One Last Chance to Get it All Wrong

Achieving the proper perspective on the WSOP Main Event  (this is the third year I'll be playing), is a little trickier than it might appear. This singular $10,000-buyin even is the centerpiece of the poker universe and has become an almost mythical entity, assuming a disproportionate amount of interest and energy from the media world and the general public. It has become a staple of pop culture. Underneath that, its primary value is unanimously recognized by poker players, who consider it the most profitable tournament of the year.

On the other hand, it's just one poker tournament. One tournament that caps off a grueling month of tournament action, a month that saw many triumphs and victories, but probably a greater amount of frustration and disappointment. Getting motivated after a month of tournament variance, even for the juiciest event of the year, is more challenging than it might appear.

Even though I've been playing high-stakes tournaments for almost three years now, I still feel unsteady as I approach the main event, with all the baggage attached to the Series as a whole. The conflict between knowing that this is "just another tournament" and also "the most important tournament of the year" is surprisingly difficult to resolve. Not knowing whether tomorrow marks the end of my WSOP, or the beginning, is bizarre and almost torturous.

When I bust out of a tournament, I'm usually able to process the event just like dozens before it--there will be another tournament next week, next month or whatever. Another chance to get it right. If I played well and lost, I usually have few regrets and, if I played poorly to bust, I can usually find a way to deal with the feeling of failure and look for ways to improve in the future. Yet, I'm pretty sure that if i bust out of the tournament on the first day (I play tomorrow), I'll be heartbroken despite the rational understanding that I've accumulated since becoming a "professional poker player."

So, the anticipation I feel is palpable, and that derives from the same special, intangible quality that the WSOP engenders. As badly as the tournaments themselves are organized, there is no tournament festival that creates a vibe to rival the WSOP (which happens to also be the reason that Harrah's can get away with so many mistakes and so much mismanagement--the WSOP has a presence of its own, regardless of who owns the rights to its name). After a summer spent in daily 100+ degree heat playing high-stakes poker tournaments, there is a feeling that even having survived is an accomplishment on its own.

So I'm going to relax today, maybe spend the day shopping at the Forum Shops or go to the Bellagio steam room. Even though it's been a long, hot summer, I am excited to play the Big Dance tomorrow and feel that my mindset has me poised to play halfway decent poker and maybe stick around Vegas long enough for a couple more blog entries.

***

My Series up until now has felt a little strange and arrhythmic, but it was far from a disaster. I never quite got into the groove, but managed to eke out a decent Series by stumbling into a 5th place finish and $111K cash in event #8, ensuring minimum profitability for the summer.

I'm not complaining, since I'm well aware of the players who participated in a dozen or more events without a cash, of people who dumped tens of thousands in buyins without managing to see a dinner break.

Then, on the other end of the spectrum, there are the players I marvel at: like Alex Bolotin and Michael Binger, with five and seven cashes respectively, who seem to effortlessly chew through every field they enter. Equally impressive are players like Tom Schneider and Robert Mizrachi, who dominated the non-hold-em events that were re-introduced into the 2007 schedule. These players seem to enter a zone where dominance is effortlessly achieved.

***

I'm not big on holidays, or socializing, otherwise I would have gone to Phil Gordon's July 4th BBQ, mostly because of the grace and good humor with which he invited me, handing me the invite in the Amazon Room and mentioning, with a smile, that he was extending the initiation despite my "trashing" Phil in a blog I wrote several months ago. As I mentioned in that entry, too, I've always been fond of Phil's outgoing nature, and I appreciated his acknowledgment that, "What happens online, stays online."