After hitting those key hands early, I was only tangled up in one big pot before dinner.  I held 108 in the big blind and was able to rake a big pot when I turned a full house and another player rivered the top straight.  After that, I simply ran over the table.  Remembering that sometimes your cards don’t really matter helped my stack surge. At one point, I raised 12 consecutive hands, winning 10 of them (a few times I didn’t bother looking at my hand—not highly recommended).  I was a stealing machine, but every time someone reapplied pressure, I seemed to have a hand and often busted them. 

Joe’s advice proved prophetic when he said, “Play your tightest game after the dinner break.” I guess everyone else started sipping the crazy juice while I ate a cheeseburger, because we lost table after table after table when we returned.  After a year of covering poker tournaments, I suggest making this one of your 10 commandments as it proves true event after event. 

Unfortunately, when our table broke, I completely lost my ability to get a “feel” for where we were at in the tournament.  I kept drawing the next table on the list to break.  Every twenty minutes I had a new seat at a new table with new players.  It was impossible to get anything going; I even had AA twice during this period and lost both all-in preflop (once for 10.5k when I flopped a set and lost to a four-flush).

This constant shuffling threw me off and led to a critical mistake.  I ended up sluffing off a ton of chips with A7 on a 1074 board. I had no true read on my opponent, but I put him on a total whiff or a draw and called off ½ my stack to his all in (actually the dealer announced 17k when it was truly 33k and that didn’t help either).  As it turned out, he had 1010.  Whoops. Yet again, I forgot the advice "don't play a big pot without a big hand."  Middle pair does not count as a big hand.  Just two hands later I was able to get it all back when he called my all in on a draw and missed.

I avoided playing big pots for the rest of the night, and slowly chipped my way back up to ninth place out of the 53 remaining.  A few of those pots came from being ready to pull the trigger when I sensed weakness in an opponent.  One memorable pot came from calling down a double-barrell bluff from Antonio Esfiandiari (he held 5 high and I paired a 6).

Day 2 was a bit rough; I couldn’t seem to get anything really going for me again.  If I made any mistakes during this stage of the tournament, it was not recognizing the value of patience and position.  The deck was not being kind to me and my impatience led to overplaying a few hands from the wrong spot. 

Harry “Lucksack” Demetriou was at my table playing every pot like he had the nuts. He was throwing sick beat after sick beat on his opponents, twice going runner runner against them.  I was about to get a taste of it for myself. 

With 19 people left, Harry opened the pot for the umpteenth time when I looked down at the AA.  The blinds were 1.5k-3k and Harry raised to 9k.  I reraised to 25k and the rest is like that slow-motion death scene when the hero has dodged his last bullet…

Harry insta-shoved, I insta-called for around 100k…I saw the K door card and the K quickly followed it.  Just to stick it in me a little more, the lucksack actually made a four-flush with the A (I say lucksack in the nicest way possible).   

My impressive little run ended with the worst possible beat, giving Harry the chip-lead I should’ve had.  Anything can happen in this game.  That’s why I’m giving the first six-handed event this year a shot.  I’ll keep you updated on my progress starting at noon. 

And if I don’t make it past the first break, at least I can cheer on fellow PokerWire blogger Shaniac at the final table of the $1k rebuy event.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.  I was excited to play in my first WSOP event—the $2,500 price tag was the most I had ever spent on a tournament.  Fortunately I had been running and playing well in satellites.  After ponying up the tournament lammers at the registration window, I headed to my seat. 

I was doing my best not to over-think how I would play—I just needed follow Joe’s advice and let the game come to me. 

Players at my table were immediately active, with a raise to 75 or 100 on each of the first five hands, and at least three players to each flop.  I saw my first flop with 98 on the button, flopped a gutshot and folded to a bet and a raise.   

I immediately broke point #3 on my next hand: Play small pots early.  I was in the big blind with my least favorite hand, AJ.  There was a raise to 75 with two callers, so I tried to a big raise to 300 just wanting to pick it up there.  It’s my least favorite hand after all, so why not put in a big raise?  This was a terrible move.  So I built a huge pot totally out of position with a crap hand.  Bracelet winner James Gorham quickly called and the rest of the players folded.  This hand becomes significant as it was the first of three major confrontations with James. 

To make a long, embarrassing story short, I ended up losing 1.3k of my 2.5k stack  after making middle pair, a gutshot straight draw, and the nut flush draw.  It would have been very easy to go broke here, but James was not going anywhere as he flopped a baby straight with 98 on the QJ10 board.  I can’t stand calling stations…

I was feeling pretty miserable after this hand.  I was down to 1.1k in chips and we were not even out of the first level.  I had yet to win a pot—and instead of preying on the dead money I mixed it up with an experienced player.

Thankfully, after that hand, I was able to start picking up steaml.  I doubled up with 108 when I flopped two pair which gave me some breathing room again.

With the blinds at 25-50, I raised to 175 with pocket threes after one player limped.  I wanted to be heads-up as I felt he was the weakest player at the table and it would be easy to outplay him after the flop.  However, my brilliant plan was foiled after getting a caller on the button, both blinds, the original limper, his brother, and two of the railbirds behind me. 

This hand demonstrates the importance of #4: Don’t get cute with Aces.  Actually, James Gorham had QQ, but the principle is the same with a big pair.  The flop fell 532. As JDN would say, "SNAP!"  However, this board could be tough to fade with straight and flush possibilities. 

My options became pretty limited as the the opponent I hoped to isolate pushed all-in for 2.1k into the 875 pot!  I shoved in for 2.8k and James immediately pushed his 3.2k into the middle.  He tabled two black queens and the other player turned over pocket sixes.  No help came for either player, and my stack sat at 8.6k after being down to 1k less than an hour ago. Thanks to some good luck and both players misplaying their hands, I was in great shape (James should’ve stuck in a big raise pre-flop, or mucked to all of the post-flop action).

I didn't play another hand until just before the first break, and you guessed it, faced off against James yet again.  He had built back up to 3k, and I ended up stacking him off when we got it all in on the turn when I held a full house and James had a flush. 

This was like a dream come true to a fanboy like myself.  I had more than quadrupled my stack, and was actually chip leader in my first WSOP event.

During the break, I remembered the advice Joe had given me two nights before, “Let the game come to you, Oi! Oi! Oi!” Ok, so he might not have said that last part. But I knew that if I could follow that advice, the odds were in my favor to make the next break in good shape.

5. Take time to figure your table out
Don’t go in saying, “I’m going to raise with this,” or, “I’m going to play this hand this way.”  This is especially true in short-handed.  You must feel your way through it.  Get a feeling of what your table image is.  Have they played with you before?  Some tables I can sit down and raise every hand and they are expecting me to do it, and they still let me.  If I sit down and think these guys are gonna be after me, then I just sit back and chill, picking my spots.

6. Sometimes your cards don’t really matter.
Everything depends on your table.  I will make a decision on the spot about a situation.  I will decide I’m raising Jeremiah’s big blind this hand. My cards are irrelevant, so why even look at them?  I try to play each player individually.  If I known you are not coming after me unless you have a hand, I’m stealing from you all day long.

7. Always be ready to pull the trigger
There’s a certain stage in the tournament where playing just small pot poker becomes hard because there’s so much out there.  You are always ready to maneuver.  In a shorthanded event, you are always ready to pull the trigger.  If you are involved in a pot and you feel you have to go for it, go for it.

8. Push hard with AK
In short-handed events I will push a lot harder with AK than in full ring.  The chances are even that much smaller of someone having a bigger hand.  Again, in the 25-50 level there’s no reason to go broke with top pair; but as the tournament progresses, push hard with it.

9. Play your tightest game after the dinner break.
Play always tightens up when you are close to the bubble, of course.  Just before dinner time, play tightens up.  Just after dinner time, everyone blows themselves up.  They go and have dinner and they think about what they are going to do and they come back and just…blow themselves up.  The start of day two people just come in, they’ve thought about it all night, they haven’t slept, “I’m gonna do this, this, and that;” they come in and boom boom boom, you lose a big percentage of the field in the first level. I want to wait and wake up with a big hand so I can get some of the sugar.

That wraps up my conversation with Joe. In my next two posts, I'll let you know how I was able to apply (and completely ignore) Joe's advice through Event #21 at the 2006 WSOP. 

On Thursday, I'll let you know how Joe's advice is working for me a year later by updating during the breaks of the $1,500 Six-Handed tournament.

I was able to put the advice Joe gave me to good use as I made a nice run through my event.  I'll be posting his strategy mixed with how I applied it (and didn't apply it).  I'll follow that up by keeping you updated on how it all looks one year removed during Wednesday's $1,500 Shorthanded tournament.

Here's the first four points from Joe:

3. Play Small Pots Early

If I can just pick up a pot here or a pot there without risking my chip stack, that work’s the best for me. I’m not having huge confrontations early in a tournament. The 25-25 and 25-50 level you don’t want to be involved in big pots there without a big hand. Contrary to popular belief, a big hand is not top pair. To play a big pot in the first two levels, two pair is the minimum.

4. Don’t Get Cute With Aces

If you are at an active table with a raiser and a few callers, don’t get cute. If the blinds are 25-50, there’s 500 in pot if someone raises and two people call.  If you have AA in the small blind, you want to take it down right there. Make it 1500. You just picked up 20% of your chip stack. Other people might want to gamble and try to double up early. There’s no reason too. 

If it’s a very active table and I’m under the gun, as long as my image is not too tight at the table, I’ll just limp in with them and wait for the raise. But if you’re gonna limp in with aces, you have to be prepared to drop them after the flop...but people just get married to them. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve folded aces after the flop.