World Series Conclusion

Well by now just about everybody knows that I went out midway through Day Two.  For the record, my last hand was King-Jack offsuit.  I went all in and was called by the player to my right, who had a pair of Tens.  The board was irrelevant.

I had made a prediction before the Series started, which I only shared with a very few people because I didn’t want to jinx myself.  But after making a brutally frank assessment of my tournament skill and expertise, this was what I concluded:

• ·         I would make it to Day Three, but just barely.
• ·         I would make it through about ¾ of the field.
• ·         I would finish out of the money.

The last two predictions were spot on.  I didn’t make it to Day Three, but that’s because I didn’t expect the field to thin so quickly.  So I had a pretty accurate assessment of my chances, for what that is worth.

I had a sort of Zen-like epiphany during the final break before I got knocked out, which will probably sound kind of goofy when I commit it to paper but it actually was a pretty incredible realization at the time:

It’s not about how many chips you have.

It’s not about making it into the money, or how much you make.

It’s all about playing good poker!

If you play good poker, consistently, you will win your share of tournaments and earn your share of the money.  Just make good decisions, one at a time.

One of my childhood heroes was Coach Tom Osborne, former head football coach at the University of Nebraska.  Even though he consistently coached one of the nation’s very best football teams year after year, he never set as a goal for his players to win a certain game or defeat a certain team.  The goal he wanted his players to have was always to play the best game possible.  To give the best effort you can, each play.  He realized that, given the talent of his players, if each of them played the best that they possibly could, then his team would win their share of games overall.

I think that works in poker too (or any other endeavor, for that matter).  Just do the best you can, one play at a time, and your decision-making will be rewarded over time.

Again, it sounds goofy now that I have it on paper, but so what, it’s my blog so I can put whatever I want in it.

As far as the rest of my trip went, well, what can I say, it was extremely successful.  I basically paid for my trip with what I earned at the poker table (not counting the WSOP of course, but I had saved up for that separately).

I entered one particularly interesting tournament at Harrah’s, after I was knocked out of the WSOP.  It was a “bounty” tournament, which is something I’d never played before.  The buy-in was $100, but you got $10 back for each player you knocked out.  I knocked out eight players (there were 46 total), so I almost made back my buy-in just on bounties alone!  I finished in third place, which was a pretty pleasant confirmation of my abilities to still play good tournament poker.

I’ll be posting more feedback about Vegas, the series, and other stuff in the days to follow.