Hitting the wall

I've been moderately successful over the years playing low-limit hold 'em -- mostly $4/8, with occasional $3/6 games and some $6/12 -- but whenever I've tried to step up to $10/20 I've been spanked, taken a hit to my bankroll and had to drop back down.

Actually, that's true primarily here in Seattle, where I'm beginning to realize the games are rougher than in a lot of other parts of the country. Even in Las Vegas, which has a reputation as a tough poker town, I've won playing $15/30. And I've beat the L.A. games pretty good, up to $20/40. (That reminds me, I still need to file a trip report on our recent Los Angeles vacation.)

This annoys me. I've been playing this game for a long time now, more than 25 years, and at this point I ought to have sharpened my skills enough to compete with the "big boys" (really, at $10/20, just the mid-size boys). It's also important financially. The "rake," the amount taken out of each pot by the house, is proportionally smaller in larger-stakes games. And a healthy win in a bigger game obviously is more profitable, which is the whole point.

So what's going on? I know I understand hold 'em well and I have great confidence at the table. I played in the World Series of Poker this summer and even there I didn't feel intimidated. In fact, if anything, as I've said before, some of my biggest leaks come from hubris, too much confidence.

My WSOP table, with "the joker," pro Jeff Madsen

Some of my poor results at $10/20 fairly can be chalked up to bad luck -- I've got stories to tell from a Diamond Lil's session a week or so ago -- but I'm sure a lot of it is me. Sometimes I tighten up too much, afraid of losing at a faster clip, and turn weak/tight. Sometimes I'm too suspicious that the players -- who are clearly a level or two above the low-limit fish I'm used to -- are "making moves," trying to steal pots, and I pay them off with inferior hands. And in some cases, especially at the Muck, the $10/20 players are just better than I am; they play with more discipline for longer periods, exploit even smaller margins of potential profit, and instinctively (or through deeper study) know when to ratchet up the aggression and when to back off. They outplay me.

But I'm determined to break though this barrier.

After my profitable games in LA, I took a shot at the Lil's $10/20 game last week. Not so great. I burned through my "rack of red" -- 100 red $5 chips -- in less than two hours without winning a pot. Argh. I didn't rebuy.

Instead I rebuilt my stack a bit in my next couple of sessions, down in $4/8, and decided I'd look for a spot to try again.

Yesterday, with an afternoon to spend playing while Michelle worked, I drove to the Muck and sat into my normal $4/8 kill game. From my first hand I was on fire -- flopping straights, hitting flush draws, making big pairs stand up, even bulling my way into a few pots. Before long they started a new $10/20 game and, $160 up already, I changed tables and took a seat.

Fortunately some of the tougher regular players weren't around; nobody in the game spooked me. In the first hand I was dealt A-Q of clubs, raised, got called in two places, hit an ace on the flop and got paid off all the way. Nothing to it. Deal me in.

For the next hour or two my papers went cold, but not disastrously so. In fact, I was lucky in a way: I was so card dead that I couldn't get into much trouble. Still, inevitably, chips dribbled away and after a while I realized I was $200 down for the day, even counting my profit from the $4/8 game. Man.

But I kept my cool, finally made a hand or two and rallied a bit. When it was time to cash out I was up $200 for the day -- $160 from the small game, and $40 profit at $10/20!

Not a killing, clearly. But not a loss either. Sometimes just breaking even can feel like winning. Maybe I'm over the wall.

Hang up and call!

Strange little dustup yesterday at the Muck involving my friend David.

An aggressive but good player on my immediate left, in Seat 6, raised a kill pot ($8/16 for this hand), and a couple players called, including David in Seat 1, who had the kill button and therefore already had posted $8.

The flop came ace-ace-something, with two of the same suit, and David raised Mr. Raiser, who called.

As this was going on, my neighbor was talking on his cell phone, playing half on autopilot, it seemed to me. He check-called the turn, which was a blank. The river brought another non-flush card, and Mr. Aggressive checked again, all while continuing his phone call. David bet out and Mr. Aggressive, looking right at him, said "Yeah."

Taking that for a call, David turned over his hand, ace-king, for triple aces and, barring some unlikely, weirdly played full house, the winner. But now Mr. Aggressive tried to throw his hand away, without ever having pushed his $16 call into the pot, and David just about came out of his chair in protest.

"He said 'yeah,'" David said. "He called!"

My neighbor insisted that he hadn't called -- "I missed my flush," he said, "why would I call?" -- and had just said "yeah" into the phone. It was all a big misunderstanding!

The floor supervisor was summoned, and after hearing a replay of the action with lobbying from all parties, she chastised Seat 6 for talking on the phone, the dealer for letting him do so (a violation of house rules) and David for flipping his cards before chips went into the pot. And then she decided in David's favor, ruling (correctly, I thought) that the verbal "yeah" was binding as a call. If you don't want to be misunderstood, she said, don't talk on the phone. That's one of the many good reasons cell phones aren't allowed at the table.

Here's where David blew it. Not satisfied, apparently, with winning the argument and the nice pot, he continued jawing at the floor supe and the offending player. He kept saying yeah, yeah, yeah, David said.

Well, wait a minute then, the floorwoman said. That sounds more like he was talking into his phone. She ended up reversing her ruling, allowing the phone guy to take his $16 back, and putting David on irreversible tilt.

I don't blame him for being miffed. He lost a double-big bet on a bogus play and a seemingly bad floor call to boot. But David didn't help his own cause. It's a good reminder, if nothing else, to slow down and wait for the chips to cross the line.

Justice!

In addition to the fun and good fortune of winning a couple racks worth of chips this afternoon, I had the satisfaction of exacting a tiny punishment from the dealer who jacked Michelle out of a pot last month.

After that horrible hand Michelle and I both vowed to stiff "Triple H" from our customary one-dollar tokes when dragging a pot. Unfortunately, in subsequent trips to the Muck either H didn't make it to our tables or we weren't able to win a hand when she did. In fact, I knew it was time to leave in one game last week when Triple H pushed me a pot and I inadvertently tossed her a chip. I'm not paying enough attention, I thought to myself, and I got up and cashed out.

But today, playing in a softish $4/8 game that included my friend and former boss David, I happened to hit a little rush during H's down. Four pots I won while she was dealing, and four dollars I didn't slide back in her direction. I think she noticed too. She looked at me kind of funny and then, when other players tipped her, pointedly knocked the felt and thanked them before glancing back at me.

Is my no-tip policy mean? Oh well.

I'm sure she'll never connect the toke drought with her own bad dealing on that sorry night. But who knows, maybe she'll concentrate a little harder if only to figure out for sure whether I'm stiffing her. That's a good outcome right there.

And anyway, those are four bucks I can use to tip the waitresses, who work harder and are more deserving.

Your lucky number for this week ...

I got off to a pretty good start tonight in my $4/8 game at the Muck, playing the tight, solid style that I think works best here, especially at the beginning of a session. In fact I took down the first four or five pots I entered, all but one without a showdown. Seemed like easy money.

Then, in one hand, I had 10-8 in the big blind, checked along with several limpers and was happy to see a flop of 10-9-7, giving me top pair and an open-end straight draw. So I bet right out, happy to lose players or get callers, and felt OK when two players came along, no raise. The turn was a jack, giving me a straight, although if either of my opponents were playing K-Q (or, less likely, Q-8), I'd be toast.

I bet again, to see what's what. Now I was called only by the late-position guy in Seat 1, a solid player with a big chip stack who hadn't been in a lot of pots. At this point I didn't figure him for a straight or he'd have raised heads-up. My best guess was A-10 for one pair on the flop, or J-10 for two pair and a straight draw on the turn. When the river brought another 9 I guessed my straight was still good. This time, though, when I bet Seat 1 raised. I groaned and paid him off -- J-9, for two pair on the turn (my read was close) but a full house on the end.

OK, fine. The point of this isn't to bemoan the beat. But minutes after that hand ended I finished my plate of fried rice and cracked open my fortune cookie:


I passed the fortune around, including to the guy who spiked the 9 on the river to beat me, and we all had a good laugh.

Happily, the 9 did turn out to bring some luck, mostly because of the joke about the fortune. From then on, every time a 9 came on the board everyone looked at me and chuckled, and I managed to hit one 9 for a straight and another for two pair. Another time I played pocket 9s aggressively and took down a pot despite overcards, then showed my pair to the good-sport opponents.

On my last hand of the night the flop was 10-9-9. I had nothing but bet out anyway. A couple players laughed about "there are your nines again" and everyone mucked.

I cashed out an $81 winner -- $90 if you count the lucky nine chips I spent on my dinner and tip.

Check the camera!

Well, I never saw this one before.

Just back from a week in the juicy Southern California cardrooms (report on that adventure to come), I decided to get reacclimated here with an afternoon trip to the Muck.

Shortly after I sat into the $4/8 kill game, in Seat 4, the young woman on my immediate left raised from the button and got called in a couple of places (I wasn't in the pot). She bet the flop, bet the turn, and by the river was heads-up with a middle-aged, yellow-sweatered woman in Seat 9. I forget the flop, but the turn was the jack of clubs and the river was a king, and the third club on the board.

Now Yellow Sweater bet out. Seat 5 sat staring for a second at the board. Finally she flipped over her cards -- pocket jacks, for three of a kind -- and muttered something about her Seat 9 opponent getting there on the river. But she didn't put any chips out as she showed her jacks, so the dealer scooped her hand and Yellow Sweater's unexposed cards into the muck and began to push the pot to Seat 9.

Wow, I thought, what a laydown. There's no way I muck a hand that strong in this situation, not on the off-chance of a single opponent hitting a runner-runner flush draw. I looked past my neighbor to Seat 7, where Judy, a very good player and frequent opponent, shot me a raised-eyebrow look. She would have called too.

"Wait!" Seat 5 interrupted. "What does she have? She never showed her cards!"

The dealer looked stunned, and several of us, including me, informed the player that she never called the river bet.

"Call the floor," she said. "Check the camera! Why would I fold a set of jacks?"

The floorman came over, interviewed the dealer and then directed her to "impound the pot" while the game continued and technicians checked the security-camera recording of the action.

Seat 5 continued to protest and explain, but I had little doubt how the challenge would turn out. I wondered, though, what would happen if the camera showed somehow that my neighbor had in fact slid her eight chips forward as she claimed. How could they possibly determine who would win the pot, since Yellow Sweater's cards were never exposed and the cards were long-since shuffled?

By the time the case was settled -- no, the camera confirmed, Seat 5 never called the bet, the impounded pot would go to Seat 9 -- a new dealer was in the box and didn't even know the back story. So I asked my question, and he informed me that Seat 5's triple jacks, as the only exposed hand, would have been declared the winner.

OK, fine.

But what really should have happened, Brysen continued, is that the dealer should have asked Seat 5 whether she intended to call or fold.

Wow, what a horrible policy, I thought. And then I remembered that this was the very scenario that cost Michelle that big pot a couple weeks back and led to our vow to never again tip the offending dealer, "Triple H."

And who do you think dealt today's disputed hand? That's right, HHH. Looks like she's out to piss people off on both ends of the same play.

Would anyone here like service?

The new and improved old card room at the Muck reopened late Wednesday night, recombining with the old new room, and it still had that new-degenerate smell when I got there yesterday afternoon.

The carpet has been replaced, and that was long overdue and much appreciated by everyone, I'm sure. The bigger and more noticeable changes though were the fancy new tables and electronic communication system.

At the new front desk by the entrance a floor guy takes your name, asks what you want to play and types it into a computer. Big plasma screens around the room show the constantly updated list of games and waiting players, and also the high hand for that hour's bonus and the dealer rotation.

Each table has a little panel in front of the dealer, with a row of buttons and a small LED readout screen. When there's an open seat the dealer pushes a button and the next player on the big board is called to the table. Next to the dealer's panel is a credit card swiper. When a new player sits in, he hands the dealer his Muckleshoot player's card, used to track hours for comps and giveaways, and the dealer swipes him into the system. If he gets up for a break, changes tables or even changes seats, it's noted.

That's good because a lot of players were gaming the system. The Muck always tracked hours for generous quarterly giveaways -- they'd hold nightly drawings for thousands of dollars every three months, with tickets in the barrel determined by hours played, and also freeroll tournaments with starting chips determined by hours -- but the tracking system was extremely loose. Some players would sit into a game, clock in, and then get up and walk around or hang out in the restaurant for hours, returning to play a round just often enough to keep their seats. The result was that when it came time for the quarterly drawings the same couple dozen "players" -- playas, more like -- would pull down thousands of dollars raked from the pots of us solid citizens. That always annoyed me.

But the early reviews of the system yesterday weren't good, at least from the dealers. They all hated the extra work, and already the button panels seemed finicky.

The one thing the dealers seemed to appreciate was the relative quiet in the room. Gone were the constant shouts from the tables to the floor to the tables to the food station to the tables. "Seat on 4! Thank you 4. Mark M for 4-8, table 4. Chips! Service on 3! Thank you 3! Double on 16!"

If you worked there, I guess, that would get old. But I always liked the cacophony. It's part of the experience. And if you hear enough calls for "service" at the next table you might get a bead on some guy who's drinking too much.

At our table yesterday, the dude in Seat 8 sipping vodka and cranberry juice quietly asked the dealer for a cocktail waitress. The dealer must have pushed a button because in a minute, without another word being spoken, Anna was standing there. "Would anyone here like service?"

Must be the magnet

First, let me say that I had a medical procedure this morning, an MRI, that involves a very powerful magnet. So my theory is that maybe all the good or bad luck particles got attracted or repelled into the wrong place.

Whatever it was, my post-hospital poker session was about as fun and profitable as a trip to Radiology. Let me save space by giving the short versions of the four key hands: bad beat, bad flop, suckout, super suckout.

It took me two hours to win one small pot. I dragged two smaller ones in the next hour, then sulked home three racks to the bad.

I thought, believe it or not, that I played pretty well.

New Muck update

The refurbishing of the old poker room was supposed to be done Saturday, but as of Sunday night it was still closed off, leaving players jammed into the smaller "new" room.

With my fuzzy camera phone I could see the new carpet's laid and the tables are partly reinstalled, so I'm not sure what the holdup is at this point. Word around the campfire, with much eye-rolling by dealers, was that they still need another week or so.

Three hands, seven queens, zero pots

Despite my goal (not quite a rule) of refraining from bad-beat stories here, I've got to take one minute to moan about some bad luck during my one frustrating hour at the Roxy today.

The session got off to a bad start when I was dealt pocket aces on the first hand. I know you know what's coming: capped pre-flop, capped on the flop when the player on my left reraises me all-in, running cards give all-in player a straight with his king-10.

Later, I was dealt pocket queens an unbelievable three hands in a row.

1. Flop safe. Turn jack. River 6. Two pair, J-6, wins.
2. King on the river wins it for A-K player.
3. Queen on the flop! River spade wins it for flush-drawer.

I'm not even complaining about their play (except for the J-6 guy). It just sucked, that's all.

Triple-H's lucky day

That lame-ass dealer who ripped Michelle off the other night caught a break today. She wasn't working when we stopped by the Muck for a couple of hours. That meant she missed out on our new toke-withholding punishment policy.

Maybe her shifts will never coincide with our occasional visits, and she'll never know that we're stiffing her.

One player (and one dealer?) per hand

Thanks to a horrible mistake by an experienced dealer, Michelle got ripped off of a big pot in our Muck session the other night, a swing that made the difference between a winning and losing session for her.

I wasn't in the hand and don't remember all the particulars, but I know she raised pre-flop with A-K, hit a king right away and didn't slow-play. I think the flop was K-9-7. One of the other players in the pot was a friendly, extremely loose, not very knowledgeable and heavily drinking Tracy Morgan look-alike in Seat 9. He kept playing back at Michelle, but she didn't back down, reraising confidently and forcing the dude to pay if he was drawing.

By the river there was a possible straight on the board -- something like K-9-7-10-6. Again, Tracy Morgan bet, but now Michelle, smart enough to slow down with one pair only on a board like this, just called him.

"Ah," Tracy Morgan said, "I just have the 9," and he gave his cards a dispirited, disinterested flip toward the middle. He knew he was beat.

The cards bounced, landing face down -- not in the muck, but on top of the shuffling machine and touching the giant pile of chips.

Here's where the dealer, a woman we've known a long time, made the move that will cost her all future tokes from both Michelle and me. She asked Tracy, "Are you sure you want to muck that," and as he reached in robotically to turn over his cards she announced: "straight." Tracy looked at his cards -- A-8, no 9 -- and literally counted out the 6-7-8-9-10 on his fingers to confirm he had a straight.

"Oh, I didn't even know I had that," he said.

How Michelle kept from leaping across the table and knocking their two heads together I'll never know. She didn't even call the floor for a ruling, although she asked a supervisor about it later and was informed she would have lost the appeal since Tracy's cards never touched the muck.

Still, very bad play by the dealer known as Triple-H. This also strikes me as a bad policy by the Muck. The man surrendered his hand and miscalled it to boot. The dealer, who may have seen the player's cards as they tumbled feltward, should not assist him in reclaiming his hand and dragging the pot. In many other rooms this ruling would go in Michelle's favor.

Michelle said that next time she plays she might table-change around the room, following Triple-H, just so she can make a point of not tipping her whenever she wins a hand. I don't blame her.

Think you're going fishing?

If you watch any poker on TV like we do, you've seen those clever commercials for Milwaukee's Best Light (the spots are much better than the beer). The setups change, but always a bunch of guys are standing around talking and one of them does something girlie or seems whipped by a wife or girlfriend, and a giant beer can comes crashing down on him.

"Men should act like men," or something like that, is the tagline. It's a pretty funny campaign.

OK, so last night Michelle and I were out playing poker, sitting at the same table, and when we found ourselves contesting a pot she punished me with a classic, made-for-TV dis. Michelle had raised before the flop and then reraised me again after the flop when I bet, trying to take the pot away from her. I sat staring at the board for a minute, trying to figure out what she might have, and she said, "You look like a beer can's going to fall on your head."

Ouch.

I folded, of course, and everyone laughed.

I care too!

Today is the United Way's Day of Caring around these parts, and the P-I is giving a bunch of people the day off to go out and volunteer. I don't work there anymore, and I've never been a fan of the United Way anyway (long story), but I'm thinking about doing my part by driving to the cardroom and giving the degenerates a couple hundred bucks.

Not on purpose, of course, but still.

The Lion

In that Roxy game the other day there was a waiting list to move to the other, "main" game. One of the newer players, a pleasant, 40-ish Asian guy I've played with before, had somehow slipped into our game without getting his name on the list, so he asked the young floorwoman to put him up -- Leon, he said. She went to the board and wrote "Lion."

Leon laughed and said to me, she must be Spanish. A couple of hands later he raised and took the pot without a fight. "The Lion!," I said, and he laughed and even gave a little roar. It felt like a nickname was born.

Fast-forward to yesterday at Diamond Lil's in Renton, where I had cruised for some loose $4/8 action and, I hoped, more of the good play that had sparked my comeback at the Roxy. Unfortunately, the session didn't start off so well. On my first hand I flopped a set of 4s then lost to a guy who caught runner-runner hearts to make a jack-high flush. In short order I had pocket queens and aces also get cracked, once by the same dope on my right, and I had dug myself a rack-plus hole before I knew what happened.

Dazed, I barely noticed when a new player filled Seat 1 until I heard a familiar voice: "Hey, didn't I just see you yesterday?"

The Lion!

I was happy to see a friendly face, especially since I associated him with my previous comeback. And when I called him by his nickname Lion smiled and the other players took notice, like one or both of us might be dangerous and at the very least both were regular players.

The Lion, maybe emboldened by his new identity, played like the king of the jungle, raising nearly every pot. The entire table seemed to shrink into the shadows and Lion stacked chips. After a while everyone, me included, decided that the Lion must be over-representing at least half the time, and we met his raises with reraises, making for some juicy pots.

My analysis is that by this point the entire table was playing poorly. Lion was over-aggressive and sloughed off much of his profit. The rest of us chased, bulled or otherwise tilted off a lot of chips too. Money was moving around the table, but almost randomly. It became a game of blindfolded chip-tossing, with everyone peeking at the end to see who would scoop. Not that fun.

By the time I recognized all this I was stuck two racks and feeling whipsawed by the growing pots and shrinking hand standards. So I resolved to tighten up.

Sadly, this led to my worst play of the afternoon.

In one hand I decided to call from middle position with the 9-8 of diamonds. Several limpers already were in the pot, including the dumbass on my immediate right whose J-6 had snapped my triple-4s earlier.

The flop came 10-8-2, giving me second pair and a backdoor straight draw. Lion checked, Dumbass bet and with $28 already in the pot, I put in $4 more to see what developed. Now the solid but tricky player on my left raised, one late-position player called two bets cold and it was folded around to Dumbass, who called. I called as well. $56 in the pot.

The turn's a 7, giving me an open-end straight draw in addition to my pair of 8s, which the way the table is tilting right now might even be best unimproved. Check, check, bet, fold, call, call. Three of us in the pot, $80.

The river is a king, missing my straight and putting one more overcard on the board. At this point I don't really like my hand. I'm vulnerable to J-9, 9-6, any two pair or, for that matter, any 10 or king. But something still smells funny. I know I can beat a weak pair or a complete bluff, which I wouldn't put past either one of these dudes.

Dumbass checks. I consider betting myself, hoping to steal, but instead check. Mr. Tricky bets again. Hmm. What the heck does this guy have that could have been so strong on the flop and also isn't scared by a sraight-making turn or a king on the end? Maybe he flopped a set, maybe he had pocket kings all along and now got even stronger. Maybe he raised on the come and hit his straight on the turn, which would explain why the king didn't spook him. But I didn't think he had any of these things. I suspected utter bullshit and decided I would call him down.

Except then Dumbass called. OK, wait a minute. Now I'm confused again. Dumbass had bet out on the flop and then check-called all the way. Maybe he hit his straight. More likely, the way this guy plays, he caught a 7 on the turn for one pair and a king on the end for two. At the very least he had to have a weak 10.

So after turning all this over in my head for at least a minute I decided to surrender. "I don't mind you betting," I said to Mr. Tricky, "but I don't like this guy calling. I can't beat both you guys."

As soon as I tossed my cards, Mr. Tricky groaned and said "good call" to the other guy. No pair, he said. As expected.

But now Dumbass, as if he knew what he were doing all along, said "I've got the 8," and turned over 8-3 -- the same pair I had just mucked except with the worst possible kicker. Shit. I threw away the winner ... just gave away a $96 pot. The horror.

The next hand I raised with A-K, then paid off some guy with K-J who hit his jack.

The Lion got up and cashed out, a small winner. I followed him to the cage -- the Lamb! -- a $280 loser.

Leaks

Writing about my hubristic (and costly) demand to see the "losing" hand the other night got me thinking about other leaks in my game. I've worked hard to plug a lot of them, like betting into the nuts on the river, calling before the flop with marginal hands or chasing with second pair or weak draws. Those improvements have saved a lot of money.

But I still leak chips in certain situations, and I realize a lot of them share something with that bad play the other night: over-confidence or too much ego. Hubris.

Yesterday, for example, I stopped by the Roxy for a couple of hours in the afternoon. There was one $3/6 game going and a waiting list for a second, so we decided to start a short game, six-handed. Already this is bad for me, mostly because I think it's good for me. I generally like my chances in a short-handed game, even more so at a donkfest like the Roxy, where many players are bad and I believe my superior play will allow me to roll over everyone. It's odd, though, how the other players don't automatically share my high opinion of my own abilities, especially when a game's just starting and I haven't done anything yet to earn a rep.

So it's the first hand, and I raise from middle position with A-6. This is a hand I normally wouldn't even play for one bet, but hey, there are only six players and an ace might be good, plus I can probably outplay these doofs after the flop. Bingo, the flop brings an ace. They check to me and I'm off and running. A couple guys call along on the unthreatening turn, and then on the river I get check-raised. Wha? OK, maybe I'm beat, but I make the crying call ... only to run into pocket aces in the big blind! Holy crap, I was drawing dead.

Slow learner that I am, I made similar overplays in several of the next dozen hands, and 20 minutes into the session I needed to rebuy. So long $100.

Here I caught a break. More players joined the game, making it a full table, and that combined with the shame of my speedy rebuy led me to lock down and play right. An hour or so later I had somehow rebuilt my sorry stack and managed to cash out an $8 winner. But I vowed to remember the lesson I've been taught so many times. We'll see about that.

Poker players out there, does any of this sound familiar? What leaks are you working on?

Good call bad call

Addendum to the previous post about last night's Muck session:

The guy I described as Mr. Steamy on the first hand of the night turned out to be a pretty bad player -- calling every hand, betting into a big crowd with nothing, showing almost no regard at all for the texture of the board. He was caught trying to steal numerous times, and if he was heads-up with another player you could count on him to get out of line, a tendency I noticed and planned to exploit.

So at one point I was in the big blind with A-7 offsuit. A late-position player limped in without raising and Steamy completed the small blind; I checked along. The flop came raggedy -- no big cards, no possible straights or flushes -- so when Steamy bet out I decided to call and see what happened. The late-position player folded. The turn was a king, the river some blank that left the board uncoordinated, but now any king, any 9, any pocket pair or anything else that paired the board beat me. Even a bigger ace, not unlikely, would win. Still, I didn't believe Mr. Steamy, and when he fired yet another bet I thought only briefly before calling him down.

"Ah shit," Steamy said, "if you can call you win," and he held his cards like he was about to flick them into the muck.

"Wait a minute," I said. "I called you. Let's see what you've got."

This is something I often say in these situations, and I've been slow to learn how stupid it is. It's a move that shows an excess of hubris and a deficit of cool. Basically I'm just trying to humiliate a guy who's bluffing, even though he's already admitted by conceding the pot that he was full of shit.

So Steamy, compelled by the rules of poker, fulfilled my request and turned over his cards: Ace-7, the same hand as mine! Cripes! Instead of me winning everything, being rewarded for my excellent read of Mr. Steam as a bullshit artist, we'd now split the pot. Humiliating -- I negated my own good call with the bad call of asking to see the "losing" hand.

The table laughed, as they should, along with a bit of praise for my brave call. I turned red and muttered something about this being why I never have chips at the end of the night.

And then I proceeded to prove the point, losing most of the rest of my two racks before getting up to go home.

Call your banks!

The first hand I was dealt last night at the Muck was a strange one, and even though I didn't end up in the pot I should have known it augured badly.

I've been running good lately, rebuilding a bankroll after what seemed like a long losing streak by tightening down my game, exercising patience and being more willing than previously to give up a hand when I thought I was beat. Playing better, in other words. And it hasn't hurt that I've caught some cards, made some hands and avoided deadly rivers. All of that has combined to make me feel very confident at the table. It's also given me the jones to play, and so last night when Michelle didn't feel like going and my friend David couldn't make it, I decided to try my luck anyway.

So I come in behind the button, in Seat 3, in a kill pot; although normally a $4/8 game the stakes would be $8/16 this hand. The kill button is with Seat 7, a middle-aged Asian man who has a monster wall of chips, probably $500 or so worth of one-dollar whites, and the smug look of a dude who's been running over the game. In fact, he won the kill by bulling a pot and then, after scooping it without a showdown, announcing he hadn't looked at his cards yet and turning over a 3-2 offsuit, no pair, the nut low.

When the kill-pot action got around to the guy on my right, who had laid down the winner in the previous hand and was steaming, he announced a raise to $16 "just in case you haven't looked yet." I folded, Kill Button reraised (without looking, I thought), another guy called, Mr. Steamy capped it, and they went to the flop three-handed with more than $100 already in the middle. The flop was something like K-9-3 and again there was a lot of action. By the river, with a possible straight and flush on the board, they had lost the third player but Seats 2 and 7 were still pushing a lot of chips around and it looked like Kill Button might actually have something this time.

When the betting was done, Mr. Steamy slapped his cards down, hard, on the table in front of him. But before you could even see what they were they bounced funny, flew up and hit the chest of the older man in Seat 5, halfway around the table. They came to rest on the rail in front of him, pocket 9s, for a flopped set and the apparent winner. But now Kill Button protested that Steamy had mucked his cards and the hand should be declared dead. His queen on the river, for one pair, should scoop the pot.

Wild protests and yelling all around. The floor supervisor was called over and after interviewing all witnesses decided that since the 9s never hit the carpet or even Seat 5's lap they were still good. After an admonishment Mr. Steamy could stack the chips.

Now, with the exception of angry Seat 7, there was some light joking. No spiking after a touchdown, someone said. Picking up on the sports metaphor, I added, Call your banks. This made Steamy smile.

The cards didn't bounce so well for me. It was a tough game with tricky, hard-to-read players, and I would have been smart to change tables; staying put was the first of several bad decisions I made.

In one hand I raised from the button with pocket 10s after several players limped in. The flop came 8 high, an early position player bet, I raised, he three-bet and I called. By the end there were three 8s on board but no overcards to my 10s. I wasn't worried about a straight; unless the other guy had the case 8 my boat looked good. Turned out he had pocket queens (unraised before the flop), and he took a nice pot. Later, over-afraid of his trickiness, I played passively when I flopped top pair against him and he caught running cards for two pair.

Needless to say, I didn't need to spike any monster winners. I won a few small pots but cashed out a $175 loser for the night.

The new* Muck

(* halfway there)

The Muckleshoot poker room is in transition. A couple of weeks ago they closed down the original, big room for updating, including new carpet, and shifted the action to the year-old addition.

As an extension of the existing room, the "new" room seemed fine to me -- 16 new tables taking the overflow, allowing bigger tournaments and shortening the wait for a game. Plus there was talk of cool new high-tech improvements, like an electronic board to manage the waiting lists and card readers at the tables that would automatically record players' hours for the purpose of promotions. I also liked the direct doors to the outside, so you don't have to walk through the smoky casino to get to the smoke-free poker room.

But with the opening between the rooms walled off, the addition feels cramped and airless, a long narrow hold-em hallway with no amenities save the sports-tuned flat-screen TVs. And so far at least, the improvements are a no-show: They just moved over the old, big dry-erase board to manage the list, and the auto card readers aren't in use. In my couple of visits during this transition period, the dealers have universally grumbled about the room; the tables are uncomfortable for dealing, they say. One dealer said all the furniture was ordered by "someone upstairs who's never played poker, let alone dealt."

I don't know. I was dealt a straight flush on the flop one day last week -- good for a $300 high hand prize in addition to the pot -- and I've cashed out a winner on both trips, so I'm not complaining.

One strange result of the construction: There's no direct access to restrooms from the addition; you have to walk outside, down the sidewalk and then back through the main casino entrance. Kind of a pain.

Last week a kid got up on his blind to make the trek, came back five minutes or so later, then left again after one hand. When he got back I said, Dude, you missed your button. He said he realized he left his watch in the bathroom and had to go back to get it. Some kind of Larry Craig foot-tapping ritual going on there, I think, but whatever.

The old room is scheduled to reopen, recombining both halves, next weekend.

Betting the nuts

Here's a poker etiquette question for you. Is it OK to bet the nuts?

This seems like a no-brainer to me, but I took so much grief one night last week at the Roxy, the humble little card room by my house, that I'm curious about other players' thoughts.

I was in a $3-6 game, up a few chips after an hour or so, when I flopped a set of 7s from early position with about six players in the pot (standard for this game). I check-called the flop of Q-7-3. The turn was another queen, giving me a boat. I checked again, the original better bet, the guy next to him raised, we lost a couple and when it got back to me I three-bet it. The other two called. I'm pretty certain I'm best at this point and unless another queen falls I'm not too worried.

The river is a 7, giving me four-of-a-kind and -- discounting the highly unlikely pocket queens -- the stone nuts. So I bet out. Now the guy to my left raises, and the other player cold-calls! So I pop it again and they both groan as they call. Weak queen, weaker queen for second and third place. Boo-de-hoo. I scoop.

I figure that's that, but they both start bitching right away about what a jerk I am. "What, you need to jack us for another bet? You've already got quads!" And like that. This continues, I'm not joking, for the next hour, until I leave.

Now, in my country when you have the best hand you're supposed to bet it. Seems to me that's the whole point, especially in a stupid suck-out game like this one where you can't protect your hand and the rake will kill you if the Q-3 offsuits don't. Besides, if the dumbass complainer in Seat One didn't want more money in the pot he didn't have to put it there. He raised me!

So I just said, hey man, I tried to tell you what I had by three-betting the turn and betting out on the river.

I should also mention there is no bad-beat jackpot in this place, so that wasn't a consideration, although I did win a $148 bonus for the quads in a Monte Carlo-style jackpot they have. Also these other players aren't longtime playing companions who give me air, or vice versa, as a courtesy (another play I don't get).

So what do you think? How would you have played it?