time being Thursday night in the HORSE game, so I didn't feel too bad. I did outlast Gavin Smith who came through and called everyone at the remote tables "cheaters, cheaters, cheaters, cheaters" after he busted out, so that was a highlight. At least my chips went to good use as they helped take Sabyl to the final table (this was a theme of my tournament play). After getting some lunch I jumped into the $1/2 NL game. This was the first time I'd ever played a real NL cash game, so I was a bit nervous, but I slowly built up a decent stack until it was time for Calcutta. Over at the Calcutta, Sean invited me to join the ADV syndicate, so I gave ADV slouie some money and hoped for the best. Poor bastard Steve Landrum was stuck with me as his Calcutta pairing, so of the $100 Ploink paid for us $99 was for him. It was fun, even though I had no clue who was worth anything. I hung out with Zbigniew some who had some comments about which pairings were good deals. Back at the Plaza I jumped back into the $1/2 NL game with most of the same people who were playing when I left. The game was pretty quiet, I was trying to play tight, not drink, play tight, pay attention, play tight, focus, etc. Then Don Perry showed up. First thing he did was pull a horseshoe out his pocket and said he'd crapped it out that morning. Old joke, I'm sure, but it got me laughing. I think I was laughing almost the whole time Don was at the table. Then he got me drinking vodka gimlets. Not good for the EV, but we were just joking and drinking and having a grand old time. Then came the hand. I mentioned that this was the first real NL cash game I'd played in, right? By this point I had built my stack up about and had about $250 in front of me when I got KJs in late position, raised it, got two callers. The flop was KTx. A check, a bet of about $10, and I raised to $40, initial checker pushed all in for more than my $200, initial better folded. Holy crap! I don't think we'd seen a pot higher than $80-100. This was the biggest bet I'd faced in my life. I got a little light headed and my heart was racing as I went through the action in my head, calculating odds, recalling previous hands played by the one seat, figuring out the Matrix and looking into his soul. Okay, that's bullshit. I just called and prayed. Bastard flipped over a KT for two pair. SHIT! Turn was a rag. Come on dealer! River JACK! YES! And yes, that was me who yelled loud enough to bring Russ over from another game. I' m as cool has Howard Lederer. Riiiight. My heart was racing a mile a minute from the adrenaline as I raked in the biggest pot of my limited poker life. The poor guy I sucked out on took it a lot better than I would have. Hey Russ & Scottro, which chapter covers going all in with the worst hand and sucking out with a three outer on the river? After sucking out a couple of times for gutshot straights, Don decided to save his luck for the tourney in the morning and headed off to bed. He was replaced with virgin Jonathan "Must Straddle, Must Drink" Lieberman. By now my adrenaline had simmered down, but the good times continued. We had a blast. BARGERs John Lloyd and Sarah (sorry, I never caught your last name) joined the game and I think we all had a good time, especially making fun of the turnstile in seat 3. Three young guys who claimed it was their first time in Vegas, were taking turns playing until someone complained. The main player had watched waaay too much tv and would take about 30 seconds to fold, playing with his chips, checking his cards, and finally folding. Eventually, after spewing back a lot of the chips I won in my suckout, I had to call it a night about 2 am (I know, I'm a pussy). I think I ran into David, Bryan, and Tim who were off to get some more steak and eggs at the Nugget, or maybe that was Saturday night. You guys are machines! Steak&egger every morning! Saturday I was determined to play g00t in the main event. Oh crap, sitting next to me was Don "Gutshot" Perry. There goes whatever limited focus I might have had. Please don't order me a vodka gimlet! Fellow virgin Claudia was also at my table as were Ploink, who had bought me in Calcutta, and Marc G. I apologize to the others, I didn't catch your names. After half an hour I hadn't spotted the sucker so I knew I was in trouble. Don claimed he was going to play seriously because he was surrounded by a Powerful Winning Force. I guess so, since he got aces three times in the first hour and a half, the third time knocking me out holding big slick. I was pretty bummed because I felt like I played poorly again. On the final hand, I think I was UTG with $50/100 blinds and raised to $225, Don re-raised me, and I pushed my last $1000. He called. Oops. The flop gave me some hope with JQx, but no help on turn or river and IGHN. Feeling like a total fish, I needed a break from BARGErs and their damn quality play. I'd wanted to check out the Wynn, so I headed down to the strip and got in a $1/3 NL game. The Wynn itself was kind of disappointing. It's nice enough, but basically it was the Bellagio with brown paint instead of gold. It was okay, but I expected more. The poker room is really nice, though. So were the fish. Yes, it was good to be in a game where I felt like I was better than most of the players. I built up a nice stack and felt like I was playing really well, pushing people around, getting away from some trouble hands, and actually making some key reads like when I got put all in with AK and an Axx board. I just felt like the guy had AK and that we'd chop. I was right. I also made my most profitable play of the weekend winning when someone bluffed with JT on a QT44 board against my KK. He didn't hit his two outer. It felt really good to leave up $500 after my pitiful performance in the tourney. There were some complete fish in this game. One guy didn't realize it wasn't limit until he'd been there about half an hour and the dealer told him he could bet as much as he wanted for the third time. Game selection is everything. I made it back in time for the banquet and sat with Randy, Sean, Scottro, Mickdog, Russ, and Mr. & Mrs. Howler McBride. Howler, I do want to play in your home game, game selection be damned. On my way in, Steve Evans caught up with me and gave me the nicest gift. He had a commemorative chip of "Smarty Jones" from the Palms that he had mentioned when I met him at Calcutta. Thank you again, that was really a cool thing for you to do. I don't know about the "Smarty" part, but I'm definitely a donkey! The steak was delicious and the shrimp divine. Okay maybe not, but at least the company was great. I really, really enjoyed Wil's speech. As a fairly recent convert to poker with my first casino card room visit about a year and a half ago, I could definitely relate to what he experienced. After dinner and the announcement that some of the games would be over at Binions, I went over there and got into a great game of CHOWAHA. Before starting, I found myself standing next to Greg Raymer. I shook his hand and was struck speechless so I just mumbled something about congratulations on his world series. He's a patient man to graciously suffer dorks like me. While waiting, I also got another really cool gift, a 2004 BCC Bounty chip from Scottro. Thanks, Scottro! Once we got the game started, it was a total blast. Jonathan "Must Straddle, Must Restraddle, Must Re-restraddle, Must Cap!" Lieberman was once again at my table and kept the action going. I actually eeked out a profit even after toking like crazy. What a great tradition. The game broke and I moved over to Patti & Asya's table, but that one broke soon after, so I headed back to the Plaza with Mickdog. Sunday morning I ran into Sean and Mickdog in the buffet, so we grabbed some breakfast together and were joined by Bingo. It was cool to just hang out and talk to you guys. I felt like I've known you for much longer than a weekend. Mickdog definitely deserves my thanks as he was one of the people who pushed me to come when I first brought it up on my livejournal. After breakfast I had to head to the airport with a quick stop at the Gamblers General Store where I got a setup of KEM cards and then it was back to Denver. What a fantastic weekend. It was great meeting all of you! Peter, I can't thank you enough for all your hard work and for really making me feel welcome. Every time you saw me, you took a minute to ask me how things were going and make sure I was having a great time. My only regrets are that my stay was too short and there were a lot of people that I barely got to speak to as well as a lot more who I never got to meet. I'm sure I've left out a lot from the weekend, I'm terrible with names and didn't take notes, so if I left people out or got things screwed up, my apologies. I can't wait 'til next year, next year I play g00t! Bob ________ BARGE 2005 is being supported by PokerStars.com and ParadisePoker.com.