So it's Tuesday and I decided to take my second day in a row off. This is pretty awesome considering that I had played for something like 8 or 9 days in a row. Kind of weird, I say awesome yet it's my prerogative to take a day off.
So the whale; a little background first. The 2/5 game in Pittsburgh used to be a good game, or so I've heard. As a lot of the bad players lost money at an unsustainable pace and went bust or hit their threshold of pain, action at 2/5+ dried up. This is why many casinos in places like LA set the max buyin of the game so low, to prevent people from losing money too quickly. This can be a problem at the lower limits too. Here's a good example: a young guy sat down (probably my age or so) at the 1/3 game with $120 and posted UTG+3. I took all his money within 3 hands, before he even posted his natural blind. Somehow I don't think he enjoyed his time at the table or his "night of enjoyment". That's the nature of NL games though. Holy shit what a tangent.
Anyway, most days the casino only gets one table of 2/5 going that is filled with old nitty regulars who are solid and unspectacular. Saturday is the exception. The casino gets busy enough that a second table opens; the second table is usually solid gold.
The first table filled with nitty regulars is then referred to as the main game while the second table is the must move. As people get up from the main game you must move from the...must move in the order that you went on the waitlist. I only play 2/5 (usually) on Saturday's because my expected hourly at a 1/3 table is higher than my expected hourly at 2/5 due to table composition.
Fish are the dead money, the guys in business attire who just got off work, the frat bros who saw the game on TV, the cocky bastards who read a book and think they are god's gifts to poker, these are the people that lubricate the poker economy with money while people like me take it out. Whales are special, they are the type of player to make you stay at the casino and blow off a date or skip sleeping although you are confused as to why the dealer is your mother and the chips start talking to you. A lot of fish don't know that they are bad at poker. They don't think that they are incredible but they don't realized how much they truly suck. It's mostly irrelevant though because for them it's just entertainment money that they expect to lose like at blackjack or 3 card poker while they gamble. At least at poker you can talk to the other people at your table and have a decent chance to walk away a winner if you can catch cards. Most fish will at least try and conserve money and hate to put it in super light because they have an allotted amount of money. Meanwhile, whales know they suck (I think), they just like the gambool. The bigger the pot, the better.
He started off fairly innocuously in a polo and khakis with ~$500. Then he limp/shoved 89s utg and showed. Then he called off a $300 all in with J9o. Then my hand happened. I was sitting in the game ~$1100 after binking the nut flush draw for a nice size pot when I am dealt AA UTG. I make it 20 to go and get 3 callers including the whale in the big blind. He donks (that is, leads out) 20 into 80 on T95r which I then raise to 70. The other two guys go away and he calls. Turn is a K that completes the rainbow and the whale leads 80, I call. River is another K and the whale shoves in for 200 which I of course snap. He shows 79o for a pair of nines. As I am mentally celebrating my win he pulls out 1k and asks for black chips (hundos). With that, visions of a 3k+ day start dancing before my eyes. My dreams are crushed as Jamie the floor man tells the dealer to deal me out because I am to be moved to the main game. I sit there in a state of shock as the one other competent player at the table (the rest of the game was simply incredible too, honestly one of the best 2/5 tables I have seen ever) remarks "ah what a shame". As I sit there stacking my chips I watch this guy blow off $800 with second pair to a set and then pull out a roll of hundos, one of those wads that you get when you cash out large amounts. Benjamins arrive at institutions in wads of $5000 with a sticker band thing that indicates 5 grand. Tears of rage fill my eyes (okay not really but this is poetic license) as I move to the main game. I play 3 hands, rack up and leave, no longer in the mood to play poker. Before I do I watch Moby-Dick lose 2k with a flush on a paired board.
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