The Ride Ends....

Finally...my run in the WSOP Main Event has ended. And it ended in a fashion that so many of my previous deep runs in tourneys has ended...with a sick beat. I'm not going to write a whole lot today...since most of you already know that I am out. I busted...met some friends at Rio's iBar...pounded about 7 dirty Grey Goose martinis...went upstairs...packed, and met Leo Whitt out front...where we shared a cab to the airport together. 

I caught my plane at 11pm...and got in this morning at 10am. I kissed my baby, hugged my wife...cuddled with my dogs, then slept for about two hours...before getting up and doing our two-hour radio show. Not sure how I made it through that. But I did. Kai Landry has a little poker, dinner, drinks get together at his house tonight at 8pm. I may or may not make an appearance. All I can think of right now is sleeping. As I type this I'm listening to Carley...who is sitting in front of our 55' Samsung watching her new favorite show 'Yo Gabba Gabba' and kicking like a maniac while cooing and cawing. It makes me smile so hard. She is so beautiful. It was so nice to get home to her. 

Yesterday I was hovering around 500k...picking up a couple of more pay spots..and only 12 spots away from picking up another $8k...up to $52k. But when I got KK...which was only the second time in 6 days I had seen kings in the Main...I knew I was either going to win a bunch of chips...or get sent to the rail. When Elisabeth Hille started examining my chip stack after my raise (10k/20k) to 55k...I knew it was about to get interesting. She made a raise to 120k. It folded around to me, and I had no choice but to ship...and hope she didn't have AA like she had just had in the previous orbit against Jeffery Finkelstein. I shoved. She called. I asked her if she had aces again. She said no...just tens. She saw my KK and made an expression that said "Oh well." I mean...hell, she had 3.5m chips at point, and losing 500k to me wasn't going to hurt her one bit.

I had no problem/issue with her call. Not at all. Sure I would have too. Specially with that stack. Plus...hell...I WANTED that call. KK against 10-10? To get to over a million chips, and get myself into solid position to make a deep run? You bet! So when the flop came out...all hearts, and me holding the king of hearts...I wasn't that deflated that she had flopped a set. Nope...that happened on the river...when Randolph put another 10 out just to drive the stake through my heart. And douse my dreams of winning the 2012 Main Event, and retiring from poker, forever. With the cameras hovering around our table, I made sure not to make a bad impression. I merely got up...walked around to her side of the table, and smiling, shook her hand...and wished her good luck the rest of the way. She was real sweet, and said she was sorry.

Walking out of the Amazon room...was tough. I was more stumbling than walking. And then in the payouts office...I had to basically take a number and wait my turn. It gave me time to sit there and reflect on the whole week. I guess overall, I should be happy. Things could not have gone much smoother, aside from getting down to the bottom of the barrel a couple times...only to fight back and get to a decent stack. All of my big hands had held up to that point. I was due to lose one....I just wish it hadn't had to happen there. But those poker gods...they work in very mysterious ways sometimes, don't they?

Tomorrow I will sit and figure out what I owe everyone...after I spend one nice long day sleeping. Then I will get them paid out right away. It makes me VERY happy to get to send them back more than they sent me! And probably doesn't hurt my chances to sell these type of event packages in the future. I am very grateful for the people I am surrounded by...and my supportive wife, friends and family. Thanks to you ALL for your phone calls, your emails, your text messages, Twitters, and Facebook posts. It really made the experience all that much more enjoyable. 

And to all you haters...I just have one word for you a-holes.......

S-C-O-R-E-B-O-A-R-D !!!!!

Monkey