The night after I played in the
Neeme/Owen meet up game (here),
I returned to Westgate to play in The Trooper's
game. The Neeme/Owen meet up games are
irregularly scheduled, but Trooper has his game at Westgate scheduled for every
Thursday night.
Again I phoned ahead to get on the
list and again there wasn't a seat available when I got there. There were two full tables. I immediately found Tim, aka Trooper, and
went over to say hello. I'm not sure I'd
seen Tim since the Linq closed its poker room.
He gave me a warm greeting, shouting "Robvegaspoker!" He asked if I came from California. Yes, but not that night, I'd been in Vegas
for almost a week. And at Tim's table, I noticed AustinBluffs, who I had sat next to at the other Vloggers' game the
night before
Before I got into a game, I helped
myself to some chocolate chip cookies proved by the poker room. Later, Tim brought in a pizza, and I confess
I had a piece. As I write this, I
realize that I forgot to mention that at the Neeme/Owen meet up game the night
before, they had sent out for a bunch of pizzas and I had a slice or two (or
more?). Thanks to everyone who provided
me with free food at the Westgate over these two nights.
Actually, one of the floor people was
sitting in at the other table and gave me his seat, so I got into a game fairly
quickly, but not at the table Tim was at.
Our table was pretty quiet, except for one player who talked basically
non-stop. I'm going to call this player
"Petey" because that's what Tim called him. I have no idea if that's his real name or a
nickname bestowed upon him by Tim.
Petey didn't let the fact that he
wasn't at Tim's table stop him from carrying on a lengthy conversation with him
from across the room. Apparently, Petey
and Tim were acquaintances from before.
I wasn't sure if Petey had been to previous Trooper games at the
Westgate or if perhaps Petey had just run into Tim at a poker room in
Vegas. Petey was obsessed with Tim's
coffee drinking habits. He wanted to
know how much Tim spent on coffee a month.
He even came up with an over/under figure on it. I don't recall what it was. Tim gave him a figure which Petey thought was
too low and Tim went thru the numbers with him to show him how he was wrong.
After I'd been playing for at least an
hour (maybe more), Tim and his fellow vlogger pal Pure Aggression switched tables so Tim ended up at my table. And after a seat change by another player,
Tim ended up seated to my immediate left.
I think they were doing bomb pots at
the other table but we couldn't get unanimous agreement to have them at our
table, mostly because Petey vetoed the idea.
He claimed poverty. Since I
continued to be card dead, that was ok by me.
One of the (many) things Petey was talking about was that he had to
leave soon to go to a movie. When he
finally did leave, I asked him what movie he was going to see. He said Jumanji. I dunno why, but everyone thought that was
funny.
Tim said he hadn't gone to the movies in
like forever. So I said, "You
know, they have sound now." The
dealer for some reason thought that was hilarious.
The two guys on Petey's left and my right,
a couple of older gentlemen, just happened to be there for poker and didn't
know who Trooper was—or for that matter, what a vlog was. Petey explained it to them. He said there were other vloggers but Trooper
was the biggest. Tim corrected
them. "I'm not the biggest, but I
was the first." They asked if
Trooper's vlog were all about poker and he said not really.
Later, he told the table that I had a popular
written blog. "He's robvegaspoker….he has a blog about poker…..and
boobs." The dealer (same one who
liked my "movies have sound now" joke) said, "Boobs? Why didn't you tell me? Now I'm interested."
Tim mentioned that he is leaning
towards getting away from poker.
"I'm getting a new hustle."
He didn't elaborate. People were
guessing. I guessed pimp or stripper,
but he said no. I think I may have also
guessed if that he was going to become a woman, that too was incorrect.
We talked a lot and Tim spent some
time trying to talk me into changing the blog into a vlog. "You gotta do video, that's where it's
at. No one reads any more. I don't read." I said, "Yeah, well, I have a face for
writing." He said, "Well do
audio then. Do a podcast." I said, "Well, you can't do boobs on
audio." Tim replied, "Sure you
can. You can talk about the sound they
make, like when they're flapping around."
I said, "Motor-boating?"
Yeah.
Soon after Tim joined our table, there
was some commotion at the table he left.
There was some kind of dispute between two players and loud words were
exchanged, some threats were made and eventually one of the players was booted
out of the room. I don't think Tim got
any of that on his video though.
Also, Tim and Petey got off on some weird tangent on advanced mathematics. They were trying to figure out what a trapezoid was and how it differed from a parallelogram. Then the discussed planes. It was not typical poker table talk, that's for sure. Fortunately, debates/discussions like this don't have to take too long these days, with everyone having Google in the pocket.
Also, Tim and Petey got off on some weird tangent on advanced mathematics. They were trying to figure out what a trapezoid was and how it differed from a parallelogram. Then the discussed planes. It was not typical poker table talk, that's for sure. Fortunately, debates/discussions like this don't have to take too long these days, with everyone having Google in the pocket.
The game was 1/3 and as I mentioned, I
was card-dead again. My stack dwindled
down until I was short-stacked, and I was debating whether or not to
add-on. So I got pocket Aces in the big
blind and raised to $15. There was one
or two callers. The flop was low and I
bet $25, got one call. The turn paired
the board (7's) and he donked out a bet.
It was almost my remaining stack so I shoved and he snap called. Now, earlier in the evening I had noticed
that a player was paid for $50 for having his Aces cracked. I had forgotten they had this promotion until
then. Lucky for me I saw it then. By this time, I knew if I got my Aces cracked
I'd get $50. So I was in a no lose
situation. Either my Aces were good and
I'd win the pot, or they were no good and I'd at least get $50 for my
troubles. Once I had bet the $25 and
been called, it only made sense to commit my stack there with the Aces. The river blanked and of course he showed 7-6
for trips. But I showed my hand and got
the $50 promo money. I probably wouldn't
have played it any different if I hadn't know about the Aces cracked promo, but
I wouldn't have known to show my hand to get that promo money otherwise.
I'm pretty sure that this was the
first time I was ever paid for hitting an Aces cracked promotion.
I added $50 out of my pocket so I
could have a little more money to play with, but it was pretty clear this
wasn't going to be my night. I should
have left then but I was enjoying the conversation too much. But I was at my cut-off there, I wasn't going
to dig into my wallet again.
Which explains the hand you can
actually see me play in Trooper's 360 video from this table, which you can find
here. It's near the very end of the video.
I was down to $15 and I had pocket 7's.
I shoved, first in. Three people
called and I just watched the rest of the hand.
The flop was Jack-10-8, two spades.
When the turn was the Ace of spades, I think you can see on the video
that I checked my hand to see if one of my 7's was a spade and sure enough it
was. So the 9 of spades on the river
gave me a flush (and also a straight, I didn't notice that til I watched the
video myself). Was it good enough? Actually it was. One guy had a straight another guy had two
pair, I'm not sure what the third guy had but my 7-high flush was good. I didn't realize that Tim had likely recorded
the hand until he came back to the table.
I returned to losing and cashed out a
few chips. It was a fun time but again,
just couldn't get any cards.
The "regular" video that
Trooper made of this game can be found here. Thanks to Tim and to the Westgate for
sponsoring these games, they are great fun and great for the Vegas poker
community.
not everyone at my westgate table liked me either, since i didnt want to get in on the $5 button (which wasnt a straddle but something more complicated to explain). me being difficult did cause me to win $319 though, since it probably effected how they played vs me. then i hit and ran. i did do the bomb pots though but only because on the first bomb pot, i had the button, they since i played the first one, felt funny if i sat out the second.
ReplyDeleteThe button game was fun....and if it's only $5 once an orbit, you shoulda played it (we had it at the Neeme/Owen game the night before.
DeleteBen Affleck was in The Trooper’s game?
ReplyDeleteWhat? You didn't know Ben and Tim were buds?
DeleteGlad you enjoyed Trooper Thursday - stick with the blog though – some of us are better suited being one iteration of technology behind!
ReplyDeleteDon't worry....I plan to stick with the written word. I prefer it.
Delete