Tier 1's

I celebrated my birthday yesterday, treating it as I would any other day off. I haven't had more than one day a week off in a while, and I credit the new schedule for it. This week, I have five bartender shifts, no serving shift. Pretty sweet.

I have absolutely no explanation for my luck during Tier 1 sng's. For those of you unaware, they are $4 single table sng's that pay a $26 tourney token to the winner, and $10 to second. Nothing for third. They also come in $8-turbo and $6 flavors, with two tables condensing to a few chips for the top 4 spots.

(Hey Change!) I've played in six of these now, and have three chips to show for it.

My luckboxing started on the second hand dealt, with some idiot play. I hate min-raises, and responded with a call out of my BB with K6o. I don't know what possessed me to believe my top pair, rag kicker was any good, but I shoved all-in on the turn and my opponent had KJo. The river was my three-outer six, and I had just doubled up in donkey fashion.

Ok, so I've got chips and a horrible table image. Time to do what I do best: fold. Nobody's going to give any of my bets any respect anyway. I played perhaps two hands in the next 3 blind levels, calling a min-raise with 66, then ditching on the all-overcard flop to a bet.

The next hand I raised was jacks, in the cutoff. The BB defended, and I couldn't help but check the flop: Q-J-J. Them is most definitely quads, beeches. A ten on the turn was nice. The turn and river went check-small bet-call. He had KTo. Looks like I could've put in a decent bet on the flop, too.

Heads-up was against the other box of luck at the table, the guy who busted two players with ATo when he flopped and turned a ten against both players' KK. He favored trapping top pair during heads-up play. It bit him in the ass on the last hand. I button-raised with J9-suited, and took my free card when he checked the Q-T-3 rainbow flop. He also went check-call when a 9 hit the turn. He checkraised me for all of it when another 9 hit the river. I called, figuring if he had a better hand, my hat's off to him. He had QJ. He had picked the wrong time to stick in a big raise.

Lucky me.