Top 40 Movies of the Decade

one of my favorite trends that accompanies the end of every year is the best of the year lists in various publications. this year is especially fertile for lists because we are treated to best of the year, AND best of the decade. after reading rolling stone's uninspired top 10 films of the '00s an d the onion av-club's solid top 20 films of the decade, i decided to craft my own list.

1) memento
2) city of god
3) royal tenenbaums
4) the departed
5) mystic river
6) the dark knight
7) slumdog millionaire
8) gran torino
9) amores perros
10) the 40 yr-old virgin
11) half nelson
12) best in show
13 oh brother, where art thou?
14) lord of the rings trilogy
15) sideways
16) the 25th hour
17) inglorious basterds
18) the man who wasn't there
19) american psycho
20) sin city
21) pan's labrynth
22) knocked up
23) donnie darko
24) bad santa
25) catch me if you can
26) the rules of attraction
27) harold and kumar go to whitecastle
28) mulholland drive
29) confessions of a dangerous mind
30) the proposition
31) a history of violence
32) sean of the dead
33) no country for old men
34) gangs of new york
35) ghost world
36) role models
37) amelie
38) old boy
39) borat
40) high fidelity

10 days in vegas

i'm in my second week out here in the desert. its been a bowl of mixed nuts so far in terms of ups and downs. i make the final table of the first tourney i played out here... only to lose a coinflip and bust in 9th place only minutes into the second day of the event. i've been going to the gym and eating well some days... but boozing it up and eating in-and-out burger at 3am on some others. i've gotten cinderella sleep some nights... but have also woken up on the hallway floor in a weird off the stip hotel curled up in a ball next to a soda machine some (well, one) other days. i made day 2 of two non wsop events... but lasted a combined 31 minutes in the two wsop events i played. i made the final table in 2 out of events i've played... but have placed in 9th and 10th place for 2 ham sandwiches and am up less than 1k for the trip.

i'm happy with the way i have played in every event but today's venetian 560. i played my stank ass off in a venetian 340 buyin event a few days ago. i got big chips early but stagnated after the dinner break, and basically hung on with a 10-20 bb stack to get into the money and get through the first day. the event had a record field for the venetian with 870 runners. first place was $65k. i came back for the second day with a 17bb stack and 51 players remaining.

i never got close to an average stack until there were 17 players remaining. at that point i was able to more than double up when a shortstack shoved 185k at 15-30k blinds from utg. as the action folded around i peeked at one hole card which was a 6. another woman in late position decided to push for her last 150k as well. i had 335k in my stack and told myself that if i found another 6 i would call as i was getting the chance to more than double up while only risking approximately half of my stack. it felt like both the other players had big cards and were likely sharing an ace. sure enough i found another 6 and made the call. my read was spot-on as the utg shover showed aq and the woman showed aj. the flop was kjx. i felt strangely confident i was still winning the pot for some reason. that reason became clear when a 6 rolled of the deck on the turn. the river was not a 10, and suddenly i had over 700k and an above average stack for the first time since moses sported a finely trimmed goatee.

unfortunately for muggins i didn't get to keep my freshly baked biscuits for long. an orbit later i was in the big blind when it folded around to the button. i had seen this player shove very light in late position and the blinds when he had a shortish stack at the previous table. the blinds were still 15-30k and they were going to 20-40 within a few minutes. my 700+k stack was ok with 15 players left, but i definitely need to pick up some more chips to be able to play my game at the final table. anyway, the button shoved 345k and i looked down at AT off. i quickly made the call and the button showed me J9. the flop was clean, the turn was clean, the river was one that cocksucker the J. i was back to being crippled (well hobbled anyway) with about 10 big blinds. the blinds promptly went up to 40k and with about 350k, it was looking bleak for our hero.

i hung in however, and shoved about 3 times every 2 orbits at the short-handed table and was never called. eventually the guy who doubled through me with the J9 lost a big race and we were down to the final 10. we were at the final table. well physically anyway. most poker tournaments have a flat payout structure between 10th and 12th place. so even though we were down to 1 table, the pay-jumps would not start until the 10th player busted.

i brought just over 400k to the final table. the dealer high-carded for the button and i was unlucky enough to start as the big blind. the first hand of the FT was dealt and it was folded around to one of the chipleaders in the cutoff. he opened to 110k. i looked down at A8o in the bb and decided to go with it. i shoved my 400k. amazingly, he tanked and folded even though he had about 1.5 million and was getting a disgusting price. nice. i was up to 500k and change. the next hand is folded around to a bad player in late position who also opened for 110k. he seemed weak, so i decided to shove from the sb with Ah9h. he tanked and foolishly called off the additional 400k from his approx. 1.2 million stack. i tabled my hand and his shoulders slumped as he tabled A8o. the dealer spread the flop and it was 865 with one heart. i got outflopped but had some outs. unfortunately those little bastards didn't come through for me and i was out in 10th place. $2770 for 10th place stung like a ball-peen hammer blow to the left nut when 1st was going to be paid $65k. if i won my final hand i would have been right in the middle of the pack in chips and in outstanding shape to chop the tourney for $25k or more.

anyway, i've got to hit the rollaway sack as there are battles to be fought again tomorrow. i'll try to get another blog up in a day or two.

btw... congratulations to two of my friends named Steven who made WSOP final tables this week. steve burkholder (UFman2, PiKappRaider) took 2nd in the $1500 PLO event for close to $200k and steve karp took 2nd in the $1500 NLHE for over $440k. well played sirs.

vegas diary night 2

got in at suppertime last night.

did i just say supper?

anyway... had an uneventful night last night. tucked myself in at about 11pm. necked a sleeping pill. woke up, decided not to brush my teeth. the goal was to go to the gym and run 5 miles. 1.5 miles later i realized that nobody was counting. i pumped a tiny bit of iron and returned to my room for a toothscrubbing and a shower. i was going to play the caesars 1k event. i slipped into my seat 12 minutes into the first level.

i played some hands and folded some others. suddenly it was dinner break. i stuck with the clean living theme and had stirfried veggies for dinner.

several hours later there were 10 players left and i was semidrunk. i have 213k with 40 minutes left at 6-12k blinds. the average is about 340k. play resumes at 2pm. i got my work cut out for me. i think i just heard some wild catholic school girls in the hall.

gnight. hopefully i report back with some good news tommorrow.

vegas bound

the world series starts this week, and my flight out to vegas is on wednesday. i'd like to give regular (possibly daily) updates throughout the summer.

its become clear that catching up on the past 2 months of travel, poker, and assorted shenanigans is never going to happen in this here blogspace. you're just going to have to trust me when i tell you its been only mildly interesting. i made a few final tables in events with small fields and made (4-figure!) scores but have definitely lost money overall on the live circuit in april and may. i played a pretty high volume of online MTTs (especially during the FTOPS) and have struggled mightily. i made my first online final table in months a few nights ago. the whole quitting drinking thing didn't really pan out. i have not been drinking as often... but when i do its still anybody's guess whether i'm going to behave like a perfect gentleman or a wild-eyed hellspawn. the smart money is generally on the latter. hopefully i can keep muggins hyde under wraps this summer.

anyway... i'm excited and a little nervous about the wsop. this will be the first summer in vegas playing live tournaments fulltime. i'm fortunate that i have backers that are confident enough in my game to put me in a high volume of tournaments. its a tremendous opportunity to hit a huge score for life altering money. realistically, however, most players lose a nice chunk of change across the nearly two months of tournaments. there is a high probability of returning home with my tail between my legs, buried in the red.

fuck probability. i'm ready to get after it.

signs of life... tying up loose ends from months back

hello again my chickadees.

very little has happened since my last post.

errr... that's not entirely (or even remotely) accurate. i've been pretty busy and my dainty little typing fingers have been very, very lazy. considering my last post was close to two months ago i'll try to give a recap of march and april as briefly as possible. unfortunately, brevity's never been one of my strong suits.

Caesars AC

when i last posted i was at caesars in AC for some WSOP Circuit events. after bubbling a few of the prelim events, i made a deep run in the caesars 1k event. i made the final table with slightly below average chips, but picked up some big hands, won a rare 30/70 for about 1/3 of my chips, and steadily chipped up in mostly risk-free fashion. when we got 5-handed, i believe i was 2nd or 3rd in chips but the stacks were all fairly even . the blinds were quickly escalating and the prize distribution was even more top-heavy than usual. it broke down as follows:

1st $96,100
2nd 49,600
3rd 24,800
4th 21,700
5th 18,600

as you can see there was an enormous disparity between 1st and 5th-place money, and a much larger than usual gap between 1st and 3rd-place money. normally this would be a good time to start discussing a chop or payout redistribution. however, chris reslock was one of the remaining players and he never makes deals. so we played on. another level passed.

i believe we were a little more than halfway through the 12-24k blind level when reslock busted in 5th place. at this point i was 2nd in chips. in retrospect i should have brought up the idea of a deal right then. the chipleader was an amateurish player from montreal that spoke very little english. i wasn't certain he was going to understand talk of a deal. the kid who was the shortstack at the time did not seem terribly experienced either. the other player was frank calo, a 21-yr old internet player that played a hyper-aggressive style (Frankthetank on FTP and Rainetech on Stars). Frank was definitely my biggest threat at the table.

right before a break in play, i raised with KQo on the button, and frank shoved on me after a short time in the tank. he had reraise-shoved countless times at the FT and i knew his range in this spot was immensely wider than most players in this spot. i had him covered by approximately 100k (the stacks were something like 500k to 400k at the start of the hand if i remember correctly). my gut told me that i had the best hand. but the idea of a deal still had not been introduced and i didn't want to get crippled if my read was inaccurate or i got sucked out on. i couldn't pull the trigger. i folded and we went on the break.

i talked to one of my backers who thought maybe i should wait out the shortstack before discussing a chop. we resumed play at 15-30k blinds. frank shoved from the SB the first hand back. the shortstack called from the BB and showed 77. frank sheepishly tabled 92 offsuit. but the flop contained a 9 and we were down to 3. unfortunately, the last 2 pots had made frank pretty even with the chipleader and gave both of them a decided edge (over 2-1) on muggins. at this point i felt like i needed to double up before discussing a chop. unfortunately, i ran aj into frank's aq a few hands later and was out in third place. i was very disappointed in myself. i played great throughout the event but somehow a cat got my tongue (for once in my life) at the worst time and i left alot of money on the table. i read the tournament recap after the fact and discovered that the french canadian guy had won his entry into the tourney through a recreational poker league in quebec and had qualified for this event for a whopping total of $2. i also learned that Frank was 21 and it was one of his first live cashes. i'm pretty confident that they would have both been receptive to the idea of a chop. anyway, live and learn.

i ended up playing the $5k main event at Caesars as well. i started out extremely card-dead in this event and watched my 20k starting stack dwindle to around 10k. however, i went on a nice rush of cards midway through the first day and was able to steadily build to close to 100k at a pretty tough table. the epic syracuse vs uconn 6-overtime thriller was played that night, and as at least one of my eyes was focused on the television at all times, i played tight and solid and actively tried to avoid confrontations. i finished the day with 98k which was good for about 15th position with around 50 players remaining from the starting field of 208.

i was pretty wound up after the first day of the event and as i wasn't drinking at that time, i wasn't sure i was going to be able to fall asleep that night. a friend gave me a xanax and it put me right out. unfortunately i woke up the next morning only minutes before the start of the day and i was still pretty groggy. i made it to my new table in time for the first hand but was definitely rough around the edges. my boy mike leah was a few spots to my right and with about 50k in his stack and the blinds at 1200-2400 he opened to 5k in late position. i looked down at 1010 in the BB, and made it 20k to go, pot-committing myself in the process. mike shoved and i was forced to call, even though i was pretty certain that i am never ahead in this spot. AK is a big enough part of his range and my preflop raise precluded any guesswork. much to my chagrin he showed jj, which held and i lost more than half my stack.

shortly thereafter i was on the button with a6 offsuit. bill gazes was in the sb and beth shak was in the bb. my memory is a little cloudy but i believe i had about 45k, bill had around 32k and beth had around 25k. as i mentioned before i woke up groggy and still hadn't fully shaken off the cobwebs at this point. i looked down at A6 and decided to raise. already this is a mistake, as i believe this is a shove or fold situation based on stacksizes and blind level. my second mistake came when i tried to make it 7k, but accidentally threw out an extra 5-k chip so i made it 12k. gazes quickly shoved his remaining chips. if i made it 7k as intended, i could now fold, but once i made it 12k i was getting way too good a price to fold. i called and bill showed me a8. it was a pretty bold reshove but he did in fact have the best hand. the board rolled out 779. the turn was a 9. sweet! a chop! but then the river was a dreaded 8. puke. i was now crippled.

a few hands later i shoved my remaining 12k with a4o and was called by alex bolotin with j8. i flopped an ace and doubled up. i then shoved approximately 28k utg with 88 and beth shak called off her remaining 20k or so with A10. she flopped a 10 but i flopped an 8 and i busted her. i picked up one or two sets of blinds and then my table broke and i was moved to a new one with 70k or so in my stack. i didn't see a remotely playable hand the entire next level (1500-3K) and bled all the way down to 40k. we went on a break and were down to the final 36 players with 27 places paid.

we came back to 2k-4k blinds. i shoved all-in the first two hands and won the blinds uncontested. my stack grew to 50K+. i folded my big blind. the next hand, igor borukkov, a little russian hothead from new york raised to 10k in late position. he had a 250k+ stack. i looked down at 66 in the small blind. i sensed zero strength from igor, but knew he would call me pretty light because he was stubborn and hated to fold. i decided to go with the hand and shoved. he tanked for a few minutes and then called me with the Q10 offsuit. the door card was a glorious 6, but i still couldn't breathe easy as the entire flop read 6KJ leaving him drawing very live. the turn was clean, but the river was a filthy Ace, filling his straight. winning that pot would have nearly ensured me of a cash, and given me a fighting chance to final table the tourney. i finished only 6 or 7 spots from the money, the closest that i've ever come to cashing in a 5 or 10k event. my friends matt brady, jason young, david zeitlin, and frank vizza all final tabled the tournament, but all fell short of the big money. vizza had the best showing and finished in 3rd.

i was going to try to get all the way caught up to the present with this blog post, but i realize that my oral diarrhea makes that incredibly difficult. so i'll go ahead and publish this installment and hopefully complete the remaining posts by the end of this week before i hit the road again.

on the wagon?

i had a really rough couple of nights in a row (ie bender) and have to decided to give staying off the sauce entirely another go. i keep coming dangerously close to getting my ass kicked or arrested or worse because of my drunken bufoonery. if anyone sees me drinking please give me shit about it .

mohegan recap... crime and punishment aint got shit on this lengthy post

on thursday morning ronNasty, hounddog (chris lindh), and ol muggins here dragged ourselves out of bed at the crack of ass and cruised from foxwoods to mohegan sun in the nastymobile for a $550 satellite. one in five players would win seats to the main event and they got about 70 players for 14 seats. i chipped up a little bit right out of the gate and was able to maintain a reasonable satellite stack the entire way to locking up a seat. ronnie also secured a seat, although he had to stress a short stack for much of the tourney and won a 30%-70% and a 20%-80% for all his chips. hounddog unsuprisingly gunned in his biscuits and was out in the early levels.

after the satellite we went to this mexican joint at mohegan, soltoro. we chowed some tacos and sipped some delicious margaritas. we all had a nice tequila buzz on the way back to the 'woods. my plan was to have perhaps one more drink and then drift off to sleep early. i was still a little under the weather, was overtired and had to play a full day of tournament poker the next day. however, the boys dragged my ass down to the treehouse, which is the kiddie arcade at foxwoods. we played some big buck hunter, but the real highlight of the arcade was the incredible teamwork on display that evening. nasty, hounddog, and i generated enough tickets playing carnival-style games at the arcade to purchase the priceless monkey light seen above.

after the arcade we went with frankie flowers and a few other heads to the local townie bar where we had some jagerbombs and watched some lesbians and other assorted riff raff ride the bar's mechanical bull. the dude running the mechanical bull kept telling us how easy it to conquer the might beast. he claimed to be a real life rodeo cowboy and sported a ten gallon hat and a fresh new eyepatch. i couldn't make shit up like that if i tried. anyway, bars close at 1am in the CT so we were back at the 'woods at a reasonable hour and i was in bed sleeping by 2.

friday morning i cabbed it over to mohegan sun. we would be staying at the sun the next few nights but since ronnie wasn't playing the main until saturday and had played cash till the wee hours of the morning, he was not terribly gungho about driving muggo here to mohegan at 10am.
i arrived toward the end of the 1st level. the tournament started you with 40k stacks and 45 minute levels. the structure was nice and slow and didn't skip any of the early levels. we were scheduled to play 10 levels on day 1. 60 players started the day, and the recognizable faces were few and far between. this definitely looked like the softest field you could find in a $2500 event anywhere. i got off to a bit of a rough start and was down to 30k after a few levels. initially i played similarly to the way i had in the borgata main event: i was involved in too many pots and i was playing passively. however, i got my head together and started chipping up with some selective aggression. my stack never dipped below 35k or above 45k for much of the day.

i finally won a big pot in level 9. at 500-1k blinds i opened in early position to 2800. ross santos, a solid local cash game player, called me from the small blind and we saw a flop heads-up. the flop was ak10 rainbow, and ross led out with a 6k bet into a pot of about 7k. i started the hand with about 44k. there was no way i was folding my hand at this point, but if i raised here i would basically commit the rest of my stack with what very likely might be the worst hand. so i elected to call in position and see how ross would proceed. well the turn was beautiful jack, completing the rainbow board. ross led out 15k, and i quickly shoved my remaining 35k assuming that we were likely chopping the pot. ross looked disgusted and folded after about 30 seconds of deliberation. i assume he had 2 pair, and was upset with himself for betting the turn. so that was my only real pot of the day, and i basically folded my way to the end of the day and bagged 63k. 60 players started day 1a and 23 remained for an average stack of around 95k. i was well below average but would be coming into day 2 with a very comfortable 40bb stack.

there were two day 1s for the tournament so i had a day off to rest up before getting back to work. my girl luciana came up to mohegan on saturday. we had a nice relaxing day. we got drinks and lobster at the bar at the summer shack and then lounged in the hottub that evening. the whole gang went to ultra 88 (mohegan's nightclub) that night. not a huge fan of that club but i overall it was fun night and i was pretty focused and eager to get back to the felt the next day.

i dragged myself down to the tournament room once again on saturday for the 10am start time. the tournament levels for day 2 had increased from 45 minutes to 1 hour. joeytheb was at my starting table, as was jeff king, who i played with for several hours on day 1 and was very impressed by his play. i increased my stack to about 77k over the first 2 levels by winning a few small pots and stealing the blinds and antes.

my first crucial hand of the tournament unfolded as follows: at 1200-2400 blinds it was folded to me in the small blind and i completed with J9o. the big blind, an older guy with lots of chips and a penchant for overplaying the shit out of mediocre hand checked his bb. the flop rolled out K99 rainbow. i checked, he checked. the turn was the Qh, putting two hearts on the board. i bet 4200, and the old guy made it 15k. i had about 65-70k behind. i considered my options. folding was clearly not one of them. i was willing to go broke on this hand. my hand crushed his raising range here. based on other hands i had witnessed, this guy was not a big fan of folding, but shoving might kill any further action. i decided to reraise to 42k total and go with the hand regardless of the river card. the old guy called, and the river paired the k, which was definitely one of the worst cards in the deck. however, i didn't reraise most of my stack on the turn to fold now, so i bit my tongue and shoved it in. the old guy shook his head for about 30 seconds, much to my delight, and then called my all in. i proudly showed 9s full and his cards sailed into the muck as he muttered something about having a queen. thank you sir. thank you for stinking at poker.

my stack was now around 160k, which put me above average for the first time in the event. 15 places were being paid and there were about 30 players remaining of the 104 entrants. at this point i decided to unleash some relentless aggression. i began opening about 30-40% of pots and reraising in spots where i sensed weakness. there were many amateur players left in the field and nobody wanted to play back at me. the pace of play stagnated when there were 22 left, which worked out well for me as i continued to grow my stack while others were worried about bubbling. we finally got into the money with the blinds at 3-6k. at this point i had about a 400k stack. most of the good players remaining in the field were at my table with 13 players remaining. matt castarella was to my direct right and a good young player named bobby was two to my right. it was folded to bobby on the button when the following hand occured.

bobby limped the button. he had a very similar stack to mine. he had been playing pretty aggressively, but had played a little bit trappy at times and had limped in late position a few times before. i had reraised his open from the blinds at least twice before, so i think he was a little gunshy about opening light. so he limped, matt completed from the small blind (sitting on about a 275k stack), and i looked down at 99 in the big blind. i raised, making it 41k straight. bobby called after some deliberation and matt folded. the flop came 772 with two of a suit. i bet 65k and bobby went into the tank. he seemed a little torn about how to proceed but i sensed strength and he never really looked like he wanted to fold. he called after about a minute. i thought there was a strong possibility he had limped a big pair on the button or had flopped trip 7s. this kid was good enough to be floating me here with air as well, but regardless i was not loving the spot i was in when he called. the spot improved dramatically when a nice crisp 9-ball rolled off on the turn. ollll muggins! i considered leading for a minute, but didn't want to shake him just in case he had been floating the flop. also, with our stacks, i thought it would be very tough for him to bet the turn and and not go all the way with the hand. so i checked, and he bet out 85k, leaving himself about 200k behind. i check raised, putting 100k on top. he quickly shoved, and i snapped. he showed me the 78ss and i faded the one out and was now top two in chips with 12 left. we were down to the final 10-handed table by the end of the next level, which also happened to be the dinner break.

i was 2nd in chips at the beginning of the final table. as previously mentioned, the field was very soft overall, and the final table was pretty reflective of that. several of the better players in the field were still alive with two tables left but failed to make the final 10. JoeytheB was the only top player in the final 10 and he was one of the shortest stacks. the chip leader was this guy tim griffin who said that this was only his second live tournament and it showed in the way he handled his chips and some of the ridiculous lines he took in hands. i really liked my chances to take this thing down.

with that said... the wheels came flying off as soon as we got back from dinner. twice i raised the cutoff or button pretty light and got shoved on and folded. then at 6k 12k blinds i opened 77 in early position and the woman lynn shoved on me. i was getting slightly better than 1.5 to 1 and if i called and lost i would still have over 500k and be top 3 in chips. i could also tell she wasn't in love with her hand. unfortunately, she was only in love with kings or better and when i called she showed me 1010. a few hands later, bob lauria opened for 32k utg. i reraised utg+2 with jj and the chip leader tim instashoved. bob folded and i clearly folded, throwing the jj face up in disgust. i raised my next button with a suited kk and got shoved on again. all of a sudden my 800k stack was about 350k. i was one of the shorter stacks and was in danger of going out in tenth place. joeytheb unfortunately beat me to the punch. he busted tenth when his ak couldn't outrace lynn's qq.

the blinds went up to 8-16 and i lost another frustrating pot blind vs blind vs al cammorata. i was all the way down to around 200k when i was able to win two pots in a row. the first pot i took the blinds uncontested and the 2nd i opened kq and got called by lynn from the blind. the flop came qjx and she checked i bet about half my stack, clearly committed to going all the way with the hand. lynn tanked folded aj. my stack was back to around 350k. just a couple hands later al opened utg. i looked down at jj and realized i was going to have to tie my tournament life to the johnnies. i reraised his 40k open to 130k. it folded back to al. he looked torn. he asked me if we were racing, if i had aq. he continued to look stressed. then he shoved. it crossed my mind that he was hollywooding with a monster. he had me covered by about 100k or so. but i didn't reraise with jj to fold now. i called and he showed me 99. jj held up. al busted the next hand.

i remained really active the next level or so. i traded some pots and maintained my stack by busting 2 of the 3 shortstacks. when we got down to five players, i made an ill-fated attempt to squeeze the kid tim's utg raise and passive patty's call with a10. i elected to fold after putting over 30% of my stack in the middle. nothing was coming easy. i played my ass off the whole day leading up to the ft but was having a pretty tough time holding on to my hard earned barrell of biscuits.

then this pretty interesting pot came up. with a 450k stack i raised to 55k with at 10-20 k10h in the cutoff, tim called from the sb. i visualized a beautiful flop and whaddayaknow the cards rolled off qh10d9h. this kid had minraised several flops when he had a marginal holding as a tester of sorts, and he was wearing his cards on his face everytime. after he checked this flop i decided to lead weak with 69k, hoping he would minraise and i could stuff the biscotti in his eyeball. well that plan became an impossibility when he just called.

the turn came an offsuit k and he now shoved. i had top two and a straight flush draw on a 4-liner board and didn't love it but never considered folding. i called and he was generous enough to show me 109. i faded the two-outer and was back in bidness.

the kid aaron who was sitting to my left busted a few hands later. i thougt he played very well and battled with a short-ish stack the whole final table. the other player who's play impressed me at the final table was ross santos. ross came into the ft as one of the middle stacks and quickly took control of the table. he made some power moves when he sensed weakness and was top 2 in chips for several levels. four handed the stacks looked like this:

Timothy Griffin - 1,500,000

Ross Santos - 1,440,000

Theodore Ely - 800,000

Lynne Mitchnick - 483,000

ross and i are friends and respect each others' play so weren't going to going out of our way to butt heads. i envisioned grinding out the tight old woman Lynn on the shortstack, and then starting to talk with the other two about some sort of deal. unfortunately for ross, he didn't get that chance to take part in any dealmaking. just minutes later he was suddenly out in fourth place courteousy of one of the dirtiest live tournament poker beats i've ever seen. it was folded to tim in the sb, he raised, ross called. the flop came j22 while tim clumsily pondered his next move, ross winked at me. tim decided his best course of action was to announce an all-in shove of 1.4 million into a pot of about 150k. ross instacalled and popped out of his chair, tabling the k2c. tim dejectedly exposed 99. i had a sick feeling that turned out to be well-justified when the 9 crept out of the deck on the turn, no waiting. ross's stack was decimated and he busted the next hand. i was geninunely said for the kid... he played very well and deserved better than 19k for 4th.

tim had all the biscuits in the room, but i was still solid in 2nd position. now all i needed was for lynn to bust and i felt like i could weasel my way into locking up 50K+. she was stubborn though and decided to win a race against tim with a10 vs 88. we had a break in play, and the stacks looked like this.

Timothy Griffin - 2,545,000

Theodore Ely - 805,000

Lynne Mitchnick - 785,000

it seemed like the right time to make a deal. i thought a prize-pool redistribution and a continuation in play was in my best interest. the payouts were scheduled to be:

1st - $77,752
2nd - $39,818
3rd - $28,273

lynn and my stacks were nearly identical and i don't think she was going to be that receptive to giving me a significantly bigger share of the loot. i proposed that we each lock up 40k and play for the rest. lynn quickly accepted (obv). tim accepted the deal after making a dumb face and scratching his head for a minute or two. as i mentioned he was pretty wet behind ears and didn't really know that he should be guaranteeing himself more money and/or putting a stop to play at this point. i had a godzilla sized skill advantage on the two of them and figured i could a)remain afloat in hopes of getting headsup and making a further deal, or b)double up and try to win the 25+k we were still playing for.

well, tim played aces like some sort of idiot savant soon after we got back from break. i raised pre from the button, i flatted from the bb with k7hh . the flop came q108 with two diamonds and it went check check. i led 115k on the offusit 7 turn and he flat-called. the river came an offsuit 9. i checked, he made an awful constipated face for a few minutes and then bet 200k. i could tell his discomfort was genuine and he did not have the straight. for some reason i decided that was reason enough to call with bottom pair on q10879 board. he showed me aces. oh. aces. yeah... those are good. i'm pretty sure he thought he was bluffing on the end-- as it turned out he was taking me on a tour of every street in value town. now i had about 12 bbs and was somewhat resigned to finishing in 3rd place.

then, within the next few hands, tim busted lynn. he raised from the small blind with k6 and she called from the big blind with kj. the flop was k76. he check called her flop bet, and after the turn bricked he check called her shove. the river was clean and i was now heads-up. unfortunately for team muggins i was at about a 12-1 chip disadvantage. i had a shoving stack and he had well over a hundred bbs. skill meant very little at this stage as he could safely double me up multiple times without jeapordizing the chip lead. this is where the real skill came into play. i immediately offered to lock up 7k for 2nd and give him the other 18+ of the 25 we we were playing for. a familiar look came across his face as thoughtfully stroked his chin. again he accepted the deal. obviously i wanted to take down my first live tourney and make more than 47k, but considering how rough things went for me at the final table, i feel like i negotiated masterfully. i certainly negotiated a lot better than i played.

so i've taken a little time off from live poker (not to mention taken my sweet-ass time getting this blog posted). i feel like i've gotten the monkey off my back with this score and am confident that this is just the beginning of a successful year. caesars AC is next. i'll be there by the middle of next week. i'm pretty much going to be living in hotels the rest of the winter/spring. i'm moving my shit out of my apartment in brooklyn this weekend and truckin it back to my parents' crib in jersey. the plan is to buy a car in the next few days. i'll be in ac for most of march and then its back to foxwoods for their spring series.

hopefully i'll have enough of a roll built up to afford my laserbeam eyes by the time i move to vegas in may.