Deep Frustration

More on the constant tribulations of tournament play.

The rewards for winning a large-field MTT are undoubtedly substantial, especially online (where there can be thousands of entries). Unfortunately, the payoff structure is highly weighted to the top few places. The result is that one can place high in the field for scant return.

Still worse is to play for hours and fall short of the money altogether, but in monetary terms there is little to choose between just in vs. just out of the money.


The biggest payouts are, certainly, in events like the pokerstars Sunday Million, but even low buy-in MTTs yield large prizes in some cases.

Last night, for example, I was online for the gutshot forum league MTT. Now, that is not about the money. nb - I won it again. It's hard to explain how it is that I have such a strong record in this competition: 5 tourneys so far of which I have won 2, and placed 2nd and 3rd.

Anyway, as I was online, I had a look to see if there were an MTT that I should play simultaneously. There was nothing really suitable, but there was a $5 rebuy on stars due to begin later on during the forum comp. So, I registered, and virtually forgot about it.

When the start time came around, up popped the table and I " sat out" to concentrate on winning the forum event. When I had done that, I wondered whether to even bother with the $5 rebuy. But, I made some good headway in the rebuy period, without ever needing to rebuy, and was in the top 200 at the break.

I carried on, and played aggressively (figuring on a few key occasions that it was pointless just limping along so if it came to a probable race, I raced). It was one of those nights when out of 6 races (of the AK vs TT variety) I won 5 and kept moving up.

Eventually, I was in the money (504 places out of 2,630 to pay). Still, with the bottom rung of the money being about $35, this was largely symbolic. The top end was far from notional, though. $8k for first.

I had advanced to 15th/100 or so when I made a horrible bluff with King-high on the river against a strong player who had shown strength on every street. This pushed me way back down to < 50% of average chips after having been at 2 - 3x average for hours.

However, with the aid of some bold moves and some more race-winning, I eventually peaked at 7/58 and started to really think I could make the final table.

Sadly, I let my guard down and also LOST some key races. Actually, first I lost a couple of races, then I tried to force the action and lost more chips. Ironically, in between hands where I played some big pots (winning some, to be sure) with marginal hands, I also picked up KK UTG twice and each time the whole field folded to a single raise.

In any case, I was down to 225,000 chips which was about 60% of average when the chipleader was moved to our table on the cut-off. Blinds 6k/12k with a 300 ante. He raised to 48,000. I pushed from the SB with JT and he called with QT, which held.

6-hours for a top 2% finish and a 600% ROI, but at the end of the day it was a win of only $75 which is an average sized pot at a $1/2 game.

I'm pleased to have got this deep, but the fact is I need to go on to the top places to make it worthwhile. I certainly learnt from the tournament, and it's certainly a reminder (if any were needed) that 100% concentration and 0% mistakes are the magic mixture. You need luck as well, of course. One can always be luckier, but I have no complaints on that score.