Travel Report: Season XII WPT Fallsview Poker Classic, Day 3 -- Kick Your Heels

Airport blogging once again, presently awaiting first flight out of Buffalo as I’ll be winding my way back home after the conclusion last night of the World Poker Tour Fallsview Poker Classic in Niagara Falls.

We finished up around 10 or so last night, although the day felt a little longer after my blogging partner Remko and I reported every hand from the ten-handed final table on down to a winner (over 250 of them). Matthew Lapossie ended up winning the sucker after carrying a big chip lead into heads-up versus Dylan Wilkerson and then finishing the deal after a little over 20 hands.

One hand early on saw Lapossie turn a straight flush against Peter Labib’s ace-high flush to knock out the latter, easily the most remarkable hand of the day. There were several come-from-behind turn or river saves for short stacks, though, which made things interesting while prolonging the final table.

Chris Tessaro noted at one point how the table was a “short-stack shamble,” the phrase sounding enough like your humble scribbler’s moniker to wonder if I were to blame. He also tweeted the best line of the day about players’ managing to double up over and again:

“Not saying this fallsview ‪#wpt final table is taking too long,” he wrote, “but I just gave coffee shop my last 1.60 and she gave 3.20 change ‪#doubleup.”

Great working alongside Remko who always keeps people smiling. Walking back from a short dinner break yesterday, he turned to me and asked earnestly “Wanna see my favorite move?” “Whaddya mean, dance move?” I replied, but rather than answering he jogged two steps then leaped in the air, kicking his heels before landing, momentarily becoming a literal flying Dutchman. Soon Remko was encouraging one of the friendly Fallsview staff to try the move as well.

Speaking of, all of the Fallsview staff were especially accommodating throughout. Indeed, as is often pointed out by those traveling north of the border, there were nothing but friendly folks at every turn during my brief Canada sojourn.

Gonna cut it short as they’ll be boarding us soon. Looking forward to reuniting with Vera and the horses and barn cats later today. Return tomorrow for the farm report.

Travel Report: Season XII WPT Fallsview Poker Classic, Day 2 -- Roll Up the Rim to Win

In a bit of a rush (as usual) this morning as I get my act together for one more long day of tourney reporting. Yesterday’s second day of play here in Niagara Falls at the WPT Fallsview Poker Classic went well as 114 survivors from a starting field of 383 played down to just 10. That group will reassemble at noon today at an unofficial ten-handed final table, then play down to a winner tonight.

There were a few better known players left as the night edged towards the finish -- e.g., Mike Leah, Mike Watson, Peter Jetten, Shawn Cunix -- but all fell shy of the final ten and so the winner here will be a relative newcomer, although a few have had some nice scores before.

Matthew Lapossie final tabled the EPT6 Barcelona event back in 2009. Josue Sauvageau finished fifth in this same event a year ago. Dylan Wilkerson has 15 WSOP cashes and over $340,000 in career tourney winnings. And Jason James, who has a big chip lead to start the day, also has a number of cashes at the WSOP and elsewhere, although this should mark his biggest to date.

The day began with an enjoyable breakfast meeting with a family friend who happens to be based here in Niagara. Always nice to be able to connect with folks on these trips, and we enjoyed a nice visit before I headed to the tourney room.

I’d already had a couple of cups of coffee before breakfast, drank more there, then during the late afternoon Chris Tessaro introduced me to Tim Hortons coffee, in particular the popular “Roll Up the Rim to Win” promotion which encourages people to buy still more cups of the popular brand.

Chris bought me a cup -- and a chance at cash prizes or even a new car -- while also filling me in on the history behind the franchise first co-founded by the late NHL star after who it is named. The coffee was good (even if I didn’t exactly need yet another shot of caffeine) and while I didn’t win any prizes I did feel connected for a moment with the many other Canadians rolling up the rims of their coffee cups every day.

Speaking of hockey, there was a positive vibe in the room for much of the day as people shared stories about Canada’s gold medal victory in the morning, with the match being replayed on CBC on television screens in the afternoon. Big deal, that.

Must sign off as I have much left to do before play kicks off at noon. Join Remko Rinkema and myself for the hand-for-hand coverage over on the WPT site today. As Remko would say, it should be a barnburner.

Travel Report: Season XII WPT Fallsview Poker Classic, Day 1 -- Good View

I write from chilly Niagara Falls where the temps will be going down further over the course of my short visit for the three-day World Poker Tour Fallsview Poker Classic.

Didn’t get to start the trip until relatively late on Friday, meaning it was pushing midnight before I rolled in. But the hotel room is comfortable -- affording this fairly spectacular view of the falls -- and all’s gone well thus far.

The tournament is being played out in the Grand Hall here at the Fallsview Resort Casino, a spacious room that impressed my colleague Remko and I as nicely laid out with great lighting and lots of room between tables for us to mill about. A total of 383 ended up coming out for the $5,000 buy-in event (Canadian dollars), and after a full day of play there were just 114 left to return today.

Was impressed as well by the music selections early on, kind of laughing to hear tracks like “Take Up Thy Stethoscope and Walk” (Barrett’s Floyd), “Virginia Plain” (Roxy Music), and “Eight Miles High” (Byrds) playing overhead. However halfway through the day the mix gravitated away from psychedelia to nondescript contemporary dance stuff. Laughed a little, though, at Griffin Benger’s tweet early in the day that the music was “the devil’s anthem.”

Benger also didn’t care for the 10-handed play (which was the case for most of the early part of Day 1), which I know many tourney players aren’t crazy about. They eventually moved to nine-handed, though, once late registration closed.

Had fun working with Remko whose special fascination with barns I was able to satisfy with some pictures of the one Vera and I now own. Also was glad to meet Chris Tessaro of the Hardcore Poker Show. I remembered once doing a quick spot on there a long while back, and we had fun comparing our memories of that “Niagara Falls” bit I was writing about on Friday.

Chris pointed out that the Canadians remaining in the field are all going to be tired today after getting up early to watch the gold medal hockey match. I have it on (watching CBC) as I write this morning, with Canada trying to hold a 2-0 lead over Sweden as the third period begins. A lot of excitement about this match around here, as you might imagine.

Signing off to watch the finale and get some other business done before heading back to the tourney room. Check in over at the WPT site for our Day 2 live updates today.

Niagara Falls! Slowly I Turned, Step by Step, Inch by Inch...

I write today from the airport, awaiting the first of a couple of flights which will take me to Buffalo, from which I’ll travel to Niagara Falls to help cover the World Poker Tour Fallsview Classic stop. It’ll be a quick one, a three-day event that’ll begin tomorrow and end on Monday.

I’ve been to that part of the country several times, but never to Niagara Falls. Was telling my brother the other day about the trip, and he immediately responded in a way that might be familiar to many...

“Niagara Falls!” he said, interrupting me. Some of you might know instinctively what came next.

“Slo-o-o-wly I turned, step by step, inch by inch...”

I joined in before he finished and we both laughed. Do you recognize what he was saying?

There’s probably a cutoff age for folks to recognize the reference to what was originally a famous vaudeville sketch, much reprised by many performers during the first half of the 20th century and into the early era of television.

It’s kind of a goofy bit involving a couple of strangers (or in some variations more) meeting with one telling a sad story about an unfaithful lover. When he gets to the part of the story in which his beloved left him for another at Niagara Falls, the name of the place triggers a violent reaction with his innocent interlocutor the undeserving victim.

From there the skit continues, with every mention of “Niagara Falls” again igniting slapsticky violence. The bit is so famous there’s a Wikipedia page dedicated to it.

Both Abbott and Costello and the Three Stooges did it during the mid-1940s, and I think it was the Stooges’ version my brother and I saw multiple times as impressionable young’uns. Here it is as it turns up in the Stooges’ 1944 short film Gents Without Cents in which the trio plays a group of performers with the sketch comprising their triumphant stage show:

There was a variation in an I Love Lucy episode, the show which was featured in the latest episode of my infrequent podcast, The Hard-Boiled Poker Radio Show. I also seem to remember it coming up in a cartoon somewhere, which may well have been the version my brother and I remember, but I can’t put my finger on which one it might have been.

In any case, I know the two of us aren’t alone with this association deeply lodged in our brains. The WPT’s Vince Van Patten will be making the trip as well, and earlier this week he tweeted a reference to it (see left) which got lots of responses.

Good thing the memory of “Niagara Falls” makes us all grin and chuckle rather than start throwing punches at the nearest poor sap!

Degrees of Defeat

Had both of those women’s hockey medal games on today as I worked. My attention was divided, but I was looking up frequently whenever play-by-play man Mike “Doc” Emrick’s voice rose in response to a developing situation on the ice.

If you watched as well you know that both matches followed similar plotlines with a team roaring out to a lead while shutting out the opponent, carrying that lead into the final period before the team that was behind staged a stirring comeback to snatch victory away.

In the early tilt for the bronze Sweden was in control with a 2-0 lead through two, then Switzerland scored early in the third, then again, then again to grab the advantage with less than seven minutes to go. An empty-netter was added, then a too-little-too-late response near the close to make the final 4-3 in favor of the Swiss.

Then in the gold medal match the U.S. led Canada 2-0 in the third before the latter scored twice, the second goal coming in the final minute of regulation, then scoring again in overtime to win.

In both cases the heartbreak of the losers was plain to see, their anguish heightened by having come so close to winning and falling short.

The pattern reminded me of some of the conversation following Super Bowl XLVIII in which Seattle smoked Denver 43-8, the outcome essentially decided even before halftime. I’m remembering the sports talk shows afterward debating whether it were preferable to lose a close game -- say, like the previous Super Bowl won by the Ravens over the 49ers by a score of 34-31 -- than to get routed as Denver had been.

The run out of cards after a preflop all-in in hold’em uniquely mimics both scenarios all the time.

The player all in with against an opponent with watches a flop bring three spades and is like the Broncos. Or a flop comes to put the queens way ahead, then a trey and a five bring a backdoor wheel and the all-in player is like Sweden and the U.S. today.

In poker the obvious psychological manipulation of the latter scenario probably makes the analogy less apt. It’s a simulated similarity, you could say, with the order of the community cards suggesting a winning-then-losing sequence when in fact the outcome is the same regardless of the order of the flop, turn, and river. Indeed, any five cards adding up to a loss is more or less equivalent when all of the poker decisions have already been made.

Still, the pain experienced by the loser is often greater after having been teased by the prospect of victory. I think in sports I’d rather my team fight hard and lose a tight one than get crushed. (The pessimist in me is presently imagining both possibilities for my UNC Tar Heels tonight versus Duke, not allowing me to indulge in envisioning a Carolina win.)

In poker, though, I’d rather not go through such runner-runner anguish. Nor would I prefer to play well for much of a hand or session or tourney only to lose focus at the end to lose over being card dead or busting early, if the amount of my loss were the same in both cases that is.

I guess poker teaches us how a loss is a loss, however it comes. The Swedish and U.S. teams would probably disagree tonight, though.

(Photo above tweeted by AP correspondent Oskar Garcia capturing the reaction of U.S. goalie Jessica Vetter as shown on the big scoreboard following Canada's winning overtime goal.)

Not Guilty

This morning was different. I was in court. No shinola!

Back in early January I was pulled over for having failed to renew my license plate. I was given a court date about six weeks later, and today was the day. I could have just paid the fine plus court costs, but the officer suggested I go in and as long as I had renewed in the meantime it was possible I might get it dismissed.

Turned out his advice was correct, and I felt like I began the day in the black after avoiding having to drop a couple of hundy for my mistake.

I was one of about three dozen who had shown up to be there when the door opened on traffic court. In fact I got there about 20 minutes early and so was among the first in line. Not really up on exactly how it would go, I spent the time letting my imagination wander through vague, ill-informed possibilities.

The theme of these musings was of course finding ways to mitigate my guilt. I had excuses for forgetting to renew my license plate, of course. I won’t rehearse them here -- just fill in the blanks with your own excuses for why you might forget something similar. And underpinning all of these explanations was my history of never having forgotten to renew my license plate on time before.

Even as I sat there working out this staggeringly long list of mitigating circumstances, I was laughing at myself at the futility of such thoughts. I was most certainly guilty of the violation described on the sheet of paper the officer had given to me. And while I didn’t know whether or not I’d be made to pay the amount listed at the bottom of it, I knew this vain checklist I was building as a kind of theoretical defense wasn’t going to matter one way or the other.

This instinct to defend oneself comes so naturally, it’s almost startling to become conscious of that fact in a setting such as the one I was in this morning. We are always thinking to ourselves variations of the same idea, over and over in different ways and with different applications...

I’m not guilty.

We’re all familiar with that reflex in poker, often coming after losing but sometimes after winning, too. I’m not guilty of making a bad play. I had to make that call or bet or raise or fold. My opponent played his hand badly, leading to the hand’s outcome. And so on.

Better players are able to prevent such self-defensive recasting of reality from affecting their play, or even to allow such thoughts to develop at all. Meanwhile I’d venture the great majority of us can’t help ourselves, and in truth we’d all like to believe no one can judge us -- can really judge us -- like we can ourselves.

Duly humbled by my court appearance, I drove home flawlessly, stopping at every sign and light, observing speed limits and maintaining safe distances from others, steering and signaling like the champion vehicle operator I am.

Guilty? Perhaps... of being awesome.

Two Cents (Not a Manifesto)

Lots of manifestos and visions and grand statements flying about the poker world these days.

There’s probably a reasonable explanation for everyone suddenly becoming inspired to deliver such sermons. Sort of like the way certain styles of play slowly begin to be popular, then suddenly it seems like everyone is four-betting light. I guess it’s like a lot of people are playing “long ball” right now when it comes to what they’re saying or writing, trying to articulate big-picture ideas rather than sweat the small stuff. (Although plenty are doing the latter, too.)

That’s not to say some of these grand opinions and the debates they’re engendering aren’t diverting -- even enlightening, in places. I’ve been following with interest Daniel Negreanu’s thread over on Two Plus Two over the last few days, the one occasioned by Joe Hachem’s “poker is dying” interview (discussed here a couple of weeks ago). Phil Galfond’s “old school-new school” post last week -- to which Negreanu was also responding -- contained a number of thoughtful points as well.

One theme that’s been reoccurring in these statements is the familiar one about the poker community benefiting from the civil treatment of individuals within it of one another. Among Negreanu’s points, for instance, is the one in which he says he wishes for “a world where the game is fun first and a competitive endeavor second.”

I’ve seen a couple of especially obtuse responses to that thought, also delivered in manifestos-like fashion arguing that poker is solely about “profit” and that any suggestion it isn’t is either (1) wrong or (2) deliberately misleading. “He’s only saying have ‘fun first’ to trick the fish into happily losing their money to him, thus increasing his profit” goes that argument, one that willfully ignores both the idea that Negreanu isn’t being cynical and that poker actually can mean something other than the bottom line.

I’ve written before here many times about the paradox of poker being a game that brings us together while also encouraging us to view each other as antagonists. I’m remembering writing a post titled “Poker, the Antisocial Social Game” that touched on the topic. It’s that tension that makes the game so intriguing -- the fact that our being able to compete against one another depends in part on our being able to get along with another.

Obviously I’m one who like Negreanu believes poker has the potential to provide a lot to those who play it beyond just a means to make money. I also think those who approach the game in that narrow way are missing out, big time.

I’m not saying profit isn’t important. (Nor is Negreanu.) For those who make a living at the game (or who try to), that obviously tops the list of reasons to play. But there have to be other reasons, too, to give meaning to one’s participation, with having fun or at least participating in a constructive way in a community of others with similar interests being a good start.

That’s just my two cents. Small change. All anyone can make on his or her own.

What Am I Watching?

Like many on this globe, I’ve had the XXII Olympic Winter Games from Sochi on as a more or less uninterrupted accompaniment to household activities for the last week.

Most of the time I’m not fully focused on whichever of the 98 events in 15 different disciplines is on, although once in a while I’ll stop what I’m doing to watch in response to an excited announcer’s reaction or to catch the conclusion of whatever competition is playing out.

Curling strangely keeps my attention, the back-and-forth strategy somehow appealing to me (and reminding me of other two-player games). Hockey does, too, of course. While curling isn’t perhaps an obvious one to figure out for those unfamiliar with the sport, I understand it well enough to recognize what is happening at any given moment, and thus both of those sports require little extra explanation for me.

Last night I became engaged for a while by women’s snowboard cross, one of the events in the snowboarding discipline for which it also seemed immediately apparent what was going on. There were a series of races, with the winners winning and the losers losing. Fast and exciting, with little need to know who was who to get a kind of visceral enjoyment from viewing.

However, for many of the events it is much more difficult to know how performances are measured. As I write I have on something called “Men’s Aerials,” an event I thought at first was part of the “ski jumping” discipline but after looking it up I see it is part of “freestyle skiing.”

There are spectacular jumps with judges awarding points, but I have no idea what a good score is and what a bad score is, and only when a poor fellow crash lands do I know for certain his chances for medaling have decreased.

Sports like these make me think a little of poker’s constant struggle to attract non-poker audiences and the various experiments tried over the years to create “must see” television out of poker cash games or tournaments.

Those who televise the Olympics have established a complicated strategy for presenting unfamiliar sports, one that involves all sorts of editing choices that mix live and delayed programming, combinations of in-game commentary, event-related features, and interviews, and of course the profiles of athletes that have become a hallmark of Olympic narrative-creation. They aren’t always on target, but the programmers have a plan and it generally works for a lot of us.

On Friday I was referencing one recent poker-related debate on Twitter. Last week there was another one concerning whether or not people watch poker on television primarily to learn more about how to play or for other reasons. While a minority maintained education to be the biggest draw, most seemed to suggest that was less of a priority than simply to be entertained (by the competition, the players, the spectacle, and so on).

It’s difficult -- and unfair, really -- to compare the Olympics to other sports or types of programming. And while I might be learning a little bit about these various disciplines and the particular events, I know that primarily what I’m experiencing when I watch is a pleasurable form of distraction that is engaging in an ephemeral way.

When poker was at its most popular on television (nearly a decade ago), it provided similar, fleeting thrills that captured an audience of both players and non-players, watching -- and being compelled to watch -- for all sorts of reasons.

That’s hard to do anymore, I think (again for all sorts of reasons).

On “‪#FlippingCoins #$250kaPop”

Another short writing window for your humble scribbler today after another long day of other duties to tend to, including some here on the now super-slushy farm. Thought I’d sign off the week with reference to a debate that arose a few days ago regarding these “high roller” events.

The conversation was occasioned by the two big buy-in tourneys that happend at the Aussie Millions last week and which I was writing about a week ago -- the A$100,000 Challenge won by Yevgeniy Timoshenko who earned A$2 million for topping a field of 76 entries, and that LK Boutique A$250,000 Challenge in which Phil Ivey won A$4 million after prevailing in a field that drew 46 entries.

Both were re-entry events, allowing players to buy back in as many times as they wished up until the start of the second day of play. That led to some eyebrow-raising examples of players spending a lot in Melbourne to play in the tourneys. Daniel Negreanu, for example, bought in five times to the $100K event and another three times to the $250K one. He managed to cash in both and in fact turned a profit overall.

The debate to which I am referring regarding the high roller events arose over Twitter and primarily involved Negreanu and Dan Shak. In his “Five Thoughts” column this week, Rich Ryan touches on one aspect of that dialogue, namely the one over whether or not these huge buy-in events have an effect on all players. (Do they or don’t they?) But in fact I was intrigued by another issue that arose between Shak and Negreanu during their Twitter exchange.

During the frenzy of re-entering the $250K, Negreanu at one point tweeted “Doubled up! K9 vs A8 I hit a 9 weee! This is so fun! ‪#FlippingCoins #$250kaPop.” Not long after Shak wrote a number of tweets about the $250K and high rollers, generally speaking.

Shak actually likes the high roller events (and has a record of doing well in them), but wasn’t crazy about the unlimited re-entry option being available so deep into them as was the case at the Aussie Millions. “Never thought I would say this but what is going on right now is a complete embarrassment to the game and what it means to the value of $,” Shak tweeted amid other comments.

A couple of days later he and Negreanu got into a conversation and Shak noted to Negreanu “the tweeting and referencing 250k flips is what I had issues with,” adding “you are a role model whether you like it or not and it's my opinion that [it is] not necessary to glorify it to the young.”

Negreanu of course defended his tweets about “flipping” for a quarter milly while arguing that delivering such messages wasn’t harmful in the way Shak suggested. You can search through the timelines of both for more, including going up and down the conversations emanating from the tweets linked to above.

Like Shak, I’m somewhat weary of the unlimited re-entry format, generally speaking. I’ll admit to being a bit awe-struck by players dropping so much into these high roller events such as happened in Melbourne. Meanwhile, I’m not sure what sort of effect a player like Negreanu tweeting excitedly about “‪#FlippingCoins #$250kaPop” has on younger, aspiring players, nor how such spectacles might affect broader perceptions about poker’s skill component. But I do get that there is something kind of out-of-whack about it all.

What do you think? What sort of effect do these six-figure tourneys really have on the larger poker community?

Farming on the Moon

Snowed under here at the farm. Lost power for a few hours today, although it’s back now. Thankfully temps aren’t dropping too low tonight -- although it will be below freezing -- and it appears the warming will begin in earnest tomorrow and over the weekend.

Those few hours without power today weren’t all bad, as I was able to read and enjoy the postcard-like scene outside while being disconnected. As you might have guessed, we’ve taken a ton of pictures over the last couple of days, many of which will do nicely for Christmas cards. Doing chores today and Vera took that one of me -- looks like I'm farming on the moon. (Someone else added the animation.)

Now that we’re back online, I wanted to pass along a couple of items that went up today on the Learn.PokerNews site.

One is a new piece from Andrew Brokos (of Thinking Poker) which is actually the first of a two-parter on “Getting Started With Hand Reading.” In this one Andrew starts to distinguish the idea -- largely fanciful -- of putting a player on an exact hand from the more practical approach of narrowing an opponent down to a range of possible holdings.

Also up today is a neat interview Michelle Orpe conducted with the U.K. player Oliver Price. I had a chance to meet and talk to Price briefly not too long ago at EPT10 Deauville where he ended up finishing third. Nice, thoughtful guy, and he really took his time answering Michelle’s questions about how he got started and about advice for new players. Though primarily a cash game player, he’s emerging as “one to watch” on the tourney circuit after putting up some nice results over the last few months.

Gotta cut things short as there are various duties to attend to now that the power is back on, including making sure we’re prepared in case it goes out again.