The Past Three Days

I've spent the past three days in action playing cash games in the local card rooms. On Wednesday I started the day off right by getting a cavity filled. AWESOME! It actually wasn't bad at all. After going to dentists who were clearly sub par (I swear to god one of them was located between a dollar store and a fried chicken place) for the past 5 years, Jen and I decided to upgrade our insurance so we could go to one recommended by our friend Chrissy "The Gas" Cowsert. Great nick name huh? I came up with it (it hasn't really caught on yet)! Chrissy works for PG&E as a "gas engineer" so it makes sense in that context, but it also leads people to think she might have a problem with flatulence! HA! Or I suppose if you wanted to pretend it was still the 1940's it could mean she was hilarious. You could say things like "That Cowsert's a real gas! I remember this one time she took my pocketbook off the ice box and threw it right into the face of the milkman!"

Anyway, Chrissy recommended a great dentist and it was best cavity filling I've ever experienced. Afterwards I came home and jumped into 5 SNG's. After a kick ass performance I found myself ahead $700 and got the urge to go to the Oaks. I was planning on playing $15/$30 (a game where a standard buy in is $500 and you could easily win or lose $1000 in a session), but when I arrived, I discovered that there was a $30/$60 game going (As you might imagine this game has twice the stakes of $15/$30). The Oaks never had $30/$60 in the past (at least since I'd been going there) and it's only been in the last year or so that they've started running one every Tuesday and Friday. Since it was Wednesday I didn't expect one to be running, but apparently the Tuesday game had gone around the clock and was still going. There was a seat open so I sat down, counted out ten $100 bills and bought myself a rack of one hundred, lime green $10 chips.

I hadn't played a limit cash game in person since I was in LA in May, so I was a little nervous that my game might not be sharp. But, once the cards started flying I felt right a home. It's a tremendous comfort after going to the WSOP this summer that I've done OK against the worlds best so I'll be fine against whoever strolls into the Oaks. Another thing that helped was there wasn't much in the way of competition in the game. I expected to run into at least one or two strong players, but I didn't find any. In fact after about an hour it was perfectly clear to me that I was the best player in the game. There is something tremendously ego boosting to be in a room with a few hundred people playing poker and to know that you are the best player in the biggest game (there was actually one player in the building that I know is a better play than me (my friend Bombay Jack), but he was playing Pan).

At some point I realized that I was living the dream that I had for myself about 5 years ago. When I was dealing cards for a living instead of playing, all I wanted to do was play. I had the utmost respect for the players in the $15/$30 game and every time I dealt it I dreamed of sitting in that game and competing against those players. Eventually I did start sitting in that game and competing, but while I was a prop player, I only had to play up to $6/$12. I rarely made the jump to $15/$30 and was always nervous when I did so. To think that I could sit in a $30/$60 game at the Oaks, be calm, and be the best player in the game is something I could barely have imagined even 2 or 3 years ago.

It also put a smile on my face to look at a college kid or two sitting by themselves, reading cardplayer magazine waiting to get called for the $3/$6 game. The days when I was at that level were the funnest part of my poker career. I couldn't play whenever I wanted and as much as I wanted so when I did play I really enjoyed it. I'd get more excited about winning $100 in those days than I would about winning $5,000 today. It was nice to remember those times.

I spent about 6 hours playing $30/$60 and won a little over $800 which is a solid, but somewhat modest amount for a game of that size. The next day I came back with E.B. and played a little $15/$30. I'd done well the day before so why not keep the ball rolling. Unfortunately I had one of the worst runs of cards that I can remember. After 4 hours of play I'd won exactly 4 pots, and two of them were total bluffs. I wasn't getting any cards at all and found myself stuck almost $1,500. Yuck! I was playing well and up against weak opposition, but there was just nothing I could do. I got things turned around and only ended up losing about $650. It still sucked, but I was happy to make a comeback.

The next day E.B., Jen and I made the trip 30 miles south to Bay 101, the largest card room in the bay area. I wanted to sign up for two tournaments that are going off next weekend and I heard they were filling up quickly. Unlike big tournaments in L.A. and Vegas the one's around here always have limited number of seats available because of space constraints.

I considered playing $40/$80 but the amount of cash I had on hand was a little light for a game of that size. I opted instead for a $20/$40 game. When I sat down it was the toughest $20/$40 game I'd ever seen. Players can be grouped into two categories. Winners and losers. At the low limits 95% are losers and at the middle limits at least 80% are losers (the reason for the jump is the amount of money the house takes is proportionally much smaller the more money you play for). In this group by my estimation there were 6 winners (not including myself) and 2 losers. Everyone kept commenting on how bad the game was and luckily after an hour or so the game softened up substantially. I spent the early part of the day behind about $700 and the made it back to the point where I was ahead $300. Sadly I made a few bad decisions, lost a few huge pots that I played well and caught a few bad breaks towards the end of the session. I ended up leaving down about $450.

These past three days spent back in the card rooms, although not profitable, gave me confidence that I could in fact earn a nice living even if online poker goes the way of the do do. It was also fun and I expect that I'll be making weekly appearances at the Tuesday $30/$60 at the Oaks.