Paboo's Home Game

I made my first home game tournament at Paboo's house over the weekend. Wow, what a structure. I'm suprised that the tournament was as short as it was. The levels were 30 minutes and the blinds were 25/50, 50/100, 75/150, 100/200, 150/300, 200/400, 300/600, 400/800. We played 9-handed.

The very first hand of the tournament I am on in the SB and pick up Ad,Kd. There is an early position raiser to $200 and there is 2 callers. I pop it to $700 and everyone folds and I take the first pot of the night. I didn't get much to play the next lap or two and then I get K,7 off in the BB and get a free look at the flop 3 handed. The flop comes K,9,4 rainbow. I check call a $200 bet. The turn is a 5 and I check. The other player bets out $400 and I raise it to $1300 trying to take the pot right there. He calls and now I' going to check the river till the Ace falls. I think this is a great scare card here and I lead out for $1200. He calls and shows K,9. Probably would have worked if he didn't already have 2 pair, D'oh. After that hand I am down to around $2800.

The next couple of levels I tightened up massively and just tried to stay afloat and pick up info on the rest of the players. It seemed to me that most players were playing solid hands and only bluffing if they missed the flop with premium hands. People didn't seem to play junk and try and win. I blinded down to around $2200 or so when I pick up As7s in late position in the 75/150 level. I raised to $400. One of the blinds makes it $900 to go. Tough decision here and I decide to call. If I miss the flop I will dump the hand and still have $1300 to play with where I'm probably in shove mode. I didn't have to think about it after the flop came all spades and I flopped the nuts. I checked and the pther player put me all-in and I got the double-up.

After that hand I had plenty of chips to splash around with playing connectors and 1 gap suited cards. I don't think anyone put me on these hands even though I repeatedly did this. I was able to make a couple of hands and chip up to around $7000 when we got to 5 or 6 handed. In the 100/200 level I picked up A,A and raise to $700 in early position. A short stack shoved for around $3000 and I won the pot vs an unimproved A,Q. This got me up to $10k and I was in good shape. By the time we got down to 4 handed I was a shorter stack with one other player. I had around $3500 with the blinds at 200/400, not really short but short compared to the top 2.

I ended up busting the 4th place player and I was in 3rd with 12k vs 18k and 13k. I asked for a 3-way shop but no dice. One hand that went down 3 handed I turned the straight, rasied a bet and got a call. The board paired on the end and I bet around 1/3 of the pot and the other player folded. He said that he had 2 pair and his 2nd pair was counterfitted on the end. Fuuuuuuuuk. Good lay down.

My bustout hand was 10,9 in the BB and the SB limped. The flop came 10,4,4 and it all went in the middle. He had Q,10 and I couldn't get a chop and I was out in 3rd for a $20 profit. Since the game lasted so long I wasn't able to get in the cash game.

All in all a fun night with one minor complaint: PAT, GET A POKER TABLE!!!! (j/k)