Shootout Final (Part 1)
The best way I can think of to talk about the final is to go through the players, and talk about various hands and impressions as and when. So, in reverse order :
Rayvenia Puckett (8th) : Basically a local amateur who had given the tournament a spin. However, she was much, much better than you would have thought from first impressions. Given the structure of the tournament (which was awesome), anyone would have to have been extraordinarily lucky to reach the final without being at least competent, and she certainly was that. However, she probably was the weakest link in truth. She had Kings cracked by Ram's rivered flush, and then Kings lost to Noyan's Aces. Those two hands seemed to affect her quite badly and the rest of the table smelled blood in the water at that point. I did feel sorry for her because the one thing that was totally FUBAR about this tournament was the payout structure. Everyone who won the first round made $6500, which was far too much, while 7th and 8th made $12K and $9K respectively, which was nowhere near enough. It was pretty weak that Rayvenia only made another $3K for winning what was probably a very tough second round table over at least 8 hours play.
David Baker (7th) : Lost a couple of big pots early on, once when Ram turned a gutshot straight. I did think at the time that Ram was dangerous enough without hitting draws on people. David was on a short stack for ages and I thought he didn't play it all that well. He didn't seem to open-raise enough, and was mostly putting his chips in calling, even 3-handed. However, he kept escaping again and again and again. By this time I had been chipped down to 200K (partly by Baker with 88 against my AK) and the prospect of 7th place for a bag of rice $12K was weighing on my mind. Eventually I took him out myself with AQ v Q9 on a queen high flop. Everyone except David was probably pleased, not just for the payout jump but because it meant Greg "FBT" Mueller stopped calling the play :-)
Sondre Sagstuen (6th) : Had an awesome "bad guy in Casino Royale" look. However, he did seem to have some weaknesses. Warren, who was sweating most of the game, was quite critical of his play but that seemed harsh. He did, however, have a spell where he was caught bluffing too much and I think he overpaid me in a hand just after Baker was knocked out when I found Aces (just in time !). That knocked him down to the short stack, and when he raised my blind with only a few chips behind I thought I would take a shot at busting him with 64o. The flop came Q53, monster, I check-raised and he dwelled right up for his last 4 chips (which was the raise plus one chip). He made a very reluctant call with T7hh (one heart on the flop), and I rivered a 6.
Ishak "The Butcher" Noyan (5th) : This was the guy who knocked me out of the PLHE with AKs against my QQ. I thought he played much like I did to be honest, tight but very aggressively when he did play. Unfortunately his rush came too soon, when the limits were quite small, and he couldn't accumulate enough chips to really get going.
Rayvenia Puckett (8th) : Basically a local amateur who had given the tournament a spin. However, she was much, much better than you would have thought from first impressions. Given the structure of the tournament (which was awesome), anyone would have to have been extraordinarily lucky to reach the final without being at least competent, and she certainly was that. However, she probably was the weakest link in truth. She had Kings cracked by Ram's rivered flush, and then Kings lost to Noyan's Aces. Those two hands seemed to affect her quite badly and the rest of the table smelled blood in the water at that point. I did feel sorry for her because the one thing that was totally FUBAR about this tournament was the payout structure. Everyone who won the first round made $6500, which was far too much, while 7th and 8th made $12K and $9K respectively, which was nowhere near enough. It was pretty weak that Rayvenia only made another $3K for winning what was probably a very tough second round table over at least 8 hours play.
David Baker (7th) : Lost a couple of big pots early on, once when Ram turned a gutshot straight. I did think at the time that Ram was dangerous enough without hitting draws on people. David was on a short stack for ages and I thought he didn't play it all that well. He didn't seem to open-raise enough, and was mostly putting his chips in calling, even 3-handed. However, he kept escaping again and again and again. By this time I had been chipped down to 200K (partly by Baker with 88 against my AK) and the prospect of 7th place for a bag of rice $12K was weighing on my mind. Eventually I took him out myself with AQ v Q9 on a queen high flop. Everyone except David was probably pleased, not just for the payout jump but because it meant Greg "FBT" Mueller stopped calling the play :-)
Sondre Sagstuen (6th) : Had an awesome "bad guy in Casino Royale" look. However, he did seem to have some weaknesses. Warren, who was sweating most of the game, was quite critical of his play but that seemed harsh. He did, however, have a spell where he was caught bluffing too much and I think he overpaid me in a hand just after Baker was knocked out when I found Aces (just in time !). That knocked him down to the short stack, and when he raised my blind with only a few chips behind I thought I would take a shot at busting him with 64o. The flop came Q53, monster, I check-raised and he dwelled right up for his last 4 chips (which was the raise plus one chip). He made a very reluctant call with T7hh (one heart on the flop), and I rivered a 6.
Ishak "The Butcher" Noyan (5th) : This was the guy who knocked me out of the PLHE with AKs against my QQ. I thought he played much like I did to be honest, tight but very aggressively when he did play. Unfortunately his rush came too soon, when the limits were quite small, and he couldn't accumulate enough chips to really get going.
1 Comments:
Pahhh. Never mind all this. How about updating the football blog?
Dom
ps congrats obv.
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