Second Day at Hawaiian Gardens

My original plan was to play at Commerce, but the games had been so juicy at Hawaiian Gardens I decided for a return engagement.

If anything else, my table was even better than the day before. Actually, the players were a little better, but they were incredibly predictable. I had wonderful reads on everyone there. I just needed some cards. Unfortunately, my first 90 minutes I ran card dead, and my $100 buy-in dwindled. I had a couple drawing hands that fizzled. I tried making a couple of plays at some pots and had to release my hands when I encountered resistance. Finally, with about $50 left in my stack I landed JJ on a 9-high flop. The player to my left reraised AI on my Cbet and I was pretty much pot-committed. I ruefully called and saw my first buyin go away to the man who flopped a set of dueces. I reached for another buy-in and hoped my luck changed.
And it sure did. I really didn’t get great cards, per se, but the rest of the table would overplay anything they had, betting big with TPTK against a highly coordinated flop. In the next several hours I made killer pots when someone slow played big PPs preflop, only to go AI after I’d made a set or other bigger hand. Twice someone with a baby flush went AI when I made the nut flush, etc. All the while I am having my conversations with Seymour the Seagull and some players are (half) joking about kidnapping the bird, or putting a Haitian Voodoo hex on it. Good times.

After four hours I cash out, the longest I could sit in the chairs at Hawaiian Gardens, up a nice $1018. The facilities at HG weren’t the best. It also has the California cardroom tendency for low-buyins which make for some serious short stack tables. However, if you have a kitchen sink knowledge of position and pot odds there is lots of money to be made there. Play good TAG poker and value bet and the money is there.