We played poker at Binions on Wednesdsay, after eating a couple more deep fried twinkies at The Mermaid, naturally. They don’t seem to cater too much to the professional crowd now that The Strip casinos have taken over. Binion’s spread 1/2NL, 2/4, and a single table of 3/6, so we played 2/4 to avoid a wait. Even the tables and dealers seemed old fashioned. The dealers all looked like they’ve been in Vegas way too long and the tables had old, rough felt with no lines or marking or anything anywhere. I’m not sure I’ve seen any felts without at least a oval line to show you where to place your bets.

I’ve only played at one table, but from my experience, only degenerates play at Binion’s. There was the middle aged woman who was trashed to the point of slurring her speech, repeating herself, and talking about her mother-in-law with her husband sitting right beside her. She had him copy her drink orders so that she could get twice as many drinks in half the time. If that fella in the picture above wasn’t standing at the rail you would be able to see this lady on the far side of the table and my empty seat on the near side. Seat one was very much a redneck and terrible at poker, seat two went wrong with me by wearing a Michigan hat (coach thieves), you can see Anand there in seat three, seat four was another of those slightly brain-damaged seeming Vegas burnouts, and the dude on the right with the glasses looked just like Peter Griffin from Family Guy. It was uncanny and also very unfortunate for him. I kinda wish I had a picture of just him. Anyway, the game was loose and awful and I lost like I always do against maniac tourists.

The table hanging on the right is signed by tons of pros. Binion’s began the World Series of Poker began in 1970, and apparently the casino also made poker popular in Vegas in a more general way. “The Place that Made Poker Famous” reads the signed table.

Bellagio makes me feel bad too. Sitting at their cheapest table and losing is kinda sad when you are constantly listening to them calling peoples names to play 100/200, 10/20NL, 25/50NL, and 50/100NL. I mean, holy sh*t, a wait list for 50/100NL? The minimum buy-in for 1/2 at Excalibur is $100, so maybe the min for 50/100 at Bellagio is $5000? With the very real potential of losing it all in any given hand. Wow. The kid to my left when I sat down, who couldn’t have been any older than me, stood up after only a few minutes to claim his seat at a 30/60 table. Wow, again. Also their dealers were mostly foreign born with less than a mastery of the English language, and their cocktail service was terrible. Besides for having crazy high stake games, the Bellagio poker room did not impress.

Now let me set the stage for the worst hand of my life …

• Early on I’m dealt a A♥5♥ and I check in the BB to see the flop. A♣5♣8♦, sweet. The small blind bets, I raise, old asian guy calls, and small blind folds. The turn is the Q♣, I bet, and asian guy raises. Less sweet. For some reason I call and call again on the river to see his flush. Dumb.
• I have A9 on a 922 flop. The guy to my right, who I will henceforth refer to as Lucky Guy, bets, I raise, and everyone folds to him who calls. The turn is a 5 and eventually he shows 95 for a two pair that he hit on the turn. I can’t remember for sure, but I’m pretty certain he wasn’t in a blind when he played his 95. But hey, it was suited! Drawn out on again.
• I get JJ and raise in late position with lots and lots of callers. The flop has a Q, I fold to a bet, and two people end up with two pairs, holding Q2 and Q8 I think. That’s the type of garbage you lose to when you play against a table of these maniacs.
• I have K♦K♣, and raise in early position. This would be a very strong, clear sign of strength. A sign that you are way behind unless you have something really good and that you shouldn’t call. So 5 or so people call anyway. The flop is good, something like 2♥7♣Q♥. No straight draws, no ace, and just the two hearts to be really concerned about. Lucky Guy bets, I raise, and two more people call. The turn: A♦. Crappy card, especially in this game where people like to call bets just in hopes of hitting an ace. I bet anyway and a couple people call. I feel like I’m still ahead here. The river: 5♥. Wow, how terrible. I get an ace and then a heart – probably the worst two things possible. Yay. Lucky Guy bets, I fold, and Anand actually winds up beating Lucky Guy with a better flush. They draw out on me on the river.
  

At this point I’m down to $50 or so from my $200 buy-in and still haven’t won a single hand. I get down to $26 and finally win a hand when I flop two pair with an unsuited 37 that I’m dealt in the big blind. It took an hour and fifty minutes and I finally win with one of the worst hands there is. Awesome. I win another big blind hand with T2 and a hand with pocket eights, getting back up to around $90. I thought my luck was turning … and then I took the worst beat possible in hold’em:

• I’m dealt 88 in what I think I was the big blind. I call a raise to see a flop with 6 people in. That’s 6x$8=$48 in the pot already. Shaping up nicely. The flop is KK8. I flopped a full house. I bet and three people call, including Lucky Guy. Someone comments that we can’t all have kings. Even if someone did have a king, I still have them destroyed. There’s $64 in the pot. The turn is a 5. Lucky Guy checks, I bet, two people fold, Lucky Guy raises, I re-raise, and Lucky Guy calls. $112 in the pot. The river is another 5. This is a terrible card for me; now a single king beats me. I didn’t consider the possibility of the board pairing originally and am too caught up to realize now what it means. This would be where I donated an extra $32 out of stupidity. Lucky Guy bets, I raise, he raises, I raise, he raises, and with great horror I realize that it would only take a king to beat me. Playing higher limits definitely threw me off my game. I call. $192 pot (should have been $128). Lucky Guy doesn’t have a king; that would be boring and reasonable. Lucky Guy shows 55, to have hit runner-runner quads to beat me. Runner-runner quads. What the f*ck! With two cards left to come, he had to hit his exact two cards to beat me. You cannot be further behind in the game of Texas Hold’em. It is not possible. Given our two hands and the board, his odds of beating me after the flop were (2/47)*(1/46) = 1/1081. Less than a one in a thousand chance! He called my flop bet with nothing against my full house and won anyway! If the river had been anything in the desk besides the very last 5 I would have been back up to at least $178. As it happened, I was at $10.
• The next hand I re-raise to go all-in with 22 against Anand and Lucky Guy. I’m leading until the river, for a chance to more than triple up. Naturally Lucky Guy hits a straight and I’m broke.

So I took the worst beat of my life after hours of already horrible luck, while playing at the highest limit I’ve ever played at. There is only one reasonable conclusion from all this: God hates me. Oh well.

Speaking of waiting, the promotion is doubly entertaining in that it changes the strategy. When you get aces or kings you just limp in, and check/call through to the river. You only need $10 in the pot to qualify for the bonus, so you can just sit back ultra-passive and hope people hit their inside straight draws and runner-runner flushes. You’ll never see so many people get mad about winning with aces or kings.

Plus, and probably more importantly, though less exciting than winning free money, the old regular folks play tight, and I’ve been beating them fairly consistently. It’s easier to win and less crazy for the ol’ bankroll when you aren’t playing with maniacal, drunken tourists late at night. On top of all this, every morning is it’s own little drama, Grumpy Old Men style. Lots of yelling, and card throwing, and ridiculous poker advice. I’ll probably try to describe some of them individually on this blog’s counterpart, but it would be hard to do them any justice.

• I have 88 on the button and call a middle position raise to $5 to see the flop with four other people. The flop is something like J74, with one card higher than my 8′s and it gets checked around to me. With likely only the remaining jacks to worry about, I bet $15 into the $25 pot and take it down. I think this is was good play. Kinda risky I suppose, but someone would have to be playing a jack really poorly or slow playing a set to be ahead of me. And then I’d be screwed.
• I raise with AJ suited under the gun I think to $7, a guy in middle position raises all in to $21, a girl in late position calls, and I call also. The flop brings J86, I bet $20 into the $65 or so pot, and the girl folds. It’s just me and the all-in guy, so the last two cards are dealt. The river is another 6, and the all-in guy shows 6T or 56 or some sort of worthless crap to beat me on the river. That’s $60 I’d have liked to have.
• This one sucked and accounted for the great majority of my NL losses for the day. A guy in early positions raises to $5, the next guy calls, and I raise to $17 with KK. It’s folded around to a horrible, tilty player in a blind who raises $50 more. We’d only been playing for a couple hours at most and this guy had already lost his money twice and had bought in for at least $400. After he lost all-in the first time he went all-in again with something like JQ for a pair of queens and lost to a KQ. Not exactly an awesome all-in powerhouse. It was against the same guy as the first time, so I guess he was trying for revenge. It didn’t work. Anyway, he sucked and I called his $50 raise. Much to my delight an ace comes on the flop. He checks to me and for god only knows why, I decide to completely ignore his crazy aggression and inability to fold. I bet $50 into him and he check raises it to $100. He could have had nothing, but I was in no position to find out so I fold. And there went $117 in about 2 minutes. Um, darn. Not seeing an ace on that flop could very well have meant a 300+ dollar turnaround.

We finally picked up our complimentary lucky medallions from Caesar’s Palace yesterday before playing some 2/4 at Imperial Palace. I think this gross oversight could be responsible for my not being a famous poker player yet. Hidden in my pocket, the medallion’s effect was tempered for all but the last several hands of the session, but radiating luck at even a fraction of capacity, it still willed me to victory. One fairly monster hand went roughly like this:

• I have J♥T♦, four or five people limp in, I follow suit in late position, and the blinds call. The flop is Q♣J♦5♥, giving me a fairly unimpressive middle pair with lowish kicker and crappy back door straight draw. In ultra-loose low stakes limit hold-em games the odds are right to try and get lucky (especially with a lucky medallion in your pocket), so i joined four or five other folks and called a $2 bet to see the turn card. T♣. Excellent! Someone would have to be pretty amazingly awful to have AK and not raise pre-flop, so that’s one straight combination I’m not overly concerned about. K9 and 89 for straights or QJ and QT for better two-pairs are possible, but not worth worrying about at this point. Someone bets, two people call, and I raise with everyone calling. Big pot. The river is the J♣, which is a fantastic card. It likely gives someone the flush they wanted while giving me an even better full house. The first guy leads out, next calls, the guy to my right raises, and I 3-bet. Only the guy to my right calls and he shows me the ace high flush. I could possibly have gotten one more bet into the pot if I had just called and let the other two players call behind me, but I think raising has more potential.

I hit a long cold spell but was still up a moderate amount when Anand decided to stand up from the table. I stayed for my free hands while the blinds were coming back around and pointed out to him that the lucky medallion was working, to which my neighbor said that I really ought to be wearing it. So I wore it the last few hands, and It’s full magic went to work on this, my fourth to last hand:

• The guy three to my right straddles, i.e. raises blindly and effectively becomes the third blind. The guy to his left 3-bets blind. There’s no name for that, I’ve never seen anyone do it, it’s an exceptionally ridiculous poker move, but it sure made things interesting. There is 13$ in the pot without anyone having even been dealt cards. Dealer deals and my neighbor folds while I remark that I hope I get something crappy so that I don’t have to get involved with this nonsense. K♣K♥ … not quite as crappy as I had in mind. I raise to $8. Very surprisingly, two people behind me call the $8. I have no idea what they could have had. Either the straddler or the blind 3-better caps it and everyone calls. This makes it 53$ in the pot pre-flop with five people still holding cards. The flop is A♣J♣6♣ and I’m briefly too disgusted about seeing the ace hit to realize I’m on a nut flush draw. The straddle bets and everyone but the guy to my left calls. I guess he had TT or something. Turn is the 3♦. Darn. Same guy bets and all call. River is the 3♣. Bingo! Well kinda; now full houses are possible. This time it’s checked to me, I bet, and straddle calls. I show him my K♣ for the flush, and he shows me his 2♣7♣ for the losing flush that he had flopped. Thanks lucky medallion!

My last hand I raised with a suited AJ of diamonds, four spades came, and I chalked it up in the L column. The guy didn’t show a spade, but had QT for two pair and the winning hand. Or so I thought, until the dealer called to me after I had stood up and started walking away. She asked “don’t you want your money?” “Uh, yes?” I had completely overlooked that I caught a runner-runner straight with my jack. Good thing I didn’t muck! Thanks again lucky medallion!

• I have 2♦3♦ and the flop is A♣4♦5♦. Umm, yay. A straight and an open ended straight flush draw. Also, this was the very next hand after I almost hit another low diamond straight flush, but that was with something like 4♦7♦ and would have been a crappy no-bonus one-carder. Anyway, with the 2♦3♦ I got a flush but no straight flush and won the hand. A straight flush would have given me 150$ or so of High Hand bonus money since we were playing at Bally’s.
• I have Q♣K♥ and the flop is Q♥Q♦7♣. Yippee! Well, around 35$ of bets and raises later we have a showdown, and the other guy flips over … Q7 for the flopped full house. Ouch.
• I have Q♣Q♥ and raise from the button with the BB and three or so limpers calling. The flop is T♣5♥7♣. It’s checked to me and I bet with a couple people calling. Turn is a 4♦ or some crap like that; I really don’t remember besides that I was pretty sure I was still in the lead. Right as, or just after, the second guy puts his 6$ in to call my bet he says “you’re going to hate me.” Uh, okay. He’s been drinking a fair amount, so him telling me right out that he got lucky against me isn’t too surprising. Kinda odd that he did it before even seeing the river. The river: 8♣. It’s checked to me and I check and ask him if he hit some garbage two pair. The guy has something like J♣4♣ for the flush, meaning he told me that I was going to hate him before he even saw that last card that gave him the flush. Weird. I was actually too busy being confused to see exactly what he had. He might have had a pair or a straight draw too, but he definitely beat me on the river.

• I have K♥Q♦ in the BB and the flop is something like K♣6♣2♣. I bet, a couple people call. The turn is low non-spade and I bet with one caller. River is 8♣ (yay, another!) and I lose to someone holding the J♣.
• I raise with A♣J♣ in MP, two people behind me and the BB call, and the flop is J♦T♥4♣. BB bets, I raise, person to my left calls, BB calls. Turn is something low, BB bets, I raise again, person to my left calls again. I probably should have just folded when he led out into me again, but alas, how was I supposed to know they both flopped sets against my top pair. TT in the big blind, 44 to my left. Yay!
• I have T♣J♦ in the cutoff and limp. Five or so see the flop of 7♣8♣9♣, giving me the straight and a straight flush draw. The river is another spade, but not the six or jack, and I lose to someone who actually flopped the flush with K♣5♣ or some crap like that. People need to stop flopping flushes every time I have top pair or better.
• I get my highest pocket pair of the night, 9♣9♥, and the flop is K♦T♦6♣. I fold. Run of the mill hand, only notable in that within 3.5 hours of playing, I’d hope to get something a little more exciting than pocket nines.
• Three people limp, button raises, and I 3-bet from the small blind with A♥K♣. Two limpers and the button call. The flop is K♥J♣7♦, I bet and one limper and button call. Turn is the 9♣, I bet and they call. River is the T♥, I check, limper checks, button bets, and I pay him off to see his J♦Q♦ for a winning straight on the river. Not awesome.

The highlight of the night was the last three hands I played strongly preflop. In each of those three hands, the person I was against flopped a flush against my top pair or better. First I had JJ for an overpair, then AT pairing the top card ten, and the last time AQ with an Ace on the flop.  The odds of flopping a flush? 118 to 1. And it happened against me three times in a row. This is a stupid, stupid game.

We tried out the Mirage poker room yesterday. It was alright. Big, with some high limit games, good crowd, and tables whose felts were slanted inwards. My chips kept felling over after I sat down. And then they kept finding their way to the house and other players, as I only won one hand in the two hours that I was playing. It was a pretty miserable session, and I stood up, dejected, around midnight. I got two AQ’s that hit nothing on the flop and one KK that hit an ace and lost to A8o. Other than that, my cards were crap, which was too bad since some of the players there were terrible.

I thought that the competition might be stiff since The Mirage has high limit tables and undoubtedly has some pros running around, but that was definitely not the case. Actually, I always think players at a table look tough when I first sit down because everyone always seems so focused. I don’t know what they’re concentrating so intently on (Oscar’s, Lost, cocktail waitresses?) but it cant be poker. Here are the most noteworthy people from the table:

1) Old Rat-like Lady. She looked and moved like a rat, with quick twitchy motions, and has clearly spent way too much time in casinos, but that’s not what made her special. What impressed me was how she played the turn on one hand where the board was 5K65. She bet 6$, and it was raised and reraised behind her. She calls 12$ and it was raised and reraised behind her again. She called 12$ again. So she’s put $30 into the pot against people who are clearly very happy about their hands. It goes to a showdown and what does she have? J6. Offsuit. No flush draws or anything. WTF? 30$ into the pot holding one small step above nothing. I was dumbfounded.

2) Grey-haired mini-afro and black eyebrow guy. I hope this guy was on some prescription painkillers or something, because otherwise he’s quite the dimwit. In 3/6$ limit the first two betting rounds you bet and raise in 3$ increments, and the next two rounds you bet and raise 6$. People get it wrong at first, but this guy was still completely clueless after having sat there for a couple hours. Still, not that bad; there’s more. He would put in 3$, the dealer would tell him it was supposed to be 6$, and he would lose count before he got to 6. Like, “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, oh, wait, I lost count,” restart. He did this several times. Once, he ended on 7. I’m not making this up. Later, he asked how much to call (dumb question) and the dealer replied, “six.” His completely serious response: “dollars?” I should have asked him what other potential answers he was expecting because I have no earthly idea.