Super-long Super-Loud Super-Sat

If you've not yet read the first entry on tonight's Super Satellite for the main event, you may want to read this first for some context. --Otis

After a couple hours of play, the tournament directors announced that of the 224 players, 17 would get $8000 seats into the main event. The 18th finisher would get somewhere in the neighborhood of $5600. Nineteenth place got what my dad always used to call, affectionately, squat.

I was keenly interested in how the man who dubbed himself The Suck-Out King would finish.

With eighty players left, I wandered through the tournament area and found the King getting shortstacked. It looked like he had around 3600 chips left. The blinds sat at 300/600, so he knew as well of the rest of us that it was fold or push in time. On the button, he made his move, re-raising all-in. The original raiser had the King covered, but not by much.

The King's opponent considered his move for a long time. I half expected the King to call the clock on the guy. At that point, I likely would have. After what seemed like a very, very long time, the guy called and flipped over pocket tens. With a sigh of relief, the King flipped his queens (the Hilton Sisters, as my fellow poker bloggers like to call them).

Now, I didn't know this and you may not have either. While karma is a concept embraced more in the Far East, it is apparently not lost here in the islands.

The flop came as rags and the King turned to his buddies with a sigh of relief. He turned back around when then table let loose a scream. The turn was a ten.

And the Suck-Out King gave up his crown.

It was that kind of brutal night here in the first-ever Bahamian poker room.

Pro player Evelyn Ng busted out on the first hand of the super satellite and reportedly didn't rebuy because, like me, she's no big fan of rebuy tournaments. I saw her later in a $800 single-table satellite. I walked up as she went all-in with AT vs. KK. The flop came with a ten, the turn an ace. As the crowd started to murmur about her two pair, her opponent spiked a king on the river for a set. She walked away gracefully as the assembled crowd exploded.

Yep, that kind of night here. I have unlimited space, but not unlimited time. If I were limitless, I'd just sit here and write up the bad beats I've witnessed in the past six hours.

Alas, the action goes on.

When the action got down to three tables, the floor had to establish a rail. Since there was no rail, the guys encircled the tables with empty chairs, upon which the railbirds climbed for a better view.



The action remained brutal. Sighs, screams, and the occasional blue word spat from the tables every few minutes. Until, finally, after hours and hours of play...we reached the point at which even strong men start to get a little quivery.

You know it as well as I. They call it...

The bubble.



The big board indicated it as clear as a Bahamian day. Nineteen players left. The next guy out (and it was only guys that remained) got squat.

It became immediately evident that one table was going to be the table to watch. There were a few very short stacks.



A first it seemed when a big ace was up against QT that the shortest stack at the table would survive into the money. But the QT rivered a sraight and play resumed.

Finally, agonizingly, the nice guy just couldn't hold on anymore.


Bubble=Squat

Frankly, that's where things got a little odd. One guy desperately wanted a seat in the tournament. He also happened to be the shortest stack at the table and was facing the second bubble, which meant a decent payday, but no seat.

What made the table strange was that a few guys at his table just...how do I put this...they just didn't give a damn. They didn't care about the seat. However, no one could agree to a good deal that fit within the payout structure. For a few minutes, it seemed that several of the people in the tournament were arguing about who could just give up. Since nobody could agree on who could give up, those who didn't care started pushing in with anything. The sad result always left the shortstacked guy who wanted a seat in last place.

Finally, he met his ineveitable end.


Cash, but no seat

The rest of the guys won seats (or cash, if they'd already won a seat.) I don't have their names now, but should in a few hours.

It's now past 5am and the Main Event begins in seven hours.

At some point, we all need to sleep...