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This week was exciting and fun as players are ejected early!

Two hands into the game we have a head-to-head battle with monster hands. Tuffy flops top two, Q's & T's, and Terry Flops broadway, a flush draw, and a royal draw.  Bets, raises, and re-raises fly.  The Ten of spades river makes Tuffy's nut full house, Queens full of Tens and Terry's Royal With Cheese.  Terry bets, Tuffy raises, Terry Re-raises all-in and Tuffy calls-  It's over.  Second hand in and we're down a player and another's doubled-up.  The only consolation is, I suppose, if you're gonna lose, at least it's to the best hand in poker & everyone at the table would've played it the same way- NO exceptions.  That hand was destined for danger.

Last year we had Three Royal Flushes all go to Denny early in the year, I sure hope they don't all go to Terry this year! An interesting aside:  I was watching episode six, season six of GSN's High Stakes Poker in a hand where Daniel Negreanu turns a straight flush, he remarks that he's never made a royal.  I find that interesting with all the Royal Flushes we see year-in, year-out in our little bitty game!


Back to the game.  The Dealer's gifting me great fold cards & I'm happy with that, if I can't get great cards, garbage is good.  Folding three circuits around the table is NOT my idea of fun, but it'll get you into no trouble.  The saving grace part-  I would've won no hands I folded.  I finally check to see how warm the water is with a limpy KT suited only to get raised by the big blind. I called only so as not to appear too weak hoping to hit a nice flop I could play.  I flop air & check-fold.  I crawl back into my shell and wait.

The blinds continue to increase and I've gotta get aggressive.  I make a suited Ace and raise big out of position and take it.  First win, finally.  The next hand is the same, Hey, Mikey's on a rush.
From here on in, I'm playing everything aggressive.  I've convinced everyone that I am not messing around and stuck to the premiums.  with my hands starting to fire on all cylinders, these guys are right, I'm hitting and they're folding.  There was no single hand this week that made an impression on the game, it was just solid poker, nothing flashy like everyone else!

I was the  winner last week and I wanted desperately to have a nice back-to-backer.  The Trifecta was out of the question as Terry locked up high-hand with his royal, but I could still fight for the bounty and win.  After the others drop It's heads-up, Denny and me.  The cards were running cold and I was folding more than I like to heads-up, but it couldn't be avoided.  I thought I'd lay back and wait for a decent hand so I take a few more stabs at limping only to get smacked down.  I win a few here and there, and even trap him a few times, but Denny's on top of his game & calling the shots.  Last hand I try to get cute, He's checking top pair, using my aggression against me, and I'm all-in straight into his Kings with my silly little pair of sixes.  Insta-call, no sweat cards and it's over.  I couldn't have played that hand worse.

I climb back atop the League Standings, I guess a second is better than Bubble!