Vegas TR Day Three: 4/8 Horse Game with Jerry Buss

So I'm sitting at the Mirage O8 game, and Shifty walks up to me and says "dude, I just got Jerry Buss to play in our Horse game." Now, first off, props to Shifty for attempting to get the Horse game started. He bugged the Mirage floor all day for a game, and they eventually caved and said we could get our own Horse table as long as everyone was there at 10pm.

Anyway, I call bullshit and walk over to Shifty's $175 sng, and sure enough Jerry Buss is sitting in the seven seat. I promptly cash out from my O8 game and make sure I'm at the Horse table to police people from getting in when they weren't supposed to, make sure our guys got in the game on time, etc. Around 10pm Shifty was still going deep in the sng, but Jerry busted and Shifty yelled at me "Santi, make sure Jerry gets a seat." Most of our guys had locked up spots, but there was still a couple empties and I told Jerry we had a spot for him. He asked if he could have the available four seat and of course I said yes.

Here's Shifty's side of the story:

I was standing there bugging the shit out of the floor to open a horse game for us when jerry walks in and asks to play 40/80, they just have an interest list, so he decides to play a 175 SNG. i overhear this and lock up a seat. i walk over to jerry and say "hey you know they aren't gonna get that 40/80 off, you wanna play some horse after this SNG?" he says "really? i didn't see a horse game." i tell him they're going to open the game for us, and i'd put him at the top of the list. he says "sure, i'll play. i'm waiting for a friend, but i'll play for a while. i don't care how high you play, horse is always fun." awesome.

after about 15 min, some asian dude comes over, and hands jerry a couple of light-blue chips. i think they were 25Ks, but what do i know. jerry busts quickly after, 77 vs 10s, and i see the horse game opening. i tell him we got his seat and yell at nik. jerry sits right down, and immediately, the horse list is like 15 deep

Table make-up was me in the one, my friend Tommy in the two, Fender three, Rambler's IRL friend Dennis in the five, Deuce in the six, Rambler in the seven, and some d-bag who snuck on the interest list locked up the eight.

I guess the backstory is Jerry was waiting on a guy to pay off a bet, and so he put his name on the 40/80 interest list and the $175 sng. After seeing Jerry at the sng table, Shifty asked if he would play in our lowly 4/8 game, and I guess he said something to the extent of "I love Horse, I don't care what stakes we play." Awesome.

So long story short, Jerry played a complete rotation of Horse with us, and I think we got him for about $150, and only cause he ran kinda crappy in Razz. Everything else he seemed to play seriously, and it was pretty obv the dude just plays to win. We all made small talk for awhile, until sometime in the O8 section of the game a tiny, smoking hot asian girl in a Lakers shirt started sweating him. After that he just kinda ignored us.

During the Stud8 (last game) rotation, Shabba walked in with a couple girls from his work (hot) and started introducing us to his friends. "That's Nik, Tony, Tommy, Dennis, Ryan, the owner of the Lakers..."

Everyone, including Jerry, laughed really hard at that. Good times, probably the highlight of the trip. I'll start the rest of the report later, but I probably just blew my load.

Everyone with their own stories or pics from that game plz post, thanks.

After the Horse Game broke, Shifty, Pika, Reb, Dennis and I went down to the Venetian for an awesome late-night meal, pretty cool Shifty was able to get a great steak at 5am. By the way, the V was a great place to see beautful girls walking everywhere, edging out Bellagio. I was told however Wynn's scenery was even nicer, but I missed out on Wynn this trip. Maybe next time I can make it down there.

Still to come in my TRs is more 15/30 action (which includes one good winning session and one absolute ass kicking), more deli, the Venetian $120 Tournament with a 10 man last longer and a visit from alex the admin at CP, more drunk 4/8 hammer throwing (I actually have two Newcastles during the game :eek: ), the In n Out Challenge and a competitive bowling prop that came down to one pin. Stay tuned!

Jerry chillin' before game time with his reds and blues. A lot of people were wondering why Kid Buss was in Orlando to give the Lakers' Championship speech. The answer: Jerry was too busy kicking it with CP crew playing 4/8 Horse at the Mirage

Vegas TR Day Three: Getting Hammered and Trevi

So I woke up early yet again, even though I was out having french toast at about 6am, I was up and moving before noon. I remember texting Deuce to see if he wanted to grab some Panda Express, but he had just woken up so I had to give him some time. I decided to see what everyone else was doing, and it turned out Rambler and Trey were playing 1/2 NL at Harrahs. I figured I could check up on them and hang out while I waited for Deuce.

I witnessed a couple funny hands while I was with them, one where Rambler mini-re-raised a button min-raise to $6 pre-flop with KTos. He told me that play was for me since I play mini-bet, and to be honest it made me laugh really hard. Some guy who had limped in from MP actually popped it to $14 dollars with QQ, and then stacked off to Rambler when the flop came KKx. The turn was a King for further overkill, and to make the hand even that more entertaining one of the guy's queens came on the river. Too funny, too bad the turn wasn't a queen then river king...

So after some badgering I decide to just sit down. I can't remember too much about the action, except I somehow found myself up like $40 when I decide to raise Rambler's blind to $10 with JT of diamonds. I get a flat caller behind me that i don't notice until the hand's over and then Rambler makes it $35 to go from the BB. I just sigh and tell him "Rambler, you either have Aces or the hammer" and fold. I was waiting for him to show the hand when I turned and saw the guy who flatted my raise. Turns out I didn't notice him at first, and I could have given Rambler's hand away...thankfully the dude folded and Rambler said "you were right Nik" and showed me the hammer. Ugh, Rambler threw the hammer against me FML.

I hung out a little while longer, shooting the shit with Trey and his wife some. Turns out Trey's wife is also half-Mexican/half-white, mixed babies ftw. Finally Deuce and Fender showed up to save me from NL hell where even Rambler was pwning me, so I took my $29 in profit and went to lunch.

We went super all-out for lunch and grabbed Panda Express located in between Harrahs and Casino Royale, then we walked to Bellagio I think. Now this is where it's all a blur...I can't remember if I played 15/30 or wtf, because all I remember is the hockey game being on, and a crew of Shifty, Rambler, Dennis, Tommy and Fender fetching me to go grab a nice dinner somewhere. Pika and Deuce wanted to stay behind and watch the game/play more cards at Bellagio.

We ended up going to Trevi, a nice Italian restaraunt located in the Caesar's forum shops. I had gone there my last couple of trips and really liked the food, so I suggested to the group that we try it. On the way there we played live MFK and made fun of Phil Hellmuth for acting like a complete crybaby toolshed the night before when busting out of the $1500 WSOP NL event.

Anyway, the place delivered hard, and every single guy that went along told me it was a great pick for food. Everyone had something different, and it all looked really good. I think I had something called Penne Puttanesca with Sausage, it was penne with spicy tomato sauce, kalamata olives, and capers. I think the best looking entre was the Chicken Parmigiana that Shifty got...plates were something like $20-$25, good portions, and tasted great.

Haha I'm talking too much about food I'm sure, so after dinner we head back to Mirage and break off into our own games. I had a nice run at O8, and came up over two stacks of red after scooping a couple big hands. O8 was good to me once again, maybe I should play it more often.

Vegas TR Day Two Part II: Mesa Grill and The Rio

After walking back and changing at Harrahs, me and Fender met up with the Superdonk, Deuce, workgirl and her friend at Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill inside of Caesars. Our waitress was a bit rude, but aside from that the food was pretty good, although a tad pricey. I got the grilled lamb porterhouse chops cooked medium with a side tamale. Honestly, the lamb was awesome, and tasted the best out of the other three dishes I tried (work girl's pork sirloin, Tommy's tuna steak, and fender's salmon). Oh their pesto mashed potatoes were the nuts, but overall I'd say it was a tad too pricey and not enough quantity (obv I'd say that) for the food they served. Good, not great...oh and Deuce got blindsided by an awful $16 long island ice tea...haha sucks to be him.

After dinner we all broke off, changed in our respective rooms, and met up with Shabba minus the girls at Mirage's cabline to go sweat Shifty at the Rio. We arrived and were greeted by Rambler, Dennis, A-Kid, and Pika. After checking out the packed cash games, Deuce, Shabba, Fender, Tommy and Pika decided to cab it back to the strip and I hung around with the rest of the guys to sweat Shifty. He was a couple tables deep away from the rail, so only Rambler could see enough of the action to know what was going on. Instead I walked over to Humberto Brenes' table, and since he was in the eight seat, he was right next to the rail where I was standing.

Now, for the record, I was always kinda got annoyed by Humberto's CHARRKKK coverage he gets on TV. I've always heard though that he's a great player and on the table minus the cameras he's super nice and entertaining. Those that say that were right. After sweating him a bit people would come up to the rail behind me, talk about the shark, and he'd get up at times in between hands and talk to them. Tell them "It's CHARK, CH CH CH" and give everyone a laugh. Eventually he started showing me his cards and saying "you play along with Humberto?" and I just nodded and said "sure, that's awesome." He even offered me some gum :lol:

Later on after I left Humberto's rail to talk to shifty, some douchebag kid with a hot girlfriend railed Humberto for a bit. He was loud and obnoxious, but Humberto was cool with them and the crowd that kinda gravitated toward them. After him and his girlfriend left I walked back over and Humberto started talking to me in spanish "Chica guapa si?" and I was just like "si, muy bonita, pero su novio es douchebag." That got a laugh from Humberto and made everyone else on the rail think I could speak spanish, when in reality I'm god awful. Fun times, I'm now an Humberto fan for sure.

After watching Shifty make the money, we all caught a cab back toward civilization and I think we donked it up at some more 4/8??? I think that's what we did, I may have played some O8 for awhile, honestly it's a bit fuzzy, but after O8 we all got onto another 4/8 table and played some. After the 4/8 broke around 5am I bribed Tommy and A-Kid with a free breakfast as long as they went to the deli with me, there I got some some french toast and a side of bacon. Turns out splitting a plate of bacon with me got A-Kid hooked on it for the rest of the trip as he ordered at least two more plates for himself that I know of spread out throughout the rest of the trip.

Oh and Reb called me while we were at the deli, turns out he was right behind me walking by, but was too much of a pansy to come up to me and say hi. Apparently him and Tommy were eye-fucking for awhile, unsure of whether or not one was the other, that's why he called :lol: We shot the shit for awhile until they decided to break off and go to the Paris breakfast buffet.

Next time we'll cover Rambler throwing the hammer vs me at 1/2 NL and I'll talk about the Horse game we played at Mirage with a certain well-known poker celeb.

Vegas TR Day Two Part I: Bellagio 15/30

So in suprising un-Santi-like fashion, I was up and going at 11am or so. I showered up and headed over to Bellagio to try and get in some 15/30 action. Last trip the tables were great, so I really expected some of the same. When I first got there the tables were actually nitty as shit, so I sweated the 15/30 and 30/60 games from the rail for about an hour before deciding to put my name on a list. The 30/60 game was actually really good, so I texted Deuce to let him know he should probably get in the game. Eventually the 15/30 games were to my liking (multi-way pots/alot of limping), so I threw my name on the list and was seated soon after.

If you guys ever read my blog, you'll know I almost never talk about beats, but today you're going to get some. The first hand I raised pre-flop was probably my fifth hand at the table. I raised QQ and ran into KK on an all-unders board, hooray...thankfully he didn't re-raise me pre-flop or I would have lost more. A couple hands later I get QQ in the BB with five limpers behind me, the SB completed, and I pop it. Seven players, two bets a piece see a flop of QT5 with a couple spades...weeeeeeeeee

SB checks, I lead out, get called in a couple spots, Hijack raises, Button calls, folded to me, I 3-bet, original callers who called folded, Hijack and Button called. We're now 3-way...

The turn was a King...not necessarily a good card since there's now three broadway cards on board and a straight is likely. Thankfully I bet and it only goes call, call.

The river was an awful card though, as he put out an Ace of clubs...at least it wasn't a spade I remember thinking. I opt to check and catch a bluff, Hijack bets, Button tanks and folds, and I call. He shows me QJos :steam: and rakes in a fantastic pot that I built. Blech.

I actually maintain some decent composure, and pick up small pots here and there in between my next beat. Folded to me in MP, and I raise with 55. I get called by a lpp-tard in the CO and the BB.

The flop comes down AQ5 rainbow. Check, I bet, Co raises, folded to me, I 3-bet, CO calls.

The turn is a King. I bet, Tard calls. River is another King. I bet, tard snaps and says "raise!" and I lose the minimum when I call and he shows me AK. Uggggggghhhhhh so awful.

There's a couple three-outer hands I won't get into, so I'll wrap up with a pretty fun hand with QTsooooooooted. So like I mentioned early on, the table had been really passive. Lots of open-limping, so I looked down at QT of spades from the CO with three limpers in front of me so I popped it. Unfortunately seat two woke up with a hand and 3-bet it. The blinds folded, the limpers called, and we all saw a flop of J83 all spades. Fun times...I flop a Q-high flush with a straight-flush draw.

It checks to me, and I actually donk-bet into the button, something I almost never do. I flopped the Q-high flush, but since it was such an ugly board and the button was kinda passive at times, I thought the flop might check through. I bet out, he insta-raised, and it folded back to me where I 3-bet. Meh, maybe he would have bet out :? Oh well.

The turn pairs the jack, but I know I'm still good so I bet out and the Button only calls. I figure I need to dodge some paint cards (boats) and another spade (unless it's the eight of spades, which would be a great action card for me if my opponent has the Ace of spades).

Unfortunately the river card is ridiculously gross, as it brings out a third jack. What...the...fuck. I check, and the button bets out...I go into the tank for a second, and just start cursing in my head. Obviously I have to call the river since the pot is so big, but dammit I was certain this guy had Aces or Kings. He was the player that had originally flatted my QQ raise with KK earlier, how could he not have Kings? Finally I throw six red chips into the pot and say "well I hope you have AK with a big spade"...he says "you got my hand perfect" and shows down the Ace of spades, King of diamonds.

Wow that felt good. I left the game a little after because I had dinner reservations with Tommy and work girl, only dropping $200 (two stacks of red). After the beating I took, dropping only $200 there felt like a three rack win.

I'll be back in a few to talk about the Mesa Grill and sweating the $1500 NL WSOP event.

Vegas TR Day One: Mirage 4/8 and Pastrami

So after a bumpy flight into McCarran (even after some Dramamine I almost yacked), Fender and I landed safe and sound into Vegas and made our way to Harrahs to drop bags and see what everyone was doing. After talking to Shabba, we decided to meet up in the Venetian food court for a bite to eat and wait for everyone else to get in. First we met up with Albinokid, who actually reminds me a lot of Doyle (stature, voice, overall sexiness), except with a bit more punk-style (green and yellow shoes, band t-shirt). Cool guy, reminded me a lot of my younger brother plus the cool british accent.

After eating, Shifty, Rambler, Rambler's IRL friend Dennis, Trey and Trey's wife met up with us and the eight of decided to go play some mini-bet at Mirage. The game was great, as it was us and two tourists that were constantly rotating in and out, probably based on shock and absolute monkey tilt.

Shifty was about what I pictured, and to my delight, I didn't get punched by him at any point during the trip. He had a $100 freeroll to anyone who punched me in the face, thankfully no one took him up on the offer. He was good at setting up things to do but was still laidback and cool enough to go along with whatever people wanted. Rambler was much taller than I expected...probably 6'1 or so. He was a good kid and seemed to have a lot of fun, he's much better without a computer in front of him. Rambler's IRL friend Dennis looked a lot like Turtle from Entourage, he clicked really well with all of us despite not e-knowing anyone but Rambler prior to the trip...talk about a handicap. Trey told me he would be along with his wife and to look for a guy wearing an Andre Johnson jersey and a beard, I was expecting someone old like Deuce. Thankfully Trey turned out to be a younger guy with a wife much cuter wife than he deserved ala tttthomas :lol: :wink:

Okay had to get that out of the way, onto the game. We played with a couple rules. First off, throwing the hammer got you $5 a piece, and the second was you had to show one card if your hand didn't go to showdown. Usually I just told people what my hands were, like saying "well do you want to see top pair or my kicker?" or "which king do you want to see?"

I ran like a god early on, picking up Aces a couple times and winning, and then this hand comes up. So we had been straddling some of the time, and since I was on a tear, someone said "do a double straddle" which I of course obliged. So I have a dead straddle in the two seat (i.e. I can't raise if it's only called back to me) and watch Shifty make it $16 from the four seat. Awesome. Called in one spot behind him, I think the original straddler in the one seat (I think this was Shabba) called, and I look down at Red Kings and cap (cap is 5 bets). Weeeeeeeeeee I hold and take in a big pot, Shifty's a tad bit tilted I double straddle and get Kings :P

My only time on the trip getting 7-2 while playing the 7-2 game comes up during this session. I raise somewhere from MP, my IRL friend Fender 3-bets directly behind me from the three seat, and it gets called in two spots, I only call.

Flop is QT6 rainbow

We all check to Fender, called by a random and I call while showing my hand to Shabba. I'm setting up a turn CR bluff...

The turn obliges with a 6, and now I think I can bluff Fender off a good chunk of his hands on this QT66 board. The random and I check to him, he bets, the random folds and I raise with my seven-high. Fender snap 3-bets and I puke a little in my mouth, then actually start thinking about 4-betting. He knows we're all screwing around having fun, and maybe he thinks my CR is just a play...maybe he's got QJ or some shit. I decide not to follow through with the 4-bet plan and I hem and haw over folding, after I muck he shows one card which was a ten of spades or some shit. Obv full-house tens full, no way he has any other hand. He told me later that day he had Tens full (ldo). Sweet, my one chance to throw the hammer and I run into a boat :(

After a good chunk of time people start breaking away from the game (can't handle the mini-bet heat obv), and I decide to go with Deuce across the street to Harrahs to book my room. This mini-venture turned out to suck ass, and Fender owes me one for not making him go across the street with us. First the line to register was insanely long with only two people working the desk, then some jackass closed our safe before checking out, so we had to wait while a security lady opened the safe for us. I think me and Deuce were talking shit about the Shabba fitness challenge or w/e, because as soon as she came in she started hitting on Deuce and telling him "oh you look good" or something. Deuce runs good with olllllld women apparently.

I can't remember much after that, we probably ate at the deli at some point (edit: we did, I had pastrami, it was awesome obv) and I think I dropped $400 after running like ass at 10/20. Great, I crush 4/8 but won one pot in two and a half hours at short-handed 10/20.

Tune in next time for Thursday's shenanigans which include 15/30 at Bellagio, eating at Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill, and a trip to the Rio where I would sweat Shifty and Humberto Brenes.

4/8-Kill Action and a "Wtf?" Article

After work yesterday I decided it was ridiculously hot, windy, and I felt like shit...so what better to do than go down to Cap and play some cards? Actually my buddy Tony (you all know him as Fender) hit me up via text message to see if I wanted to grab food at Cap, so I decided fuck going home and sleeping, I could just hang out for awhile and eat something good off their Asian menu.

Well I walked into the room and Sam quickly said "nik, I gotta 4/8 seat for ya." Well...okay then. I wasn't actually that hungry yet, so I decided I'd sit down and let Tony play at 6/12 until he was ready to grab food, and I could just leave whenever. I played for maybe 30 minutes, missed a double gutter/flush draw combo, and also had a flopped set of Jacks get beat by a rivered flush. Fun start to the day...Eventually I hit a pretty gross gutterball in a killpot with J9 of spades to get me +$30 for the day before breaking off and going to eat with Tony.

After dinner I was about to go home before Tony convinced me to just sit down and play 4/8 with him. Ugh...they had a seat open and they were about to draw cards for the button, so how could I decline? Who cares that my right ear was plugged, hurting like a bitch, and fucking up my equilibrium right? Right. So I drew the King of clubs, received the button, and went on a nice little heater for a few hours, making a couple racks profit. I was up three racks at one point, but I ran into back to back rivered baby sets...I'll post those hand histories tomorrow, today I want to post an awesome, truly sick LHE article by Mike Matasow. Dear God, this entire article has to be a level of some sort...there are so many quotable gems in here it's hard to just pick one as my favorite.

If I had to choose...I'd say the part where he puts Mortensen on KK after she 3-bet pre-flop and then put Syracuse Chris on a flopped boat after he led the flop. Seriously, props to Mike for being able to read hands so well, that's why he's a pro ladies and gentleman.


Check-Raising the Devil by Mike Matasow

In the second week of the 2004 Series, I just missed a final table, finishing eleventh in a $2,000 Limit Hold’em event. Daniel (Negreanu) went on to win that tournament for his third bracelet. What I remember most about that tournament was a hand that came up about eight hours into Day One.

“Syracuse Chris” Tsiprailidis had pocket queens, Cecilia Reyes Mortensen was dealt pocket kings, and I looked down at two aces. Not surprisingly, the betting got capped preflop. I really didn’t know what Chris had, but I put Cecilia on kings.

When Q-4-4 flopped, Chris bet out with his full house, queens full of fours, and both Cecilia and I just called. I suspected Chris for the boat at this point, but the size of the pot was sitting on the borderline of being worth a call to try to spike an ace. When the turn came with a king, Chris bet out again and Cecilia flat-called. The pot was huge by then, but I was sure Cecilia had kings and was laying a trap for us both with her kings full.

In a cash game, you still might make a call, but saving a bet in a limit tournament is a lot more important. Although I was almost sure I was beaten, I went in the tank for awhile with my aces, wondering if I could be wrong. If there were two boats against me, they would clearly pay me off if I hit an ace on the river. This one pot would ensure that the winner would go deep in the tournament. I eventually called, hoping for a miracle ace on the river.

Miracles do happen! When that big fat perfect ace hit on the river, Syracuse Chris led out again and Cecilia raised. I reraised. Chris immediately showed his pocket queens to the spectators sitting behind him and folded. Cecilia went into the tank for about three minutes.

“I can’t believe I only called on the turn. I know you have aces. How could I play this so badly?” she moaned.

These were not deep stack tournaments in 2004; saving one bet at this point in a tournament could make a huge difference, but she finally made the call. I showed my aces full, Cecilia showed her kings full, and Chris flipped over his folded queens full.

Everyone at the table went wild when they saw the cards, and tournament players from the other tables came over to stare at the board.

In Vegas, June 10th-15th

Just a reminder I'm going to be in Vegas from the 10th-15th with some friends...if you want to meet up at the Mirage deli and grab a pastrami sandwich, drop me a line :-P