UWSWSOP 4 Day 5: Without Lamps There Would Be No Light
Dave Hill
out of my hotel at the Nugget. My flight left at 1:30am so I was
going to spend the day playing poker as high as I could afford and
take a final shot at either a big win or a big hit. So far, my
results were unimpressive, being up only around $1200 after the small
loss at 30-60 the night before. The only good news was that I think
by Sunday I was the only person who had won over 4 figures (at one
point both Brandon and Josh were up more than 1500) and I may even
have been the only person winning at all. But it wasn't good enough,
I wanted to take a big shot. Thats what this trip is supposed to be
all about. Its supposed to be the one week out of the year that I can
gamble higher than my means, play with players who are top-notch, and
mingle with poker greatness and pretend that I belong. I can play
15-30 any day of the week. And even if I go to Atlantic City when I
get home and play 75-150, it just wouldn't be the same as winning ten
grand in side games at the WSOP. Now thats a good story.
So Sunday was my last chance at a big stand. I had plans to get on
the lists for 40-80 and 80-160, and 50-100 if I could find it again.
I was also going to try to get into one of the handfull of 10-20 NL
games still going since the WSOP started. But first, I needed some
spiritual uplift, so I tried to call the guys together to meet me for
Gospel Brunch at House of Blues at the Mandalay Bay. Even though they
were all in desperate need of some good old fashioned spiritual
healing after the twisted way we spent our Sunday morning, they felt
their need for sleep was more important, and therefore sacraficed
their only hope at redeeming their ever-lasting souls in exchange for
a couple extra hours of shuteye. Talk about an underlay.
When I got to the House of Blues, I noticed that Dave Chapelle was
performing that night, so I called Peter, who is a huge Chapelle fan,
and the next thing I know we are buying 9 tickets to the show. So much
for my big stand.
The show was at 6:30pm and it was now 1pm, and I was still supposed to
meet people for lunch. And so it was on a day that I was going to
spend going for broke in dramatic fashion at the 80-160 tables at the
Bellagio, I was sitting at the 1-5 stud table in the sportsbook at
Mandalay Bay sitting next to some guy who was trying to teach me to
play. Killing time waiting for the other guys to come to the show
after lunch, John and I decided to watch the Laker game at the
Mandalay sports book. But there were open seats in the poker room, so
we sat down. I don't play enough stud at all, and I just read my
buddy Ashley's book "Winning 7 Card Stud", so I figured I'd play some
hands and do some serious thinking about the game. But this was far
from a serious game. Every time I made any hand, meaning any pair or
better, I bet the maximum, $5. And rarely did I get called by more
than one person. And when I won a pot, I courteously showed people my
hand so they wouldn't think I was just trying to recklessly run over
them. After all, before I sat down it was a friendly locals game with
a handful of dealers from other rooms and other Vegas lowlife
typicals. The guy on my right, who before I started winning was being
pretty chatty and jovial with me, was now aggrevated. I just showed a
girl who folded to me that my fourth street 6 paired the 6 i had in
the hole which is why I raised to $5. He says "You know you'd make
more money if you didn't always raise and scare everyone out." I
laughed and said "No, you just want to draw out on me cheaper. I just
won the pot with a pair of 6s, and Im pretty sure at that point it was
the best hand." He started to argue with me and his buddy next to him
actually put his hand on the guy's arm and shook his head as if to say
"leave him alone, he's hopeless." I swear to god. I laughed again and
said "look at it this way, man. When you do finally catch a hand on
me, you're going to win a big pot." That did nothing to soothe his
steam. He was, as were many who had crossed my path this weekend, on
tilt.
I stared down at my stack of $140 (including real actual US quarters)
and wondered how I had ended up here in this most unglamorous place.
Sitting 1-5 stud with the locals at the Mandalay, counting down the
hours to my plane.
Dave Chappelle was funny as hell. Before the show we had set the
over/under on jokes about the difference between white people and
black people at 5, and to my surprise it went under! I lost that bet
to Peter, so I'm now 1-10 on prop bets this trip.
Werushed back to the Mirage to see if i could spend my last three
hours in Vegas raising every pot in the 40-80. The list was bannanas,
but I asked the floor if I could play over a guy who had three buttons
and she said sure. So I grabbed 2k in chips and a box and went over
to play over him. Right when I got there, the dealer called the floor
over to pick up the chips. "But if you pick him up I get screwed
because I go to the back of the list." "You're talking to deaf ears"
he replied as he stacked the guy's chips. I looked at the players and
said "guys, if you let me take this seat and not say anything, I swear
I'll make lots of loose calls. I'm looking to win or lose all this
shit in two hours, ok?" They laughed, not knowing just how serious I
was, when a guy standing nearby said "No way buddy, Im on this list,
you aint sittin down." So I took my chips back to the cage and sat in
the top section in some vacant chairs with John and Rob and we just
bullshitted about poker, life, friends, and poker. I was bummed about
not getting in the game but I was happy just sitting there, in the top
section, hanging out with my friends and begging for some action.
Confident in my poker game and happy with the company of my friends, I
felt like I was a long way from that 1-5 game from the afternoon. I
was a long way from the 4-8 game in Shreveport where I learned the
game, and a long way from the 4-8 at the Diamond Club where I used to
donate my per diem, and a long way from the 10-20 at Foxwoods where I
made my comeuppance. I felt like I was willing, at that moment, to
play for any limit with any person and take my shot. I felt like
poker was just a game, like any other, and there was joy in playing it
and the challenge of the game, and not solely in winning. And that
its the distraction of losing money you don't want to lose that ruins
the game for people, that puts them on tilt, that makes them play
poorly, that makes them angry. This weekend I played with so many
people who come to the table with a bad attitude, and react to
everything with suspicion and anger and a sense of entitlement. I
played with people who lack social skills to such an extreme that they
are incapable of even dealing with the cocktail waitress in any
fashion other than rude and stand offish. These people are on a kind
of tilt, the kind that tilted them off of being capable of enjoying
PLAYING poker, and therby being incapable of enjoying winning, because
hey,they're SUPPOSED to win. I just want to play poker, and play
poker in the NFL, not just in my backyard. Why? Its challenging, and
thats half the fun.
I thought about how earlier in the trip I had written all those sports
bets on that gambler's anonymous thing, and how its title was "when
the fun stops." And how I put it on the table in that 5-10 omaha game
and then put my chips on top of it. And how after I lost all my
chips, I was staring down at that thing, "When the fun stops." And how
again the irony wasn't lost on me.
If it isn't fun, it isn't worth doing, and it certainly isn't worth
all the fuss we make over it. If it isn't the same as chess or
backgammon or scrabble or gin or spades or bridge or any other game of
skill, then its only because of the money, and thats pretty fucked up.
I suggested to my friends that we go to the room and watch tv and play
chinese poker at $10 a point until it was time for me and Chonko to
head to the airport, and they all agreed. And there we sat around the
bed, playing and joking and telling stories and handing each other
money and it was fun. Nobody was mad at anyone else. Nobody cared
who won how much money. Everybody was quoting lines from the
Breakfast Club as it played behind us and talking about Peter and
tits.
And at the end of the week, there will be 6 new millionaires in Las
Vegas, and something tells me that the VICTORY in such a historical
event will be more life-altering to the individuals than the MONEY.
You may disagree, or think Im being dramatic, but I think that playing
a game well and proving that you can play better than anyone else in
the world, that can change a person's life too you know. That can
change a person's self image, their confidence in themselves, their
personality, their whole lives in ways that money never can.
And so it is at the World Series, and so it is on the Upper West Side.
How you win and how you lose, it has a lot to do with how you are.
And I want to be a winner, so I better start acting like one, even
when the chips are down.
Until Next Year....
Dave Hill
Mike
any pics on your site?
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