A New Place to Play....

Well, a couple of weeks back, Joe gave me Matt's name and number and told me that he had a game in Cary on Thursday and Sunday nights. I decided to give it a try and last night Rick and I went down to test the waters. It was $2/$5 No Limit and after a slow start the table was full for several hours. My cold deck continued from PKR however and for quite a while I either got 100% crap or when I did get a decent hand, the cooler was right around the corner. I did manage to scratch and claw my way to even before we left, but only after waiting patiently for a couple of hours to set a trap for a guy that was raising about every hand.....

I'll tell you more about that one in a minute, but I will tell you about my best read of the of the night. These two guys came in together and sat down in card-rack seats and both of them built up nice stacks within just an hour or two. I only got heads up with either of them 2 times during that period and didn't win a hand, but I am proud of the read that I put on one of them just before they left. I was the button and had pocket sevens. One of the guys in middle position raised the $5 blind to $20. He had been doing this quite a bit and I decided to call to try to spike a 7. The flop Ax, 10x, 7x! Sweet! He checks and I lead out with a $30 bet. After thinking a little about that series of events I realized that this was the first hand that he had not raised after the flop regardless of the flop. So when the turn brought a brick, he checked and I checked. The river was a brick and he leads out with a $40 bet. Normally I would have come over the top here, but something just felt funny and so I called. He turned over a set of 10's and I ended up losing about as little as I think I could lose when I flopped a set on a disconnected board. Sometimes it isn't about winning, sometimes it is about not losing anymore than you can help with the 2nd or 3rd nut.

Those guys cashed out with two nice stacks and another guy soon climbed into the seat where I had just gotten pummeled with set-over-set. And this guy was raising just about every hand and based on my table position after another guy had left, I ended up on the button when he was UTG. This was good in that he often straddled. The one hand that I really wanted him to straddle, he limped.... pocket Aces. I had them one time earlier and raised to $20 and everyone folded so I thought I would take it down a notch and only raised to $15 and everyone folded except the guy who had been raising most of the night. The flop was Kc, Qc, 7h. He bet $20 and I raised to $60 and he called. The turn was a brick and he bet $20 and I moved all-in for another $150 or so but he only had about $140 but he quickly called. I flipped my Aces and he mucked.... The river was a brick.

I was very pleased to find this new place to play. It's very nice with a good player pool.And one of the dealers there is probably the best dealer that I have run into outside of a casino. I believe his name was Brian and although the other two dealers were good as well, he was definitely the best. Their processes are excellent as well in that the player on the button doesn't shuffle so the dealer is completely responsible for the deck. They wash the cards after every hand and Brian was excellent at keeping the action moving along and everyone's focus on the flow of the game. He made certain of everyone's action by counting their chips in front of them and then stacking them along-side the other callers before carefully leaning them into the pot. They also keep the rake out in front of them until the end of the hand so that everyone can see what they are raking which is a very fair $1 on $10 to a maximum rake of $5 per hand. Nice!

Matt actually played a little with us when there was room at the table. He made a very nice lay down to me just before we broke up for the night. He was in middle position and raised the $10 straddle to $20 (I'll come back to that in a moment).... I find pocket Kings and while I like his raise I want to make certain that I'm not playing with 5 guys on this one so I bump it up to $60 and everyone folds to him and he calls. I've put him on Queens or Jacks... don't know why but that is just my thoughts on what I think he has..... At any rate, the flop Q, 7, 7.... crap! He checks and I've got to find out where he stands so I bet $60 and he struggles a little with it and folds. I showed him the Kings and he told me that he folded Jacks. So it was good night of poker and I have found a new place to play when time will permit.

I'll definitely be back!