Date: Tue, 6 Aug 2013 23:32:54 -0500 From: Chris Mecklin Subject: [BARGE] (no subject) Part I of several: Rev. Tom Bayz Trip Report for BARGE 2013 I'm going to write stories rather than giving a chronological report. I hope this makes it more interesting. Many of you spend all of your time at BARGE playing tournaments and cash games at Binion's with other BARGErs. Some of you venture onto the strip to play bigger games or other tournaments. I don't think many of you ever step foot in localz jointz like the Boulder Station during BARGE. You might ask yourself "Why would I waste any of my time playing small stakes limit poker at some place out on the Boulder Highway when I can play more interesting small stakes limit poker games at Binion's with my r00ling friends? Plus don't they still allow smoking there? (answer to that is finally no)" Well, I was always under the impression that the nastiest poker game in Las Vegas was Omaha 8/better at The Orleans on a weekday afternoon. However, a few years ago I played the Sunday night mixed games at the Imperial Palace (before name change) and an employee there assured me that the $4/$8 limit Omaha high only at Boulder Station is the nastiest, snarliest game in Vegas. Ah, a challenge! Last year, Keith T. and I made a field trip and played in a real action game that I took a couple of racks off of. From last year's report: *"Mark", the guy to my immediate left, was a 60ish man in a nice suit who looked a little too upscale for a localz joint, but was obviously a regular and played every hand. I picked up a tell on when he would raise or when he would call, but I could discern no pattern on how this was related to the cards be held. [He chose the action that he believed would maximize the size of the pot] I got yelled at by one old regular ["Herman"] for the SIN of preflop RAI in a 4 card poker game. Another old guy, wearing a Party Poker hat and an El Cortez jacket, ["Steve", a WWII vet who is at least 90] berated every single player as soon as he sat down, including Keith & I who were unknowns to him. I booked a win, as I won a couple of big pots correctly chasing with gutters and backdoors getting 30+:1 when 8 people see a capped flop. * This year on Tuesday afternoon, I got a ride with Schmengie, with Keith T and Tina G coming out later. Dean and Redbird never made it due to Redbird's trip to the beauty salon. Mark T. decided to win a Binion's morning donkament instead. Within the first five minutes, my table is already bitterly arguing about the seat change buttons (at one point, there were FIVE seat change buttons out, I was holding out until I could ask for the seventh button) and the dude that constantly walks and hardly ever plays a hand. After 10 minutes, some younger guy loses the rest of his chips and goes off on the table as he departs. It's just poker reg stereotype city. Seriously, if I spent a few weeks just playing this game, I could probably bang out a decent NaNoWriMo about the characters. Keith T. arrives and eventually ends up in my game. "Mark", the dude with the suit from last year who drove the action isn't there, so the game isn't playing quite as big, but I recognize two old codgers from last year: "Steve" was the 90 year old guy in the Party Poker hat and El Cortez jacket, and "Herman" is the bastard that yelled at me for preflop RAI after a pot that HE won. I thought Steve was a prick last year, but I figured out this year that he just uses "old frail curmudgeonly bastard" as his schtick for having fun and messing with people and getting away with all kinds of shenanigans. He even offered me the "bro fist bump" after we chopped a pot and sucked out on Herman. That was kind of surreal--I took it, of course. I think Herman is just a miserable dick, though, and has been his whole life. Steve sure thought so! There was another great hand where Steve won and yelled at the dealer to push the pot to him faster. This dealer was awesome and starting throwing the chips to Steve ONE at a time. It wasn't a BARGE game, but I had to tip him just for that. Randy and Keith leave but then Tina G. rolls in the house and gets seated at my game. Oh my god, she is AWESOME at locals casino poker (I guess Atlantic City is a good training ground), as she nearly immediately gets most of the table on raging tilt, particularly "Herman". She drives the action and gets our average pot sizes back up to near "Mark" levels. I'm not making any hands and I'm down several racks. I did win my last hand when flopped top set held on a scary runout to turn a 4 rack loss into just a 2 rack loss. It is a great game though as long as you can take the swings and not get tilted by standard omaha beats and losing to goobers. The standards of play, self-control, and behavior are so horrific and it's hard to fathom that most of these people play all the damn time and still think having their "flopped straight" lose is an unbelievable rare instance of bad luck. Just before we have to leave, some middle-aged Asian lady sits next to me and her & Tina are immediately yapping. Lady obviously thinks she's the Queen of Boulder Station and is outwardly saying how she likes Tina's style and is muttering on how she's gonna get her. LOL. Unfortunately, Tina needs to get downtown for dinner so that pay-per-view caliber fight is cancelled. We then return downtown with Tina driving Goldie's convertible with the top down in the dry fucking heat. Date: Wed, 7 Aug 2013 14:04:05 -0500 From: Chris Mecklin Subject: [BARGE] Bayz Trip Report Part 2 of several: Lowbah Lowbah Part II of several: Rev. Tom Bayz Trip Report for BARGE 2013 If you missed Part I (Field Trip to a Localz Casino), I posted it yesterday on the BARGE list but forgot to give the email a subject. It's a vignette about limit Omaha high with really crabby people far from the strip. As many of you know, I am a lowbah aficionado. You may wonder why or how, since I'm only 43 and have never lived in California and thus I certainly wasn't around during the heyday of Gardena. The sum of my California lowball experience is watching clips of Elliot Gould and George Segal in the 1970s movie "California Split" on Youtube. I loved the crabby old lady=97"You mean I have a goddam six and NOBODY CALLS?!?" I learned how to play poker (draw & stud) when I was a kid from my great-uncle Ed, who lived near Chicago. Ed was my grandmother's bachelor brother who had made a lot of money on the stock market and always made sure me and my sister and cousins had walking around money. You can literally see the Hammond Horseshoe from the house that Ed shared with my grandparents. He used to always give us $2 bills, which I never saw otherwise, and it wasn't until I was an adult that I realized he always had so many $2 bills because he went to the track to bet on ponies a lot. OK, then when I started playing online they had these 5-card draw and lowball tournaments on Planet Poker. I had never played lowball, but from RGP and Michael Weisenberg columns I was quickly able to beat the weak fields in those low buy-in tournaments. I continued to enjoy draw games as other variants like 2-7 triple draw and badugi came onto the scene. Then when I started coming to BARGE in 2008, one of the highlights for me was the yearly A-5 lowball tournament. I've had a good track record in lowball games at BARGE, including my BARGE win in the lowbah in 2011. I have a rep amongst some BARGErs as a wheel-card catching draw luckbox. My wheel-card catching don't seem to translate to stud games like 8/better or razz, though. This year's tournament featured 55 players (presto!). There's a lot of good lowbah players at BARGE=97some of you played in California during the draw days and many are just damn good at every variation of poker there is. I had some good fortune early, including being dealt a pat wheel on a hand that Warren S. was unfortunate enough to draw and hit a six on. Just before break I got Carol K. all-in. We both drew one and I made an 87 but she also caught an eight to make 86 . She also survived a second all-in from me before I finally busted her to claim a massage bounty. My initial table breaks and I'm moved to a table that includes Russ F. and Mickdog. I'm now pretty short and have a 432-joker draw against Mickdog. Since I'm a draw luckbox I of course catch a five to double up and cripple him. I start winning hands and bust several players. At the final table, I continue running pretty well and avoiding too many beats. I bust Rick K. from PokerStars in 7th. After losing Michael M. and Dan G., we have a final four that includes the last three winners of the tournament (Fich last year, me, Omaholic in 2010) and Andy H., who has a win in History of Poker on his BARGE resume. After Fich gets knocked out in 4th, I use my two-card drawing skillz to knock out Rich B. in 3rd to claim the Loser Store keychain and win our last-longer bet. Unfortunately for me, I cannot win and get my second runners-up finish in Lowbah and third overall at BARGE. I run my pat eight into Andy's pat six and he claims the trophy. The other chance to play Lowbah at BARGE is typically during Reindeer games. For my first several BARGEs, we played the $10 Nor-Cal lowball, where you could kill after the first two cards. Last year, we played $4/$8 lowball variations instead, which was a pretty crazy game but probably not the favorite of many of the lowbah regulars. So this year was $4/$8 A-5 lowball, without variations, and where you can limp in (i.e. So-Cal style, I think). Forgive me if I forget you, but the players included Betty T., Bob H., Gillian G., Rich S., Patrick M., Bayz, Llew. I'm probably the most active player in the game and I'm doing pretty well. Llew takes a horror beat running #2 into #1. My buddy Ron G. shows up and plays a while, along with non-BARGEr Susan, who does seem to know most of the people at my table. We also had appearances by Keith T., Randy C. (very briefly), and Doug M. I think Susan had a lot of fun and might be back next year. Without Spencer at BARGE, I don't really have a chance to show off my skillz at hitting wheels after drawing multiple cards. My dream session of Reindeer Games lowball would be to play the $10 Nor-Cal game for the first few hours, and then make it into a $4/$8 or $5/$10 Fiple draw (i.e. rotate all of the various triple draw games like 2-7, A-5, badugi, badeuci, badacey). Anyways, I enjoy getting to play these games with my friends once a year. Date: Thu, 8 Aug 2013 11:53:25 -0500 From: Chris Mecklin Subject: [BARGE] Bayz Trip Report Part 3 of several: On Thursday I Drink On Thursdays I Drink Part III of several: Rev. Tom Bayz Trip Report for BARGE 2013 Part I (Field Trip) and Part II (Lowbah) have already been posted to the list. Part I has no subject in the email because I forgot it. During the rest of the year, I am a college professor. While my university is by no means a party school; the town was "dry" when I arrived (and not dry in the way Vegas is dry), became "moist" (i.e. can serve drinks in restaurants but no package sales) and recently is now "wet". Despite the claims of the local Christians, no deity has yet turned us west Kentuckians into pillars of salt. Many of our students have a local tradition that involves getting hammered on Thursday night and missing class on Friday, as professors never say anything important or schedule quizzes or exams for Friday. As a semi-responsible member of the faculty, I refrain from such and hold classes as scheduled on Friday. I've noticed Paul and the other members of the Binion's tournament staff are also responsible and hold tournaments no matter how hungover or still drunk we might be. Looking at the Thursday line-up, this looks like a prime drinking day: CHORSE, PLO, and then a big gap of time after busting PLO. Any drinking day should start with a good breakfast. Before coming out this year, I conducted an Internet search for a non-casino breakfast joint downtown and came across "Eat", located on 7th and Carson. The Yelpers liked the food and had some trepidations about some of the waitresses, but I don't mind snarky servers as long as they bring me good food. So a group of nine of us (Bayz, Ron G, Karl K, Tracy & Rick, Lynnsey & Bruce, Mark T, Kenny S) went on my "off off-Broadway" or "unofficial unofficial" event to Eat. As promised, our waitress was a shade sarcastic. A few minutes after arriving, Steve McLaughlin shows up with Chuck Weinstock and I immediately realize that I have chosen well, as I put Steve on being the guy that's in touch with the local food scene. Steve asks me how I knew about Eat, I said "looked online" and he told me about the World Series of Food foodie event he had hosted for poker folks at this location. I ended up choosing the "chilaquiles"=97others had such delicacies as the "huevos motulenos" (I'm getting those next time) and "shrimp=91n grits" and everyone seemed very happy with breakfast. Mickdog=97sorry you missed this year, you'll definitely need to come with next year on some day. I'm not actually playing CHORSE but I guess since I'm up and have already escorted a group of people to breakfast that I'm kicked off of Team Sleeping In. I'm hanging with the Arrogant Bastards (Skippy Ron on holdem, Super EV Kyle on Omaha/8, Super Hungover Chris J on crazy pineapple, Redbird on razz, Samurai Scott on stud/8, BronzeDodger Dave on stud). Someone says that I'm team cheerleader, but I decide to give myself a battlefield promotion to coach. Oh, and there is a squadron of cocktail waitresses replenishing the team's supply of Coronas and crazy pineapples. I advise Ron and Kyle to play tighter; they ignore me. Scott complains about losing a stud/8 pot to Carol K when she plays nines, so I suggest playing tens since 10>9. Jepsen goes AWOL, so I get to play one orbit of crazy pineapple. I won a small pot and didn't play any other hands, so I deserved full credit for the Bastards' narrow victory. Or maybe it was Redbird's razz bluffin' skillz or Skippy Ron getting Kluchman to tilt off his chips in a late level of holdem. Then we go to PLO. Hey, we have three BARGE 2013 lammers, so I can bust this tournament FOUR times and get a lot more drink units in, as I'm already pretty buzzed from CHORSE and decide to go into Monte mode. I choose to go that route rather than rebuy right away. I heard one time someone asked Johnny Chan when you should use rebuy lammers, and he said "As soon as the worst player at the table doubles up", and then he rebought as soon as the guy who asked the question doubled up. I didn't have to face the scenario of an early double-up, as I got it in on the very first hand against Len G. I had a straight/flush redraw but he rivered a bigger straight. I got to play for quite a while but never really built a stack. Paul F on my left is winning virtually every big pot he got involved in and has a big stack. I got lucky on a couple of shoves against Brian J, but finally Nolan D and I lose our final pot on the same hand against Paul. Now it's time to r00l cash games. I had taken a couple of racks yesterday, mostly due to a friendly drunk young tatted-up local who was learning all about the trials and tribulations of Omaha/8 (i.e. we three-quartered him and nut-nutted him a lot). Today is a $4/$8 H.O.E. table. We get an angry bitter drunk old local, I think his name was "Jim". Jim supposedly was a dealer at Binion's back in the day and was telling stories about the good old days and how great old-time players were and what shit the game is now. He talked about a game called "chow-a-PA" [sic] and says "I remember when BARGE was full of great players, but now it's just a bunch of leftovers!" Someone at the table mentions that people like Andy Bloch and Terrance Chan (did TC play this year?) still come to BARGE, but apparently Andy's in Jim's leftover category and he never heard of Terrance Chan. If I had been more clever, I could have seen if the nickname "Not Fucking Johnny" would ring a bell. Jim is pretty rude and unpleasant and it's obvious the staff knows and hates him. There's another local on his immediate right when controversy happens. The game is Omaha/8, first local limps UTG, Jim raises to $8, a bunch of people cold-call, and then when it gets back to first local he makes it $12. Jim completely loses his mind, insisting that he had only called and that he only owes $8. The dealer and everyone else disagrees with Jim's fictional account of the hand. We do get the rarity of needing the floor during a BARGE game; Nick correctly rules that Jim can call $4, raise, or fold. Jim angrily mucks some shit hand face-up, screaming that he would never have raised with such a hand. Uh, but you did. I'm not in the hand and BARGErs at the next table are waving me over to find out what the commotion is about. Uh, the commotion is about $4 preflop in a multi-way hand of Omaha/8, LOL. Jim goes on tilt and I'm the primary beneficiary of his terrible play. Jim's final hand comes during stud/8. It ends up being Jim and I heads-up. I've got a lock low and an open-ended straight draw against his high-only board, so I'm on a total freeroll. We get the rest of his chips in on 6th street. I catch a six on 7th street, which only gives me a pair of sixes for high to go with my low. I announced "I've got half with a low", pause waiting for him to announce some decent high hand, and then as he says nothing finish with "and a pair of sixes for high!" He looks at his cards several times and finally mucks and storms off. SCOOP SEAT OPEN Date: Fri, 9 Aug 2013 18:31:09 -0500 From: Chris Mecklin Subject: [BARGE] Bayz Trip Report Part 4 of 4: Odds and Sods Earlier parts chronicled my field trip to the locals casino, playing lowbah with my friends, and drinking on Thursday. This part is various short stories from throughout the week. Part 4: Odds =91n Sods *My Tournament Niche*: In addition to A-5 lowbah tourneys, I seem to be good at 10AM $60 NLHE tournaments held at Binion's. I played it twice this week and cashed both times for a per tournament average profit of $265. I might just move to Vegas, move into Siegel Suites, get up at 8AM, take the bus and wafflecrush my morning tournament, then grind $2/$4 limit holdem until I have enough comps for a brisket/pastrami/corned beef from the snack bar, made by Florencio, and be home by 5PM so I can spend the rest of my life trolling poker forums and lists. Some of you haters will probably say that heavily raked low buy-in tournaments with fast structures are unbeatable in the long run. *Casa de Alcoholico*: Two visits this week. I skipped Chinese poker to come to the bourbon tasting, which I hadn't made in a few years. Thanks to Bob O. for ride and Dan for the booze & hospitality. Also was there on Sunday for hangover party. Played some OFC, made $5, then was there until middle of night outside dozing off while Nick C., Dan, Sharon, Rich B., Ron G. played "Six Degrees of Separation". Dan and Sharon are such nice hosts and I can't believe they didn't kick us out. Rich then "tunnels" Ron taking him to airport for early morning flight. I get back downtown with enough time to pack but not enough time to sleep before my trip to the airport. *Culinary Downtown Vegas*: Best Meal of the Week: Dinner at "The Flame"(El Cortez's steakhouse). I got the fabulously old-school Steak Diane, unfortunately without tableside preparation. Breakfast at Eat and all those deli sandwiches from the snack bar that Florencio made were great as well. Finally ate my first Vegas buffet ever (breakfast at MSS). Also had the "Aloha Breakfast" in the California, which is eggs, white rice, Portuguese sausage, spam, and "luncheon meat" (which appears to be just a spam variant). Worst Meal of the Week: Banquet prime rib. Sorry, but worst meal I've ever had in Vegas, and I've eaten at the Gold Spike and the Imperial Palace. *TOC/HOSER/Karaoke*: The Tournament of Champions tournament started off rough for me, as I bled down from 3000 to about 1500 chips. Then Diane showed up to deal at my table just before the first break and I seemingly won every hand she dealt during her down. It was mostly Omaha/8 where I'd either get lucky or have a monster and won almost every hand. I put a pretty bad beat on Caryl A. in limit holdem where A5>KK when I flopped trip fives. By the end of Diane's down the rest of my table is telling us to get a room and I'm up to like 7500. I kept running good for the next few hours, busting several people including my second Carol K. massage bounty. Then it all went horribly wrong. They moved Gillian to my table. Gillian crushed my soul, over and over and over (congrats on winning). I did make it to the game change to NLHE, with a freaking 1BB stack. I won my first all-in hand with J3, but then got AT of clubs against Bingo's tens and the ten-high flop with no clubs sent me to the rail just a few spots short of the money. I then played the $500 HOSER tournament against a super-soft field with a few people without WSOP bracelets or deep main event runs and again was rather inefficient in busting out in 7th. As I had been not drinking all day (Monte outdrank the rest of the HOSER field by himself), I went up to karaoke and got in a day's worth of adult beverages and public humiliation. *Does He Look Like a Man Beaten By Jacks?* (my main event story): Yes, a "Rounders" quote. While Mike McDermott was not a man beaten by jacks, Tom Bayz was a man repeatedly beaten by jacks. I guess if I insist on putting money in behind over and over, that the posterior probability of a quick elimination is quite high. Misplayed Hand #1: I'm in BB, Kenny S. raises as usual, Tina G. flats him, I try squeeze with total rags. Kenny folds, Tina does not. I try a c-bet on a QJx board, she calls. I give up and accidentally expose my shite hand as I muck after she bets river. Tina said later she flopped set of jacks. Misplayed Hand #2: Very next hand I open with AKo. Ha, I have a real hand this time! Rick M. comes along. I probably have him dominated, bwahaha! Turn puts 3 hearts on board and the river the 4th heart; I have a red king but have forgotten the suit. Instead of checking my cards, I decide to bet like I have the flush; Rick calls like he has the Jack of hearts with his JJ and my King of diamonds is no g00t. Misplayed Hand #3: I raise with 98, Kevan G. defends his blind. Flop is 8 high, I bet, he raises, I jam, he pauses and says "I'm probably making a bad call" as he makes an excellent call with his JJ and wins the bust-out box of bourbon balls. Then I'm immediately summoned to be one of the very few that had to pay off a Goldie bet this year. *Chick-a-ha:* Here's how my hand went. Dealer is Asian Jenny, not Texan Stephanie. I'm UTG, straddle, get 33, which isn't a very good starting hand in this game. I do flop bottom set on one of the three boards, which still doesn't seem very strong. I turn quads, which seems better. I had already decided I would chop with Jenny if I won; I don't recall exactly when I verbally announced that intention, but my quad treys did win a pretty nice pot for a $2/$4 game, which I chopped with Jenny.