I awoke this morning a man of optimism and hope.  After my hellish 2 levels at the WSOP I am as empty inside as Hilary Clinton’s soul.It’s not that I was card dead (I had a decent run of cards), it’s the fact that I ran into pocket aces FIVE times in 2 levels.  Twice with one guy and three times with another.Oh I also had the joy of having a flopped full house get beaten on the river by a higher boat.I went out on the last hand of the second level where I flopped Q-10-9 with a Q-J suited.  The chip leader with about $80k in chips had limped in in middle position (her first limp since she came to the table).  I called and the big blind made it $600 to go.  We both called.

Chip leader makes it 3k and I go all in for $6k more.  I think I am good with top pair, an open ended straight draw and a backdoor flush.  Both of them go all in behind me and I see anither Q-J which makes me happy.  Then I see the big blind had aces against me for the third freaking time!  They held up and I was off to Caesars to try some cash games.

At caesars I sat down at a 1 - 3 game and lost $500 in thirty minutes because I ran into aces TWO MORE TIMES.  I have to say that the last time the guy told me to fold and showed his set of aces on the turn and saved me more cash.  Normally I don’t want any pity but by that time I felt like I had a target on my forehead.I gave up and headed to Bellagio to make up the money at the BJ tables.  Yay for Bellagio! After winning I had a nice meal and am heading back to sleep. Tomorrow I will try to redeem my self esteem in the Caesars mega stack tournament with the entry fee kindly provided by the Bellagio..

All I can say about the WSOP was that it was quite an experience and just wait til next year!  It was worth all the ups and downs.

Day 3

The first thing I did was hit the blackjack tables and I promptly lost 3 doubles and splits to an English dealer named Jane. Luckily the shoes were pretty decent and I was able to eke out a decent gain.

I thenregistered to play in the 11 am MGM tourney and busted out first hand with J-J vs 2-3 clubs. He called a large raise and a large continuation bet then lectured me how you should never raise Jacks. Apparently I was stupid not to recognize his flush draw (backdoor runner runner).

I then went to Harrah’s and played in their bounty tournament. I had 80 percent of the chips and knocked out 27 people ($10 a head) when we split. I took down first prize and an invite to the year end tournament of champions so I will be back in August.

A woman was one of the last 3 and she had unbuttoned her shirt to distract the table. Hah! I was unfazed since she was had nothing on my wife Missy!

One notable incident occurred during the tournament. A dealer raked the pot after an all-in short stack survived without matching the chips. I helped figure it out and correct the problem but the other guy kept arguing. I looked him in the eye and told him there were only 2 things that were true in this world.

1 NEVER fight a land war in Asia.
2 NEVER argue math with an Asian.

Day 2

After taking a refreshing swim I played BLackjack for several hours and netted over $400 catching a few good shoes.

I decided to head over to Caesars to play in their megastack tourney for practice. My first hand I played Q-7 off from the big blind and flopped second pair. I may be color blind because instead of betting $100, I bet $1000. I got a caller and wanted to kick myself! The turn was a Q and I bet out $3000. Another call and another on the river. So I almost doubled up through a mistake!

The lesson here is always act like you know what you are doing, even if you don’t. Despite some good play I got caught making a huge bluff with A-8 suited against A-K (the guy was moving all in with marginal hands). The upshot is that I will not get in that situation in the WSOP.

I returned to the MGM to play some BJ and promptly lost almost $5k! Things were looking bleak for our hero until I used a positive shoe to win it all back plus $300 with large bets and doubles.

During this session I saw a craps table going nuts for 20 minutes. I meandered over and who did I see but my old buddy TJ Cloutier(a famous pro poker player).He was actually pleasant to me and we commiserated as he lost mucho dinero. I could do an entire blog on TJ saying nasty things about people. The entertainment value was well worth my losses. You have to admire a guy who can tell person after person what worthless halfwits they are to their faces wirhout ever losing track of all his bets on the craps table. Soon he ran out of money and he had a LOT. He went through a roll faster than my wife at Neiman Marcus. Last year he told me he won $40k in a tourney and then lost $50k at the craps table.

I went to bed thinking that if I ever start gambling like Mr. Cloutier someone needs to shoot me. Actually that someone would be Missy.

Honestly, my journey to the WSOP will only turn erotic if I make it deep into the tournament and Missy comes out to support me. Those of you who know Missy know that that is as much of an incentive as the cash.

My trip started out great as I was pleasantly surprised to find myself upgraded to first class! Seat 1A, surely a good omen.

Once I landed I hit the blackjack tables. After going down a grand playing $50 a hand, I was lucky enough to get a real plus7 shoe. I made a quick $1600 and left up $675 for the session. When I hit a positive shoe, I progress my bets.

Brimming with confidence I headed out to the Rio to register. I saw many celebrities including Ray Ramano (he is uglier in person) and Jesus Chris Ferguson. The place was packed, more so than when Rick Fleck checked out the scene last year. I am playing Saturday, July 5th at 12, seat 1 (I am taking this as another good omen).

Heading back to the MGM Grand I decided to hit the tables again. Once again I went down a grand playing $50! Luckily I was able to hold on to catch a plus 8 shoe and upped my bets to net $400. I was up more but I played for the dealers, doubled a ten vs 6 and lost.

Thus ended Day 1. As a side note I continued my streak of being the only man in Vegas not to be approached by a prostitute. I am beginng to develop a complexm

Here’s an update from our Vegas blackjack insider, Charlie..

“The games of blackjack at the RIO were just OK.  They played a lot of 6 deck games with good rules and many one deck games with poor rules.  The one deck games paid 6 to 5 for a players blackjack and there was no doubling after splitting.  They did have two double deck games that were very good with a good cut (meaning good penetration always past 5/8ths of the double deck.  I won pretty easily in this game.  The only problem I had was getting a credit line.  I applied for credit early in the morning and didn’t get it approved until about 6 PM.  I think it was because my Merrill Lynch account stopped using Bank One and started using J.P. Morgan Chase…”

“I also played at the Bellagio and the game there is great with the same rules as the Rio in the double deck game.  A strange thing happened at the Bellagio when I asked for a marker for the same amount as a player to my left.  We left the game at approximately the same time.  He won and I lost.  In Vegas you usually pay off your marker at the table (different from AC where you pay the marker off at the cage).  The pit boss made a mistake and gave the player next to me my marker instead of his.  He immediately ripped it up and when the pit realized what they did, they tried to find me.  They didn’t know where I was staying so if I never returned I would have never had to pay off the marker.  I did go back, however, so they immediately told me about their mistake.  I naturally agreed to signing another marker and that made them very happy.  They told me that this happened before and they ran into players that were not so agreeable.  I asked them what they would have done if I didn’t come back to the table and they said they would just wait for me to come back some day and they were not going to call me at home. They were very embarrassed, but it turned out well.  By the way I won more than the value of the marker when I played the second time.”

…Until next time…

Blackjack Tournaments are becoming more and more popular at casinos recently. Not only are they fun new way to play blackjack, but since most people already know how to play, it is accessible to a lot more people than a poker tournament. Another advantage of a blackjack tournament is that it doesn’t take up a lot of time. Even in a very large tournament, the time commitment is only a fraction of that of a poker tournament. With this guide, we at BlackJackForWinners.com will teach you some simple strategies that will give you some significant advantages in blackjack tournaments and help you win some money!

Determine Which Tournaments to Enter

First you need to choose a tournament. The best tournaments to enter are the ones that are free. The free tournaments tend to be invitation only so the vast majority of tournaments available to you will have an entry fee. Try to avoid tournaments where the prize pool is less than the sum of all the entry fees. Most casinos will guarantee a minimum prize pool and will add to it as more people enter the tournament.

Make sure you understand the Structure

The typical round in a tournament consists of 25 hands, with a minimum and maximum bet. Each player places their bet in order, with the initial bettor switching each hand. Usually the last hand of the round has no limit, that’s when you want to make your move. You need to bet enough to ensure that if you win you will be in second place and move on to the next round.

Blackjack tournaments have many different structures and a smart player will understand how to gain an advantage (on top of the card counting advantage) for each one.

The Cut-Off

With open tournaments, there are usually more entrants than will fit neatly into a bracket (24, 48, 96, etc.). When this happens, the tournament will have a preliminary round to reduce the number of players to fit into the bracket format. The problem most people have with this initial round is they take too many risks. Remember, the guy with the most chips advances as does the guy who just makes the cut-off. You do not need to make big bets and risk your tournament life.

The most important thing to remember is that just as in real life, most people who play in tournaments are ignorant. Instead of wondering how much you need to advance, spend your down time watching other tables and write down how much everyone has at the end of their round. When I play in tournaments I bring a friend who can help me write down totals. At the end of the shoe, the tournament director will do an official count of each player so the results are very easy to record. If you are lucky enough to be in a later seating, you can determine with reasonable accuracy the amount you will need to move on. This will allow you to make smaller bets and keep your risk to a minimum.

If you are unlucky and are one of the first people to play in the preliminary round you will have to make slightly bigger bets but being conservative is the way to go. Most people will overestimate the amount they will need to advance and will make large bets. This means that more than the normal number of people will bust out. Also, people who bet big tend to continue to bet big so that even if they move out to an early lead they tend to give back the chips by the end of the shoe.

Top 2

Many tournaments will have multiple rounds in which the top 2 or 3 players at the table advance. When you are playing in this format, you need to watch the other players closely. For most part you want to play somewhat conservatively, unless more than one of your opponents takes off to a large lead. Remember, you aren’t trying to get the most chips, you are trying to get the second most. Many players will try to jump out to an early lead, let them take the risk of busting out. I have been in several tournaments where I have advanced in a round by only betting the minimum and watching the rest of the table bust out with a bad shoe.

Head-to-Head

Some tournaments will have you face off one-on-one, with half of the players advancing each round. If this is the case, then playing conservatively is still the better strategy. If your opponent starts to lose early you may advance on him busting. If he gets ahead you can always start being more aggressive after he has taken the risk already. You may lose but it is always better to let your opponent be at risk first.

If you get to bet last on the last hand then you have the advantage. You can bet just enough to beat him if you both win. Note that I usually do not take into consideration a Blackjack unless I have my opponent covered by a large margin. It is better to lose to the rare Blackjack (like I did in the MGM Grand March Madness $500,000 Invitational) than to bet to protect against it and lose simply by having him win the hand and you lose. Go with the percentages.

In later articles we will get into the math.