Railing the Sunday Storm tournament

About 90 minutes ago, I ended more than 4 hours watching an online tournament when I could have been playing.  But it was a good time investment, and I learned a lot.

The tournament had an extremely large, and extremely weak, field.  What was even more interesting to me was that it had a very good structure.  Often very large tournaments will speed up the blinds so that they don't run too long--which is exactly the opposite ]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]q2]\  [Psalty just walked across my keyboard] of the structure that I like.  But big prize pool, slow blinds, and weak field--that's right in my wheelhouse.

The tournament started with over 111,000 players.  It was an $11 tournament, and I know that the field was weak because satellites were runnning 10 or more at a time to get people into this thing, and the satellites were only $2.20.  When you have a bunch of people who can't afford to get into a tournament, who try to take down a cheaper tournament to win a seat, that just screams, WEAK FIELD.  And since so many satellites were running, 24 hours a day (there are 16 registering right now), I think that most in that huge field earned their tournament spots that way.

When I started watching, there were 131 players left, and the players getting knocked out had finished just high enough to mincash.  The blinds were so high that I didn't think that those 131 players would last very long, but when I realized that it would be quite a while, I was learning so much that I decided to stick with it. That took 4 hours and 4 minutes.  The entire tournament ran for almost 11 hours.

I analyzed the tournament correctly.  Even when it was down to 36 players, they were making basic mistakes.  Players were limping (making the minimum bet) when their stacks were so small that the only two choices were to go all in or to fold.  There were also players so worried about getting knocked out before the next pay level that agressive players pushed them around mercilessly.

Sometimes just surviving until the next pay level is correct, especially when it's life-changing money. Economists call that marginal utility, when just one more unit of something makes all the difference.

The classic example is that if a person is starving, the marginal utility of one loaf of bread is great.  A more contemporary example might be avoiding risk at the poker table, while coasting into enough money to buy a car, or to pay a year of college tuition.

If players had been making that decision with a thousand dollars or more on the line, it might make sense--but jumps that big didn't happen until it got down to the final two or three tables.

In my opinion, the $25-$50 prizes that had players playing carefully after nine hours were not a big deal when the prizes at the final table were so huge.  Usually you need a good reason not to take the risks necessary to get to the final table, and the final table money was so compelling in this case that it's not even a close call.  Ninth place was $8,418.98.  First place was $210,531.74!

So, I watched this extravaganza, and I liked what I saw.  The Sunday Storm runs once a week, and I would definitely like to give it a shot.  Satellites have their quirks, but they happen to be one of my specialties (I used to play a lot of $2.20s and cash out the ones that I won, adding the $11 to my bankroll instead of entering the target tournament) so I probably wouldn't have any problem taking one down in 2 or 3 tries.

But I'm hesitant to do that yet, for several reasons:

1. I'm not bankrolled to play $2.20s yet.  My Consolidated Bankroll Formula tells me that I need  $114 in my bankroll to play $2.20s.

2. When I win a satellite, the Sunday Storm buy-in might be better used by cashing out and adding $11 to my bankroll.

3. Variance.  No matter how good a player is, there is huge variance when playing in a very large tournament.  It's easy to make one big mistake, or to have a run of really bad luck, sometime during an 11-hour tournament.  To put it another way, you have to be both lucky and good to go deep in such a large field.  And since the Sunday Storm only runs once a week, it would take a long time to play it often enough to reach the long-term, where skill dominates luck.

In any case, I can't play that tournament, or any of the other Sunday Majors, more than twice a month.  Starting in April, half of the time I will be gettting up early to go to church on Sundays.  Getting up in the morning, going to church, coming home around noon, playing a tournament that starts at 3:30 P.M. and could go for 11 hours--not a good plan.  I would definitely prefer to be rested and able to make good decisions when a lot of money is at stake.

4. It's 11 hours!  Players didn't start cashing until about 9 hours in.  I could easily play 6, 7, or 8 hours and not cash.  That's a lot of time during which I could have been doing something else--like making money.

So, it was interesting.  I learned a lot about how different players react in an unusual tournament situation.  It would be fun to try, and I might have a decent shot at making some serious money if I played it once in a while. 

But now is not the right time.  The Sunday Storm, and all of the Sunday Majors, will have to wait for a while.