Harrahs Weekly Poker Donkley 1.12.11 Part Two

Continued from previous post:

So at the Harrahs Donkley their weekly Wednesday Holdem poker tournament. Now that they have the Saturday tournament two I guess I'll have to come up with a name for that one too? The weekend Donkley? Doesn't roll off the tongue. Oh well, I'll put some thought into it.

Where was I? I just quizzed the kid to see if I had a shot at buying the pot with a third barrel bluff. I wasn’t quite prepared for the answer to the question (though I'm pocketing it for next time), but I read it for real strength. It wasn’t “Strong” is weak it was kind of like reluctant acceptance that he was tied to the hand. Maybe a quick assertive move could have gotten him to change his mind but maybe not. I finally, meekly, checked, which I hate to do but is sometimes the best poker strategy. He said “I got an Ace,” and turned over Ace rag. I nodded and mucked, knowing any hand he had beat me.

He told me during the break, he had decided on the turn he was definitely calling any river bet from me, so perhaps, my gambit would have failed anyway.
I rebuilt again. I played AA pretty badly and was rewarded for it. The same kid in early position opened for a 650 raise, blinds 1-2. On this table that was fairly large. I saw my Aces and knew he had been opening fairly light and I decided I was going to be willing to die with them. If he passed me with the community cards oh well, but we were going to take a flop together and I was going to give him an opportunity to bluff me or stack off.

I said I played them stupid, because I did. There were two calling stations in late position and one right in the blind. My call encourages those three to jump in. It did swell the pot (never a bad thing when you need chips) but now I was playing AA against four people. Not the best situation for rockets and a now dwindling stack. Should have put in a modest re-raise and played with the kid but didn’t. If I had paid attention to the table I would have known a call would only encourage the stations to jump in.

So we see the flop and I believe a 9, an 8, and maybe a 4 hit the board. I think it was rainbow. The blinds check, the kid checks, I eye one of the guys in late position amassing his chips and hold off on betting. Luckily he wasn’t running an angle (okay, not an angle but a fake-out is a better word) on me and that was his intention, he opened shoved. He didn’t have much. One of the other two stations got out of the way, the other called and then my friend flat called.

I looked at my stack and I had enough to put a hurting into both the callers stacks. After some time I shoved over the top. The first caller folded immediately, the kid who I couldn’t bluff earlier thought longer. He folded.
The guy that shoved had middle pair a redraw with a gut-shot (couldn’t have been 4 must have been a 5).

He said “I thought I had the best had,” when he turned it over. I was happy to see it. My Aces held and I ended up dragging a stack re-invigorating pot because I played them incorrectly. Granted I was willing to gamble with them but I didn’t think that meant gambling against four others. Btw another 9 hit the river and both the two people that called the flop but then folded to my re-raise claimed to have a 9. The kid rued not calling as he probably had the chips to spare