Quitting Poker

SirWiffleWaffle quit poker this weekend.

I thought about quitting this weekend too. It looks like SirF is quitting because he is losing. I might be the only person who thinks about quitting after winning.

When people ask me if they should quit poker, I have almost the exact same reaction as I have when people ask me if I think they should start playing poker. It's a tough question that I have no answer for. If you think you should start, you probably should. If you think you should quit, you probably should. Other that, you're pretty much on your own. People never take advice about things like that anyway.

Of course there are certain personality types that absolutely should not play poker. If you are prone to fits from frustration, or likely to become a degenerate gambler, then of course, you should not play poker. But the former should be obvious after the first couple of bad beats, and the latter will never be stopped anyways.

I thought about quitting after playing at the TBird on Friday. (Yes I saw Maudie, no, I didn't say hello.) I might just quit live poker, and almost certainly quit playing at the TBird.

I was playing $3/$6. I arrived around 7:00pm and didn't get seated until after 8:00. No big deal. When I got seated the table was full of fishies. If I were to describe the table in Maudie fashion, I'd have to say Seat 9 was a moron, seat 8 was a moron, seat 7 was a moron, seat 6 was a moron....you get the picture.

I wasn't catching any big hands at all....it makes it tougher to beat the fishies when they catch all manner of goofiness, but I was still beating these idiots. Betting every pair, betting two pair like is the absolute nuts and not understanding why trips beats their two pair.

Here's the hand that bothered me so much. I had J9s in middle position. The flop is J7J. Idiot in 9 seat bets, I raise in the 2 seat, Idiot in 7 seat calls, 9 seat calls. Turn is a K. 9 seat checks, I check, 7 seat bets, 9 seat calls, I call. River is a 3. 9 Seat checks, I check, 7 seat bets, 9 seat calls, I raise, 7 calls, 9 folds.

7 seat shows King Trey. I show my J9, Clueless Dealer (don't get me started on these winners) shoves my money toward 7 seat. Someone at the table corrects the dealer (for the zillionth time tonight) and he pushes the money to me. Idiot in 7 seat stands and gets upset. He still thinks he had the best hand. Someone explains to him that he lost, and he is so mad at me for check raising him that he collets his money, which is a HUGE stack because this moron played every hand and hit two pair EVERY TIME, and leaves the table up a TON, very disgusted with me.

This is how I play limit poker. THIS IS THE ONLY WAY I CAN SEE HOW TO WIN AT LIMIT POKER. When you have the best of it and you KNOW YOU HAVE THE BEST OF IT, whether it's because you have a monster or you know your opponents are idiots, you have to get EVERY EXTRA BET YOU CAN. That is the GAME. You don't leak extra bets, and you generate extra bets where you can. You didn't have to bet the river idiot. You didn't even have to call my check raise. If you even understood that you were counterfeited, you wouldn't have.

I bet a chased four people from the table the same way that night. And I wasn't doing very well, I was only up about $100.

This wouldn't have ordinarily have bothered me, but there were aggravating circumstances.

The table eventually got bad. I knew this, but I still couldn't leave. I lost a lot of my meager winnings playing short handed against players that I shouldn't have. One sat behind me for about 2 hours and watched every hand I played. He was in a wheelchair and was buddies with the guy next to me. I didn't see the harm until his name got called and he refused to play any other table. But I still played. I played until 5am. When I finally left there were SIX messages on my phone (which got no signal in the casino) from Mrs. Bogey, who was getting more and more PISSED OFF with every message.

Add to this that the TBird, which already takes an outrageous rake, forces you to post when you sit, or wait for the BB. The list is a mile long, but you still have to post. How retarded is that? It caught everyone off guard because they just changed the rule in the past week. Seats were constantly empty, even though the list was miles long. It took 20 minutes for them to fill a seat. The hands per hour rate is atrocious. There was one time when the dealer, who counts the cards after the river is dealt, started counting the cards out after the turn was dealt. "FLOOR!" That took 15 minutes to resolve.

And my favorite. Capped pre-flop by a half dozen players. Flop is Ace-Three-Three. Turn is a king. Capped the whole way and winner turns over KK, for the turned boat. Nice Hand. Right? After this hand there is a dealer change, and the new dealer counts the cards. 53.....There were five threes in the deck. "FLOOR!" I don't even know what should have been done in this situation....Felicia? Little help? I do know what they did....nothing.

So, since I can't seem to play a reasonable amount of time, I can't leave when the table gets bad, the rake is outrageous, the dealers are incompetent, and I piss off too many people when I play there, I don't think I will be patronizing the TBird again.