Limon's Essays II

[limon]

I am more Greek.

I love it when I get to the table and see a bunch of Persian types. Armenians, Greeks, Turks, short hairy loud dudes. I can assure you there will be lots of yelling, lots of fights lots of dealer abuse, and tons of bad poker. This night was no exception. The game is 1-2-5 to go no limit holdem. The pot can be killed for $5 from any position and re-killed and re-killed. This is the biggest action NL game in any casino anywhere, especially when tempers get flaring.

Upon sitting down a mountainous Greek (?) fellow in seat 1 was raking in a huge pot. Chips spilling through the fingers of his fat ham hands as he chortled and bragged. His opponent, an older Persian type with dyed black hair, stares the dealer down. It seems as if they both got all of their money in on the flop, AA v. a set of nines. A third Ace came on the river busting the 9’s. Fat Greek with talking chips blurts, “You shouldn’t have been in with 9’s to begin with, you deserve to lose.”. Dyed Greek is staring at the dealer, “Why, Why, Why you [censored] me? You are miserable, I never play a hand with you again.” A note about dyed Greek his favorite saying is “Why” he says it before everything. Every time he gets raised he cries “Why”. Then the table mimicks back “Why!”. He then says, without fail, “Why, why you raise me? Are we heads up? Then I raise back.”. When you’re in with him the pots get huge, he will raise with any hand or any draw. When you have something better than his average holding you just have to dig your heels in and go for broke.

But anywho, back to the matter at hand. As dyed Greek berates the dealer fat Greek tips him, tells him, “You good dealer, I tip again. He is mad that he’s broke”. Like a child in a custody battle the dealer is smart and keeps his mouth shut. Now dye job goes nuts, “I am not broke, I am Greek, I work, have many jobs, homes, how much you have in chips, I buy to cover.” He pulls out a disheveled wad of money and plunks down 2k, “all green dealer”. The chip runner brings him 4 stacks of quarters. Now the fun starts. The button kills it for $5, this is a standard move, if no re-kill it gives the button last action on every round. Dye Job now re-kills it with a slam to the table proclaiming, “ I am Greek!”. Now fatso re-kills it again for $20 yelling, “I am more Greek”. Dye job rifles back, “WHY, why, I bet all my chips blind, I am more greek!”, fatso now stands up and pushes in a mountain of chips, “I call all my chips blind I AM MORE GREEK!”. A complete nit at the table begins to protest, “you cant do this its against the rules, call the floorman.”. The table silences him in unison, “Shut the [censored] up”. I chime in with, “This is a big bet game, if you can’t handle it leave”. He succumbs to peer pressure. There is noooooo way those of us at the table are going to pass up the chance to call an all in bet from someone who hasn’t even seen his cards. It’s all reward no risk. Furthermore the last thing you want to do is kill the buzz at the table by getting all technical. These guys showed up to gamble, for god’s sake let them gamble. If you make them feel big and brave and funny and important this behavior may go on for hours. So the deal goes around and sure enough everyone folds but the “greeks”. I get a King and a Jack and seriously consider calling knowing I’m a favorite to 2 random hands but, I know this won’t be my best situation of the evening and I want to have chips when that big hand comes up. Besides there were 2 players to act behind me and they could have had the nuts.

The Greeks hold their hands tight as the flop turn and river are dealt. One says, “no pair”, the other says, “no pair”. One says, “ten high”. The other says “ten what?”. Now the table is getting restless, a weird old guy grumbles, “turn the [censored] hands over”. They expose their hands and both have 10-4. The table explodes in shouts and laughter. Railbirds from around the casino gather around to see what’s going on.

Now lets get technical: This game is good and not as rare as you might think. Right now I need to develop a game plan for this situation. There’s 3 certifiable maniacs in the game, And they’re competing with each other for attention. I’m gonna play tight, real tight, but I need to piss the Greek’s off so I’ll get paid when the time comes. My plan is to make a stupid juvenile bluff and rub it in one of the Greek’s faces. This will cost me little in expectation but a lot in payoff’s.

I kill from the button, now it’s $10 to go. The maniacs limp $10 to me as expected. I plan to make it $50 to go with 34 but the weird old guy big blind makes it $50 first. Oops, lets try that again. Now I’m in the Big Blind. Button, dyed greek kills it. One limper to me Small Blind folds. I raise to $30 with K9, both call. Flop is junk, I bet out $100 both fold (whew) now I flip my K9 over and say, “Like taking candy from a baby, I thought you were greek”. He responds with “why”.

The trap has been set, goddess please let me go on a rush.

6 hours later I’ve played maybe 3 hands past the flop and the game breaks.

[Paul2432]

Another great post.

Too bad you couldn't catch anything.

Paul

[Graham]

"I am more Greek" [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img] lol

Great story!

Everyone at the table shoulda given that rules nit a good thwack with their elbow every time they got up to go the bathroom.

[limon]

its amazing how little they really know about poker...they can quote chapter and verse from any s/m book but when it comes to winning money they're lost. i dont know how many times ive been at a great NL table with three affable losers when some limit poker HPFAP nit comes and sits to the left of a main contributer in the game. the contributor is happy having a beer and being ENTERTAINED. a situation arises where its only the nit and the loser left and the nit WONT CHOP! WHAT THE F IS THIS!?! now the affable loser becomes very defensive and irritated and he WILL LEAVE the next time he loses a pot. Why dont s/m write a chapter on the negative ev of stupidity?

[tewall]

They've actually written quite a lot about this.

[J.R.]

Thank you. I have an insight into the greek mind and this is one of the funniest things I have ever read on this board. Your essays are excellent, please keep them comming.

[Phat Mack]

This is the biggest action NL game in any casino anywhere, especially when tempers get flaring.

Which casino is this?

[Rick Nebiolo]

limon,

I noticed you posted from Los Angeles. I'm not sure were they spread a "1-2-5 to go" NL game but it sounds great.

Do you think any of these guys might want to play at the Bike in a $2/3 blind game with a resticted buy in? Do you think they would even care that we take less (50 cents) when there is no action? Or does taking $4 or $2 when there is no action "nit proof" the game? (BTW, this is actually a semi-serious question).

I'll be playing tomorrow night at the Bike. "Hairy" types are welcome [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img].

Great story!

~ Rick

[limon]

the game is in hayward, ca. at the palace (or used to be) cant comment if its still as good as it was during the dotcom boom.

Rick, no one i know will play in a restricted buy in game. not the good palyers and DEFINITELY not the bad ones. The good ones understand this is a major disadvantage, the bad ones WANT TO GAMBLE. the only players who frequent these max buy in games are scared limit players.

if the casino wants to limit the risk LOWER THE BLINDS, dont cap the buy in. OR (even better) lower the blinds and make the game POT LIMIT. a $1-$1 pot limit game is EXTREMELY deceptive. a good player can average $20+ an hour in such a game. a .50/$1/$2 to go is even better one could easily avg. $40 an hour in such a game. the "to go" is the key it fools everyone and makes a $2 kill high leverage cause now its $4 to go.

thats why the hayward gasme is so good. its looks like $1-2 no limit but plays like $5-5 no limit (or bigger)

[Rick Nebiolo]

limon,

Thanks for the reply. This post came in just as I was going out the door for the day. I'm linking it to my desktop and will try to comment tommorrow.

Regards,

Rick