Bigger Deal

I could blame the cards, the dealers, the TV lighting, the jetlag. I could quip, after watching that all-time-great men’s Wimbledon final, that at least there were no rain delays. But no, I’m not going to blame anyone or anything. For, reader, I survived Day One of the world-title event, and so climbed into the top half of the 6,000-ish field - in worse shape than at the dinner break, after a lousy late-night session, but still with a decent enough stack to fight another day on Wednesday.

With 1,928 starters, Day 1c did indeed prove to to be the biggest ‘flight’ so far, with five former world champions among the runners – Chris Moneymaker, Joe Hachem, Huckleberry Seed, Brad Daugherty and Jim Bechtel – plus such poker luminaries as David Sklansky, Sammy Farha, Isabelle Mercier, Clonie Gowen, John Juanda, Mel Judah and Mike ‘the Mouth’ Matusow.

At 1am, after 13 gruelling hours, I proved to be one of 1,026 survivors – just over half the field. Among the big poker names to have bitten the dust were Huck Seed, T.J. Cloutier, Tony G, Marcel Luske, TV’s Mike Sexton and Hustler’s Larry Flynt. Other surprise fallers included Gavin Griffin, Justin Bonomo, J.C. Tran, Max Pescatori, Joe Reitman Johnny Lodden, Dmitri Nobles, Jeffrey Lisandro, Antony Lellouche, Steve Paul-Ambrose, Kevin O’Donnell, Raj Vohra, Fred Berger, Mark Gregorich and last year’s final-tableist from the UK, Jonathan ‘Skalli’ Kalmar.

Also playing was legendary Vegas gambler Archie “the Greek” Karas, best known for parlaying a $50 stake into $40 million a few years ago, then losing it all back again. Somewhere in the room, apart from poker writer Anthony Holden, was his pal poker writer James McManus*. Unlike poker writer Garry Gates, neither was wearing a white toga, sandals, and a headband, waving a giant palm frond at Evelyn Ng.

The day began with country singer Andy Griggs treating us to the world premiere of his new song ‘It’s All About the Money’ ­– which, at the time, seemed like the longest country song ever written. Commissioner of Poker Jeffrey Pollack then grabbed the mike to remind us that ‘It’s all about the bracelet and tradition, too.’ The day’s ritual ‘Shuffle Up and Deal’ was a stylish one from WSOP Tournament Director Jack Effel.

Each seat at each table was provided with free energy drinks and bottled water from sponsors All In, and seat cushions donated by Everest Poker. My table proved to be a quiet, friendly, all-male affair, and I made my first mistake early on, bluffing into what proved to be A-A. Eh bien, some adrenaline expended, and not too much damage done.

I won’t bore you with all the hands in which I got involved; suffice it to say I was playing carefully, pretty accurately, and making the most of the few premium hands that came my way. Standard first-day play in an event of this scale. Apart from taking advantage of the occasional good read, the infrequent situation-in-my-favour, and a few positional blind-steals, my unique personal innovation (as now immortalised on the PokerStars blog) was to think of my adorable six-week-old grand-twins George and Ione, shove in my money, and hope. It seemed, on the whole, to work. Maybe I should get them to help me write a manual?

After six hours of play, at the dinner-break, I was up to 30,000 in chips. Given the familiar difficulties of finding food amid the teeming poker hordes, it was kind of my friend Des Wilson to have booked a table in my eponymous Rio restaurant, Antonio’s (soon, if I have my way, to be renamed Grantonio’s), and as generous of him to pay for dinner. Even more important to my survival was Des’s ferocious insistence that I have no more than two glasses of wine, one of each colour. I REALLY wanted just one more red – but, no, Des just wasn’t having it.

Quite right, too, I hear you say. And you’re all spot on, for my habitual Dutch courage can be dangerous when the cards go dead on you, the jetlag begins to mingle with the growing sexagenarian tiredness, and the younger online players keep making their crazy pre-flop raises. During the penultimate two-hour level, I pretty much shut up shop, and managed to cling to the cliff-edge. During the last, I nearly lost my grip.

The lovely Mad Harper of PokerStars came over to my table at this stage, and started to give me a restorative massage. ‘This guy,’ she announced to my startled table, ‘is a living legend!’

‘I’m not so sure,’ I mumbled drolly, ‘about the “living”…’

At midnight, of all times, our table was broken, and I was moved from the red zone to the orange. My second K-K of the day pulled me back from the brink of extinction, and I consolidated with a few (if I say so myself) boots-quakingly ballsy defences of my big blind. When the hour gets that late, your stack back where it started, and the clock is ticking down, there’s no point in risking your whole tournament on a speculative venture. The object now is to survive, get some sleep, enjoy a few days off, and be in better shape to fight another day.

And that, at 1250am, was what I found I had managed. It was disappointing to get the big blind on the last hand of the day, and so slip for the first time below the 20K with which I started. But 19,200 is enough to work with on Wednesday, when the blinds will start at 250-500 with antes of 50. In the meantime, it’s party party party – I mean, sleep, exercise, more sleep, more exercise and MUCH positive thinking.   

*This according to every reliable Vegas news-source, some of whom reported his progress. An email from the real James McManus, of Positively Fifth Street fame, has just informed me that this is in fact some other Jim McManus – not, alas, the writer, whom I was looking forward to seeing again. ‘I am VVVVEEEERRRRYYYYYY unhappy to report that it’s a different Jim McManus up on the leader board with you,’ writes the one I know. ‘My main source of "fun" today has been repeating this to about two dozen people who have already emailed or called to cheer me on…’ Aw, shucks.

It must have been the hat!