MATTMATROS.COM

• 23Jun

  Sixtieth Time’s the Charm

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  My first World Series of Poker event was the main event in 2004, which I played immediately after stepping off the plane having come directly from my graduate school commencement ceremonies. I didn’t cash in that tournament, but I cashed at least once in every WSOP from 2005 to 2009, with 14 cashes overall in that time period over 56 events. I made two final tables, but no really big scores. Still, I maintained a 97% ROI for those 56 tournaments and had no complaints about those results, save one. I wanted the bracelet.

  I started my 2010 WSOP with a quick bustout in a NLHE event, followed by a long run in a PLHE event. On Friday June 4, I played another NLHE event that started at noon, and gathered a bunch of chips quickly. I then decided to four-bet all-in with 55 on a flop of 664, because I thought my opponent was three-betting light. He thought for a few seconds before calling off the rest of his chips with two queens. Soon afterwards I was out, and I realized I still had time to enter the $1,500 Limit Hold ’Em, albeit an hour late.

  I didn’t make many hands on Day One, but I loved the value of the event. There was a guy at my first table who open-limped from early position with 43o, and another guy who didn’t know you were allowed to raise bets in Limit Hold ’Em. (He apparently thought the big bet was the most money you could put in on any street.) Clearly this was a good tournament to enter, but I still found myself with only eight blinds at the end of Day One.

  I started Day Two by defending my blind with J9o, check-calling a bet on the A93 flop, and then check-folding to a bet when a queen hit on the turn. I’m not really in the business of folding pairs in Limit Hold ’Em, but I felt strongly enough that I was behind that I chose to lay the hand down and solider on with five blinds in my stack. I’ll never find out if my read was right on that hand, but I doubled up on the next hand when I reraised from the small blind against the button, and flopped top pair. From that point forward I roller coastered up-and-down the rest of the day, making runner-runner full houses, flopping the nuts and losing, making a set against a pair of aces, making a full house blind-on-blind and losing. I ended the day with 272,000 against an average chip stack of 216,000. There were 13 people left.

  I ran really bad to start Day Three. I put in five bets preflop with JJ against AJ and 88, and had to fold on the ace-high flop. I got rivered when my QQ couldn’t beat A3, after I’d raised the turn and my opponent took the heat with just a three on board. I entered the final table in eighth place out of nine. My comeback started when Mark Burford had AK on an ace-high board and I made aces up on him. Mark busted shortly thereafter, but I increased my chip count fairly steadily as we stayed eight-handed for a long time and some of the other players were jockeying for position, trying not to be the next one out. It wasn’t without its downturns. I lost three big pots to Limit Hold ’Em terror and longtime friend Terrence Chan: once when I barreled the whole way with king-high and he called me with ace-high, once when I lost a set-over-set hand, and once when my pocket sevens couldn’t fade the overcards against his AJ. But I won enough pots to make up for those, and I was in decent shape when we got four-handed.

  The turning point came when I three-bet Georgios Kapalas from the button with A7o, and Terrence woke up with two aces in the big blind. I hit the miracle flop of 773 and we got a lot of bets in—20 percent of the chips in play in fact. I took over the chip lead for the first time after that, and held onto it all the way to heads-up, at which point I had a 2-1 advantage over Ahmad Abghari.

  Ahmad plays a conservative style, so I liked the spot. But he won almost all the pots for the first 25 minutes, and I soon found myself at a 2-1 chip disadvantage. Of the entire tournament, I’m most proud of the way I played for the next 45 minutes. After playing 15 hours on Day One (between the NLHE and the Limit), and a long Day Two the day before, I was able to take a deep breath on Day Three even after conceding the lead when heads-up for a bracelet. I focused, played as well as I’m capable of playing, and slowly retook the lead. Ahmad eventually got down to six blinds. I opened with Q8o and he three-bet me. When the flop came Q44, I knew I had a chance to win the tournament on this hand. We got it all-in on the blank turn card, and Ahmad tabled AT. An eight fell on the river, improving my hand to queens and eights, and more importantly, giving me the victory.

  It is hugely gratifying to get this victory after so many years of playing tournaments. I thank all of you readers for all the well-wishes I’ve received in the past few weeks. Some good articles have even been written about me and the tournament. Here’s one of them.

  Now I’m moving on to other things, most immediately to watching the Algeria-U.S. match set to kick off in a few hours. Then it will be back to the WSOP grind, as I have a few more events to play before the Main in two weeks. No matter what happens the rest of the way, however, I will always remember the 2010 WSOP with a smile.

• 08Jun

  So Hey

  WSOP Comments

  This happened.

  A longer post will follow, but for now I’ll just say I’m thrilled, relieved, and in utter disbelief.

• 02Jun

  World Series of Poker 2010

  WSOP Comments

  It’s finally here, and I’m here along with it. After playing an abbreviated schedule at last year’s WSOP, I’ve really been building up anticipation for the 2010 version for quire some time–a year in fact! And I love that there are so many smaller buy-in events this time. The schedule should set up well for some good money-making opportunities. Here’s hoping I can take advantage.

  I start later today with Event 8, a $1,500 No Limit Hold ‘Em tournament that’s sure to get a ton of runners. Just the way I like it. The plan is to round into form over the next month, winning some money along the way, and to be in prime shape for the Main Event next month. I’d love if this plan actually worked. And if it doesn’t, that’s why I keep up on a lot of interests outside of poker.

  But right now, poker is center stage. Keep up with my progress on twitter if you’re keenly interested in getting chip count updates every break.

• 08Apr

  Home from Mohegan

  Uncategorized Comments

  It was an interesting experience at the old Mohegan Sun today. First, the tournament directors underestimated the turnout, which meant that us suckers who bought in with cash in the 24 hours leading up to the event were exceedingly more likely to end up playing against each other, rather than any of the hundreds of internet qualifiers. On my immediate left at my first table were, in order, David Williams, Gavin Smith, and Shaun Deeb. The overall field was soft, but you wouldn’t know it if you drew the poker room instead of the tournament room.

  Ironically, I did fine in the poker room (getting my 30k up to 39k), only to eventually go broke in the tournament room after my table got moved. There was nothing too exciting. I got up to 50k after I snapped off a bluff. Then I lost a bunch of chips where I semibluffed the whole way, missed, and got called, which took me back down to 40k. I lost a hand where I value bet the river and got called (love when that happens) to knock me down to 20k. I rallied to move back to 30k, then blinded down to 25k, and then lost a small pot to go to 20k. Finally I got 3500 in preflop with QQ, and the rest went in on the J94 flop. My opponent had J9s and I was gone.

  It was frustrating that, despite the soft field, I got to play against very few bad players. The idea wasn’t to invest five thousand dollars to play against mostly talented professionals. Oh well, these kinds of things happen in this business.

  My next brick-and-mortar event is the Spring Poker Open at Borgata.

• 06Apr

  The Sun Rises Again (or something)

  Uncategorized Comments

  The first casino I entered after reading a poker book was the Mohegan Sun, in Uncasville, Connecticut. Now, 11.5 years later, I’m back at Mohegan to play their first televised poker tournament, the third stop on the inaugural North American Poker Tour. I’ll try to keep nostalgia out of my head while I focus on the poker (which shouldn’t be too hard–the poker room has closed, been remodeled, and reopened since I last played here).

  As usual, I’ll be updating my chip count on twitter, for those who like to be in the know.

  Wish me luck!

• 26Mar

  Foxwoods Poker Classic Trip Report

  Uncategorized Comments

  Well, I busted late on Day One. It was one of those tournaments where I didn’t have any cards. During the eleven hours I played, here’s how often I had hands from the range 77+, AQ+
  AA: 1 (won the blinds)
  KK: 0
  QQ: 1 (folded on the five-high flop and was shown AA)
  JJ: 1 (fourth hand of the tournament, won the blinds and one limp)
  TT: 1 (second hand of the tournament, folded on a queen-high flop)
  99: 0
  88: 1 (folded preflop to Jeff King’s raise; he showed JJ)
  77: 0
  AK: 1
  AQ: 3 (one of which was the only decent pot I won)

  So you can see I didn’t really have many good hands. A possibly bigger problem was that I didn’t even get playable hands. I don’t need one of the above premiums to play. I’ll often take a suited one-gapper, or a suited ace, or two big cards, or some 40-50% of my hands in late position. I couldn’t even find trash like that to play. It got to the point where it folded to me on the button and I would say to myself, “yes, seven-five offsuit! I can finally open!” or “Ooooh, 95s, this is a solid spot!”

  As is typical when this card-dead, I didn’t lose too many big pots. I mostly got ground down by the rising blinds and antes and eventually committed to top pair with seventeen blinds left in my stack. My opponent gave a speech about how he didn’t think he could fold, and then said he was “not that big.” he had KQ on a queen-high board, and I estimate he had about 75% equity against my short-stack range. I must’ve looked as though I was playing super-tight.

  Oh well, today was close to an impossible task with the combination of the cards I had and the cards I ran into. I was somewhat lucky to stay alive as long as I did. Mohegan next!

• 25Mar

  Foxwoods Poker Classic

  Uncategorized Comments

  I’m back in Ledyard, CT for another year of the Foxwoods Poker Classic. Follow my Main Event updates on twitter all day long, if that’s your druthers. The over/under is being set at 162 for the number of players in the field. I’ll optimistically say OVER. Wish me luck either way.

• 01Mar

  Sunday Bustouts

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  I wanted to keep late Sunday night open this week, so I played an abbreviated schedule of six tournaments. Since that’s such a manageable number, I thought it might be fun to post the bustout hands. Maybe some of them are even interesting.

  Tournament: $50 rebuy on Stars
  Status: 383 players left out of 1090 starters
  Blinds: 300-600/50 ante
  Stack size: 5,640
  Hand: A8o
  Action: UTG folds, I move all-in. It folds to the big blind who calls with A5o. He wins.
  Analysis: Totally standard play from me. What about my opponent? He’s getting a little less than 3-2, and needs 42% equity against my range to break even. Let’s just say for argument’s sake that my jam range there is A4+, K9+, QJ, suited connectors down to 65s, and any pair. He has 42.5% against that range. I may be slightly tighter or looser than that in real life, but looks like his call was reasonable.

  Tournament: Turbo Takedown (3,000 FPP buy-in, one million dollar prize pool) on Stars
  Status: 2,505 left out of 19,379
  Blinds: 1,000-2,000/300
  Stack size: 15,341
  Hand: A7o
  Action: Three folds, and I move in UTG+3. The small blind reraises all-in with TT. He wins.
  Analysis: Totally standard by both parties. This was a fun tournament, and had about as much play as you can expect for an FPP buy-in and almost 20,000 people. Stack sizes for almost everyone were under 20 blinds throughout, which essentially made this thing one long jam-or-fold event. I was happy to cash in this crapshoot.

  Tournament: $150 rebuy on FTP
  Status: 316 left out of 553
  Blinds: 140-280/25
  Stack size: 7,750
  Hand: ATo
  Action: Five folds, and the cutoff min-raises to 560. I move all-in on the button. The small blind reraises all-in, and the big blind calls all-in for 2,800 total. The cutoff folds. The small blind has QQ, and the big blind has AA. SB wins the side pot, and BB wins the main.
  Analysis: I have three options when the action gets to me. 1) Call. 2) Reraise to an amount less than all-in. 3) Reraise all-in. Let’s look at all of them. Option 1 of calling is not bad. I can try to see a flop in position for just 2 blinds out of my 28-blind stack. The downsides are that I risk getting three-bet from the blinds, I risk bringing the blinds in cheap, and I risk allowing the cutoff to outflop me. These downsides are significant, so let’s consider Option 2. I could make it 1,700 to go, which commits about a quarter of my chips. I would give some more consideration to this option with either a stronger hand, like AQ, or a weaker hand, like A6o. I’ll 3-bet to a quarter of my stack if I’ll have an easy decision after getting 4-bet. With ATo, I don’t know what to do against a 4-bet getting 5-3 on my money or more, so I don’t like Option 2. This brings us to Option 3, moving all-in and risking 7,725 to win 1,205 immediately. My rule of thumb is that it’s always a reasonable shove if you’re moving in for six times the pot or less. I’m moving in for slightly more than that here, but given how weak the cutoff’s action is, and given that I have a relatively strong hand myself for the situation, I think it’s OK to make a slight overbet here. To sum up, I prefer the choice I actually made here, which is Option 3. The play from the two blinds was, of course, automatic. How are these offsuit aces working out for me so far?

  Tournament: Bodog $100k guarantee ($162 buy-in)
  Status: 42 left out of 463
  Blinds: 1,250-2,500/250
  Stack size: 49,008
  Hand: AKs
  Action: Three folds, and UTG+3 opens for $6,200. I move-in. He calls with QQ. He wins.
  Analysis: Completely standard for both sides. I flopped a king and he rivered a queen, which hurt. He also ended up winning the tournament, which is not all that surprising since he seemed to be a decent player and he’d started the hand with a good stack.

  Tournament: Sunday Million on Stars ($215 buyin)
  Status: 4,518 left out of 10,077
  Blinds: 300-600/25
  Stack size: 13,575
  Hand: JTo
  Action: Four folds, and the hijack min-raises to 1,200. Folds to me, I call. The flop comes J85 rainbow. I check, and the hijack bets 3,000. I move in for 9,350 more, and he calls with AA. He wins.
  Analysis: I have two choices preflop: call, or reraise all-in. Believe it or not, I don’t love to resteal all the time. If an opponent will offer me an excellent price to call and see a flop, I’ll usually prefer to do that with a connecting hand, rather than reraise all-in and pray for victory. That said, either choice would be reasonable. An all-in 3-bet on my part would risk 12,950 to win 2,325 immediately, which falls under my 6x pot guideline.
  After I check the flop (and my style is to always check there), I pretty much have to either move-in or fold when my opponent makes a full pot-sized bet. There is no card that could come on the turn where I could call on the flop, and then check-fold the next street, so I might as well go for the fold equity if I’m going to play, and not allow my opponent to catch up. Full pot-sized bets tend to be stronger than small bets, so I’m not excited about this spot. But are there enough AK, TT, 99, 77, and 66 in my opponent’s range to justify committing with the hand? Let’s say he could have those hands plus AQs, and let’s say he could also have any set, any overpair, or any jack better than mine. Let’s further say he plays perfectly against me after I move-in. Then he folds 42% of the time, and he calls the other 58% and I have 20% equity. My EV is .42*5,925 + .58*(.2*27,625-12,350) = -1,470. So if he plays perfectly, and can really have sets, my play is bad. I don’t actually think it’s very likely he shows up with a set there, really ever. So if we take those out, and also have him calling with TT and 99 (other things he might do), my EV becomes .37*5,925 + .63*(.33*27,625-12,350) = +155. After doing all the math, then, I think it was a close decision. My best play in a soft field like this was probably to fold to the overbet and give my opponent credit for a big hand.
  As for my opponent, he played the hand pretty badly. If he makes a bigger raise preflop, we get all the money in then for sure. Then, after the flop, his bet size made me think about check-folding top pair. Any half-pot or even three-quarter-pot bet, and I move in automatically instead of even considering other options. When you play AA badly, however, you still often bust short stacks.

  Tournament: Turbo $100 1R + 1A on Stars
  Status: 46 left out of 861
  Blinds: 5,000-10,000/1,250
  Stack size: 79,502
  Hand: ATo
  Action: There are eight people at the table, and the big blind is all-in for 8,699. Three folds, and the hijack min-raises to 20k. I move-in on the button. The small blind folds, the hijack calls with JJ. The big blind has 43o. The hijack scoops the pot.
  Analysis: If hijack had just moved in, my call would be automatic. His min-raise range is probably slightly stronger than his jam range, but not by enough where I can justify folding the hand, I don’t think. I have AT and eight blinds. I just can’t fold to a hijack raise. By the way, I flopped an ace and he rivered a jack, which hurt.

  I hope some of you out there enjoyed reliving my Sunday with me. I cashed in three of the above tournament for a small loss on the day (remember, play to win, not to cash). It wasn’t a total loss, though, as there were great endings to Louisville-UConn and USA-Canada on the TV.

  For those interested, my next big tournament will be Foxwoods. I’ll try to check in on the blog once before then, maybe with some PLO action.

• 05Feb

  Borgata Main Event, Busto

  Uncategorized Comments

  Only played four hands today, and didn’t have any decisions. Just an easy all-in reraise with 66 for 18 blinds on the fourth hand, and lost the flip to AK and finish tenth. Oh well. It was an amazing tournament. Fun even. Obviously I would’ve loved to finish a few spots higher, but my eyes were always on the prize at the top, and I gave myself a real shot to get it. Maybe next time.

• 05Feb

  Borgata Main Event, Day Four

  Uncategorized Comments

  After running amazing for three days, I didn’t get much in the way of cards on Day Four. I barely even had opportunities to make moves, and I lost a flip for a 1.75 million chip pot. That said, I did manage to make the final table with 1.2 million in chips (20 big blinds). It’s only half the average stack, but there are six players with 30 blinds or less, and the chip lead is only at 80 blinds, so I’m envisioning several entirely plausible ways I can get right back into the hunt for the title. I’ll give it my best shot. Wish me luck one last time!

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