I’m obviously way overdue a post, so here is a recap of one of my WSOP cashes this year (a not-that-profitable 96th in another $1500 NL event). I’ll be posting and doing more with the site I’ll try to post and do more with the site when I get back on the road playing more tournaments.

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I came into day 2 of event #38 $1,500 NL tournament with about $63,000, slightly above average at about 30 big blinds deep, and feeling pretty good about my chances despite a tough table draw. I was in the 7 seat, to my direct left were internet names Joshua “pbdrunks” Vanduyn and Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi in the 8 and 9, and in the 3 seat was Burt Boutin fresh off his huge score and bracelet win in the PLO.

Things got interesting pretty early in the day when I opened in middle position with A9s to 5000 and Sorel said “14000″ announcing a reraise. The way he said it struck me as unconvincing and as far as I knew he normally put chips out to raise rather than speak. Hmm. I ask him about his chips, etc., and he stumbles a little bit with the exact amount. I think a little longer, watching him, and I think I notice a little hitch in his hand shuffling chips. “I go all in,” waving my hand, knowing that I’m gonna know if I’m dead in the first few seconds. He shuffles chips a little bit and does his best “The Thinker” pose for 20 or 30 seconds, staring at the center of the table, but eventually throws it away. I do something I rarely do and show him the hand because it’s early in the day and it feels right. Things go smoothly after that, I chip up to over 88,000 with no resistance, and the table breaks. Sorel tells me he had A9 too. “Yeah, but was it suited? No? Good fold then.”

As fate would have it I didn’t spend much time at my new table. I folded for a little while, tried a steal with some hand I don’t remember in early-middle position and got moved in on and was at about 75,000 at 2000/4000/500a. For whatever reason I decided I was in a good steal position (tight players in the blinds, a few people in late position telegraphing folds) and opened to 11,000 with Q3o. It folded to a middle-aged amateur with about 90,000 who looks at his hand and says “Raise… 10 thousand.” At first I thought he was reraising me, but it soon became clear that he hadn’t seen that I had raised. “Oh no, I call that,” pointing to my bet, he now says. Of course, they make him raise 10 thousand more for a total bet of 21,000. He doesn’t seem too happy with the situation, but he’s not really freaking out either.

I started talking to him a little bit, both to give the impression that I had a monster and to possibly get more of a clue from him. You trapping me?, is this a sick angle-shoot?, etc. I was pretty sure that he had in fact made an honest mistake, and would have just-called had he seen my raise. With the money in there I decided to go with it.

I guess at this point with 10 tables left there were plenty of reporters watching the action, one of them, Adam Johnson, retells my “bombing out” here. If nothing else the link features a decent fro pic, so it’s worth checking out.