2005 World Series of Poker – The frustrations and disappointments inherent in tournament poker

As I write this column, it is almost halfway through the 2005 World Series of Poker, and as of yet I have had no success in any of the tournaments I have played. Before the $5,000 no-limit hold'em event, I had not even made the dinner break in any of the tournaments I had played. In fact, I had not even made it to the level at which the antes begin. I began the 2005 WSOP by playing the first event, which was awesome in terms of the energy and excitement, but my finish was less than impressive. I went out in undramatic fashion early on in the third level. I suffered similar fates in the $1,500 limit hold'em, $2,500 sixhanded no-limit hold'em, and $2,000 no-limit hold'em events. The multiple-rebuy $1,000 no-limit hold'em tournament was even more of a disaster.

The structure of the event was that everyone started with $1,000 in chips with the option of an immediate rebuy of $1,000 in chips for $1,000, which most everyone at my table did immediately, including myself. For the first two levels of the tournament, players were allowed unlimited rebuys of $1,000 in chips for $1,000, provided that they had $1,000 or less in chips in front of them. I went on to rebuy eight more times, and still found myself out of chips halfway through the second level. Disgusted with how I was doing, I quit rebuying and left the tournament, figuring that my $10,000 investment in this event was enough for the day.

The only tournament in which I had even a glimmer of hope was the $5,000 no-limit hold'em event that I won last year. This tournament had very special significance to me, since I won it last year and was very eager to defend my title and possibly repeat as champion. I was doing very well in this tournament, building my $5,000 chip stack up to almost $30,000, when the following hand came up that really crushed me, both mentally and in terms of my stack.

With the blinds at $150-$300 and $50 antes, I raised from early position to $900 with the K J and everyone folded to the big blind, who reraised me another $2,500. Normally, I would fold this hand without much thought, figuring that the big blind likely had a big hand, and K-J does not play well against big hands, as it is often severely dominated. However, something did not feel right about this scenario. The player in the big blind was a young guy with lots of chips, and I thought he just might have been trying to run over me with a marginal hand. I also thought that if he did have a big hand, I would have a great opportunity to double through him if I caught the right flop. Therefore, I called his $2,500 raise and we saw the flop.

The flop came down K-8-6 rainbow, and he thought for a bit and checked to me. I quickly checked behind him, figuring that my hand could be good in this spot and I wasn't very worried about giving up a free card with this flop. I also figured that if I didn't have the best hand at this point, I could save a lot of money by checking. A harmless-looking 8 came off on the turn, and he checked to me again. Now, fairly confident that I had the best hand, I fired $3,300 into the $7,000-plus pot. My opponent quickly called and I put him on an underpair to the king. A jack came off on the river, and he checked to me once again. I figured that unless he had pocket jacks and caught the case jack, I had the best hand with top two pair. So, I made a substantial bet, pushing $7,500 into the pot. To my complete shock, my opponent immediately called, declaring that he had three eights as he flipped over A-8 offsuit to drag the monster pot. Sure enough, my preflop read was correct, as he had reraised me with a trash hand (although he did happen to have me high-carded). Regardless, the hand certainly worked out well for him, even though he played it very passively. I ended up losing about $14,300 on that one hand, which was about half of my stack and a crushing blow at that point in the tournament.

Despite this blow, I lingered on in the tournament, surviving another four hours despite being very card-dead. Finally, with a very short stack at around midnight, I got all of my chips in with A-9 against pocket nines. To make matters worse, the case 9 flopped and my dreams of a repeat victory were quickly vanquished. I finished 90th, 45 places out of the money. Luckily, I have been doing well outside of tournament poker, so the accumulating buy-ins are not becoming a serious hindrance.

Tournament poker can definitely be very frustrating for even the most talented and levelheaded tournament professionals with today's huge fields. Many of the WSOP events are even more frustrating given how much is on the line in terms of prestige, TV time, and, of course, the ever-growing prize pools. I find the smaller buy-in events particularly frustrating, as each player starts with such a small amount of chips initially that it is virtually impossible to get away from a big hand early on.

Despite my lack of success in the first part of the 2005 World Series of Poker and my frustrations with tournament poker, I am still very hopeful that I can make something positive happen on the back end of the WSOP schedule. Regardless, I am sure that the final event will be a blast!

Good luck until next time.

Thomas "Thunder" Keller is a 24-year-old professional poker player and one of poker's young and rising stars. He can often be found playing at Ultimatebet.com under the name thunderkeller. To learn more about him, go to his website at www.thunderkeller.com.