Aces & Queens

I played a few turbo SnG’s yesterday and was up and down, but in the end down a little bit. Then I more than made up for it with a single hand of limit. More on that in a moment… But first, the SnGs:

In the course of an hour of play, I had a run of aces that was pretty astonishing. In three turbos over lunchtime, I picked up rockets five separate times. With three of those hands, I made a bunch of money. With the other two, I gave it all back. Aces really can be tough to play, especially up against more than a single opp. The guru says that he’d rather be dealt AK than AA, mainly because he knows he can get off Anna easily, but AA is so damn hard to lay down. Anyway, with all those aces showing up, I figured the law of averages meant it would be weeks before I saw another pair of wired rockets. Oh, how I was wrong...

Late in the afternoon, I made the fateful decision to try a quick hit-and-run session of a limit cash game before heading home. I know, I know. Didn’t I just post recently that this is a REALLY bad idea? Yada, yada… I had twenty minutes at the end of the day and figured I could play a little. I knew the risks, and I was willing to take them. Before I entered a game, I actually said aloud to myself that I was going to play only really strong hands. Tight is right, I said. Get off those losing hands. Be willing to take a small loss overall and DO NOT CHASE! I was mentally prepared to play good, solid, fundamental poker.

I got onto FT and found a 6max $1/2 game that looked juicy and posted a late blind in the cutoff seat. The very first hand I was dealt--you guessed it--pocket rockets. Got a raise in front of me, I reraised with my AA, it folded to the original raiser who capped and I called. Flop was a bunch of small cards. More raising and reraising. Long story short, the river brought a bit of a scare card in that a straight was possible, but I was starting to feel some hesitation on the part of the opp so I bet right into it and he just called. The rockets held up and I was up significantly for the day.

And yes, I promptly quit. Call me a wimp, but leaving the game after one amazing hand was the right decision for me. I packed up and went home feeling very good about things.

That night I played a few more $1 and $2 SnGs (and lost), but that was okay, as I found Bret playing a 180-person $2 entry and had fun just sweating him for a while. Then, before you could say Tornados-In-Georgia, he had made the money. I missed the final table action, but this morning found an email that said he had busted out in ninth when he called an all-in with QQ, only to find himself up against--yes--AA.

I’ve busted out of more tourneys with QQ than probably any other hand. The pros all seem to be able to lay that shiny bright hand down to all-ins in situations like that. Why can’t I? (Or Bret, for that matter?) We talked a bit about it this a.m. I’m convinced that playing QQ in a single table is a completely different beast than in a multi. It all has to do with payout structures. In a 1-table, the 50/30/20 payout split makes it imperative to simply make the money, but then once you’re in the dough, you can and should play QQ as hard as just about anything else. In a multi, however, with the exponential payout structure, you have to play those QQ-22 hands much more judiciously once you’re in the money. It really pays off, literally and figuratively, to move up higher in the rankings before busting out...

Okay, enough of that...
24-Hour Bankroll Change: +0.7%

All-in for now…
-Bug