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Mike Mendez wins Le Batard poker at Dania Jai-Alai
Mike Mendez of Weston was declared the winner of the Dan Le Batard Celebrity Poker Tournament held Wednesday night at Dania Jai-Alai.
The multi table Texas Hold’em tournament drew 250 Hold’em and 790 The Ticket fans paying $50 to enter.
According to a release from the fronton, with six players remaining as midnight approached, an agreement was reached to “chop” the pot equally giving each player just over $1,200. Mendez (at left, with Le Batard), being the chip leader, was awarded the tournament trophy. (Note to Marc Hochman, who comlained of 'No Love' in Action: Hi, Marc! and your picture has been in this space before.)
Dania Jai-Alai’s Cardroom is open Sundays through Thursdays from noon to midnight, Friday and Saturdays from noon to 2 a.m. The fronton is located at 301 E. Dania Beach Blvd in Dania Beach.
I had a decent night. I was down to 1200 chips early, and with blinds at 300-600 I jumped into a five-way pot with K-3 out of the big blind. Doubling up wouldn't have gotten it done. Cards turn up 4-5-6-7, so I hit the straight and have enough chips for awhile.
Then late, I'm at about 20,000 chips, blinds at 3,000-6,000. Get J-10 suited in the big blind; three callers, one an all-in. Flop comes Q-9-6, so two of us start to check it down. Third guy raises 10,000. So it's 26,000 in the pot (with antes) and I'm at 32 percent to hit my straight on turn or river. So I call, and call when he puts me all-in on the turn. He flips over A-6, so he has a pair of sixes and I have the open-ended straight draw and two overs! A 14-outer, which doesn't hit. And I go home.
Did I misplay it?
(FYI, to Isle poker players: I'll have all the Battle at the Beach results together, including the win by Hayden Fortini, as soon as I get them all; I just got a little behind.)
NICK SORTAL began playing 3-card "gut" and "Indian poker" on high school band trips, early training for his...
Comments
Did you misplay it? YES
You're the b.b. with $6K in the pot, you're short stacked and you have a pretty decent hand, especially for b.b. Why let 3 callers in? If the A 6 guy was fairly tight, I doubt he would call a $20k raise,depending on his stack. Regardless, the outcome would be the same.
If you wanted to check the flop for a free card, do you think the button is going to allow that? He was trying to steal and you should have just folded - (If you weren't willing to bet to begin with).
When you're short stacked, you gotta make the commitment and the only time you had enough money to cause the other players to hesitate was pre-flop, ESPECIALLY when there was no raise.
Posted by: KCK | March 27, 2009 5:00 PM
Good thoughts, thanks.
You know, I thought about that at the time.
My thinking was with 2 real callers and the SB, that one and probably both have J-10 beat. The table had way too much limping and way too much calling, so the idea of knocking them off a hand is lessened. But, of course, they wouldn't have known they had me beat.
So I said, hey, take the free flop, see what happens because you can get off of it less it's a great flop (which it was, for me). Clearly, had I not pushed preflop I should have pushed post-flop, instead of letting the A-6 lead out.
After he won he said 'I bet it once, so I had to keep betting it.' Which supports what you're saying.
Thanks.
Posted by: Nick Sortal | March 28, 2009 12:47 PM