I never drink when I play poker. This is absolutely 100% true, but like any good rule, there are exceptions.
When you see me playing cards, you’ll usually see me wearing jeans, comfortable shoes or flip-flops, a t-shirt, and a hooded sweatshirt or fleece. Sometimes I wear a hat, or sunglasses, but that’s usually not the case. Most of the time I wear headphones that connect to an iPod in one of my pockets. Sometimes there is music playing, and sometimes there’s not. Either way, I usually sit there, nearly motionless, studying the action and not really talking to anyone.
However – if I’m in a game where I don’t feel like there are any real strong opponents, such as the $1-2 No Limit game at the Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, I appear to be a completely different person.
There’s one occasion in particular that I want to tell you about. It occurred during the first of my two trips to Vegas last summer. My confidence was at an all-time high because I had just won a deep-stack tournament over at Caesar’s. I was on my way out of town, and there was no way I was going to lose the money I’d won. That’s not cockiness – I’m just not the type of gambler who’s willing to risk large amounts of money on a long shot. Mandalay had been pretty good to me so far, and I saw no reason tonight should be any different.
It was around 10:00 when I rolled up to the card room, ready to play. Generally when I approach a new table, I do so with the sort of optimistic trepidation one has when diving into the ocean for the first time. It’s important to make a quick survey the area, and see what kind of dangers might be in store for you once you’re in the water and plan your approach.
Standing in line before me was a collection of players that would make any proper card sharp grin. There was one housewife, two twenty-somethings on their way out to the bars, a collection of middle aged couples dressed for golf, and a European couple that looked ready for clubbing. The male – half of the appeared to be about 6’5” and built like a linebacker. He wore a shiny black shirt over a tank-top made from the kind of mesh they make football practice jerseys out of. It was black too, as were his pants. His leather boots had about 4 inches of sole on them, making him appear much taller than he actually was.
The girl he stood next to was shorter, with a black tribal tattoo that wound seductively into and out of a black tank top – miniskirt combo that managed to be tasteful and enticing at the same time. She had bronze skin that appeared to have the texture of silk. The pair definitely appeared to be together, but I still hoped she’d draw a seat at my table.
You can’t always tell how a person plays by their appearance, but you can usually get pretty close. The housewives you find in casual games tend to be conservative and overconfident. They usually don’t bet enough when they have a hand, and are used to having their bets called too often by male opponents whose egos cause them to bluff and too often and foolishly call down their female opponents with weaker hands. Because of their frequent home game victories, these women fail to realize they’ve turned into calling-stations. Their persistent value betting makes them easily trappable when you have a big hand, and easy to call for odds. Folding never hurts much because they keep the pots small unless they have a monster, which makes folding hurt even less. They don’t generally slow-play their hands, so if they check to you, you can most often pick up a head’s up pot with any bet.
I realize these observations can come off as sexist, but I assure you they’re not. I think women have the capacity to be extremely good poker players. In fact, I’d argue that the ultimate female player in the world would most likely be better than the ultimate male player due to women’s superior peripheral vision and sensitivity to gestural nuance. They’ve been training for this most of their lives, guys - unfortunately that training usually happens away from the poker tables. However, quality female players are rare, and they’re generally not found at the lower stakes tables, but I digress.
Guys on their way to bars are usually inexperienced players and easy to manipulate, and let’s just say I wasn’t intimidated by the out-sized European or his girlfriend.
After putting my name up on the board, I grabbed one of the “How to play Texas Hold’em” pamphlets - they’re found in just about every card room – and looked it over to pass the time. It wasn’t long before the floor man opened a new table and called my name, and just for fun, I brought the pamphlet to the table and continued reading as I waited for the game to start.
I wound up in seat 7, with the housewife seated to my right, one seat in between us, and the European couple next to her on the other side. To my left was an older couple – obviously man and wife who handled their chips awkwardly. They were dressed in flower-print vacation wear, and each wore a couple of flashy gold rings. They obviously would not be a threat.
The dealer came to the table and handed out chips. The housewife commented about the pamphlet, but said she didn’t buy the act because I’d also brought my iPod to the table and hadn’t turned it on yet. Damn! The jig was up, and I hadn’t even started shuffling my chips yet.
The game started out pretty much as expected. The housewife did pretty well, taking down a couple of pots with top-pair, and I started out playing pretty conservative. It’s usually best to start out conservative against players you’ve never seen because a) your presumptions might be wrong, and b) they’ll think you’re a tight player and give you more credit than you deserve when you start speeding around.
Nothing much happened for about 20 minutes, but the arrival of a large and boisterous middle-easterner changed everything. He wore a Hawaiian shirt, gold rings, and a moustache. He was almost as round as he was tall, and he bought his chips with $100 bills peeled from a large roll kept in his right pants pocket without so much as a rubber band holding to hold it together. Men like this are almost always careless and overly aggressive. They bet $30 into an un-raised $2 blind, and raise $12 bets by at of least $100. This man was no exception. When he took the seat directly to my right, I began to salivate.
When I have such a choice seating position against an opponent like this, I all but ignore the rest of the table. I focus almost entirely on just one opponent. I play tight, I trap, and when I feel I’ve sufficiently baited the hook, I put all my chips in the middle almost without exception.
I doubled up with a straight, and he bought back in. I doubled up again, and more bills came off the roll. At this point, I think it’s prudent to go back to playing cautiously because eventually he’ll have a big hand, and there’s no point in risking a huge pile of chips carelessly. Eventually, my new friend became bored and frustrated with his losses and wandered off to play blackjack, leaving more than $600.00 on the table in less than an hour of play.
With the big spender gone, it was time to turn my attention back to the rest of the table. Everyone looked pretty jealous of my good fortune with what I’m sure they all assumed was an oil baron or something, but their envy took a distant second to their amazement at what had transpired. I used this period of commotion to take stock of what had transpired during my little skirmish with the Arab.
The housewife had gone back to her room and a new player had entered the game to my left – an older Caucasian gentlemen with a Spanish accent. I also learned that the European couple weren’t a couple at all. They were brother and sister and the older gentleman who’d joined us was their father. My happiness at learning they weren’t together was mitigated only slightly by the sight of the massive diamond engagement ring on her finger. Her fiancée, I learned was back in Spain. At least I could flirt without fear of creating an international incident.
As usually happens when someone dumps a bunch of money on the table and then leaves, everyone instantly bonds. An energized chatter consumes the table as everyone feels like this sudden windfall of chips is a communal victory. Suddenly, you’re no longer competitors. You’re friends, sharing in one another’s good fortune, and if that happens, you want to keep it going as long as possible. I called for cocktails.
Alcohol impairs both judgment and cognitive ability – a fact you probably know but on some level don’t think really applies to you – and you should never play cards while intoxicated. I never play cards when I’m intoxicated. Ever. Except under special circumstances.
The question you need to ask yourself is this: Is my level of play at my current (and future) level of intoxication better than my opponents’ level of play? As a matter of fact, this is the same decision making process you should make whenever you decide whether or not to sit down to a card table. Am I, in my current mental and physical condition, able to play better poker than my opponents? It’s not always an easy question to answer, but introducing alcohol into the mix makes it a lot harder.
Let’s take stock of the situation: I was pretty confident nobody at the table was going to outplay me. Everyone was happy and joking around and more concerned with making friends and being entertained than making money, and I wanted to keep it that way. They’d just seen me win a bunch off money off of a real gambler, so it seemed like I had reason to celebrate.
I decided to make myself the center of attention. Remember, table image is extremely important. I really can’t emphasize this enough. You should always be aware of how you’re perceived at the table, and how you’re perceived should affect the way you play.
If I’m drinking at the table, I never drink as much or as fast as everyone else thinks I am. I become more outgoing and talkative. I also change the way I play. In this case, that meant playing looser and more aggressive, but not as loose or aggressive as what I figured people would expect from me based on my apparent mood and how much I’d had to drink. The added benefit here is that you can really turn it on and do some damage if you get a run of good cards. People will think you’re throwing a party when what you’re really doing is using your table image to capitalize on a series of good situations. Any time you’re drinking at the table, it’s important to know your tolerance, and track the way the alcohol is affecting your system. It’s also important to have rules. If I ever catch myself making one of those too-loose calls if I’m drinking in a game where there’s any real money involved, I get up immediately.
I ordered a Jack and Coke. I sucked it down and I ordered a second. I laughed as I bet. I raised, and re-raised. I cracked jokes and flirted with the hot Spaniard across the table. I made friends with her brother and father, and got do know some of the other players at the table as well. When my second drink finally arrived, I drank it slowly, but by then my new table image was firmly anchored in the minds of my opponents. All they needed now was the image of the drink in front of me to reinforce the idea that I was just there to have a good time.
I was surprised to learn that the Spaniards were in town for the World Series. The brother, I’d learned, was named Javi, worked in advertising, and had won a seat in the W.S.O.P. Main Event in an online tournament. He offered to show me around if I ever came to his hometown and we exchanged business cards. It’s possible I’d underestimated him when I made my initial assessments, but watching him over the ensuing hands seemed to bear me out. His game was either extremely tight-weak and passive, or he was extremely disciplined and in the middle of a really incredible run of bad cards.
I had the most fun playing against his father. He was a typical recreational player, and really a very nice guy. We had some good laughs. I took a lot of pots off of him, and when he finally did suck out on me (I flopped top two pair with J-8, and he turned a higher two pair with J-9) I congratulated him on his good fortune, and put my arm on his shoulder. It’s good sportsmanship, and it preserves the image you’re trying to project – as a recreational player out to entertain yourself with a game of chance. It wasn’t purely a show though. I really did like the guy and was having a great time socializing – but you should never let your feelings about the other players prevent you from playing the best poker you can.
It wasn’t long after that that I realized I’d become more interested in the conversation I was having than in bilking my opponents out of their remaining chips. When you come to that realization, it’s time to call it a night. There wasn’t much point to continuing the game anyway. The married couple to my left had long since wandered off – the husband’s stack hadn’t moved in two hours, and he’d cut his wife off after paying for 3 of her re-buys. The Spanish sister/daughter had already gone to bed, taking with her one of my reasons for staying. There wasn’t much money left on the table compared with what I’d already won, and it wasn’t worth the risk of playing when I was distracted and tired.
I decided to call it a night. I always stick around for a little while after deciding to retire if I’m up by a significant amount - it’s good sportsmanship and it gives the other people at the table the impression that you’re willing to lose some of their money back to them. More importantly, you never want to give casual players the impression you’re just after their money if you’ve succeeded in taking it. You want them thinking they have a reasonable shot at beating you even if they don’t, and you wan them to have had fun playing with you. It’s what keeps them coming back.
Satisfied with my winnings, I ordered a third drink and screwed down tight. I folded pretty much every hand dealt to me for a few rounds before shaking hands, saying my goodbyes, and walking back to my hotel room. I was slightly buzzed, slightly tired, and up close to $1000 for the night.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Sometimes when you lose, you really win....
I know of two underground poker rooms near my apartment. One has a better, friendlier dealer, but is less convenient and is populated by some of New York’s rockier players. The other is a mere 10 minutes away by subway (just one stop on the 2 down to Times Square) and boasts 2-5 action so wild that I was literally able to take down a $4000 pot when I turned a straight that gave my opponent middle two-pair. I usually opt for the latter. I can tolerate a fair amount of fluctuation when playing deep-stack poker, and I’d rather take my chances with the fish than struggle to eke out a few big blinds an hour against the rocks.
Lately however, the action has dried up. Maybe it’s due to the dog-days of summer, maybe the fish have come in second-best a few too many times, or maybe everyone has just gone on vacation – who knows. The net result though is fewer fish to fry and a lot more waiting around until there are enough players to get the games started.
Despite the action-draught, boredom and general lack of legitimate work has driven me back to the card-room after a 2-week hiatus. I felt I’d recovered from both illness and bad luck and my recent return to the world of online poker has yielded some nice results. With that in mind, I trekked on down to the ATM and jumped back into the ring.
I opted to try the Times Square location, and despite the advertised 7pm start time, by the time I arrived at around 9:30, there were just 3 other players lurking around. Nathan, the club’s promoter/dealer had told me they’d be coupling with another room to bring in more players and promised action, so needless to say, I was disappointed.
I decided to stick it out for a while, and before too long, we were playing 5 handed. At this point, I knew the other players. They were regulars, there to pick off the fish, and the result was a near total lack of action.
After an hour or so, things began to look up. A knock on the door and the outsized security guard named Tiny let in our newest arrival. "Tiny" stands at least 6’6,” 300lbs, with a lazy eye and hands that could palm a Volkswagen. Big men are not usually known for their speed, but this man’s movements could easily be considered sloth-like. Waiting for him to come upstairs and let you in through the building’s security doors can seem like an eternity. In a race against the proverbial tortoise and the hare, our man Tiny would come in a distant third.
The new player was dark in complexion. He was in his 40’s, sported a thin mop of Roman curls and a hat from the Borgata Casino in Atlantic City. He carried himself with that air that says, “business has been good, and I’m a man of leisure.” I’d never seen him before, but from the way the other players at the table started drooling, he’d apparently been around for a while and had deep pockets.
The energy in the room changed completely. Everyone started shifting in their seats, and exchanged knowing glances. One of them even gave me an excited nod, as if to say – this is what you’ve been waiting for.
He bought in for $500, and immediately began splashing around, making outsized raises that bought him 4 consecutive pots without anyone putting up much of a fight. The other players had changed strategies too. Instead of saving money on bad hands, and betting hard with the good ones, they stopped raising, but would call raises with virtually any two cards in the hopes of catching a big hand and doubling up. The average pot size went from about $30, to up around $200 in a matter of minutes.
Someone had to take control of the table, and usually I like to volunteer for the job. I had about $350 in front of me – down from my original $400 buy in, and picked up A-5 of spades in the big blind. The whale made his customary $20 raise, and got 4 callers before the action got back around to me. I was already in for $5, so I happily threw 3 more red chips into the pot and waited for the flop.
A-K-7 all different suits. Not a great flop for me, but not a bad one either. I was pretty sure my new friend didn’t have an Ace, and I read everyone else for weakness. I figured it was highly likely they’d called the $20 with small pairs and suited-connectors, none of which seemed to have hit. So I lead out with a $100 bet, just a little bit less than the size of the pot.
Not surprisingly, the fish called, and the rest of the players folded around. I felt the fish would have called with any two cards, and thought it most likely he’d hit the king. The pot was now up to $300, and definitely worth fighting for, and when another rag fell on the turn, I felt pretty good about my prospects. I announced an all-in, and pushed my remaining $240 or so in towards the pot.
My opponent took a moment, and called. The river brought another 7 – giving me a pretty meaningless 2-pair. If I was ahead before, I was still ahead. If not, I’d lost anyway, but the extra 7 wasn’t going to change anything. I announced my hand, and my opponent calmly turned over pocket-kings, giving him a Full House. The worst players in the world are bound to wake up with a hand once in a while. He did, and I was down to the felt.
I sat there and let the loss sink in for a minute before deciding what to do next. The players I knew at the table were all shaking their heads and giving me sympathetic looks. One muttered “one in a million,” meaning that in his estimation, if I’d made the exact same play another 999,999 times, I’d be rich.
I didn’t want to miss out on the feeding frenzy, and I didn’t want to hike back to the ATM, so I made a short-buy with the rest of my cash on hand, for $120. Normally, I don’t like to buy in for less than the maximum, but I know how to handle a short stack, so I liked my odds.
A friend of mine who’s into psychology recently introduced the idea of “Flow” into my lexicon. If this term is unfamiliar to you, it’s psycho-babble for “being in the zone.” We all have psychological triggers, and losing a big hand like this to someone I believe to be a weak player is one of mine. When I bought back in, a calm washed over me. I was focused. I was lucid. I was ready to play for hours. I began to flow.
By now, two additional players had arrived and were just getting into the game. The newcomers, Latinos as well, were both large, bald, and flashy. The larger of the two – sporting a pair of cheesy shades that would blind you momentarily if the zirconium that ringed the lenses caught the light in just the right way - started splashing around almost immediately. He was spreading more money around than the fish that came before him and obviously playing trash. He was getting pretty lucky though, and was soon up to almost $1500 in chips – up from $500. The gentleman who arrived with him was doing the same, but with a little less style, and a lot less luck.
Against wild players, there isn’t much room for finesse. This is especially true when you’re short stacked. The best strategy here is to call less, save money for when you have a really solid hand, and try to double up. When you bet though, you want to have a chance of pushing people out of the pot, so that usually means you have to push all in either before or on the flop. You pick your spot, close your eyes, shove it all in the middle, and hope for the best.
After folding about 20 consecutive hands, I picked up pocket-9s in the small blind. By the time I got to act, there was a raise (from the same guy that’d cleaned me out the last time) and 5 limpers. My options here are A) Fold (HAH!) B) Call off 1/5 of my stack, and be prepared to throw my hand away when I miss the flop. Or C) Shove it all in the middle. A raise of 5x the bet should be enough to push out the good players. I’d probably still get called by the fish, but that was fine by me.
Choice C is clearly the best option in my book, so that’s what I did. Wouldn’t you know it, the plan went exactly according to plan. The fish called with K-7 off-suit (a horrible call) and failed to improve. So far so good, back up to $240. Not bad, but still a long way from where I want to be.
Play continued. 2 fish were nursing fresh wounds, the third (Shades) was loaded, and loving life. The sharks at the table, sick of losing at the rate of $20 per hand, were tightening up.
After a few limpers, the pot was around $30 when it came around to sunglass-man, who quickly and predictably raised it up to $80. I looked down to find Ace-King - the perfect hand with which to teach him a lesson. “All in!”
Folds all the way around, followed by an insta-call by the raiser. I wasn’t the least bit surprised that he called. I was surprised that he didn’t even want a count of my chips to find out how much he owed.
The flop: A-8-4. No danger there. When the Jack hit on the turn, my opponent reacted visibly. I knew he’d hit it but figured I’d probably be okay, having already scored the Ace. After a totally meaningless river-card, we both turned over our hands.
He showed J-8 off-suit for 2 pair, beating my lowly pair of Aces by a mile. Nothing like your opponent hitting a 6-outer on the turn to derail your flow.
I lost here, but there really wasn’t anything I could have done to avoid going broke on that hand. Even if I’d smooth called him (which I maintain would have been a bad idea) he would have called my all in on the flop and still caught his second pair. He possibly would have even put the money in for me. There was simply no way to avoid going broke here unless I’d folded pre-flop – not just out of the question, it’s mathematically incorrect. I’ll make money there more often than not.
In situations like these, it helps to remember the words of Rosie Perez from White Men Can’t Jump. “Sometimes when you win, you really lose, and sometimes when you lose, you really win, and sometimes when you win or lose, you actually tie, and sometimes when you tie, you actually win or lose. Winning or losing is all one organic mechanism, from which one extracts what one needs.”
Of course, that doesn’t make the walk home any easier.
Lately however, the action has dried up. Maybe it’s due to the dog-days of summer, maybe the fish have come in second-best a few too many times, or maybe everyone has just gone on vacation – who knows. The net result though is fewer fish to fry and a lot more waiting around until there are enough players to get the games started.
Despite the action-draught, boredom and general lack of legitimate work has driven me back to the card-room after a 2-week hiatus. I felt I’d recovered from both illness and bad luck and my recent return to the world of online poker has yielded some nice results. With that in mind, I trekked on down to the ATM and jumped back into the ring.
I opted to try the Times Square location, and despite the advertised 7pm start time, by the time I arrived at around 9:30, there were just 3 other players lurking around. Nathan, the club’s promoter/dealer had told me they’d be coupling with another room to bring in more players and promised action, so needless to say, I was disappointed.
I decided to stick it out for a while, and before too long, we were playing 5 handed. At this point, I knew the other players. They were regulars, there to pick off the fish, and the result was a near total lack of action.
After an hour or so, things began to look up. A knock on the door and the outsized security guard named Tiny let in our newest arrival. "Tiny" stands at least 6’6,” 300lbs, with a lazy eye and hands that could palm a Volkswagen. Big men are not usually known for their speed, but this man’s movements could easily be considered sloth-like. Waiting for him to come upstairs and let you in through the building’s security doors can seem like an eternity. In a race against the proverbial tortoise and the hare, our man Tiny would come in a distant third.
The new player was dark in complexion. He was in his 40’s, sported a thin mop of Roman curls and a hat from the Borgata Casino in Atlantic City. He carried himself with that air that says, “business has been good, and I’m a man of leisure.” I’d never seen him before, but from the way the other players at the table started drooling, he’d apparently been around for a while and had deep pockets.
The energy in the room changed completely. Everyone started shifting in their seats, and exchanged knowing glances. One of them even gave me an excited nod, as if to say – this is what you’ve been waiting for.
He bought in for $500, and immediately began splashing around, making outsized raises that bought him 4 consecutive pots without anyone putting up much of a fight. The other players had changed strategies too. Instead of saving money on bad hands, and betting hard with the good ones, they stopped raising, but would call raises with virtually any two cards in the hopes of catching a big hand and doubling up. The average pot size went from about $30, to up around $200 in a matter of minutes.
Someone had to take control of the table, and usually I like to volunteer for the job. I had about $350 in front of me – down from my original $400 buy in, and picked up A-5 of spades in the big blind. The whale made his customary $20 raise, and got 4 callers before the action got back around to me. I was already in for $5, so I happily threw 3 more red chips into the pot and waited for the flop.
A-K-7 all different suits. Not a great flop for me, but not a bad one either. I was pretty sure my new friend didn’t have an Ace, and I read everyone else for weakness. I figured it was highly likely they’d called the $20 with small pairs and suited-connectors, none of which seemed to have hit. So I lead out with a $100 bet, just a little bit less than the size of the pot.
Not surprisingly, the fish called, and the rest of the players folded around. I felt the fish would have called with any two cards, and thought it most likely he’d hit the king. The pot was now up to $300, and definitely worth fighting for, and when another rag fell on the turn, I felt pretty good about my prospects. I announced an all-in, and pushed my remaining $240 or so in towards the pot.
My opponent took a moment, and called. The river brought another 7 – giving me a pretty meaningless 2-pair. If I was ahead before, I was still ahead. If not, I’d lost anyway, but the extra 7 wasn’t going to change anything. I announced my hand, and my opponent calmly turned over pocket-kings, giving him a Full House. The worst players in the world are bound to wake up with a hand once in a while. He did, and I was down to the felt.
I sat there and let the loss sink in for a minute before deciding what to do next. The players I knew at the table were all shaking their heads and giving me sympathetic looks. One muttered “one in a million,” meaning that in his estimation, if I’d made the exact same play another 999,999 times, I’d be rich.
I didn’t want to miss out on the feeding frenzy, and I didn’t want to hike back to the ATM, so I made a short-buy with the rest of my cash on hand, for $120. Normally, I don’t like to buy in for less than the maximum, but I know how to handle a short stack, so I liked my odds.
A friend of mine who’s into psychology recently introduced the idea of “Flow” into my lexicon. If this term is unfamiliar to you, it’s psycho-babble for “being in the zone.” We all have psychological triggers, and losing a big hand like this to someone I believe to be a weak player is one of mine. When I bought back in, a calm washed over me. I was focused. I was lucid. I was ready to play for hours. I began to flow.
By now, two additional players had arrived and were just getting into the game. The newcomers, Latinos as well, were both large, bald, and flashy. The larger of the two – sporting a pair of cheesy shades that would blind you momentarily if the zirconium that ringed the lenses caught the light in just the right way - started splashing around almost immediately. He was spreading more money around than the fish that came before him and obviously playing trash. He was getting pretty lucky though, and was soon up to almost $1500 in chips – up from $500. The gentleman who arrived with him was doing the same, but with a little less style, and a lot less luck.
Against wild players, there isn’t much room for finesse. This is especially true when you’re short stacked. The best strategy here is to call less, save money for when you have a really solid hand, and try to double up. When you bet though, you want to have a chance of pushing people out of the pot, so that usually means you have to push all in either before or on the flop. You pick your spot, close your eyes, shove it all in the middle, and hope for the best.
After folding about 20 consecutive hands, I picked up pocket-9s in the small blind. By the time I got to act, there was a raise (from the same guy that’d cleaned me out the last time) and 5 limpers. My options here are A) Fold (HAH!) B) Call off 1/5 of my stack, and be prepared to throw my hand away when I miss the flop. Or C) Shove it all in the middle. A raise of 5x the bet should be enough to push out the good players. I’d probably still get called by the fish, but that was fine by me.
Choice C is clearly the best option in my book, so that’s what I did. Wouldn’t you know it, the plan went exactly according to plan. The fish called with K-7 off-suit (a horrible call) and failed to improve. So far so good, back up to $240. Not bad, but still a long way from where I want to be.
Play continued. 2 fish were nursing fresh wounds, the third (Shades) was loaded, and loving life. The sharks at the table, sick of losing at the rate of $20 per hand, were tightening up.
After a few limpers, the pot was around $30 when it came around to sunglass-man, who quickly and predictably raised it up to $80. I looked down to find Ace-King - the perfect hand with which to teach him a lesson. “All in!”
Folds all the way around, followed by an insta-call by the raiser. I wasn’t the least bit surprised that he called. I was surprised that he didn’t even want a count of my chips to find out how much he owed.
The flop: A-8-4. No danger there. When the Jack hit on the turn, my opponent reacted visibly. I knew he’d hit it but figured I’d probably be okay, having already scored the Ace. After a totally meaningless river-card, we both turned over our hands.
He showed J-8 off-suit for 2 pair, beating my lowly pair of Aces by a mile. Nothing like your opponent hitting a 6-outer on the turn to derail your flow.
I lost here, but there really wasn’t anything I could have done to avoid going broke on that hand. Even if I’d smooth called him (which I maintain would have been a bad idea) he would have called my all in on the flop and still caught his second pair. He possibly would have even put the money in for me. There was simply no way to avoid going broke here unless I’d folded pre-flop – not just out of the question, it’s mathematically incorrect. I’ll make money there more often than not.
In situations like these, it helps to remember the words of Rosie Perez from White Men Can’t Jump. “Sometimes when you win, you really lose, and sometimes when you lose, you really win, and sometimes when you win or lose, you actually tie, and sometimes when you tie, you actually win or lose. Winning or losing is all one organic mechanism, from which one extracts what one needs.”
Of course, that doesn’t make the walk home any easier.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Poker in London
During the summer of 2007, I had the good fortune to receive a free trip to London. NYU sent me to watch over a group of undergraduate students that would be studying there - Obviously a lapse in judgment on their part. Don’t worry – the undergrads were fine. As for me, I got a free flight, and free lodging in London’s trendy Clerkenwell district.
During the 6 weeks I was there, I took in a lot of culture – the British Museum and the Tate Modern are amazing by the way. I saw a few plays, went on some walking tours, and drank many a Guinness. And of course – almost as soon as I got there – I searched out all the nearby poker games.
There are many well known card rooms in London, but I spent most of my playing time at the Gut Shot Poker Club. It was within easy walking distance to my flat, and since poker wasn’t really the focus of my trip, I was content to just play there.
The club is located on a quiet little street, surrounded by small shops and businesses. Smoking is not allowed inside the club, but with the cloud of smoke produced by a near constant stream of nicotine refugees huddling outside the door, it may as well be. The club is small, but relatively nice. The downstairs area features 4 or 5 tables running cash games. There isn’t much action during the day, but after people start getting off work, the tables begin to fill up.
While the action at these tables was pretty lively, the easiest game to get into was the 1/1 pot limit hold’em. The problem with this game is that it’s pretty loose, but has a maximum buy in of just 50 pounds. In my opinion, this isn’t nearly enough starting capital to make a game like this anything other than a total crapshoot. I did pretty well in the games there, but didn’t really enjoy the experience.
In general, I found the players in the cash games there to be argumentative, and awfully self-righteous about their pot-odds-based decisions. After a few short sessions I decided to stick with the tournaments.
It was a rainy Sunday afternoon. Every afternoon was rainy. I got down to the club early, as I do for almost every tournament I enter. As the tournament began to fill up, the room was filled with an excited buzz. These were not professional players. Almost without exception, these were men (and I think 2 women) who were excited spend an afternoon hoisting a few pints and joking around with their pals.
I was further surprised to find that the club did not provide dealers. Players dealt their own games, which leads to slower action and the added worry that there may be cheating going on. The slower action was by far the biggest concern here because the blind levels were only 15 minutes – not nearly as conducive to skillful play as levels half and hour or 45 minutes in duration.
I decided to turn it into high gear early and play very aggressively in position. The plan worked. Some of the players dismissed my barrage of raises and re-raises as the foolish antics of the over-aggressive American, but none of them wanted to make much of a stand against me. I managed to catch a couple of hands in key positions – just enough to plant the thought that I might actually be on a wild hot streak.
Comfortable with the growth rate of my stack, I began to look around the room a little more. By far the loudest player in the room was a large black man who was berating the players at his table at full volume, almost every hand. Think Michael Clarke Duncan but with more flamboyance and less boyish charm. His name was Ade (pronounced Addie).
He was constantly yelling and criticizing play. Obviously, this was meant to rile up the other players and put them on tilt, but for all his lecturing, about all I could gather from his preferred tournament strategy was that you should push all in with any pair, and fold everything else. He even carried around a stack of business cards that he would hand out to players he thought were fish. It had his name on it, and a list of 10 reasons he thought you were a bad player.
On the rare occasions when he wasn’t telling people off or handing out cards, he was telling anyone within earshot how he’d played such and such pot with such and such pro, and earned their money and respect for his guile and poker abilities.
Oddly enough, once you got over the initial revulsion, he was actually pretty likeable. I never saw him cash though – not in that, or any other tournament that summer.
By the time the tournament got down to the last 3 tables – from about 9 total – it pretty much became an all-in fest. I managed to survive, and ended up head’s up with a slight chip advantage. My opponent was a skinny online player – probably college age – that I could tell didn’t have much real poker experience.
With astronomical blinds, and 850 GBP left in the prize pool, I offered to re-negotiate the payout structure. At first, he had no idea what I was talking about, but after reasoning with him for a while, we finally settled on 450 for first, and 400 for second.
A few bad beats later, I was out in 2nd place with almost enough money to cover the next 4 weeks’ worth of exploration in London.
After playing in a few more tournaments and cash games during my stay – including an unusual little tourney at a dive bar in South London, I came to a few conclusions about English poker players.
As a group, they are much louder and more flamboyant than American players. They have no problem telling you how they think you’re screwing up, despite the fact that I never saw any of them exhibit any real creativity at the tables. They tend to be a bit more self-righteous than American players, despite the fact that most of the games I played in or witnessed were structured to favor luck over skill. I didn’t get a chance to make it over to the ritzier or more famous card rooms – an oversight I hope to remedy in the near future, but from what I saw, the overall quality of play wasn’t as high as you’ll find among most American players.
During the 6 weeks I was there, I took in a lot of culture – the British Museum and the Tate Modern are amazing by the way. I saw a few plays, went on some walking tours, and drank many a Guinness. And of course – almost as soon as I got there – I searched out all the nearby poker games.
There are many well known card rooms in London, but I spent most of my playing time at the Gut Shot Poker Club. It was within easy walking distance to my flat, and since poker wasn’t really the focus of my trip, I was content to just play there.
The club is located on a quiet little street, surrounded by small shops and businesses. Smoking is not allowed inside the club, but with the cloud of smoke produced by a near constant stream of nicotine refugees huddling outside the door, it may as well be. The club is small, but relatively nice. The downstairs area features 4 or 5 tables running cash games. There isn’t much action during the day, but after people start getting off work, the tables begin to fill up.
While the action at these tables was pretty lively, the easiest game to get into was the 1/1 pot limit hold’em. The problem with this game is that it’s pretty loose, but has a maximum buy in of just 50 pounds. In my opinion, this isn’t nearly enough starting capital to make a game like this anything other than a total crapshoot. I did pretty well in the games there, but didn’t really enjoy the experience.
In general, I found the players in the cash games there to be argumentative, and awfully self-righteous about their pot-odds-based decisions. After a few short sessions I decided to stick with the tournaments.
It was a rainy Sunday afternoon. Every afternoon was rainy. I got down to the club early, as I do for almost every tournament I enter. As the tournament began to fill up, the room was filled with an excited buzz. These were not professional players. Almost without exception, these were men (and I think 2 women) who were excited spend an afternoon hoisting a few pints and joking around with their pals.
I was further surprised to find that the club did not provide dealers. Players dealt their own games, which leads to slower action and the added worry that there may be cheating going on. The slower action was by far the biggest concern here because the blind levels were only 15 minutes – not nearly as conducive to skillful play as levels half and hour or 45 minutes in duration.
I decided to turn it into high gear early and play very aggressively in position. The plan worked. Some of the players dismissed my barrage of raises and re-raises as the foolish antics of the over-aggressive American, but none of them wanted to make much of a stand against me. I managed to catch a couple of hands in key positions – just enough to plant the thought that I might actually be on a wild hot streak.
Comfortable with the growth rate of my stack, I began to look around the room a little more. By far the loudest player in the room was a large black man who was berating the players at his table at full volume, almost every hand. Think Michael Clarke Duncan but with more flamboyance and less boyish charm. His name was Ade (pronounced Addie).
He was constantly yelling and criticizing play. Obviously, this was meant to rile up the other players and put them on tilt, but for all his lecturing, about all I could gather from his preferred tournament strategy was that you should push all in with any pair, and fold everything else. He even carried around a stack of business cards that he would hand out to players he thought were fish. It had his name on it, and a list of 10 reasons he thought you were a bad player.
On the rare occasions when he wasn’t telling people off or handing out cards, he was telling anyone within earshot how he’d played such and such pot with such and such pro, and earned their money and respect for his guile and poker abilities.
Oddly enough, once you got over the initial revulsion, he was actually pretty likeable. I never saw him cash though – not in that, or any other tournament that summer.
By the time the tournament got down to the last 3 tables – from about 9 total – it pretty much became an all-in fest. I managed to survive, and ended up head’s up with a slight chip advantage. My opponent was a skinny online player – probably college age – that I could tell didn’t have much real poker experience.
With astronomical blinds, and 850 GBP left in the prize pool, I offered to re-negotiate the payout structure. At first, he had no idea what I was talking about, but after reasoning with him for a while, we finally settled on 450 for first, and 400 for second.
A few bad beats later, I was out in 2nd place with almost enough money to cover the next 4 weeks’ worth of exploration in London.
After playing in a few more tournaments and cash games during my stay – including an unusual little tourney at a dive bar in South London, I came to a few conclusions about English poker players.
As a group, they are much louder and more flamboyant than American players. They have no problem telling you how they think you’re screwing up, despite the fact that I never saw any of them exhibit any real creativity at the tables. They tend to be a bit more self-righteous than American players, despite the fact that most of the games I played in or witnessed were structured to favor luck over skill. I didn’t get a chance to make it over to the ritzier or more famous card rooms – an oversight I hope to remedy in the near future, but from what I saw, the overall quality of play wasn’t as high as you’ll find among most American players.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Poker Friends
A friend recently asked me if I like the other people I play against at the poker tables. I was surprised to find that it took me a moment to find the answer. Most of them are decent enough folks, but many of them are there either because they are compulsive gamblers, or because their social and family lives are so lacking that they literally have nothing better to do.
I think this is even more true in New York than in places like Vegas, because many of the players there are tourists.
Most of the people I meet are decent enough. Some have become friends, but the dominant trend has got to be no. No, I don't like most of the people I play with on a regular basis.
Sometimes my distaste for them stems from the way I see them interact with the dealers or each other, in between or during hands. Something happened tonight though, that demonstrates why I really don't have anything in common with most of my opponents.
As I write this, it is August, 2008, and the Olympics are in full swing. When I showed up at the game tonight, there were only 4 other players present, and the decision as to what to watch on the rather dilapidated 13 inch television that sits in the corner had not yet been made.
I suggested the Olympics.
No one reacted.
Some time went by, and when the subject of what to watch came up again.
Again, I suggested the Olympics, and again, my suggestion was met with silence. It was almost as if they didn't hear me.
Then someone suggested the Mets game.
Someone else suggested the Yankees.
A third person piped in "If this were Thursday, we could watch pre-season football."
At once, the dingy, subterranean card room was alive with debate.
Once every four years, we have the chance to see the greatest athletes in the world compete in a celebration of peace, athleticism, and the human potential. Once every 4 years, the world comes together and celebrates its diversity and sameness. Yesterday, a Georgian athlete and a Russian embraced, despite the fact that their two countries are engaged in a bitter and bloody conflict. People from all over the world are doing things faster and better than anyone has ever done them before, and we get to watch them do it.
And these jokers would rather watch preseason football - where even the teams that are playing don't care whether they win or not. This, or one of two games that feature two teams that will play a combined 324 times THIS SEASON, and are widely considered out of playoff contention.
I think I've made my point.
I think this is even more true in New York than in places like Vegas, because many of the players there are tourists.
Most of the people I meet are decent enough. Some have become friends, but the dominant trend has got to be no. No, I don't like most of the people I play with on a regular basis.
Sometimes my distaste for them stems from the way I see them interact with the dealers or each other, in between or during hands. Something happened tonight though, that demonstrates why I really don't have anything in common with most of my opponents.
As I write this, it is August, 2008, and the Olympics are in full swing. When I showed up at the game tonight, there were only 4 other players present, and the decision as to what to watch on the rather dilapidated 13 inch television that sits in the corner had not yet been made.
I suggested the Olympics.
No one reacted.
Some time went by, and when the subject of what to watch came up again.
Again, I suggested the Olympics, and again, my suggestion was met with silence. It was almost as if they didn't hear me.
Then someone suggested the Mets game.
Someone else suggested the Yankees.
A third person piped in "If this were Thursday, we could watch pre-season football."
At once, the dingy, subterranean card room was alive with debate.
Once every four years, we have the chance to see the greatest athletes in the world compete in a celebration of peace, athleticism, and the human potential. Once every 4 years, the world comes together and celebrates its diversity and sameness. Yesterday, a Georgian athlete and a Russian embraced, despite the fact that their two countries are engaged in a bitter and bloody conflict. People from all over the world are doing things faster and better than anyone has ever done them before, and we get to watch them do it.
And these jokers would rather watch preseason football - where even the teams that are playing don't care whether they win or not. This, or one of two games that feature two teams that will play a combined 324 times THIS SEASON, and are widely considered out of playoff contention.
I think I've made my point.
Hunting Fish, Tilt, and Bankroll Issues
I just finished Jay Greenspan’s book, Hunting Fish. Truth be told, I didn’t think it was all that great. It offers few insights into the game that a player with any real world experience doesn’t already have, but I don’t think that’s what he was really trying to do. The book is more of a memoir, but I didn’t find Jay all that interesting as a protagonist.
The thing I found most disappointing though was the way he breezed through his descriptions of the places he went. I was looking for juicy details about the poker culture in the different places he went to, and insights into the other players at the table, but the book didn’t really deliver.
The premise of the book is that the author will travel across the continental United States playing poker. He is supposedly, as the book’s title suggests, on a quest to find the worst card player in America. He’s also trying to build up enough of a bankroll to play in the 10/20 NL Hold’em game at Commerce Casino in Los Angeles.
To be honest, I found even that bit a little anti-climactic since he all but sidestepped the 10/20 game at the Bellagio, which is a much more storied game. As far as I am concerned, that would have been a much more interesting place to end the journey. I never found the card room (or the players) at Commerce all that inspiring.
The book did offer a couple of good insights.
Greenspan cites a discussion he had with Howard Lederer about the phenomenon known as TILT. According to Greenspan, Lederer says “A tilting player plays badly because on some level he’s determined that playing well is irrelevant. He’ll lose anyway, the perverted logic goes, so why not hunt for some ridiculous draws to make or some nonsensical raises.” I’m quoting Greenspan here, who in turn was paraphrasing Lederer.
All in all, I think Lederer’s philosophy here is pretty incisive – but then again, who am I to question Lederer. I bring it up now however to offer an additional possibility. It is usually presumed that only players who are losing – or emotionally disturbed for some reason – are susceptible to tilt. I’d posit that a player in the midst of a winning streak is also in danger of “tilting” as stated in this definition. A player used to winning all the time may become over confident. He will often overplay hands and make ill-advised draws. He or she may make more loose calls than normal and bluff too often, sure that their reads are accurate and their bets always respected.
Of course, treating a winning player like he’s on tilt is a bit more dangerous – for a start, they probably have a lot of chips in front of them. They may also still be running well. Eventually though, the math will catch up to them, so if you notice a winning player becoming too confident for their own good, despite their good fortune, there may be advantages to be exploited.
The other important concept at play is actually what the majority of the book is dedicated to – and that is the importance of a healthy BANKROLL.
For a good, long while now, I’ve described myself to inquiring acquaintances as “semi-pro.” As of tonight, I’m (temporarily, I assure you) downgrading myself to amateur status. My reason is simple. I do not, nor have ever had, a true bankroll. Poker winnings and wages earned would enter one account, from which expenses would also be withdrawn. Most of the time, poker was a benefit to this account. It has occasionally been a burden.
Despite my most successful summer of poker to date, I don’t have a ton of money at the moment to risk at the poker table. Though I am currently in a bit of a losing streak, this is not the reason. The fact is that most of my money these days goes towards food, rent, credit cards, and student loans. I’ve been paying off debts left and right, but unfortunately (should still make my mom happy), that has not left much money to throw around the card table.
Playing poker without a dedicated bankroll, especially at the stakes I’ve started to play at is both foolish and irresponsible. Worst of all, a deficient bankroll . I’ve always considered a bankroll to be important – building one has just always taken a back seat to things that seemed more pressing at the time.
Don’t get me wrong. I believe I have what it takes be a semi-pro. Maybe even a full-timer. I definitely have the right mind-set. But, from now on, I will endeavor to grow my bankroll before taking any more money out for expenses - and in that spirit, I am temporarily downgrading myself to amateur status. We'll call it 2 minutes in the penalty box for tripping. Don't worry. I promise to be back at full strength quite soon.
The thing I found most disappointing though was the way he breezed through his descriptions of the places he went. I was looking for juicy details about the poker culture in the different places he went to, and insights into the other players at the table, but the book didn’t really deliver.
The premise of the book is that the author will travel across the continental United States playing poker. He is supposedly, as the book’s title suggests, on a quest to find the worst card player in America. He’s also trying to build up enough of a bankroll to play in the 10/20 NL Hold’em game at Commerce Casino in Los Angeles.
To be honest, I found even that bit a little anti-climactic since he all but sidestepped the 10/20 game at the Bellagio, which is a much more storied game. As far as I am concerned, that would have been a much more interesting place to end the journey. I never found the card room (or the players) at Commerce all that inspiring.
The book did offer a couple of good insights.
Greenspan cites a discussion he had with Howard Lederer about the phenomenon known as TILT. According to Greenspan, Lederer says “A tilting player plays badly because on some level he’s determined that playing well is irrelevant. He’ll lose anyway, the perverted logic goes, so why not hunt for some ridiculous draws to make or some nonsensical raises.” I’m quoting Greenspan here, who in turn was paraphrasing Lederer.
All in all, I think Lederer’s philosophy here is pretty incisive – but then again, who am I to question Lederer. I bring it up now however to offer an additional possibility. It is usually presumed that only players who are losing – or emotionally disturbed for some reason – are susceptible to tilt. I’d posit that a player in the midst of a winning streak is also in danger of “tilting” as stated in this definition. A player used to winning all the time may become over confident. He will often overplay hands and make ill-advised draws. He or she may make more loose calls than normal and bluff too often, sure that their reads are accurate and their bets always respected.
Of course, treating a winning player like he’s on tilt is a bit more dangerous – for a start, they probably have a lot of chips in front of them. They may also still be running well. Eventually though, the math will catch up to them, so if you notice a winning player becoming too confident for their own good, despite their good fortune, there may be advantages to be exploited.
The other important concept at play is actually what the majority of the book is dedicated to – and that is the importance of a healthy BANKROLL.
For a good, long while now, I’ve described myself to inquiring acquaintances as “semi-pro.” As of tonight, I’m (temporarily, I assure you) downgrading myself to amateur status. My reason is simple. I do not, nor have ever had, a true bankroll. Poker winnings and wages earned would enter one account, from which expenses would also be withdrawn. Most of the time, poker was a benefit to this account. It has occasionally been a burden.
Despite my most successful summer of poker to date, I don’t have a ton of money at the moment to risk at the poker table. Though I am currently in a bit of a losing streak, this is not the reason. The fact is that most of my money these days goes towards food, rent, credit cards, and student loans. I’ve been paying off debts left and right, but unfortunately (should still make my mom happy), that has not left much money to throw around the card table.
Playing poker without a dedicated bankroll, especially at the stakes I’ve started to play at is both foolish and irresponsible. Worst of all, a deficient bankroll . I’ve always considered a bankroll to be important – building one has just always taken a back seat to things that seemed more pressing at the time.
Don’t get me wrong. I believe I have what it takes be a semi-pro. Maybe even a full-timer. I definitely have the right mind-set. But, from now on, I will endeavor to grow my bankroll before taking any more money out for expenses - and in that spirit, I am temporarily downgrading myself to amateur status. We'll call it 2 minutes in the penalty box for tripping. Don't worry. I promise to be back at full strength quite soon.
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Blowing Off Steam
At the end of a long day of losing money at poker, once you’ve done the requisite analysis, there's really just one thing you can do. Exorcize your demons, and put your troubles behind you. If you’re me, and you’re in Vegas, that means playing like a jackass and beating the tourists senseless. Of course, moderate alcohol abuse helps as well.
My dad had a rule never to drink when you’re depressed. For the record, if I’m really feeling down, I never drink. I certainly don’t want to advocate that type of escapism. This is different. I’m talking about celebrating the fact that at the end of the day, poker is only a game, and loosening the inhibitions enough to play like a total maniac for a couple of hours.
After busting out of the World Series, I was feeling a bit out of sorts. Spending so much time and energy in a losing effort, followed by hours of internal reflection had left me frustrated, and a little hesitant to get back in the ring. It’s just a good thing I had friends around to help lift me out of the mire.
Jonathan and I were staying at the Tropicana. This is not something I recommend that you do. The hotel is old. It’s not that well maintained. The food is terrible, and the beds are lumpy. Kick in the extra 20 bucks a night and stay someplace with a little life to it.
For all its faults, the Trop does have one saving grace. Okay, two – the pool is also nice. Walking back to the room that night, we wandered by the poker room to see if anything was going on. Much to our delight, we discovered the three-table midnight tournament was just getting underway. I was a little leery of starting a tournament at midnight – that would mean I’d be up until 4, and I’m pretty picky about my sleeping hours when I’m on a poker trip.
There were however, many compelling arguments in favor of playing the tourney, so we settled it in the only manner that seemed reasonable at the time. We flipped a coin.
Done and done. We marched back into that pathetic 5 table poker room, tucked away, long forgotten by the rest of the Vegas poker scene, between the dilapidated casino bar and the nickel slots, and arrogantly threw down our $50.00 buy ins.
Taking our seats - next to each other, which would never happen in a real tournament – and ordered some drinks - a shot and a beer for each of us, which would also never happen in a real tournament.
We instantly started joking around, poking some good-natured fun at the other players at the table and betting on pretty much every hand. There was a large, friendly, amateur player from Colorado who took an immediate liking to us.
He had a great gregarious laugh, and the type of ruddy skin tone that makes you wonder he really is that fantastic shade of red or if the he’s just blushing. All the time. His hand shook violently as pushed his chips out in front of him on his first bet. We all folded around to him and declared that he must have had aces because of all the shaking.
When a player’s hand shakes uncontrollably as he or she bets, it is not usually a sign of nervousness, as new poker players commonly believe. It is a sign of excitement. The body just has so much excited energy; it can’t keep it all inside. Hence – the shaky bet.
He swore up and down that his hands always shake. That, in addition to his improbable size, was enough for Jonathan to begin calling him Tremors. He liked the nickname. He liked us. We decided to let him stick around. Not that we had complete control over his fate, but if memory serves, he did finish 4th.
There were two other notable players at our first table. There was a tall, lanky southerner who had apparently played in the same WSOP event that I did, and apparently busted out just as quickly. He was decked out from head to toe in NASCAR gear, and wore a Dale Earnhardt #3 baseball cap. He was also drunk, and didn’t take it at all kindly when Jonathan started calling him “Junior” after Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jonathan was not deterred however, and “Junior” eventually got over it.
Other players were rapidly dropping out. Most of them were either too tired or too inexperienced to stand much of a chance. There was one guy who had sat silent for most of the tournament with a scowl on his face. He didn’t care much for us, and he was angry because he wasn’t getting any hands. After Jonathan finally gave him the bad beat that broke the camel’s back, he started to complain – basically that we were having too much fun. He eventually got blinded off for playing too tight and disappeared into the night.
When we got down to two tables – just to show you how little the casinos care about these little midnight tourneys – the other table stopped increasing the blinds for two whole levels. Our table complained, but to no avail.
I was mildly amused by the whole affair, but lost interest pretty quickly, and returned to flirting with the middle aged Italian bombshell that was seated to my immediate right. Beautiful woman. Perfectly nice. Couldn’t play cards to save her life. A admit, I was a little disappointed when she eventually went broke and was picked up by her rather bored looking Italian boyfriend. So it goes.
With the loss of a few more players, including our friend “Junior,” we were down to 9.
Not too much danger here, both Jonathan and I were in good position going into the final five. Among the other refugees from the broken second table was one rather tense fellow who seemed hell bent on winning it all. Among his less desirable traits was his predilection for self-righteousness towards both is poker ability and his perceived religious and moral superiority. I decided to make it my personal mission to take him down.
Things didn't exactly go according to plan. Unfortunately the deck picked that precise moment to start running cold on me. I couldn’t hit a hand, so after a few errant bets, I was out. 5th place, and no money for me.
Fortunately, Jonathan was able to make quick work of the rest of the players and, flush with winnings, he triumphantly handed me my cut, as was our arrangement. This was just what the doctor ordered, as the pain and heartache of my spectacular collapse and subsequent demise at the World Series of Poker seemed like a distant memory.
I suppose one could come away from this story thinking I condone wild antics at the poker table. I don’t. One should carry oneself with class at the poker table, and show respect for the other players. But – if there is ever a time to break from this rule, it is certainly the $50 midnight tourney at the Tropicana.
Everyone’s just there to have a good time, and I think most of them did. Nobody should be taking it that seriously because the payout isn’t that great, nobody who has done anything during the day is going to play their best when they start a game at midnight, and with the blinds going up every 15 minutes, the whole thing is basically a crapshoot anyway. Nothing against the players who take their $50 buy in seriously. I still take my money seriously, and it wasn’t long ago that losing that kind of money would have been a serious blow to my bankroll. But if that’s the case, there are far better investments, with far higher and more probable returns than this type of tournament.
We would’ve headed straight back to the room at that point, satisfied with a job well done, had we not encountered a hysterical girl from Texas named Alison who had lost her boyfriend and was locked out of her room with no money, no wallet, and no-where to go. Apparently the guy she was with had found not one, but two women he liked better than her and took off. That’s Vegas for you.
We made several chivalrous attempts to help, but there really wasn’t all that much we could do, and without a night manager on duty, the Tropicana wasn’t all that helpful either – or sympathetic.
In the end, she decided that the best course of action was to sit outside the door to her room and wait for her friend to return from whatever adventures he had gotten himself up to with the two girls from the MGM.
This experience was, without a doubt, one of the major highlights of the trip. It wasn’t a major victory, but a win is a win, and it certainly put me in the right mindset to jump back into the fray the following morning. It must’ve worked because two days later, I made the final table of a major (for me) tournament at Caesar’s Palace. $235 buy in. 425 people. Biggest single event win of my life. But that’s a story for another day.
My dad had a rule never to drink when you’re depressed. For the record, if I’m really feeling down, I never drink. I certainly don’t want to advocate that type of escapism. This is different. I’m talking about celebrating the fact that at the end of the day, poker is only a game, and loosening the inhibitions enough to play like a total maniac for a couple of hours.
After busting out of the World Series, I was feeling a bit out of sorts. Spending so much time and energy in a losing effort, followed by hours of internal reflection had left me frustrated, and a little hesitant to get back in the ring. It’s just a good thing I had friends around to help lift me out of the mire.
Jonathan and I were staying at the Tropicana. This is not something I recommend that you do. The hotel is old. It’s not that well maintained. The food is terrible, and the beds are lumpy. Kick in the extra 20 bucks a night and stay someplace with a little life to it.
For all its faults, the Trop does have one saving grace. Okay, two – the pool is also nice. Walking back to the room that night, we wandered by the poker room to see if anything was going on. Much to our delight, we discovered the three-table midnight tournament was just getting underway. I was a little leery of starting a tournament at midnight – that would mean I’d be up until 4, and I’m pretty picky about my sleeping hours when I’m on a poker trip.
There were however, many compelling arguments in favor of playing the tourney, so we settled it in the only manner that seemed reasonable at the time. We flipped a coin.
Done and done. We marched back into that pathetic 5 table poker room, tucked away, long forgotten by the rest of the Vegas poker scene, between the dilapidated casino bar and the nickel slots, and arrogantly threw down our $50.00 buy ins.
Taking our seats - next to each other, which would never happen in a real tournament – and ordered some drinks - a shot and a beer for each of us, which would also never happen in a real tournament.
We instantly started joking around, poking some good-natured fun at the other players at the table and betting on pretty much every hand. There was a large, friendly, amateur player from Colorado who took an immediate liking to us.
He had a great gregarious laugh, and the type of ruddy skin tone that makes you wonder he really is that fantastic shade of red or if the he’s just blushing. All the time. His hand shook violently as pushed his chips out in front of him on his first bet. We all folded around to him and declared that he must have had aces because of all the shaking.
When a player’s hand shakes uncontrollably as he or she bets, it is not usually a sign of nervousness, as new poker players commonly believe. It is a sign of excitement. The body just has so much excited energy; it can’t keep it all inside. Hence – the shaky bet.
He swore up and down that his hands always shake. That, in addition to his improbable size, was enough for Jonathan to begin calling him Tremors. He liked the nickname. He liked us. We decided to let him stick around. Not that we had complete control over his fate, but if memory serves, he did finish 4th.
There were two other notable players at our first table. There was a tall, lanky southerner who had apparently played in the same WSOP event that I did, and apparently busted out just as quickly. He was decked out from head to toe in NASCAR gear, and wore a Dale Earnhardt #3 baseball cap. He was also drunk, and didn’t take it at all kindly when Jonathan started calling him “Junior” after Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jonathan was not deterred however, and “Junior” eventually got over it.
Other players were rapidly dropping out. Most of them were either too tired or too inexperienced to stand much of a chance. There was one guy who had sat silent for most of the tournament with a scowl on his face. He didn’t care much for us, and he was angry because he wasn’t getting any hands. After Jonathan finally gave him the bad beat that broke the camel’s back, he started to complain – basically that we were having too much fun. He eventually got blinded off for playing too tight and disappeared into the night.
When we got down to two tables – just to show you how little the casinos care about these little midnight tourneys – the other table stopped increasing the blinds for two whole levels. Our table complained, but to no avail.
I was mildly amused by the whole affair, but lost interest pretty quickly, and returned to flirting with the middle aged Italian bombshell that was seated to my immediate right. Beautiful woman. Perfectly nice. Couldn’t play cards to save her life. A admit, I was a little disappointed when she eventually went broke and was picked up by her rather bored looking Italian boyfriend. So it goes.
With the loss of a few more players, including our friend “Junior,” we were down to 9.
Not too much danger here, both Jonathan and I were in good position going into the final five. Among the other refugees from the broken second table was one rather tense fellow who seemed hell bent on winning it all. Among his less desirable traits was his predilection for self-righteousness towards both is poker ability and his perceived religious and moral superiority. I decided to make it my personal mission to take him down.
Things didn't exactly go according to plan. Unfortunately the deck picked that precise moment to start running cold on me. I couldn’t hit a hand, so after a few errant bets, I was out. 5th place, and no money for me.
Fortunately, Jonathan was able to make quick work of the rest of the players and, flush with winnings, he triumphantly handed me my cut, as was our arrangement. This was just what the doctor ordered, as the pain and heartache of my spectacular collapse and subsequent demise at the World Series of Poker seemed like a distant memory.
I suppose one could come away from this story thinking I condone wild antics at the poker table. I don’t. One should carry oneself with class at the poker table, and show respect for the other players. But – if there is ever a time to break from this rule, it is certainly the $50 midnight tourney at the Tropicana.
Everyone’s just there to have a good time, and I think most of them did. Nobody should be taking it that seriously because the payout isn’t that great, nobody who has done anything during the day is going to play their best when they start a game at midnight, and with the blinds going up every 15 minutes, the whole thing is basically a crapshoot anyway. Nothing against the players who take their $50 buy in seriously. I still take my money seriously, and it wasn’t long ago that losing that kind of money would have been a serious blow to my bankroll. But if that’s the case, there are far better investments, with far higher and more probable returns than this type of tournament.
We would’ve headed straight back to the room at that point, satisfied with a job well done, had we not encountered a hysterical girl from Texas named Alison who had lost her boyfriend and was locked out of her room with no money, no wallet, and no-where to go. Apparently the guy she was with had found not one, but two women he liked better than her and took off. That’s Vegas for you.
We made several chivalrous attempts to help, but there really wasn’t all that much we could do, and without a night manager on duty, the Tropicana wasn’t all that helpful either – or sympathetic.
In the end, she decided that the best course of action was to sit outside the door to her room and wait for her friend to return from whatever adventures he had gotten himself up to with the two girls from the MGM.
This experience was, without a doubt, one of the major highlights of the trip. It wasn’t a major victory, but a win is a win, and it certainly put me in the right mindset to jump back into the fray the following morning. It must’ve worked because two days later, I made the final table of a major (for me) tournament at Caesar’s Palace. $235 buy in. 425 people. Biggest single event win of my life. But that’s a story for another day.
My First WSOP Experience
I played in the World Series of Poker for the first time this summer. Let’s not get crazy. I didn’t blow all my personal savings on a buy in for the $10,000 main event. I took a chunk of money, played a variety of games, and bought my way in to the first $1,500 No Limit event of the tournament. Still not great bankroll management for the amount of cash I’m currently working with, but it was definitely worth it. I figured that even if I didn’t cash (which I knew was pretty likely), the learning experience and level of comfort I would get from playing would soon pay for itself.
The tournament started on Saturday, May 31 at noon. I was entered for day 1B, which was Sunday. If you haven’t been there, WSOP tournaments have gotten so big, that many of them need multiple start days to accommodate all the players. The Main Event in fact, has 4 day 1's, and two Day 2’s.
When I first sat down at my assigned table, I was pretty nervous. As soon as the cards were in the air, that anxiety was replaced by a sense of calm and laser-beam focus on the action at the table. I was not surprised to discover that concentrating like that in a convention center full of people at the largest poker tournament in the world is not only difficult, it’s also quite draining.
I relaxed a little bit. I even took a few moments to joke round with my friend Jonathan who was watching from the rail. I found myself making some good plays, and my chip stack began to increase. I made a few good moves on the button, and at one point laid down Ace-King of clubs in first position to a big re-raise. I felt good.
After 5 hours, 6 table changes, and amassing around 30,000 chips - up from 5,000 – it was time to assess my position. I’d won a lot of small pots, made a steady climb, and then doubled up by making a solid (if reluctant) pot-odds call before the flop.
I’d raised with Ace-Jack from the button, only to face three “All Ins” from early position limpers – they were all short stacked, so I was priced in. I was pretty sure I was behind, but I called anyway. They all had small pairs and despite the fact that two of them made sets, I picked up a 5 on the river, giving me the wheel, and earning me the entire pot. If that was a little over your head, feel free to email me or ask a friend. You can also click on the highlighted words to find their definitions.
After counting up my chips, and checking the tournament clock, I found I was probably in the top 10% or so of chip stacks. By 4:30 though, the mid-afternoon doldrums had set in and I was getting pretty tired. I hadn’t slept well for a few nights, and trying to get a read on so many new players at so many new tables was starting to get the better of me. I was probably a little overwhelmed by the whole experience as well, which I’m sure played a factor.
I knew I wouldn’t be playing my best, but with no cash-out options, I had to press on. My best hope at this point was to try and survive until the dinner break when I could re-fuel and maybe catch a quick nap. By then, the antes had started, so I knew this would be much easier said than done.
Unfortunately for me, it was also right about that time that I got moved to a table where everyone else was deep stacked too. Unfortunately for me, it was then that I picked up pocket aces.
I was the first to act in the hand, so I opened for a small raise. Everyone folded around to the large, serious looking fellow in the 7 seat. He looked the way Hank Azaria would look like if he took steroids, grew a goatee, and went around wearing t-shirts with red and orange flames on them. He raised, and the action folded back around to me.
What to do… I certainly can’t fold. I have the best hand. Do I call and risk him catching a hand cheap, or I re-raise and let him know I can be serious too? I decided I had to raise, but pushing all-in would be a massive over-bet. Decisions, decisions. I ended up raising about 6000 chips, which was about 3 times his raise. I don’t know if that was the best thing to do in that situation, but I wanted to get some money in the pot before he missed the flop and gave up. I’m usually good at getting off of hands when I’m beat, so I wasn’t that worried.
He took his time making his decision. He was looking at me with that “I know you have Aces, but I’m not quite sure enough to lay down my Kings” stare that I’ve seen a million times before. I knew he was a good player, but it takes someone pretty special to lay down Kings pre-flop. He called. Reluctantly.
And then, disaster. K Q 6 flop. I know I said I thought he had Kings, but I hadn’t seen him play a hand before now, so I couldn’t be sure, but something inside me said that this was a very dangerous flop for me. I made a bet of about half the pot, and without thinking twice, he pushed all in.
Normally, like I said, I can throw away Aces, and deep down, I knew I was beat. As I’m writing this, I realize what an easy fold it should have been, but these things are always much easier said than done, and hindsight is 20-20.
If you have any poker know-how and experience, your first instinct will almost always be the right one – as was mine in this case. But as many players have done in the past, and many more will do in the future, I talked myself into seeing what I wanted to see.
I had about half my chips in the pot already, and was feeling pretty committed. Pocket Kings had me beat, as did Pocket Queens and KQ. The remaining question was, did I think he would have made the same play with Pocket Jacks or lower, or Ace-King. I figured Ace-King was possible even though, like I said, I knew I was probably deluding myself. That, balanced with the fact that I didn’t want to be the short stack at the table, the fact that I knew I’d need to gather a big stack of chips if I had any hope of winning, and the possibility that if I was wrong, there were still two more Aces floating around, as well as some Jacks and Tens for a backdoor straight…
So I called. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
I showed my Aces. He, of course, turned over Kings, and without any improvement, I lost the pot and was down to about two big-blinds-worth of chips. I’d not only taken myself out of the tournament, but given “Hank Azaria’s Cousin” enough chips to coast easily into the money. In fact, I know he made the money because I came back the next day, and sure enough, there he was… in the money, and perched happily behind a massive pile of chips. MY massive pile of chips.
With the crumbs left over from that monster pot, I did make an effort to climb back into the tournament. I doubled up three times in the next four hands. Still woefully short on chips however, I got caught on my 4th all-in attempt and was sent to the rail. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200. Kind of a lousy finish in my book, but at least I did go down fighting, and while I didn't make the money, I did finish in the top 30% of all entrants.
My World Series Of Poker hopes were crushed – at least for the remainder of that trip and for the next 6 hours or so, I was not a fun person to be around.
Thank god for good companions.
Nobody wants to hear your bad beat stories, but traveling packs of poker players will debate the finer points of strategy until the 4th horseman finally busts out of the tournament, and rejoins his friends at the party. Thankfully I had my posse. During the dinner break, I went over the hand with my friend Jonathan and my two uncles who were still in the tournament.
They didn’t offer too much help (sorry guys) except to say that I should have folded after the re-raise, why by this time, was obvious to me. After a few more hours of internal obsession, I came up with the following 3 solutions.
1) Fold after the re-raise. Duh.
2) Push all-in pre-flop, after the re-raise. Personally, I still don’t like this option because I’m pretty sure he would have called and left the rest up to fate. I know he suspected me of having Aces, but like I said before – Kings are awfully hard to lay down pre-flop, and since I was new to the table, I don’t think he had enough information on me to justify folding. He would have called, hit his King, and I still would have been out. The “I had the best hand when the money went in” argument never gave me much consolation. Except in the case of an extremely bad beat, I think it’s usually a weak way to cover for mis-playing a hand. Also, in the event that he does fold, I don’t get much of a payoff. I think pushing All-In preflop (unless you’re short-stacked) really just says to the rest of the table, “I don’t have any confidence in my post-flop abilities.” I do have confidence in my post-flop play. I just didn’t perform very well on this particular hand.
3) My favorite solution: Smooth call his pre-flop re-raise, and then see what happens. I was out of position, and if he’d decided to slow play, he could have still won a big pot from me, but my lead-out bet would have been smaller, and I wouldn’t have felt so pot-committed. I like to think I would have gotten away from the hand.
The bottom line is, there was simply no reason to risk all my chips against another big stack at this point in the tournament. Had the same thing happened an hour earlier, when I was feeling better, I think I would have been able to ditch the Aces and survive.
It’s true, this was an extremely difficult hand, and many other players have gone broke many times in exactly this situation. I firmly believe though, that if you don’t constantly examine your play, and find new ways to deal with difficult hands, you’ll never improve your game the way you need to if you want to be a really top player.
It’s possible I’ll make the same mistake again, but I doubt it. Not when my tournament life is on the line.
So yeah, I obsessed. I dissected, analyzed, and evaluated the hand for most of the rest of the day, making myself and everyone around me miserable. But I thought through it thoroughly. I found some new ways to handle similar situations when they inevitably arise again, and then I let it go. It’s not something I’ll ever forget, but it hasn’t made me gun-shy. I just know that next time I commit all my chips mid-tournament, it’s likely to be under vastly better circumstances.
The tournament started on Saturday, May 31 at noon. I was entered for day 1B, which was Sunday. If you haven’t been there, WSOP tournaments have gotten so big, that many of them need multiple start days to accommodate all the players. The Main Event in fact, has 4 day 1's, and two Day 2’s.
When I first sat down at my assigned table, I was pretty nervous. As soon as the cards were in the air, that anxiety was replaced by a sense of calm and laser-beam focus on the action at the table. I was not surprised to discover that concentrating like that in a convention center full of people at the largest poker tournament in the world is not only difficult, it’s also quite draining.
I relaxed a little bit. I even took a few moments to joke round with my friend Jonathan who was watching from the rail. I found myself making some good plays, and my chip stack began to increase. I made a few good moves on the button, and at one point laid down Ace-King of clubs in first position to a big re-raise. I felt good.
After 5 hours, 6 table changes, and amassing around 30,000 chips - up from 5,000 – it was time to assess my position. I’d won a lot of small pots, made a steady climb, and then doubled up by making a solid (if reluctant) pot-odds call before the flop.
I’d raised with Ace-Jack from the button, only to face three “All Ins” from early position limpers – they were all short stacked, so I was priced in. I was pretty sure I was behind, but I called anyway. They all had small pairs and despite the fact that two of them made sets, I picked up a 5 on the river, giving me the wheel, and earning me the entire pot. If that was a little over your head, feel free to email me or ask a friend. You can also click on the highlighted words to find their definitions.
After counting up my chips, and checking the tournament clock, I found I was probably in the top 10% or so of chip stacks. By 4:30 though, the mid-afternoon doldrums had set in and I was getting pretty tired. I hadn’t slept well for a few nights, and trying to get a read on so many new players at so many new tables was starting to get the better of me. I was probably a little overwhelmed by the whole experience as well, which I’m sure played a factor.
I knew I wouldn’t be playing my best, but with no cash-out options, I had to press on. My best hope at this point was to try and survive until the dinner break when I could re-fuel and maybe catch a quick nap. By then, the antes had started, so I knew this would be much easier said than done.
Unfortunately for me, it was also right about that time that I got moved to a table where everyone else was deep stacked too. Unfortunately for me, it was then that I picked up pocket aces.
I was the first to act in the hand, so I opened for a small raise. Everyone folded around to the large, serious looking fellow in the 7 seat. He looked the way Hank Azaria would look like if he took steroids, grew a goatee, and went around wearing t-shirts with red and orange flames on them. He raised, and the action folded back around to me.
What to do… I certainly can’t fold. I have the best hand. Do I call and risk him catching a hand cheap, or I re-raise and let him know I can be serious too? I decided I had to raise, but pushing all-in would be a massive over-bet. Decisions, decisions. I ended up raising about 6000 chips, which was about 3 times his raise. I don’t know if that was the best thing to do in that situation, but I wanted to get some money in the pot before he missed the flop and gave up. I’m usually good at getting off of hands when I’m beat, so I wasn’t that worried.
He took his time making his decision. He was looking at me with that “I know you have Aces, but I’m not quite sure enough to lay down my Kings” stare that I’ve seen a million times before. I knew he was a good player, but it takes someone pretty special to lay down Kings pre-flop. He called. Reluctantly.
And then, disaster. K Q 6 flop. I know I said I thought he had Kings, but I hadn’t seen him play a hand before now, so I couldn’t be sure, but something inside me said that this was a very dangerous flop for me. I made a bet of about half the pot, and without thinking twice, he pushed all in.
Normally, like I said, I can throw away Aces, and deep down, I knew I was beat. As I’m writing this, I realize what an easy fold it should have been, but these things are always much easier said than done, and hindsight is 20-20.
If you have any poker know-how and experience, your first instinct will almost always be the right one – as was mine in this case. But as many players have done in the past, and many more will do in the future, I talked myself into seeing what I wanted to see.
I had about half my chips in the pot already, and was feeling pretty committed. Pocket Kings had me beat, as did Pocket Queens and KQ. The remaining question was, did I think he would have made the same play with Pocket Jacks or lower, or Ace-King. I figured Ace-King was possible even though, like I said, I knew I was probably deluding myself. That, balanced with the fact that I didn’t want to be the short stack at the table, the fact that I knew I’d need to gather a big stack of chips if I had any hope of winning, and the possibility that if I was wrong, there were still two more Aces floating around, as well as some Jacks and Tens for a backdoor straight…
So I called. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
I showed my Aces. He, of course, turned over Kings, and without any improvement, I lost the pot and was down to about two big-blinds-worth of chips. I’d not only taken myself out of the tournament, but given “Hank Azaria’s Cousin” enough chips to coast easily into the money. In fact, I know he made the money because I came back the next day, and sure enough, there he was… in the money, and perched happily behind a massive pile of chips. MY massive pile of chips.
With the crumbs left over from that monster pot, I did make an effort to climb back into the tournament. I doubled up three times in the next four hands. Still woefully short on chips however, I got caught on my 4th all-in attempt and was sent to the rail. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200. Kind of a lousy finish in my book, but at least I did go down fighting, and while I didn't make the money, I did finish in the top 30% of all entrants.
My World Series Of Poker hopes were crushed – at least for the remainder of that trip and for the next 6 hours or so, I was not a fun person to be around.
Thank god for good companions.
Nobody wants to hear your bad beat stories, but traveling packs of poker players will debate the finer points of strategy until the 4th horseman finally busts out of the tournament, and rejoins his friends at the party. Thankfully I had my posse. During the dinner break, I went over the hand with my friend Jonathan and my two uncles who were still in the tournament.
They didn’t offer too much help (sorry guys) except to say that I should have folded after the re-raise, why by this time, was obvious to me. After a few more hours of internal obsession, I came up with the following 3 solutions.
1) Fold after the re-raise. Duh.
2) Push all-in pre-flop, after the re-raise. Personally, I still don’t like this option because I’m pretty sure he would have called and left the rest up to fate. I know he suspected me of having Aces, but like I said before – Kings are awfully hard to lay down pre-flop, and since I was new to the table, I don’t think he had enough information on me to justify folding. He would have called, hit his King, and I still would have been out. The “I had the best hand when the money went in” argument never gave me much consolation. Except in the case of an extremely bad beat, I think it’s usually a weak way to cover for mis-playing a hand. Also, in the event that he does fold, I don’t get much of a payoff. I think pushing All-In preflop (unless you’re short-stacked) really just says to the rest of the table, “I don’t have any confidence in my post-flop abilities.” I do have confidence in my post-flop play. I just didn’t perform very well on this particular hand.
3) My favorite solution: Smooth call his pre-flop re-raise, and then see what happens. I was out of position, and if he’d decided to slow play, he could have still won a big pot from me, but my lead-out bet would have been smaller, and I wouldn’t have felt so pot-committed. I like to think I would have gotten away from the hand.
The bottom line is, there was simply no reason to risk all my chips against another big stack at this point in the tournament. Had the same thing happened an hour earlier, when I was feeling better, I think I would have been able to ditch the Aces and survive.
It’s true, this was an extremely difficult hand, and many other players have gone broke many times in exactly this situation. I firmly believe though, that if you don’t constantly examine your play, and find new ways to deal with difficult hands, you’ll never improve your game the way you need to if you want to be a really top player.
It’s possible I’ll make the same mistake again, but I doubt it. Not when my tournament life is on the line.
So yeah, I obsessed. I dissected, analyzed, and evaluated the hand for most of the rest of the day, making myself and everyone around me miserable. But I thought through it thoroughly. I found some new ways to handle similar situations when they inevitably arise again, and then I let it go. It’s not something I’ll ever forget, but it hasn’t made me gun-shy. I just know that next time I commit all my chips mid-tournament, it’s likely to be under vastly better circumstances.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
