The Night I Didn't Rathole

We’re going back to the end of my summer trip for this one.  It was a Saturday and I wanted to play cash at least one other place before settling in at MGM, where I was going to meet Prudence and her sister for a late dinner.  I tried to get into a game at Aria, but this was when the WSOP was still going on and it was well nigh impossible to get into a cash game there at the time.  So I walked over to Monte Carlo and was able to get a seat right away.

It had been over two years since I’d played there last, a session I wrote about here.  And the good thing about this latest session was that I never saw a dealer try to foist a $2 chip on anyone.  They used them just for the rake.

The session was frustrating because I was actually running well and couldn’t really get paid for my decent hands.

Early on I called $10 in late position with Ace-Jack off, it was five to a flop of A-Q-10 rainbow.  I called a $30 c-bet and it was just heads up.  Neither of us bet the rest of the way.  I figured I’d just go for showdown value if I didn’t hit my gutshot, which I didn’t.  My Ace was good.

Then I lost chips raising to $12 with Ace-King, two callers.  I c-bet $20 on a blank board and then folded to a big turn bet with nothing.

I got pocket Aces.  Someone raised to $11 in front of me, I made it $31 and didn’t get a call.

The very next hand I got the dreaded hand.  Yep, pocket Aces and pocket Kings, back-to-back. There were some limpers so I made it $14.  I had two callers and the flop came King-8-3, rainbow.  I only bet $20 but didn’t get a call.

Opened to $10 with pocket Jacks and four of us saw a 10-high flop.  My $30 c-bet was not called.

Very next hand I had pocket 3’s.  Six limpers saw a flop of A-9-3, two clubs. I bet $10 and two players called.  I bet $20 on a blank turn and no one called.

I raised to $12 with Ace-Jack off and had two callers.  I bet $25 on a Jack high flop and took the pot.

See? I was running well and thought I should have made more money for my run.  I started running cold and bleeding chips, and finally left after a couple of hours only up $25.

Over to MGM.  The table was kind of interesting.  The lady on my immediate right was one of the most unlikely looking poker players I had ever seen.  Very well dressed, proper looking middle-aged woman.  I may be being a bit generous with “middle-aged”—it’s hard to say.  But she looked like she would prefer touring an art museum instead of playing poker, if you know what I mean.

She had been pretty friendly with a bunch of the guys (mostly young) at the table before I got there, apparently, and this was continuing when I got there.  It was clear to me almost immediately that despite her appearance, she had spent a lot of time in poker rooms—she was a good, experienced player. She revealed that she usually never plays NLH; her game of choice is PLO.  She said she comes to Vegas from 1000 miles away every two weeks to play PLO.  She can play NLH where she lives but not PLO. She was only playing NLH at MGM this evening because she was waiting for a show.

So I asked her where she plays PLO since it couldn’t be MGM.  She said she plays at Aria.  I said, “You play 1/3 PLO at Aria?”  “No,” she corrected. “2/5.”  Wow. That’s a big game—much bigger than a 2/5 NLH game, I’m sure.  Much, much bigger.  Like I said, just by looking at her, you would definitely not peg her as a poker player, let alone someone who comes to Vegas twice a month to play a big PLO game.  Looks can be deceiving.

Then she started asking some of the guys, who she had obviously been chatting with, what their names were.  Finally someone asked what her name was.  Well, I have to abandon my practice of assigning phony names, there would be no point to this story if I did that.  So I have to reveal her real name—or at least the name she gave us at the table.  “Bertha,” she said.

Bertha?  Really?  I haven’t heard of anyone named Bertha for a zillion years.  Seriously, except in a movie or TV show from the 1950’s or earlier, when have you heard anyone named “Bertha”?  My gut told me that no one under the age of 90 could possibly be named “Bertha” and this lady was nowhere close to that.

So I texted my pals Woody & LM and asked them, if I told them a woman was named Bertha, what was the absolute youngest age she could be?  Woody didn’t respond but LM said 70.  Ok, I think that’s too young but this lady was nowhere near 70 either.

Anyway, there were two other interesting characters at this table.  Sitting on Bertha’s left (and thus, two from me) was a guy I’ll call “Clueless Guy” or CG for short.  I’m calling him because he appeared to be clueless, about poker and other things.  He had a think New York accent and took frequent breaks to smoke.  He had never played poker in a live poker room before and this was his very first visit to Vegas.  He had been living in L.A. for a year or two and his girlfriend from New York was flying in later in the evening.  Now, he took great pride in telling us that she was to arrive at 10PM and that he had told her his flight from L.A. would arrive at 9PM—but it actually arrived at 5PM so he could get his gambling (and drinking) in before she hit town.  He apparently had already lost a bundle in the pit before he sat down at the poker table.

He was a terrible player.  He called almost everything.  Later I noticed when facing a bet, he would tell you exactly what he had.  “I’m on a draw, I dunno if I should go for it or fold.”  Or even, “I have two pair, should I call?”  He would do this before he acted, so if he called, you knew where you stood.  I assure you, at no point was he ever not telling the truth.

Another thing he liked to do was bet his big pairs big—I mean really big.  He’d either call preflop or make normal raises—and then all of a sudden put out a huge bet instead.  I mean a couple of times, with just a limper or two in front of him, he’d bet like $40.  One time the guy on his right said, “Why so much?” as he folded and CG showed pocket Kings.  “I don’t want anyone catching an Ace.” 

He kept buying in for $100 and rebuying, often.  Twice, I saw him get up and go to the podium to buy more chips, so I told him that this wasn’t necessary, he could buy more chips from the dealer.  He had no idea.

And apparently before I arrived he pissed off Bertha because he called her raise with 7-5 offsuit and cracked her Aces.

In other words, he was the kind of player you dream of having at your table. 

He had bonded a bit with the guy on his right, who was in town for a bachelor party (not his own).  Bachelor Party Guy (BPG) did something that really pissed me off, perhaps it shouldn’t have. Earlier, with BPG present, Bertha explained to CG what it meant to chop the blinds and why it was a good idea to do so. I think the second time the situation had come up, CG had actually figured it out and agreed to chop—but I’m not sure if it was with Bertha again or BPG.

Then, CG went on a smoke break and missed his big blind.  And Bertha was also away from the table, so I had to post the big blind while BPG was the small blind.  It folded to him. I had my cards (King-2 off) ready to muck and said, “You wanna chop?”  He didn’t say anything….he just put $17 more on top of his $1 blind.  Maybe he hadn’t heard me.  “You don’t want to chop?”  He just shook his head no.  Fine.  I pushed my two dollar chips to him and returned my cards to the dealer.

Yeah, I was pissed.  I guess I’m always kind of pissed whenever someone doesn’t chop in that situation.  I’ll chop anything, even Aces.  I see no reason not to.  If someone doesn’t want to do it, that’s fine I guess, but what the hell is he raising so big for?  He’s betting $17 to win $2.  How does that ever make sense?  If he really wants to play, limp in (possibly dangerous, I know) or make a smaller raise that might entice me to play if I have a decent but not premium hand.  I mean seriously, what am I calling with there? Note: This guy was not a maniac by any stretch of the imagination.  He was a loose player, standard level of aggression.  It wasn’t like I could put him on a really wide range there.  With only two bucks at stake, I assume he’s got a big pair or a big Ace and why would I risk anything?

So I actually targeted him.  I was committed to getting this guy’s chips—this guy specifically, more so than any other player—just because of what I considered a dick move that cost me a whole two bucks.  I studied him intently, and pretty much ignored everyone else at the table.  I almost never took my eye off, looking to see if I could pick up a tell.

I’d like to tell you that it worked, that I took all of his chips or a big pot off him, but the sad truth is, my grudge was not fulfilled.  He left after not too long, before I ever got a chance get my revenge.

But he helped me get some chips from CG before he left.  He raised to $10, CG called and I called with Queen-Jack offsuit in late position.  I think there was another player or two.  The flop was Queen high, but all spades.  My Jack was a spade, but if a fourth spade hit the board, would that be big enough?  Everyone checked.  A low spade did indeed hit on the turn.  BPG checked but CG bet $40.  Actually, he wanted to bet more.  He put the $40 out and then went back to his stack to grab more chips to add in.  The dealer had to explain the “string bet” rule to him.  There was a reason I called this guy “Clueless Guy.”

I just called, worried about a bigger spade, and BPG folded.  Another low spade hit the turn.  This time CG checked.  I thought the Jack was probably good, but I decided to play it safe and just check behind.  He was such a weird player that he could have checked-raised me big with a smaller spade and put me in a tough situation.  But he showed a 9 of spades and I took the pot.

I limped in with pocket 5’s and someone raised to $15.  He only had $25 behind.  But when CG called it made sense for me to call, One other player came in and we saw a flop of King-5-2.  The short stack shoved for his last $25, but CG folded.  I called and the other guy folded so that closed the action.  My set of 5’s held.

With Ace-King of clubs I raised to $10 and had two callers, one of whom was CG. The flop had one club, two hearts.  I made a $20 c-bet and the other guy folded, and CG openly agonized about what to do.  “Should I chase the draw or not?”  So he basically told me that he had hearts.  He finally called.  The next card was a club, so I knew it couldn’t have helped him.  Thus, with just a draw, I put out $40.  He again said he was on draw but this time he folded.  Poker is so much easier when your opponent tells you what he has.

Just as Prudence showed up and I was ready to leave the game to join her for dinner, I was dealt pocket Queens.  I raised to $10 and only one player called.  The flop was Jack-high and the other played donked out $10.  He was pretty new to the table so I didn’t really have any kind of read on him.  I made it $30 and he called.  We both checked the turn and the river.  The river happened to be a King.  He showed King-Jack offsuit.  Damn, I really should have kept betting.

I had turned my $200 buy-in into $325 when I was ready to cash out.  Although I was planning on playing some more after my dinner break, I didn’t want to tie up my seat in that game for as long as my break would take on a busy Saturday night.  They do allow over an hour away from the table before they pick up but even that might not be long enough.  And I just think it’s rude to tie up a seat without playing for that long.  So I took my chips to the podium to cash out.

Now my buddy Stan had the honor of cashing me out, and it turned out he had timed it to take his lunch break right then so he could join Prudence and her sister for dinner.  So his last official act before taking his break was cashing me out.  And as he was giving me my money, I told him to put on the list as a “phone-in” so I wouldn’t have to wait too long when I was done with socializing to get back into a game.  And so Stan said to me, “OK, but you know you’re gonna have to come in with the $325, right?”  Stan knew I always buy in for $200.  I said, “Well, it’ll probably be an hour before I’m back, so that won’t matter, right?”  And he said, “Come on, you know this.  You have to be out of the game for at least two hours before you can come back in for the minimum.”  I honestly thought it was an hour.  But it didn’t make much of a difference to me, it was only $125 more than my usual buy-in, and I really had no interest in rat-holing anyway.  I told him that was fine.

Stan left our table at the eatery before the rest of us as he had to get back to work.  Prudence and her sister wanted to check out the Slut Parade. so we walked past the ladies lining up.  It was still pretty early so there wasn’t a big crowd, and oddly enough, the crowd consisted of a higher percentage of guys than usual.  This wasn’t so bad for the Prudence and her sister, but in actuality, I think Prudence was more interested in having her sister see just how scantily the girls were clad. Although they did find some nice looking gentlemen who caught their attention, Prudence did express disappointment at what turned out to be more of a “sausage-fest.”

They took off and I returned to the poker room.  I was at the top of the list and there was an open seat.  This time Stan didn’t even ask me how many chips I wanted.  He had a rack with exactly $325 in chips already prepared for me!  It was pretty funny. I gave him the same $325 in bills he had given me an hour earlier but I had a question for him.  “How will the dealer know it’s ok to come to the table with $325?”  After all, the max buy-in for the 1/2 game is $300.  He said, “Because I’m gonna tell him.”  And then, sure enough, Stan left his post and went over to the table he was sending me too, and I saw him whisper in the dealer’s ear that I had to come in with $325 because that’s what I cashed out with less than two hours before.

There was a maniac at this new table.  He had a big stack and he liked to bet big.  Actually, he was all over the map.  He wasn’t afraid to fold (pre or post flop), and he would limp in as well.  But often he would make pretty big preflop raises ($20-$30) and also would sometimes make even bigger three-bets.  Like if someone raised to $8, he’d make it $50 even if no one else was in the pot.

As such, when I got Ace-9 of spades, a hand I would normally raise with, I just limped in and hoped the maniac wouldn’t make it too costly to see the flop.  But someone made it $10 in front of him and the maniac just called.  The flop came Ace-5-5.  The preflop raiser checked, then tried to bet.  It was kind of weird.  He definitely made a motion that everyone read as a check, and the guy behind him checked, then that first guy started reaching for chips.  The dealer of course told him he couldn’t do that.  He denied checking—he said he was motioning to the player next to him to post his small blind.  What?  Since we were already at the flop, that made no sense.  He finally gave up trying to bet and it was checked around.  The turn was an 8 and this time he bet $20.  I called and we were heads up.  The river was a 10.  This time he bet $60.  That seemed like a lot to call there.  I almost folded.  I hadn’t had enough experience with the guy to get any read.  But I made the call.  As soon as I did, he just mucked his cards.  Nice.

Then I got pocket Aces and raised to $10.  This time I would have loved for the maniac to three-bet, but of course, he folded.  Two others called.  The flop was low (8-high, I think) and a player donked out $20.  I made it $50.  He called and then checked in the dark on the turn, which was a 2.  I checked behind.  The river was a 7 and paired the board.  He shoved the rest of his chips--$98.  Did he have a 7?  I tanked and finally decided to call.  He showed pocket 10’s and my Aces were good.  That was a nice pot.

The very next hand, I had pocket Queens and I called $10.  Three of us saw the flop, including the maniac, who was not the preflop raiser.  The flop was Ace high and I called $20 from the preflop raise.  It was still three-ways.  The last two streets were checked around though and my Queens were good.

I was pretty much card dead after that.  But it wasn’t really a long session and when I left after the midnight drawing (didn’t get called), I was able to rack up $615 ($415 profit).  So when Stan saw all my chips I was cashing out, he was happy to claim credit for my big win because he wouldn’t let me rat-hole (which I wasn’t planning on doing anyway).  I just laughed and said that the extra chips didn’t make any difference at all, but he still claimed credit. 

OK, whatever.  It was a pretty decent night of poker.

"Those Things", The Tournament Tipper & Cheated Hookers

This post consists of some amusing things I overheard recently, one of which is totally unconnected to the other two.  Since none of the stories themselves is enough for an entire post, I thought I’d put them together.

I think I have to be careful telling this first story because I have a bit of a high profile in the poker world.  In this case, I don’t have any inside information, the background is pretty common knowledge.  Just the same, I’d rather not name the poker room involved.

So let’s just say this took place in a poker room somewhere in the United States.  It could be Vegas, it could be L.A., it could even be Atlantic City.  But since I’ve never been to Atlantic City, probably not.

Anyway, we’ll call this mystery poker room “Generic Poker Room.”  Catchy name, right?  It seems that at Generic Poker Room, they recently had a few employees who left under less than ideal circumstances.  A couple of the higher ranking tournament managers were apparently keeping some of the tip money for themselves instead of passing it on the dealers. One can imagine that this may have left a few of the regular dealers disgruntled, shall we say.

So I was playing in a tournament there and the guy next to me seemed to be playing live poker in an actual poker room for the very first time.  His play was ok, he knew poker.  But some of the rules and procedures for playing live seemed unfamiliar to him.  For example, he never, ever figured out that his bet was supposed to cross the “betting line.”  He was sitting close to the dealer so they would frequently just push it forward for him.

After a few hours, he busted out.  When he stood up, I was surprised that he reached into his pants for his wallet.  My first thought was, does he think he needs to give the dealer his player’s card to check out of the tournament?  But no, he didn’t grab his player’s card.  He took out a $10 bill from his wallet, and slapped it down right in front of the dealer.  “That’s for you,” he said, as he left.

Well that was a new one on me.  I’ve played in a lot of tournaments and that was the first time I’d ever seen a guy who busted before cashing—long before cashing—leave a tip.

But the dealer didn’t react like it was the first time he’d seen it, not at all.  He thanked the guy and picked up the bill.  As it happened, one of the guys running the tournament happened to walk by, and the dealer called him over, and gave him the bill. “That’s for us.”

The floorman/tournament director didn’t seem surprised either.  He took the money and kept walking.

At which point, the dealer said, “I just hope that actually gets to us.” About half the table laughed, the other half didn’t. Of course, I knew exactly what that was a reference to so I was totally amused.  The dealer then turned to us and said, “I’m just kidding, he’s a good guy, no worries.”  Then, after a few seconds, he added, “What, you haven’t heard?”  And then he wisely dropped the subject.

Anyway, I’m curious—have any of you seen something like that?  A tip given by a losing player early in the tournament? Really a surprise to me.  The only thing close to that I’ve seen is a time or two when a dealer was off duty and playing in a tournament in a room they work.  This dealer had a stack of $20 real chips (not tournament chips) and would tip the dealer a buck every time they won a pot.  But that was tipping fellow employees, so it was a bit different.

Now speaking of tournament chips….well much later in the tournament a very jovial, extremely chatty fellow was moved to the seat to my right.  He was clearly playing to have a good time, not to win the tournament.  He even mentioned that he thought if he could several hours out of the tournament, the free beer he’d get out of it would be more than enough to compensate for the tournament. 

He also wanted a massage, and made a joke about paying for the massage with tournament chips.  This prompted the dealer—a different one—to ask, “Do you know why it says “no cash value” on all tournament chips?”

A few people started to give their theories but the dealer gave his explanation.  “Because guys would pay hookers in tournament chips, and then they’d try to cash them in and they couldn’t.  And so of course they were quite upset about that.”  Someone at the table made the lame joke about the hookers getting “screwed” after getting screwed.  It’s entirely possible that someone was your humble scribe.

So according to this dealer, it was the hookers getting paid in worthless chips that forced the casinos to stamp “no cash value” on the poker tournament chips.

Truth is, I had heard that story before.  I’m not sure I believe it, but I definitely have heard it.

Totally unrelated to poker, we have a story that occurred on one of the nights when the Slut Parade was taking place.  I was just walking around the casino, minding my own business, not even noticing the many young ladies in their skimpy outfits (you buy that, right?) when I heard a “whoop,” or some similar exclamation.  It was obvious a female voice.  It’s not usual for the young (or drunk) folks to whoop it up like this when they are in Vegas.  They are happy to be in Vegas.  They are happy they are going to the club (or wherever). 

Anyway, the “whoop” sound got my attention and I turned to see where it was coming from.  I say a young woman walking the opposite direction (towards the club) and as part of her “whoop” she had raised her right arm and was waving it for emphasis.  This was a serious whoop.  Since I was to the right of her, I couldn’t help notice that the side of her dress was…well, actually, there was no side of her dress.  There was just a lot of skin.  And she was revealing….let me see, I believe there is a technical term for it.  Ah yes, I believe it is called “side-boob.”  There was actually a lot of side and a lot of boob revealed.

She was with a guy and another girl and my eyes followed her as she walked away.  It turns out she wasn’t wearing a dress at all.  There was a revealing top, which was totally backless.  And there was a skirt.  Actually, it was probably closer to a belt than a skirt.  It was incredibly short.  And it was incredibly tight.  I tried to figure out if it was tighter than it was short or shorter than it was tight and honestly, it was too close to call.

This outfit was thus a “triple threat,” something that is not actually that common among club attendees.  As I explained in my original slut parade post, the standard “uniform” of the female club goers is a) very tight; and/or b) very short; and/or c) low-cut with generous cleavage revealed.  But it isn’t that often any one girl is wearing an outfit that has all three of these features.  Usually it’s just two of the three.  Sometimes it’s one of the three, but unless that one is extreme, the girl is practically overdressed.  It’s just very challenging for a woman to pull off a triple threat dress (no, not that way) because in order to really look good in one, the woman would have to have a near perfect body.  Of course, many girls who do try to wear such a dress don’t have the bodies for it (again, few women do), but that’s another story.

This girl appeared to have the kind of body that filled out all the requirements such an outfit demanded. 

I kept walking but somehow, very mysteriously, really, I found myself wandering about the area where the club goers were milling around.  And by pure coincidence I assure you, I once again encountered this triple-threat girl.  This time I saw her while she was facing me.  And it turns out that her outfit was revealing more than just side-boob.  It was pretty much wide open in front too, almost down to her navel.  Basically, it was just two straps coming down from her neck covering her nipples and not much else. Since she was showing both “normal” cleavage and side-boob, plus the short and tight skirt, I wondered if she deserved a new category, which would be “the quadruple threat.”

Anyway, by this time her party had expanded by one, and there were two guys and two girls.  Based on the interaction, I would guess that this new guy was the boyfriend of this striking girl.  They were face-to-face, talking, and at one point, I saw him put his finger up to the girl. He was actually pointing. He may or may not have actually touched her chest, but I could hear him plainly say, “Could you put those things away, please?”  The girl laughed, and then leaned in to give the guy a big hug.  Hmm…I wonder if she would have hugged me if I had made the same request.  Probably not.

Anyway, for those of you interested in such things, I would say there is a at least a 99.9999% chance that the “things” her boyfriend wanted her to put away were purchased from a plastic surgeon.  Since she clearly wasn’t wearing a bra, with the size of those things, if they were god-given, they would have been down to knees.

I know whenever I tell a story like that, people will write to me and demand that I start taking pics and/or video of the Slut Parade.  I can’t see myself doing that—way too dangerous.  Now, if I had one of those “wearable” cameras, or some such, so I could take the video without anyone realizing I was doing it, maybe I could do it.  Hmm….perhaps I should open a “Go-Fund-Me” account to start collecting donations for it?

Now the pic below, of Reese Witherspoon, is the closest I could find to approximate the outfit she was wearing, and it really doesn’t come very close.  For one thing, Ms. Witherspoon’s natural assets are a lot more normal sized than this gal’s unnatural assets were.  Also, the quadruple-threat girl was showing a whole lot more skin.

And I doubt that Ms. Witherspoon would yell “Whoop!” if she was about to attend a night club in Vegas.  But I could be wrong about that.

Still here?  Well, the pic above was supposed to be the end of this post.  But between the time I wrote this and the time I was able to post it, I found  this intriguing picture below, which perhaps is a little more representative of the dress I was describing--or at least the top I was describing.  This is actually a swimsuit, so it's not exactly what the gal was wearing.  But the top of this swimsuit is pretty close to what the girl was wearing...perhaps the dress I was describe was slightly wider, but not much.

Stupidest Poker Decision I've Ever Made

OK, to be fair, it’s probably not quite the stupidest poker decision I’ve ever made.  And it certainly wasn’t the most expensive bad poker decision I’ve ever made.

For that matter, it wasn’t even a poker decision, technically.  It was a decision about poker, sort of.

I headed out to Ventura Saturday for another session at Player’s Casino.  Due to any early morning appointment, I got their earlier than usual (around 12:30PM) and it was even busier than usual.  I think I got the last parking spot available, or close to it.  The tournament was still taking up 7 tables.  There were lists 20+ players long for both the 1/2 and the 2/3 games.  I got on both lists and after about 45 minutes or so, had managed to get near the top of both lists.  They had opened a couple of tables since I’d gotten there and were actually calling names pretty fast.  I believe for the past 20 minutes or so, they had been calling players for one game or the other on average of every 2 minutes.

I looked up and I was second on both lists, but I was pretty sure they had already seated the player in front of me for the 2/3 game and just forgotten to taken him off, so I figured I’d be in that 2/3 game any minute now.  At that point, I made the decision that, if I was called for the 1/2, I’d tell the guy that since I was first up for the 2/3, I’d pass and wait for that.  I was sitting right next to him, so it would easy.

You see I really wanted to play 2/3 not 1/2, and it sure looked like if I did take a 1/2 seat, it would only be minutes before I’d get the 2/3 seat.  What was the point of sitting a few minutes at a game I didn’t really want to play just to move?  Plus I’d have $1 chips—a hundred of them—that I’d just have to exchange for $5 chips when I moved.  Hardly seemed worth the inconvenience.

But then….nothing.  I swear it went 10, maybe 15 minutes without them calling anyone to either game.  It was strange.

So when they finally called a 1/2 player, and then, half a minute player called a second—that would be me—I decided that I could no longer count on being called to the game I wanted that quickly.  So, like an idiot, I took the seat at the 1/2 game. Since I had no intention of staying in this game—unless in the brief time I was there I spotted something incredible that would make me want to stay—what was the point of seeing a few hands that I likely wouldn’t even play?  Was I that desperate to get my hands on some cards?  Not really. I mean, regardless of the outcome, it was just a brain dead decision.

But that’s what I did and they brought me a hundred dollar chips and I sat there with no intention of staying more than a few minutes.  And thus didn’t really pay attention, as I figured why study the players if I wasn’t staying?  I did notice one thing—a guy made a big bet on the river that another player called with very mediocre holdings, and was good.  The guy had made a pretty big bluff bet.  And since the guy who called had been playing with him awhile, presumably, he probably knew there was a high likelihood the guy who bet was full of shit, as he was.

So I was dealt a hand and mucked.  Then I was dealt King-Queen suited and limped in. I think I would have raised if I had planned on staying but with my short shelf-life at this table, I figured I’d just invest the minimum to either make a hand or let it go.  I missed and folded.

I got one or more garbage hands and then, just as I was sent the first card of my next hand, I heard my name being called for the 2/3 game.  I should have just gotten up then and not even looked at my cards.  But I figured, what harm could there be in looking?  I yelled out that I wanted the seat but that I was in a hand.

I peeked at the one card that had been dealt to me.  It was a King.  Oh well.  I figured the second card would be a deuce or some equally worthless card and I’d be on my way.  But if you haven’t figured out by now that the second card was also a King, you have never read this blog before.  Yes,, my last hand at this table—that I had been at for all of 5 minutes—was the dreaded hand.

Well, even under these circumstances, I’m not about to fold pocket Kings (when will I ever learn?).  On this hand, someone had straddled and the guy I mentioned who was caught bluffing a hand or two earlier called the straddle ($4).  So I made it $20. 

And then the guy next to me shoved for $31.  Now, here’s where maybe, just maybe, my inattentiveness to this game hurt me.  He had just lost most of his stack the hand before.  And I heard him say something about shoving now.  But I didn’t hear anything else and I kind of assumed he meant he would wait for a hand that was good enough to take a chance to shove with.  You know big cards, a pocket pair.  As I later learned, he had actually said he was planning on shoving blind, which is what he did here.  Wow.  I realize, $31 is not a lot of money but still, unless you have a plane to catch, what’s the rush?  And this is $31 to a guy who bought into a 1/2 game where the max buy-in is $100, not $31 to a guy playing 5/10 at Bellagio.

It folded to the guy who called the straddle, the guy I’d seen caught in a bluff.  He called.  I was hoping he’d repop it but all he did was call.  The $31 shove wasn’t enough to reopen the betting for me, so all I could do was call too.  The three of us saw the flop.  It was Ace high, of course.

The guy who had just been caught bluffing shoved.  His stack was pretty close to mine.  I suppose I could have folded, but this is the problem with playing in a game where the maximum buy-in is 50 big blinds.  The stack-to-pot ratios are going to be low.  And based on my stack, and his, I figured with the $31 I’d already put in, I was committed.  When I thought about it some more, I remembered the hand where I saw this guy bet with total air, and figured there was at least a chance he was bluffing here, or maybe he was doing that with second pair, which I think was a 8.

So I called. The board blanked out and he showed Ace-9 offsuit, of course.  The other guy flipped over his hand, hoping he had gotten lucky, but he had not.  The Ace-9 guy took it all.  Turned out he had $5 less than me, so I took that $5 left over into the 2/3 game I’d been called to.

When the short-stack turned over his cards and said that he had no idea what he had, the guy next to him said, “You didn’t look?”  He replied, “No, I said I was gonna shove blind there.”  Well, the other guy hadn’t heard that either, so maybe I can’t blame my inattentiveness.  But if I had known that, I would have limped in for $4, waited for him to shove blind, watched the other guy call which he surely would have done—and then shoved myself—$98 total.  That would have been the play.  Would the other guy have called his whole stack there with his Ace-9 off?  I don’t know.  But I’m thinking if he called $31 with it, probably so.  So it likely wouldn’t have mattered.  It still would have been the right play.

So I started the new game already $100 in the hole, not having played a hand there, having played like 5 hands in a game I didn’t want to get in to.  Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Of course, the fact that it was my nemesis hand, the dreaded hand, just added insult to injury.

The 2/3 session turned into pretty much a break even one.  I won a few decent pots early and dripped the profit all away.  Nothing worth talking about. 

So I booked a 3-1/2 hour 2/3 session BE, and a 5-minute 1/2 session for -$100.  All because I changed my mind and decided to take that seat in a game I didn’t want to play.

Stupid, stupid decision.