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Random Thoughts

by 8-2 Mike

Random ATLARGE 2K5 Thoughts

I'm hesitant to call this a trip report. This is more of a collection of random thoughts, as well as a few items I jotted down on my notepad since I'm utterly incapable of remembering anything on my own.

I enjoyed meeting new players; every year I meet more and more of the "regulars" that I hadn't previously.

A couple notable hands I had written down:

  1. Somewhere in the first round of the NLHE tourney, the blinds were $5 and $10. I was in the big blind and looked down to find the ultimate powerhouse: 2h 4s. So you can imagine my angst when it was folded all the way around to the small blind (8-2 James) who simply called the $5. I decided to just check, in order to conceal the power, with the intent of trapping later on. The flop came down 3 5 9 rainbow. Wow, I'd flopped an open-ended straight draw. 8-2 James bet the minimum ($20) so I called. The turn was the miracle Ace, giving me the wheel. Again 8-2 James bet $20 into me, so I raised to $100. As is his style, James immediately raised me back (to $500). So I pushed all-in. To my astonishment, he called! So I turned over my nut straight and he turned over a hand that looked very familiar: 2 4 offsuit. The river was a 6, giving us both the higher straight and we chopped it up. If only I hadn't slowplayed the monster preflop! Heh. :-)
  2. Get get moved to a new table with Lauri, Noelle, Lori, 8-2 Cowboy, Action Bob, and others. This time I'm in the small blind, and look down and find the magical, mystical hand of 8 2 offsuit. 5 or 6 people limped in, so I paid the half-bet. The big blind checked, and the flop was 6 5 A. No help. Where's the 8-2 magic??? I checked, and so did everyone else. The turn is an offsuit 7, giving me an open-ended straight draw. I checked again, and so did everyone else, again. (What the heck did they all have???) The river was the 9, so I got my straight. I bet, everyone folded, and I got to show my 8-2 monster.
Other than those hands, I was pretty much cold-decked the rest of the tournament, and I busted out 98th. I sucked in HOE and Stud, too. :-/

The side games were pretty juicy, but I didn't have the stamina to play very much after the touraments and huge dinners. I pulled in $359 in 4 hours on Thursday playing 5/10 at the Taj. Then I ended up -$48 after 2 hours i $1/$2 NLHE at the Borgata. Then another 3 hours at 5/10 at the Taj netted me another $308. Saturday I was pretty much flat with +$12. So in the end I netted +$631 in 12 hours ($51/hr) which is certainly way more than I deserved, considering that I suck.

But speaking of sucking, there was one particularly horrible dealer at the Taj. His name was "DAI" and he made so many mistakes that I ended up writing them down. Here's what I was able to record:

  1. I had AJ in middle position. It was folded to me so I raised. Everyone folded. I held my cards under my fingers until the dealer pushed me the pot, and then I released them. The dealer then picked up my cards and turned them over for everyone to see! What the....? I looked at the dealer and said, "Why did you expose my cards?" He just looked at me and shrugged. Wow. Welcome to the Taj!
  2. I was in the small blind with trash, and someone in middle position raised, so I folded. I had put up a $5 chip for the $2 blind since I didn't have any white chips. The dealer took my cards and my red chip and continued to take the discards from players on my left who'd folded. I'm in the 6 seat, so I'm sitting directly across from the dealer, I said to the him, "I need my change." He nodded to me, and continued to deal out the flop, turn, and river. Then he makes change, taking a red chip from the pot and replacing it with white chips, but he used the change to pull out $4 for the rake. I again reminded him I need my $3 change. This time he doesn't even acknowledge me. He stacks up the pot and proceeds to award it to the winner, at which point I'm forced to slap my hands down on the table and yell "WAIT A MINUTE!" I again explained that I was the small blind and never got my change from the red chip he took from me. So then he had to make change again since there was only one white chip in the pot. But he got all confused, because after he gave me the change, the size of the pot changed he had to recalculate the rake. It ended up costing the winner $1 less in rake. The ordeal took several minutes to straighten out. Welcome to the Taj!
  3. The dealer misread two hands:
    • The board was 5d Ks 6d Td 2d, and he announced "three sixes!" and pushed the pot to the guy holding pocket sixes, and everyone yelled "FLUSH" because another player held Ad Ah for the flush.
    • The dealer pushed the pot to the player holding AA with a board of 249JK when the player raising the whole time turned over 99.
  4. After several dealers had been begging floormen for a fill of white chips, they finally brought over several racks. This dealer turned the racks sideways to remove the chips, and the stacks spilled out all over the table, even mixing with my stack across the table. And he was *VERY* slow at organizing the white stacks into the tray in front of him. Every other dealer I'd watched manage a fill performed it smoothly and efficiently, but this guy was awkward, clumsy, and obviously unsure as to how he wanted to organize the stacks, since he changed things around multiple times after he's placed them. I think the entire process took 4 minutes, which is a long time when we're all just sitting there watching him. The guy sitting next to me who also witnessed all the other mistakes snickered and said aloud "Welcome to the Taj".
  5. A few hands later a few players limped in preflop, another guy raised, a few folded, and the action was up to the guy in the cutoff position. While everyone was looking at the cutoff, waiting for his decision, the dealer proceeded to scoop up the bets and deal out the flop. *sigh* Welcome to the Taj!
  6. The guy sitting to my right (in the 5 seat) turned around to chat with a buddy that came up behind him. The dealer and other players had to remind the guy twice to act. On the turn the guy was again turned around, chatting, so the dealer took his cards as if he'd folded and the hand continued. Nobody said anything. Finally the guy turned around screamed "hey, where are my cards???" and the dealer told him that he folded. The guy said, "oh, what was the river, I was going for a flush, I didn't realize I folded". He was fooled. I'm not sure if the dealer's actions were correct or not, but we sure all appreciated it since the guy was consistently more interested in his conversation than in the game...
Well, that's all I can remember.

I did have a great time, as did all the other 8-2 Club members. Only 358 days until ATLARGE 2K6!

-- 8-2 Mike