Public service announcement: do not be this guy
After a frustrating experience at a live poker table, Matt Perry writes an open letter to the Korean gentleman at The Empire Casino.
An open letter to the Korean gentleman at The Empire Casino
Dear Korean gentleman at The Empire Casino,
Following our time together at the tables, I am writing you this letter for your own good, and for the good of poker players at live games the world over. Though I am admittedly cantankerous and can find fault in most people for silly, inconsequential reasons, you pushed my buttons enough to warrant this. You seem like the kind of guy that reads poker websites, so hopefully you'll see it.
"I will eviscerate you in fiction; every pimple, every character flaw." says Paul Bettany's Geoffrey Chaucer to a pair of gamblers in the underrated Heath Ledger vehicle A Knight's Tale. I won't go into your pimples, though they were present, as that would be juvenile; I do, however, intend to detail your character flaws.
"But Matt", you may ask. "Isn't it awfully petty to showcase the faults of someone who annoyed you at the poker table to one of the largest poker-playing audiences on the world wide web? Also, are you seriously comparing yourself to Chaucer?" Well, OK, maybe it is petty - but I didn't spend £15,000 and three years on a journalism degree to not go inappropriately mad with power.
"I sat there wondering if I was the victim of Punk'd"
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| The monkey would have been less frustrating to play poker with. |
We met, if you recall, on September 10. That's me pictured to the right, if you don't remember. It was a Tuesday, and you had just been moved to my table.
I noticed you first when you raised under the gun. I know you raised under the gun because you, after taking down the pot uncontested, made a point of saying that "an UTG raise deserves respect".
You actually said "you tee gee". Out loud.
This was only the initial trickle that became a torrent of shoehorned poker jargon; over the course of the next few hours you were sure to throw into conversation every technical term and piece of slang in the book, regardless of how baffled everyone else at the table may have been.
As I sat there, wondering whether or not I was the victim of some poker players' version of Punk'd (thinking perhaps that Ashton Kutcher had read my 7 things we can do to make the poker world a nicer place piece and wanted someone to test me by breaking all the rules at once), you were sure to laugh and express how flabbergasted you were whenever someone would raise/fold an 8BB stack, or fold an ace face-up in the big blind against a small all-in from the button.
Perhaps most infuriating was your habit of stating how many big blinds you had before a decision, then telling the table out loud what range you felt it was correct to call or shove with.
Please realise that this is absolutely not normal behaviour.
"Once, I was you... an insufferable prat at the table"
I know you're really proud of the fact that you've just discovered some simple strategies and you have probably been killing it at $0.01/$0.02. That's legitimately respectable, as it's more poker success than most casual players will ever have.
I know you've been studying a lot, and you know all about 3-bet ranges (they exist) and polarisation (it's a thing) and ICM (it's maths). You know you're better than these donkeys at the casino, because they wouldn't know a capped range if it slapped them in the face.
The reason I know this so well is that once, I was you.
I was you, and I'm sure that I, too, was an absolutely insufferable prat at the poker table. I was a master of multi-tabling microstakes and swimming in dat rakeback cash, ever-present at any live tournaments I could find; I scoffed at some of the ridiculous things other players did, confident in my own superior knowledge of the beautiful game. After all, I played online!
What I learned later though, was some level of humility. Have you heard of the Socratic Paradox? It essentially means that the smarter you get, the dumber you think you are - you're smart enough to know how much you don't know.
"For the sake of everyone, just keep quiet"
This is what's happened to me after spending so much time in the poker industry, with and around people that have forgotten more about the game than I've learned and who would wipe the floor with me heads-up. I know that I'm better at poker than the vast majority of people who sit at a table, simply because I know that a flush beats a straight. However, I also know that I'm actually a bit crap.
So please, for the sake of everyone, including those who know far less than you and those of us who know far more, just keep quiet. When someone does something moronic, just deal with it. When you have a chance to apply your knowledge, do it in silence.
Am I just bitter that I only came third while you went on to win the tournament? Well, yes, a little - but I was intending to write this piece within 15 minutes of your sitting down so it doesn't have much bearing. Perhaps I'd have been less vitriolic had I shipped it, but oh well.
Regards,
The quiet, frustrated-looking gentleman to your right at the final table
XOXOXOXO
By mjperry | Follow MJPerry on twitter
