Shannon Elizabeth – Week in Review

Last week was a busy week for me by way of meetings and poker, but there are not too many interesting things to blog about.

I played in the Commerce Guaranteed Million Dollar Tournament where they had 5 Day 1s and people could enter and cash up to five times. I entered Day 1A and got there right near the end of Level 3. You could re-buy up until Level 4, which started after a 15 minute break.

Right before break I was dealt Queens and ended up a few hundred short of a full double up. So that brought me to almost 8K. It’s tough with these tournaments where you only start with 4K-there isn’t much room to wiggle. In Level 4 I just played Kings and Jacks, bringing me to over 10K. Then, the next hand I remember playing, I think I was on the button with AK. The guy in the cutoff had raised and I re-popped him. Everyone else folded and he called my raise.

So let’s review my image thus far. I’ve only played three very big hands thus giving me a very tight image at this table, because there just wasn’t need to do otherwise so far. Ok-the flop comes out A-9-7 rainbow. He checks and I bet out 3K if I remember right. He then thinks a bit and pushes all-in. WHAT? He had me covered just barely at this point. I thought forever and this is where I made my mistake. I’m thinking maybe he called my pre-flop raise with 7s or 9s, but not really sure he would. A-9 and A-7 seem even more unlikely to me.  Maybe he has a big pocket pair, in which case I’m golden. Maybe he and I have the same hand. I just felt like I was good. I called and flipped my hand over. He looks at me and flips his over…9-7.

WHAT??? You called my raise with 9-7???? And this was an older gentleman, not a young, aggressive internet kid. Not a table bully. Just a guy who had seemed to play pretty solid…up until now. No-now that he takes a chance with a way worse hand he gets rewarded with a flop that not only has his 2-pair, but a card that gets him paid off! I guess you can tell that the last 2 cards didn’t help me and that was it for me with about 200 people left in the tournament. It paid to about 54 I believe that day. I should have laid it down I guess, but I had a lot invested in the pot already and that’s the flop I wanted to see. So that was frustrating.

Then, same day, I went to Hustler and played in a tourney they had going with a big guarantee.

I made it until 11:30pm, about 20 people from the money, and got knocked out when I was all-in with Kings again Jacks against A-Q. Ace right on the flop! Ugh!

Day 1B at Commerce, I played til after dinner break. During the first level after break I get it all-in with Aces against 7s against AK. I immediately walk away because I just can’t bear to watch. You know it’s never a good sign when you hear the whole table let out a collective “OH!.” Yes, 7 on the RIVER!  Of course…why wouldn’t my aces get cracked? There were only 100 people left and it paid to 54 with 27 people moving onto Day 2.

The only other thing I did last week worth a tiny mention is play in an EA Sports Pro-Am football game in Malibu. It was fun and for charity-so that’s why all in all it was good. But I used to play powder puff football in high school and was an athlete in general. So I expect at least a certain level of athleticism from myself. And during warm-up I hardly missed a catch. But during the game itself…I couldn’t have played worse! I couldn’t seem to catch a single ball for some reason-I barely touched the ball to pass-and my shoes weren’t cleats so I was sliding around all over the place. It was truly embarrassing. But many of the pro players really tried to make me feel better and help me….especially Deion Sanders. He was so sweet to me I was fighting back tears. I am a huge Dallas Cowboys fan being from Texas, and was always a big fan of his. And now, I love him that much more!

I have a bit of traveling coming up soon, so that should make for some more interesting blogs. I’ll keep you updated as fun stuff occurs. Have a great week everyone….xoxo -Shannon