For Christmas I visited my family in Naples, FL. There ain’t a whole hell of a lot to do in Naples, FL. Sitting on the beach, the early bird special, and Waiting to Die were ranked at the top 3 on the 2006 list of “Things to do in Collier County”. The bummer of it all is that the all time most awesomely redneck extravaganza known as the “Swamp Buggy Races” only comes twice a year and this wasn’t one of them. By day three I had soaked up enough sun to make to make Thomas Magnum jealous and I really needed something to do. The savior came from a most unexpected source: The Dog Track.
It’s been said that everything in Florida is in the 80s. The ages, the temperatures, and the IQs. This was no more evident than at the Naples – Fort Myers Dog Track. That’s right the friggin’ dog track. The one in Naples has a poker room. They have dealers, cards, felt, and shoddily dressed waitresses hocking cocktails, just like any other poker room. But this one has some screwy idiosyncrasies. In true legislatorial backward ass thinking, the Florida doofusses actually found a way to make luck an even BIGGER factor in a poker game. They have no limit poker but they enacted a law limiting the amount one can buy in for at any poker table to a maximum of $100 at a time, no matter what the limits and blinds. 1-2, 2-5, 5-10...doesn’t matter sir, you cannot start with more than $100. And these goobers just eat it up. At a 5-10 no limit game, you still can’t start with more than 100 bucks. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that, yeah, everyone’s all in before the turn. I didn’t bother, 1-2 sounded just fine.
I threw down my Benjamin, set down my mighty stack of twenty red chips and scanned the landscape to see just what kind of maneuvering this expedition would take. Most poker tables run the gamut of characters and this one was no different. It was littered with your usual assortment of ne’er do wells, bottom feeders, and one or two guys that actually had a clue. I even spotted the elusive Rascal-Oxygen tank combo. The most noticeable of the fish was some Midwestern alpha male who actually grunted and pumped his fists whenever his 3 outers hit (what’s a 3 outer?). Have you’ve ever seen the “World’s Strongest Man” competition on ESPN 9? In this contest, each meathead goes through a routine designed to psyche himself up before he throws a VW Bug through an oversized basketball hoop. They grunt, groan, turn red, flex their guns, and generally work themselves into a frenzy. That was this guy’s post victory celebration every time he hit some bullshit suckout. I nicknamed him “Mitchell Report”. Then there was “Authority Artie”. He was more concerned with informing everyone of the correct pot odds than he was with ever making any money (I offered his only profit that I can remember when my queens ran into his aces, costing me a cool $92). Then there was Family guy, a friendly clueless chap who unloaded at least $400 in the 4 hours I was there, and a veritable smattering of lifeless Floridians, either one step way from the grave or one bad decision from starring in their very own episode of “cops”. Drinks were bad, water was 2 bucks, bathroom smelled, and the floor was dirty.
Onto the game. There was one guy 2 to my left who was really stacking it up. It seemed like he’d catch a straight on the river every 5 hands and these chumps were far too clueless not to pay him off EVERY time. In between constant fiddlings with his cell phone, he had run his stack up to over $500. I felt that was an injustice to the balance of the universe and was of the opinion that a good portion of those chips should be in front of me. But before I knew it, it was getting near the zero hour. I had about 5 minutes before I had to leave to meet the family for dinner. I had $176 in front of me on the button when Authority Artie raised it to $17. He was transparent and it was obvious he had big cards. I told myself I would call him with anything that had a remote possibility of dismantling a big hand.
I looked down at 6-7 of clubs, more than enough to make that call. The small blind (Clueless Family Guy) called and so did Mr. Straight Catcher. There is $68 in the pot. The flop was 2c-3c-4d. Family Guy bets $20, Straight Catcher set his phone down long enough to call and Artie folds. There is now $108 in the pot and I have $159 left. I didn’t like my chances here but I knew if it hit I would win a big pot. Family Guy had just re-bought and there was no doubt he would put in his remaining $85 and the way Straight Catcher reacted to the initial bet, I knew he would call all my chips as well, he might as well just text messaged me as such. A quick study of numbers revealed that if I moved in, the total pot would be $491 (108+159+85+139). I’m getting 3 to 1. Is my hand better than a 3 to 1 dog? I figure one of them caught a piece of the flop and one is on a draw. I throw out my flush draw as a possibility, which leaves me a nonclub 5 for a straight and a 6 or 7 for an overpair. 9 outs with 2 cards to come, I’ll win about 28% of the time. 72 to 28 is just slightly better than 3 to 1 and I'm done swimming with the fishes, let’s go. They both call.
Family Guy has A-8 of clubs and luck box straight catcher has…A-4 of hearts. I am now seething at Mr. Luck Box Straight Catcher, that dude has been dodging bullets all day. No one has had a hand against him. You give me enough time and I’ll be shoving sets and over pairs right up your dumb ass all day long, I think to myself as the turn and the river blank off. All my hopes and dreams are left stalled in the sippy hole. Instead of 500 bucks and buying the family some burritos, it's chips n’ salsa, water – no ice.
Although Straight Catcher had some skills, you get tired of seeing an oblivious card rack rake in pot after pot. Pair of 4s for 160 bucks? Raiser and 3 callers and somehow numbnuts gets so ass lucky that no one has a pocket pair or catches anything. ANY pocket pair beats him. Think of the flop, every pocket pair available in the game of poker crushes him to stone. BUT NOOOO! draws galore and cell phone phan (not to be confused with David “The Dragon” Phan) dodges ‘em all and has over $800. I couldn’t bring myself to even look at the stack, I shook Artie’s hand, bid family guy farewell and jetted out of there.
Had I had the time, I would have located that hallowed sippy hole and baptized myself of all my sins in the muddy dirge. But I had correct odds, it was Mexican night and the waiter sounded EXACTLY like Fez from that 70s show. Margaritas all around.
The lesson here: Keep pushin’, it’ll hit.
It’s been said that everything in Florida is in the 80s. The ages, the temperatures, and the IQs. This was no more evident than at the Naples – Fort Myers Dog Track. That’s right the friggin’ dog track. The one in Naples has a poker room. They have dealers, cards, felt, and shoddily dressed waitresses hocking cocktails, just like any other poker room. But this one has some screwy idiosyncrasies. In true legislatorial backward ass thinking, the Florida doofusses actually found a way to make luck an even BIGGER factor in a poker game. They have no limit poker but they enacted a law limiting the amount one can buy in for at any poker table to a maximum of $100 at a time, no matter what the limits and blinds. 1-2, 2-5, 5-10...doesn’t matter sir, you cannot start with more than $100. And these goobers just eat it up. At a 5-10 no limit game, you still can’t start with more than 100 bucks. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that, yeah, everyone’s all in before the turn. I didn’t bother, 1-2 sounded just fine.
I threw down my Benjamin, set down my mighty stack of twenty red chips and scanned the landscape to see just what kind of maneuvering this expedition would take. Most poker tables run the gamut of characters and this one was no different. It was littered with your usual assortment of ne’er do wells, bottom feeders, and one or two guys that actually had a clue. I even spotted the elusive Rascal-Oxygen tank combo. The most noticeable of the fish was some Midwestern alpha male who actually grunted and pumped his fists whenever his 3 outers hit (what’s a 3 outer?). Have you’ve ever seen the “World’s Strongest Man” competition on ESPN 9? In this contest, each meathead goes through a routine designed to psyche himself up before he throws a VW Bug through an oversized basketball hoop. They grunt, groan, turn red, flex their guns, and generally work themselves into a frenzy. That was this guy’s post victory celebration every time he hit some bullshit suckout. I nicknamed him “Mitchell Report”. Then there was “Authority Artie”. He was more concerned with informing everyone of the correct pot odds than he was with ever making any money (I offered his only profit that I can remember when my queens ran into his aces, costing me a cool $92). Then there was Family guy, a friendly clueless chap who unloaded at least $400 in the 4 hours I was there, and a veritable smattering of lifeless Floridians, either one step way from the grave or one bad decision from starring in their very own episode of “cops”. Drinks were bad, water was 2 bucks, bathroom smelled, and the floor was dirty.
Onto the game. There was one guy 2 to my left who was really stacking it up. It seemed like he’d catch a straight on the river every 5 hands and these chumps were far too clueless not to pay him off EVERY time. In between constant fiddlings with his cell phone, he had run his stack up to over $500. I felt that was an injustice to the balance of the universe and was of the opinion that a good portion of those chips should be in front of me. But before I knew it, it was getting near the zero hour. I had about 5 minutes before I had to leave to meet the family for dinner. I had $176 in front of me on the button when Authority Artie raised it to $17. He was transparent and it was obvious he had big cards. I told myself I would call him with anything that had a remote possibility of dismantling a big hand.
I looked down at 6-7 of clubs, more than enough to make that call. The small blind (Clueless Family Guy) called and so did Mr. Straight Catcher. There is $68 in the pot. The flop was 2c-3c-4d. Family Guy bets $20, Straight Catcher set his phone down long enough to call and Artie folds. There is now $108 in the pot and I have $159 left. I didn’t like my chances here but I knew if it hit I would win a big pot. Family Guy had just re-bought and there was no doubt he would put in his remaining $85 and the way Straight Catcher reacted to the initial bet, I knew he would call all my chips as well, he might as well just text messaged me as such. A quick study of numbers revealed that if I moved in, the total pot would be $491 (108+159+85+139). I’m getting 3 to 1. Is my hand better than a 3 to 1 dog? I figure one of them caught a piece of the flop and one is on a draw. I throw out my flush draw as a possibility, which leaves me a nonclub 5 for a straight and a 6 or 7 for an overpair. 9 outs with 2 cards to come, I’ll win about 28% of the time. 72 to 28 is just slightly better than 3 to 1 and I'm done swimming with the fishes, let’s go. They both call.
Family Guy has A-8 of clubs and luck box straight catcher has…A-4 of hearts. I am now seething at Mr. Luck Box Straight Catcher, that dude has been dodging bullets all day. No one has had a hand against him. You give me enough time and I’ll be shoving sets and over pairs right up your dumb ass all day long, I think to myself as the turn and the river blank off. All my hopes and dreams are left stalled in the sippy hole. Instead of 500 bucks and buying the family some burritos, it's chips n’ salsa, water – no ice.
Although Straight Catcher had some skills, you get tired of seeing an oblivious card rack rake in pot after pot. Pair of 4s for 160 bucks? Raiser and 3 callers and somehow numbnuts gets so ass lucky that no one has a pocket pair or catches anything. ANY pocket pair beats him. Think of the flop, every pocket pair available in the game of poker crushes him to stone. BUT NOOOO! draws galore and cell phone phan (not to be confused with David “The Dragon” Phan) dodges ‘em all and has over $800. I couldn’t bring myself to even look at the stack, I shook Artie’s hand, bid family guy farewell and jetted out of there.
Had I had the time, I would have located that hallowed sippy hole and baptized myself of all my sins in the muddy dirge. But I had correct odds, it was Mexican night and the waiter sounded EXACTLY like Fez from that 70s show. Margaritas all around.
The lesson here: Keep pushin’, it’ll hit.
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