$4-$8 Holdem. A gent that’s been playing in the room for at least six months was in the 10s. He won a pot. While I dealt the next hand, he asked when the third dollar was taken for the rake, was it taken on $50 or $60? I told him $50. He said, “Look!”

I looked at his chip stacks and he had $49 stacked out in front of him. “That’s all that was in the pot.”

I said, “Yes.”

He said, “Well it’s not $50.”

I said, “Add $3.”

He looked at me like I’d lost my mind.

I repeated, “Add $3.”

“Oh…” the light went on “you take it out of a $50 pot.”

I nodded. The game went on. It was a crazy little jammer as all of the $4-$8 Holdem games seem to be anymore. There’s very little learning going on with a lot of them, they just came to play.

Which brings me to another thought on people that haven’t learned much from their table time. He’s good looking, clean and neat, great smile, early 30’s, and a veteran of the $8-$16 Holdem game. He wears heavy duty headphones and is armed with an MP3 Player and stacks of chips. He’s got the Heart of a Lion when he plays and is charming and upbeat when he’s winning. When he has a bad day and is getting drop kicked around the table, the wrath of Godzilla’s Mother-in-law couldn’t compare to Tony’s tongue and explosive anger.

The game had a ton of action…too much for the player that can’t mix it up and shift gears. Of the ten players at the table, I only knew two of them, Tony in the 5s, and an elderly gent in the 1s. For the first fifteen minutes of my down, the chips rolled in and out, people jammed it up, the 3s was d-r-u-n-k and kept slamming chips in with ATC. He went BUST and left the game.

The 9s won a big pot and the next hand the bet went to $24 pre-flop with seven way action. The Flop was a Jack with small cards and one Club. Action, action, action.

The Turn brought the Jack of Clubs. More action.

The River brought a Club and Tony and the 8s checked. The 9s bet. Another player in between called the bet and Tony hesitated and finally called, as did the 8s. Tony mumbled something like, “You didn’t catch runner-runner Club did you?”

Sure enough, the 9s turned over the K-2C. Tony turned over J-9 offsuit or something like that and slapped the table so hard they could’ve heard it on the Strip. He had a fit, went into the ‘NICE runner, runner Club, SIR!”

Then he went on to exclaim that the guy called a capped raise before the Flop with K-2.

I said, “No…it wasn’t capped.”

The Super Rant was on. He just couldn’t shut up about bad players and how he’d gotten beat with A-A earlier by 9-7 Offsuit.

I asked, “What difference does it make, whether it was suited or not?” trying to get past it and stop his poker face from leaking all over the table. Believe me, there weren’t enough bandages in the world to do that.

He just couldn’t let it go. He went on and on about getting beat by bad players. I finally said, “You need to change the way your thinking about this.”

(And I know Tony away from the table so it’s not as if I’m punishing him after he’s taken a beat. There’s another post here about his attitude along the same vein about a year ago.)

Definitely defiant, he exclaimed, “I hate getting beat by a BAD PLAYER.”

I almost laughed, “What? How do you know who’s a bad player?”

He said he didn’t care if he got beat but not by a bad player.

I told him to stop it, there was no need to make statements like that at the table.

He put his hand out, across the table, in the direction of the 1s and said, “I’m sorry you’re a bad player, Sir.”

I wanted to slap him. He made himself look so bad.

The 5s and I were both laughing because we were trying to figure out how you know someone’s a bad player.

Should all players be forced to take a quiz and if they fail, they have to wear a stamp on their forehead that reads: Bad Player?

Better yet, what should the players that want to tell people they’re a bad player have to wear on their foreheads? Tony?