First live experience tonight near Seattle(long post) |
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Posted Sun Apr 10, 2005 6:02 am GMT by Klumsysmurf
Saturday night after work I decided to stop by the Great American Casino since it's only a block away and I had noticed them advertising on their billboard that they now had 3-6 holdem games and a few weekly $20+3 nl holdem tournies.
It's a small casino, nothing special. No slots, normal blackjack and other house games, none of which interest me. The cardroom has 3 tables that seat nine each. When I arrived at 7pm on a Saturday night there wasn't a game going. I attribute this to the fact that it's a very small casino, and the cardroom has only been open a few weeks.
I joined the 3 others who were waiting for enough people to show to get a game going, and had a quick dinner at their restaurant. The food was decent, nothing great but I wasn't expecting much.
Around 8pm we got a game going 6 handed, and until we got a full 9 about 45 minutes later they only took a $1 rake. I was very impressed with how well it was run. The two dealers who rotated in were very competent, and did a great job of keeping everyone in line and moving along at a nice pace. They have automatic shufflers and because of that and the good dealers, we saw a lot more hands per hour than I was expecting to. It wasn't nearly as slow as I feared it might be, and overall I had a great time tonight.
Lots of lag's and tight passives at the tables, a few fish and people that were there just go gamboool, I'll list a few of them now.
Casino - A fun natured guy who everyone called Casino, was definately there to gambool. He was very loose and aggresive. He loved to straddle, raise without looking at his hand or with crap, and would call down to the river with nothing and then call the last bet just to "see what you have". He was up to $250 after the first hour and was quite intimidating due to his aggresiveness, but by the end of the night he lost all of that and had to rebuy for $40. He immediately doubled up on that when he raised blind, and raised and reraised his entire $40 blind. The other guy had pocket jacks, Casino flipped over his cards to see KQ, and doubled up with a pair of kings. He enjoyed that one.
Pappa - An old asian man who everyone refers to as Pappa, very funny guy, and like Casino very lag, although not nearly as much. He hit a royal flush 30 minutes in and won the jackpot of $2300 for that, which sure made him happy the rest of the night. He was up around $300 from his initial $100 buy-in at one point, but I took a big chunk of that off him when I flopped the nut flush and he called me down the river. He was definately a tricky player and the guy I feared the most by the end of the night, as I could never tell if he was flat out bluffing or actually had a hand.
She-fish - A women that I nicknamed she-fish due to the fact that she was just plain fishy. She saw about 75% of the flops, and was constantly complaining that we needed new decks because she kept getting the same cards over and over. Ignore the fact that we had already switched out the decks twice after Pappa hit his royal, and another man hit his quad J's to beat my 9's full of J's. She was definatley of the mindset that "any two can win" and would call with almost anything. Paid me off when I raised preflop with AK and spiked a K on the flop. She called me down to the river with K4o, as did another who I knew to be on a flush draw and luckily it never hit. She complained that she was just having terrible luck all week and was down over $1000. She said the cards just weren't comming and she hoped her luck would turn around soon, nm that she raised with crap and called down with bigger crap, it was obviously just due to bad luck since that's all holdem is right? I told here to just keep playing her game the the cards would start coming her way (not before she paid me off first hopefully) 
Notable highlights include Pappa hitting his royal straight, me losing with my set 9's on a 3 J 5 9 J board to quad J's, and me taking down a nice pot from she fish when I hit my set on the river, and quad 3's on the turn. She had 2 pair, one other caller was on a straight draw, and another on the flush draw. That was my biggest pot of the night, and I won the $255 quad 3's jackpot. The guy who hit his quad J's an hour earlier was pissed because it had been hit the day before and so didn't pay out anything.
I walked away with $550, so up $350 from my original $200. Won about $126 from actual poker, which I'm very happy with considering I was down $135 at one point, and another $250 or so from the jackpot. Spent $12 on food, probably $20 or so on dealer tips, and bought everyone at the table a round of drinks after I hit the quad 3 jackpot so that was another $30.
I was very nervous when I first got there, and let myself get pushed around a little too much especially by Casino. He was two to my left, so I was in a terrible position and often avoided calling with suited connecters or low PP's when I normally might, because I could see just from looking how he held his chips that he was going to raise. There were often 5-7 callers to see the flop, and if no one else raised he was almost sure to, and if it was raised before him often times he would reraise. After I calmed down a bit I played decently the rest of the night. Made a few costly mistakes, but got some nice hands that I was able to get paid off on as well. Made a few good folds and folded a winner once, but with 1 raise, reraise and then back to me with another left to act I wasn't about to call my pair of nines with A kicker on the flop when a 10 also hit the flop. An A hit on the turn and A5 won it with a pair. No one had the ten.
The first hand I actually played I lost with A10. Was folded to my just to the right of the big blind, 7 handed at this point. I raise with A10s, sb and bb call. Flop comes 10 5 2 rainbow. I raise, get called by an asian women in the big blind. Turn comes an 8 and I bet out, she reraises me and I think... uh oh. Call that, she checks the river when a 9 hits, as do I. She show's 5 8 for two pair and I loose my first pot.
My most costly mistake occurred soon after I had to rebuy with my 2nd $100. I got pocket 5's on the button, and there were 3 callers. I could see that Casino was going to raise it, and I was running a little scared at this point due to having my first $100 so I folded. Sure enough he raised, and the flop was seen 5 handed. It came A 8 5. Turn 8, river 10. Casino and another player raised and reraised each other sever times, one had K8 the other had J8, and I would've won a huge pot with 5's full if I had stayed in. I believe at that table with that many callers, even calling a raise is EV+ with a pp, considering that I'm sure to get paid off if I hit. But because I was a little scared, I folded it. Oh well, after that hand I calmed down, realized that it didn't matter if I lost the rest of my money since I could easily afford it, and I playing my B- game instead of my D+ game that I was playing earlier. Luckily my B- game was good enough.
I'll probably try out another casino in the Seattle area sometime later this week to see how it compares to the Great American Casino. I'll definately come back to this one at least once, as I had a great time tonight and from talking with the dealer and some of the employees there quite a few of the fish and lags are regulars so the game is very beatable. I know I need more live experience to improve my game, but I would like to get an idea of the best spot to do so before I start playing regularly
Sorry for the long post, but I couldn't help it :D
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Posted Sun Apr 10, 2005 2:20 pm GMT by Pinnacle
Diamond Lil's in Renton is also a great place to play. 4/8 is their lowest level, but the atmosphere is wonderful and I had an awesome time there my last trip out. Its only about 10 minutes south of SeaTac International.
Posted Sun Apr 10, 2005 4:05 pm GMT by JohnnyCache
Is there any good NL in that area? I'm really eyeing Seattle for a change of scenery and poker being legal doesn't hurt the decision.
Posted Tue Apr 19, 2005 6:09 am GMT by Cyberhwk
| JohnnyCache wrote: | | Is there any good NL in that area? |
Unfortunatly, I don't know of any No Limit live play in private casinos in the State of Washington. State law allows no "player funded" jackpots to be larger than $12,000 and, though extremely unlikely, there's no way to prevent rich guy from re-buying multiple times until a $12K pot is a possibility; therefore I believe the gambling commision won't allow NL play.
There are many indian casinos in the state though and I believe they are exempt from WSGC rules. I think those would be your best bet and they usually aren't too far of a drive if you've got the day. Unfortunatly if you're looking to play nightly, it's either going to be online (which is ALSO technically illegal in Washington State), or you're going to have to brush up on your limit play.
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