I've Finally Slain the Beast!

Last night, I finally get a chance to enter a MTT cash tournament ($11 buy-in) and not a satellite. Now, to keep interested, I usually play a 1 table SNG at the same time. I see a 45 player SnG, just opening up. I sign up for it, but then decide against it and join a regular 9person SnG. I lose at that while I'm in the MTT so I enter a new one. I'm in the middle of both when all of a sudden a new table pops up. I FORGOT to unregister for the 45 person SnG. CRAP!

I decide to check my balance on FTP while play. I started the night with $60, but now have only $20 (basically because of the first SNG I lost and the three I'm in at the time).

So I busted out of the single table SnG around 7th or so. Nothing spectacular. I failed to finish in the money in the MTT. I was doing OK in the 45 player SnG and was just focusing on that (and playing Xbox to keep me from getting bored and playing marginal hands). I managed to get to the final table. I was severly short stacked, but didn't get desperate. Even at one point when I had about 450 in chips and the blinds were 60-120 (in the BB everyone folded to me, and in the SB, I went all-in when it folded around to me and the BB folded). I hit some good hands then, and tripled up. Waited patiently for a few more hands, doubled up a few times again. Found myself heads up, down about 2-1 in chips.

Heads up play didn't last very long. First hand. I'm dealt a very poor hand, but still called a 3x BB rise. Had to fold on the flop.

The 2nd hand I'm down: 51,680 to 15,820.

I'm dealt a marginal hand of 98o and raise. my opponent calls. Flop comes 3-3-A. I have a 3rd of my chips in the pot already, so decide to push All-in to end the hand here. Unfortunately my opponent had an Ace and i was done.

But I did manage to make about $115 in that SnG , and get my first Multi-Table cash (not counting one freeroll I won over a year ago, and not counting the $3 I won when I played in a satellite on Sunday).

Now reviewing my hand history for that tournament I have come up with some pros and cons to my play.

PRO: Good hand selection. For the most part, I'm not often picking just junk hands and willing to see flops cheaply if my cards dictate it. Throwing away the marginal hands I do hit to shows of strength (example, A3s- I played that for the flush. Ace hit the board. I bet. Was re-raised and folded. Opponent showed a set of 4s).

CON: The one of many that was easy to see. Not capitalizing when opponent shows weakness. There were a bunch of hands where I missed the flop and just checked down to the river. Only to show the opponent either missed to but had a higher high card, or hit some tiny pair on the river to win. Need to be willing to bet out and take the pot. Though a lot of the time it has to do with having low chips at the time. If I had more chips, I'd more than likely fire in a bet and let it go if it's re-raised.

Overall, I'm happy with how I've been performing in tournaments recently. If those satellites had been cash tournaments I would have cashed in both of those too.