Ryan Hall's Blog

WSOP stuff
Friday, June 8th 2012 1:22 am

So I'm here in Vegas and I've played a few events already.  I played the 1500 Reentry first after taking the shuttle over from Bally's, which has become a daily event for me.  Yes, I am a balla.  Day 1A was just frustration after frustration.  Every decent hand I had, I was forced to fold in some marginal spots.  Eventually I picked up AK and got it in against a PXF sub's AQ but I did not hold (ps comment on here if you read this and let me know how you did!).  There were some good players on that table including Ryan Julius, and Andreas Hoivold and Luke Greenwood (who both busted fairly early).

Day 1B was a totally different story.  The very first hand, I picked up AA and raised to 75 UTG.  Immediately, some guy started chirping (in a friendly way) about not being allowed to raise the first hand blah blah blah.  Then he looked at his cards and made it 325.  I took a look at him, thought for a bit and made it 850.  He shipped, I called and he had KK.  Chipleader!  I hope it wasn't the only tournament he was playing, but I think it might have been :S.  I would continue to chip up to around 18K and then I picked up black QQ UTG+1 at 150/300 and I made it 650.  LP put some amount of calling chips out and an old man in the BB shoved for nearly 6K.  IMMEDIATELY, the young caller said "I call!" and went to turn over his cards but everyone instantly let him know he was out of turn and he had the "oh s***" look on his face.  Sometimes it's hard to convey things over text, and I simply can't tell you just how much I felt he was strong.  He covered me, and I decided to fold.  Some people I've talked to like my decision and some don't.  The players at the table really didn't like it (foldQQomglolz).  He didn't even look to see how much the old guy had.  Not even a glance.  It was instant and I didn't want to get in nearly 60BB, even w/ QQ, against what I perceived to be his range.  Unfortunately, he had AK and I would have won a really big pot.  No problem, fast forward to a little while later and I pick up KK.  German sounding dude opens UTG, big stack calls in CO and I reraise the button pretty big.  The BB just calls and the original raiser ships.  I ship.  The BB, who was the major don't fold QQ there advocate, now goes into the tank and the German guy calls the clock on him.  With about 15s left, he calls.... with QQ.  Oops.  At this point, I was up to around 55K and probably was the chipleader of the day.  A little while after, I made a mistep and got in AQ for quite a bit against a young guy's AK, but I hit a river Q to go up over 70K, which would have made me the chipleader by quite a bit at that point.  However, soon after, I picked up AA and reraised Jordan Morgan, and he called.  The flop was J high, I bet and he called in position.  The turn was a Q and he really, really seemed to like the card from what I could tell.  I checked and he put out a small bet (not much bigger than my preflop reraise size).  So I obviously called.  The river brought a 3rd spade (there were 2 on the flop) so I led out for 7K, which was maybe 1/3 of the pot and he called with QQQ.  That set me back, but I picked up a bunch of little pots to end the day at 60K, which was good for 46/517 of the 2 days.  Oh, and Jerry Yang was on my table for a while!!  Sadly, I didn't get to raise to wan mirrion.

Day 2 was miserable.  I was definitely on a tough table.  2 guys to my right kept going at each other and I was looking for an excuse, ANY excuse, for a cold 4bet but I wasn't just going to do it with a complete garbage hand - I wanted a blocker and there were just no good opportunities.  The first 3 hands I opened were all bottom range hands and they were all 3bet, so I folded each of them.  Then I got KK and opened and everyone folded.  And I just didn't win a whole lot of pots after that.  I did cripple Allen Kessler though, who told me that my 30 seconds (10 minutes in his eyes) was too long to decide to call.  The table had a good laugh at him.  I guess he's trying to be the new Hellmuth (?) but he just can't pull it off.  Eventually, with 147 people left, I shipped QJo in in the SB and got called by 66 in the BB and didn't win, but I got my first cash for the WSOP this year.

I played the 1500 shootout 2 days later and wow, this was the dream table.  There were a couple of good players, but most were just not.  Players were flying off our table.  5 minutes after I came back from 1st break, we were down to 4 players, as some tables still had 9-10!  I didn't pick much up 4 handed and it was a fast structure so I was down to 20 BB quickly.  One player on the table was from Venezuela and he was very aggro and bluffy.  He was caught several times making multi barrel bluffs but he was winning big preflop allins so he had chips.  I raised QJ in the CO and he called in the BB.  The flop was AJT with 2 diamonds.  He checked, and I checked and decided that I'd probably havne to call 2 barrels on raggy boards.  The turn was irrelevant and he made a big bet, 800 into 1000.  At that point, I certainly could have folded.  But I decided to go w/ my original plan and I also had the gutter so I called.  The river was also irrelevant and he bet 2K, which was almost all of my stack.  I agonized over the decision but ultimately decided to call and he had A8 so I was wrong and I beat myself up pretty good over not just folding the turn for the rest of the day.  I think a lot of players just let it go easily but I really don't.  If I don't make a play I'm unhappy with for the whole rest of the summer, I'll still be thinking about that one.  I guess it's just the way I am.  Hopefully it will change over time.

Today, I played the 1500 6max and very little went right.  I reraised a few hands in position when we were 4 handed at the start and wasn't winning pots.  It was ok though, as a few advertising dollars can sometimes go a long way.  I got the 4bet shove I wanted from a player later but he had 88 and I had AK, and didn't win the race.  I then doubled up my 3.5BB stack w/ AQss against rcrane's A2 so I had 7 BB.  But in the BB I picked up 88 and the SB r/c (???!!) T9o and he won that race and I was out.

Tomorrow, I'm playing the Venetian 600 and I'll try to report on each tournament whenever I get a chance.  Looking forward to meeting some people, so please say hi if you see me! 



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kosamm
Sunday, June 10th 2012 11:08 pm
Ryan I was the PFX sub who knocked you out with AQo vs your AKo. I only lasted may be an hour or two longer, I got short and got my AKo in pre and busted by ATs. Finished 400th or so. It was a pleasure meeting you and I wish you all the best with your Vegas events. Keep us updated.

Kosamm