Money Hater

The action of any poker hand is like a conversation. By checking, betting, calling, raising or folding, each player is making a statement. What that statement is often depends on many things; what the player holds, what the previous action was, what the player thinks his opponents have, etc. But it also depends greatly on who the player is. Two players may play the same hand the same way but for two completely different reasons.

For example, two good players may play the following hand (what the player is likely stating with their action will be in italics):

preflop

utg folds my hand sucks, utg1 raises i like my hand, 2 more folds this dealer is kill me all the days, button 3bets i care not that you are fond of your holding my friend, blinds fold these hands suck, initial raiser now 4bets i have a big one my good man and i ain’t scared of you at all , so thank you for 3betting button calls shit, i just have two jacks. i hope it comes AQ9 so I can fold this hand.

flop: 833r

utg1 bets i still got your ass, button calls this really sucks. i hope a jack comes.

turn: A

utg1 bets i am not worried that you have an ace in your hand, button folds thank god, now i beat nothing and can safely fold.

From a poker perspective, this is a reasonable dialogue that any skilled player could see unfolding given the way the hand played out. With many very bad players, however, the conversation becomes significantly more vague, and often utterly absurd, not unlike listening to a blithering Ronald Reagan during his twilight years.

I witnessed a few interesting chats this evening at my local card establishment. I have attempted to translate for you what these players are most likely saying with their actions given their hands, what they think about their opponents’ actions up to this point and what they think their opponents have.

preflop

I raise UTG with two black jacks i have a good hand and i know you guys will call and put in money bad here, utg1 coldcalls hey look, i have A5o, if an ace comes, i’ll have a pair of aces. yippee. utg2 coldcalls i am wearing sunglasses and was born with a silver spoon up my ass, thus i can call with whatever random shitbox i have, mp1 coldcalls i also am wearing sunglasses, and have A7o. i have been playing for months, and have yet to figure out that when one calls with a shitty ace like this, one often loses a big pot when the other guy has AK, or wins a small pot when he check/folds the turn with two tens. i also repeatedly burn my hands on the stovetop, for I have yet to figure out that it is really fucking hot, BB calls pot odds

flop: Q86 with 2 clubs

BB checks i don’t have anything, I bet i have two jacks and i don’t think you idiots have anything utg1 calls sometimes i forget to feed my gerbil and he dies. his name is stanley. utg2 folds my hand sucks, mp1 calls i sometimes wet my bed.

turn: (3 players) A of diamonds

I bet no way you guys are dumb enough to have an ace here, utg1 calls i wish i could talk to birds mp1 raises (blank stare) i fold wow you really are that dumb. god i hate losing to these dipshits, utg1 calls if i could fly like birds, i’d fly high.

river: 2

utg1 checks i like trains mp checks hooked on phonics is hard

One other hand I saw may be one of the more hilarious I have seen in quite some time.

preflop

utg raises i have a good hand, mp coldcalls i have 2 cards, mp1 coldcalls i have 66, blinds fold we have nothing

flop TT2r

utg bets my AJcc is the best hand, mp calls holy shit, i called with T2hh and it come TT2, better make some sloooowplay mp1 raises i have the best hand, utg calls ok, i know i’m behind, mp calls on tuesdays veronica takes me to the park

turn: 3 putting two clubs on the board

utg checks awesome, now i have a flush draw and two overcards, mp checks (more blank staring, now with mouth 1/2 open) mp1 bets if i had the best hand on the flop, i gotta still have the best hand. this is the last bet i’m putting into this pot utg calls i sure hope a club comes mp calls what?

river: 4c

utg checks i’m gonna check raise. i called the flop raise because i didn’t think he had a T, for if he did i could never call that flop as i have absolutely nothing. but now since it is what i want him to have, i’m gonna change my mind and assume he does indeed have a T. mp checks up to this point in the hand, every decision i have made was in the incorrect one. why on earth would I suddenly play good now? mp1 checks nothing i beat calls.

In my last 200 hours of play in this game, I am in the red. Wow.

I have been in LA at the Commerce Casino for the past few days. It is always a bit of culture shock when I get back here. In Minnesota we have to be kind to each other and to the dealers at the poker table. Raise your voice; use the F-bomb; toss a card; do any of these and you’re getting warned. If the floorperson has to talk to you again, you’re probably getting tossed for at least 24 hours. This is not the case at Commerce. Berating each other is commonplace, and verbally assaulting the dealer in a variety of tongues happens so frequently that most dealers and players have become numb to it.

It seems that many view the dealer as some klutzy messenger for the Goddess of Luck (who, according to what I can glean from a 3 second Google search, is called ‘Fortuna’). When they lose a pot, it is not because (a) they play bad or (b) Fortuna determined that another person was to win that pot or (c) they just play really bad. No. It is because the dealer put the wrong cards out there. Why the dealer put the wrong cards out there is not known, but they surely messed up somewhere along the line. When these people win, well, it is only because the dealer did not screw up Fortuna’s intention. They seem to feel that they are supposed to win every single pot.

When the dealers are constantly screwing up Fortuna’s will, the player is not without hope. He has a variety of tactics at his disposal, and he is not afraid to use them. One of the most common is the ’set-up’. When a player calls for a new ’set-up’, he is asking that the decks in play be replaced with two new decks. To the untrained eye, the new decks look just like the old decks. Actually, they look the same to the trained eye as well, but that is not relevant. We are not dealing with rational beings.

Another tactic is the ’scramble’. At the end of a hand, the dealer has all of the cards face-down in an unruly mess. Usually the dealer collects the cards into a nice, brick-like pile and places them into the shuffle machine. If someone asks for ’scramble’, however, the dealer pushes the cards all over the table by making circular motions with his hands, in effect shuffling them, before picking them up and putting them in the shuffle machine.

Sometimes there is no flop, and so the hand ends very quickly. Often when this happens, the dealer will shuffle the cards by hand instead of waiting for the machine to finish shuffling the other deck. Many do not trust the dealers to shuffle the cards properly, and thus will request ‘no hand job’ from the dealer. So, we all wait for the machine to finish shuffling the other deck.

I had experienced all of these methods of thwarting the evil dealers in my previous Commerce excursions, but I was about to experience something new and perhaps even weirder.

A few days ago there was a regular in the 100/200 game who was running good. Another player at the table, who was not faring so well, requested that the dealer ‘make good scrambooooool’ after one of the hands. The regular objected. I thought all hell was going to break loose. One guy is losing, and thus thinks that the dealer is a bumbling idiot who is misinterpreting Fortuna’s intentions. The other is running hotter than the sun, and thus thinks this dealer is some sort of savant and wants nothing to disturb the rhythm between the dealer and Fortuna. To my utter surprise, nothing happened. It turns out that one is indeed allowed to object to a scramboooool. One objection is not enough to stop the scramboooool, but two objections and the scrambooooling will cease. I was shocked to see that both parties knew and understood this, and were content to defer to this rule. I guess they understand that they may be on the other side of things someday, and thus want equal protection. The next day that is exactly what happened.

The regular was blowing his brains and, being the wily little gamboooler that he is, used all of the resources at his disposal. He changed seats repeatedly. He called for set-ups. He told dealer ‘no hand job’. He even asked for scramboool, but when he did 3 people who had played with him the previous day spitefully (and to my sheer delight) objected. There would be no scramboooool to save this guy. He went on to lose over $20k.

Karma’s a bitch.