Posted by Johnnymac 5:21 PM
I have recently discovered the "Sit N Go" one table tournaments at Pokerstars and have found them to be a lot of fun and good practice for small tournaments and short-handed play. Since I opened my Pokerstars account I have played in twelve of these tournaments and have one 1st place finish, one 2nd place finish, and six 3rd place finishes.

The four times I have not finished in the money, I have one 6th place finish and three 9th place finishes.

Aside from the 6th place finish, I am actually very proud of my record and I think my results are quite indicative of a successful strategy on my part - to play very tight during the first few rounds of the tournaments and get into the money, but take smart chances at the beginning if I have the best of it and try to win the whole thing.

I bring this up because I finally have a hand history to share on this blog - I just sat down in a tournament and got eliminated on the very first hand. I did have the best of it, tho - the other guy got lucky on the end - so I'm not that upset.

(And in the interest of fairness, I have to point out that in the one tournament I did win, I knocked someone else out on the first hand and doubled up, so what comes around goes around)

Anyway - today's hand:

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PokerStars Game #819070205: Tournament #3241833, Hold'em No Limit - Level I (10/20) - 2004/11/01 - 18:13:45 (ET)
Table '3241833 1' Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: Dojan (1500 in chips)
Seat 2: Knerten (1500 in chips)
Seat 3: ddutz (1500 in chips)
Seat 4: JustinZ (1500 in chips)
Seat 5: 1908nomore (1500 in chips)
Seat 6: PHIDELT757 (1500 in chips)
Seat 7: johnnymac96 (1500 in chips)
Seat 8: Enigmma (1500 in chips)
Seat 9: strokes03 (1500 in chips)
Knerten: posts small blind 10
ddutz: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to johnnymac96 [9h 9c]
JustinZ: calls 20
1908nomore: folds
PHIDELT757: folds
johnnymac96: raises 40 to 60 raise 3x BB and see what falls out
Enigmma: folds
strokes03: folds
Dojan: folds
Knerten: calls 50
ddutz: folds
JustinZ: calls 40
*** FLOP *** [Qs Js 5c] two suited overcards on the flop, I will try and win right now but I will fold to any challenge
Knerten: checks
JustinZ: checks
johnnymac96: bets 200 "fire that other barrel" and bet the size of the pot
Knerten: calls 200
JustinZ: calls 200

at this point I figure they both caught a piece of it, but not a very large piece - my best guess is that one has a spade draw and one has either a jack or a queen with no kicker - if I don't get a 9 on the turn, I'm folding to any action. Otherwise...

*** TURN *** [Qs Js 5c] [9d] WOO WOO! OK, this is it - I'm gonna win this thing right now!
Knerten: checks
JustinZ: checks
johnnymac96: bets 1240 and is all-in ain't no one gonna catch up to me
Knerten: folds
JustinZ: calls 1240 and is all-in wtf could he possibly have? T8? Slowplaying QJ or maybe a set?
JustinZ: shows [Ts Jd] well, that was a crappy call, see ya later! - ok, no 8 no K and I am on my way!
johnnymac96: shows [9h 9c]
*** RIVER *** [Qs Js 5c 9d] [Kc] ARGH!
*** SHOW DOWN ***
JustinZ: shows [Ts Jd] (a straight, Nine to King)
johnnymac96: shows [9h 9c] (three of a kind, Nines)
JustinZ collected 3280 from pot

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In retrospect, I guess I should have been more wary of the QJ flop than I was, because making my set could only help the guy with the T. That said, those factors are exactly the reason I bet the way I did - so as not to give cheap draws. He paid for the privilege of seeing the next card and he hit it. His call of my all in bet gave him only approximately 2-1 odds, yet with eight outs (8 or K) his odds were only slightly better than 5-1. He needed to get lucky and he got lucky.

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