The Universe Has Finally Realigned

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I've been playing tournaments at the Venetian, the Wynn, and the Orleans and not doing well. Yesterday I played at the Venetian and hung in for a while when I suddenly had a streak of great hands late in the day. The one in the picture was just one of them (the best). I min-raised pre-flop and got one caller. I then flopped quad aces! He checked and I checked. The turn was an 8 giving me... well... still quad aces but a pair of 8s to go along with it (that didn't count for anything). He checked and I checked. The river was a K. He made a large bet. I doubled it. He called. He told me later he had a K, giving him the second nuts (second best possible hand) so I probably could have bet even more since I had the absolute nuts.

Another time, I got pocket Ks. The player to my right raised from $3K to $12K. He had about 2/3 of my stack. I reraised to $24K. He looked… really upset? annoyed? angry? disbelieving? We were close to the money. He hesitated, giving me an angry look, and folded by tossing his cards up into the air toward the dealer. I scooped in the pot. On the next hand, I got pocket 9s. Again, he raised and I reraised. He looked at me with disbelief (a nice tell) and then shoved. I snap called. He had 10 8 suited. I was way ahead! The board ran out 67K… J… I said to the dealer, “No nines! I don’t want a set!” My third 9 would have given him a straight. The river was… drum roll, please… 4. He stomped from the table while I scooped up his chips.

We were on the money bubble for almost two hours before it finally burst. And I made it to Day 2 on Thursday with $162,000 (in play money). Wish me continued luck!

Thursday I’ll be playing against some well-known pros. One of them is Jeremy Becker who seemed to come out of nowhere a few years back to become one of the most frequent winners at the Venetian and the Wynn. He plays mostly low buy-in tournaments. Around March 2023, he finished first in 8 tournaments in a single month!

Jeremy is in his late twenties and likes to talk at the table. He does a lot of smack talk, mostly teasing his friends who seem to enjoy it. He directed a little at me, and it seemed like it’s just fun rather than nasty, though I wasn’t completely certain.

His strategy, not one that I want to emulate, is to shove a lot, early in the tournament. If he wins a few times, he builds a big stack that takes him to the end of the tournament. If he busts out, he simply buys back into the tournament until the registration period is over. This is an expensive way to play, and it means that even cashing in a tournament keeps him in the red.

I understand that “Kid Poker” Daniel Negreanu was impressed with “JBex” and now backs him in tournaments. That means Negreanu puts up the entry fees and gets a share of Jeremy’s winnings. Rumor has it that Jeremy is in debt for about half a million dollars. Negreanu can afford the loss, having won over $55 million in his poker career, but it still strikes me as a bad investment.

Jeremy’s tournament strategy makes him really hard to read and really hard to bluff. I’ve played against him where he was in hands he shouldn’t have been in but got lucky. Like the time I had pocket Ks and made a fairly substantial raise pre-flop. He called from the small blind. The flop was 357. I figured he couldn’t have hit anything on that flop, so I shoved, just to get him off the hand, collect my chips, and move onto the next hand. He snap called with 46 off suit. Why would he even call my bet pre-flop with such a bad hand? But that’s how he plays.

Another pro player is Adam Walton, who placed third in the 2023 World Series of Poker (WSOP) main event for $4 million! That’s real money. Adam is a really solid player. He had a big stack when I sat at his table on Day 1, but it got whittled down over the next couple hours, including losing one big hand to me. He got moved to a different table when the tournament broke up our table, and by the end of the day he had built his stack to one of the largest of the day.

Adam is a nice guy that I’ve talked to at last year’s WSOP. He’s very modest. He rarely talks at the table, which was difficult for one of the other players who became an instant groupie when Adam sat down. This groupie had been loud and obnoxious all day, talking nonstop about his hand, other players’ hands, the dealers, his financial situation, his sex life, you name it. Very, very loud. I wasn’t at his table at any time during the day, but I had to focus to keep his chatter out of my brain. When Adam came to his table, you’d think he was a teenage girl who’d just met Taylor Swift. The groupie kept praising Adam, who would just smile sincerely, and kept trying to engage him in conversation, but Adam rarely said more than a few words.

I’m guessing that Adam was backed in the WSOP for the $10,000 buy-in fee. Why else would he play in a $600 tournament at the Venetian? Most professionals are backed because they can’t afford to buy into every tournament. Even professionals bust out more times than they cash. Of the $4 million, he probably took in less than $1 million, maybe less than $500,000. It’s hard to get rich at poker. But I’m still having fun trying.

One other player who played but didn’t make it to Day 2 was Billy Baxter. At 85 years old, he’s one of the real old-time champions of the game long before it was popular and attracted hundreds of thousands of people worldwide. He was moved to my table at midday. One of his major accomplishments that we poker players need to appreciate (well not me, but all profitable poker players) is that he sued the government over the taxes on his poker income. The judge ruled that poker winnings should be classified as earned income, taxed at the normal tax rate, rather than its previous classification as unearned income, which was taxable up to 70 percent.

At one point he raised pre-flop. I decided to reraise as a bluff, hoping to get him to fold. Instead he shoved. I looked at him and said, “Have you ever actually played this game?” Fortunately, he smiled. As I tossed my hand into the muck, I added, “I know, I know, you’re the top player in your home game.” Fortunately, he smiled again.

I like to kid the great poker players this way, but I need to be careful. Last year at the WSOP, I was moved to a table with Jamie Gold, winner of the 2006 WSOP for $12 million. He busted out shortly after I sat down and, as he left, I said “Hey Jamie, if you want poker lessons, let me know.” He didn’t look at me. I found out that some other players had been teasing him at the table. I then remembered that many people think that he’s a bad player who got lucky to win the WSOP. He has cashed in very few other tournaments, and he may have lost much of his winnings over the years. I felt bad about it. About a month ago, I ran into him at a poker tournament and went up to him at the break.

“Hi Jamie, I want to apologize,” I said.

“For what?

“At the last year’s WSOP we were at the same table for a little bit before you busted. I said something stupid that was meant as a joke, but I realize it might have sounded mean. I respect your poker play.”

“What was it you said? I don’t remember anything like that.”

“It was nothing, just a stupid remark. But I wanted to apologize.”

He smiled big and held out his hand. “That’s really nice of you.” I shook his hand and wished him luck.

Now you can all wish me luck today!

About the author

Bob Zeidman is a high-stakes recreational poker player. He created Good Beat Poker, a free online poker site using patented technology for audio and video—see and hear the other players at the table if you choose.