MORE Springfield Tournament pictures!

The eventual winner. Congratulations!
The winning hand.
The other dealer for the final table.
A nice lady I met, named Muffin.

Some Springfield Tournament Pictures

The final table
The final Table.
The singular worst suck-resuck bad beat I've ever dealt in one of our tournaments.
Getting ready for the Abate tournament.
The final hand.
Winner of the K of C bounty thanks to Greg Langdon.


Blue felt?
The famous one fingered salute a la Dotty.

An old tournie picture.

My final table

Hi everyone, it's Dave again. I assume you've read what Abe has written about my experience in Tunica. Not to toot my own horn, but I am currently the 256th best tournament poker player in the world, according to Cardplayer magazine. Since I'm sort of a big deal now here in Springfield, I decided to write about it, since I am an English major anyway (Cardplayer college, this is my request to join your bullpen of writers, I play poker and I'm in college, perfect match, no?).

Abe tells everyone differently, but my road to the final table of the stud 8/b tournament was a little bit longer than he says. In actuality, you need the back story, beginning with the day I arrived.

As soon as we got to Tunica, and after running to the bathroom stall, I was a kid in a candy store. In fact, compared to everyone else at the casino I was a 21 year old wet behind the ears baby. My eyes were dancing from the slot machines to the dice tables to the blackjack tables. I was having the greatest time of my life. I'm glad I'm not epileptic, because I would've collapsed on the floor, twitching in seizure with a ridiculous grin on my face.

Then I got carded for the first of a million times.

This is something that eluded me. I specifically tried to have conversations with all the casino workers to somehow imprint myself into their memories so they wouldn't card me. They never stopped. I kept pulling out my passport after statements like "They let you into the casino?!!" and "Yeah, you look young...". I decided to conduct a little personal survey, and asked casino personal how young they thought I looked. They said 26. Why they carded me? No idea...

After looking at the Gold Strike poker room, I was chomping at the bit to get my money on the table. I might've been a little over-eager, because within three hours at a 10-20 Omaha 8/b table, I experienced my first and biggest loss at a casino. Stuck $800 and a little dejected, I stumbled into the tournament room, only to get my second wind of excitement. I sat down to play a $65 sit'n'go tournament (my bread and butter game online) only to lose that too. I wasn't too dejected, however, because I had found I was playing the sit'n'gos much better than everyone else there. I was actually invigorated, and mad at myself for being such a big loser for the day. Big losses aren't the only thing given out liberally to 21 year olds, though, and got the first of many comped meals, and went to bed vowing to destroy the sit'n'go tables.

I slept for four hours, then woke up at 7:30 AM, because that was when the tournament room began to spread sit'n'go tournaments. Still a little groggy, I picked up some money at the ATM for buy-ins, and proceeded to win three $500 entry chips. I was getting ready to pick my seating card for another single table tournament, when I found, to my surprise, I had no cash! While I was an overall winner for the trip, I was broke! All my money was in tournament entry chips. Luckily, I found some people willing to buy my entry chips for cash, and ended the day a few hundred dollars ahead.

The next day, I discovered a hidden trait of mine that I had never known before. I was grinding it out, playing 10/20 limit hold'em at the Horseshoe, and our table broke after fifteen hours. I was stuck about $150. The only games that were being spread at the time were 4/8 limit, and 20/40 limit. My decision was to either drop down, or take a shot. Since I'm an action junky, I walked to the 20/40 table. They were playing Omaha 8/b with a half kill to 30/60. I had about $370 in chips, nowhere near enough to play comfortably at that level. I was nervous, and to make it worse, no one was saying a word at the table. I tried my best, in my most congenial manner to liven up the table. I was greeted by cold stares. My first hand I played I ended up having to call someone down with a weak hand for the high half of the pot. My read was right, though and I ended up chopping. In the next round, I watched the table, and found something interesting. The players here were much, much worse than any player at the 10/20 game. In the next hour and half, I carved the table up, turning my $370 into $1700, playing exactly five hands. Then I politely excused myself, and cashed out three racks of red chips, and some spare greens, silently praying that those players played every day. I looked at my watch, and was surprised to see it was 6:30 in the morning. I had been playing for 18 hours! And I was nowhere near tired, so I went back to the Gold Strike to play some of the sit'n'gos, and won a few before lunchtime came, and I went to sleep.

I grinded out a small profit in the cash games in the next few days. With my newfound talent for stamina in poker sessions, I played an 18 hour 10/20 hold'em session and broke exactly even, minus a half hour massage. Frustrated and working 36 hours of being awake, I walked to the tournament registration desk and registered for the day's tournament, 7 stud 8/b, which was my best game.

I expected the field to be weak, since stud was a dying game. But to my surprise, my first table was a disciplined, and full of tough east coast-ers. I played really tight, and stole antes on one hand, and got lucky and scooped another pot and when the table broke, I had turned my initial 3000 into 4000. Then, I picked up a few good hands. There was one hand I played funny. I had (K2) 4, and brought it in. I called the completed raise, planning to dump the hand if he caught good. The only way I was going to go ahead with the hand was if I caught good (K,A,3,5,6,7,8) and he caught bad. And that's exactly what happened, kind of. He paired his door card (3) and I caught and ace. He bet, and I decided to call. The fifth street brought him a 7 for a board of (337) and I caught a King for (4AK). He checked and I bet, to his surprise. He called, and caught a queen on 6th street, I caught a 6 and bet the hand. I checked in the dark, in case he made a scoop hand, like a small straight or two pair. He checked behind, clearly missing his low and, my pair of kings scooped. In retrospect, although it worked out for me, my third street call only got me in trouble. If I had suspected him to be stealing, the third street call isn't horrible, as I could outplay him in the later streets, but there was no chance that he was stealing, considering his position, and the door cards up. After the dinner break, I was all in for the first time. I had four little ones with a pair of kings, squeezing my 7th street card, hoping for a low. I felt I didn't have much of a chance of winning the hand since I was against two players, but to my surprise, my lone pair of kings scooped the pot, tripling me up! I then went on a little rush picking up split kings a few times, and scooping a few pots, and getting away from some close hands, when I had two pair. When we got down to the final table, I had been awake for close to 50 hours, and been playing the tournament for around 10 hours. I was third in chips.

It took a little convincing to get me to not play cash games after the tournament broke for the day. But my conscience and my friends urged me to sleep. I didn't feel tired, and wanted play some 10/20 or 20/40.

The next day, after having slept for the first time in two and a half days, I went to work at the final table. I started out with some nice hands, and I played them aggressively and after my opponents missed fourth and fifth streets, I picked up some small pots, building my 93,000 into around 120,000. Then disaster struck. Around four or five hands in a row, I had to squeeze my 7th street cards. If I picked up my perfect card usually a small suited card for a flush and low, I would've scooped and terrorized the table. But to my disgust, I ended picking up tens, and pairing my small cards. Eventually, I threw my last 1000 chip as an ante. I hadn't looked at my hole cards, because I had no chips, but I didn't have much of a board. I think it was something like Q,6,10,7. Anyway I squeezed my first card, and it was a 5. I squeezed my next one and it was an 8. Now, I had a hand. My opponent had no low with a pair of aces. I needed 9 to scoop, or an ace, 2, 3, or 4 for half. I squeezed, and it was a ten. My day ended, the way my last five hands went, squeezing the river card, only to catch bad.

Tunica Highlights - part 1

11 days in Tunica -- SO many stories:

The New Dealers - Patrick and Amanda got jobs dealing at the WPO tournament, a WPT event. They were dealing tourneys, satellites, big limit cash games and the regular Gold Strike poker room. Both doing great, and getting good reviews. SO much better than most of the usual tournament dealers. They were both dealing Stud, Omaha, the whole bit. Patrick even dealing some Triple Draw.


Final Table Dave - Dave K enters a 7stud Hi Lo Tournament with 160 others and makes the Final Table. Wins 7th place and much $. See his picture and complete tourney stats on; www.pokerpages.com click on WPO and select the 7stud hilo event, then click on his name.

All the Springfield Guys - 15 of us there by my count, maybe more. Great fun seeing so many of the Springfield players there. I've been going to Tunica since '96 and to their tourneys since '99. Its a wonderful time and a great value.

The Midnight Shift - I played from midnight to 5 or 6am almost every day. The players were worse and more numerous than in past years. Also - I never had to wait for a seat.

My "0 for 2" Day - One morning I played at the Horseshoe until 3am then went to the Gold Strike until 5:30. Very bad timing. At 3:15 the Horseshoe poker players saw a huge fight that started in the snack bar then rumbled out into the casino pit. At 5:45 the Gold Strike poker room hit their $250,000 bad beat jackpot. All players seated got $1,700.

Off to Tunica We Go

Theres SO many people from Springfield going this year. This should be great fun.

WPO tournaments - at the Gold Strike starts on Jan 4 and runs for 3 weeks.
WSOP-C tournaments - at the Grand starts Jan 8 and runs for a week.
Horseshoe will have daily tourneys and they have added 16 tables so theres lots of room for cash games.
Sams and Hollywood will probably have increased poker action too.

Hope to see you there.