Watch your back

I might just write about this one hand today.  Let me just write about how this went down first and talk about it after.

Red Rock 2/5 NL.  I limp for $10 with 7-6 of hearts (there was a straddle).  The big blind makes it $50 to go.  2 people call, and I call.

Flop is K-5-2 with the 5 of hearts.  It checks around.  The turn is a 4.  Checks around again.  The river is my money card - the 3.  So I have the nuts.

So the river comes out and one guy bets $80.  I raise to $300.  He goes all-in for a bit more, I call.  We chop the pot.

Not a very interesting hand (and definitely disappointing for me).  But here's how the betting and physical actions went down on the river.  He bets $80.  I raise to $300 by throwing 3 bills out (I had 5 bills in front of me).  The dealer pulls in the $80, leaving 2 bills and 5 red chips in front of me.  Now the guy says all-in.  I put out a small stack and say call.  We show our hands.  I take my $220 back.  Now the dealer said something about "I need to give him $200 out of the pot first" just thinking out loud, and I think he gave the other guy $200 or $220 to account for the $220 I just pulled back.  Then he chopped the rest.

So I was a bit shell-shocked because it definitely hurts when you are already down, you river the nuts, and end up chopping.  I wasn't paying close enough attention.  So I stack all of my chips, look down, and see that I have 4 bills.  And not a lot more chips.  And then it hits me - I had 5 bills before.  Now I only have 4.  And I have about the same chips as before.  I should have the same bills and a little more chips, or 1 less bill and a lot more chips.  I had lost a bunch before this point so I started the hand with 5 bills and maybe $170 in red (had to put a bunch of bills on the table).  Now I have 4 bills and $200 red.

The chips are already in my stack and his stack.  At this point I realize that I have no recourse.  The next hand is already going.  The cards are out and there's no way to prove anything.  I guess I could have thrown up a hail mary and said I got shorted, and just hope that they get someone in the back to review the hand on camera and pay me back.  I decided not to say anything.  I think that expecting that they are actually going to run the tapes back or whatever to find out about $100 is super unlikely.  The biggest thing is that I didn't want to call it out, have everyone know I lost that $100, and now everyone is talking about it all night and I'm just on SUPER tilt.  I was already tilting hard because of the hand.  If it was public knowledge and people were just sitting there laughing about it and talking about it, you made the nuts and still lost $60 or whatever, I don't know that I could really deal with that.  I just thought it would be a better idea to cut my losses, act like it didn't happen, and try to move on.

Mentally it was incredibly hard.  Sure, it's only $100.  I bluffed away $350 earlier in the day (fucking STUPID by the way) so this pales in comparison, as far as the amount.  But still, the fact that the dealer caused me to lose it instead of a bad decision on my part was really fucking with my mind.

At that point I'm in damage control mode.  I know I'm on tilt.  I can feel my temperature going through the roof.  I know I have to keep it under control because I'm going to be more likely to make some bad decisions.  I should have walked it off but I just stayed at the table.

Overall it didn't screw me too bad.  I had like zero hands after that to play, so I basically sat there pissed off for another 1.5 hours and left.  I think the lesson to learn though is that you really have to pay attention at all times because you never know when you are going to get screwed over by a bad dealer.

As far as the bad bluff, that hand was fucking atrocious.  It went down like this:

Guy raises to $20.  I call with A-8 suited.  Already maybe a sketchy play, but I guess it's OK.  Guy in the blind makes it $50.  Raiser calls, and I call.  I definitely don't love it but I tell myself I'm priced in, and I think that's reasonable.

Flop comes 6-3-2.  It checks around.  Turn is a 4.  Now the preflop reraiser bets out $85.

I get it into my head that he probably has something like A-K.  So I come up with this elaborate scheme to win the hand - I'm going to float the turn, and bet the river to get him to fold his A-K.

River comes another 4.  He bets out $100.  I raise to $260.  He snap calls.  He had K-K.

This hand was so fucking stupid.  Calls preflop - fine.  I kinda got screwed into calling the reraise and I'm in position, so whatever.  As far as his bet on the turn, I should have just given up.  But honestly I don't really hate the float THAT much if I honestly think he has A-K all the time.  Of course, I made the classic mistake of wanting to find a reason to win the pot, and A-K was the only hand that you might reraise preflop with that I can beat here.  In general people aren't reraising a ton preflop, and this guy also had to reraise out of the blind.  And he didn't make it that much more.  If I analyzed the preflop action a bit more I would have seen that he could easily have a big hand.

Why check the flop, who knows.  I think that's kind of a weird play.  The pot was already pretty big so maybe he thought a standard cbet wouldn't be called by much.  But if someone had an overpair that would probably call at least one bet.

On the turn, his bet makes sense.  He's like OK nobody bit on the flop, now I'm going to try to get some value.  My float would have been better if I knew this is a guy that might bet ace high here, and also if I knew that he is a guy that can fold on the river if he didn't have much.  I knew none of those things from this guy so it was moronic to try to steal the pot.  Sure, it could have worked.  But logically I had no reason to think that it would work other than "It's going to look strong if I call here, and I can probably steal on the river if he doesn't have much."

Then on the river, my biggest mistake ever.  He bets out $100.  I already thought I was going to try to take this away from an ace high type of hand.  What ace high hand bets here again after betting the turn?  And a super small bet?  NONE!!!  Fucking nothing.  Especially that size.  It's screaming this is a value bet.  Sure, he might have something like 9-9 and might fold to a raise.  But there is no way in hell that's an ace high bet.  What I should have done if I chose to float was see that he bets the river and say, OK, fine, he has something.  I fucked up and called incorrectly on the turn because he has something.  So now I'm going to give up.  But instead I decide to follow through with my bluff and he insta-calls me.

So, idiot play there.  It's cool I'm playing around with those kind of things, and hopefully in the future I'll take some time to think through what the guy actually has, like replay the action in my head.  And maybe when I decide to float there, I can think, what will I do if he bets out?  What will I do if he checks?  What will I do if he check-raises?  That way I'm prepared.

Oh well.  Shitty session, I lost $300 and I did not play that great.  Basically just played bad in the hand above.  It's OK though, I'll probably play more tonight.  :-)