Subject: Vegas TR: Dec. 14-20 From: Terrence Chan Newsgroups: rec.gambling.poker Date: Fri, Dec 21, 2001 8:05 PM Message-ID: <1j182u4uu3ni7ndruthv0jnltkinabo93v@4ax.com> Vegas Trip Report Lite: The Great Taste of Vegas Trip Report, But A Third the Calories! Hi, gang. I know it's not anything as juicy and scandalous as big-time tournament players accusing other big-time tournament players of cheating, but here anyway is my humble trip report for Dec. 14-20. I don't have the time or inclination to write about every event of my 7-day excursion to Disneyland for Big Kids, so I'll just share a few fun observations and experiences. It's still plenty long anyway, but digestable enough so you can read what you feel like. No bad-beat stories, at least. *** We'll start a comment on hotels. The five of us -- three poker players and two non-gamblers/Vegas virgins -- stayed at the Mirage for the first three nights for the very attractive average rate of $70/night from Thursday-Sunday. Three of our team departed Sunday, leaving RGP lurker Thomas and I to stay at the Holiday Inn Boardwalk for the bargain basement $23/night. The Mirage room is about 60 square feet bigger. It has a nicer TV. The bathroom is a bit bigger, and the temperature controls on the shower are a bit better. This is what your $47/night extra buys you, and remember this is the cheapest week fo the year in Las Vegas and it's doubtful the Mirage will be this cheap for a while. Why do people insist on nice hotels, unless you're impressing a wife or girlfriend? (Yes, I know, it's the third law of demand.) *** On December 10, mr_jmac@hotmail.com (Joe) wrote: "I quickly learned that poker players are not playing to gamble in LV... most are decent poker players who have played a lot of hours...In Las Vegas, my experiences indicated that every table had approx. 4-7 solid players." My opinion is that Joe should work harder on his game selection. With the exception of one 15-30 game on Wednesday night and one 8-16 game on Thursday afternoon and the tail-end of a 20-40 game on Monday pre-sunrise, all the games I played were _live, live, live_. Great games. *** Case in point (or, Terrence sucks out like a bandit). It is 5 limpers to me on the button with A6s. I limp (trust me...). SB completes. Maniacal BB raises. UTG calls. 2UTG limp-reraises, making it three bets. All call to me. I make it four. SB dumps. BB caps it five. Six players, 31 bets. Flop of Q93 with one suit gives me no pair, one bad overcard and backdoor nut flush. BB checks (?), UTG checks. 2UTG leads. Two dump (?), one call, I call, BB and UTG call. Phew! Turn card gives me the fourth card of my suit and we're off to the races. BB bets, UTG raises, 2UTG makes it three, limper dumps, I call three cold, called around. Dealer burns. Remind me again what the difference is between a church and a casino is? Something about prayer? I manage to concentrate enough to look for a visual cue; by the time I look down at the flop, two players have checked and a quick glance shows me I have completed my 24:1 draw and am the owner of a big dangling pair of mortal nuts. It's checked to me (darn, no underflush), get two calls, and receive my pot; a typical one for that hour. The pots are just insane for that hour, still fairly big two hours after that until one of the calling station contributors leaves and the maniacs turn into mere loose-aggressives (i.e. they've upgraded their standards from 62s to 64s and K5 to K8). I make aces hold up for a $400 pot and book a decent win for the session, erasing my -$652 result from another very good game two nights prior almost twice over. Between two loose-aggressive players and one clueless calling station, these three players lost an estimated $6500 total in my time at the table. This is my best estimate; I am not exaggerating in the slightest although my accuracy may not be perfect. At one point I did a quick count and there was $14000 on the table. Yes, this was still 15-30. Darn those tight, tough Vegas mid-limit games. *** One great thing about Vegas are the attractive ladies in the poker rooms, and I don't mean cocktail waitresses and rich Europeans' girlfriends, both of which I've been immune to for a while. There seem to be at least a few good-looking babes in their 20s and early 30s at low and mid limits alike. Presumably some in the top section too, but I didn't really look. (I did Annie Duke cashing out though, and she is a very pretty woman in person.) *** I can't play O/8 worth a lick, at least in a casino. (And if you ever see me playing it, please remind me of this post.) I'm up a little on Paradise 10-20 and 5-10 O/8, and the games at the Mirage seemed to be much better than Paradise (don't see Q662 much on-line), but I think it's actually my own discipline with starting hands that is probably the killer. I'm supposed to be on vacation here, after all. At 20 hands an hour or whatever, KT32ss looks a lot better than it really ought to. *** Rumours abound of Howard Lederer (I think?) losing $5 million to some billionaire banker from Texas, but apparently Ted Forrest got it back for the pro team the next day. I wouldn't recognize most poker celebrities (this oxymoron of the week brought to you by the good people at Christian Science) if they punched me in the face, so I pretty much have to rely on second-hand information. I was there when the banker took an 83o against Forrest, took a lot of heat all the way but got there for a big (at least for heads-up hold'em) pot. Poker celebs I *did* spot: Daniel Negreanu (at least Thomas and I think it was him; if not there is quite a resemblance between him and this guy) playing graveyard 30-60 hold'em; Mason Malmuth playing 20-40 on the swing shift at the Mirage -- I got my seat in that game about 90 minutes after he'd left it. Thomas wanted to say "hi" and shake Daniel's hand, but spotted him picking his nose and decided against it. *** Sat beside, then in, Sgt. Rock's famed Seat 3 at Table 4. Ran fairly well in it. Flopped lots of draws and made lots of semi-steals, and got paid off at the right times. (It was a 6-handed game on the graveyard shift.) *** A thought just occurred to me: It may be that the reason many out-of-towners think the mid- and low-limit games in Vegas suck is that they played in the daytime. I didn't. In fact, I remember from my August trip that the best games are almost always swing to graveyard. I adjusted my sleep schedule accordingly before I left Vancouver, and in Vegas I was routinely waking up at 5pm and going to bed at 9am. If you're a tourist looking for better games (albeit worse game selection due to fewer numbers), try it and you may be impressed with the results. Avoid marathon sessions on no sleep, of course. I kept all but one session under 12 hours. *** Mmmmm, strawberry Julius... *** Terrence plays the fool: On about the fifth hand of the Tuesday $60 NLHE tournament at the Mirage, I went brain-dead and raised a T$75 bet on the flop to T$130. An illegal raise, of course. I had shit (QJ on AT5 flop) and didn't want to look weak, so I improvised by acting like I'd barely played poker before. "How much do I need to put in to raise?" "You need to put in 150." "Okay." He debated for a while, and laid it down. Most likely some pair KK-JJ, I'd imagine. With a pair and a kicker, I'd expect him to peel one to try to bust the clueless newbie. At least, that's what I'd do. I continued this charade for another hour. I played very tight, and when I called, I picked up all the required chips at once and gently placed them halfway into the middle of the table. I folded similarly. On one hand I limped in for T$50 with JTs, Oklahoma Johnny Hale went all-in for T$165 more, the first limper called also all-in, I called (with my T$980 stack), flopped a ten and took it down. A3o for OKJH; the other guy didn't show. *** The tourney started off with an interesting hand for Hale as well. It was folded to him on the button, and he went all-in. Yup, on the first hand. Called by the big blind. KT for OK, A3 for the big blind and the er, best hand won. Johnny re-buys, but not before making a book sale to his neighbour in the #10 seat, who also ends up buying Susie Issacs' book (she was in the #1 seat). With 50-100 blinds, UTG made it T$300, and I went all-in with TT for T$800. It got folded around to the SB who pushed all-in for $T1500, which I figured was certain death for me. UTG thought for a good minute and folded. "Umm...I have one pair...of tens," I said nervously (but only acting somewhat). "Two overs," was the response I was hoping to hear. We saw a flop of 8-4-3, a deuce on the turn, and a 5 on the river. I show the tens, SB disgustedly slams AKs face-up and curses. When the cards landed, about five people said "straight", and the "clueless newbie" gets knocked out by an experienced player who misread the board. Thomas is still in the tournament with T$1600. I decide that while I'm acting, I head over to the blackjack pit. I look clueless enough to get ID'd (for age) by the pit critter and spread lightly (1-4 in green chips). Sitting at +4 with a $50 bet out, I get a re-split and double down with 8,8 vs. 3 to watch the dealer pull two paint cards and bust. That puts me up $225 just as Thomas finds me to tell me that he got sent to the rail taking two cowboys against Presto and Big Slick (people have to play any hand that has a name, right?) in a great opportunity to make a huge triple-up and coast to the final table. The Mirage poker doesn't look nearly as enticing as the Bellagio's had been (and there were only two 10-20s and one 20-40 anyway) so we took a brisk walk south. *** I should probably get my RGP trip report shout-outs out of the way before I forget. Met prolific RGP poster Jeff Biship, an all-around nice guy. (And one I hope remembers what I told him about double-checking hole cards - you reading this, Jeff?) Met RGP lurker Derek in a 6-12 HE game just before the tournament. Thomas and I were discussing the entry field, when Derek turned to me and said, "you should have no problem with it. You're Terrence Chan!" right out of nowhere. Derek is a good guy and was kind enough to share a lot of Vegas poker insights with me. I'd plug his adult movie distribution website here had he given me the URL. Asked Bellagio graveyard shift manager Bruce for a buffet comp, and he was generous enough to hook me up. "The Terrence Chan of RPG [sic] fame?" "No, no, I'm a completely different one." Thanks again, Bruce; you run a great room. Don't know if she reads RGP, but I played a few hands (well, 16 hours) with 1998 WSOP women's champ (and Canadian!) Mandy Commanda, as sweet a person as I have ever encountered in a poker room. An incredibly nice lady, but if you chart just her playing actions and ignore her girl-next-door looks and demeanour, all you will notice is superb play. Also met a bunch of nice locals and tourists whose names I never learned or can't remember or won't mention, so if you're reading and some of this stuff seems familiar, hi. *** Terrence gets it in with way the worst of it, but to a machine this time. Faced with a three-hour wait in the airport coming home, I decide to kill time on a 9/6 Jacks machine. 9/6 alright, but they paid even money for two pair. I didn't even notice this until I was down to my last ten 25c credits. Count that one as a -$20 in the record book and a reasonably inexpensive lesson in checking the whole payout chart, not just full house/flush. *** Sunday morning at the Mirage, upon returning from the Bellagio, there is one 3-6 HE, one 10-20 HE, and one 5-10 stud. Three tables. Ouch. *** On the bonus side for the Mirage, I love that you can get fresh-squeezed orange juice at the table. It's $3.75 at the Bellagio, even for players. *** Did I mention how good the games were? On Monday night, stuck about $800, I ran into Thomas in the bathroom. Now, Thomas was not running well to this point and was not terribly high on confidence, although I knew (and I knew he knew) that he could beat these games. But he had taken some losses and was playing 4-8 only. I gave him $300, got him to take his chips off the table and head into my 15-30 game and he could keep half of what he made. He played fine, won two big pots and lost two big pots and made each of us a slight profit. The bastard even 3-bet me with eights out of the blind to build a big 7-way pot. (Luckily, I flopped nothing and folded or I would have ended up on the wrong end of his 8s full.) *** In my very unscientific study, 4 of 9 people knew Vancouver is in Canada. Two of them were Canadian, though, and one was a Michigan native. One of the five thought I would lose sleep due to the time change back home. Eventually I ended up telling most people I lived "north of Seattle." In fairness, I didn't quite know where Burlington and North Bay, Ontario were until I met two players from there. *** To chop or not to chop? (This may be a separate post in the future.) Is it -ev to not chop in a 15-30 with a dollar at 40/70/100? I think it is, but probably only slightly. About 1 in 8 or so players I encountered were anti-chop. But they always seemed to sit on my right, which is fine. I think it is unlikely anyone at this limit is a good enough heads-up player over the competition that they can beat anyone at a $3 rake in a 15-30 game. I guess you could chop selectively (i.e. against tough opponents but not weak ones), but that is bad form. I chopped when possible, except when the game got short and they gave us a rake cut. *** Does anyone know how much a cocktail waitress at a place like Bellagio actually makes, gross? *** Free advice: The Bellagio telephone calling card may seem like a decent deal at $12 for 20 minutes, but the connection fee is ridiculous. I made four short phone calls to Vancouver before the damn thing expired. *** Total result: +US$1804, 80.25 hours. Decent, but unspectacular and a little sub-expectation. However, the ~$2900 Canadian it converts to gets you a lot more back home than 18 Ben Franklins buys in the United States due to purchasing power parity. I could say that if I didn't play those two tournaments, I'd have finished up $2184, but I could also say that I would have won a lot more if I only put money in the pot with the flush draws that got there and folded when I would have missed them. But after three attempts (at tournaments, not flush draws), I really don't think much of my tournament game. Unless it's on Pokerstars :) *** That's it for now. Merry (secular alert-->) Xmas to all. Thanks for reading. -- Terrence Chan http://www.sfu.ca/~tchand/