Playing Lowball Against a Maniac - Part II

Last issue I started to answer the question, how do you play lowball against a maniac? In a word, carefully.

You can isolate the maniac, but you have to do it just right.

After losing a huge pot to a player who had drawn and made a 7, when Charleston had gotten into a raising war against a drunk who held a worse pat 9, Charleston slowed down a bit.

I didn't like my position, because Charleston was two places to my left. I had requested to be put on the change list, but it didn't seem likely that anyone would be leaving this game anytime soon, so I just had to play my best while out of position.

The deal was opposite me, and Charleston had killed the pot, as usual. No one opened to me. My cards were 5-4-2-A-K, a nice one-card draw to a wheel. I opened. No one else called. Charleston raised. I knew that he would raise with far more hands worse than mine than better, particularly since the only better hands were pat hands and wheel draws with the joker, and it was unlikely that he had one of those, so I reraised. Charleston raised, and I raised again. Most of the hands he would have in this spot were still likely to be worse than mine. Charleston showed me a little respect, and just called.

I drew one card, and so did he.

I caught a queen, and checked. Charleston said, "I paired," and showed that he had been drawing to an 8, quite a bit worse than my hand, but still worth five bets in his mind. I was glad he hadn't bet. I would have called with my queen, and I'm pretty sure he knew that, so he gave up when he paired. I had won $200 on a hand that the more timid players at the table would have won $80 with, so I was pleased.

Wally, the slow-playing drunk who earlier had helped build the biggest pot of the night for the player who had made a 7 on a draw to a bicycle, finally collapsed in a stupor onto the table. Security had been called to pick up the comatose player, and Charleston had immediately moved into Wally's vacated seat. Even though I was first on the change list, I naturally did not object to his moving before I did, since the seat change placed Charleston two places to my right.

Charleston won a few pots in the new seat, and was up to about $1,500 in chips. He had bought another rack at some point, so he was into the game about $1,000, but he seemed happy with many stacks in front of him, and was back to his aggressive play. I knew that everyone else knew this, and that many would slow-play monsters hoping that Charleston would reraise, thus trapping anyone else in the pot. This was where I had to be supercautious to avoid getting myself trapped.

Sally was first to open in this pot. Charleston, to her left, had, as usual, killed the pot, so the action skipped him and went to the next player. That player folded. My cards were 8-6-5-4-joker, a pat 8. This was normally a good raising hand, and I would normally always raise Sally with this hand, for two reasons. One, I didn't want to let anyone in cheaply behind me to draw out on the hand. Two, the hand played best against one opponent, and I would want to make that one opponent pay for the privilege of trying to beat it. But I was almost certain that Charleston would raise when it got to him, and I wanted to see what was going to happen in the interim. So, I just called.

No one came in behind me, which was just fine with me. It got to Charleston, and, as I had expected, he raised.

In many clubs, when a pot is killed, which causes players to enter the pot in other than normal rotational order, and someone raises, the players come back in again in the order they originally came in. This is so the situation of one player having to call two bets or more before another player has even had to call one doesn't arise. (Other clubs have a rule worded as the action never backs up. So, after a raise from the killer of a pot, the next bet goes to the player to his left, even if the opener of the pot originally came in before the player to the killer's left. I don't like that particular rule. In any case, though, you should know which rule prevails where you play. This is another reason why it is good to be familiar with the rules of any cardroom before you first sit down to play.)

After Charleston's raise, the action returned to Sally. She called. This was great. This told me Sally did not have a pat hand – otherwise she would have reraised – and I was far ahead of any draw she would have. Even if she actually had a pat hand, it would be something like a pat 9, with which she was hoping to escape cheaply. It was almost certain that she did not have me beat. Furthermore, unless a fluke happened, I was undoubtedly even farther ahead of Charleston.

The action came to me, and now I reraised. It then went to Charleston, and he put in another bet.

Again, the action returned to Sally. Now she must have thought she would be ending up in the middle of another of those raising wars that had earlier produced a pot of nearly $1,000. I suspect that she had a pat 9, and now thought better of playing it – either that or a less-than-premium draw, say, to a smooth 8 or rough 7. And since I had slow-played my hand, she might be suspicious that I had a pat hand better than anything she could hope to make; that is, she might be afraid that she would be putting in four or five bets only to be drawing dead. Of course, I had slow-played my hand not because it was a monster and I was trying to trap anyone, but because I was seeking information, but Sally didn't know that. She folded. That pleased me, too, because I wanted to play my hand against only one player, not two. I knew that if Sally called, she would be drawing to better than my hand. Also, her folding left dead money in the pot, which increased my expected value.

Charleston put in one more bet. This was fine with me. In case he had something like a pat 10 or 9, I did not want him to decide to break it and draw to a hand that might beat me. If I was already beat, I was going to lose three more bets by reraising. If I wasn't and he was standing pat, I was going to guarantee a winner vs. a possible loser if I convinced him to draw by going one more bet. If he was drawing all along, well, he might be drawing to worse than my hand anyway, and a reraise would convince him to draw more cards. So, I just called. We had put in four bets each, and the pot contained 10 bets, including Sally's two abandoned bets, plus $17 in blinds.

When asked by the house dealer how many cards he wished, Charleston stood pat, and so did I. Charleston bet after the draw, and I called. He showed a 9-7 and I took the pot – and a $297 profit – with my 8-6.

I had figured it right. Had I raised once more, Charleston might well have broken the 9 to draw to the 7. That would have changed my equity on the pot from 100 percent to a bit more than 75 percent – still a favorite and still a profitable situation, but not optimal. Of course, had I gone one more bet, he might have reraised and still stood pat, and I would've made two more bets. But Charleston had been showing me more respect than anyone else at the table. In fact, he had even asked my advice about the play of a few hands when I ran into him outside during one of his smoking breaks. I think I did the right thing.