"Good Luck, All In"

Of all the, um, “traditions” (for lack of a better word) in poker, the one that baffles me the most, the one I just don’t get—and the one you’ll never hear out of my lips—is saying “Good luck, all in,” when someone moves all in is at risk of being felted.

I mean, I’m ok with saying “nice hand” when someone sucks out on you, when what you really mean is “f-you”—because it would be extremely rude to say “f-you” to someone at the poker table (and most anywhere else, for that matter).  And then there’s always the “I’m sorry” when you suck out on someone, and of course you don’t mean it.  You’re just being polite. 

But “Good luck, all in?”  Who the hell came up with that bit of stupidity?

You seem to hear it more often in a tournament, so let’s discuss that first.  Here, it is mind-boggling moronic.  If you’re in a tournament, you pretty much never want the person all in and at risk of busting to get good luck and win, right? Every player that busts out puts you closer to cashing.  The person who says this insipid phrase isn’t in the hand, but if he or she had even a single functioning brain cell, he or she would be wanting the short-stack to bust and thus reduce the field by one player.  So if you have any smarts at all, you can’t possibly mean it. 

In a cash game, it might be a little different.  All things being equal, you might not care one way or the other, since, if the persons busted out and left, another player would take their place. But let’s assume the person who is at risk is a really, really bad player, and you figure that this bad player won’t rebuy if they bust.  I suppose you could seriously hope they win the pot, stay in the game, and then hopefully bust out to you instead of the player who they’re up against at that moment. 

Maybe.  Except that, I’ve rarely heard “Good luck, all in,” come from any player who was good enough to have actually thought at that level.  No, it’s usually just said reflexively, automatically.  As if it is something you’re supposed to do.  Like saying, “gesundheit” when somebody sneezes.

Now I suppose you might make an exception if the person who was at risk was someone who was really, really hot.  And you were really enjoying ogling her company, and you were even deluding yourself into thinking that you had a shot with her.  Maybe that woman (or a hot guy, I suppose, for those female poker players out there) you might sincerely wish good luck, because you didn’t want her to leave.

So I suppose if the poker player who was all-in looked like the woman below, I might make an exception and say, “Good luck all in” and maybe even mean it.

But aside from that, there’s no excuse for saying it. 

You see, what people who say that don’t seem to realize is that when you wish one player in a hand good luck, you are in fact wishing the opposing player (or players) bad luck.  It’s inherently implied. In poker, one person’s good luck is another person’s bad luck.  And why is the player with the shortest stack more worthy of receiving good luck than the player with the bigger stack?  It’s actually damn rude to the other player(s).

Every time someone says “Good luck, all in” to my opponent, I’m always just a little bit irked.  In my mind, I am thinking, “Hey, what’s wrong with me?  Why aren’t you wishing me good luck?”  Fortunately, the very first time I heard it, I wasn’t in the hand, or I might have said something.

So you’re saying something you don’t mean, and you’re inadvertently saying something not very nice to another player at the same time.

It just strikes me as a really dumb thing to say.  Where the hell did it come from?