Once more unto the breach, dear friends

I mentioned the other day that I was having ideas of getting myself into Friday's Seniors event at the World Series of Poker. It's my first year of qualifying by age, and I can't think of any better way to celebrate turning 50 than winning the bracelet for which I am now eligible.

So this evening I went to the Rio to see if I could win a seat via a satellite. You have to play a $125 single-table satellite to win a $1000 seat. I had to wait in line for about 45 minutes before getting into one, and then nothing went right for me in it--third one out. Back into the line. I was prepared to take two shots at winning, and if it didn't happen, well, I gave it a try.

On the second time, I actually entered a $175 satellite. The system there has one long line for all satellites of every level. When a table is freed up, they somehow pick one of the buy-in levels, and go through the line offering seats. I had waited about an hour to get near the front of the line, and when they came through saying the next one would be a $175, I decided to jump on it, rather than wait who-knows-how-long for them to offer up a $125 table. Because the prize for the $175 satellite is $1500 in tournament lammers, and I only needed $1000, I also figured that the extra would be a nice bit of cash for me, or, alternatively, I could use it as bargaining leverage if a two-way chop were contemplated. (I.e., if I had the chip lead going into heads-up play, I could offer to take two of the $500 lammers and give the other guy one of them, thus eliminating the risk of ending up with nothing if he accepted the deal.)

But I won the whole thing with no chop.

I got my money in bad only once. With about 10 big blinds left, I open-shoved with Q-10 offsuit, got called by the big blind, who had K-Q. Ouch! But a 10 on the flop ended the matter and knocked him out. Other than that, I never got it in as worse than a coin flip. (I won one race, my A-K against another player's Q-Q, and turned a K.) I was really proud of my play--reading situations exactly right, and shifting gears between aggressive and patient quite well, thankyouverymuch.

Down to three-handed, I had a commanding chip lead--about 75% of all the chips in play. One woman was very short (2 big blinds). I was waiting for her to go out before offering a deal to the other guy, who was hyperaggressive, unpredictable, and very lucky--exactly the kind of player I had in mind when thinking about the offer described above, one who easily could defeat me by being stupid and lucky, leaving me with nothing to show for my work.

But as it turned out, I didn't have to offer anything. The woman shoved her last on the button, and both the other man and I called from the blinds. I had J-8 offsuit. The flop was 10-9-x rainbow, giving me an open-ended straight draw. The other guy pushed in the last of his chips, having hit top pair. It was 1900 to me to call, and I had started the hand with about 7500, with blinds at 200-400. I don't like calling to hit a draw when there are no additional implied odds if I get there. However, with my chip lead I wouldn't be crippled if I called and lost, and if I won, I would score a double elimination and it would, in the immortal words of Scotty Nguyen, "be all over, baby." I called.

BOOM! 7-ball on fourth street locked up my win with the nut straight. The woman had 9-5, and hit her second pair on the river, but it wasn't enough.

The double knockout meant that there was neither opportunity nor need to even talk about some sort of chop of the prize money. I earned $1500 in tournament buy-ins, plus $120 cash, minus the $40 I gave the dealer as a tip. (I have no idea how much of a tip is appropriate here. I'd appreciate comments from my dealer friends. They run these things with one dealer doing the whole satellite start to finish, and this one took about 90 minutes. I hope my stab in the dark at a number was appropriate.)

I went to the registration window and got myself signed up for the event. Noon tomorrow, table Pavilion Yellow 137, Seat 8. I know that several friends and readers are also in it. They had about 3500 players last year, so it's a big one.

Thanks to my pal Eric for railing me most of the way through.

(If the title of this post puzzles you, see here for a little cultural education.)