Downed by the river

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 29/08/2010 (5544 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

CALGARY — The 2010 Canadian Open Poker Championships is almost over — the final event is on as we speak. Personally, I haven’t had much success, but that’s not to say that Winnipeg hasn’t been well represented.

In the main event, the 5k heads up tourney I lost in the first round as I got run over by my opponent. The way the cards fell in his favour, I didn’t stand a chance. In the first match my 55 was no good against his AJ when he hit a J on the river to take a 1-0 lead in the match. The second match went much the same as the first — he made hands and I bricked repeatedly. The final hand was when we got it all-in pre-flop. I had A7, he had 66, and after an ace came on the flop I thought I was in good shape. But somehow the dealer managed to find a 6 on the river to eliminate me from the tournament.

I did, however, have a good sweat as my buddy Travis Brown went deep. Travis and I always swap 25 per cent whenever we enter the same tournament. He played great and without losing a match he was quickly into the semifinals. With a first-place prize of $100,000 this was starting to get exciting. Travis drew 2010 WSOP final table qualifier Matt Jarvis in the semis and he quickly took a 1-0 lead over his opponent. The second match didn’t go smoothly and Travis ended up having to play a third-match tiebreaker.

Travis’s fate, unfortunately, didn’t end up in his own hands. In a hand that would have decided everything, the dealer accidentally flipped up one of Travis’s cards, a king of spades. The flop came down Q108 and it went check-check. The turn was a K. Matt bet out and Travis called. The river was another K. Had the dealer not misdealt Travis’s hand, he would have had a full house with K10, while Matt held the case K and would have ended up losing a huge pot. That was not the case and a few hands later Travis was eliminated, taking third place. He did receive a hefty $30,000 for his effort. Well done, buddy!

Another Winnipeg boy and one of my close friends also had a good showing here in Calgary. Clayton Mozdzen chopped the 1k buy-in event, winning $20,000 for his good run at the tables. I am never surprised when Clayton goes deep, as he is probably the best tournament player in Winnipeg.

On Friday we all played the $2,200 buy-in event and I was up and down like a yo-yo.

The player to my immediate right was very weak and I did everything I could to exploit his weakness. I three bet him several times pre-flop and without any cards to play with I had an average stack with about 70 players left. I knew he was getting extremely frustrated with me and when it was folded to him on the button he raised my small blind and I three bet him. The big blind folded and we saw a flop — oh, did I mention I had 97 off-suit? Well I wasn’t playing my hand, I was playing my opponent, and when the flop came down 1092 I bet out about half the pot, leaving myself with about 14k left in chips. He looked very uncomfortable with this flop, which led me to believe I had the best hand, but he was taking his time. The more time he took the more confident I became that my hand was good, so I needed to figure out how I was going to get him to make a move on me.

He looked at me and said, "I told you the next time you three-bet me I was going to go all-in on you." Now I knew he had nothing, so I told him "I have by far the best hand." He didn’t take two seconds to announce that he was all-in. I snap called him with second pair and was delighted to see his A8. The dealer however, had other plans for me. She wasted no time finding an ace on the turn and an 8 on the river to knock me out.

We have no control over the cards to come, so our only focus should be on getting our money in with the best hand. If we do that we will be successful in the long run. It just didn’t pan out for me this time.