It's Never Too Late For My Super Bowl Post, Right?

It’s not, is it?

I don’t post in chronological order, I never have.  Besides, everyone remembers the Super Bowl like it was yesterday right?  Let’s see, it was the Nashville Predators vs the New Orleans Zephyrs, right?

Or something like that.

I wouldn’t mention the Super Bowl at all except that, this year, for the first time ever, the Super Bowl game did not have my undivided attention.  Unlike all the previous ones, I was doing something else while watch the “big game.”

I was playing poker.

Originally I planned to come back from Vegas the Friday before the game.  But as it closer to the end of my trip, it occurred to me that Super Bowl weekend is a pretty big deal in Vegas.  A lot of people come to town that weekend to place bets on the game (yes, they do allow that in Vegas—in fact, they encourage it) and watch the game at Super Bowl parties that the NFL refuses to allow them to call “Super Bowl Parties.” And these people seem to have a lot of money to throw around, so I assumed some of them might want to throw it around at the poker tables.  And I thought maybe I’d be able to catch some of it.  It seemed like the games might be juicy so I decided to stay through the football game.

It was gonna be weird watching the game while playing poker but I wasn’t all that excited by the match up this year anyway, so I figured I could manage.  I was able to remotely set my TiVo back home to record the game for me in case anything earth-shattering happened.  You know, like a 33 minute blackout.  But what were the odds of that happening?

I tried to see if any rooms had interesting promos going on.  The only really good promos were the ones at Mirage, all kinds of bonuses and high hands and drawings and stuff.  The trouble is that in order to get into a game, you had to get there by 11 AM or all the seats would be filled, and unlikely to open up.  Too early for me.  I also assumed that a lot of the players would be playing ultra tight because they didn’t want to bust out before the game finished, making the poker less than optimal.  Maybe I’m wrong.  But I kind of think you probably needed to hit one of the drawings or jackpots to make it worthwhile. 

So I opted for good ol’ BSC.  I arrived about an hour before game time and walked past the sports book, which was mobbed.  There were at least 150 people in line trying to get last minute bets down.  Although busy, I didn’t have any trouble getting a seat at a 1/2 game, and was able to score a seat which gave me a pretty good view of the TV’s.

At first the game was just what I was hoping for, It was loose and there were several wild players.  I looked for my spots and got paid off some for my decent hands.  I worked my stack up to over $100 profit when two things happened.  The two loosest, worst players left (and before the game had even started—the nerve) and some crazy Russian dude took the seat immediately to my left.  He only bought in for $60 but seemed to like raising preflop pretty much all the time.  If he shoved and busted out—and that happened a lot—he just re-bought for another $60.  Apparently his particular short-stack strategy was to short buy and be ultra aggressive with every hand.  Guess what?  It didn’t work.

But before that, he got lucky by catching me holding my favorite hand.  Yeah, the dreaded pocket Kings.  I raised preflop to $10 in early position and the crazy Russian called, as did 4 others!  The flop was low, I bet out $40 and he shoved with his last $60.  No one else called but it was an easy call for me.  Nothing helped me on the last two cards and he turned over 5-2 (but at least it was soooooted) for a flopped 2 pair.  Yeah, he called a raise in early position with 5-2!

Damn Kings.

But later he paid me off when I flopped a set of 10’s and turned a boat.  Also hit runner-runner for the nut flush to get well more than what I lost to him with the Kings back from him.  He re-bought many, many times, and eventually started re-buying for $120 instead of $60.  The bigger stack didn’t help his game anyway.  He was just giving money away, and fortunately I got some of it.

Meanwhile, there were of course some distractions from everyone watching the game.  But the best moment for me was before the game started and they had coin-toss.  When the result was announced, a huge roar erupted from the sports book, I knew that meant that a lot of people had bet on the coin toss, and half of them won.  I was quite amused.  Crazy gamblers betting on a 50/50 outcome and giving up 10% vig for the privilege!  Dumb. (There was a similar loud cheer towards the end of the game when the Ravens took an intentional safety, for all the bettors who bet that there would be a safety in the game).

As the game was winding down, I got texts from Lightning, who had come into town earlier that day.  We decided to get together for dinner.  He was over at Harrah’s, and I decided to kill two birds by meeting him in that neighborhood so I could also check out the newly relocated Quad poker room (formerly Imperial Palace).  I wanted to see it so I could update the info in AVP and also mention the relocation in my Ante Up column.  See guys, even on Super Bowl Sunday, I’m working.  I cashed out of the game up $135.

I came by Harrah’s to see Lightning grinding away.  Lightning has long ago given his version of the night here.  After rejecting a bunch of ideas, we ended up trying the burger place at Harrah’s, KGB.  Like the better Le Burger Brasserie at Paris (see here), the burgers are served by good looking, scantily clad women.  Unfortunately, these waitresses, unlike those at the Paris burger joint, do not serve the burgers in their underwear.  

I had what one fellow blogger insisted (via Tweet) was scientifically impossible—a good burger at this place.  But Grange is a gourmand while I’m just a slob who likes a juicy burger.  It had the one requirement I insist on that I often find hard to get—it was rare.  I was happy with it, even though it wasn’t as good as the Bra burger place or, for that matter, the Fuddrucker’s at the Orleans.  Also, I should point out that Lightning used his Total Rewards points to pay for our meal, meaning the next time we get together, it’s my turn.  I’m hoping that by the time he returns to Vegas, the Jack-in-the-Box in the BSC food court will start accepting BSC poker comps.

After the meal, we did indeed walk over to the Quad and found the new poker room.  Unbeknownst to me, the location we found it at was only a temporary location (I said in my Ante Up column it was the permanent location—damn).  I’ve heard they’ve moved again and will move again into their—really, we mean it this time—permanent home in October or later.

We couldn’t have played at the Quad even if we wanted to, as the only games going were the tournament.  Lightning wasn’t sure if he was going to be up to playing any more poker and this was my last night in town so I was anxious to get back to the tables.  We parted and I returned to the poker room for my last session of this trip.

I got into another wild and crazy game, lots of huge raises with marginal hands.  Having learned from Grump that you can’t just play tight in games like this (see here), I called a small raise with 7-5 diamonds on the button.  Yeah, I did.  And flopped an open-ender.  And hit it on the turn.  By the river, there was a flush possible (not diamonds), plus a bigger straight possible.  My value bet was raised 3X.  I thought about it and just felt there was too good a chance he was either bluffing or overvaluing his hand.  So I called.  It was the right play.  He had flopped bottom pair with A-6 and caught the Ace on the river for two pair.  My straight was good.

I had another good read when I had a King high flush.  There were two 8’s on the board but I really didn’t smell a boat.  The aggro guy to my left bet out on the river, and a lady who had built up a small stack into a medium stack shoved.  It would have cost me $68 to call with my flush.  She was the one player at the table I was hesitant to call there.  It was a pretty big pot, and it was tempting to call.  But I put her on the Ace high flush and mucked.  The other guy called and showed an 8 for trips.  The lady did indeed have the Ace high flush.  Good lay down.

I was up and down the whole session, there was a lot of variance at such a wild table.  I would have left even but I decided to call a preflop raise to $25 with pocket 7’s.  It was a bad play, but I knew the guy would pay me off if I hit my set.  I whiffed.

So I was down a little for that session but still up for the day.  Had a nice dinner with Lightning, did a little work, and oh yeah, watched a little football game.  I had to look it up.  Turns out the final score was Ravens 34-49’ers 31.  You remember right?