Loose Cannon Poker League + Arnie

Poker league finally off and running. I think if it hadn’t started last night it would never have happened, but we got a field of 16 and most of those will return next week I think, plus a few others so it should build from there. The usual faces were in attendance - Carl, Alex, Sharon, Tom plus a couple of faces from the past, Kay and Bo who played in the LC league the previous year. Both of these players are typical young aggressive players, although too reckless at times.

The league is a £75 buy in standard tournament. However, points are also allocated depending on where you finish and there will be a 36 man play off at the start of June to determine who wins a seat to the WSOP Main Event. The more points you accumulate, the more points you start the final with.

I have never had a more boring tournament. I played for nearly 3 hours busting in 7th place (I think). My biggest pair was 77 and the only other hands I got were AQ once and A10 (if you can call that a hand) twice. Tremendous.

By the time the final table came around I had bluffed up to 5000 chips from 3500 starting stack and then I sat. And sat. And sat. I pushed twice with poor holdings and picked up the blinds to keep me alive but eventually had to push with Q9 in mid position and the volcano woke up with AK in the big blind and that was that.

The Volcano came from a short stack to win the tournament so has 20 points in the bag in the league already. Undoubtedly the hottest player at Loose Cannon so far in 2008, although it will be interesting to see how his fragile temperament handles the inevitable downswing when it occurs. :)

A cash game had kicked off next to the tournament, which was to provide some interesting hands. My NL Holdem cash game pretty much sucks, so on any given sitting my sole aim is to sit down with £50/£100 and come away with a small profit until I can improve in this area. I achieved that last night just by playing tight.

Geordie Sharon, while a strong tournament player, hadn’t played cash before, so Alex (The Good Doctor) had given her a few pointers to help her out. The first hand I arrived at the table promptly had Sharon and Alex all in pre flop against each other. Alex shows KK, Sharon flips AA. The bullets hold and it’s echoes of Vader striking down poor Obi-wan back in 1977 :)

Another interesting character at the table was a German/Belgian Arnie Schwarzenegger look-a-like. Did not see any hands he played of note, but he seemed more interested in securing a steady flow of beer than the cards.

When LC called last orders at 10:30 this sprung Arnie into action. (as a side note I have no idea why they closed the bar because it was the busiest I have ever seen it - sometimes the club seems to have a corporate self masochistic streak). Anyway, Arnie was gone and arrived back with 8 (EIGHT) pints of beer and a single bottle of Peroni. The significance of the Peroni is unclear, but perhaps it was an hors d’oeuvre for the liquid yeast feast that awaited our Euro friend.

Tom pretty much drove the betting on the cash table as is the norm, so I was pretty keen to keep out of the way given I only sat down with £50 and he seemed keen to play big stack poker.

One bizarre hand did occur though involving myself, Bo and Tom. 4 limpers to me and I call with 7 8. Bo makes up the small blind and Tom raises to £10 in the big blind. I call, probably unwisely but I’m getting a bit fed up of being bet out of pots before the flop by Tom and Bo. Bo calls, everyone else folds.

Flop Ace, King, Two.

All checked.

Turn Jack. All checked.

River 5.

All checked. I’m in the process of throwing my cards in the muck when I realise that Bo and Tom have already done it. At the last moment I manage to twist my wrist over to show my cards and the 8 high takes the pot.

Cue for Bo to frantically try to fish his 9 high out of the muck but of course it’s too late. Only a £35 pot but an odd situation.

Also makes me wonder what Tom has been raising with all night……hmmmmm.