Episode #157: Chris in Connecticut

MAIN TOPIC
Chris calls in from the land of pink carpet and princesses (can't make that up if I wanted to) to give us the lowdown on Mohegan Sun's new electronic-only poker room (live poker returns Sept. 1) and his usual ringing endorsement of Foxwoods. Click here to listen to the show.

OTHER TOPICS

World Series of Poker: Kenna James cashes, Jerry Buss busts in time to catch his Lakers, another Man vs. Machine is scheduled and a doctor abandons his stack to help a fallen player.

Mixed games mania: The Imperial Palace in Vegas is dealing a $3/$6 limit mixed game at 7 p.m. on Sundays. Some crazzzzzy games being offered. We love it.

Gas up at the Commerce: Commerce Casino in L.A. is randomly dropping $50 gas cards into poker pots in July.

Sinatra's home game: Who played in it? It was a fun one: Jack Lemmon, Angie Dickinson, Gregory Peck and more.

Tampa Bay Poker Replay: The Seminole Hard Rock Tampa bad beat jackpot is hit for $564,912. Glen Upchurch of Clearwater wins $282,452 for his losing quad 6s, while William Lewicke of Winter Haven takes $141,227 (and the pot) with a straight flush. The other eight players at the table won $17,654 each.

One Minute Mystery: We make the call, and take down the pot when our opponent shows K-6 for top pair, weaker kicker.

HAND OF THE WEEK
It's a Crazy Pineapple hand! Dan, a fellow journalist from Greeley, Colo., offers us a home game no-limit high-only hand with loose players who have been hitting the sauce.

He's dealt K-K-7, pops it 5x and gets two callers. The flop is K-8-6, two spades, and Dan bets pot but can't shake either opponent. He dumps the 7, and the turn is an Ace. With just $5 left, he checks (Chris would have pushed, I kinda like the misdirection), but one opponent bets $2 and both players call. The river is a 6, completing the flush but also filling Dan up. He gets it all-in and takes down a nice pot against two smaller boats.

- SCOTT

Comments

[Chi-Guy]

Fun show!

Unbelieveable bad beat jackpot. I cannot wait to get out to IP and play on a Sunday afternoon!

I have to disagree with Chris on the Podcast comment though. Pineapple is meant to be a limit game. Cooincidentally, one of the other Podcasts had a veteran poker room manager on who said that no-limit died out in the late 80's and will die out again. Limit poker is the future, according to her. Pineapple and all of the crazy games at IP is the future!

Also, I am guessing that you don't have alot of experience playing no limit Pineapple based on the comment, "It doesn't matter when you ditch and long as you see the flop". After Scott corrected you, you got it right. Here is a prime example.

ON the button, You hold two black aces and a 7 of spades. Easy pre-flop raise. Three to the flop, which comes down 4,9,10, two spades. Here are the two possibilities.

1. check, check, I bet and dump the 7.

Or, ( and this happened to me)

2. Bet, raise, I call and dump the ace of clubs.

How would the ante up nation play this hand? (Limit game).

Brian

[Chris Cosenza]

Sometimes I wonder if people ACTUALLY listen to the show at all. What was actually being discussed was when the betting and discarding occurred. It had NOTHING to do with strategy. I would venture that I've played more crazy pineapple than anyone in the Ante Up Nation, and that includes the no limit version.

[Chi-Guy]

Chris,

Yes, I was listening. You indicated that it didn't matter if you discarded before or after the betting after the flop and Scott corrected you.

Don't you remember that?

Brian

[Chi-Guy]

To Quote...

"It makes no difference when you discard, as long as the flop has been seen...."

.......Spoken like a true donkey.......

Brian

[Chris Cosenza]

Again, it had nothing to do with strategy, it was making the distinction between pineapple and crazy pineapple. As long as see the flop before you discard it's CRAZY Pineapple. That's when Scott made the distinction of turning the conversation into a strategy discussion. And that's when I understood what he meant.

I think you need to move to a warmer climate. ... that cold windy Chicago weather is freezing your brain so much that even the warm summer months can't thaw it out.

[Brian]

I have some comments about the One Minute Mystery from this show. In my opinion, Columbo was rewarded for weak, passive, and generally donkish play...on every single street. It worked out this time, but I think play like this loses money in the long run.

First off, I see very little reason not to raise with the AK pre-flop. He’s in the big blind with a secure chip lead and position on the limping small blind who could have just about anything. Why not make the SB pay to play out of position and deter him from limping in the future? It really sucks to let someone into a hand on the cheap, only to be outflopped with AK (which happens pretty frequently). It is, of course, good to mix playing lines up a bit here and there, but unless the SB is really weak and tight, he’ll might call a small raise if he is willing to limp against the chip leader in the first place. I understand the motivation to extract value from this monster pre-flop starting hand, but it might not hit, and there are other psychological considerations to account for in this sort of scenario. The third player has so few chips, that it’s really just down to Columbo and the SB in the game, and it would be good in this 6-max SNG to start dominating the SB while the short stack is still alive because he would likely fear busting 3rd unnecessarily. In these sorts of situations, one can practically win the tourney before the little money bubble even bursts.

The second issue I have with the hand comes with Columbo’s play on the flop. The SB comes out betting, and Columbo puts in a min-raise. Why? Columbo said it was to see where he was in the hand. If you want to see where you are in a hand like this, a min raise is not going to provoke that information. Unless the SB had absolute garbage (i.e., no pair, no decent draw), which he probably didn’t given that he bet into the chip leader out of position, a min-raise is not going to get him to leave the hand, and his calling of the min-raise doesn’t say much about his hand except that he is willing to continue with it. So, the min-raise accomplished nothing: It brought no new info to Columbo, and it didn’t get the SB to fold.

The third issue I have with the hand comes…you guessed it…on the turn. Here the SB checks, and Columbo checks behind. I understand that Columbo is concerned about the board here, but as it turns out, so is the SB. I think a bet is in order. Nothing too drastic like an all in, but perhaps half the pot in order to let the SB know that you’re not playing around. This is a place where info about the SB’s hand can really be gained. If he calls this bet, or raises, then concerns about the board may be well-founded. I doubt that the SB would have folded his top pair here, but the question that comes to my mind is if you’re willing to call a rather big bet on the river after a blank comes, then why not put the bet in yourself on the turn, and perhaps take it down right there? If you think AK is good, then look at it as a value bet.

I guess I have less of a problem with the river call. I’ll just say that the river decision would not have been nearly as difficult if the hand was played differently throughout.

[bfos7215]

Hey, three Brian's out of three commentors!

Of course, Chi-Guy-Bri is kind of letting us down. Seriously, dude, you're WAY to smart of a poker player to be wasting your time listening to this podcast, not to mention starting a pissing match in the comments. Move along.

Brian

[Chi-Guy]

SOrry to let you down....But I love this Podcast. Nobody is too smart to listen to this one. Nothing brings me more joy on Friday than listening to Scott make us all laugh and then getting under Chris's skin...... It is just too easy.

I've learned that Chris will react strongly if you use any word that contains one or more of the following letters, "D" "O" "N" "K" "E" or "Y" (as either a vowel or a consonant).

Brian

[Chris Cosenza]

(yawn)

[BlkBeltJones]

I was down in Vegas a couple weeks ago for the $1500 Limit Hold'em event (sorry, no cash for the Ante Up Nation tally) and stayed at the IP. Scott, you'll be happy to know that the Sunday 3-6 Mixed game at the IP was still raging on at 5:00 AM Monday. Oh yeah, and it's "Ba-deucey" (as in Deuce to seven) not "Ba-dookie". However, you can still get away with asking for "Au Juice" at the buffet.

[jherky]

Just curious about something. What happens in Crazy Pineapple when you get it all in pre-flop against one opponent? When do you discard? Do the players have to flip their hands before the flop? Do you see the flop and then discard like usual? I would imagine you would not flip your cards until after the flop after you discard one card. Anyway, just a random thought.

[Christopher Cosenza]

jherky: Nothing changes, you get it all-in, then the flop comes, then you discard, then you reveal your cards.

[Zerbet]

Checked the comments only to assure that someone had already pointed this out, but low and behold, nothing here, so...

The email/press release/whatever during the Tampa Bay Poker Replay segment about the Bad Beat Jackpot getting hit for over a half a mil was either mis-read or incorrect, and I was kind of surprised neither of you picked that up...

It's not possible for a straight flush to the eight of spades to beat quad sixes.

Do You See Why?

[Pakashkan]

"It's not possible for a straight flush to the eight of spades to beat quad sixes."

Maybe one eyed Jacks are wild in Tampa!

[Clever Moniker]

Why is it not possible for a straight flush to the 8 & quad sixes to occur in the same hand? The 6s would have to be a community card, but that's about it.

[Chris Cosenza]

Though I was in CT and didn't have this release in front of me, I still can't figure out the problem. Guy was holding 6c6h. Other guy was holding 8s7s. Board came 5s6s6d, turn was the 4s. Straight flush beats quads every time in my book, and they both played both cards in their hand to qualify. Zerbet, I know you love to point out mistakes, can you point your own out here? Did you maybe think this was a stud hand?

[Zerbet]

My bad; multi-tasking while semi-ill and then posting without a peer review == weak sauce.

[Christopher Cosenza]

Hey, as long as I'm not going crazy, that's all I care about. Get better Zerb.

[pokerpeaker]

Wow. The Crazy Pineapple was MY hand, and I made a mistake, and Scott corrected it on the show after I told him it was indeed a mistake, and all of a sudden there's a flame war going on?
Sort of, anyway.
Chris momentarily said "I guess it doesn't matter" then reconsidered.

If that's what people are focusing on then I need to come up with a better hand!

Chris also disagreed with the way I played it since I checked the turn. I still like my play though I totally agree with his reasoning. One of the reasons I did what I did was in my home game, we all start with $5. So I still had half my stack left, and a $5 push in our game is a HUGE, monster bet. Therefore I was trying to lessen the blow.
I still think I agree with Chris but that was my reasoning.
That's what hand of the week is for though. It was a good discussion hand. That's the whole point.

[Rebeldoug]

Can someone on this site tell me what the
status is of gambling deal Gov. Crist and the Seminoles?

Has the State Supreme court made a ruling
on the constitutional question concerning
the governor's legal right to act on the deal?

I know it's not really big news but no one seems to cover any of this.