Wild Night Playing Live

Headed to the live club for some poker goodness last night because Kat said she was going. Managed to move a meeting to a future date so I could be on time and sober for the $40 tournament.

In these tournaments you really need to catch some cards around the 30-45 min mark because there will be a few races to get to the final table. Instead my AQs < A10o and that crippled me. Very next hand QJs < 97o but at least I was short in that one.

The funny thing about playing a tournament and then going right into playing 1/2 NL is that some people don't adjust. Actually the play at the live table was the most action I had ever seen at a table (including online). To fully explain I will have to label a few players:
(Seat number, label, read)
1. Bay St. Buddy (BSB) - slightly loose, ABCish, a little tough to push off of a pot
2. Tough Guy (TG) - likes to raise with position and willing to go to felt to show his manhood
3. Scared Lady (SL)- tight / super weak (does she blog?) who says has been running bad
4. Scared Guy (SG) - tight / super weak (does he blog?) trying to play ABC at a wild table
5. Tournament champ (TC) - loose but had to play tight - won large live event
6. Super Maniac (SM) - Asian super loose, super aggressive ATM looking for action
7. & 8a. Maniac Tricky Guy (MTG) - very loose passive preflop , aggro push monkey post flop who likes to call with low cards
7a. Tight Asian (TA) - smart tight player with the worst seat in the house
8. Calling Station (CS) - dumb calling station who feels lucky sometimes
9. Fearless Guy (FG) - loose player who will float and catches cards
10. Hero (Hero) - all round excellent player who will play super-TAG this evening
11. TAG (TAG) - solid player who respects Hero's raises and is forced to make some tough calls

So we have a very full table with loose guys in the early and mid seats with tight/weak people in between and tight / aggro people at the end of the table. Super maniac decided he was going to give all of us as much action as we could handle!

For the first 3 orbits I don't even play a hand as I was watching raises and reraises all over the table. I finally get to see what SM was raising with and he was going to pay me off. MTG had just busted and bought in short for $50 and raises from MP to $10 and CS calls with his $65 stack. In the BB Hero raises to $50 with AKs to isolate the tilting MTG and get him into a race. He calls and so does CS so when he checks to me on the J high flop I bet $15 to put his ass all in as well. He says he is feeling lucky with his QJo and the turn and river are blanks so he wins a nice pot. That is the hand that proved to me that CS was indeed a calling station and he said he felt lucky. In the end I was lucky to be at a table full of so many losers.

So being a shorter stack I continued to play tight (didn't have cash on me to rebuy fully). SM had just lost a monster pot when his Q high hand got cracked by two pair that he tried to bluff on the turn! Everytime that happened he raised bigger on the next hand especially if he just rebought for more chips. On the BB when he raised to $22 (only a standard 11x bb raise) which was called by MTG as expected. Now with AQo I could just call but that would be weak and my starting hand selection is much tighter so I push while ahead. SM calls with 55 and I win the race with a Q high flop. Now the stack is starting to get back to normal.

Then the rush starts with a flush vs. TC that hit on the river where I flopped bottom pair and nut flush draw and he bet much less than pot and then check called my value bet.

Get pocket 10's UTG and just limp and call the raise to $6. Flop is 883r and the BB leads out for $15. I call along with one other to see the turn. Turn is a beautiful 10 and I try to not look all excited. BB leads out for $30 and I take a bit of time to see if he has an $8. FG is known to bet all streets when he thinks he is ahead and senses weakness. So I just call to see the river which is a blank and he bets out $65. Unlucky for me he folds to my push so I don't get his last 80 or so but still a nice hand.

Overall, just another wild night of playing live poker and winning $260. Darn shame that Kat missed it as Lee sat down at the other table and donked off a couple buy ins.