Lost Episode 14: Cashing at Binion's Tourney

This past summer Binion's held an event every day which mirrored the world series events. The day prior to most any event at the Rio, you could play nearly the same structure with half as long blind levels for 1/10th the buy-in. The next day was a $2500 No-Limit Holdem event at the World Series of Poker, so I was pretty certain there would be a big field at Binion's, and when the opportunity arose to early out from work, I high tailed it down to Fremont street and got registered just in time. Just over 500 players started the tournament and my first table was pretty wild. I doubled up when a really bad player pushed into my pocket queens that held up and sort of took it easy through the early levels. After the break I caught a little rush of cards that helped me accumulate some chips, and that helped me get pretty deep. With about 100 players left, I moved to a table and sat down right beside Ellix Powers, who was featured on an ESPN broadcast of a WSOP main event several years back. He had been tangling with the author of Positively Fifth Street, James McManus on a few hands, and then got a involved in a big pot where McManus called him down with nothing. You may remember Ellix Powers shrill exclamation, "He called me with jack high!" Well, Ellix was wearing a t-shirt with that precise statement emblazoned across it. Unfortunately, the t-shirt looked like he had been wearing it for several years and I wondered if he'd had it on since that broadcast.

I felt a bit accomplished when I outlasted Powers, but there were also some other recognizable faces in the crowd. The only name pro that I remember was Susie Isaacs. When we reached the money bubble, I was starting to get pretty small stacked. Enough so, that my all-in moves might not bring any hesitation to the couple of big stacks now at the table. I hung on by the skin of my teeth and watched all-in after all-in for several button passes with no real opportunity of my own. Then, I finally got involved and nearly tripled up on a nice pot and my stack increased to a size that I thought I no longer had to push or fold. With an aggressive big stack on the button, I looked down at pocket kings under the gun. I had been waiting for this hand and had a plan for it before I even saw them. I felt that if I raised under the gun for about 20% of my chips that the big stack might get aggressive and try to push me off the hand. He had seen me lay down a few times much earlier in the tournament when I had enough chips to get away from a raise. Sure enough, everyone folded around to him and he went into a little act about how strong his hand was. He bet enough to put me all-in and I insta-called and stated that I just hoped he didn't have pocket aces. After I tabled my kings, he showed A-10. The flop seemed safe, J-7-2, but an 8 hit the turn and a 9 on the river gave him runner-runner for a J-high straight and I was on the rail. I finished 21st out of 529 and doubled my money. I was happy with my play and getting deep in a big tourney, but I also felt quite empty because I knew I had made a good play and it just didn't work out. Had I doubled through him, I would have been one of the 5 or 6 largest stacks and had a real chance to make some money.