Best session in a while

Bellagio

I played a ton of poker this weekend.  On Friday night, I played 1/3 NL with my wife at the Wynn.  On Saturday, I played 1/2 at Red Rock and later, 2/5 NL at Bellagio.  On Sunday I ventured over to the Venetian.  When all was said and done, I won $400 this weekend.  My best session though was at the Bellagio.  I played for 5.5 hours and broke dead even, but I think I played about as good as I've played in a very long time.

Few hands from the Bellagio 2/5 on Saturday:

I call 20 preflop with 10-10.  The raiser was in early position.  Flop comes out 9-7-3.  He bets 20.  I raise to 55.  He calls.  Turn is a 3.  He checks, I check.  I figure he probably has one of two hands : an AK/AQ type of hand, or a JJ+ type of hand.  Since my hand has good showdown value I'm just going to try to check it down, and maybe use it as a bluff catcher on the end.  The river is another card below 9.  He now bets out 110.

I definitely thought about calling.  However, I felt like this person was a pretty tight player overall and I didn't feel like this was a bluff.  He was looking at me (not away) which is one of those Caro tells that someone is bluffing.  However, based on the fairly large bet size, the fact that I thought he might be a reasonably good player, and the fact that I hadn't seen him bluff other times, I figured I'd just let it go.  If he bet less I think I may have called.  Just the overall feel of the situation I got was that he didn't look nervous, and there were really no legitimate betting hands that I could beat.  In my mind this was one of those spots that would have been easy to call, but overall I think it was a good fold and I saved myself $110 there.

I had a couple huge hands where I got zero value, which was frustrating.  Maybe there wasn't anything I could do to get more out of them, but either way I think I could have played them differently.

First, I called a raise out of the blind with 4-4.  Flop comes K-7-4 and there are 3 people in.  I check to the raiser, he bets 30, I raise to 75, he folds Q-Q faceup.  This one I think I played fine.  If he didn't have a king, it was going to be hard to get much more out of him.  I could have lead out, but whatever. 

lol

Next, I raise with Q-J suited.  Flop comes K-T-9 with the T-9 of my suit.  SICK flop, just absolutely hammered this flop.  Now some guy leads out into me for $30.  This seems like a pretty good spot to raise.  I didn't actually hit anything on the flop so it's more likely that he has a king.  If he has a flush draw or a straight draw, I want to raise.  Basically there was no reason against raising here, but I just called.  In retrospect I could have put in a small raise, like to 75 maybe.  Or hell, maybe even a min-raise even though I'm not generally a fan of that.  So I just called, the turn was a blank, I bet 80, he folded.  I also could have bet much less on the turn, like $50 I think.

Next, I call a raise out of the blind with 5-5.  Flop comes 8-5-4.  I check, it checks around (3 ways).  The turn is an 8.  I guess I should have bet there, but I checked again.  I figured nobody hit anything on the flop, and I seriously doubted the 8 would help anyone, so I might as well check again (plus there is like zero chance of being drawn out on).  River is a 10 and it brings a flush.  I bet out 40, everyone folds. On this one, I could have pretty easily bet out on the flop small, or maybe the same on the turn.  Definitely a small feeler type of bet seems like it would have made the most sense.  Like whatever the preflop raise size was, putting that out on the turn could potentially have gotten a call from as weak of a hand as A-K.  I probably couldn't have gotten much out of that one but I should have tried.

Then I played some pretty big pots, and some fun ones.  :-)

I raise UTG to $20 with AJs, 2 callers.  I'm not really loving that raise honestly, but whatever.  Flop comes T-8-4 and I flop a flush draw.  First guy checks, I bet 35, call, and then I get check-raised 70 more.  I felt like I had reasonable odds to call especially since this guy probably had a big hand, so including the implied odds I felt it was worth a call.  60 preflop + 110 on the flop + 70, so I need to call 70 to win 240, so around 3.5 to 1 odds.  I need like 5 to 1 or so if I'm only going to see one card, but that's where the implied odds kick in.  So I call, I miss, he bets 150, I fold. 

Neverending nightclub line

Fun with floating : I raise preflop in late position with 7-5 offsuit.  Girl in the blind calls me.  Flop is J-6-3.  She bets out 15.  I call.  I figure I have the gutshot, and maybe I can take it away later.  Plus F you for betting out into my raise!  :-)  Turn comes a king, she bets out 25, now I raise to 75.  She folds.  I love representing strength when an overcard comes on later streets, thats something new I'm messing around with.  It's pretty nice because it's hard to have the turn hit you if the flop also hit you.  She could have flopped a set here, but at least if that happened I can easily give up.  And if she did have a somewhat big hand maybe I river my straight and get paid.

This one was fun.  Guy raises to 20, I call with 87s.  There are 4 people on the flop.  It comes A-K-6 with 1 spade.  Checks around.  The turn is an ace.  Checks to the raiser, he bets out 35.  I'm just like, this guy does NOT have an ace here.  I thought he would for sure bet it if he had it on the flop.  So I just call, planning on taking it away on the river.  River kinda messed up my plan, it was another ace.  :-)  So now I basically have to represent quads if I want to bluff.  AND, the guy bets out 65!  Still, I went with it and decided to rep quads.  I figured a min-raise would be great, totally looks SO strong.  So I make it 130 and he insta-folds.  Even though I have to represent quads there which is a little silly, it did fit completely with the story I was trying to tell, in my opinion. 

This next hand was the best I've played in forever.  At least, it felt amazing.

I limp in with A2s after another guy limps.  I was listening to some podcast that talked about limping with suited aces to encourage others to limp with dominated flush draws, so that's what I was thinking (whether it's actually smart or not).  Next guy makes it 30 to go.  2 people call, I call, and we see the flop 5 ways. 

Bellagio hallway

The flop is T-8-7 with 2 of my suit.  First guy checks, I check, preflop raiser fires out 70.  Guy behind me calls.  I was thinking about calling the 70 already but when the guy behind me calls I think I definitely have to call.  I'm getting 4 to 1 on the call (70 to 150 + 140), definitely good odds.  So I call.  Turn comes out an offsuit king, and there is now like 360 in the pot.  First guy checks, and I fire out 175!  :-)

I was thinking, the pot is fucking huge.  The guy behind me had something like 350 or 400 left.  If he shoved, I'd just call and hope to hit.  But I figured again, it's an overcard to the board so unless this guy flopped a set, he would be pretty scared by my big bet.  Even if he had A-A he would have to be a little afraid that I flopped a set or straight or something.  Well, I guess that doesn't make THAT much sense since my call did close action on the flop.  Maybe it would have made more sense if I put in a monster raise on the flop.  Either way though, they both folded and I took down a huge pot with nothing.  That felt unbelivably good.

It was fun playing at Bellagio.  There are a lot of things to hate about Bellagio.  The self park is really far.  The room is SUPER crowded.  The tables are too close together.  The floor is not particularly friendly.  But the room does have an amazing energy that you just don't get anywhere else.  It's SUPER busy.  At 1 AM, there were still 5 2/5 NL games and even 5 5/10 NL games, each with a 20 person waiting list.  That is completely unheard of in Vegas.  There are a ton of high limit games running, and I saw an all star lineup playing in Bobby's Room : Doyle Brunson, Johnny Chan, and Gus Hansen among others were in there.  I also saw James Woods out in the hallway talking to some people.  It's just THE place to be for poker in Vegas.  So for that reason I did really enjoy it.  I'll probably go back again next weekend.

I ended up losing $300 on Saturday, and winning a whopping 1 dollar at 2/5 NL.  Overall though I was really happy with how I played and it gave me good confidence in my game going forward at 2/5 NL.