A word about my last entry...

I have thought a lot about my last entry. One thing has been on my mind, and I wanted to clear it up. I made the following statement:

I can honestly say that last night I made no mistakes. I played every hand the way it should be played, and as a result, I came out on top.

I followed that up by relating how I called an all-in and a re-raise that put me all in with AJ of diamonds. Some would see this as a mistake. Here's my rationale, and you can then determine if it was a mistake.

The guy who went all in for 6000 at 1000/2000, I put him on a strong hand. AQ, AK, or a pair. The drunk guy who raised to 10000 I was not putting on a strong hand. He had called me down earlier on the river with no pair. I had also heard from other players how he had been raising with crap all night, but that he just happened to get lucky.

The thought process was, I can call myself all-in and be an underdog to the initial raiser. I was pretty sure that I had the drunk guy beat. So let's assume that I lose to the initial all-in but win against the drunk. I will lose 6000 and win 4000. I've already got 1000 in the pot, since I'm in the small blind, so basically, I'm out the price of the small blind (since it would take another 1000 to call the big blind, if nobody had raised). Basically, I'm paying 1000 to call a 4000 raise. It is almost as if the drunk had just slipped me the 4000, to offset the 6000 of calling the first all-in. I figured it was worth the price to take the chance.

As it turned out, the drunk had a hand, albeit a weak one. I don't believe I would have called an all-in with pocket deuces, much less raised to 10000 with them.

The point is that I don't consider this a bad play because of the thought that went into it. I was basically looking at losing only 2000 for the chance to almost triple up. I was already well into the points payout, so I was playing to win, not survive. Think about it, and I think you'll agree that it was the proper play given the circumstances.