1:17pm: Last night was an interesting night, and serves to show that even if you run bad in the small hands, as long as you run good in the big hands you can still turn a decent profit. I was telling my friend Joe, who was sitting next to me in the 2 seat, that last night was as bad of a run with cards preflop as I have ever seen. I couldn’t recall a single night where I picked up 10x (where x < 7) so many times. It seemed like an endless string of 10 4 off, 10 6 off, and 10 2 off. Even when I picked up hands like KQ, QJ, KJ, and J10, the board still held nothing interesting for me — absolutely no draws or pairs. On top of that, every time I was dealt a pocket pair, I missed my set and the board was to high and I had to abandon the hand.

That is, until this hand: I picked up 99 in middle position. I decided to call because I knew someone was going to raise. I was right, as someone on tilt tried to “sweeten the pot” by making it $15 to go preflop, and was called by 7 people. When the action is on me, I contemplated trying to take the pot down right there with a huge raise, however I decided that I was probably going to get called in more than one spot (as everyone in New Orleans loves to gamble), and I didn’t want to make things tough on myself if the board wasn’t to my liking. Consequently, I decided to just call and set mine, or if the board came low I would lead out/raise strong on the flop.

The flop: 9h8s4h

Needless to say, my hand at this point is the nuts. The odds of someone not having flopped a flush draw with this many people in the hand was slim, so I knew I was going to have to play this hand strong and make people pay to draw. The small blind leads out for $60. Everyone folds to me, and I make it $160 to go. The guy who initially raised, who I’m sort of friends with (but not close) goes all in for about $535 and is visibly aggravated with the way his night is going, so I put him on some sort of flush draw or straight draw. The guy who initially led out for $60 thinks about calling for a good 2 minutes, but then decides to fold. Right before I called, the guy that I knew told me, “I got the last thing you wanna see if you have a set”, so I knew I was going to have to dodge some bullets. He said he had a combination straight/flush draw.

The turn was a complete dagger: Kh. When it hit, he was like “you’re behind now.”

Although he hadn’t turned his hand over yet, I knew he was good on his word, and I knew the board had to pair for me to win the hand. Much to my delight, the river was a 4 and I breathed a sigh of relief and dragged a pretty sizable pot. After counting my chips, this hand had put me up $400.

This hand was followed by about 3 more hours of being card dead, and was slowly dwindled down to -$50 from +$400. Then, in middle position with a straddle on the board, I picked up AA. 3 people called, and when the action was on me I made it $50 to go. 2 people called, including the tightest old man at the table - who had about $500 in front of him to start the hand. When he called, I immediately put him on JJ because I felt like he would have re-raised me with QQ or KK to find out where he was at because he knows I play solid. The other guy that called was $3,000 deep and had me covered by a good bit. For the duration of the hand, I would be in the middle of these two guys, which doesn’t make my situation any easier.

The flop: 10c8h10s

The really tight man leads out for 150, which was actually ideally what I wanted to happen. This spot is a little tricky, but actually kind of plays itself if you’ve got your thinking cap on. A lot of people would make the mistake of raising here. I call it a mistake because if I raise, and the deep stacked guy that is left to act after me caught a 10 OR if he just felt like making a strong move to take the hand down, there’s no way I can felt this hand for my whole stack ($1,200). Being as such, I decided to just smooth call and see what the deep stack did, hoping for a fold and to be heads up with the man who I knew had a pair lower than mine. The guy to act after me decides to fold, and now I’m heads up with Mr. tighty.

The turn is 3d, and once again the man leads out for 150. At this point, I figured the money is getting in regardless, so I figured I might as well let him do the betting, and if the man decides to check the river, i was going to put him all in.

The river is another blank: 5s. The man goes all in for his remaining $250. I call instantly, and the man flips over QQ and I drag the pot. A few hands later I decided to call it a night, and finished +$550 on the day.