Tales of TOCs championships, summer 2015 edition (part 2)

By Matthew E. Milliken
MEMwrites.wordpress.com
Aug. 20, 2015

Continuing my chronicle of championship events…

On Saturday, I had a relatively brief stay in the Buck’s Billiards TOCs tournament. Once, while in the big blind, I checked pre-flop with a hand of seven-five off-suit. The flop came out nine-eight-six, giving me a nine-high straight, which I decided to check.

That was a mistake. The turn was a seven, which I was unhappy to see — it left the board open-ended. Still, I had a made hand — I already had five-six-seven-eight-nine — so I bet something.

Dave folded to my very modest bet of 600; the other participant in the hand, a woman whose name escapes me, stayed in. We were now heads-up.

The river was a 10. This was even worse news for me: The board was now a 10-high straight, rendering both my five and my seven useless.

Tales of TOCs championships, summer 2015 edition (part 1)

By Matthew E. Milliken
MEMwrites.wordpress.com
Aug. 20, 2015

World Tavern Poker divides each year into two 26-week-long halves. The first 24 weeks of each half constitute the regular season; the final two weeks are when venues stage their championship events. First comes the tavern championship, open to players who have played at least 15 games that season at a specific venue, which I wrote about previously.

The final week is the tournament of champions (or TOCs) championship, open to anyone who has placed first, second or third at any game at that venue in the season that is coming to an end. Everyone gets the same starting stack in the tavern championship games, but TOCs starting chip amounts are based on the player’s number of top-three finishes: The more you have, the more chips you get.

I qualified for TOCs at a number of venues, but gosh — it was kind of ugly, especially at first.