An old-fashioned Mookie + Dookie recap

It's been a really really long time since I've done a bloggament recap. So why not two for the price of one, seeing as how I made the final table in both?

The Dookie was a PLO8 tournament. PLO8 is pretty much my favourite poker variant of them all, and I like to think I am pretty solid with the fundamentals of this game. Many people are not. So I was sailing along in a commanding position, chip-leader with six left, and ultimately decided to put maximum pressure on the villain whom I barely had covered, with a premium hand: Kh Ad 2c 3d. He opted to put 7000 tournament chips in with Ah 2s 3c 2h (!) ... and a measly pair of deuces held up in a pretty sick spot:



Needless to say, I think the villain should never get it in here.

I wasn't too unhappy because I was making a run in the Mookie and was trying to focus on being a short-stack ninja as we reached the final nine and the final table (which was also the cash bubble). In the previous BBT series (2-4) I have managed to win this tournament for a ToC seat, but so far in BBT5 I have only played one Mookie and didn't get anywhere. This time, I swore it would be different.

Things got off to a good start as I got some revenge on JuliusGoat, when he 4-bet jammed with QQ and ran into a bigger pair:



Then I folded, folded, folded, and folded some more. Card death was rampant. I won the occasional pot to stay at around 5K in chips for a very long time.

Then I opened in early position with sevens and folded to a button re-raise by a player whom I know doesn't ever fold to a 4-bet.

The very next hand, I was able to squeeze in the big blind against three opponents with pocket tens. Given my image, I probably would have tried this with any two cards.

Shortly after this I was dealt three good hands in succession, and lost 1K in chips since I don't like to overplay AK or AQ unimproved ... this put me back down to 4K in chips, and I was struggling to maintain an average chip stack. I refused to panic, however, since I still had plenty in relation to the blinds.

Using my tight image, I played some positional poker to get a fold from what was likely a better hand than mine:



The very next hand I was dealt tens again and 3-bet to bring my stack up 6K without a showdown. I like it when my raises get respect.

I went back to folding for multiple orbits.

As the antes kicked in, I won the blinds a couple of times with AK.

I was able to win a bigger pot, without having to go to showdown, with the reliable jack-ace:



I 3-bet light on the button and folded to a 4-bet, tumbling back down to 4500 in chips.

I had my one big suckout of the tourney right here as a blind steal went wrong. With 1000 out there and a stack just over 4000 behind I open-shoved A2 on the button to pick up the pot. Of course, I got out of jail against a big pair:



As the blinds and antes increased, I was able to take them down uncontested again with AK two more times, and then my pocket jacks held vs. a short-stacked opponent's eights. I looked up and all of a sudden I had over 15K in chips. I felt like I was Astin for a while.

I folded down to 12.5K and snapped off cmitch's open-shove with the mighty ace-ten (easy call because his range here is really really wide):



Then I was able to win another hand against a short-stack when my eights held up against his early position shove with KJ to climb to 23K in chips as we neared the final table bubble. Sadly, I would climb no higher than this and was forced to fold my way up the ladder for a while.

I ran up against MemphisMojo right on the final table bubble when we were playing five-handed and was forced to lay down a hand when I just didn't think I could get him to fold once he'd led out on a scary flop, since he was representing exactly what I was supposed to have:



Once we reached the final table a player quickly busted out so we were down to eight. I was somehow dealt AK back-to-back and prayed for action on the second hand, but no dice. (Seriously, I must have been dealt AK about six times, and always won the blinds without any action. If I had ever had some other quality hands that I could have opened to appear more active, I'm sure I would have gotten some action. I really felt like I was Astin in disguise.)

Unfortunately, I then had to fold a parade of junk hands for multiple orbits and my tournament came to an abrupt end as I exited in 7th place as I open-shoved 13 bbs from the small blind right into the big blind's pocket jacks. FPT decided to taunt me by giving me eleven outs on the turn, but I didn't get there.

Only three more BBT5 tournaments to go! I hope to give myself at least one more good shot at a ToC seat. Best of luck to everyone in their pursuit of this same goal.