Scott is Playing the 2025 WSOP Seniors and Super-Seniors Tournaments

First hand - A4.  I pass. First hand I play - K 10 clubs on the button.  Blinds are 100/100, and I call a 300 raise.  The big blind (John Morgan) raises to 800.  I decide to speculate and call along with another guy. The flop is KQ7, two hearts.  The 800 raiser goes 1500.  I think long and hard about it, but decide there are too many hands that beat me, including AK, KQ, and KJ, not to mention AA, KK, Q7 and K7.  So I fold. In retrospect, I’m not sure why I was in the hand in the first place.  If you aren’t willing to play it after the flop, why play it at all? Morgan has been on what poker players call a “heater,” taking down pots on junk hands.  It won’t last. Next hand I play - AJ.  Weird hand.  From middle position, the guy to my right raises to 400, and I call.  We get another caller and then a raise to 1200.  Everyone calls the reraise.  The flop has nothing for me, and the guy to the right bets 4000.  We a...

I’m back! Since we chatted last, I have played six more smaller stakes poker tournaments, some Pai Gow (don’t ask how that game works, it just does), some blackjack, and some bingo. I worked out at the Paris gym (arms), played a lot of online poker, and worked about three New York Times Acrostic puzzles. Diet has not been great, but it has been satisfying in the way that you decide afterwards that you really need to diet when you get back home. I have been assigned Black Table 103 at the Paris Casino, and am surrounded by coots. George Devlin, Seat 1 John Morgan and George Little, Seats 6 & 7 We are starting with 20,000 chips.  I plan to play very tight for the first two hours and let the cards come to me. Cards are in the air!  Let’s go.

First hand is QJ hearts.  Raised to 6,000. I call along with another guy.  Board does not improve, so I fold to a bet. I win the blinds a couple of times over the next ten hands and then I look down at AA.  I shove all in and get one caller, who has JJ. He hits a J on the flop and that is the end of me. Fun while it lasted!  Sorry I could not get to the cash for those of you who put the money in for me, but I hope you enjoyed the ride!

We are back after a nice night’s sleep. When I got back to the hotel room, I was steaming, to say the least.  I went from 109,000 to a mere 47,000 in just three hours.  My chances of cashing in the tournament went down quite a bit. The bagged chips from last night But all is not lost.  Quick stats here: *   There are 1,445 players left. *   The bubble for cashing is 1,137th place. *   I am in 1,180th place.  I need to make up 43 places to cash. *   My table does not have any dominant stacks, so I will be able to make some moves. Plus, I have some momentum.  Last night, I played in an online tournament and finished 1st out of 144 players.  My $50 entry yielded $1,194, a very nice profit! So, I just need to ride that wave and get to about 80,000 chips in the next two hours, and I will make the cash. I am at Horseshoe Blue 438, surrounded by grizzled men. Cards are in the air.  Wish me luck!

This is the last level of the day, thank goodness.  I am absolutely wiped. With the blinds 1000/2000 and a 2000 ante, every orbit takes 5,000 out of my stack.  Hopefully, we play no more than four orbits, which, if I left right now and did not play another hand, would leave me with about 70,000 chips for Day 2.  Not bad! Superman keeps firing at my big blind.  There is no respect coming from him, and I guess he is entitled to keep firing because I haven’t given him any reason to stop. I just folded QQ preflop because there was a raise of 6000, then a reraise to 26000 by the chip leader.  At a different time in the tournament, I would have called the big bet, but her stack is too big and I smelled AA or KK.  No, thank you. _______________ Run of bad luck.  I raised 7,000 with A10 one behind the button, and a loudmouth goes all in for 15,000 with 33.  I call, and he hits a 3 on the flop.  So irritating.  The end of Day 1 could not come soo...

I am back from dinner.  A very nice meal at the Paris Hotel’s French bistro - a salmon salad with blueberries and nuts, and a Diet Pepsi - with the Houston contingent.  So far, April, Samm, Larry, Mark and I are still alive in varying degrees of success. My 109,000 is almost twice the average stack of the 1428 players left.  There were 4211 entrants today, and I am in 163rd place.  I am told there were about 900 players that ended up surviving the first flight, so assuming that we end up close to the same in the second flight, we’d have 1800 players trying to make the bubble of 1200th place.  I just need not to do anything stupid.  This is harder than it seems for a good player like me.  For some reason, probably fatigue, I have made some real boneheaded plays late in the day at the WSOP.  They usually come from reraises where I think I can convince the other player that I am stronger.  It NEVER works. That is why experience matters.  I ...