DAVIS GOES BACK TO BACK WITH MARCH WIN

Post date: Mar 08, 2021 1:16:34 AM

Aaaaaah, March, the snow is off the ground, the days are getting just a tad longer, the sun is getting just that much warmer and Brooktown poker, for the first time in one year since our March 13, 2020 event just before the pandemic went viral,  was back up to 12 players!!!

We welcomed back one of our all time favorite people, a legend, Rich Mangine, back in action, and promptly sat down and opened up the evening winning the first hand, now the question was would he pull a 2020 Uncle Bob and also win the last hand?

Pete Costello‘s house always serves up some great treats, as you entered the home this evening you were greeted with a sausage and broccoli rabe sandwich, not only was the sausage and broccoli rabe perfect the bread, wherever it came from was absolutely spectacular.

Keep in mind it was also Lent so not everyone was eating meat -  skirt steak or sausage, so in addition to mozzarella that melted in your mouth, tomatoes and eggplant towers (that looked so good uncooked I almost ate one before it was even ready) , there was salmon, but there wasn’t just one option for your salmon pleasure, they were two salmon options I really enjoyed pineapple habanero but that’s not to say I didn’t enjoy olive oil drizzle!!!

But back to poker, two tables of 6, like we said, for the first time in a year – to me, it’s great as always to see everybody, have some laughs, and play some cards, unfortunately for Pete he was the first man eliminated and was then followed by a Jay Fern KO,  and just like that we were at 10 people, however unlike when we start an event at 10, we had 5 per table and we played 5 each, for quite a while. I was very fortunate to have a wonderful group of guys in my table, gentlemen some may even say, and the highlight of our table (aside from my 4 of a kind, which won the $60 4 of a kind pot and high hand) was when Scott Boles decided on one of my deals, to nonchalantly announce what the flop was going to be, he called for a very non descript Jack 9 9. So the first card I turned over was a jack, Augie and I thought that was adorable,he got the first one right,  next came a nine, hmmmm – do you know what card came next? that’s right, it was the other 9 that he called, the son of bitch announced the actual flop in the exact order the cards came out  – a legendary moment for Scott Boles.

On and on the H.O.E went,  Hold ‘Em, Omaha Hi, Omaha Hi Lo, we laughed we teased, we laughed some more, then eliminated in 10th place, with a 2 outer from Eddie P was Richard Southard, the 3rd elimination on table A,  poor JStu was sent over from our table into the lions den, and we continued to play H.O.E, Hold ‘Em, Omaha Hi, Omaha Hi Lo  - Mike Altilio who had about 500 chips in front of him for an hour and refused to give up battled and battled until finally he was out and we merged with a fine group of 8 men.

Again, on and on the H.O.E went,  Hold ‘Em, Omaha Hi, Omaha Hi Lo until Scottie Boles was the first man in the final 8 to run out of chips, over to the side table he went for some cash games, where we hear he had some success – after Boles, JStu, who has a very busy and long Saturday of referring ahead of him, finally ran out of chips and received all the blessings of a 7th place finish, he did not go over to the cash game, but a little while later Eddie P got unlucky and he found himself at the cash game and  we were one player away from the money.

Luke’s chip stack of low, he went all in, we were ALL rooting for him to get knocked out, but he doubled down (bitch) then Brucato was low and he was all in, I could be wrong, but unlike Luke I don’t think there were all rooting for his elimination, and hot damn, Brucato survived and  doubled up then Luke was low again and that son of a bitch doubled back up again, hell, even everyone’s favorite, Rich Mangine was all in at one point, and he survived, finally after about an hour of 5 man play Brucato succumbed to the pressure of 2020 Champ Augman,  Scott Davis, Luke Lucash and Rich Mangine, yes that Rich Mangine who won the first hand tonight, who had missed the last year of activity, who EVERYONE was rooting for, was he going to pull off an Uncle Bob and take home the prize?

After Brucato’s elimination players got a little loosey goosey, but the quality or play was still top notch,  sadly Augie LaMalfa (sadly for Augie only) who had built up a monster stack but then the cards when cold and Augie was gone. Luke, after a masterful job of managing a large stack early, getting cold in the middle rounds, and holding on to advance up the leaderboard finally ran out of time and chips and we had Scott Davis, last month’s winner and point leader,  versus Rich Mangine, the entire league was rooting against Scott Davis, even Scott Davis said “I’m rooting for Richie but I’m not gonna make it easy” They both had a couple of shots to take each other down but Mangine caught a card and survived and doubled up they were dead even on chip stack 36,000 chips each but finally The Grinder started whittling away 6,000 here another 6,000 then 8,000 till finally Rich and Scott both all in with trip threes but Scottie D out kicked Richie and gets win number 2 of the year with number 25 of his career and broke the heart of fans everywhere.

Did I mention the raviolis? Yes there were raviolis and they were glorious.

Congrats, of course to Scotty D, welcome back Rich Mangine, thank you Peter as always for a great time I would be remiss if I failed to mention the old fashion Jay Fern made for me at approximately 5 o’clock which had just the right amount of sweetness and just the right amount of wood smoked whiskey, it helped to make it one of the best nights of the year.

2 events in April  - depending on uncle Bob status will depend on which games were are playing and if guests will be back in the fold - but we do know, right now, we’re playing April 9 at my house. That’s it for me boys, it’s after 3:30, so I’m gonna wrap this up, I will work on the website this week – thanks as always for reading, thanks as always for coming to play, thanks as always for all you do for me, and for each other – we have a special group of guys and a special bond – don’t ever lose sight of what that means.