Naturally I figured my harsh exterior coupled with the ability to read people fairly quickly I could hold my own against a few poker players. For the most part I was right. I'm rather proud of making it half way through a tournament of 21 players. Reaching number 10 or 11 is an admirable feat.
Now I always imagined my first actual poker tournament with money would be in a casino. As many times as I've been to Vegas I figured it'd probably be there. If not in Sin City I figured it'd be in a smokey, seedy casino with a bunch of asians down on Interurban Blvd. But found myself in good company at one of my long time work buddies Craig's house. Craig has poker tournaments every few months or so and I've been trying to invite myself to one of those for years now. Once I gave him my spiel about the 30 for 30 he finally gave me the invite.
The cool thing about Craig's tournaments are that they go towards funding his wife's 3 day walk for breast cancer. Half of the buy in goes towards breast cancer awareness and the other half goes towards the pot. So I actually feel pretty good win or lose the money is doing something worthwhile. I figured for sure the place would be filled with co-workers and people I usually don't get to talk with at work. But was pleasantly surprised to find out that I only knew about 4 people (including Craig) there.
All of these people were good folks that were really easy to get along with. We broke off into 3 tables of 7 people each. This tournament, I figured would be kinda play nice everyone take it easy. Boy was I wrong, it was all business. They knew how to run the show and it was down to a timer which setup bigger blinds and buy ins helping eliminate the tables quickly. Our table was your typical northwest nice. Nobody placed very aggressive bets and I took the table on the very first hand. Why not right? That's when everyone has equal chips and it's easy to gauge who's willing to push.
To my right was Joe. Probably the best player at our table he ended up with a stack of high denomination chips and held them for most of the game. Next was a nice gal who stayed in for a while and seemed to be playing mostly for fun. Then Cass who made aggressive bets that didn't always pay off. Followed by Ray one of Craig's oldest buddies who turned a losing streak into a huge handful of chips. Joe's wife who was equally a good player and was stacking her own chips. Then Alex who didn't really know what he was doing. We all went round and round no one at our table really dropping.
It wasn't until the first chip up when things started to get interesting. A chip up is where you take your lowest denomination of chips and eliminate them from the table. Cashing them in for the next higher chip. First chip up I was lucky to make it to. I made a few stupid aggressive bets that cost me a handful of chips. But eventually won a couple to turn it around for me. I pushed Alex into a few dumb bets that caught up with him and wiped him out. Joe nearly got me a few times but I was smart enough to back down when it counted. Cass ended up cleaning herself out until there were five of us left. Another chip up and the tables turned. Now my chip count was shy and after intermission we had other tables switch up to the remaining players left.
About each table had four players left each. Craig and his dad came to ours. This was no bullshit time his dad kept that game moving and would bitch him out if things were going too slow. They came to our table with a mountain of chips. I'm talking 12 stacks at least 6 inches high each. Against my 4 stacks 3 inches high. Craig's first hand with us he wiped Joe clean off the table. Easily our strongest player gone in the first hand...one hand?!? He moved fast, dealt fast, talked fast, bet and pushed fast. It wasn't enough time. I didn't know what I'd gotten myself into and before I knew it I was wiped out on that very second hand Craig played. At least I got beaten by the host and at least I made it against half the others playing.
That was however, a one two punch I didn't even see coming. Then I was downstairs with all the other losers playing pool and watching Hotel Transylvania 2 with Craig's four daughters. Not much longer after that things started to get awkward.
Ray who held his own in the poker game down to the final 5 had not held his liquor quite as well.
He'd been slinging back whiskey shots and started to get obnoxious. Then he started getting belligerent. One of the last guys made a wise crack about him betting too slow and Ray got all bent out of shape about it. Practically throwing the table over and flipping shit over a slight sarcastic comment. It got to the point where Craig had to escort him outside. By escort I mean full on grab and throw this guy out. They tripped over each other but it looked like he tackled him full bore out onto the deck where they were scuffling. Imagine old style cartoons where there's a cloud of smoke with legs and fists coming out of it. Pretty much what happened. It got awkward really fast where Craig's dad just left. Super pissed off and inline to win money, he just took off. Shortly afterwards all four of his little girls left crying that dad and uncle Ray were fighting. It hit that level of awkward that instantly sobers you up. Me and a few others were looking for our opportunity to leave. We left shortly after Craig asked if we wanted to play another round.
Things I learned today:
Don't get in the middle of a fight between two best buddies. They'll work it out in the end
How not to get worked by the host
The more angry the drunk the more difficult it is to give them a ride
