That Feeling
I often write nonsensical pieces about specific emotions I get whilst playing poker and this another of those; so if the last few have bored you senseless then please switch off now.
As per most Thursdays, this week I was down at Hartford Social Club with my mates having an average game of poker in the same old setting with the same old faces and it’s still as enjoyable as ever. Now maybe most people don’t think like I do, maybe I’m weird, but I have this thing inside my head whereby if something happens to me that is pretty normal at the time but is one of those things that when you look back at it in twenty years you’ll go on about how good it was; well I try to take those things in and appreciate them at the time. It’s a bit like a decent night out in a city centre. At the time, you go out, you have a laugh, get pissed, fall asleep then get on with your life the next day. Five years on, when you’re a bit older and more boring, you reminisce about that night and then truly appreciate it for the great night that it was. Anyway I’m digressing.
So the same old game is running as it does every week and I toddle along nicely, winning a few pots, bluffing a couple and losing a few. We start with 20 players and without much to report I make my way to the final table. Everyone is relatively similarly stacked although I’m maybe one of the lower ones. It’s the same old final table we’ve all played a hundred times where in a single hand, the short stacks and big stacks are swapping places regularly. Then the following hand crops up; I think we were still eight handed at the time and blinds were 1k/2k. Average stack 50k and I had about 40k.
To my immediate right is Jeff, a solid player and very good. He raises 3*BB from early position and I call behind holding 710 suited. I know this seems like an odd play, especially given our position but given the blind sizes only 2/3 players were ever seeing a flop and although Jeff is very solid, if I’ve got position on him I can be pretty sure where I am and can easily take a decent post post flop. My thinking is proved to be nonsense when my flat call induces three more callers!! One of them is to my immediate left and it’s the infamous Devil Neck, a player I love to have at every game. You can’t put him on much, you never, ever, ever bluff him but he’s not as bad as some players like to think. Anyway, with the pre flop action, the pot is already healthy and we see a beautiful flop of 7-10-3 with two spades. Even better, Jeff leads out for 12k. Now the pot is already something like 30k, I’ve got about 30k behind facing a 12k bet so I just ship the lot. I think I’m someway ahead of both players and the pot is now the biggest of the night by by a mile.
A soon as I ship it Devil starts think about the call and I can see that Jeff is really, really thinking hard, both of them think they’re ahead. That said, Devil is infamous for calling with any sort of draw; I saw him draw at a flush once after facing overbets on the flop and turn and he only held the two of the suit he was chasing!! Anyway, as I sit there I got that old feeling back. My heart was literally thumping in my chest. Now this is a poxy poker game in a poxy club with a bunch of players of ability ranging from ‘good’ to ‘atrocius’. The prizepool is about £250 total but for those short few moments, the game draws you in and it becomes as important as anything else in the world. As it happens, they both held top pair but due to the nature of the action and the fact that it was me who shipped the chips, they both convinced themselves everyone else was on a draw and both called. The board blanked off and I took the chip lead to subsequently finish third for a massive £40!!
That’s the point of this piece, I love the way in which poker can matter so much when it actually matters so little. Aside from a European Cup Final penalty shootout, I don’t think that there’s anything else in my life that could give me that feeling. Now maybe that says more about how sad I am rather than how great the game of poker is but I really don’t care. As long as I can continue to enjoy a simple game of cards more than other hobbies which cost other people hundreds and thousands of pounds then I’ll continue to be an extremely sad individual. I suppose if you’ve bothered to read this piece to the end, then you’re about as sad as me 
.
S
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[...] Patrick Flanigan wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptist2_9738642-happy-poker-player I often write nonsensical pieces about specific emotions I get whilst playing poker and this another of those; so if the last few have bored you senseless then please switch off now. … [...]
[...] unknown wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptI often write nonsensical pieces about specific emotions I get whilst playing poker and this another of those; so if the last few have bored you senseless then. [...]