E Tay’s Blog

Had a good run in Rincon. I actually told a few people I had a good feeling about this tournament because it was my first circuit event and my first time being at Rincon. I just have this superstition about me having a little run good the FIRST time I play a certain event. I said the same thing about WPT Biloxi, and I had the chip lead after day 1 and then I blew it. I think I messed with my superstitions a little bit that time. Well anyway, let’s start with the 1k.
156 players. My first table was actually pretty tough. It was the late registration table, so of course all the young degens were at it. Pretty solid table, had this kid Scratch who ended up making the final table with me in the main. The kid plays great. So the first couple levels were a bit slow, and our table broke. I got moved to a little bit better table. Eric (Rizen) Lynch was the only player I recognized and he was playing with a shorter stack. There was another girl, who I actually have to give props to too, her name was Kim and she was from Japan, and she was super solid as well. Well anyway, I did what I was suppose to, played solid, and my reads on people right now are incredible. Not really too many interesting pots, played my usual style of pot control and value. Had a pretty big hand where a “usual” limper limped, Rizen raised, 1 smoothie, 1 smoothie from the small, I wake up with KK, I three bet, limper folds, Rizen folds, smoothie 1 folds, and SUPRISINGLY the small blind calls. The flop came A53 rainbow. Check I check behind of course. I am going to check ALL pairs behind here on this board, even if I had AK, AQ I’m still checking behind. The turn was a K! Guy bets 1/4th the pot, now it’s the K of clubs bringing a flush draw which I’m not TOO concerned about. I raise anyway, a small raise for value to leave the buy 5k behind in a pot of 15k. The river is 10 of clubs. Not the greatest card in the world, but he checks again, and so I put in the 5k and he calls with AQ. Pretty big turning point in the tournament for me, it gave me a decent chip lead over my table. We got down to the bubble and by now I have a little below avg stack and I raised the first hand on the bubble with 1010. A guy moves it all in, and now I tank. Ok, first of all, you don’t know how many times I bubble these 1k’s because I just DON’T care about the money at that point, and I am willing to play huge pots. This guy has made too many plays like this with extremely marginal hands, 4 times I saw him show down AJ like it was the nuts. I just absolutely KNEW I had the best hand. Sometimes I think too quickly though and act too quickly and make mistakes. I decided to take my time here, talk to the guy a little bit, yell at him a little…blah blah blah… There was something about his calmness in this hand where I go to shove my stack in and at the last second, even though it HURT so bad I folded the hand. He flipped up AA. PHEW. That fold saved me, and eventually we were done for the night, playing the final table the next day.
Final table was not too tough. There was I pretty good player, called himself Ha-bee-bee and there was also Kim from Japan. I grinded a below avg/avg stack all the way day to 4 people, and I got in a huge all in with Habibi for the chip lead. I had AJs and he had KJ. The flop came 883, I couldn’t imagine a better flop, but I still found a way to lose. SIGH. 4th place for just under 13k. S’ok though, I even said that I guess the run good was saved for the Main Event…..
Day 1 I was a little bit late, but had already bought in few days before. I get to my table and I see Paul Smith, Mickey Mouse Mills and Devo. Not the best table I could think of seeing as the field was only 106 players and there were so many unknowns. Interestingly enough, Paul and Devo both busted in the first couple levels. I had a real insane start of the day. I chipped up pretty quick to 26k. Mickey was playing kind of a short stack early, when he limped in , I had 88 I raised, he called. The flop came 854 all clubs. He checked, I bet ½ pot, he raised I moved him all, he called with JJc. The turn was the Kc and the river doesn’t fill, and Mickey gets up to leave. He doesn’t even realize he has the flush. I’m like, “you’re gonna win this one”. That was a 18k pot, and pretty important at the time. So I was down to about 13k. Chipped back up to 35k, back down to 15k back up to 33k. All in like the first 4 levels. From there I pretty much played average stack till we got down to about 4 tables. I raised on the button with 69s, this crazy asian calls from the small and the big blind calls. The flop comes k95 one spade. Checks to me, I check. The turn is the 3 of spades, Crazy Asian bets 1/3 pot, I call. River is an off 8, he checks and for some ungodly reason I thought I rivered two pair, and so did a massive over shove for value. This takes 3 minutes to finally call….during that time I realized the mistake I made. When he called I was like sigh, nice call…but he wouldn’t flip his hand. At that point I realized I just got the thinnest value, he flipped up a3. THAT WAS HUGE. Right after that hand I got moved again. I had Shaun Deeb to my right, and another a couple other decent players. Shaun and I were chatting, messing around and we were being dealt one more hand. I had made a joke about his opening ranges, and of course he raises the hand right before break. I get KK, I three bet. Guy in the small blind, who is actually a very good player, cold 4 bets, Deeb tanks and folds AK, and five bet shove and get called by 1010. That pot gave me chip lead with 26 left and I held that lead until the end of day 1 with 16 left.
Day 2 we went pretty fast from 16 down to a final table of 10. I spewed off 100k in chips doubling up one short stack and having to raise fold a few times. I went to the final table with an average stack again. I played pretty patiently, knowing where my spots were and picking up important pots here and there. I busted on Cosmo out with 88 against AQ which is just SUCH a sick hold for me. I’m not a favorite in races like that.  That was an important pot. Here is the big hand. Pilgrim was short and shoving his stack in every chance he could. Tryba opens from early, Pilgrim shoves and 4 bet shove with KK. Tryba lays JJ down face up and Pilgrim flips up A4. Flop comes J104, turn was clean and river A. SIGH. That was such a huge beat to take there. After that Pilgrim was unstoppable, busting players and winning every hand. I was so tilted after that I had to get up walk around, Deeb was there sweatin me and he calmed me down a bit. I had to maintain composure and really focus, because now I had to work twice as hard. We finally got down to 3 handed and I was the short stack. I played a big hand with Charles where I raised with 89 suited, he called. Flop came 887. Check, check. Turn was J. He bet I raised he called. Then he checked dark. The river was a 7, and so I moved all in. Another over shove, but definitely getting value here. He called and showed 710. That double up was HUGE, and at that point I was felt like I could really win this thing. Finally we got to heads up and Pilgrim had about 4 to 1 in chips and we made a deal to chop everything evenly. People are not going to agree with this, I don’t even know if I agree with it, but that’s what was done. So I took 2nd place and took home $118,000. I’m disappointed I didn’t get the win, but I really feel like there is many more opportunities for me. I really really REALLY want to express how much it meant to me, all the support I got throughout the final table. I don’t know if people realize how mental this game is, but having tons of support and friends behind me, it makes THAT MUCH of a difference. I realized that in this tournament more than ever, there were times where I could of blew up, and had constant encouragement, it was just amazing.
Ok well that’s that. Just realized how boring this blog may seem. LOL. Anyway, I will be playing SCOOP for the 10 days, and I will also be playing Bellagio, Venetian Deep Stack, and Caesars Circuit events. April is such a busy month in Vegas, but I am EXCITED for it all. I am taking most of the month of May off, except for going to New Orleans to play the Circuit main there, that’s it. Then World Series of Poker….Here I come.
Peace & Good Luck!

Exit Interview With Joy Miller

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 2nd, 2009 at 4:45 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.