What do you do for a living?

Here’s a hand I played in the big no-limit game at Lucky Chances. There was a guy in the game I’d never played with before. He was giving lots of action. So far I’d played two pots against him. Both times I was on the button. Both times the river went check-check. Both times I had the winner. And both times my cards caught him by surprise by being quite a bit less strong than he expected. He made it known that in his perception of the universe, I suck.

Then this hand came up. My stack was $4,000 and he had me covered. He was on the button and I had the big blind. Everyone folded to him and he opened for $160. The small blind folded and I called. The flop was J-J-2 rainbow. I checked, and he checked. The turn was an ace. I checked. He started to check, then he said “time,” and he acted like he was thinking, and then he said “two hundred.” I called instantly with two $100 chips while he fumbled around with putting ten $20 chips into the pot.

The river was a king. Final board: J-J-2, A, K. I checked. His face got consternated and he shrugged and said, “Your ace is good. I check.” I turned over pocket sixes and he said, “That’s good too.”

“Nice hand, buddy,” he said with a snark. “If you don’t mind me asking, what do you do for a living?”

Now, if he had intended this as a polite question, then I would have ignored him politely. But he didn’t. He was being mean. I’d been poked by this rib before. He was mocking me and my poker playing by implying that I must have a pretty good job to be able to afford to play as bad as I do. Well, I lost my cool. I got rough. I ignored him ruthlessly.

It all ended happily though, with a round of laughter, when one of my best poker buddies, Sam B., spoke up and replied on my behalf…

“He plays limit.”

 

5 Comments

  • Alan Bostick Posted January 23, 2009 4:23 pm

    It is of course a foul canard. Today’s limit player, holding 66 in the big blind, would have three-bet the raise, bet-called the flop and checkraised the turn in hopes of getting a free showdown.

    (Today’s limit players are lagtards.)

  • Asahi Man Posted January 23, 2009 8:08 pm

    “I lost my cool and ignored him.” Ha. Classic.

  • bicyclekick Posted January 25, 2009 10:56 am

    LOL I get that a lot when I play no limit too. I didn’t expect it here so when I read it I burst out laughing. So classic.

  • Sean Gibson Posted January 27, 2009 12:32 pm

    Absolutely classic. I’ve only lost my cool once playing NL in Vegas, it was at Ballys and I won a couple of hands and the self proclaimed (out of towner no less) expert pro “called my hand” (and of course he was completely wrong). Anyways, I like your strategy of pissing em off with silence.

  • I Don’t Need a Job Posted April 13, 2009 7:28 pm

    Good call on the turn. It goes to show that if you trust your reads, more often than not you will profit.

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