Live Poker: Day 5
August 25, 2007 Posted by Tyler CruzLast night was my 5th day at the casino. I’ve still been keeping my promise to myself of working 6-hours before heading out. This has resulted with PokerForum.org (PFO) getting a lot of improvements and work done from me. I feel good about all the work and time I’ve been putting into the site since I’ve neglected it for far too long.
I left for the casino to play slot online a bit earlier than usual yesterday as it was Friday which is always a very popular night for gamblers. Many top sportsbooks provide improved odds on various markets to attract more players who come with the thought of making higher profits by placing apuesta deportiva. I believe I got there around 7 or so, and saw 5-6 players there already. A couple of them were regulars, but I’ve now put the regulars into two groups: the good and the bad. There are only 4-5 good regulars, but about 15-20 bad regulars… I just thought I’d mention that so it’d be understood that when I say “regular” from now on it doesn’t necessarily mean a good player. Those who need to win cash with the speculating ability must try playing the shalimar game.
Anyhow, one of the good players, Dennis, was there, and so I quickly took the chair to his left. Dennis, who I may start calling Muscles, is a talkative, energetic guy with a type of short mohawk (think Chuck Lidell), muscles, and plenty of tattoos which are easily seen with the wifebeaters he wears. I think Muscles liked my company because he sure had a good time talking to me. I was surprised, he must be around 50 or so because he was telling me how he went to two Led Zepplin concerts in ’72, and had two kids, one who is 33. It’s crazy because this guy could pass for 35! He had his headphones on most of the night and would ‘sing’ most of the night and tap the table as he got into his musc.
Anyhow, Muscles is a good player. He made a number of bluffs, which worked almost everytime (he showed) but from what I’ve seen so far is a pretty solid player. He’s a bit too loose, but still good. He made his way up past $500 today, and the first day I went to the casino I think he had $650 or so. So, my decision of having him on my right was great since while he could play loose post-flop sometimes, he was pretty conversative agaist me since he respects me.
Another difference I’ve noticed between live and online play at New Casinos is that postion seems to matter so much more in person. Now, this shouldn’t be the case at all.. because position is position… but I simply find it making such a bigger deal live. I think one of the reasons why is becuase, especally in an environment like the one I’m in where there are only two poker tables, is that there are so many regulars. Online at sbobet88 you’ll see regulars too, but 90% of the players are one-timers who you don’t know how they play. When I’m playing at the casino, I know exactly how each regular plays, which makes me feel so much more confident, and makes postion matter more. As long as I have the good regulars on my right (or bad regulars who are rocks), I have all the advantage in the world.
Now let me share a couple “poker stories” that are particularly interesting. The first is from two days ago. A new player sat down at the table, he looked Vietnamese to me, and had absolutely no idea how to play. Now, I don’t just mean he was bad or crazy, but he literally had no idea how to play. What’s stranger, is that he didn’t appear to care.
He lost his first $200 in probably 15-minutes, went to reload his card, and came back to the table. He’d call on the river in a $160 post with ten high, and whenever he lost, he was always polite and said “Good… good” in his very heavy accent. He wasn’t angry or anything, in fact he seemed happy-go-lucky. Yet, at the same time it didn’t seem like he was celebrating an event and just gambling off money or anything.. he seemed like he just… wanted to play.
He would be in a hand, have a straight or trips, and bet $2! Just because he didn’t know how to use the calculator yet (When you want to enter a bet bigger than min or double, you just manually enter it then hit the bet/raise button) or didn’t know how to play. He’d have a full house and bet $2!
Every 30-40 minutes he would lose all his cash, reload his card, and come back and reload. I started to feel really sorry for the guy because he just had no clue what he was doing. But there wasn’t really anything I could do to help him. I just hope that he’s some rich guy who owns a big company, because when the night was done he had lost around $800. Keep in mind that this is only a $1/2 table!
I should sell lessons at the casino. I’d charge $200 per hour of teaching. It’d definitely be worth it. In 1-hour I could teach anyone enough priceless information that makes $200 a bargain. I dunno.. I just wish I could have helped that Asian guy.. he was nice and I just wish he could have got more fun out of his $800.
My other story happened last night and I still feel bad about it. I was on a little run and played KTo with about 5 people in the hand. The flop went 2, T, 7 with two diamonds and so I led out to bet around the pot which was $11. However, I accidentally hit $111 which then immediately made the chip splash sound on the table, to which I immedately sceamed “Shit!”. This is one of the downsides to digital tables… you’d never have this problem live.
Now, things could have been worse, I mean, I did have top pair wth a decent kicker, and $111 is a lot for somebody to call so they would have to have something big. However, I did yell “Shit!” which made my mistake obvious. The first player folded. Good. The second player folded. Great. The third player thought for a few seconds, but then folded. Whew. The fourth player folded. Nice. Then it was on Tammy. She gave me the strangest look, like I was caught stealing cookies or begging on the street. It was a look of pity and anger.
She said “I have something. Do you have a hand?” to which I replied “I have something but nothing warranting a $111 bet on the flop”.
She thought about it for a little bit and we exchanged a few more words which I can’t recall word-for-word. She said she had a set, 777 and asked what I had. I told her KT and she folded telling another player at the table “I’ve played with him enough to know that he didn’t mean to do that.” I mean, I obviously didn’t mean to bet $111, that was very clear, but SHE FOLDED A SET! I can not believe she did that. I immediately showed her my cards out of respect and told her I owed her one, but I mean damn. Think about it. She flopped a set on a board of 2 T 7, with a pot of around $125 and ‘mistake bet’ of $111, just because she knew it was an accident. Not only did she spare me of losing my $111, but she gave up the pot that she would have inevitably won from me.
I felt really bad after that hand, and still do, because I don’t know… that is just a very…. difficult thing to do. I don’t know what I’d do if I was in her situation. If it was a good regular I’d probably ask if it was indeed an accident and might fold, but only after showing them my cards. But to be honest I really don’t know what I’d have done. If it was against anyone else I’d call, but not against a good regular out of respect. But one thing is for sure – I definitely owe Tammy one.
It’s a fine line though, because otherwise it’s a form of collusion or soft-playing, so it’s hard to offer or ask for $20 for example.
I stayed until closing time last night (2 am) and at one point had close to a $400 stack, but had to forfeit it when I left the table to grab some grub at the casino restaurant. I actually sat out and would run back to the table every 15-minutes to sit back in and then back out to get another 20-minutes of sit-out time, but I must have timed it wrong because when I returned one trip, my seat was taken 🙁 I ended up having to wait an hour for a seat to come free, which really sucked (I played on www.nonukcasinos.uk latest Netent casinos while waiting though) and had to buy back in again at $200, so I lost my advantage of having a large stack.
Anyhow, that’s the update. I’ll be back playing at a casino online gratis sin descargar sin deposito tonight, can’t wait 🙂
Always an interesting read… and dang you were lucky that she folded on that bet. Although I suppose it could never happen when you are playing with real chips, so it’s one of the downsides of using a computer.
I know that this is your blog and you can essentially do what you want on it. But dont you think you are losing focus talking about poker here? It’d be awsome content for PFO, but not for a web entrepreneur site.
Yea Tyler please stay on topic, like once in a blue moon this post would be good but every week.
I am not that into poker to be honest, frankly I despise it. Having that said, the black berry thing sounded fun. Hehe
Wow a long post atleast you had fun
Of course you don’t actually know if they had the set or not – they could just be saying that 😉
Greg
Linux Poker
She showed me…
Hi Tyler. I’ve been reading your blog for about 4-months now. I enjoy it because of your personality and questions and trial and error situations. So thanks.
One thing I noticed in this post is that you have a common underlying language pattern. You said you “wished” you could have helped the asian gentleman at the table with poker. And that you felt a bit bad about the woman who folded on your $111 mistake.
But Tyler! You CAN do something. For some reason, as of late, it seems like the word “can’t” or a mindframe of “can’t” has crept into your vocabulary. I just wanted to give you a heads up as it’s something I’ve noticed. It’s obviously up to you to further recognize or reject. I just wanted to bring it to your attention.
They say that wise people take rebuke or correction (or similar things), which people lacking wisdom get angry and reject any notion like this. So with that in mind, I decided I’d tell you and let you decide for yourself.
Anyway, you CAN help them. You CAN do all of these things. Do it! 🙂
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Tyler, let me know if you can commiserate.
Last night I go to the casino with $100 on a 1-2 no-limit table. I’m limping in all the time just to see if I catch something. I’m down to about $60 so I start taking things seriously.
The next hand starts. I have Ace-spades & Ace-Diamonds. The flop comes up 3-spade, 5-spade, 7-spade. The idiot that I am, I go all in. I wanted to scare out everybody who might be looking to draw. Unfortunately the one guy has K-spade, 2-spade.
Ugh…
Of course no more spades came.
Would you have done the same thing?
Well you’re missing a lot of information your not telling me, but:
Did you limp in with the AA or did you raise it properly PF? You have to raise AA, slowplaying it is only asking for trouble.
Why did you sit with only $100 on a NL200 table? 1/2 should have a $200 max buy-in, and you should ALWAYS sit with the maximum. It’s not even up for debate.
Normally I’d say your push on the flop was horrible, but you’re probably +ev because you do have a made hand, and a nut flush draw with 35% of hitting it, and then of course with your fold equity, you’re goign to profit from that in the long run unless your opponant is a TAG (Tight aggressive) player.
Anyhow, you missing a lot of information there but that’s my answer 😉
Okay, back to work!
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