Scanning back through my performance in the 50-50 on Full Tilt, I have played the tourney five times, satelliting in once for total buy-ins around $230. In those five tournaments, I have cashed for $342 and an average finish of 215...almost always, 153 make the money in these tournaments. While I am not going to make a living with these finishes, for a recreational player who vastly prefers tournaments to cash games...this is the best bang for my buck that I have found on any site.
I told a friend of mine last night (who specializes in six-handed SNGs) that the same reasons I love these tourneys are the same reasons he would hate them. You start with a fantastic amount of chips relative to the blinds...the structure is slow and even...with a flat pay structure. Bravo, Full Tilt. Bravo. And on top of that, the $2 rebuy satellite at 6:40 is a donkfest just waiting to be taken. So a $55 buy-in can easily turn into $10.
That said, as much as I love this tournament, I feel like I am stuck in a rut of mediocrity. I play so few tournaments with less than 500 players that my "end-game" is dreadful. And worse yet, as I have previously opined, I am always playing tournaments above my bankroll so the money means something. This leads to a lot of finishes between 50-250 and good, but not great performances. Last night is a perfect example.
Most recently, last night I bought directly in and as I scanned the table, I didn't recognize a single name. Usually a good sign. It was a weak table and I was able to pick and choose my spots and they would still pay me off regardless of my image. I quickly doubled-up before going card-dead until well after the first break. One of the best things about this tournament is that few people understand the relevance of the blinds to chip ratio. So you will find people with 3,000 chips getting "desperate" at the 80/160 level. They're easy to pick out and exploit. Utilizing that strategy, I built my chip stack up to a little over $10,000 and pretty much folded my way into the money with a few well-timed steals despite not seeing anything other than a KK which was folded around.
Once in the money, I loosened up and tried to steal a little more frequently and unfortunately got caught a few times. I was getting short and pushed with 99 in early position. I got called by AK and doubled up to over 12,000. After a few successful steals I was sitting on a stack around 24,000-25,000 and about 26 out of 35 or so. My table was pretty weak and I felt confident that this was my turn for a deep run. Then came the evidence of my lack of end-game. I wake-up to 10-10 in the small blind. It's folded around to the hijack and he bumps 2.5x the big blind. I knew this was a bet that signified something, not a steal, but was most likely a mediocre hand and almost surely a drawing hand. K-Q, Ace-rag...something of that nature. So it's up to me.
Logically...at this point...with blinds and antes high and pocket tens...what do you do? CLEARLY you push. If he is on a draw and given his stack around 30,000 he is not want to go to war with KQ. Most likely. But no. My thought process went like this. I can call his bet and still have over 20,000 chips if a high card comes on the flop and promptly check-fold...living to fight another day and maybe make the next $30 payout level. All this for an extra $30. So I just call.
BB folds and we go to the flop heads-up. Clearly the flop comes A-Q-5 rainbow so my likely scenario comes to pass. So CLEARLY I check-fold...or MAYBE re-raise and represent a monster...but no. At 2:15 a.m. and my bravado rising in dreams of a final table, my adrenaline tells me that he had KJ or something and I push my last $20,000. He insta-calls and flips A-7. Say what you will about an instacall in this situation with A-7, but my play was stupid. I read him perfectly and even though I made the incorrect play pre-flop for maximum EV, I still gave myself an out that I refused to take post-flop.
Idiot.
I was out in 30th place for ~$200. Not a bad return and continued success in the 50-50, but it could have and should have been much better.
Thanks to an ill-advised trip to the .50/$1 pot limit omaha table and an untimely QQQ loss to a rivered straight with the money all-in on the turn and a peer-pressured entry into a $26 LIMIT Omaha Hi/Lo tournament that was akin to paint drying...my account sits somewhere in the $290 range. Over doubling my buy-in from last month, but continuing on the roller coaster of my last few weeks.
Stuipid is as Stupid does.
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