When Lloyd the Floorman announced they were about to start a new $1/$2 "Low Limit No Limit" table he might as well have just said, "Hey, take a twenty out of your wallet and burn it for me, wont cha?"
Without so much as a by-your-leave, both Worn Hat and Claude Rains immediately stood up and went over to stand around and wait while they set up the new table. I was a little surprised; after all, Worn Hat had been on an Uber Heater only a couple hands before, but I could tell watching him that he never even considered staying at the Stud table.
With the Mumbling Frowner having been crushed like a bug during The Attack of the Hilton Sisters, that left only three of us at the Stud table. Our dealer, sensing a window of opportunity, instantly asked the Large Woman (whose stacks I'd just replenished to what looked like just about her original buy-in) "Do you want to continue?"
Much to my surprise, the Large Woman immediately looked at Trembler and pointedly said, "I don't want to play three-handed, do you?"
I don't know for a fact that these two were married, but he sure picked up on her body language and verbal clues like they were... and then he quietly answered, "Naw."
They began racking up their chips, while I was scratching and shaking my head... and the
Much to my chagrin, my crafty ploy of calling two $6 bets to make a statement to the table had become a completely wasted effort.
Remember, this is NO ANTE, NO BLIND Stud. It is free to play unless you decide you have a hand and voluntarily throw some chips into the pot! I guess they were afraid they were going to miss bed-check at the home, or something...
With the Stud table broken, I was back where I'd started when I wandered into Your Place for the Best in Live Poker! in the first place: do I play $4/$8 with a short stack, or $1/$2 No Limit... with a MANDATORY short stack?
A quick survey of the people sitting down at the newly-launched $1/$2 game made the decision for me. There were at least two who appeared slightly drunkish, Claude Rains was a known quantity, and the attitude and all the comments from Worn Hat had me convinced that he had "ATM" written all over him (assuming the Queen storm had blown over, of course.)
Not knowing how long the waiting list for NLHE had become while I was playing Stud, I asked Lloyd if the new table was full. He said, "Well let's see, one, two, three..." as he began to literally count the people sitting at the table OUT LOUD while pointing at each seat as he did it.
Uh, thanks pal, I'll take it from here.
The 10 seat and the 2 seat appeared to be open, but when I got to the 2 seat there was Zippo lighter sitting on the felt; someone had already taken that seat. I hate the 1 and 10 seats, but I guess someone has to sit in 'em...
A new dealer was sitting in the box, waiting for someone to unlock the chip tray. I told him I was taking the seat, but that I needed to go buy some more chips. He gave me a weird look but didn't say anything, so off I went.
When I got back with my $40 in red $5 chips, Lloyd was struggling with the key to the chip box, but he got it open after a couple of whacks to the case. I sat down, adding the chips to my stacks of $1 whites... and realized two important things immediately...
The first was that no one counted my stack up when I got back from the cage. I think I could easily have brought down another $60 or $70 or $80 worth of mixed colors from the Cashier. When everyone else had $100 max, I would have had an extra $30, or $40, or $50...
The second thing I realized was that I had just short-stacked myself! While I started with $60 on the Stud table, I had won a $2 raise-and-take-it hand but lost a $38 hand (my ill-fated Aces-Up hand.) When I rushed up to the Cashier cage, I bought enough to bring my total chip buy for the night up to the $100 max for the table... but forgot to add in the $36 I was stuck!
There are times when a man is prepared to look stupid, but sitting down with a bunch of strangers at a poker table with the clear intention of taking their money away is NOT one of them - at least not for me.
I also intended to play pretty damn tight unless this $1/$2 table turned out to be the only one I'd ever seen that didn't play loose as hell. Given my fear of looking silly and my intention to play tight, I convinced myself that I was OK sitting with only $64, at least until I knew I was going to need/want more...
It's so sad when a man let's his Macho drive, ain't it?
As the first hand at the new table was dealt, I took a look around the table to see who I was up against:
Seat 1 - a guy in his 30's who never spoke the entire night.
Seat 2 - Zippo guy, an active and very aggressive player.
Seat 3 - a twenty-something guy also wearing a ball cap.
Seat 4 - a young lady with a determined look in her eyes.
Seat 5 - a young blond guy with a smirk that never left his fact.
Seat 6 - Worn Cap and his big stack. He brought his chips over from the Stud table, and as I suspected, no one counted them out to make sure he didn't exceed the max buy in.
Seat 7 - a boisterous late 30's/early 40's guy named Ralph with a quick wit.
Seat 8 - a guy in his late 30's who talked college hoops the whole time.
Seat 9 - Claude Rains from the Stud table.
Seat 10 - Your Narrator and Guide for the evening.
The dealer pitched a card in front of everyone, the young lady won the button, and the dealer re-shuffled and dealt the first hand. The tone for the evening was immediately clear; fold to Worn Cap who limped, Ralph made a joke and limped too, it folded to Zippo who threw out enough chips to raise it... to $35.
$35. Into a $7 pot.
Everyone folded except Worn Hat, who surprised everyone and flat called. Flop came out with three small cards and two clubs. Worn Hat bet $20, and Zippo shoved his stack into the pot.
Remember, this is the FIRST HAND.
Worn Hat calls without any hesitation. No one noticed that while Zippo's all-in bet left him, as you might expect, with no chips, when Worn Hat called he still had a couple pretty big stacks left behind.
Zippo flips over a 6 of Clubs and a 4 of Spades, matching two of the cards on the flop for Two Pair. Worn Hat flips over the Ace and 5 of Clubs for... nothing but a bare flush draw.
The Turn hits no one, but the River is the Jack of Clubs, giving Worn Hat his first flush of the evening.
You may suppose from the use of the word "first" that this was not the only flush he had that evening. Such a surmise might be the second biggest understatement since the dawn of time.
With a few minor exceptions here and there, this was pretty much how most of the next hour went:
Huge over-raises by Zippo, who actually built quite a stack a couple of times from hitting his preposterous starting hands against players with, y'know, big pairs and soooted high cards and junk like that.
Crushing beats from Worn Hat who played any two soooted and simply refused to be bet off of any flush draw no matter how much Zippo (or anyone else) bet. He hit a flush on the Turn or the River. Over. And. Over.
Zippo took his beats without a flinch, hopping up and running upstairs to the Cashier to get another $100 stack, usually only missing one or two hands in the process.
Others were a little less resilient, and Ralph, particularly, commented about Hat's insane flush chases... but not about Zippo's bizarre overbets, I noticed.
It didn't take long to figure out why he was all over Hat's case but ignoring Zippo.
When the guy in Seat 8 was finally felted trying to play normal poker with this one-ring circus going on, the determined young lady in Seat 4 - who'd proven to be a pretty good player, taking shots from time to time to see if she could get Zippo's stack and staying the hell out of hands with Worn Hat - asked for a seat change, saying "I don't want to have to sit next to my brother anymore."
Turned out that the blond guy with the smirk was her brother, and making it known to the table prompted Ralph to laugh loudly and exclaim, "Wow, you play with your brother? So do I!" while pointing over at... Zippo.
Watching from then on made it clear that the siblings were staying out of hands with each other. Makes sense, I suppose, if only because they have to sit around the Thanksgiving table together...
I'd actually played a couple of hands myself during all this, but missed every flop completely with drawing hands and was forced to fold JJ in a non-Zippo/non-Hat hand when Claude Rains appeared from nowhere with a pot-sized bet on the Ace-high flop.
After a while my stack had dwindled down to about $50. It was getting to be late, and it was pretty clear that Zippo and Worn Hat both were planning on hanging around for a long time. I was in the Big Blind, and I decided as the cards were coming out that I was going to play another orbit and then get out of Dodge.
It folds around - even Zippo and Worn Hat both fold - to Ralph in the Cutoff, who raises it to $7. The determined young lady who moved seats is on the Button, and she smooth calls the raise. Claude Rains in the Small Blind thinks... and then raises it to $28.
I say, "Jesus! I don't even want to look," peek at my cards and find, believe it or not... two red Queens.
I'd played so tight that I was pretty sure if I raised I would lose at least one and possibly both of the people between me and the Invisible Man. I'd never seen HIM fold, once he was committed to a hand, though...
I thought about it some, and decided that even though I wasn't able grind out a profit as I'd hoped, I did get some serious entertainment out of the trip, and sometimes, you just have to grit your teeth and hope for the best.
So, I put my stack into the pot and said those fateful words... "I Ore Eeen."
The dealer counted it out and said, "All In for $48 total." Ralph folded so fast I believe he created a vacuum where he cards used to be; then the determined young lady looked at her cards again, and she too, mucked.
Claude Rains peeked at his cards, and then said, "No choice I guess, I call" and flipped over Big Slick, suited in clubs.
The dealer, who'd been competent but not especially engaged in the game, suddenly came to life and whipped out the Flop, Turn and River so fast the entire board was out before I finished flipping over my Queens.
As I double- and then triple- checked the board, I found that, for once, I'd managed to dodge six outs and win the hand!
It turned out, of course, that he really only had three outs. Worn Hat claimed he folded a King, and both Ralph and the determined young lady claimed they folded an Ace.
I stacked up my $90 in chips and waited for the Blinds to come around, never seeing two cards above and 8 for the whole orbit. When the Big Blind was going to hit me next, I folded my 94o, stood up and said "I'm done!"
Total damage for the night: six or seven bucks for beers (they can't give you free drinks, it's Missouri remember) and a couple more for tokes (hard to toke much when you win maybe three hands all night.)
At least, that's what I thought... until I got to my car and realized I'd forgotten to get my parking ticket validated at the casino. So, $7 for beer, $3 for tokes, plus the $5 stupidity tax for forgetting the validation.
Quite the entertainment extravaganza for a mere $15, don't cha think?
~ Fini ~
Noice!
ReplyDeleteI've payed a stupidity tax or two in my day as well!
Zerb, gotta say you are by far one of the best story-tellers! I was rolling on the floor, and I love the side bars. Sounds like a surreal experience....
ReplyDelete