Gray-haired poker TRs: Living the WSOP dream

At this point I'm not taking a break because of AK losing to AQ. I am taking a break because I am a little burnt out. I don't think think the time off will be lengthy.

For what it's worth, I forgot to mention it in my last post, I did listen to Nick Schulman's new radio gig on Sirius radio last night (it's a six-show trial). I'm a Schulman fan, and the first episode was fine. But it lacked the magic of his Main Event booth pairing with Ali Nejad. It sounds like there could be some big name poker pros appearing on the next episode, so I'll keep an open mind. I hope it works out since Schulman is such an interesting guy and seems so knowledgeable of all things poker, but a poker show on radio targeting a more mainstream audience seems like a tough nut to crack. Schulman seems reluctant to make the show about him, which while I respect his humility I think is a mistake since he has so many stories that he can tell if he so chooses.

to rp's later point, if he's feeling burnt out then he should take a break tiil he's feeling refreshed, but in general I'm a big +1 to your post. All my friends that are pro/semi pro mtt just want to get the volume to get on top of the variance as quickly as they can.

It's different for a hobbyist & bankroll is a thing too, but the overall point still remains. The cards will turn & the more you play the closer the deep run should hopefully be

Everything is wonderful

I'm still mostly in poker silent mode, but poker is starting to creep into my thinking a little bit

Watched the World Cup Final today. Kind of a tough game to view. Spain absolutely dominated the game, yet the score was 0-0 at the end of regulation time despite Spain outshooting Argentina something like 324-0 (the 324 is an exaggeration, the 0 is not an overstatement as Argentina did not achieve its first shot on goal until the 115th minute, which I would not have thought possible). Spain fans must have been beside themselves at all the opportunities they had that failed to put the ball into the net. Argentina fans must have been beside themselves at the utter lack of scoring chances and complete inability to possess the ball. Spain finally scored in the second period of extra time, so the better team won. Finally. Glad it didn't get decided by penalty kicks, which I think is a ludicrous way to decide a champion.

Tonight, I finished the fiction book I was reading. I pulled two new books off my to read area of my bookshelf. The first was Modern Poker Theory: Building An Unbeatable Strategy Based on GTO Principles by Michael Acevedo, which was a birthday gift from my brother and sister-in law. I had no intention of reading the book right now as I recharge my poker batteries. But I wanted to see if this is something I will want to read sometime in the future. I quickly skimmed the book. Man, it looks like a tough slog. High-end math and tons of GTO charts. It may be good stuff, but it is definitely tedious stuff. I'm not sure I will eventually want to read it cover to cover. Maybe as I come across certain spots in tournaments I play or poker streams I watch, I will find the appropriate section in the book and study it.

Instead, I started reading the other book I selected, which is Checkmate: Genius, Lies, Ambition, And The Biggest Scandal In Chess by Ben Mezrich.

Poker is starting to slowly find its way back into my brain. For some reason late tonight I was thinking about when is the ideal time to show up to play in a WSOP event. No idea why this showed up on tonight's Bingo card. In WSOP 2019, 2024 and 2025 I always showed up in time for "Shuffle up and deal." In my seat for the very first hand. Every time. Without exception and not open to debate. During WSOP 2026, I baby late registered quite a bit. No, I did not take my seat for the first time in level 9. What I did do was register very late in level 1 or sometime in level 2. I think arriving mid to late level 2 is ideal and is something I will do most of the time in WSOP 2027.

I have two reasons for this ...

Reason 1: I am not a morning person. I do not care at all for 10:00 a.m. starts. Poker is not meant to be a morning endeavor if you ask me. Happy morning people are not to be trusted in my world. A 10:00 start is when I meet with my accountant or attorney. It is not a respectable time to start a poker tournament. Would a Texas road gambler from days of old agree to start play at 10:00 a.m.? I don't think so! Start late, end late is way more in my wheelhouse.

Reason 2: When you show up on time for the start of level 1 of Day 1, you are often four-handed. I'm not afraid to play short-handed, but it is a completely different animal than nine-handed. You have to play a wider range of hands. You also need to pay careful attention to when the table starts to fill up and you have to adjust accordingly. Again, I am capable of doing this, but playing four-handed when the blinds are just 100/200/200 doesn't seem especially fun to me, and it is a little difficult to keep myself from overdoing the aggression. I'd rather show up a little late and take my seat at a table that is very close to full. I suppose an argument can be made that this runs the risk of missing out on the really bad players, but even the really horrible players are still around late in level 2. Plus, what I noticed is that a player has a big stack in level 2 from a cooler and they decide to try to be table captain around the time when I show up, which has all kinds of great potential for me. Or you get a really aggressive player who has been pushing the table around, it works and they get even more hyper aggressive and are ripe for the picking by a player who plays good cards.

In any event, I think a big take away from my WSOP 2026 is that baby late registration is the way for me to go in the future.

Too funny.

It really seemed like Argentina was playing for PKs, which was hampered when they went down a man. I know that Spain dominated, but I thought Argentina played fairly well defensively and while it was a lot of shots they didn't seem like big threats. I haven't played soccer in a long time, so what do I know.

To my earlier post about not taking a lot of time off, obviously do what is best for you and if you need a break then you should definitely take one. It sounds like you think about the game a lot, so a break isn't always a break, which is why I said not to take a long one as you'll be thinking about it anyway.

Fully endorse. Not only is jaka’s content strong, the community really separates it from the herd. So much so that I never had a chance to meet any of you other than TJ. Hopefully rectified next year!

Enjoyed the thread thank you for all of the effort that went into it. I lost AK

Fortunately my AK>AA day 2 of the main this year made up for it!

I was glad to see you embrace late reg a little and it’s an excellent topic for debate. When is the optimum time to enter a tournament?

It’s a question that I don’t think has any right or wrong answer and depending on who you ask you’ll get a lot of different takes on it.

Personally I do like playing short handed, especially in fixed limit mixed games so that’s the main reason why I reg those on time mostly.

In big bet games I look at the structure and if I think it starts too deep then I’ll go later.

I’ve also tried max late and 1 or 2 levels before end of registration. Its something I will keep experimenting with but would love to hear others thoughts on the subject.

For me I think the decision is between the incredible gifts that are sometimes on offer in the first few levels if you’re lucky with table draw and card distribution vs the benefit of being mentally fresher later on in the day when the stacks are shallower in terms of bb and the pots really start to matter

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Other things being equal, I always prefer being in my seat for hand 1.

Tournament poker can very much be thought of as a race for the worst players’ money… and they have deep chips at the start.

I came up online playing heads up and short handed, so I’m perfectly comfortable 4-9 handed. And you can establish a LAG psycho image, to get you paid when you screw down and tighten up.

But late reg isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I don’t usually like max-late-reg’ing, but I can see it being a time saving strategy.

I think in WSOP 2027 in an event like the Colossus where there are four Day 1s with $500 entry fees and 50,000 starting stacks it would be interesting one day for me to show up around level 7 (500/1,000/1,000). Thats still 50 BBs. Plenty of play. And I'd be armed with re-buy money if necessary. I don't know that this is better or worse than showing up level 1 for the first hand, but I think it would be a fun exercise to try once.