Well Saturday’s game started out VERY slow for me.  So slow that I played a total of ONE hand in the first two levels of play.  I’ve often said that one of the biggest leaks in my game is that I defend my blinds to my detriment.  This night I didn’t even do that – partially because I had such garbage hands that I couldn’t and partially because I had a couple of really aggressive players at my table so when I was in a blind it was raised and often times re-raised before it got back to me.  The one hand I did play went something like this.  I was in the big blind and looked down to find this monster:

The action came around to me and I was more than happy to check my option with this garbage.  Of course I couldn’t just get a nice little 662 flop to give me a boat and I had myself a decision to make when the flop came:

The small blind had folded before the flop so it was on me to act first.  I thought about firing a bet to see where I stood but I had 3 limpers in the pot and I was guessing one of them may have limped with a big pair or at the very least something like Jack/Ten, Queen/Ten, King/Ten or Ace/Ten.  After I checked the hyper agressive player to my left fired out a medium size bet which took down the pot.  I suppose I could have called and tried to catch trips on the turn or river but I was so used to folding at this point that it just felt like the right thing to do.  He didn’t show so I can’t be sure but I’m guessing I made a good laydown (especially with such a garbage kicker).  Looking back I probably should have made a bet after flopping middle pair but based on my read I just couldn’t pull the trigger.

After the break I did manage to wake up with a pair of red Nines in early position.  I raised before the flop and got a few “oohs and ahhs” from the table cause they noticed that I’d been playing super tight (very perceptive bunch at my table that night).  Of course the flop came out TERRIBLE for my hand:

With my luck thusfar I was just sure that I’d been outflopped but I stuck to my guns and followed up my pre-flop raise with a bet.  I took down a small pot and got a little bit of confidence from there.

After that I went back into waiting mode and played REALLY tight poker.  I still wasn’t getting too many hands and when I did I was playing in mulit-way pots which for my position was a bad thing.  After another hour so or I got to the point where I playing “all in or fold” type of poker.  I won a race with Sixes against Ace/Jack.  I had one big hand where I picked up Kings in the big blind and managed to nearly triple up.  From there I manged to just stick around and stay out of people’s way.  I had a couple of big stacks at my table and they were picking at one another rather than at me.  Through no fault of my own I managed to find myself heads up with a nearly 10 to 1 chip deficit which quickly ended the night.

In the final analysis I don’t think I had any right to be in second place but I do have to say that I played MUCH better than I had been all season.  I stuck to my game and even managed to fold some hands when in the blinds that I KNOW I should have but in the past would have stuck around with.

See you after the flop!