Tao of Poker

Final Table and Hammering Out Cancer


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I'm back in Las Vegas and my JetBlue flight from Long Beach, CA was early so I was able to play in the Hammer Out Cancer WPBT-POY charity tournament on Full Tilt where $15 per entry was being donated to the American Cancer Society. I ended up coming in 2nd place out of 61.

I didn't play perfect poker, instead I got lucky and the right things happened for me. I got cards when I was shortstacked. My good hands held up against weaker ones. I won a timely coinflip against the chipleader. My pocket Aces and Kings held up everytime. I folded J-J twice to huge re-raises preflop; once to SoxLover's Hiltons and the other time to SirWaffle's K-K. And I had one big suckout when I was dominated.

My starting table included IPlayLikePhil, SoxLover, Change100, LA Loan Shark, WooWoo3, Drizz, Gracie, and Rod. In the first hour, I flopped a set with A-A against BG. By the end of the first break I was 10th in chips with 37 players remaining.

By the second break, I was in 8th place out of 14. I doubled up after I sucked out on SoxLover. My K-Q bested his A-Q when I hit a three-outer. Derek made a huge run over at his table. At one point he was in 36th place with 36 players left and had a paltry 105 chips in his shortest of stacks. He went on a tear and ended up 6th in chips by the second break.

I made the final table and I'm proud to say that I also made the final table with my brother. That's never happened before in any MTT that we've played in. The Rooster predicted that it was going to happen.

***** Final Table Live Blogging Updates *****

11:31pm... Derek bounced out in 9th place when his Hammer lost in a 3 way pot. He outflopped A-K and K-Qs but his hand could not hold up.

11:40pm... I won a race with A-K against BG's 7-7. I raised preflop, he reraised and I moved all in. I turned a King and doubled up. I'm currently the chipleader with 29K and 6 players remaining.

11:50pm... Down to 4 players. I'm 2nd in chips.

11:52pm... With A-A holding up, I busted bsabala1's A-5. He took 3rd place.

11:53pm... I found myself heads up with FrankL and behind 62K to 26K in chips. Frankl had a 2.5 to 1 margin on me. I won the first hand but lost the second hand and got sent to the rail. Yeah, our battle lasted only two hands. I busted in second place (out of 61 players) when I moved all in on a flush draw. Frankl had top pair and won it all. Congrats!!

1:55am... According to the WPBT-POY rankings, I jumped up to 8th place. I was languishing in like 55th place or something awful like that. Derek is currently 12th on the leaderboard. StB is still the points leader... by a lot. I had gotten A-A and K-K brutally cracked in previous WPBT-POY events so it felt good to make the final table, make the money, and finish in second place which improved my POY ranking. The Top 5 bloggers on the leaderboard include: StB, lucko21, Gracie, Bad Blood, and DoubleDave.

Thanks again to Easycure for setting this event up and to Byron for keeping the POY points. And thanks to everyone who participated. I think that Easycure raised at least $1000. It was really cool getting to play at the same table as my friend Shirley a.k.a. Poker Babe, who if you didn't know, was diagnosed with breast cancer a few months ago.