It’s Saturday morning as I recap my Halloween in Vegas doing my best to imitate a competent poker player, a feat which I seriously doubt I pulled off with any sort of credibility.

I started off switching apartment locations as my first corporate location didn’t have the total number of nights needed for my stay but thankfully our other location on the north side of town was open, my last 2 nights were secured! I had to be out of the old one by 9am so that meant an early day! Since I’m only going home for 4 days before coming back to Vegas, I decided to drop off my work clothes and some edible items at the corporate office, lightening my travel load. By 10:30am I was all settled in and planning out the coming day.

I’d really wanted to play in the Binions tournament at 2pm as I hadn’t played much cards during the week, save for a Social House comp-fishing session at $2/4 and 2 $65 TI tourneys but since the offer was put out to attend the Poker After Dark tapings, once again my plans had changed. I did some laundry and other miscellaneous other mundane tasks before really busting my eating regimen and snagging a cheese-steak at Pops around noon time. Man that thing went down smooth…damn tasty! I was out the door a bit after 2pm, destination Golden Nugget.

As usual, I parked in valet at Binions as I most always do when trekking to Fremont. It appeared that Binions had around 10 tables or so for their 2pm tourney, still a shame I missed that one, but oh well…Sauntered across the “street” to the Nugget and wandered around before actually finding the well marked Grand Event center across from the none-too-special Red Sushi. Although I didn’t play cards, I was pretty I impressed with their “new” poker room, have to make a point to try it out one of these days! It didn’t take long before I was passed security and being escorted onto the set by John. I have to say, I was pretty hard on him about the series last fall but seeing what he does during the day, I can now fully understand, my apologies John! He was extremely gracious not only to extend the offer to AVP’ers to attend the taping but to show me around and getting me settled before heading back to his hectic day!

Taping was already in progress as I entered and Mike Matusow had already blown a large portion of his stack off to Phil Laak. Observation was available from 2 locations, on set behind the cameras where you could hear the banter and see the players but not the action or from a side room with a tv setup to watch all the action, including the cards with headphones carrying all the conversation. Needless to say but I’ll say it anyway, there was no lull in conversation with those two at the table! Also playing were Chan, Daniel, Tilly and some contest winner who’d picked the lineup. Mike was LOUD, Phil was boisterous and antic fueled, Chan looked downright odd in his punked/colored hair and biker outfit, I don’t know if it was for Halloween or not, I suspect not. He’s also much shorter and much less talkative than I’d imagined. Daniel was Daniel, great guy and it’s not just for the cameras. Tilly was busty and nobody guy was well…nobody :). It was definitely a blast watching all the action go down and I was quickly drawn into the mechanics of filming more so than the cards themselves. Pretty neat to see a set constructed in a ballroom and even more considering the final result of camera framing when seen on tv. It was damn cold and more lights were used than I’d ever imagined possible! I didn’t sign any paperwork regarding spilling the beans on the action but I’ll refrain from doing so anyway. I will say that Mike mentioned working on his autobiography but I didn’t catch the title, Jennifer liked it though. The hostess was much more “Hollywood” commenting about having to work with a bunch of “f’king babies” after having to shoot a side-bar conversation several times due to Mike not being able to refrain from cursing :D

I bailed after about 90 minutes or so but could’ve stayed as long as I liked. Thanks again John, really very cool of you to extend the offer and take care of me as you did!

I headed back down the strip for my daily dose of Patron ritas and Cuban smoke! After parking at TI, I meandered over to Venetian to pick up a Platinum version of this tasty concoction then lit up as I hit the casino floor and headed back to the Breeze Bar at TI to enjoy my ill-gotten goods! I’d decided early on to play the Bounty Snatcher tourney at TI so I’d registered for that after exiting the garage and before settling in for a smoke. Once again, I really have to hand it to TI for their amazing customer service! It still blows me away that I can be gone for months and yet treated like a regular when I walk in, more times than not even recalling my name, thanks Troy and Chris! And in case you haven’t heard, Troy had one of the best costumes of the evening, pretty damn funny to see Nam dealing a table and “Nam” playing :D Later that evening I saw the best costume ever with a spot-on rendition of Timberlakes’ “Dick in a Box” :shock: :D

I don’t recall the total number of entrants but it somewhere north of 40 and south of 50, with the top 5 actually getting paid and the last 8 locking in their bounties at $50/pop. I hadn’t planned on doing a tourney report so I wasn’t recalling hands as is my usual course of action. I do remember starting with 7500 chips and 30 minute levels, chipping up to almost 15k by the first break. I think that’s about the time I cracked aces with K9 making an isolation move against the short-stack pusher. I also made a call that got plenty of talk when we were down to 2 tables. I’d open-raised with 67s at my new table and faced an all-in push which I barely had covered. Blinds may’ve been at 1k/2k by this point with an ante but I know it all factored into my decision considering his range and bounty cards. It was marginal at best and most likely shouldn’t have been made but I haven’t played much cards at all since my last trip in July and regardless of what anyone will say, you need to practice as stamina, decision making, etc will all be affected. At any rate, I found myself up against pocket kings. The flop was of little help but I turned a gutter-ball with a flush-draw that materialized on the river I was tossed a mountain of chips along with the bounty cards, he was none too happy!

We formed up the final table a short time later and with 2 short stacks and 2 players right behind them needing chips, it should’ve been an easy ride to lock in the bounties. But is wasn’t; both short stacks were doubled up by the massive chip leader and with blinds/antes so damn high, it would’ve been nice to see them knocked out so I could collect on my yet to be counted cards. That eventually did happen and thankfully I didn’t have to expose much of my stack before it happened. I’d locked in $700, 14 bounties and had already made a nice profit before playing down to the 5 who’d get additionally paid. That also happened in short order and I was the only outsider at the table. All others were local and very well known to the room. There was some talk of a chop but with 2 large leaders, it was more joking than not. But after some chip exchanges and escalating blinds, we’d decided to lock up $350 for everyone, better than 3rd place cash, with 1 & 2 70/30 splitting the remainder. I eventually busted third when my KTo ran into a well paid pair of aces from the blind, nicely done John! I cashed out $1050, tipped $40 and headed to Social House at 1:20am to eat on comps :D

I was disappointed that only the late nite menu was available but nonetheless thoroughly enjoyed the Sashimi and rolls along with some green tea. What I didn’t appreciate was the cold-shoulder attitude I received from everyone except the guy mopping up. I get the fact you may not want to be there, let alone serve at the hour, but if that’s case, then close up and don’t serve…don’t take it out on me. I probably won’t ever step foot in that place again and I LOVE their sushi, damn shame!

I was back at the apartment sometime after 2am and was more than ready to crash! What I wasn’t ready for was the light streaming through the windows at 8am :shock: But now I’m up and looking to play the Venetian Deep Stack that starts today, no doubt not in the right condition but how can I be in town for 6 days now and not play the Venetian?