Well, in the very first hand after the third break I was booted from the tournament. The hand is an excellent illustration of what happens when you have a tiny stack–you have no flexibility. You just can’t play a hand normally. Here’s what happened. I was dealt:
Now here’s the scenario: I have a stack of $3,804.88. The blinds are $800/$1600 with a $150 ante. So just taking part in the hand costs me $1600. I was under the gun, so my position was poor, but I also am facing the reality that the blinds are coming fast. I could barely get through the blinds, but doing so would put me with such a low amount of money that I would have to have an extraordinary number of successful all-ins to get back into the tournament.
So my only option is to jump all over a good hand. The hand above is certainly a playable hand, even under the gun, but it is hardly a powerhouse. My hope was that everyone would limp in to the flop, and I’d be able to hit something good or, if not, get out with only $1600 gone.
The key was for everybody to limp in. Well, so much for that–a player in late position raised to $4,000. And this is thus my dilemma: Normally I would immediately fold. But that would lower my stack to $2200 or so. If I got a good hand and doubled, all that would do is take me to where I am right now. And if I didn’t get any good hands, I’d be out quickly. The result is that the raise behind me pretty much forced me to go all in with A8. The good news is that if I hit, I would come away with over $7K, which I could work with better than the $3K I currently had. The bad news is if I don’t hit… I’m out.
My opponent turned over:
Ouch! The only good news is that I had an Ace. If an Ace dropped I’d be in good shape. Unfortunately, the odds of that happening are 15 to 1. Not good. Here’s what dropped:
And my pair of eights weren’t good enough against his two jacks. After over three hours of poker play I was out, finishing in 99th place, a mere 36 places out of the money, and quite good when you consider the tournament started with 4,059.
Still, my bankroll stands at a depressing $0.00.