Blowing a Big Stack

My wife and I played in the Caesar’s Deep Stack tournament on Saturday. I already posted about her bubble finish but I never wrote about me spewing away a big stack. Well a little history is in order about how I became the big stack. Everyone started out playing really tight, which was a surprise in a $175 tournament. So I started splashing around and taking a stab at raggy flops. It worked well, built up my starting 20K chips to 25K. Than a cooler hand took place with me on the winning end of it. In level 3, think it was 150-300 at this point; three people limped when a tight older man raised it up to 2000 from the button. In the big blind I look down at American Airlines(AA) so I go into the tank and try to figure out how to get a lot of chips in the pot. Also I wanted it heads up against the raiser who I knew has JJ, QQ, or KK. I decide to raise it to 4500, a little more than a min-raise trying to represent A-K or A-Q. Everyone folds back to the button who instantly makes it 10K to go.(BTW he had around 24K to start.) Bingo my plan is working, I pause for a second and shove over the top of him. He goes into the tank, at this point he has 14K behind. He starts talking saying, “How can I lay this hand down.” I know you have Aces but I can’t fold. He was thinking forever and finally says I call. I say, “This hand is a cooler you have Kings right?” He had the Kings and I bust him and now have almost 50K in chips, which is 2nd biggest stack in the whole tournament. This is a place I am not used to being in! So at this point I start to splash around even more than in the beginning of the tournament. I steal a few pots but then the table gets tired of it and I run into trouble. This hand shows the kind of trouble you can get in when your image is ruined at the table. From late position I raise 3x from the cutoff with Q-7 of spades. (This is my first mistake.) Only the Big Blind calls me. Flop comes 10-5-5 with two spades so I lead out for half the pot. Turn bricks off with a six and I lead out for 3K. Big blind flat calls me again. River is a King and he checks to me and I fire the third shell with my Queen high. I insta-bet 4K and he calls me within 3 seconds. I say good call and he turns over pocket 4s! Talk about getting owned he calls my every bet with 4th pair to the board. It really was a good call, we talked about the hand for 10 minutes after it. Two things contributed to his call, first that the board was paired and second I bet the river way too fast. I fired out my bet, which was a classic tell that I was weak and wanted him to fold. Still I give credit for a good read and call. After this I tried bluffing another flush draw with the same losing results. I spewed away a lot of chips and then went completely card dead. Problem was my image was ruined so it was hard to steal. Also my table was crazy aggressive so it was raised and/or re-raised before my turn most hands. I ended up out in 18 place, should have known better. Online whenever I get a big stack I tighten up to protect it. This time I tried something different and paid the price. Thanks for reading and good luck at the tables. Tony

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