The Steinhorn Stare

The streak is finally broken!

After missing the money in yesterday’s $2000 no-limit WSOP event, I played and cashed in a non-WSOP event today at the Venetian. As I mentioned in a previous post, the Venetian is running some great events ($10,000 in starting chips, hour rounds), and I decided that despite the glamour of the WSOP, a good tournament structure was more important (today’s $1500 no-limit WSOP event started with only $3000 in chips).

The Venetian event started at noon with about 600 players, and after some strong early play, I ran my $10,000 starting chips to about $35,000. Unfortunately, I was card-dead for the next several hours, and relied on some well-timed bluff reraises to keep my stack between $35-45K for the next 10 hours. At about midnight, we were down to the final 40 players and the money, and I still had my $35K in chips, well below the $120K chip average.

An hour later, I busted in 35th place…good enough to make a couple thousand dollars and break my horrible streak of non-cashes. I certainly would have liked to have gone a bit deeper in this event, but given my lack of cards for the last 10 hours of the day, I’m not complaining.

Tomorrow is another Venetian event, and Monday is the $2500 six-handed no-limit WSOP event.

After winning the $2500 Bellagio Cup III no-limit event, my best friend was back in strong form today for the the $2000 no-limit WSOP event.

The event started with just over 1600 people at noon on Friday, and was down to the final 153 at 1:30am Saturday morning. Ezra and the other 152 remaining players are each guaranteed at least $4000, and play will continue at 3:00pm Saturday. I’ll post an update tomorrow, but here’s hoping that Ezra makes the final table, and takes a shot at the $600,000 first prize!

For those wondering, the streak continues for me as well…after a very good first couple rounds today (tripled my starting chip stack by the second round), I got all my chips in with the best of it, and lost to a two-outer on the river when I was called by ace-high. No complaints though; I played well, had some good reads, and got my chips in with the best hand.

Go Ez!!!

UPDATE: Ezra finished the $2000 no-limit event in 54th place, and made about $11,000. Congratulations again, Ez!!!

Congratulation to my best friend (of 25 years) for winning the $2500 Bellagio Cup III No-Limit Hold’em event that completed today. Ezra started the final table today in seventh place, and after a rough start (he was in last place with 7 players remaining) made a spectacular run to capture a Bellagio gold bracelet and $70,000.

Ezra went into heads-up with a 2:1 chip disadvantage to Rene Angelil (Celine Dion’s husband). As a heads-up specialist (he plays online heads-up “shootouts” about 30 hours a week), Ezra was in strong position to overcome the deficit, and did in just about 45 minutes.

I can’t say I’m not a little jealous that Ezra won a major event before me, but he certainly deserves it…congrats Ez!!!

Wow.

That’s really all there is to say about Harrah’s decision this year to disallow live spectators for the non-televised World Series of Poker final tables. You heard me right — if you’re one of the lucky ones to make a final table at this year’s WSOP, you won’t have your friends and family there to cheer you on, to give you encouragement, and to have the opportunity to possibly see you win a coveted gold bracelet.

Wow.

This year, Harrah’s and Bluff Magazine (the official press outlet for the WSOP) have decided that anyone who wishes to watch a non-televised final table will have to watch on a one-hour taped delay away from the action — this includes both people around the world who have the option of purchasing the event on pay-per-view and people sitting 20 feet from the final table in the Rio poker room, where TVs are set up in the hallways. Curtains now surround the final table area, with the only people getting access during final table action are the players, the staff, and “selected guests” of the players.

I understand offering pay-per-view for those people who love to watch poker, and who unfortunately, don’t have the option of seeing the live action in Vegas. I even understand the one hour taped delay for those watching on TV. But, for those fans who may have travelled across the country (or across the world) to see their favorite players, to possibly see their family members, or to see history made at WSOP final tables, this decision is an insult.

As someone who has made a final table at the WSOP, I fully understand what it means to have my friends and family watching me grasp my own little piece of history. And it makes me angry that other first-timers (and long-timers) will not have that opportunity; to say the least, it detracts from the allure of WSOP success.

I’ve written about some of the other bad decisions I believe Harrah’s has made regarding the WSOP this year, and this is just another example of why I believe Harrah’s is making short-term financial decisions that — if not reconsidered — will ultimately open the door for major competition to the WSOP franchise.

Wow.

As promised, here’s a WSOP update after my first weekend in Vegas…

Quick version: I played two WSOP events ($1500 NLH and $2500 NLH), and made relatively early exits from both. I also played the first event in the Bellagio Cup III, missing the money by seven spots.

Before I go into more detail, some general WSOP observations from this year:

First, as has become all too common, the rake has increased once again. This year, the rake is tiered between 7-9% of the total buy-in, depending on the buy-in amount. As an example, in the $1500 NLH event, 9% ($135) was taken off the top. This is completely ridiculous, especially considering the fact that very little additional money is going in the pockets of the dealers, who will no-doubt receive fewer tips due to the higher rake.

Second, while the number of starting chips for the WSOP events has doubled this year, the blind structure has increased as well, essentially negating the benefit of the added starting chips. While I understand the rationale for keeping the structure relatively the same – it’s already difficult enough to finish these things in three days – the relatively poor structure still favors luck over skill, especially early in these events. This has been a key complaint of mine for several years now, and I’d love to see this addressed next year, even if it means capping the entrants at some lower number (and yes, I realize that would mean Harrah’s makes less money, which is why it will never happen).

It’s interesting to note that a number of other casinos are providing serious competition to the Rio and the WSOP. On June 11, the Bellagio started the Bellagio Cup III series of events, with the same blind structure and starting chips as the WSOP, but with generally higher buy-ins ($2500 - $5000 for most events) and smaller fields (Event #1, the $1500 NLH event, drew 150 players). The Venetian has their “Deep Stack Extravaganza” going throughout June, with daily events ranging from $330 - $1060 buy-ins. These events feature one-hour rounds and starting chips ranging from $5000 - $10,000. Last Sunday, the $1060 event drew nearly 400 players, and personally I think this event was much more worthwhile (in terms of starting chips and structure) than anything the WSOP would have offered that day.

I’m curious to see if these and other tournaments, combined with Harrah’s inability to take care of their WSOP players, succeed in siphoning off WSOP players in the coming years. While those ugly little gold bracelets still have a lot of drawing power, I firmly believe the WSOP is going to have to make some changes to keep from losing players in the future.

Back to my update on the first weekend…

The two WSOP I events were relatively uneventful; in the first, I slowly bled chips until just before the dinner break, and to be honest, don’t even remember the hand I went out on. I wasn’t playing particularly well, and didn’t quite have my “feel” back after not playing for much of the past year.

The second event was a bit more eventful, but unfortunately ended less than an hour in. For the better part of the first round, I spent a bunch of time sparring with a young, aggressive player. We traded chips back and forth over the first couple dozen hands, and about 45 minutes into round one, this hand came up between he and I:

$25/50 blinds, $5000 in my stack, $7000 in my opponent’s stack. I pick up JJ under-the-gun, and raise to $150. My opponent, in middle position, barely hesitates after looking at his hand and raises to $450. Folded around to me, and I decide I don’t want to play the hand without more information, so I raise to $1450. My opponent thinks for a long time, and I assume at the time that he’s trying to decide between calling and folding. He eventually calls, and we see a flop of Q62.

At this point, I decide that I need to give myself an opportunity to get away from my hand if I’m beaten, and I want to do that as cheaply and with the most confidence possible; I decide that my best alternative is to check raise, and if my opponent comes over the top again, I can safely lay my hand down. So I check. Fortunately or unfortunately (as we’ll soon find out), my opponent checks behind me.

The turn is a Jack. Without hesitating, and assuming my hand is now good, I bet $1500, about three-quarters of the pot. Without hesitation, my opponents says “all-in,” pushing his chips in front of him. This is where I made a critical mistake that could easily have been avoided had I done one simple thing…stopped to think.

Had I thought about it, I would have realized the following: when my opponent called my big three-bet pre-flop, he essentially was telling me that he had AA, KK, QQ, JJ, TT, or AK. He didn’t have JJ. It’s also unlikely that he would have put in the second raise with TT pre-flop, so I could rule that out as well. This leaves AA, KK, QQ, or AK. With AA or KK, it’s highly unlikely my opponent would have checked behind me on the flop, risking giving me a free card to draw out on his overpair. With AK, it’s unlikely my opponent would be pushing in this situation, as he must realize that my range of hands is likely more narrow than his, all of which I’d be likely to call. So, that leaves QQ. And I would expect that with QQ, my opponent would have checked the flop (as he did) and push on the turn (as he did). So, while I could have known I was against a bigger set had I thought about it, I unfortunately didn’t think about it.

I called and my opponent turned over the QQ for the bigger set.

A couple friends I spoke with said that there was little opportunity to get away from my hand, and hitting the Jack on the turn sealed my fate. At first I agreed with them, but after thinking about it for a little while, I honestly think I could have (should have!) gotten away from it. Then again, hindsight is 20/20…

After busting out of that event, I headed over to the Bellagio to play the first event of the Bellagio Cup III, a no-limit event that drew 150 people. For the first time this year, I finally started to hit a groove, and controlled my table throughout much of the first five hours. I ran my $3000 in starting chips to $16,000 and likely would have made the money (the top 18 places got paid) had I not been outplayed by a guy with AA when I hit top pair with my AQ. I finished a respectable 25th, but can’t say I’m not disappointed, as I’m ready to break the streak of non-cashes…

Heading back to Vegas on Thursday evening to play some more events next weekend…

A bunch of people have been asking what events I plan to play at this year’s WSOP, so I thought I would post my schedule here and hopefully find the time to update with results…

As many of my friends have already pointed out, it’s pretty lame that I have decided to give up playing Limit Hold’em tournaments. But, despite my record of doing well in these events, I’ve both lost my enthusiasm for Limit tournaments and have found that going back and forth between Limit and No Limit events degrades my play in both (as evidenced by my poor showing in last year’s WSOP). After taking much of the year off, I’m going to focus my efforts on No Limit tournaments and non-Hold’em cash games.

Here’s my schedule for the first half of the series (hopefully I’ll do well in some of these and will only be able to play a couple of them):

Saturday, June 9: $1500 No Limit Hold’em
Monday, June 11: $2500 No Limit Hold’em
Tuesday, June 12: $1500 No Limit Hold’em Shootout
Friday, June 15: $2000 No Limit Hold’em
Saturday, June 16: $1500 No Limit Hold’em
Sunday, June 17: $3000 No Limit Hold’em
Monday, June 18: $2500 No Limit Hold’em Six Handed

Depending on how I’m playing during the first half of the series, I’ll figure out my schedule for the second half.

Starting tomorrow, the 2007 World Series of Poker gets underway.

As you may have gathered from my lack of blog posting on the topic, I’ve taken a hiatus from poker for the better part of the past year (with the exception of a couple small tournaments and some home games where I’ve enjoyed some spectacularly underwhelming results ). And while I’m still a bit burned-out from the game after a year of practically working full-time and playing cards full-time, I am looking forward to the WSOP.

For the first time in a few years, I’ll be missing the first weekend of events; a very good college friend is getting married on the east coast, and apparently didn’t review the WSOP schedule before planning her wedding. I’ll forgive her this time…

I will be flying out next week, and will be playing a number of events throughout June and early July. I’ll be traveling and playing with some good friends (Jason, Ezra, Joon-Soo, Elliot), and wish them all good luck during this year’s series.

I’ll post details and status between events…

Okay, now it’s true…

As I mentioned in a recent post, after a many month hiatus from poker (new job, new girlfriend, etc), I’ve started playing again just a bit, and today I played my first tournament since August. It was the Shooting Star $2000 No-Limit Hold’em Event at Bay 101, and play started this morning with 250 players.

Long story short, I played well, and finished a respectable (though disappointing) 62nd place.

Not many terribly interesting hands, though after the second round, I got moved to a table with two “shooting stars” (Phil Hellmuth and Eli Elezra). The shooting stars are well-known pros placed one-per-table to make the tournament more interesting. In previous years, knocking a shooting star out of the tournament would have earned you $1000 in “bounty,” though this year there were no bounties, so kn0cking out the stars only gets you bragging rights. Too bad, as I knocked both of them out within about 30 minutes; oh well, there goes what would have been an easy $2000…

Unfortunately, I can’t take much credit for the knock-outs, as both players were short-stacked when I got to the table. The hand against Phil was pretty straight-forward; with blinds at $100/200, a middle position player comes in for a raise to $700, Phil pushes all-in on the button for a total of $3500, and I look down at AKo in the small blind. Assuming Phil is going to reraise in this spot with pretty much any pair or any ace down to AT, the call is relatively easy. I actually push all-in to isolate, and knock out the original raiser, which I do. Phil turns over ATo, and my AK holds up. And the hand against Eli is even less interesting, so I won’t go into details.

At one point I was able to run my chips up to about $40K when my JJ flopped a set and held up against an open-ended straight-flush draw. After that, I started picking up a lot of above-average hands (big pairs, big suited connectors) that w0uld get multiple callers and then completely miss the flop. After hovering between $25-35K for about 6 hours, I made an all-in reraise for my last $25K (blinds at $500/1000/100) with JJ, got called and found myself against QQ, and out of the tournament.

The only other interesting story from the day is that I had a last longer bet (a bet on who will survive in the tournament longer) with a good friend of mine who was also playing; after playing for nearly 7 hours, we both got knocked out within 45 seconds of one another, though unfortunately for me, I was first and lost that bet too…

Just to clarify for everyone who has asked, Tellme was not purchased by Microsoft last week.

On Monday, TechCrunch writer Michael Arrington published a blog post titled, “Microsoft Has Acquired Tellme,” laying out the details of a Microsoft purchase of the company I recently started working for. After getting picked up by Om Malik on his blog, the rumors started flying, and even the Tellme staff was wondering what was going on.

But, a few minutes later, both TechCrunch and Om revised their “information,” clarifying that “Microsoft Has (Not) Acquired Tellme.” The next day, the headline was again revised, this time as “Tellme For Sale.”

Anyone who has followed the Tellme saga the past eight years knows that the company has some amazing people and products and has successfully reinvented itself multiple times (from consumer-focused products to carrier-class directory assistance to Enterprise business solutions and now coming full circle back to consumer-based); as is common with successful startup companies, rumors of forthcoming liquidity events are quite common. And Tellme is not immune to the rumors.

So, to set the record straight…while Tellme’s strong revenue and growth could likely allow it a successful IPO, and it’s tremendous people and products certainly make it attractive to a number of large players in the telco and Internet spaces, as of this writing, Tellme is still privately owned. And more importantly, it’s still fully focused on building some of the best consumer and business-class voice-based applications on the planet.

If you’re not familiar with Tellme’s voice-enabled consumer search products, take a look…