Big Dance 7

Now playing 300-600 with 75 antes; so 1575 in the pot pre cards.

In seat 4 we raise to 1475 with KK and get calls from seat 6, the button and the bb. No aces please. Flop comes 345 with 2 diamonds. Bb checks and we bet 5000. Seat 4 calls, button folds and bb goes into the tank and then folds. That's good. Bb scares me as he could have called the preflop bet with about anything. Turn pairs the 4 putting 2 clubs on the board. We have no club or diamond. Kc or Kd river would be amazing if it gave him a flush. We bet 8600 hoping for a call not a raise. He tanks and then folds.

Next hand we raise to 1600 in seat 3 with QK and everyone folds. Okay. This feels better. We have just over 70000. Going in the right direction.

We raise to 1550 from seat 6 with K9d. Bb calls and flop comes 678 with one diamond. He checks and we bet 1500. He calls. Turn comes about perfect - 5d giving us second nut flush draw and a made straight. The only better turn would have been Td, and even that's debatable. He checks and we bet 3800 hoping for a call or a raise. We would push all in with this hand given the opportunity. He folds. Ok. Too bad. But ok.

Seat 4 raises to 1200 and we call with 34s from seat 5. Seats 7 and the blinds call. Big pot. Just what we want to see with low suited connectors. Flop comes 69A with one spade. Not what we wanted to see. The sb bets and everyone folds.

In seat 3 we raise to 1575 with AJ. Seat 6 raises to 4300 and everyone folds to us. Hmm. Too much chance he has AQ or AK. And if we do hit the miracle jack, we still don't know if he has QQ or KK. We fold.

Next hand same guy now in seat 5 raises to 1400 and we raise to 4800 with QK in the bb hoping he will fold. He calls and the flop comes A26 rainbow. Ugly. 10000 in the pot and it goes to whoever has an ace or performs an ace-acting job. We bet 2500, which is like saying "hey - I have an ace. Do you want to play with me?" Luckily he didn't want to. He folds. Giddey up. We are closing in on 77000.

Lando raises to 1500 and gets an all in push for about 14000. Lando calls showing KK to crush the J8c. Clearly the J8 saw that Lando was playing a lot of aggressive hands, but he didn't note that Lando has basically had the goods every time he's had to show (and hasn't folded much).

This ones a little fuzzy as that's what adrenaline does to my memory. Seat 4 raises to 1500. The sb has only 5100 left so we have to be ready to call that to proceed. We call from seat 5 with 79s hoping the sb folds. He does and we see the flop heads up. 457 with 2 spades. Amazing! He bets 2100. We could call but we are probably in the lead and don't want to see something like an Ad turn. We min raise to 4200 and he calls. Good. Unlikely he has a big pocket pair. Turn comes Qs. This just gets better and better. We have a flush. He checks and we bet 7800. He raises to 17500. Hmmmm. He could have a bigger flush. This could be the reverse of our day 1 spade flush over flush Unlikely, but possible. However what would it be that he raised pre flop and raise called post flop? AK or AJ re raise post flop. As likely would AT KJ KT or JT. Especially out of position. However if he were going to flat call the flop raise out of position, the check raise on the turn makes a lot of sense. More likely he has a strong Q, like Q with an A or K of spades. That's more likely. He has about 25000 left. We just call, to hint at weakness, and let him bet the river, hoping it's not a spade and doesn't pair the board in case he's pulling to a full house. River comes 3h. Perfect. He bets 11500. Strange that he would bet half his remaining chips. We tank for a moment and then push all in. He goes into the tank. Fantastic! Anything that beats us would have resulted in a snap call. We have a winner. Now we just hope he will call to see it. Sadly he folds, but that's okay. Great hand!

We are up to about 108000! Back. Back in the saddle again! Back. Back in the saddle again!

Orlando raises to 1400 and we call from the bb with 77. Flop comes A97. Giddey up. We flopped a set. Hopefully he has an A. We check and he bets 1600. Easy prod. We call. And the turn comes 4c putting 2 clubs on the board. We bet 3200 and he raises to 7800. Hmmm. Don't like the idea of him having a free look to fill a straight or a flush. Also, having some PTSD about day 1s flop set over set and now starting to worry he could have 99 or AA. If he does, we're done, so let's focus on clubs. Nothing we can do but give all our chips away gracefully if he flopped a set. We raise to 17500 and he folds. He admits he was bluffing, so we weren't getting anything more out of him most likely. Anyway, nice to take some more chips in.

On a side note Rabbi Watstein just sent me the following supportive text:

Last week's Parasha, the Torah portion that began this tourney, was a cryptic tale of a talking donkey who is "able to see that which others are blind to". Be the donkey....see what others don't.

Here's the cliff notes
http://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/balaam-and-balak/

Back to the game.

Button raises to 1500 and we call from bb with A7s. Flop comes 7JQ with one spade. We bet 1600 and he raises to 4200. Hmmm. This doesn't feel good. If we call and get a spade then we are calling again to fish? We can call hoping for a second pair, but an ace could be bad if he is playing JA QA or TK. We fold. No reason to get in trouble out of position.

Seat 7 raises to 1500 and seat 8 calls. We call from the button with K9h. Bb calls. Flop comes 459 rainbow no hearts. Seat 7 bets 4500 and 8 folds. We have top pair, and would have bet if he didn't, but we just call to see the turn and what he does with it. Bb folds. Turn comes J and he bets 7500. Hmmm. Not good. We call. Probably our worst call of the tourney right there. River comes 2 and he checks. He isn't folding anything that beats us and we don't feel too strong so we check and he shows TT to take it down. Going the wrong way now. Time to correct course.

We have just over 101000, so in a good place still. We were up close to 120, but we were also down at 60, so head up.

We haven't led out much so from seat 5 we bet 1500 with 89. The button calls and the flop comes 59A. We bet 1600 and he folds. Great result.

We close round 7 feeling much better about life. And sitting on about 103000 in chips.

All the best,
Back to where we started Donkey

Sent from my iPhone