Thursdays are generally quiet, but they had this Jive ballroom dancing lessons party thing going on in the Ignite nightclub that shares the 3rd floor with the poker room.

As if that was not irritating enough, my table was 8 parts donkey, 2 parts rounder. Here is what the table looked like:

Seat 1: Bad. One of the worst players in Detroit that I have some history with. This is the heavy drinking, any two cards playing, go broke once an hour type donkey.

Seat 2: A solid donkey. Only plays big pocket pairs and any Ace. This is the gutshot chasing, fifth diamond hoping, must see most flops and every river type donkey.

Seat 3: Calling station. This is the see every flop at any price calling station type donkey. This is the why raise when you can call, why fold ‘em when you hold ‘em type player.

Seat 4: Broke-ass high roller. You know the type. They think that just because they are in a casino that everything is a gamble. Any two cards at any price kind of fool who’s job at the table is not done until all the money is gone.

Seat 5: Another calling station. Just clone Seat 3.

Seat 6: This is a rabbit-type of donk. Plays every hand. Scared.

Seat 7: A true grinder posing as a internet playing, A-K playing young gun. Except he does not play like an internet player and does not overplay A-K. I would stake this guy.

Seat 8: Inexperienced player. This guy can’t play after the flop. He shoves all-in for about 100X the big blind pre-flop with any big pair and pretty much folds the rest of the hands he is dealt.

Seat 9: What can I say. Had there been a waiting list, I would have paid someone to take my place. This is not the kind of table I like to be at. The only player I can outplay is one that I want to help felt the donkeys. Pirana don’t eat other pirana.

Seat 10: My favorite donkey. This is the heavy drinking, chatty, rebuying ATM type player.

Now that you have an idea of the level of play, you can appreciate that the night is going to be a long one. You will be forced to see every river and showdown every hand. No play the player tonite … ok … maybe a little bit.

A couple memorable hands that got alot of talk at the table. They all involved me having a pair of 5s.

I am heads up with Seat 3. The flop is Qd, 8d, 4d. I am last to act with 5-3 hearts.

My opponent bets the flop and I call with the plan to bluff the turn and take it down. I figure he has Ad … but only four cards to the flush.

The turn is my money card: 5c.

I know my pair is good and am willing to risk my stack knowing I am a 7:3 favorite to win the hand. I shove and get called. The river is a blank and my 5s hold up.

All I could do is grin when the guys that thought I only play Aces were surprised to see that not only did I have a garbage hand, but that I had the stones to make a play.

Now, I would have thought I earned some respect on that hand.

Fuck no.

Enter Seat 4.

Somehow, we keep getting heads up together. He starts the trash talk about me not having a hand. Yet pot after pot, he is behind the whole way and hits the miracle on the river to win.

Flash forward to the hand where he straddles. Seat 7 calls. Seat 8 calls. I call. And, seat 10 calls.

I knew before the action got to me that Seat 4 was going to raise. My plan was go re-raise him all-in for another $200 or so.

Sure as hell, he raises another $45. I put him on pure garbage.

Seat 7 calls. I put him on a big King. He claims to of had Q-Q … maybe he did. Either way he calls.

Seat 8 calls.

I go all-in.

Seat 10 calls and is all-in.

Seat 4 calls and is all-in.

Seat 7 thinks a bit and folds. If he had Q-Q, I got lucky that he folded. But, as he said after the hand played out, folding Q-Q was the right move. I agree.

Seat 8 calls.

Seat 4 proudly shows Q-5s.

For me, that was some bad fucking news.

Seat 8 shows 9c only.

The flop is even more bad news: Js-10s-8c.

I now have to miss the flush and gutshot with Seat 4.

My read was right on each player before the flop. I knew my 5-5 was good. For how long, well, that is another story.

Fourth street was 6c and fifth street was 2h.

The pocket 5s held up.

And for the next five minutes, the table talked about the play of that hand.

And that stands to reason. Most poker players at the table today had their first poker experience by watching it on television.

What these players do not realize is the ‘E’ is for Entertainment. What is shown on television is not necessarily good play, but then again, you don’t know what you don’t know sometimes.

For starters, I find it entertaining when a player in a live cash game shoves all-in with a flush draw or a straight draw against the odds like they see on the tournament television show, then tilt because they missed 2 out of 3 times.

Another entertaining move I see at the live cash game table is players thinking they have a monster hand when dealt A-K and they play it like A-A. The A-K is no better than 2-2, which ironically is portrayed on television for what it really is: just about useless.

Oh, and there is the “always make a continuation bet” move in the live cash game that players idolize from watching a highly edited tournament on television. This move is just as bad as the position raise on the button no matter what move.

Hell. If you are supposed to raise on the button every time you are on the button, why waste time looking at your cards. I bet you could speed the game up by a good 5 hands an hour if you don’t look. Then again, playing live cash games like made-for-television touramants will likely have you leaving the table broke in under an hour anyway.

For me, I equate ESPN poker and real live everyday casino poker to porn and real live everyday sex (that would be some day but not today for you married folks): Porn always looks more fun and exciting than real live everyday sex is.

I digress.

Day after day, night after night, I feel more pressure at the table than most players. At the risk of coming off as arrogant or pompous, (I am definitely confident, but I am certainly not arrogant or pompous) I want to tell my story in the card room that says “I am the best player at this table.” My reason is simple. I want to be respected so I can minimize getting drawn out on.

I want to earn that respect by playing my best game every single hand in every single session.

Even with my self-inflicted pressure, I have a target on my back. Some guys sit down with a Saturday Night Special try to gun me down.

Take the session from this past Saturday night that ran well into mid-morning Sunday. A player came to the table with a $300 buy-in and sat in Seat 8. I am sitting on a stack of $1100 and the table average stack was only $100. In other words, half the chips in play were with me at Seat 9.

This player starts jawing at me trying to get information on how long it took for me to go 5X on my buy-in. 

“You look like you know what you are doing,” the player that is about to take Seat 8 next to me says as he sits down. I detect a confrontational motive behind his comment. “I better watch out, huh?”

I blow him off. He keeps pressing me, so I tell him I am the worst player at the table, but the luckiest. Five minutes later, he got shut down by a guy who walked up and sat in Seat 2.

This guy, who has no chips, is asking Seat 1 and Seat 3 who I am, how I play, and all that. I don’t pay much attention until the dealer spoke up. “Listen, this is Sammy and he has the deepest stack everytime I deal to him. You either need to go get chips or leave the table, Sir.”

Ok. Now, he has my attention. “What’s up bro?”

“Those mirror shades must help you play, huh?”

Fuck. Another sunglasses slamming asshole. If I did not wear my Oakleys, people would think I am strung out on crystal meth because my eyes are darting from player to player on every single hand on every single street, regardless if I have cards or not.

“No. I am blind. Do you have a problem with blind people?

“How do you see the cards, then?”

“I don’t. I feel the ink on the cards to know what I am holding.”

“Why the fuck are they mirrored?”

“Since I am blind, I want you to see what I can’t.”

“And that is?”

“How fucking bad you play. Why don’t you go get some chips and put me to the test?”

“Hey, I can back it up, man,” he responds.

“I am sure you can. You talk alot for a guy with no chips. Instead of you being over here busting my nuts, go get some chips so I can bust you with the nuts,” is my taunt back at him at about 2 AM.

I end up busting both Seat 8 and Seat 2 within 30 minutes.

What the hell are these guys thinking, anyway? I can’t rationalize it. Do they really think I just got lucky and won one monster pot? Do they think I will bleed off chips and leave dead ass broke like some casual player after too many shots?

I could do without the trash talk and taunting, but these guys are amongst my best customers.

By new, I mean inexperienced. Inexperienced players come in two flavors: those that know they don’t know how to play and those that wish they knew how to play.

I encounted both flavors this past weekend. Here is what I mean:

A 60ish woman sits down in Seat 7. She is nervous as hell and does not know the first thing about poker. I give her a few helpful tips from my signature Seat 9. She seems to appreciate the help with how much blinds are, when to post, all that sort of stuff.

She played every hand dealt for two hours and went broke a few times. Down to her last $2, I told her if she wanted to keep playing, she should put more money on the table now if she does not have the minimum buy-in. In other words, she was about to see another flop and probably did not have enough money left to stay. She smiled, thanked me again, and dug into her purse.

Now, I play the players as much as the next grinder. One thing I won’t do, however, is prey on people at the table that have no business sitting at my table. The most money I was going to make on her was $2 a hand. Since I raise 90% of the pots I am in and she folds to 90% of all raises, the risk of us butting heads was 0%. I figure if she can call my raise, she has Aces. For me, it is pretty much that simple.

Too bad the donk in Seat 3 did not feel the same way.

This guy gets K-K and was talking like he won the pot already. Please.

The nice lady I just mentioned threw in a red chip to call the $2 big blind. She immediately asked the dealer for change.

Seat 3 then raises to a whopping $12 and gets 4 callers. Not the way to play Kings if you ask me, but whatever.

The lady throws in two more red chips and does not say a word.

“That’s a raise. That’s a raise. I want my money,” the donk in Seat 3 starts yelling at the woman that is twice his age.

I normally don’t get involved if I am not in the hand, but this poor woman was just about in tears.

See, she has not raised a single street since she sat down. There is no way this person intended to raise. Period. In her mind, she thought the original red chip represented the $2 and the additional $10 was a flat call. End of story.

But no, this Seat 3 guy was trying to bully her for another fucking dollar using his bullshit math. He asks for floor. What a coward.

“Hey pal,” I say to him, “She has not raised, let alone re-raise anyone on any street in any pot in two hours. What the fuck makes you think she is re-raising you?”

He stares me down from behind his sunglasses that he is wearing upside down.

“Hey. A min raise is $20 anyways. It is a call. The dealer is right and you are slowing the game up,” I continue.

“I raised by $8. Half my raise is $4. Four and 12 is 16. She owes me a dollar,” he says in return.

“The fuck she does. You raised by $10, not 8. A min raise is double your raise for another $10. Besides, you have not seen a flop yet and already you have a cinch hand?”

By this time, floor is there, at the table, with the rule book. Poor floor had to read the definition of a min raise to this guy before we could complete the hand.

This cowardly bully cost us about 10 hands worth of playing time.

The only thing worse than having an inexperienced player at the table is a player that is inexperienced but thinks they are a card player simply because they play cards.

I guess I played bad. That is all I can come up with when I replay the hand in my head. Here is what happened.

I figure the player on my immediate right has a hand like A-Q or A-J when he raised to $75 pre-flop. I called with A-10d knowing I could outplay him on the flop.

The player on my immediate left also calls. I felt that this player is solid and that I could also outplay him after the flop. By solid, I mean the type that does not overplay hands or chase straights or flushes.

The flop comes Ah-9h-2c.

Mr. A-Q fires out another $75.

“I am all-in,” is my statement, which makes it another $500 or so to go and consequently, puts both of my opponents all-in.

I knew I was in second place. But I also knew that the pot was big enough for me to make a play. Afterall, I was card dead for a few hours and was getting impatient to stack some chips.

Would these guys really risk their entire stack on that flop, especially when I have a tight-aggressive table image?

The player on my left that I thought was solid took about 2 minutes or more to make a decision. A decision that surprised me. I put him on a heart draw, based on his reaction to the flop, when I decided to push.

He called.

The action is now on the bettor, and he thinks I have a set.

After pondering a fold, he announces a call with a disclaimer: “If he would have folded, I would have folded, too.” Then, he shows A-Q.

The turn is a blank and a third heart comes on the river.

The player on my left shows 7-3. Both hearts.

How he could call that bet with nothing but a 7 high flush draw is beyond me. I really thought he was a better player than that.

Had he folded, Mr. A-Q probably would have folded as well.

I thought it was a good play gone bad.

No. It is not what you think.

I played bad in a short session. Even though I felted the same player twice with 7-2 (trip 2’s on one hand and trip 7’s on the other), my playable hands quickly became rags on the flop.

The entire table thought they would break some casino rule if they did not showdown every hand on the river, so there was no opportunity to put a play on anyone.

My last hand sucked. I got my favorite pocket pair: 8’s. That was about the time some street walkin’ skank sat down in Seat 10.

I think it was a woman, but she was big enough to play linebacker for just about any pro football team.

She had enough tattoos to play pro basketball.

At any rate, she re-raises me. The action folds around to me and I shove. I read her to have a hand like A-K.

She calls.

The flop comes 9-9-7 rainbow.

I show my 8-8. The ho sits there with a smug look on her face.

“You have Aces?” I ask her.

Smug.

“You don’t show?”

Smug.

“You don’t fuckin’ talk either, huh?”

The turn is a Jack.

A river 8 or 10 and I am good.

The river is a 6.

About 30 seconds go by and still nothing from him / her.

I figure I am good, so I toss a tip chip on my cards as I wait for the pot to get pushed to me in Seat 9.

Finally, she turns over her cards. One at a fucking time in slow motion.

A-A.

The ace on Fourth Street gives you a gutshot, but if this kid could have put it all together, he would have realized half the outs he needs are gone. I liked my chances on the turn and figured it was an easy double up. I shove. My opponent calls and hit the miracle 2-outer on the river.

Well, that was Friday. Saturday was just sick.

I bought in at MGM for $300 around 11 PM. The only game running was $1-$2 tables.

By 11:05 PM, I had doubled up when a loose aggressive type re-raised me pre-flop. I played back and turned my A-A into top set.

Flash forward to last call at 1:30 AM and I had tripled my buy-in. It really was not the quality of cards I held, although the deck was hitting me. Instead, it was the level of bad play by what seemed like an endless steam of drunk young internet players.

We are down to a handful of players when the alcohol stopped flowing at 2:30 AM. I patiently waited for the usual crowd of drug dealers, pimps, and prostitutes to show up at the table and give me the spoils from their illicit wares. No one came.

My poker pal Trista suggested I play at her table where there was fresh meat to be had. You know the cartoons where the hungry cat sees the mouse not as a mouse, but as a cooked meal? It was like that.

To make it better, the short stack was giving me shit about my sunglasses. Half the fucking people in that room had shades on. That was all I needed to stay and make my stack deeper.

I show up with more money than the rest of the table combined. Hell, I had the dealer covered.

It was bad enough the kid pissed off my pal who was on a short stack, but now he was jawing at me. He tosses chips around like it is play money on some free internet poker site.

“I am lovin’ it,” I tell Trista. I end up staking her so she could reload. She does not know me that well, but there is mutual respect at the table. We were not working together, but you don’t see pirana eating other pirana either.

What happened over the next two hours was amazing. I call it the McTrist, with apologies to Shawn White.

I end up cashing out at 5 AM for just under $1,400 for near 5X of what I bought in for. That is nearly a buy-in per hour of play. Sick.

Even sicker is this. McTrist went from about $50 to over $1,200 in two hours (with the help of my stake, of course).

Back to the drunk young gun who thought he was a player and talked smack about my Oakleys. I wanted to take him out in two bites so I could use his money from the first bite to finish him off with the second. And if I got unlucky, it was ok because it was his money to start with.

Well, I got that first bite of my McTrist sandwich. He pretty much shut up and stayed out of my way at that point.

But, it did set the stage for my poker pal to felt this guy. This player did not respect her for a big hand. He ended up leaving the table dead broke after Trista felted him.

I was jealous and proud at the same time. It was a good session.

“Top set.”

Had a short but solid night at MotorCity on the $200 – $500 game. We could not get enough players for the $300 – $2000 game, so a new table for a must move $2-$5 game was opened.

Overall, it was a tough table with grinders outnumbering the fish. A tough rounder got to seat 9 before me. He offered to give it up, but I chose seat 2 instead.

To put how tough the table was into perspective, No Home Jerome used to sweat cards in Atlantic City for the player in Seat 7.

The table looked like this:

Seat 1: Grinder
Seat 2: Grinder
Seat 3: Grinder
Seat 4: Fish
Seat 5: Fish
Seat 6: Grinder
Seat 7: Grinder
Seat 8: Grinder
Seat 9: Grinder
Seat 10: Fish

At no time during my play at the table before the forced move to the main game did a grinder ever see a flop with another grinder. Pirana don’t eat other pirana.

I played 4 hands in 4 rounds until the move. It was a straightforward night and played well. Here are my hands:

Round & Hand #1: Seat 9 makes a standard 4X BB raise. Seat 10 calls. I re-raise to $60. Seat 9 folds and Seat 10 calls. I never looked at the flop, but Seat 10 did not like what was out there. I bet $50 and take it down with Q-Q.

Round & Hand #2: Five players ahead of me limp in. I call on the button with 5-5 and flop a set. Seat 5 got felted on the hand before and just did a $500 rebuy. He over-bets the pot by pushing out $50. Action folds around to me and I make it $150 to go. My opponent raises to $250 and I play back by putting him all-in. He calls, sees the set, and mucks his hand on the river.

Round & Hand #3: Seat 6 raises to $25. Seat 8 re-raises to $50 and Seat 10 calls. I four-bet it to $150. Seats 6 and 8 fold and I am heads-up with Seat 10. He misses the flop and checks. I bet out half the pot and take it down with pocket 10s and top set.

Round & Hand #4: Seat 3 raises pre-flop and Seat 5 calls. Seat 7 re-raises. I four-bet and end up heads-up with Seat 5. I bet about 3/4 of the pot on the dangerous flop of As-Qs-9h. I put my opponent on some kind of King like K-10 or K-J. If he has a straight draw and flush draw, I want him to pay for it since I flopped top set. He folds and claims he had 4-4.

All my other hands were rags. Noteable folds were 10-9s, K-10, K-J, and a slew of A-rags.

What a bunch of big talking donkeys.

It was sick. Not a single card player at the table.

The buy-in was $2500.

Now, for me, an average night is a double-up. The cards usually act in defiance of me going 10X.

Until last night that is. Walked out with just over $25,000. Thank goodness for donkeys that rebuy once or twice.

They should rename that town Definance because dey finance my next car.

Suckers.

The flop is Jc-9c-7h.

There is $60 in the pot and you have to call a $50 bet with one player behind you.

You are not sure what the bettor before you is holding, but you are pretty sure the player that acts after you will call off anything on a flush draw.

What do you do?

I have seen this scenario countless times. Right or wrong, in this situation I fold the set and flush draw if I am certain my opponent flopped the straight. For me, it is a coin toss based on the feel of the hand if I think my opponent has both a straight draw and flush draw, making them a 60% favorite to win the hand.

Back to the hand above. I bet out the $50 hoping to take it down right there.

The player to my immediate left takes about 20 seconds to act. He decides to shove his stack of $300 into the middle to win $110.

I am sure of two things at this point: the player left to act is on a flush draw, and he will likely fold if he knows I am calling. Gaining this information came from the long time it took the other player to make a decision.

And that is what this game comes down to. It is not about chasing cards, or calling a certain size bet with a certain hand. It is all about making the right decisions. Profitable decisions.

As the three stacks of red hit the felt, I announce “call”.

Yeah. I acted out of turn. But, with the next player to act watching me for 10 or 15 seconds for an indication of what I am going to do, I figured he needed the extra help.

Besides, I really did not want the flush draw in the hand in case I get unlucky. I would rather go up against any set over a flush draw. For whatever reason, I seem to beat sets after flopping a straight nearly 100% of the time but lose to flush draws almost just as often.

Flush draw folds.

“Jack no good,” my opponent says as he turns over 9-9.

“Straight.”

“Ah fuck,” he says as he sees 10-8 for the nuts.

The board does not pair and I take it down.