Nitty by Nature 6: The Nit Stays in the Picture TR (5/23-6/28 and beyond?)
Is it too early to post this? Yeah, I think it's too early to post this. I still have 12 days until my trip, but I'm sitting here trapped inside on a Saturday with a mild cold and a growing case of poker fever. We're entering summer TR season. Reading through the other entries is getting me excited for my own annual sojourn to the desert, so please forgive me for the premature etripulation.
Honestly, I didn't know if I'd do a TR this year. When I first came out for the WSOP in 2018, it was my first trip to Vegas in 5 years and my first time EVER being in town during the series. It was a very special occasion for me. Everything was fresh and exciting. After five years of doing these, I've begun to feel a bit like the jaded old-timer. I've played over 100 MTTs in Vegas since that 2018 trip. I've seen all the sights and played all the rooms. I've achieved a lot of my initial (modest) poker goals.
What's left to do? What's left to see?
One of the ironic things about poker is the paradoxical diminishing and increasing returns. Hear me out. On that first trip in 2018, I played a $110 nightly at the Nugget. Low stakes, low pressure, low prestige, but...this was possibly going to be my first ever recorded live MTT cash (I had cashed a couple small untracked events at the local tribal casino in college). When we went on break near the money bubble, I was so excited that my hands were shaking. Now I can be sitting at a final table playing for a decent chunk of money and feel almost nothing. That's what I mean by increasing and diminishing returns. My skills have gradually improved with experience, while the excitement that I derive from the game has dropped. For the most part, the tense spots no longer affect me very much.
You can see how so many players fall into the trap of always trying to play bigger, like a junkie chasing that first initial high.
Ultimately though, bigger is not always better. While I do yearn to level up and play bigger (more on that later), I still find poker intrinsically rewarding, even if the adrenaline spikes have waned. Like a lot of poker players, I enjoy the puzzle and strategic aspects of the game. I've found that you can have as much fun in a $200 event as you can in a $1k if you focus on the process and not the extrinsic rewards. Likewise, the process of writing these TRs is enjoyable for me, even if there's not necessarily a lot of fresh ground for me to break. I like writing them. I like going back and reading them.
With that mind, I guess Nitty by Nature 6 was never really in doubt. Hence the title of this year's entry:
"The kid stays in the picture!"
Before I look ahead and discuss this year's plans, I'll start by looking back.
BACKGROUND
Like a lot of people in my age bracket, I'm a Moneymaker baby. I played poker sparingly in high school before catching the fever in college. The early WPT seasons on Travel Channel and ESPN's constant reruns of the 2003 WSOP kicked my curiosity into overdrive. I began splashing around live and online, first in LHE and then later moving on to NL. I eventually became a prolific 180 man SNG grinder on PokerStars in the late 00s. I wasn't winning a lot of money, but I was winning, over a huge sample size.
Black Friday hit, other life priorities took precedence, and poker took a backseat. I effectively quit the game for most of a decade, though I would still sweat the WSOP every summer with intense pangs of FOMO. Finally, in 2018, the stars aligned for me to visit Vegas during the summer and fire my first official WSOP event (the $365 Giant). I didn't cash, but I was hooked. I've been back every year since.
In the next entry, I'll take a quick stroll down memory lane, covering some of the highlights from my first 5 years attending the WSOP.
Nice job, good write up, and glad you had a good time.
I will also be having a second leg to my Vegas summer trip starting next week
I hope you play in the Main. You are already well on your way $ wise. Someday when you are old and reflecting upon your life, I think you will be happy you took your shot.
Of course, it's not my money, so do what you are comfortable doing. But I'm hoping for a LVL sweat of you in the Main.
if you can afford it I think you should go ahead and buy in to the main. it's a bucket list experience.
that being said I couldn't even afford to play one of the turbo satellites into the Main. but it seems you might have a little more disposable income.
then again, I would understand sitting on your recent WSOP success and "quit" while you're ahead, and plan on a next time.
you be you
It was a colossal f-up that I'll be hard-pressed to top any time soon.
The bubble has just burst and I'm at a new table. I have about 300k after stacking someone AA vs. AQ.
Kathy Liebert (~100k chips) opens from EP. I have AhQd a couple seats to her left and opt to flat. I think this hand can go either way, but I often like to play it as a flat when I'll be in position. Everyone else folds. Flop is a doozy: AdQhXd. I have smashed the board, with top two and runner-runner flush possibilities. To m
I must have done something similar early in my poker playing life, because I'm glacial in that situation. If someone gets pissed because I took an extra 5 seconds, we both just have to live with it. Sometimes someone even tells me "he folded".
It might tilt some dealers, but I always wait to release my cards until I see some chips are starting to get pushed towards me. This is precisely to avoid situations like this, just in case I have misinterpreted or missed something. I see many people start releasing their cards way too early, and not protecting themselves.
DogFace, was your cards not retrievable or were they buried deep in the muck?
Waaaay back when Paris had a poker room, I learned a valuable lesson. and it was a dealer that taught it to me. I loved that room, it was low key and almost always a lot of fun. Their tournaments were fun too.
I had probably been playing a year or two, and sitting in the 1 seat, I quick-mucked my cards in a pot that I won. The dealer calmly and quickly showed me never to give up my cards until the pot was pushed my way. I guess it was easy to tell I was a rookie.
OUT of the Salute event in level 8. This might be the best low budget tournament you can play at the WSOP. You get a 50k starting stack and 40 minute levels. The field today looked more like a seniors event and my table was very, very passive. Often times this is going to be smooth sailing towards the bubble.
Unfortunately I kept running into the nuts today. My tournament can be summarized by three hands:
#1 - I've worked my way up to 62k at 400/800 blind level. Three limpers call and the SB make
I played the Salute last year. I lasted about as long as you.
It's one of the many I wanted to play this year, but they were too spread out to play them all. I keep saying that some year I'll rent a vrbo or airbnb for a month and play a mother crapload of events <= $1500. I get lots of vacation time, but to be honest I'm afraid that if I take a month off, they'll realize they don't need me at all. Depending on the schedule I might be able to play for a week, take a week off, play for a week, etc.
VEGAS – It's a double-edged sword for sure. The strip is exciting with lots of things going on around the clock, but the gouge is real. You get squeezed and nickle-and-dimed at every opportunity. While I enjoy playing poker out here, there's a cost that comes with it: airfare, resort fees, meals that will run you 2-3x what they should. Gouge, gouge, gouge. The gouge is the biggest deterrent from coming back out here more often.
Interesting. The airfare doesn't apply to me because I drive. A lot of the other stuff is mostly solved by a month-long airbnb. Or even just a furnished apartment. In the average small town they would think you're insane for asking about a 1 month furnished apartment, but Vegas has so many transients, they're common. I think I could probably get a reasonable place for 2 grand-ish or less. So no resort fees and meals would be a fraction of Strip hotel prices. TV dinners and low cost restaurants would do the trick.
The big question for me after this week is what I'm going to do in July. I've always wanted to play the Main Event. I've had the room and flight booked for months. I see three clear options:
#1 – I "book a win", cancel the July trip, and bank the profits. I'm up about $7k on poker this summer, due primarily to the runs in the MSPT and Milly Maker. The figure is closer to $5k when you factor in the overhead of trip expenses. Not life-changing money, but a nice chunk of change to pocket.
#2 – I come back in July and play satellites. $5k profit is not enough to buy a Main Event ticket outright, but I could fire 2x $1100 megas and 1x $2200 mega and use the rest of the winnings to cover most of the overhead. I wouldn't be heartbroken over losing the full $5k since it's found money anyway. The way I see it, it's almost a freeroll.
#3 – I say **** it, YOLO, and just pony up the $10k outright. I can try to sell some action, but I don't know if the marketplace will bite. If I want to be 100% assured of playing this thing, I might have to pay the iron price. I could get the money without any real risk to my everyday life, but I'd be pulling about $5k extra from sources not earmarked for poker. It's a lot to wager on a poker tournament, even if it's THE poker tournament.
I lean towards coming back in some capacity, but I don't know exactly what that's going to look like yet.
In the mean time, thanks to anyone who took the time to read and follow along.
Option 2 seems the easiest route. Get there early after they start. If you get there later, all the crappiest players that drove to Vegas with $1100 in their pockets will have lost it to someone other than you. Although, I don't really know for sure, I've never played a thousand dollar+ satellite.
As long as you can live with losing and not making the Main, even after witnessing the terrible play of so many dill-holes in the satellites.
Appreciate the comments and suggestions. I'll be weighing all options in the coming days.
As I'm sitting here in the airport doing research, I discover that "Coach" from my Milly Maker day 1 table was Thomas Boivin, a top 50 GPI player. There are sharks in those Paris waters!
Whatever you decide on the Main, I'd be interested in hearing the thought process which leads you to that decision. Of course, without going into too much detail like personal finances.
Thanks again for the great TR!
Dog,
As always nice write up and nice results. I wish you the best if you are heading back out for the main. After I cashed for 21k at the Wynn, I wanted to extend my stay, fire it again to try to take it down outright, and after my profitable trip, I certainly want to come back and fire the main, but it's not in the cards for me this year. Hopefully next summer. Best of luck.
P
Appreciate the comments and suggestions. I'll be weighing all options in the coming days.
As I'm sitting here in the airport doing research, I discover that "Coach" from my Milly Maker day 1 table was Thomas Boivin, a top 50 GPI player. There are sharks in those Paris waters!
Yup, it's important to stay current with the latest crushers, at which I absolutely failed. At my Day 2 Monster table, it was Joe Cada that pointed out that last year's Monster winner was sitting right across the table from me.
Whatever you decide on the Main, I'd be interested in hearing the thought process which leads you to that decision. Of course, without going into too much detail like personal finances.
Thanks again for the great TR!
Sure. I was thinking about it for the entire flight home last night. I slept on it, did some research this morning, and reached a relatively quick decision.
First off, locking up the profits was never a serious consideration. I already paid for July flights and had a hotel reservation. I could cancel all that and get all the money back, but with a chunky surplus at my disposal, it would've felt wrong not to keep the parlay going in some fashion. The real question was whether to fire the satellites or just YOLO the $10k into the Main.
It's a tricky dilemma because I've always wanted to play the Main. I talk about it every year. I've watched every Main Event since 2003, many of them (much) more than once. To be a part of that history is pretty appealing. Even if I don't cash, just entering the tournament would mean that I'll forever be a part of poker history as one of the digits in the record of 2024 entries. If it's 10,213 players, I'll be one of those numbers. Playing the Main is a bucket list item for me.
But we must consider the downside and weigh it against my priorities. The downside of digging into the bank account and playing the Main would be busting outside the money and dusting off $10k. In a literal sense I can afford to do it, but it would be quite a reckless financial decision, even as a "once in a lifetime" type of experience. I'm not a high roller. Finishing the summer down $5k would make me feel bad about heading out to Vegas in subsequent months to fire other series, which I like to do. On the other hand, what is the downside of firing the satellites? Well, the downside would be sitting here a week from now with a zero balance in my WSOP tournament account and nothing to show for it. It would be really easy to play bad and/or run bad in the satellites, win nothing, and be left to think, 'Well, that sucked.' The satellite route is the only option that guarantees nothing. Locking up the profits guarantees a positive outcome whereas firing the Main guarantees a memorable experience.
I had to ask myself what is the bigger priority: securing the bucket list experience or protecting my ability to keep firing tournaments indefinitely. The answer is that I think I'd actually feel much worse being $5k in the hole and being able to say, "Well, I played the Main Event" than I would punting off all my profits, but still walking out of the summer no worse for wear. The Main Event is THE poker tournament, but it's ultimately just one tournament. I've survived a few decades on this planet without playing it, and can still wake up and look myself in the mirror each morning. Missing it again this year won't affect me in any tangible way.
So here's the actual decision: I will fire two satellites for the Main, an $1100 and a $2200. If I win a seat, awesome. I'll be thrilled to play it. If not, awesome. There are actually lots of other interesting tournaments coming up in early July: a slew of $300 Resorts World dailies, a $600 WSOP Ultra Stack, a Venetian $1600, and a Wynn $2200. I'm excited to engage with that stuff. If I brick the Main Event satellites, I'll still be able to fire a full week of poker in July and maybe spin up a run or two somewhere. If I strike out absolutely everywhere, I'll end the summer about where I started it, which is an outcome that won't bother me at all. So there you have it.
Leg three will begin on July 3rd. With any luck, I'll be on the ground early enough to fire the 1PM $1100 mega. Maybe I'll get lucky and win a seat. Regardless of what happens, I'll have another full week of firing high volume. In the mean time, I'll rest up at home, relax, and recharge the batteries for the final push.
It’s a good, carefully measured, well considered plan.
I’m here for it!
Leg three will begin on July 3rd. With any luck, I'll be on the ground early enough to fire the 1PM $1100 mega. Maybe I'll get lucky and win a seat. Regardless of what happens, I'll have another full week of firing high volume. In the mean time, I'll rest up at home, relax, and recharge the batteries for the final push.
July 3 will be a good day. my reentry to the desert too!
enjoy the in-between time and good luck
You've thought it through. Now we root for you to make it into the Main and win the whole darn thing.
Thanks for the detailed write-up, DogFace. As others have said, I think it's a good, thoughtful process you went through.
Not sure of your situation (financial and age-wise), but there will always be other Main Events to play in, as you build your bankroll. Just don't let it slip away permanently. If it's something you really want to do, put it on your life list and keep working toward that goal.
Thanks for the detailed write-up, DogFace. As others have said, I think it's a good, thoughtful process you went through.
Not sure of your situation (financial and age-wise), but there will always be other Main Events to play in, as you build your bankroll. Just don't let it slip away permanently. If it's something you really want to do, put it on your life list and keep working toward that goal.
Yes, that's part of the reasoning. I don't think it made financial sense to put so many eggs in one basket. I take nothing for granted with regards to the future and being guaranteed to have other chances to play this event, but unless I run very bad IRL, there will be other years and other opportunities.
As I said in my early posts in this thread, I feel like my game has improved a lot in the last two years. I find myself getting down to big spots a lot more often. With that being the case, I have a decent amount of confidence that I can bink the full entry fee outright at some point in the not-so-distant future. It almost happened a couple times this summer. A couple more good hands at Venetian or in the Milly Maker would've put me over the hump.
On that note, I'll share an odd wrinkle about my Venetian run that I didn't mention when it happened. As we got down to the final two tables, the monitors showed a chunky $2.1k pay jump on the horizon. A player got knocked out. Sweet. We've secured the pay jump. Another player and myself are knocked out shortly thereafter in consecutive hands. When I go to get my payout, this player tells me that the monitors were wrong. The actual pay jump was only about $900. We check the event website. Sure enough, this is correct. The jump was meant to be about $900 and not the $2.1k indicated by the monitors. The venue somehow displayed the incorrect information. So each of us ends up getting about $1.2k less than we thought we'd won. Not the end of the world, but an annoying spot.
I suppose we could've pitched a fit and tried to squeeze them for the prize shown by the monitors. I'm not sure you are going to win a lot of arguments against a casino though, especially when the actual event website displayed the correct payouts all along. I decided not to make a fuss about it.
I mention it because that extra $1.2k would make a minor difference in my July plans. It would increase my likelihood playing the Main. Furthermore, there was one spot I passed on prior to busting that I might have taken if I'd known the jump wasn't going to be so big. Not the end of the world, but irritating.
Good luck! When you get there, check out all the other satties for the Main. They sometimes have things they don't put on the website. If you're feeling really froggy they have them where it's just a flip, no decisions. Everyone gets dealt a hand and the best one gets the seat.
If you end up losing, you could also try smaller satellites, and run it up. Lots of crazy ways to get into the Main.
It's time to finish the trilogy. After a short break in the real world, I'm packed and set to head back to Vegas. The few days off have been refreshing. I feel recharged and ready to tackle another full week of poker. This will be the first time I've made a third early-summer trip, and my first time making any real attempt to qualify for the WSOP Main. There are a lot of fun possibilities.
The plan is to land before noon on the 3rd, drop off my bags at Harrah's, and immediately try my luck in the 1PM $1100 WSOP mega satellite. 10% of the field will win the $10k entry and 90% will be unhappy. If we're in the unhappy group, we'll try again in the 7PM $2200 mega satellite, which will make 20% of the field happy. Statistically, we will be an underdog to win a seat from just $3300 in satellite tickets, but there's a significant non-zero probability that we run good and bink it. One time?
These satellites will be landmark/milestones satellites. The goal in this format is not simply to survive, but to accumulate 10x or 5x the starting stack. You need to hit the milestone to win the seat. I've played one of these in the past for a smaller prize and ended up winning it. I can't claim to be an expert in the specific strategic adjustments dictated by this format, but there are a few seemingly logical conclusions we can derive. It stands to reason that you should start out playing this event like you would any other MTT, looking to take good spots and build a stack. Where things get interesting is when you start getting close to the milestone. At this point you can take some divergent lines. For example, if you have 220k and you need 250k to win the seat, you may have some shutdowns on the turn and river to keep the pot small instead of playing for pure chipEV. If the pot is already big enough to put you over the line, you are disincentivized from growing it further. These are the type of things we'll be considering if and when we get close to the landmark.
If I crash and burn on the 3rd, all hope is not lost. I will play the $300 Resorts World daily on the 4th. If I bink a positive result in that event, I will fire one last WSOP satellite on the 5th, with the intention of winning a seat for flight 1D of the Main on the 6th.
The initial goal is to win a seat and play the Main, but success or failure on that front won't define this trip. There are other good tournaments happening in Vegas this week. If we miss out on the Main, we shift our focus to racking up results elsewhere. I'm likely to play some of the $300 Resorts World dailies and probably at least one flight of the $600 WSOP Ultra Stack event. There will be $500 satellites on the 7th and 8th for the Wynn $2200 multi-day. If any of that stuff goes well, we can play the $1600 Venetian multi-day and/or the Wynn $2200 multi-day, which look like great events that also offer avenues to a big score. So while we want to win that sweet WSOP seat and try our luck in the Main, it's not an all-or-nothing proposition. The main goal is to fire, fire, fire high volume and try to hit something somewhere.
Let's spin it up (again and again)!
good luck. I can't handle grinding that many tournaments.
I say just win in EVERYTHING. Run as hot as the sun and set ablaze all that is in your way.
PART 3, DAY 1 - 7/03
Flight out was smooth. I was able to arrive at my hotel, dump my bag, register for the 1PM mega satellite, and print my ticket with enough time to cram in a Sbarro slice. Their veggie slices have become a staple of my trips out here. Not amazing quality, but passable and usually very quick.
There's something ironic about the WSOP Main being one of the deepest/slowest tournaments of the year and its mega satellites being shallow turbo luckfests. In this $1.1k, you get 15k starting chips. The first 6 levels are 20 minutes long and terminate at the 400/800 blind level. Then you switch over to 500/1000 and the levels are 30 minutes long for the duration. There's not a lot of play in these things, but I knew that going in. All the structure sheets are available online. I knew I was going to have to get lucky.
Was it my turn to run hot? Not really. I made some good hands in the very early levels and got up to about 20k. I dwindled for the next hour, but managed to survive until the break with about 11k in my stack. At 500/1000 blinds in level 7, shortie in EP jams his 8BB stack. We wake up with AQ on our 8BB stack a couple seats behind. Only one move here. Rip City. Shortie in BB with about 5BB behind tank-calls as well. It's AQo vs. A4o (EP) vs. KJo (BB). We have the best hand until the board brings a 4 and a K. We are OUT.
I don't think I made any glaring mistakes in this tournament. You need to run very good and I didn't. That's maybe 4-5 consecutive all-ins across the last few weeks where I've lost after having a good chunk of the pre-flop equity. I'm not mad about it, but it would be nice to start winning some of those again.
If you are wondering about the field and turnout for these megas, this one got a juicy 740 entries. I saw a lot of familiar faces and tough reg types around the tables. There's some soft money to chop up too, but it's not a candy-from-babies situation. It's a gauntlet. I'll try to survive it again tomorrow.
My initial plan was to play both the 1PM $1100 and the 7PM $2200 today, but I've pivoted to trying the $1100 3x if needed (today, tomorrow, and Friday) rather than putting so many of the eggs in the $2200 basket. Volume is the key to variance, and I think the $1100 price point is going to be a touch softer than those $2200 on average. So that 1x $2200 will become 2x $1100. We'll be back at the satellite mission tomorrow. Tonight I will play the Resorts World $200 and try to hit a positive result over there. The nice thing about this schedule is that the megas don't run until 1PM, so there's no harm in staying up super late at RW if needed.
In terms of other happenings around the WSOP, Main Event flight 1A is underway. I took a quick look at the field and saw a few familiar faces. Greg Merson. Jeff Platt. There was no featured table set up in the Events Center at the time, though I imagine there will be later.
Played the $200 Night Cap again at Resorts World as planned. Got through about 70% of the field before getting my last 13BB in pre-flop with AcKc vs. KhQs. Three spades on the flop and a queen on the turn. River is a brick. Yikes. Been losing every all-in lately, but hopefully just charging up the holdometer for bigger and more important spots.
Will run it back again tomorrow. Same plan for the day. Satellite at 1PM and nightly at 7PM.
I'm convinced that this RW $200 is the best nightly event you can play in town right now. So much better than the 8PM $200 at Horseshoe.
Played the $200 Night Cap again at Resorts World as planned. Got through about 70% of the field before getting my last 13BB in pre-flop with AcKc vs. KhQs. Three spades on the flop and a queen on the turn. River is a brick. Yikes. Been losing every all-in lately, but hopefully just charging up the holdometer for bigger and more important spots.
Will run it back again tomorrow. Same plan for the day. Satellite at 1PM and nightly at 7PM.
Good luck tomorrow.
I'm convinced that this RW $200 is the best nightly event you can play in town right now. So much better than the 8PM $200 at Horseshoe.
Do you think it's better than the Friday night Orleans? That runs from late afternoon to about 2 or 3 am, depending on chops, with 250-300 runners.
Good luck tomorrow.
Do you think it's better than the Friday night Orleans? That runs from late afternoon to about 2 or 3 am, depending on chops, with 250-300 runners.
Ah, I hadn't thought about that one. Sounds like the structure is about the same as the RW event, but with bigger fields. RW field was around 150 last night. I busted with about 45 players left around 12:30 AM. Blinds were getting high, but the event wasn't close to over yet.
Orleans sounds like a good option as well. The reason why I haven't played at Orleans (or Nugget) this year is the lack of walkability from the strip. If you are spending $10-15 on a ride share each way to play a $200-300 event, there goes a big chunk of your expected profit. Not an issue if you have a car, but I'm always car-less in Vegas.
