Family Pot

Over the Thanksgiving Day weekend, I was at the poker table every afternoon, and came out completely even. I was dealing, not playing. My wife's family comes into town - all thirty to forty of them - every Thanksgiving. This year, they wanted to play Texas Holdem, just like on TV. I am the poker player in the family, so I was asked to set up the game. I didn't much feel like winning money from family, so I acted as the game's non-playing dealer.

It was a great deal of fun. We played No Limit with a buy in of $10, and blinds at five and ten cents. Then we played a tournament, with the grand prize of $40. Some of the family came to the table with sunglasses, and one of my cousins wore a hooded sweatshirt. The game was unlike any other I'd ever seen, even in college. People were hooting and hollering, throwing in chips like they were pretzels, and pulling down pots with smiles on their faces like kids on Halloween. And while it was nothing like the games we play in live or online, I think it was instructive, even for us jaded poker regulars. Here are a couple of details:

1. As expected, nearly all of the players were loose passive. A few would raise before the flop, but whether it was ten cents to call or twenty-five, nearly every player saw nearly every flop.

2. When there was a raise, it was usually the minimum raise, and while it tended to slow down the original bettor, it was nearly always called.

3. Every once in awhile, somebody would try to bluff, and their intentions were always easy to spot. They would say something cute to make them look really strong when they raised, or make some gesture like slamming their chips onto the table. Once again, they were nearly always called.

4 .When a player had a big hand, they did one of two things. Some players would bet or raise with it, disrupting their pattern of only calling bets by other people. That indicated that they were strong. Other players would continue to check and call passively, just as if they had nothing. They gave no indication that they had a hand, and continued to call down to the river. My mother-in-law's sister-in-law (no, I'm not making this up) called the river with quad sevens. After the hand, she was asked why she didn't raise, and she said, "I didn't want to lose anybody."

What can be learned from this surreal experience, besides "don't try to play cards with your in-laws?" Well, here are a few things I took away from the weekend.

1. You don't see too many newcomers like these at the No Limit tables at the casinos, but you do see some. Typically, someone wants to take a break from blackjack or craps and decides to give poker a try. After all, the game looks simple enough on TV. While it is a treat to have someone like this at your table, you simply cannot play them the same way that you play against "regular" players. Think twice about bluffing them, and just because they only call instead of raising, it doesn't mean that they don't have a monster hand.

2. There is nothing wrong with limping to see a cheap flop. But if you enter a pot with six or seven other players, you are going to need a monster to win. I cannot tell you how many times I saw premium starting hands cracked because they couldn't get anyone to fold before the flop. Instead, the biggest pots were won by 7-5, 8-3. and A-4, all unsuited of course. (The A-4 won with a Wheel, by the way, and the winning player didn't realize she had won since she didn't know that an Ace could play high or low.) If you let anyone and everyone see the flop, you shouldn't be surprised to get beaten by one of these hands. You should count on it.

3. The minimum raise on the flop is a failed strategy most of the time. It doesn't work as a bluff, because you will get called. It doesn't work as a value bet, because your opponent will slow things down on later streets, and the pot you end up winning won't be as big as if you'd bet or just called. It can work if you are trying to buy a free card on the river, but you kind of give yourself away when you check the turn and bet on the river when you hit. The minimum raise is a paper tiger, whether you're playing for ten dollars or ten thousand.

4. Finally, poker is supposed to be fun. None of the players in my family were good players, although some were better than others. Yet there were no hard feelings at any point. Nobody complained about bad beats. Nobody berated anybody for playing crappy cards, or for calling a bluff with Kind high. Nobody even kept track of how much they won or lost. Even the losers wanted to play again.

Sure, things are a lot more serious when hundreds or thousands of dollars are on the line. They should be. But all of us came to poker for the fun of it, for the chance to match our wits and guts against others in nonviolent mental combat. And while nearly all of us have stopped playing in those nickel-dime games that we started with, we aren't necessarily enjoying poker more. Believe me, my cousin in the Unabomber hood and sunglasses had a lot more fun playing poker last weekend than you did. And now she knows what a Wheel is.

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