Keep those wild-and-crazy guys in game

By Mark Lasser

The last month or so I’ve managed to get myself wedged into games with some pretty wild characters. Before I go any further, I should probably talk about player types. Sometimes in poker, we talk about players being tight or loose. Passive or aggressive. For this column, I’m talking about more general types of characters.

For example, some players fancy themselves professionals. They may like the game and they prefer playing poker to hard labor or working in a hot kitchen, but ultimately, the reason they sit down is to grind away and make a living so they don’t need to get a “real job.”

Other players are playing to kill time. You’ll find older players and sometimes retirees who play a very tight game of poker and participate in few hands. These folks like making money, hate losing any money, are very risk averse and are really spending eight hours a day playing to participate in promos, hit bad beats, have some human interaction and enjoy some time engrossed in the game.

Then there are the gamblers. They fancy themselves poker sharks. They often have bright and bulky jewelry like rings and necklaces. They’ll inevitably be wearing fashionable and loud clothing, designer eye glasses, and they’ll have a poker weight for their cards that calls some attention to them. They like to drink, can be loud and there’s no amount of attention that will satiate them. These are the guys I love to play.

I recently had a session in which I got seated to the left of a guy with a big pile of chips and several drinks in his gut. When I say pile, I mean pile. Nothing was stacked up. This guy was open-raising from early position with 3-5 off suit. He even opened one hand under the gun for $100 in the $1-2-100 game with the mortifying 7-2 off suit. And he was killing the table. I saw him play a 9-5 off suit against a strong player’s preflop raise. The cards came 5-A-T. He bet $20 and was called. The turn brought a 9 to give him two pair. This time he check raised and was called. The river brought another 5, giving him a runner-runner full house. He bet $100 and was called. The other player had flopped top two pair with an AT suited. He was only beaten by the wild man’s bad beat catch on the river.

At one point, a good online player came into the room and took an open seat at our table. He mentioned to our wild man that he should stack his chips. Well, the last thing you want to do with a drunk, loose, wild guy is tell him what to do or how to play. You want him to stay on the trajectory he’s on so you can get a shot at him. Making him self-aware is a bad thing. So, I caught the guy’s eye who was sitting down and gave him a subtle head shake and wink to let him know that the last thing he should do was scare off the maniac. He nodded and realized what was going on.

So how does this story end? The way it’s supposed to. The wild guy got played to the felt after being up almost $1,000. He went to the ATM, got up a few hundred again, and then once again got played to the felt. I’m glad to say I got some of it. The rest of the table seemed to make out decently as well. So the lesson here? Never correct a bad player’s game. Don’t make them uncomfortable. Don’t call them names or make them aware of how they’re playing. Tell them you understand why they played the 9-5 when they win. Commiserate with them on their bad luck when the 7-2 falls to someone’s aces or kings. But whatever you do, keep them in the game!

Mark B. Lasser is Denver writer and international poker player. He regularly plays in Colorado, Arizona, California, Missouri and Nevada. You can hear him talk about gambling and casinos every Friday at 5 PM on KEZW AM 1430. Readers can send questions and comments to him at ColoradoPokerMark@comcast.net.