Getting Rewarded for Bad Play Part II

It’s Tuesday night. I am home early from my poker league tournament. I took yet another bad beat. I’ll get to that in a little later. I am a little ticked off at the moment.

So I get to the tournament, register, draw my seat, and find my chair. As usual, I am keeping an eye on who else draws my table. Once all is said and done we have 8 players at my table, 8 at table 2 and 7 at table 3. I take a second to recall info on the players at my table. From my left back around here’s how it goes: 1- super tight, 2- super tight, 3- crazy player, 4- straight forward player, 5- calling station, 6- easy money, 7- the mathematician.

With super tight & super tight on my left- I am stealing their blinds all night. I am not going to try to get mixed up with crazy player (#3) unless I have a strong hand. The tight semi-aggressive player needs league points tonight; he will be playing a little tighter than normal (plus two weeks ago he told me that he plays tight early). I have good reads on the players in #5 and #6. Player #7 is all about math.

When I am not in hands, I watch the action. I try to remember everything I can. When a player opens a pot- First, I look at my position. Then, does he seem strong? Or is he weak? How long has it been since he played a hand? What were the last few hands he has shown? How many chips is he sitting on in relation to me? This all flashes through my head, then I look at my cards.
I think all this is often my downfall. Since I do these things I often expect others to do the same. I expect them to analyze the situation the way I do. Well, they don’t. Go figure, huh? I guess I take the game more seriously than some of the other guys in the league.

Alright, now that I have lost half the people reading this…with all the boring stuff…here is why I am ticked-

I have 14,700 in chips. The blinds are 300/600. I haven’t played a hand in a couple button rounds. Pretty card dead. It folds around to me I have four people left behind me, including the crazy idiot in the big blind. I look down and see two kings. I make it 2,600 to go. It folds to the big blind. It’s 2,000 more to him. He has me out-chipped by 800 chips. He looks at his cards, does this shrug/hand wave, and pushes all in. I am loving it. I know he is full of crap. I call in about .01 seconds. He yell’s out “aw, shit!” He knows he just got caught. He flips over a Q 8 off-suit.

I am loving it. I am about to double up, and take the chip lead at the table. The flop comes out:

10 Q 7 (rainbow)

Some idiot says, “Man, you need an eight”

Here comes the turn- 8 and the river is a J. I just got knocked out of the tournament.


I was ticked. What do you do? Say nice hand? Yea right! He looks at me and says, “Sorry man, I thought you were trying to make a move.”

WHAT?? Make a move? I have yet to show a weak hand. I am two away from the button. I haven’t played a hand in 3 button rounds. I bet out almost 20 % of my stack. Yea, let me tell you…what a move!

I was steaming. My first thought was- “that had to have been the easiest lay down in history if I was in his seat.” A player that you have out chipped by the skin of your teeth commits 20% of their stack pre-flop and you are holding a Q 8 off-suit. You lay it down.

I know that I played the hand right, but it just stinks that another idiot got lucky on me. Another moron was rewarded for bad play.