High Noon – Always popular for a Shoot-Out

World Series of Poker, Las Vegas

When I saw my table for the $1500 shoot-out event, it was good news/bad news. Although headphones are allowed at the WSOP, I hadn’t brought mine. This was a shame as the table behind me included Mike "the mouth" Matusow, (for those of you who aren’t familiar with this fellow the person who named him intended no irony), who was conducting several high decibel conversations with people on various other tables. Late arrivals on that table included Marcel Luske and top international nipper Avner Levy, so concentrating on the nine players I was stuck with was hard.

My table was good, as it had no "big name" players except An Tran, who got his aces cracked and departed early, and it consisted of players who didn’t seem to understand the structure of the tournament. The shoot-out means you have to win your table to move on, rather like a one-table satellite, but it has one-hour rounds, not at all like a OTS. Most people on my table thought going in every few hands seemed a good idea and we had early casualties. Around me I could see Joe Beevers’ table was still full (he seemed to be biding his time) and I was content to wait for a hand.

This gave me a chance to do a bit of people watching and listen in to the banter on the surrounding tables. The noise abatement society behind were involved in an interesting discussion over a side-bet that Mickey Applemans had struck with Mike the Mouth. Mike thinks this year’s main event will not be won by what he calls "a donkey" and Mickey, a legendary professional sports punter, has let Mike pick 100 players and have 2/1 odds that he gets the winner. Everyone that Mike has told about the bet thinks he’s made a rick and Mickey has let him press first with 200 and then with 250 players, still at 2/1. Personally, I’d love to be with Mickey. I reckon for 2/1 to be value, Mike would need at least 300 players. Mickey gets the rest of the field. With people talking of 2000+ runners he’ll be all right.

Warren Wooldridge was playing a one-table $500 nearby which suddenly kicked-off. A player had gone all-in 5-handed and as the other guy called, the dealer mucked his unprotected hand. The scream-up when he was told he was out of the sat with no refund could be heard at The Excalibur.

Unfortunately, my tournament ended in heads-up defeat and back on the rail I shared my moans with James Vogl who’d suffered the same fate. It’s no picnic being a world champ, Lucky Jim.

Sleep’s never been a high priority for me in Vegas and I swapped it for the Last Chance tourney at 10:45pm, where I finished 6th at 3.30 and headed off to bed.

Update from the Mob:
In the $2000 Hi-Lo Omaha yesterday both Ross and Barny put in a good show. Barny was chip leader at the dinner break and was second in chips going into the money(27 places paid). But, as can happen he took a couple of bad beats and missed a good chance to make his second final table of the series finishing 15th, his second – and the Mob’s seventh- cash of this World Series. Our next tournament is the $2000 PLH which is one of our favourite events…