Mr. May
Monday, June 01, 2009
Yesterday, the last two tourneys in the BBT4 were held, a $5.50 Brit Bloggerment in the afternoon and a $75 Big Game in the evening. I had signed up for both at least 24 hours in advance. After all, I had a leaderboard to win.
If you've been following along, I was in 1st place for the BBT4 May leaderboard as of last Tuesday. I took that spot by placing 2nd in the Skillz Stud game to 1QueensUp1, who took 1st. At the time, I was trying to accumulate points in a desperate big to catch up to qrs1, who was holding the top spot. Just 24 hours later, though, 1QueensUp1 went back-to-back, winning the Mookie and leapfrogging over me to the top of the leaderboard.
SONUVABITCH!, I thought at the time. I figured my own 3 wins in May (4 total) was a heady accomplishment, but now 1QueensUp1 had to show me up with a back-to-back win. But once I accepted the situation, I knew I only had two last shots at points, both on Sunday.
From Thursday until Sunday, the BBT4 had been pressing on my mind. I knew the pressure would be on because suddenly a $5, 40 person tourney had $2,000 implication. That thought loomed large. I knew I couldn't actually take time of for work to play at the WSOP, but the $2,000 would go a long way toward giving me the necessary bankroll boost to play a bit higher (and a bit more comfortably) live.
And so, Sunday came around, and I spent the better portion of the morning finding anything possible to keep me busy so that I wouldn't overthink the poker. The day before, I decided to play two tourneys to keep in fighting shape, but I went out of both due to suckouts that reinforced the harshest reality of them all: even if I played perfectly Sunday, I might still lose. So, Sunday, I decided to simply keep away from the poker until game time.
I'll cut to the chase. I placed 3rd in the Brit game, out of 48 or so players. I was also the shortstack from about the 12 player mark forward, but managed to skate by, initially by choosing my spots carefully, and later (when were were down to 5 or so) by hitting my hands when I had so few chips that my opponents had no choice but to call my all-ins with any two cards. I managed to make it to 3rd before my luck wore out. If memory serves correct, that loss was due to a suckout, but frankly, he was so stacked compared to me that it was a non-issue. It wasn't his fault that he got lucky or I got unlucky.
When we were down to 5 players, someone on the rail mentioned that I had successfully overtook 1QueensUp1 for the May leaderboard. I had no clue if the railbird was correct because the points process mystified me. But it was basically irrelevant anyway. It wasn't so much that I needed to beat 1QU1 in the Brit game; I needed to get as much of a lead as possible to protect me from the chance that he or one of my other pursuers would hit it big in the Big Game later that night. The Big Game's buy-in was 15x the Brit game, so it was worth a lot more points on the leaderboard.
After busting from the Brit game, I went back to doing anything BUT poker. I watched The Girlfriend Experience, a movie by Steven Soderbergh starring pornstar Sasha Grey. It lacked nudity, which was a definite minus, but the film making itself was superb and Grey put forth her best dressed acting role yet.
As the Big Game approached, I also made dinner, turkey meatballs with spinach and parmesian in a pink sauce over tricolor bowtie pasta. Anything but think about the game.
So when the Big Game finally came around, I was ready and willing to do my best. Fortunately, I didn't have to.
All in all, I made it through more than half of the field (I think), but more importantly, all of the players who could possibly take my May crown were out before me. As they dropped out, I gained a sense of relief, which was finally accented when someone said to me in the FullTilt chatbox that I had already locked up May. There weren't sufficient points for my nearest competitor still in the tourney to catch up. I busted not long after and called it a night.
It feels good to win something as prestigious (in our circles) as the May Leaderboard. To be honest, I never won any leaderboard, likely because my play is so sporadic (both time-wise and quality-wise). The cash is nice, but the pride is even better.
Final thought. None of this would've been possible without the One-Man-Party, AlCantHang. So, thanks, Al. And thanks to everyone else for being not quite as good as me in blogger tournaments for one month. It's a small victory, but a victory nonetheless.
Until next time, make me Mr. May!
posted by Jordan @ 2:30 PM,
7 Comments:
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At 5:11 PM,
Dawn Summers said...
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hahahahaha awesome! Well deserved.
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At 7:10 PM,
1Queens Up1 said...
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My sentiments exactly, great job Jordan.
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At 7:57 PM,
BWoP said...
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Congratulations, sir.
Nicely played.
See you in the TOC :-0 -
At 9:04 PM,
23skidoo said...
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Well done Jordan! Remember straight flush draws are teh nuts.
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At 1:42 AM,
Schaubs said...
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Take the cash!!
Nice work Mr. May. -
At 8:27 AM,
KajaPoker said...
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Holy Crap J! I just saw you won 4 events in the BBT4. Well done man.
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At 12:07 PM,
Mary said...
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Congrats Jordan! When does the calendar go on sale?
