By Adanthar on June 18th, 2007 (more posts by author)

I've got 7100 chips with ~134 people left, right around the average. I was completely controlling my first table for a while before going card dead, slipping down to life support, then going on a late rush/losing a big pot right at the end.

NO ONE knows how to play razz. At my first table, I had Ted Forrest to my right and Humberto Brenes opposite me. TF was a gigantic calling station and played like he had somewhere to go, spewing off chips left and right until he busted (on a hand where my 652 bricked off in spectacular fashion and I had to fold fifth in a huge pot. Damn*.) Humberto played more or less TAG, until he tilted off his last 1500 chips calling with [A2]3JJ vs. a 689 up. Of course, he got there, so he parlayed that 1500 into about 10K when the table finally broke a half hour before the day ended. Meanwhile, out of the two dozen or so people I played with, *4* knew that you have to dump a good starting hand in an unraised pot when you brick fourth - one actually managed to argue with a pro about it, just before luckboxing the pro out of a huge pot when, you guessed it, he took a card off with something like a 7J showing against something like a 38. Good times. If I hadn't hit a K (and folded!) every time I raised on third for two hours, I'd have destroyed that table.

At my new table, I busted Mark Karan, but lost that aforementioned big pot when David Oppenheimer rivered a wheel vs. a hand I had to pay off with. I also had a couple of mental lapses that probably cost me about 1K. Otherwise, though, I'm happy with my play and think I have a decent chance at this - running good is a prerequisite, of course, since that stack gives me about two hands' worth of action, but then again, that's razz.

Lots of big names still in but most of them do suck at razz - looking forward to 3 PM tomorrow.

*This is a hand I actually played bad: An ace, two threes and a four are dead, some guy raises with something and TF reraises. I have [52]6. I three bet to isolate here, and had the best hand when I did, but I should really just fold preflop because my hand is so thoroughly dead. That's what happens when you go card dead for two hours...fortunately, it didn't cost me much. Still, a better razz player would probably have about 1500 more chips than I do. Oh well - like I said, everyone else is worse.