In, Out, No Regrets
Wednesday, June 15, 2005
I played a last-minute game at Hole's house last night after my plans for the evening fell through. Poker at Hole's was like good sex: in, out, and no regrets. For the night, I won $49 and a much needed confidence boost. The game was short-handed, which is my personal preference. At the maximum, we had six players. The table was arranged thusly:
Seat 1: Robbie Hole, an aggressive player that is willing to call down bets with Q9 high when he thinks you are bluffing. He's the Captain Planet of poker because of his one-man anti-littering campaign.
Seat 2: Randle Cunningham, a player who will play any cards and has the will to keep firing bets. Randy is the king of action. He's put me on tilt on more than one occassion by setting me up with a bluff that got lucky and finishing me off a short while later with agressive play and a legitimate hand.
Seat 3: David Roose, my pick for Most Improved Player of the Year and the dark horse of poker. Roose has the uncanny ability to always seem to be losing, even when he is taking everybody's money. He was the big winner of the night, and called my hand exactly on two occassions.
Seat 4: Jefferson Hole, younger brother of Robbie Hole, and newbie to our brand of 'anal poker', aka casino rules poker. Jefferson has potential, and I hope he learned a lot playing from us sharks. I think he plays in a much looser, friendlier game, one in which I must infiltrate and suck dry!
Seat 5: Ilan, who showed up late, and proceeded to catch nothing on the board. Overall though, he ended up $10, which is not bad considering his early luck.
Seat 6: Me, Jordan from High On Poker, his Highness himself, the Paragon of Poker, the Sultan of the Steal, Weilder of Hammers, and Exaggerator of Self-Grandeur. I played extremely well last night, playing individual players accordingly, and making some key laydowns.
It was the usual structure. $20 buy-in, .25/.50 blinds.
[Note: I can't promise that my recollection of hands is perfect. I don't take notes because I get enough crap from Roose for my blog, even though he secretly loves it. So, Roose and Hole, if you see any errors, please correct them in the comments. While you are at it, feel free to post any memorable hands that I omit.]
QcJc was the hand of the night. I won big with it early on when I flopped a straight draw. I think I was the button. I raised it to $2 pre-flop, hoping to show strength for a late steal. The board was KTT, and Roose and Jefferson were still in the hand. The hand was checked around. The next card was a blank. Someone bet $2 or so. I called because of the amount of chips on the table. The river was an Ace. I hit the straight, and I knew that someone had that Ace. It was raised minimally to me. Maybe it was one or two dollars. I raise it to $6 total, which is a large amount given that we all start with $20 and this was one of the first hands. I think I had one caller, Jefferson. Roose was smart enough to fold. He played smart all night...damn him.
During the game, Roose kept goading me about the hammer (27o). Besides Hole, no one knew what he was talking about, and they didn't seem to care either. When I got the hammer on the button, I didn't have a choice. I had to play it. I raised to $3 pre-flop, after all players limped in. At this point, Ilan had yet to arrive. I had Jefferson on tilt because of some aggressive betting prior to this hand. He was playing loosely, and I had a good read on him. Overall, he has the building blocks of a good player. But he was green. So green that on one hand, he thought his full house lost to Robbie's flush. Anyway, all fold to Jefferson, and Jefferson calls. The flop was a rainbow, high card J. Jefferson checked. I raised $6. I wanted that damn pot. Jefferson thought for a while, and I was nervous as hell. He eventually folded, and I threw down my Hammer, face-up. Hammer Time!! The hammer was revealed. Roose and Hole got a kick out of it, and the other players finally started paying attention to all of this "hammer" talk. I later found out that Jefferson had 4d5d. So, in fact, I was ahead. Go figure.
I got the hammer again on Ilan's first hand. I was UTG+1. Ilan had to post as UTG. I raised pre-flop to $2 or $2.50 total. Everyone folded to Jefferson, the BB. He called. Ilan, who was looking for action, called as well. The flop was another disaster. It was checked to me, and I raised $6. Do you see the problem? I was doing the exact same thing as my last Hammer hand. Jefferson reluctantly folded. Ilan thought it over. All the while, Roose looked across the table at me and was pounding his big fist on the table, as if he had a hammer. I shot looks at him that were supposed to say, SHUT UP!! Apparently, the message he got was, KEEP GOING!! I finally gave in to his looks and shot a wink over at him. I knew at this point that Ilan was too busy looking at his chips or cards to give me a look. Ilan laid it down, and I asked Dave to make the announcement. "Hammer?" was Roose's first words. Then he realized he was dead-on. "HAMMER TIME!" I preceded to do a little MC Hammer dance in my chair, while Ilan grumbled to my right. Sorry Ilan. Just another casualty of the Hammer. Nice job Dave. You really impressed me. It was kind of obvious, but you were the only one taking the time and effort to put 2 and 2 together. Thats the sign of a serious player. Congrats, Roose.
A little while later, I had Ac7c. I was in late position, and raised to $1.50. Robbie Hole called. I think Jefferson did, too. The flop was 8c7h3c. I hit mid pair and a nut-flush draw. I raised $3 or so. Hole called. The next card out was an Ace. I checked. Hole bet $2. I raised it to $7. He folded. After joking around at the table, I said I had Ac7c. Apparently, Roose called my hand. I didn't hear him say it, but Roose wouldn't BS. So, DAMN! That Roose is making strides.
Hole got me back later. I had Q2. He had Q9. Neither of us hit anything, on a board that included an Ace and a bunch of mid or low cards. At the end, I made a $2-4 bet, hoping to steal the pot. He called me. Again, he had me read perfectly. Kudos to him.
I can't remember much else. In one hand, I had KQ. I remained the aggressor throughout. I hit my K on the flop. The turn was a blank. The river was another K and I reraise Roose from his $2 bet to $7 or more. He looked at me and said, you are acting like you have the King. I must pat myself on the back here. I knew that Roose had been playing extremely well. He wasn't just looking at his cards, but was really studying the other players. He also knows that I am a crafty mutha. I wanted to make my King obvious, so that he would think that I was bluffing. He called. I told him he was right, I was acting like I had the K...because I DID have it. Sucka!
There were some other interesting hands, including one in which I raised $10 on top of Hole's $5 when we were heads up. I think he took that hand down, but it must have traumatized me, because I've blacked out the details.
Roose was the big winner of the night, even though he kept on pointing out how big MY stack was, and acting all indignant when I'd point back at his. I didn't lose any devastating hands, and I didn't need to get lucky on any hands either. I made the best of my hands, and laid down the losers, such as one hand in which I had 99 and the board was K776. Roose made a big raise. He could have been bluffing, but I had him on the K. He had K7 and cleaned out Ilan's first buy-in.
Good times! I can't wait for next week's Desi game. I also jusy got $10 free in my Empire Poker account. I have no idea why, but it's great, since I can play outside of the limit challenge without complicated math to keep my limit challenge bankroll separate. I have to get some work done, so I'm out. Enjoy people. Poker away!
posted by Jordan @ 3:09 PM,
1 Comments:
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At 12:35 PM,
TripJax said...
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I love betting the hammer exactly the same way twice (whether I win or not) and showing it a couple of times. Then when I get a monster I bet it the exact same way as before and destroy people. It's a beautiful thing.
Good post...gotta love playing with greenies...
TripJax
