$5 MTT Final Table

I took almost a week off of playing poker. I had some things to take care of and my fiance told me I was playing/reading/thinking poker too much. No big deal.

I returned to playing last Sunday. I had a terrible day. I started by doing something I am trying not to do; I played above my bankroll. I played some $50nl. I can afford to lose $50, but I can't withstand much variance. It was mostly uneventful until this hand.

6-handed

Hero - SB

Villain - BB

Folds around to me and I min-raise with 8-6 spades. BB calls. Flop is 9-7-5 with 2 hearts. I lead $1.50 into the $2 pot. BB raises to $6 and I re-raise to $19. BB shoves and I insta-call with the nuts. BB has J-9 hearts and of coarse he rivers a heart. ugh.

I take a break for an hour or two. I'm not looking to play more cash. I played (3) $10 SNGs and cashed in none. So Sunday sucked.

On to the good stuff.

Monday after work I was ready to redeem my losing Sunday and started off with the $1 rebuy. Always a fun tournament. I had wireless problems on my laptop and to make a long story short I ended up busting and not rebuying during the rebuy period trying to switch between my laptop and desktop. ugh, not a good start.

Just a little bit afterwards I registered for a $5 MTT and a $3 rebuy. I did rebuy more times than I would have liked, but finished something like 32nd of ~650.

The $5 MTT started off great. I quickly built up my stack to ~12k and was among the chip leaders before the first break. Not much seemed to happen over the next 1 or 2 hours and my still 12k stack was very small. I was able to abuse the bubble enough to stay alive, but not much more. I was able to do the same when we got shorthanded going from 3 to 2 tables and then again from 2 to 1. I made the final table 7th in chips.

I really need to double up soon to have a chance. I took a chance calling (2) all-ins from the (2) shorter stacks with 10-10. They showed A-K and A-J and I more than doubled up. I was still only 6th in chips, but I had much more time now. I really just hung around until we were down to 4.

There were 4 left for a while before my final hand.

UTG folds - BTN min raises to 16k - SB calls and I call 8k into a 44k pot with 4-6 spades.

Flop - Ac - 5h - 3s

SB bets 16k

I debated raising with the OESD, but with the original raiser still left to act I thought better. I thought about folding, but I wasn't looking to fold into 3rd.

I call 16k into a 68k pot leaving ~150k

BTN folds

Turn - 5s

SB bets 16k

Great turn for me as I now have OESFD. SB bet is really weak.

I raise to 78k

SB call the additional 62k. Damn I was really hoping to just take it down there and have the chip lead.

River is a brick - 8d

SB checks ??? really?

I shove my last 72k and SB calls showing A-9.

Was I too aggressive? I feel like I represented a 5. Are you calling this turn raise and river bet?

O Well. 4th is respectable and paid $262. MTT seem to be working out for me. I'm going to continue with the SNGs, but I'm going to move up to $20.