"I've Never Played Poker Before"

This was from late in my Xmas Vegas trip.  I was at the end of a losing session when a guy took the empty seat immediately to my left. He bought in for the $100 minimum. He was dealt his first two cards and the action came to him.  He didn't do anything.  The dealer said something like, "It's on you."

The guy said, "I've never played poker before.  You're going to kind of have to walk me through it."

Wow.  I'd never heard that one before.  I decided that I could stay a little bit longer after all.

The dealer said something like, "Well, look at your cards.  If you have good cards, you can call or raise."  So the guy looked at his cards and called the $2. 

The action got to the guy in seat 8 (the "never played poker before" guy was in seat 2), he started talking to the newbie.  "I don't know what to do here.  I don't know if this guy's legit.  You really never played before?"

The guy said, "Well, I just play on my phone."

Seat 8 was still baffled.  "I don't know…he could have a good hand and not know it.  He could have a bad hand a not know it."

Newbie agreed. "That's right."

He played a few hands and didn't win.  He tended to call preflop and maybe the flop.  Sometimes if the betting wasn't too big he'd get to showdown with very marginal hands—or total garbage. 

Sometimes he'd show his garbage hand and said, "Well, I thought I might get something."  He called once or twice with less than nothing and said, "I wanted to see what he was doing."  Well that almost sounded like he might have known what he was doing, but he didn't.  A few more times seat 8 asked him if he really never played before, and he always said he'd only played on his phone.

But he started getting talkative, especially with seat 8—and another fellow who wasn't saying anything (seat 9).  But he decided seat 9 was always bluffing (perhaps because he was Asian?).  In fact though, seat 9 never seemed to bluff at all.

He almost never took an aggressive action.  I think I saw him raise one time.  Oh he would sometimes make a opening bet, but he would never raise in response to a bet.  Once, he limped in, called a flop bet and maybe a small river bet.  At showdown, he showed—pocket Kings!  There was no Ace on the board and it was very dry.  Even I would have won more money with pocket Kings.  He played them like deuces.

So he would start telling the other players, "You can't call me….I got you beat, you should fold."  Sometimes that meant he had a hand, sometimes it meant he had nothing.  Or, in response to a bet, he'd say, "You don't have anything.  You're bluffing."  And he would call.  But then he would show up with nothing himself (and the other guy wasn't bluffing).  One time he called with something like 10-high.  He called a guy with two pair.  "I had to call you cuz I knew you had nothing."  Apparently he hadn't learned that 10-high isn't a good bluff-catcher.  He almost never called quietly.  It was like, "I gotta call you, you got nothing."

And sometimes he'd talk when he didn't have a hand.  Once or twice he would say, "Oh you have to call him, he doesn't have anything," when he wasn't in the hand.  Of course the dealer did warn him not to do that.  But they were going easy on him since he obviously didn't know what he was doing.

At one point when he wasn't in the hand (or maybe he was and there were multiple players) he said, "I think he's going for a straight."  The dealer didn't hear that but I think one of the other players told him he couldn't do that  Eventually he did get warned about saying too much about the hand again.

I did consider the possibility that this was all an act, and that he really knew what he was doing.  For what it's worth, I was pretty sure that wasn't the case.  Even though he kept winning the occasional small pot that kept him from busting.

Unfortunately, I remained card dead through all this, and there was enough action from the other players to prevent me from mixing in.  I finally had to leave as it was getting late, down about 3/4's of a buy-in.

Once again, I was unable to find an appropriate picture to go with this blog post, the pic above again has nothing to do with this post.  However, the site I stole borrowed it from had the headline for this pic as "Fitness model from Russia with ample bosom was the star of Instagram."  I'd like to think that a fitness model from Russia with ample bosom will always have a place on this blog.

A Nice Little Session

My most recent poker session in Ventura was short and sweet.  We had a bit of rare (for Southern California) inclement weather and as such I got to the poker room later than usual.  I had some things to do after playing so I knew it wasn't going to be a very long session.

I bought into the 1/2 game for the $100 max.  I was down about $20 when I got pocket 5's in the small blind.  It was raised to $5, which I called.  Five of us saw a flop of Ace-5-3, rainbow.  I checked, fairly certain the preflop raiser would bet.  Indeed she did—$13.  One player folded, another called.  I looked at the player behind me and she sure looked like she was going to at least call, maybe raise.  I decided to take a chance and make sure I didn't scare her off with a raise.  I flatted and indeed the last player called.

The turn was a blank and I checked again.  This time I planned on a check-raise.  The same player bet $15.  The next player folded and I made it $36.  That was a few chips more than the last player had and I couldn't see the original bettor folding for that amount.  Well, I was right that the last player shoved for a less, but the original bettor went into the tank before finally folding.

The river was another brick and she flipped over Ace-3 for two pair.  I dragged a nice pot of over $100.  Pretty good for this game.

I went card dead for a long time, then got a pair of 6's.  It was a limped pot and multi-way.  The flop was King-Queen-6 for my second set of the day.  I led out for $6 and got two callers.  But on a blank turn, my $15 bet didn't get any action.

There was a straddle and I was dealt a couple of Jacks.  I made it $12 and only the straddler called.  The flop was King-King-5.  He checked.  He was short stacked and I thought he'd only call me if he had a King.  But I suspected if I checked behind he might bet his stack on the turn.  No way he had enough to get me to fold.  So I checked and indeed on a blank turn he shoved.  It was like $12 or $14.  I called  The river was a blank and he said he didn't have anything.  I didn't bother to make him show…I showed my Jacks and took the pot.

I was in the cutoff and woke up with pocket Kings.  It folded to me.  I'd already heard one of the blinds talking about chopping.  Well the hell with that.  I only raised to $6, but the three players behind me all called. The flop was 10-10-x and it checked to me.  I bet $12 and no one called.

Ace-Jack in the small blind, a bunch of limpers and I just completed.  I bet $8 on a Jack-high flop.  One call.  Blank on the turn and I bet $15. No call.

It was time to go and I cashed out $220….for a $100 buy-in.  I'll always take a double-up.

The picture above doesn't have anything to do with this post.  If that bothers you, let me know.

Mystery Woman

This is one goes back to my October trip, taking place a few days before Halloween. I had taken the day off to play the Aria tournament. I played the tournament for about five hours, busted out 26th and didn't cash. There's nothing really to report from the tournament, I only mention it because some the people I ran into there turned up later in the evening.

After a quick dinner, I ended up at MGM for the evening. This was a Thursday night and they had their then current football promotion going on. This version was the poker parlay card where you had to fill up a card with five different hands in order to get paid.

I recognized Pokerkraut at the table I was sent to and said hello. This incident took place a few days after I had met him (see here) and recorded the opening for his vlog. But he had not used my opening yet and I had not written about our meeting yet either. He had been there for some time and had most of his card filled out. While I was there he got his fourth stamp and the football game was still going so he had a chance to fill his card out and get $400. If he completed the card after the football game was over he would only get $200. And if he didn't get his final stamp before midnight, he'd get nothing.

Well the game was winding down and Kraut made his final hand to complete the card. When he showed his hand to get the final stamp I looked up at the football game and it appeared to be over. The players were walking off the field and shaking hands. But it turned out there was still five seconds left to go in the game; it was one of those situations where there were no timeouts left, no way to stop the clock, so there was no need to run another play even though there was still time on the clock. Kraut completed his card with about five seconds to spare and got a well-deserved $400 promo payout.  He cut it about as close as you possibly could.

As soon as he got paid, he decided to take the money and run, and left game. I took over his seat because it offered a better view of the crowd that would inevitably be coming for the club later that night. I happened to look over at the podium while Kraut was cashing out and I recognized the guy he was talking to. It was a tall guy in a baseball cap who I had played with earlier that day at the Aria tournament. When he joined my table at the tournament, I knew I had seen him before, but I couldn't place him anywhere. But he was definitely somebody I had seen before. Was he a dealer from another room? Was he a player I played with before? I wasn't sure. I didn't think I'd seen him at the Aria before, but honestly, I couldn't be sure. In addition to the fact that he was tall, he stood out because he had a deep booming voice and he used it a lot, if you know what I mean.

While they were talking and while I was settling into my new seat, a woman took the seat directly across from me. She looked familiar to me as well. In fact as she sat down she even said hi to me. But I wasn't sure if that was specifically directed to me, or if she was just one of those people who says hi when they sit down at a poker table—there are people like that. I guess I was staring at her a bit trying to figure out where I knew her from, so she said to me “What?” As she said that, it suddenly hit me where I knew her from. She too had been at the Aria tournament with me earlier that day—in fact she had been at the same table with me and the tall guy that Pokerkraut was talking to. At this point I had no idea she and "Tall Guy" were connected.

So I said to her, "Oh, you were at the Aria tournament with me earlier today right?" She said yeah and said it with an inflection like duh, so apparently I was remiss in not recognizing her immediately. I asked her if she cashed and she said no, she had busted out 46th. Well I had busted out 26th, so I must have seen her bust. I pointed out Tall Guy talking to Kevin and said he was at our table too. She said yes and made it clear that they were somehow connected. So I asked if he had cashed and she told me he was the stone cold bubble. I said that sucks and she agreed. For a while I kept referring to him as the tall guy and she found that somewhat amusing. I eventually asked her what his name was and she told me, but I will not reveal that here. I'll just keep referring to him as Tall Guy. I saw that this woman was talking to another woman at a different table and I was pretty sure I recognized her as also having played the Aria tournament.

Then, while Tall Guy was still at the front talking to Pokerkraut, the woman said to me, "How about that, they're vloggers and you're a blogger." That really caught me off guard, because as far as I could tell the first time I'd ever seen this woman was earlier that day at the Aria. So I asked her, "How did you know I was a blogger?” She replied, "Because I'm smart." Well that was a little too mysterious for me and a little annoying, but try as I might I couldn't get her to tell me how she knew that I was a blogger. Furthermore, for the next hour or so she kept looking at me—not really staring but just kind of looking my way a little more than I thought you should have—and I was looking back at her, I guess because she was looking at me. So every now and then she would just see me looking at it and say, "What?"  I said, "Oh nothing," but I guess I was kind of looking at her to see if I could recognize her and try to figure out how that she would know that I had a blog.

The other interesting thing was her line, "They're bloggers." I assumed at the time she meant Kraut and Tall Guy. So maybe I had seen Tall Guy in a vlog—maybe he's a vlogger? As I mentioned before though, I don't actually watch too many vlogs. But I suspected that maybe that's how I recognize Tall Guy.

Of course I knew there was a possibility that Pokerkraut had told her that I was a blogger, but for some reason I just didn't think that was the most likely scenario initially. As I mentioned earlier, I had just met Kraut a few days earlier and he hadn't known about my blog until I told him about it, and he hadn't published the vlog with my intro, so I figured he wouldn't necessarily even think much of the fact that I was a blogger.

At one point, seemingly out of the blue, she looked at me and said, "Don't write about me." I said to her, "How can I? I don't even know your name?" (as if that's ever stopped me!) She laughed and said, "Yeah, we're going to keep it that way." So any chance I of finding out who she was left the building. Actually I think this was all pretty much a game to her and she was just enjoying keeping me in the dark about how she knew what she knew. But since she was so intent on driving me crazy and also on not having me write about her, well obviously I have to write about her. That's why I'm doing this post!

So at one point during the game, a dealer pushed in who I barely recognized. I think I've seen him maybe one other time before. But the woman obviously knew the dealer and started telling him about this home game sheet runs regularly. Apparently she has a couple of poker tables in her house and they have a regular game every week or two and they run tournaments, with the eventual prize being a Main Event seat to next year's World Series. She was really talking this guy up trying to get him to commit to being one of their dealers at the game, talking about how much money he can make and how it's a great gig and she even serves food and she's a good cook and he'd really enjoy it and make a little money. He could even drink on the job. So then the woman took out a card from her purse and handed it to him while he was dealing and said to give her a call or send her an email. But she put the card on the table face down and said to him, "Don't let him (meaning me) see this card! I don't want him to know my name." I laughed at this and said, ”I'm just going to refer to you as 'Mystery Woman', but it'll be worse than if I knew your name."  She laughed.

Mystery Woman at least gave me a really good "woman said" at one point. As I mentioned, it was a club night and it was just a few days till Halloween. I was kind of hoping that people would start showing up in costumes. A few did, but not many. But at one point Mystery Woman said to the entire table, "Did you see that?" Nobody knew she was talking about, so she explained. "There was this girl in a babydoll nightie with the back totally rolled up and you could see her entire ass." She really emphasized the word "ass." Damn, how the hell did I miss that?

During all this, did I play any poker, I hear you ask? Yes I did, but it was a pretty boring session. There weren't really any noteworthy hands, and I had a slightly losing session. I got only one stamp on the parlay card, and I hung around until midnight but didn't get called for the drawing. Sorry to disappoint those of you who love my hand histories, but I don't have any for you this post. Basically I'm telling the story because I know Mystery Woman didn't want me to.

I never officially learned Mystery Woman's name, but I did manage to see it on the Bravo screen in front of the dealer because I was sitting next to the dealer. I won't reveal the name, but it didn't really help me identify her at all. I also heard her call her female friend (at the next table over) Christin. But I left for the evening not knowing how Mystery Woman knew anything about me.

It was driving me a little crazy afterwards that I hadn't figured out how I knew Mystery Woman or Tall Guy and how this odd woman knew me, or at least knew that I was a blogger.  By now I was assuming that she did indeed get this information from Pokerkraut, but I wanted to confirm it. I did in fact email Pokerkraut sometime later and asked him for some details.

However, before I heard back from him, I watched a couple of his latest vlogs and found out some info on my own.  I saw that friend of Mystery Woman, Christin, on one or two, and Kevin identified her as a vlogger from Ireland (although she is actually German). You can find her twitter account here and her Youtube page here.  I'm using her real name because I'm sure as a vlogger, she wants all the publicity she can get.  As a result of seeing her on Pokerkraut's vlogs, I checked out some of her videos and they are well worth watching.

And that explained Mystery Woman's line, "They're vloggers, you're a blogger."  By "they" she didn't mean Kevin and Tall Guy, she meant Kevin and Christin.

And in one of Kevin's videos, I saw Tall Guy.  He was with a woman whose face Kraut took great pains to cover with an animated smiley face. I assumed it was Mystery Woman.  She really does have a fetish about keeping her identity a secret!

When I did hear back from Pokerkraut, he wouldn't say much about Mystery Woman other than that she was actually Tall Guy's wife.  But he did tell me that Tall Guy used to work as a dealer in a certain poker room in Vegas.  And that finally solved that mystery.  The room he used to work, which I won't name, is one I used to play in a lot until a few years back.  And as soon I learned that, my brain immediately placed in that room—that's why he looked familiar!

In fact, as my memory finally kicked in, I could actually remember bits and pieces of a story Tall Guy had told us back when he dealt at that room.  Don't remember the whole story, but it had something to do with him getting involved in a huge traffic jam either coming back to Vegas from L.A or vice versa.  So strange how the memory works (or doesn't).

Anyway, that's the story of Mystery Woman. Still mostly a mystery to me…but then most women are.