World Series of Blackjack III, Week Six

Tonight's show:
July 10th: Ken Smith, Elie Karam (Foxwoods), Paul Eckstein, Dominick Haven (Barona), Val Hunter (Seneca Niagara)

10 PM Eastern on GSN.

 

It's amazing how much I had forgotten about that round, how the bad cards just stayed and stayed and stayed. I guess it's selective memory! I had forgotten all about that $50K bet early in the round too.

On the chip stacks, we definitely still had a rule about that, or I would have had my usual skyscraper stacks. As many of you know, my nervous habit is working my way up and down my chip stacks while thinking. Who knows whether I was in compliance with the chip-stack guidelines while doing that!

I had some interesting decisions, and I actually surprised myself on a couple of them while watching the show. I was a little surprised at my double for less, and then later I was surprised when I DIDN'T double for less. I'll have to watch again and pay closer attention to see if I like my decisions.

One thing though... It's interesting how the missing hands on TV can make a real difference in the texture of the game.

I definitely played this round with a much different mindset than the first two years. I focused a lot more on predicting my opponent's bets when betting in front. Usually, my guesses were helpful, but not always.

For Paul, I'm pretty sure he just flat forgot about the power chip. As others have noted many times before, it's different out there.

I wish I could remember exactly what I was debating on the last hand. When I was called for time, I pushed out the $50K, confident that Paul would do the same behind me. I think as time ran out I was trying to decide whether I could make a smaller bet and hope that Dominic would give me the low by betting the max. But I think that caused trouble if Paul were to double. I know I had ruled out the possible in-between bet that might have made sense against different opponents.

All in all, I consider myself fortunate to have had any shot at all after the trash I was getting. While the commentators put a good spin on it, I'll only take a little of the credit. I had to get lucky on a few key hands or I was gone early. Preservation of bankroll was the main skill that got me through it.

And, yeah, the wild card round was a really fun one. Stay tuned.

 

Yes, that was an interesting play. That was my early $50,000 bet, and I think I had only $26,000 or so left back. My thinking was pretty simple there. 13v2 is a very close call already. In my situation, I would have been happy with a push on this hand, and that swung the balance toward hitting over standing. In other words, losing is a lot worse than pushing here, more so than usual. My decision to hit was a direct consequence of that.

On that first big bet, I really wanted to position myself above the battle for last place when the first knock-out round occurred. With elimination hands in the mix, it's dangerous to linger close to the back of the pack, because lots of things can go wrong. I could have made a smaller than max bet and still taken the lead, but my bet still had to be big enough that losing it would put me in serious trouble, likely needing two wins afterward to get out of the hole. If I lose a max bet, I need the same two wins to get back into the game. Therefore, I decided to put as much reward into the risk as possible, and that was the max bet.

Why are the advantage players not faring well? That's perfectly normal. We're outnumbered! Tournament players, even highly experienced ones, do a lot more losing than winning. I don't think the format changes or anything else contributed to this. It's just normal tournament luck.

 

More thoughts

I finally had a chance to watch the show again, and take a few notes for discussion. I was glad to see that the plays that surprised me earlier weren't all that surprising upon closer scrutiny.

Here is one.
Hand 14, in button order:

Code:

[FONT=Courier New]Dominick:  $130,250   $5,000    Blackjack
Val:       $ 92,000   $5,000    16 Surrender
Ken:       $116,500   $4,000    Hard 10, Dbl $2000
Paul:      $112,000   $5,000    Hard 11, Dbl $5000
Dealer has ten up.
[/FONT]

This was the hand where I doubled for less, for $2000. While watching the show, I wondered why I had chosen to double for less here. Yes, it's clear that Paul will double here, and my $2000 dbl-for-less keeps the high over him in that case. But it's quite early in the game to be jockeying for a $500 lead over Paul.

Once I paid attention, I realized that doubling for $2000 insures that I keep both the high and the low over Paul WHETHER HE DOUBLES OR NOT. That's the key that makes this play worthwhile.

Since it's a poor double (Ten vs Ten), I want to double for just enough to accomplish my goal. But it's a pretty cheap way to correlate here.

 

Another hand

Then, on hand 19, I wondered briefly while watching why I didn't double my 12v3 after Val doubled.
Hand 19, in button order:

Code:

[FONT=Courier New]Val      $107,000   $22,000   6A Dbl $22,000
Ken      $108,750   $22,000   T29
Paul     $119,500   $ 5,000   T7
Dominick $141,750   $ 5,000   3T / 32T
Dealer 3T4
[/FONT]

Here, we know the second knock-out card could be coming up soon, so I definitely don't want to risk dropping into last place. I was happy to see Val make a bet that I could match and still chase Paul.

While watching the show, I figured I would double after Val did, to keep pace. A quick look at the situation now shows that I didn't need to. I already have a high over Paul, so I don't need to risk another $22K on a bad double (12v3). So, I just hit, and of course, I drew a 9 for 21.
Oh well!

 

And, the final hand

Final hand, in button order:

Code:

[FONT=Courier New]Ken:         $154,250   $50,000    Hard 16 Dbl $50K
Paul:        $137,000   $50,000    Hard 11 Dbl $50K
Dominick:    $170,250   $50,000    TT
[/FONT]

Deanna finally pressed me for a decision here, and I pushed out the $50K. I had a lead of $17,250 over Paul, and trailed Dominick by $16,000.

A bet of $17,000 looked interesting here, but I discarded it because I was virtually certain that Paul was going to make a max bet no matter what I bet. Taking the low over a player is not necessary when you're pretty sure you can get the high and low instead.

It's hard to remember for sure, but I think my thought process went something like this...

What about a bet of $34,000 (quickly arrived at by doubling the 17K possibility)? Yeah, that gives me the high and the low over a $50K bet by Paul, and I can also surrender to beat him if he looks likely to push.

Hmm, if I bet $33K instead, I get all that and there's also a chance I might get first low if Dominick just bets the max.
(I'll digress for a second to point out how close these parameters are on all sides! If they both bet the max after I bet $33,000, I'd have a $250 high over Paul, a $750 surrender high over Paul's push, and a $1000 low over Dominick.)
Working through that process took most of my time.

But, no, I don't think Dominick is all that likely to give me the low. He's more likely to match up. And, I can't cover Paul's double with a double of my own if I bet only $33K. (And, as BR2, a double is very likely in my seat!)

About that time, Deanna gave me my ten second notice. I was concerned that any small mistake with the $33K bet would be deadly, since the numbers were all so close. That, plus the double-double problem with Paul, led me to resignedly push out the $50K. You'll notice that I made the comment... "Well, $50K then." All that effort to figure a pinhole precision bet, and I can't pull the trigger on it.

One more thought helped make the decision though. Back in the early part of the round, I had caught up within $500 of Dominick. He had been reliably betting $5000 every hand for a while, so I bet $6000 ahead of him. He surprised me a little by matching my bet instead of pushing out another $5000. That little glimpse of his play made me give him a little more credit on the last hand. I don't think he would have bet $50K if I bet $33K.

Hopefully this little exploration of how I played is informative to some of you. Feel free to blast away at my decisions.

 

And, a cute anecdote

One more item from that show:

Dominick told me after the round that when I pulled the 'Knockout Immunity Buddha" out of my pocket, he thought for a moment that this was some kind of rule he had overlooked, and worried that I now had some special advantage, perhaps because of my participation in prior seasons!

It took him only a moment to realize I was just kidding, but it had to be an unsettling few seconds!

Lest anyone think I'm picking on him, I think Dominick played quite well in this round.