1 $1,500.00 No Limit Hold’em
2 $1,500.00 7 Card Stud 3:00 PM $2,000.00 H.O.R.S.E (super satellite)
3 $2,500.00 No Limit Hold’em 3:00 PM $2,000.00 H.O.R.S.E (super satellite)
4 $2,500.00 H.O.R.S.E 5:00 PM $2,000.00 H.O.R.S.E. (super satellite)
5 $2,500.00 Limit Hold’em 3:00 PM $2,000.00 H.O.R.S.E. (super satellite)
6 $2,000.00 Omaha Hi-Lo 3:00 PM $2,000.00 H.O.R.S.E. (super satellite)
7 $50,000.00 H.O.R.S.E. (Day 1) 2:00 PM $1,500.00 Pot Limit Hold’em
8 $50,000.00 H.O.R.S.E. (Day 2) 2:00 PM $1,500.00 Limit Hold’em
9 $50,000.00 H.O.R.S.E. (Day 3) 2:00 PM $1,500.00 Omaha Hi-Lo
10 $50,000.00 H.O.R.S.E. (Day 4) 2:00 PM $2,000.00 No Limit Hold’em
11 $50,000.00 H.O.R.S.E. (Day 5) 2:00 PM $1,500.00 Pot Limit Omaha (rebuys)
12 $50,000.00 H.O.R.S.E. (Day 6) 2:00 PM $5,000.00 Pot Limit Hold’em
13 $2,000.00 7 Card Stud Hi-Lo
14 $2,500.00 No Limit Hold’em (short)
15 $2,500.00 7 Card Stud
16 $2,500.00 Pot Limit Omaha (rebuys) 2:00 PM $1,500.00 Ladies No Limit Hold’em
17 $25,000.00 Gold Bracelet Heads Up Event 2:00 PM $5,000.00 Non Bracelelt Heads Up Event (3 day events) 128=2 matches day one, 3 day 2, 2 day 3
18 $2,000.00 Pot Limit Hold’em
19 $5,000.00 Omaha Hi-Lo
20 $5,000.00 No Limit Hold’em
21 $2,500.00 7 Card Stud Hi-Lo
22 $2,000.00 Limit Hold’em (shootout) 2:00 PM $1,500 Seniors No Limit Hold’em
23 $5,000.00 No Limit Hold’em
24 $2,000.00 Limit Hold’em
25 $2,000.00 No Limit Hold’em (shootout)
26 $5,000.00 7 Card Stud Hi-Lo
27 $3,000.00 Limit Hold’em (short) 4:00 PM $5,000.00 2-7 NL SIngle Draw
28 $3,000.00 Omaha Hi-Lo
29 $3,000.00 Pot Limit Hold’em 4:00 PM $2,000.00 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball
30 $5,000.00 7 Card Stud
31 $1,000.00 No Limit Hold’em (rebuys)
32 $10,000.00 Pot Limit Omaha
33 $5,000.00 No Limit Hold’em (short) 4:00 PM $3,000.00 Razz
34 $5,000.00 H.O.R.S.E
35 $5,000.00 Limit Hold’em
36 $10,000.00 No Limit Hold’em Main Event
The schedule consists of the following:
10 NLH
6 LH
4 PLH
3 Stud
3 Stud 8
4 Omaha 8
3 PLO
3 HORSE
1 Razz
2 Draw
2 special
2 heads up
There may be one event that you are curious about, the heads up events. Here is what I propose:
A $25,000 buy in no limit hold’em heads up tournament for bracelet winners ONLY. It would likely be a three day event, playing two matches the first day, two matches the second day, and two matches on the final day (based on a 64 player field). If it were a 128 player field, 3 matches would be played on day two.
On that same very day, we’d hold another heads up no limit hold’em tournament with a $5000 buy in. In this event, ONLY those who have NOT won a WSOP bracelet may enter!
Obviously because of the buy in the structure for the $25,000 event should have more play, so here is what I propose:
$5000 Heads Up: 60 minute levels 5000 in chips
50-100
100-200
150-300
200-400
300-600
Getting to level five would be a marathon match. If you were to play for four hours and still have no winner, obviously the blinds would now be a major factor but the thing has to end sometime!
$25,000 Heads Up: 25,000 in chips 60 minute levels
100-200
150-300
200-400
300-600
400-800
500-1000
600-1200
800-1600
1000-2000
If a match were to be a marathon, reaching level 9, the blinds would surely come into play and end it then since the average stack would have just 12.5 big bets by then. Level 9 would only come into play in the most extreme cases IMO.
Also of note, there are NO duplicate events and there shouldn’t be. With this schedule, being the “2006 $2000 NLH champion” will be more meaningful since there aren’t four others just like you! There is not one good reason to have more than one of the exact same event.
Anyway, that’s basically what I’ve been up to after finishing 36th in the pot limit hold’em today. I’ll be doing a video blog later and talking about some of my ideas. You can also discuss them in the forums where I frequent on a regular basis.]]>
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May 31: I ended up playing 36 holes that Wednesday. The first 18 I played poorly but noticed that I was playing better on the last few holes so I decided to play another 18 with my new caddy. That round went very well and gave me a big time confidence boost: 54-47=101.
June 1: I played a round at TPC Summerlin with a who’s who of professional poker players. In fact, we had so many people come out we had to play two groups.
I lost a little bit on the golf course and as soon as the round was done I had to head across town to do a voice over for an upcoming episode of MTV Diary that they did on me.
As soon as that was over I met up with E-DOG, Gavin, and a few of the boys for a late night round at Angel Park’s Cloud Nine course that is lit up so you can play late. It’s an easy par 3 course with terribly rough greens.
I didn’t hit the ball too well there either but it didn’t put a dent in my wallet at all really. Once we were done playing nine holes we decided to try the putt putt course.
This isn’t your ordinary putt putt course, mind you, this putt putt course boasts several par threes that offer dog leg lefts, bunkers, etc. which require an array of funky shots.
It was a lot of fun, but it was costing me a little bit of dough. With about 6 holes to play, Jenn and Marco dropped by to say hello and then she too got in on the action, getting a stroke a hole from Erick. By the way, I liked her side and she won easy!
The fun all started on the back nine. It was past closing time and the sprinklers were on. So now, not only did you have to line up your putt, but you had to hit it and then duck under the water that was flying at you from three different directions.
After a while I said, “Screw it,” and ended up getting drenched. So drenched that I had to drive home with my shirt off. It was all a ton of fun, I think we all felt like little kids playing outside with the hose or something. We were all giggling and having fun with it.
June 2: More Golf. Once again, we all met up at TPC Summerlin, and once again I had a rough start on the front nine. Virtually every round I play, the front nine is where I have trouble. Once I’ve got nine holes under my belt I start to play a little better.
The first nine got me off on the wrong foot but I picked it up on the back to minimize the damage.
From there I stopped over at Cecilia Reyes house for her birthday party. She reminded me that this was the fourth straight year I made it out to her birthday party. That would make the longest active streak for me!
June 3: Golf, golf, golf. I played another 18 and then hit the range for a couple of hours. I had Patty buy me into the WPT tournament the next day so I wouldn’t have to worry about heading down there.
June 4: I woke up in time for the poker tournament and should have been thinking about poker, but that’s not what happened. I dreamt about golf all night long.
When I got to Mandalay Bay I found myself practicing my swing in between hands. It was bizarre, but since we were playing so high on the golf course the tournament felt “small” to me. A million dollars if you WIN the tournament is nice, but anything less and it would just seem like a good day on the golf course.
Nonetheless, I tried really hard to focus and my mind was pretty clear. I was well rested and felt pretty focused. I got off to a decent start increasing my stack about 50% to 30,000. I then lost a pot to Gavin where I had aces up to his flush, but bounced back from that the very next hand beating Gavin with top pair top kicker in a good pot.
I made one excellent call with middle pair which cost me half my stack. I picked up on a tell and went with my read.
Finally, at about round 4 I moved in on a guy with 88 and he called me with 66. The flop came Q-Q-10, and the turn was a 6. It didn’t bother me a bit, because in the back of my mind I knew that I was only two minutes from the Callaway Golf Center and I could play the par 3 course there.
Before I did that I got a bucket of 100 balls and headed to the range. After hitting those I went to the chipping green and hit probably another 100 balls there.
I checked my watch and saw that it was almost 9:00pm which meant the others would be almost done for the day so I’d have a chance to play a round. Josh Arieh, Robert Mizrachi, J.C.Tran, and Nam Le all showed up and we discussed strokes.
I didn’t play well at all, but when all the money was on the line I came through like a champ. On the ninth hole I hit a chip over a bunker to within a foot of the cup for an up and down par. Josh then says, “How much I gotta lay you to do that again?”
“I dunno, I’ll take 5-1.” I said. We haggled back and forth with Josh offering 3.5 to 1. Finally we agreed on 4-1. Josh and Robert both had action on the don’t. This time I hit my chip to about five feet from the cup which gave me a chance. From there, I just drained the putt and won all the money on the day, boo ya!
June 5: I called everyone that morning wondering what time we were playing. Then I heard that TPC Summerlin was closed on Mondays, oh no!!! The guys actually wanted to play poker. Poker? You’ve got to be kidding me, I had absolutely no interest in spending my afternoon playing poker.
When my money game fell through I called my old buddy Sam from Toronto. Sam and I grew up in the same poker game and were considered the two best players in the game for years.
He’s a member at Spanish Trail which is supposed to be much easier than TPC Summerlin but it didn’t look that way to me. I forced all of the guys to play higher than they’d ever played before and they obliged.
I hit the ball “ok” on the front (54) but lit it up on the back with a 47 for a 54-47=101. That got the cheese easily. After the round I had a beer in the clubhouse with Allen and Melissa before heading home to bed. I’ve been getting to bed by 2:00am the latest, which is good for me.
June 6: It was back to the money game at TPC Summerlin. Only this time, the greens were a mess. They looked like sandy beaches! They were working on the greens so putting, something I did very well the day before, would be extremely difficult.
When I got to the course a ton of poker players were already there practicing. Ivey, Arieh, Greenstien, Lindgren, David Grey, Mike Sexton, Martin de Knijff, and Doyle and Dewey who joined us on the back nine.
We split the groups into two. I played with Barry, David, and Mike who all played lights out. Luckily I played pretty well so I kept it close.
Then, on number nine I had the whole of a lifetime. It was a 500+ yard par 5 and I sliced my drive out to the right but had a shot out of the rough to the fairway.
Then I absolutely pummeled a 3-wood to within 80 yards of the pin. From there, I pulled out a pitching wedge and followed through nicely as my ball neared the hole.
I was getting a stroke from everybody on this hole so I felt great about getting it close. A two putt from there would probably win, while a one putt would cinch it.
Then I noticed that the ball kept rolling… into the cup! I made an eagle! A freakin’ eagle! With a stroke, that’s a 2 on a par 5, lol… wow, what a feeling. My first eagle ever. In fact, it’s the first birdie or eagle I’ve made since picking up golf again. I just skipped right over birdie and headed right to eagle, lol.
That eagle, coupled with a 9 and an 8 had me shooting 52 on the front. I shot a 52 on the back also which was good enough to take a small win for the day as the others all shot great as well.
From there I headed to Bellagio to square up the figures a little bit and to play for an hour or so before picking up Lori at the airport. The poker game was secondary to the golf talk. He needs this many, that guy needs that many… who’ll team with who, blah, blah, blah.
In the meantime, in a 1.5 hour session I picked up $210,000 and had to go to the airport. I picked up Lori and now I’m home. I haven’t seen her since our trip to North Carolina. That’s quite a long time.
Tomorrow the plan is to take a day off and relax….not! No chance. I’m headed out there again tomorrow at noon and am hoping to break 100.]]>
No kidding man I’ve been in constant gamble mode the last few days. No Tivo, no writing, just high stakes poker and high stakes golf. Here’s a recap from where we left off in the last blog: May 28th- I had a golf date with some of the boys- Chip, Matt Savage, and Mike Minor (not Sexton). I played “ok” and had one big bet with Chip and a few small bets with Matt and Mike. Matt is just a joke to play golf with, man oh man. This guy should have been wearing a ski mask out there on the golf course the way he was robbing us! Matt played consistently well and it was clear I had little to no chance in that match. Oh well, that wasn’t the one to worry about anyway. My match with Chip was very fair and very close. Not once was any of us up more than one hole at any point. We played at TPC Summerlin and I had one highlight reel shot that made me feel better about an otherwise poor showing of 57-53=110. From about 110 yards out I was stuck behind two trees which meant I couldn’t hit a 9-iron which is the club I would normally hit from that distance. So instead, I pulled out my 4-iron and decided to hit a low half swing and let the ball roll to the green. Roll it did, as I hit the ball inside the leather! (within a foot) Before that round I only got in about 4 hours of sleep as I played poker till late the night before. So I headed home to watch a couple of the playoff games, both hockey and basketball, before heading into the Bellagio to play a little poker. Frankly I’m a litte confused now with what happened on what day, but I do know that I had a $252,000 win squeezed in there somewhere… must have been the night before. Oh that’s right. I was stuck $350,000 early in the session the night before and was playing a little sloppy early. I got it all together by morning, though, and ended up winning a quarter of a million. So where was I… oh right, after golf I headed to Bellagio for some $4000-$8000 action. We were playing all the games as usual which I just love. We tried to add Badugi in there but since David Benyamine has never played the game before he vetoed it. Too bad too, because it’s such an action game that I just know for a fact that he’d love it. Anyway, to make a long story short after about 8 hours of play at about 6:30am on four hours sleep and a round of golf under my belt I found myself just buried in the poker game, stuck about $850,000. I lost back to back capped pots, running it twice both times. That’s tough to do, especially when you are a statistical favorite. I was a little steamed up and considered just quitting right there, but then a thought took over- I wanted to test myself. Could I play well under these circumstances? Could I fight fatigue and still compete? I’ve noticed that my stamina has weakened due to a lack of play so I decided to turn this session into a mission of sorts. Bear down, try to play my A-game, and try to will myself past the fatigue. I’m happy to say that I fought really hard. This was a great test for me and a great way to prepare for the grueling month ahead at the WSOP in July. I wasn’t at my best, but I did maintain a level of play that I was comfortable with. A little sluggish, a little off on my reads, but overall not terribly bad for my first long session in a long time. Before I tell you how I did, I have to tell you about one hand that I found interesting: Playing 7 card stud hi-lo regular I had 4-4-6-7-8-9. My opponent held 2-5-6-7-9-J. Based on our boards it was obvious that I had to either have the low side or the high side at that point. David, my opponent raised me 600 times it felt like before I finally decided to stop raising. I was pretty certain that my hand was the favorite, but decided to stop after it got crazy. David, of course hit an 8 to make a straight while I hit a 9 for two pair and a worse nine low. He scooped me on that hand, but I decided to ask him if he wanted to run the hand again from sixth street for more money. He quickly said sure, thinking that he had to be the favorite in the hand. Hmmm… I don’t think so David. Later when I got home I ran the hand on the computer and found that I was about 51.5% favorite on the hand. By morning, Doyle and Allen showed up to join me Eli, David, and Barry. Some fresh meat for a game that didn’t look like it would ever break. I finally played until 8:00pm before quitting, about a 21 hour session where I was stuck almost a million. The final tally was -$190,000 in poker and -$26,000 in Chines Poker. Not a horrible result at all, especially considering where I was at earlier in the night. I got home at about 9:30pm and hit the sack hard. *************************************************************** At 6:00am the next morning I had to be up to spend the next two hours doing various radio interviews with some of the MTV radio stations. I was happy to do it, as the topic of discussion was the release of my new video game STACKED with Daniel Negreanu. We talked about that as well as the MTV special that is set to air in June 2nd on MTV 2 at 9:00pm EST and also on MTV on June 3rd at 9:00pm EST. For more info on the game and where to get it check out the website. At 8:00am I was able to get a few more hours of sleep before having to scramble to finish off a few other errands. One was a date with my new best friend Uncle Sam who needed a few bucks. Then, I realized that I was under extreme pressure to write a column for my syndicated newspaper column that was due in less than an hour! I popped out a pretty good column about playing monster draws after the flop. After I got all that done I decided to chill out for a minute and went to go see a movie: X-MEN 3 The Last Stand. I was really looking forward to this movie especially after enjoying the first two so much. One thing really stood out to me about the film. I find the relationship between Magneto and Charles Xavier to be just fascinating. The deep respect they have for each other despite being enemies. They both want the same things for their people, but have very different ways of going about it. Similar philosophical differences to those of Martin Luther King and Malcom X. After the movie I stopped off quickly at Road Runners for my friend Melanie’s 29th birthday. It’s funny, that’s the third straight year I’ve attended her 29th birthday… strange? From there I headed down to Bellagio for more action. On hand number one I was playing the wrong game and it cost me $30,000+. Oop! I won a sick pot in pot limit Omaha that had me up over $200,000 but after a 4.5 hour session I knew that I was just playing terrible and decided to quit. I’m overworked and it was starting to show. I was playing very sloppy and quitting was a good idea. I ended up winning $13,000 in a situation that could have been much worse. *************************************************************** May 31st- more golf at TPC Summerlin. This time with E-DOG, Chip and Doyle. I played ridiculously bad. I mean I couldn’t even hit the ball. That didn’t bode well for my pocket book since it’s the highest I’d ever played on the golf course. It wasn’t a case of choking, I just couldn’t hit the ball! It was awful. To make matters worse Ivey showed up to play the last five holes with us and bury me further into a hole. I’m not going to tell you all how much I lost, trust me, you’d all be sick to your stomach. Man, I’m sick to my stomach about it and I’m a gambler! Well, tomorrow is a day of revenge. I’m headed back to the golf course at 11:00am tomorrow and I plan on punishing Doyle really bad. I want to hear him whining about how unfair the match is and blah, blah, blah… there will be no mercy out there tomorrow and I could care less if I beat them every single hole! I’m so steamed up from today’s match that all gentlemenly behaviour is out the window! I want more strokes and I’m ready to play! ARRRRRRRRGH… man golf is so frustrating. ]]>