Alan's Game 1: Recap and Review

The Game

Last night was apparently dealer's choice. I don't know if that is the regular game now or not, but I'm ok with it even though Hold'em is my regular and only game. I probably know a little more about Omaha than them, but not enough to be good. But they played some gambler games, all of which I'd never played before:

• low in the hole: Stud played where the lowest card in the hole is your wild card. Everyone has at least 1 wild card. If they pair it, they have two. Stud with wild cards and you don't know what everyone's wild card is. Oh, the best part is, they play all games NL. NL Stud with hidden wild cards, played 8 handed.

• follow the queen: Stud where queens are wild and the next up card after a queen is wild. If another queen is dealt, the wild card changes to whatever the next up card is. Still a gambling game, but a little easier to figure out where you are than low.

• Pineapple/Crazy Pineapple: These were a lot better. Pineapple seemed pretty much just like Hold'em, except everyone starts with a stronger starting hand on average since you get to pick 2 of 3 hold cards to keep pre-flop. Crazy Pineapple seems like a good mixture between Hold'em and Omaha. People will have better hands on average post-flop, and much like in Omaha, starting hands that are connecting like JhQhQs seem like the premium hands.

• NL Omaha: I felt pretty comfortable in this game even though I don't know much about it. I do know more than them, have an idea of what starting hands I want to keep and want to fold, and what NOT to get into trouble with. Others, however, had no problem sticking a lot of money into the pot with TP, 2 Pair, Trips, Straights on flush boards. I think I correctly folded the nut straight once on my gin card and the nut flush once. It seems like a really good game to make money in. People bet too small, 1/3 pot, 1/4 pot, etc, so drawing is pretty easy.

• Tournament: $10BI. We start with 45bbs. Not sure why such and odd number. Stacks are 45,000 with starting blinds at 500/1000. Not sure why such big numbers. Blinds go up every 20 mins. No antes. Payouts to 1st, 2nd, 3rd, although most of the time it goes so long that they split before then.
  

The Players

We had about 12 players so the tables were split up with 6 each. I'm great with that since I play so much 6max online. The ones I played with were the younger ones in the game:

• Dave, a dealer: He's a really weak player. Too loose preflop, will make wierd raises UTG to 3xbb with hands like J9s (consider how loose the game is), calls too lightly post-flop, his bet sizes are really awful, and sometimes he bets with little reason to. These are actually common among just about every player there.

• Snoop: I can't remember what his name is right now. He's a pretty weak player as well, but at least he is aggressive. Bad aggressive, but that is better than being passive at least. He ultra loose preflop and postflop. Will call 8xbb opening raise with offsuit junk. Will call on the flop with 2nd or bottom pair, any TP. He likes to bet a lot. His bet sizes are usually pretty weak, and also indicative of the type of hands he has. It's hard to tell how often he was bluffing because he was hitting a lot of hands last night, winning some pots uncontested, and often showing up with at least a weak TP when called down.

• Country guy: Not a bad player. Still too loose preflop, but played better when it counted. He was very much on the passive side, but he wasn't a calling station and had a decent idea what was going on. He wasn't involved in many big pots without the best hand. He did check or call with monster hands on the River when he certainly should have been betting or raising.

• Lee: He's too loose, but seems like he has some real potential to be a good player. He's capable of making some good folds, and will definitely fold to raises preflop with bad hands. He is too passive. He will often check or call when he should be betting or raising. When he does bet, it's usually not as horrendous of a size as everyone else, but it is always a very big hand. For some reason, he tends to sometimes play well, and other times just call off his chips in a spot that an hour ago he would never call in. Maybe impatience, maybe he gets tired, not sure. It seems like he has an A-Game and an F-Game and he moves up and down the whole spectrum during the night. Good guy though and definitely could be a strong player with some structure and fundamentals in his game.
  

• Some drooler: Super calling station, rarely won a hand unless he got lucky. When he bet, it was always 2 or 3bbs on any street. Really, really bad player, and I could never bluff because he was in every hand.

The rest of the players I knew were:

• Alan: The host. Great guy, great cardroom, not a great player. He plays for fun and the money doesn't matter. Calls very loose and doesn't like to fold preflop. One thing interesting is that whenever he has a monster, he always starts talking. He loves to talk people into calls, it's very consistent, and always means the same thing. Weak means strong.
  

"I hope you don't raise me, but I'm going to bet anyways" = Monster"
"I don't think you have anything, I raise" = Monster
Flush hits "I don't think you have the flush, I raise" = Nut flush or better
"You don't have the balls to call that" = Monster"
Bets "Hope you don't raise" Player doesn't raise. "Phew" = Monster

I don't see how literally everyone doesn't insta-fold when they hear this, especially after playing with him for a bit, but they keep on calling anyways. What's really scary is when you have a monster too that's not the nuts and he does this. Now it's just a guessing game as to who has the better end of the cooler.

• Ron/Marshall: I grouped these two together because they play so much alike. Too loose by good standards, but definitely the tightest players in the game by comparison. They would still qualify as "loose" though. They are capable of folding before the flop and not calling with longshot draws. If they bet, they have a good hand. At least TP. If they raise, they have a huge hand. Overall, pretty standard loose/passive players, just not nearly as loose as everyone else.

• Ralph: Calling station, plays any two, calls with air drawing to a pair... It's pretty amazing when he folds. If he makes a big hand according to the chart (pair, 2 pair, set, straight, etc), he'll stick ALOT of money in the pot, regardless of what you might have. He'll do it with 2 pair on a board where there's a straight and a flush
  

To start the night, most were short or had 100bbs. By the end of the night, most of the table was at least 200bbs deep. 3 people were 3-400bbs deep (including me since I added on to cover - this got some crazy looks by people who just didn't understand why, including the dealer who said he'd never seen that done before. I don't doubt that at all). I just explained it using what I'd heard several people say during the night, "He's big stack, he can bully the table." We know how wrong that is at table stakes, but they seem to believe it so I just said "I don't want to get bullied by the big stacks."

Overall, it was super loose pre-flop. A raise built huge pots since it got several calls. Often 2-4 people may continue on the flop. People didn't raise as a bluff, always big hands. Bet sizes were terrible and always too small to accomplish anything as best as it could be.

The Results

-10 Tourney
+13 Cash

= $3 (doesn't include expenses - $5 food, gas)