Absolutely Devastated

After dinner I did not pick up a decent hand for two straight hours. I won two pots, both on bluffs, to stay at around 50k. I was getting so confident with my reads of preflop weakness. When I smelled weakness in a raise, I shoved it in. When I smelled strength, I folded. I was never wrong. With about an hour left in the day, with the blinds at 1200-2400-300, Kyle O'Donnell made a standard raise to 8k in middle position. It folded to me in the small blind and I looked down at the first pocket aces I had seen in sixteen hours of play at the Borgata Winter Poker Open.

I knew O'Donnell had a hand because he was raising Oppenheim's big blind. He was a habitual late position thief and would raise with any two cards in certain situations but I knew this was not one of them. I had moved in over the top of him a couple times with shit in those situations, and it led me to believe he was ready to make a big call if I moved in again. After thinking for about fifteen seconds, I shoved my 50k in.

He went into the staredown tank. I knew what he was looking for so I did everything I could to look weak. I clenched my jaw. I stared into space trying to imagine I had jack-four offsuit. I blinked rapidly. I swallowed. I was starting to think I was overacting so then I put my face down and stared at the felt. Right about then he called, and I found myself up against ace-jack offsuit. I was a 92% favorite to double up to over 100k.

The flop came KQQ. They dealt it out so slowly for some reason. The turn was a 6. Oppenheim asked if I was nervous. Everything was moving in slow-motion. The river was a ten.

I was out of there so fast. I might never be back. The Borgata runs some of the best poker tournaments in one of the best facilities but getting to AC is a bitch and I can't keep taking these 10k hits to the bankroll.

Losing a 100k pot when the average stack at the money will be 300k is not that big a deal. I wasn't contending for the final table or anything. The 1.6 mil was still eons away.

But gosh. To play that hard, that patiently, for that long with those horrible table draws and even worse cards, and then to bust out with aces vs ace-jack - I think seeing that ten hit the river was the single worst moment of my poker career.