Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Another Tuesday Night!

It was Tuesday night and time for another classic night at my bar poker game. I had a very enjoyable first table with many players that I like to play with including Annies Aces http://lukbox.com/blogs/ann. I had a decent cards night and was able to put together a nice size stack. I was playing classic tight aggressive and it was working well. I told Annies Aces that I wasn't sure what I was going to talk about today, but I am sure that something would come up as it always seems to and I was right.

The player to my right was a local regular that I have played with many times, but not taken a lot of time to analyze. This was the second time in a row that he was to my right. He is a player that limps often and calls a lot of raises preflop but seems to tighten his play as the tournament progresses towards the points at least that was my opinion before the last two sessions. I decided to pay more attention last night and try and figure him out. The first thing that I soon noticed that if you sit to his right is that he shows you his cards on most hands even if you are still in the hand. I am not one to usually take advantage of this, but it made it much easier to figure him out. If he had any face card he limped in. If he caught any one of his cards on the flop he will call no matter what size the bet is. If he has two face cards suited or not he will play all the way to the river unless it risks his stack without hitting. If he has top pair with any kicker he will risk his whole stack. He is always the last one to turn over his cards at the end of the hand and you can tell if he thinks he has the best hand as he sits up a little higher and almost starts to pull in the pot before he turns over his cards. In a way he slow rolls every hand that he is in. He doesn't realize that he is doing it. He is a classic bar poker donk. LOL! I can't say much about his style of play as he currently is ahead of me in points on my Tuesday night game. At least next time he is on my table I will be able to take advantage of his style and hopefully get most of his chips.

Now for the question of the day to all you poker guru's out there. After a player was knocked out on another table last night he asked another player if he could speak with him to the side. I will call him Wayne and other player F. F was in the hand that Wayne moved all in on. It was F turns to act and he was talking to himself what he should do. Such as, if Wayne has A-K or Q I should call here. He wasn't talking to any player at the table. F folds and other pl;ayer on table calls ands takes Wayne out. His conversation is about F talking about the hand while another player is involved. F says that if he is doing something wrong that he would like to know as he considers himself a student of the game and will change his game if it is wrong. Now I know that it is one player per hand according to the TDA rules and I always have a copy of TDA rules at my tournament so we look. The only thing that comes close to covering the situation is this.
41. No Disclosure
Players are obligated to protect the other players in the tournament at all times. Therefore, players, whether in the hand or not, may not:
1. Disclose contents of live or folded hands,
2. Advise or criticize play at any time,
3. Read a hand that hasn't been tabled.
The one-player-to-a-hand rule will be enforced.

He really didn't do any of the above. He was just talking out what his options were. I think it may be more of an ethical situation then one covered by the rules. What do you think? Is there a written poker ethics website or book?

1 comment:

  1. First I'm going to address the bar poker situation as a whole. Honestly, I don't think all the verbal analizing of someone elses hands would change the way MOST players play the game. In otherwords, I would guess in the situation above that Wayne was going to get that call no matter what was or wasn't said by F. That however doesn't answer your ethical question. In my humble opinion, all is fair in love and war, especially if you're not breaking a rule. Seriously, how many times in a night do you hear, or have you said...oh you hit your King? What do you have aces? I think that person has pocket sevens...etc. I can think of literally hundreds of people I have played with over the years who have verbalized a "guess" at the other players hands when other players are yet to act. Heck, how many times have you hear people do that there were not in the hand? Do I like it when someone calls out my hand correctly, not really, does it happen, you bet. Now in this case player F thinks aloud longer and in more depth than most. Quite frankly, I know similar players (grin) who do this all the time and I have had other players come up and say how much they have learned from hearing that verbal arguement. Sometimes saying it out loud helps you sort it out, etc. So really I think what you are asking is more about length and depth of the verbal guess than the actual verbal guess itself. So in otherwords, if you feel the longer conversation is unethical, and the shorter guess isn't unethical, well then...that is a bigger issue all by itself. Personally, again, I may not like it, but if it isn't against the rules I have no ethical issue with it.

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