WSOP Quest Part 2

So next thing was their new player offer.  Earn 4000 MPPs in your first 30 days of signing up and they put you in a freeroll.  They were offering 4 of these; the first one had taken place and had only had about 12 people in.  Bargain I thought so set my sites on this.  I did it right, signed up[ through rake the rake so I would get rake back on my play and also got their bonus signup offer (2000 MPPs for $200 I think it was) which could be earned at the same time as the freeroll.  During the Easter break I sat on Betfair solid for a couple of weeks and racked up my 4k in points – into the freeroll I went.  (Obviously also got the bonus and rakeback – ended up with a nice little profit through it too).

 

So this freeroll.  It played on Sunday the --- of May.  Psyched myself up for it all day, watched the lobby to check how many people would be playing and sat down with 8 other people to fight it out.  After 10 minutes one player was removed (they didn’t go out, I can only presume they were idle so they got booted from the table after a certain amount of time), down to 8.  I fought it out, played some good poker and got down to 4.  At the first break I had brought up the idea of a deal, some were up for it – good.  Then came the problems.  There was a maniac at the table who would play and raise with anything – either very good or very stupid.  He was quite short so I had a pop at him with k7 on the button, I put him all in after I caught top pair, he called with middle pair and an inside straight draw and caught it on the river.  Damn.

 

I raised a couple of times trying to steal and had to lay them down to all ins, this left me quite even with the rest of the table; I had been quite a way ahead.  So I decided to loosen up and limped with 97 of spades.  Button min raises, maniac is on small blind and he calls, bb calls so I have to call.  Flop 972.  Woohoo. Maniac bets the minimum – 300 chips at this point.  BB folds, I raise it to 1k.  Button re-raises me to 2k, half both mine and his stack, maniac folds.  I think.  It seems pretty clear to me that the button has an over pair, he thinks he’s good, I know he’s not so I move all in.  Instantly he calls me with his pocket aces.  I hold my breath.

 

Turn 6.  River 6.

 

I’m out. Aces have a bigger two pair, runner runner and I’m gone.  I was gutted.  I felt, and still do that I had played the hand just right, the only thing possibly a little suspect being the initial limp with 97.  I couldn’t do any more.  Had I won I’d have had a 2:1 chip lead on two people who had already said they would be open to a deal.  As it was the guy who knocked me out when I approximately an 85% favourite went on to win the seat.  I was fun to live with over the next few days….