Soaring Eagle Trip Report - Pretty Boring

[crockett]

For anyone who might care I’ll give a brief trip report on the Casino.

Arrived around 1 PM on Saturday afternoon and signed up for 3/6 limit. I sat down about 2 PM. Played for four hours and ended up +33BB. I thought the dealers were good but we never got into any real sticky situations. They definitely moved things along and knew the rules. The players were bad. I believe there were two other thinking players at the table besides myself. One I was certain about because I had been watching his play closely and the other was a young kid who was “talking” like he was a thinking player but getting bad cards and making second best hands. He eventually busted out so I didn’t a very good read him.

The majority could be summed up as calling stations and one older gentleman who sat on my right who would be considered weak tight. If he bet, look out. Never raised, even with KK. Raises definitely ruled the table. After the flop they were very rare and they definitely slowed down the hand and put everyone on alert. Even the player at our table who was obviously decent was not near as aggressive as he should have been. He missed some definite raises and lacked the guts to value bet the river in a few instances where I thought he should have. I made one huge mistake when I folded a hand on the river after an over card to my TP had fallen and put a 3 card flush on the board as well. I checked the river (which I think was correct in this situation) but should have called the bet that came from left after one other had folded. The player claimed he had a small pocket pair but my “poker sense” told me he was lying. If he was telling the truth I would have taken the pot. Looking back it didn’t matter I still should have made a crying call? It could have been a +42 session but I’ll never know. Obviously, most of my hands held up and it went well.

Later that night I went back for another 3-4 hour session. I didn’t pay much attention but even though the list was much longer the wait went by very quickly. My guess is that it was a lot of weekend warriors buying in for small amounts and quickly busting out but I was watching my wife play let-it-ride not watching the card room. So this time the wait was only about 30-40 minutes and I was back on a table. Unfortunately, I ended up on a fairly tight table. Two complete calling stations, one guy who was a moderate (about 25% VP$IP) and for some reason raised anytime he was dealt a suited Ace regardless of kicker and one kid who would mucked AJo on the button (his cards flipped over) but would play 85o from UTG. *Shrug*. He played decent after the flop. The remaining 5-6 six were very tight. Again, raises freaked everyone out and I only saw one hand where it was 3-bet on the turn or river. Surprisingly the tightest player on the table was a young girl. I never got to see her showdown a single hand, she was doing a lot of folding but did take down a monster pot when the last person dropped to her river bet. She claimed AQo for a rivered full house.

The hands I did play didn’t fare very well. I had QQ twice and it was cracked both times. The calling stations kept me even by calling me down after I had raised pre-flop twice and flopped top pair which held up. Other than that I made one nice hand were I flopped trip 8’s with an Ace kicker after I had limped A8s against a Q8o which C/R’d me on the turn and then I 3-bet (the only 3-bet on the turn or river I saw at this table). I missed every flush draw and OESD I flopped and this of course cost me some bets. I was happy to leave +1.5 BB.

I did enjoy the carnival atmosphere of playing live though. For example, one lady sits down with the minimum buy-in ($30) plays 3 hands to the river, the last hand she ends up all-in and her Q high doesn’t hold up. Re-buy please. This time she wises up and buys in short for $100 but has her sister as a coach and begins to actually start folding cards.

Overall the trip was nice.

My biggest complaints.

1. Allow people to call ahead. This has to cost them business and it’s stupid.
2. The waitresses come around every 3-4 days. I just want some frickin’ water! The dealers will defend them vehemently instead of passing the complaints along to the floor. Same problem mid-day and prime time.
3. Close the room off instead of having it near the machines which make noises that eventually make you insane. They could also put on some FM radio if they closed the room off.
4. Add a couple more TV’s but what they did have was adequate.

[pokerswami]

Two questions:

1) What other games and limits did you see?
I'm particularly interested in Omaha 8/Better high-low.

2) How bad was the smoking?

Thanks.

[crockett]

Shoot, I knew someone would ask this. I didn’t play very close attention to “other” games but I know I did see 7-card stud 3/6 and Omaha Hi/Lo ?/? (I think) listed on the board. I don’t know if these games were actually running or not. In limit they were running a 6/12 and a 10/20. I’m sure you could just call them and ask how regularly they run “other” games.

That is one advantage of having an open room, the smoke wasn’t too bad. I would say that the number of smokers was fairly low. A player was told by the dealer that you are not allowed to smoke if you sit left or right of the dealer so this helps and there are a lot of younger kids because it’s a college town and most of them don’t smoke as well.

However, I was constantly thirsty because of the smoke and getting something to drink is very hit or miss.

I guess I’d rate it O.K. on the “smoke” factor because it could be a lot worse.

[A_C_Slater]

Never put "Pretty boring" in your headline title. Winning 33 BB's in 4 hours is fun! What the hell is wrong with you?

[crockett]

Yes, it was nice to have hands hold up against chasers but I just thought I'd put "pretty boring" in there because my Trip Report didn't really contain any exciting hands, or possible fist fights or floor rulings,etc. But I did have a very good time. I did witness pocket Aces being dealt 3 times in four hands, twice to the same person and it was his second and third hand after sitting down.

In fact, I only saw the floor called once in my entire 6 hours. Button says "raise" and begins to put out his chips in 2 motions. SB quickly folds, BB says raise and tosses out one bet. This all happens before the Button has even finished putting his second half of the raise on the table. Dealer says "Sir, it has already been raised you need to put out another bet if you'd like to raise." He says "Oh, I didn't know/hear that he had raised, I'll just call then." Button says "Doesn't he have to raise now that he said it?" Dealer stops the action and calls the floor. Explains to the floor. By the time the dealer is done explaining the action the button "Says, hey if everyone is O.K. I'm not going to FORCE the guy to raise because he said he was, a call is fine with me." Floor looks at the two and says "Is that o.k. with the both of ya?" They nod and on we play.