CRYBABIES

                                                      

 

             What a pleasant surprise to encounter fewer crybabies here in Las Vegas than those I was faced with during my thirty years of poker in Paris.  Or so I thought until yesterday.  Stuck in a $1-$3 No Limit game at The Wynn, the converse proved to be true.  I say ‘stuck’ since I wanted to play at a $2-$5 table but no seats were available.  Rather than sit around twiddling my thumbs, I chose to play in the smaller stakes game.  Once again I was struck by the disadvantage of $3 chips over $2 chips.  Let’s face it: betting in three-dollar increments is a pain in the neck.  “Ill see those seventeen chips and raise you twenty-eight more.”  How much does that make in cold hard cash?

 

            But it’s crybabies I want to talk about, not the structure of games on The Strip.  I’m telling you, we had two champions at yesterday’s table.  The younger one, a kid sitting on my immediate right, couldn’t have been more than twenty-five.  You could see the other whiner was close to three times his age.  Hard to say who was more disagreeable, but I guess the kid would get the prize, if only because his voice was loud and strident.  Worse still, he was winning his fair share of hands.  The old timer, a geezer who looked as though he had spent the previous evening sleeping with the homeless on Main Street, couldn’t win a hand.  You know what?  I wouldn’t be surprised if he were one of those weird people who live on $200 a month then end up leaving millions of dollars to some obscure pet farm in Missoula or Grand Rapids City.

 

            Let me give you an example of junior’s conduct.  All-in head to head against an Oriental lady, the young man stood up and screamed “Oh no” when he saw her pocket queens across the table from his wired jacks.  “Why does this always happen to me?”

 

            Of course a jack came up on the turn.  Rather than fall silent and regain his seat, the fellow continued to whine and moan. 

 

            “I was really scared for a moment.  This kind of thing happens to me all the time.”

 

            “What happens all the time?” asked a bearded gentleman.  “You pull a miracle card against an opponent?”

 

            No reply to that.  Nor did the young man shut up.  When not following a hand, he continued mumbling under his breath about his lousy hole cards.  Come on, man, give me a break!  I’ve been sitting here all afternoon with nines and fours, eights and threes, sevens and deuces.

 

            About fifteen minutes passed  with no action whatsoever.  I guess that’s the nature of small stakes games where players feel constrained to be cautious. The betting is faster and far more aggressive when more money is in play.

 

 Suddenly old Art raised the bearded gentleman’s $9 bet to $21.  Au secours, - that's help in French - I thought to myself.  Art hadn’t followed a hand since Marie Antoinette was telling the peasants that brioches were every bit as good as bread.  Not put off in the least, the bearded man came in.  The dealer turned over: QH-7S-2C. 

 

“All in,” said Art.

 

El Beardo pushed his last chip into the pot before revealing two red sevens.  Poor Art’s pocket aces looked like a bird with broken wings.

 

“Couldn’t you pick on someone else?” said the old man.  “Can’t you see I’m in the shithouse?  You could have been a good guy and folded those sevens.”

 

Silence ensued.  It was an embarrassing and painful moment.  Squirming in my seat, I could see the bearded fellow shake his head sadly.

 

Old Art reached into his pocket.  It wouldn’t have surprised me if he took out a roll of $100 bills as thick as your fist or a torn handkerchief smeared with oil. 

 

“I’ve been playing this game longer than most of you have been around,” said Art.  “I still can’t get the hang of it.” 

 

He withdrew a silver dollar from his pocket and examined it carefully.

. 

“1929,” he said.  “An unlucky year if ever there was one.”

 

“Why do you keep it?” asked the dealer.

 

“That’s the year I was born.”

 

Art bought in for another $100.  Too discreet to let any of us see the size of his bankroll, he was soon engaged in another all-in hand, this time with the kid on my right.  Both players turned over pocket kings.

 

“Oh God, no” said the youngster.  “I know he’s going to get a flush.”

 

“Something tells me I’m not going to win this hand,” said Art.

 

“Can we chop?” asked the young man.  “Is it all right if we don’t turn over the flop?”

 

“Fine by me,” said Art.

 

“No can do,” said the dealer.  “Against the rules.”

 

The five common cards turned out to be: 4-5-6-7-8 of four different colors.  As desired, the two players chopped the pot.

 

“I told you I couldn’t win that hand,” said Art. 

 

“Wired kings,” said the young man.  “What the hell does one have to do to win at this game?”

 

“Cry,” said the Oriental lady.  “Like you have been doing all afternoon.”

 

Sure enough, the kid won a nice pot on the very next deal.  A few minutes later, Art followed suit.

 

            “Hand me a box of Kleenex, will you?” said I, their common victim, reaching into my pocket for additional funds.   “If it’s crying that makes a man a winner, I can bawl as loud as anyone else.”