Craziest Poker Session Ever?

Posting was light since Friday because I had a couple of friends in town for a weekend of poker and BBQ. On Saturday, we went to Soaring Eagle casino to play poker and I had what is simply the most bizarre and amazing session of poker in my life. You're not gonna believe some of this. Soaring Eagle spreads hold em games of 3/6, 6/12 and 10/20 (meaning the minimum and maximum betting amounts in the game). The 3/6 game is what we call a "no foldem holdem" game because the bets are so small that half the table stays in to the end to see if they can hit their hand, and one of them usually does. I hate games like that, it maximizes the luck element and reduces the skill element of the game. So I wanted to play 6/12, but the 6/12 table was full and the waiting list didn't seem to be moving at all. I told them I'd sit at a 3/6 table and play while I waited because I didn't wanna stand around twiddling my thumbs for 2 hours.

I'm sent to table 1 for 3/6 holdem and I buy a rack of $1 chips (a rack is 100 chips, so $100), figuring I won't be here too long and I'll just play tight. I post the big blind and look down to find pocket jacks. Beautiful. I raise, and naturally I get 4 callers. Flop comes J 2 4, rainbow (which means 3 different suits, so very low likelihood that anyone could be on a flush draw). I bet, all 4 players call. Turn is another 2. I bet, get raised, I reraise and finally everyone folds except the guy who raised me. River is nothing, I bet, he calls. He turns over a deuce for 3 deuces and I turn over my full house. I love this game. So I'm stacking my chips and the floor calls over the intercom that there's a seat open on 6/12 holdem for Ed B., so I say that's me and she says, "Go to table 3". Pleasure playing one hand with you folks, but my real game awaits.

I get up and go to the cashier, change in my $1 chips for $2 chips and increase it to $300. Take my seat at table 3 and I'm in the big blind immediately, look down to find K5. No one raises so I get to see the flop for free and the flop comes KK5. Is this a great game or what? I check, another guy bets, I raise and he calls me all the way to the river. I'm stacking my chips when the floor comes over and says, "We goofed. That seat was supposed to be for Ed P., not Ed B., so we're gonna have to give this seat to him instead. But we'll put you into a different 3/6 game while you're waiting. Go to table 13." Oops. Okey dokey.

Back to the cashier to turn my $2 chips back into $1 chips and cash out some of them, since there's no point in having almost $400 in blue chips on the table in a game that small. Take my seat at table 13, post the big blind and look down to find pocket aces. Huzzah! They hold up and I'm now 3 for 3 on 3 different tables. As I'm stacking my chips, the floor comes on the microphone and announces that they're opening a second 6/12 table and calls my name along with 9 others to go to table 2. I turn around and loudly say, "You're just trying to confuse me, aren't you?"

Back to the cashier again, please chip me back up to $300 in yellow chips. And stop laughing. I go to table 2 along with the rest of the new players and start out in the small blind. And I look down to find pocket aces again. The button raises, I reraise, he reraises and I call. Just the two of us to see a flop of low rags. I bet, he raises, I reraise, he calls. Nothing much develops on the turn or the river. At the end I flip up pocket aces and he flips up...pocket aces! Split pot, which with the rake means we each made $2 on the hand. But at this point I'm looking around for the hidden camera. This has to be a joke, right? 4 hands at 4 different tables in less than 20 minutes, all winners with pocket aces twice in a row.

As it turns out, this was a harbinger of things to come because I went on a rush of cards like I've never seen. In the next couple hours, I ran over this table like a Mack truck and amass so many yellow chips in front of me that I didn't have room to look at my cards. At one point my friend comes over from his 3/6 table and says, "Holy shit. Did you get all those chips without a gun?" I finally had to take 2 1/2 racks of yellows up to the cashier and have them give me a stack of green $25 chips to make room on the table for myself and the guy next to me. I had pocket aces three times during this run, and all of my pocket pairs held up, including one where a guy I've played with before up there (young player, very solid) was trying like hell to get me off the hand and I could tell. I had pocket 9s and there were two face cards on the board, but I could just sense that he was trying to make a stand and get me to fold. I call him all the way to the river and he turns over A9. Before long, I had the table so afraid of what I had that I was able to steal pots with a check raise any time a scare card hit the board. It was a beautiful site. And at the end, I cashed out of the game $535 ahead. In the words of the immortal Chau Giang - "I love play poker. Play poker goot."

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Congratulations Ed!!! You've just re-affirmed my lifetime commitment to keep playing *&^%$#@! blackjack!

By Roadtripper (not verified) on 10 Apr 2005 #permalink

If i hadn't just watch Sklansky hit five sets of pocket aces the other day during the tournament series i would have been more skeptical of your run. But, Ed that was one for your lifetime memory circuits to enjoy. congrats indeed.

Heh... I had a long reply to this one, but I somehow lost connection, and thusly, the reply.
Anyway... my main point was to ask your opinion on "underground" games. Especially here in Michigan, since Motown Poker was brought down.

By Funkstronaut (not verified) on 11 Apr 2005 #permalink

Anyway... my main point was to ask your opinion on "underground" games. Especially here in Michigan, since Motown Poker was brought down.
I'm not sure what you mean by my opinion of them. I don't think they should have to be "underground" because I don't think gambling should be illegal in any sense. I play in "underground" games regularly, and host one at my house every week. The fact is that on any given night there are probably a dozen different games going on within a half hour's drive of my house, and I live in the middle of nowhere.
I hadn't heard about Motown Poker. Can you give me the story? Some people think they have found a way around the gambling laws and have managed to do it in the open for quite a while now. The Metro Poker Club over in the Detroit area has a very public webpage and claims that they've got it all arranged legally. A friend of mine does the same thing but has his arranged as a gambling school that is even registered with the state. Frankly, I just don't worry about it much. They aren't going to bother a home game with a bunch of friends getting together to play in it. Hell, we've got one prominent local elected official in our regular game as well as one deputy. They're only going to go after businesses that host games in violation of the liquor laws and those who actually try to set up underground casinos with a rake and so forth.