After a long hiatus (much of it so Susanna and I could be wed) the Madison Series of Poker returned on April 16th. With a flurry of last minute entries, and the addition of five MSOP rookies, the field balloned to seventeen players, the largest the tour has ever seen!
Eight previous MSOP champions, including the 2004 Player of the Year (Todd “The Terminator” Henderson"), were amongst those vying for $340 in prize money, also the biggest ever in MSOP history.
The tournament was the first utilizing the new wing of the McKinley Casino, with 9 players beginning on the main table and 8 players upstairs.
While the geriatric crowd downstairs played at a glacial pace, it didn’t take long for the action to get very wild in the attic.
Troy, one of our newcomers, started mixing it up with Nickles only a few hands into the game. After a modest preflop raise, Nickles called and the flop came 589. Troy went all-in and Nick quickly called. Troy had pocket aces, but Nick showed 67 with the nuts.
Troy had no help on the turn and river, and was knocked out at 6:07.
After Dan was wounded severely by a big pot with another newcomer, Chris, he succumbed soon thereafter to him at 6:31. Chris and Nick were now the big stacks, and with new blood coming up from the main table to even out the numbers, the upstairs now had many extra chips.
Downstairs, they did start mixing it up, and Mark, another newcomer, took out big Chad at 6:52. Less than an hour into it and we were down to 14 players.
At 7:07, I got into it with the Terminator. I limped in along with a bunch of other folks, and the flop came . I raised it big on the flop and only Todd stuck around for a turn. With a turn of , I went all-in. Todd, after hemming and hawing for a bit, decided he couldn’t get away from the hand, pretty sure I had the nut flush. He called my bet and showed .
I was not happy a spade had come, nor that I was called. I laid down a measly two pair with . I had a few outs, with a 9% chance to hit my full house, but we learned that both a 3 and a 4 had been folded by other players; it was looking very, very bleak for me. With two outs missing, my chances plummeted to 4.6%. While I could barely cover Todd’s stack, I was going to be mortally wounded.
The river came and they could hear the sucking sound in China (and probably my hooting and hollering). I’d owed Todd a suckout from a game long ago, but not that big a suckout. The Terminator had been unnaturally terminated, at 7:07.
Dean followed soon thereafter at 7:39, giving his chips to Nickles.
Elvis lost his stack to Chris at 7:39.
His fiancee Amanda followed five minutes later, also to Chris, who was getting hard to see behind his wall of chips. That brought us to ten players at 7:44, and we combined into the main table downstairs.
At 8:30, ToddW (another of the new guys) lost to Chris, who was obviously trying to claim the title for most knockouts in a night.
Kit took out another newcomer, Julian, at 8:35.
Nick was felled by the big stack, Chris, at 8:53.
Mark lost at 8:59 to Kit.
Ian was taken out by Chris at 9:06.
Chris continued to terminate, dropping Kit at 9:17. The four remaining players (myself, Chris, Jane, and Chuck) were all in the money.
At 9:53 with the blinds escalating and three of us slowly being drained by Chris, I pushed all in with K6 suited. Chris called me with KQ offsuit and quickly sent me packing up to the cash game.
Jane lost out to Chuck at 10:20.
Chris didn’t take long to terminate Chuck, winning it all at 10:30.
Results
1st ($170): Chris
2nd ($85): Chuck (10:30)
3rd ($50): Jane (10:20)
4th ($35): John (9:53)
5th: Kit (9:17)
6th: Ian (9:06)
7th: Mark (8:59)
8th: Nick (8:53)
9th: Julian (8:35)
10th: ToddW (8:30)
11th: Amanda (7:44)
12th: Elvis (7:39)
13th: Dean (7:11)
14th: ToddH (7:07)
15th: ChadH (6:52)
16th: Dan (6:31)
17th: Troy (6:07)
Standings