Of Mice and Men

There you are in a hold'em pot with two opponents you know like the back of your hand. Holding K Q in middle position, you raise preflop, and the button – a solid but predictable fellow with little deception in his game – makes it three bets to go. The big blind – a loose player with a penchant for overacting – defends for two raises, you call, and the rest of the field folds. The flop comes K J 10, a pretty swell flop for your hand, even if you are still behind. When the blind leads, you raise, and the button again makes it three bets. It's pretty clear that you need to hit your hand again – and you don't want to hit it with a queen.

The turn brings a rag spade. The blind checks, you check, and the button, with a hitch in his motion that smacks of uncertainty, bets. This momentary hesitation is no act (the big blind is the ham sandwich in this trio), and it confirms your assessment of what you're up against: a tight player working hard to protect his A-K or A-A while staring at a trouble board that's got him plenty nervous.

But nervous or not, he's still got the lead, and you still need to hit to win. Or do you? In fact … wait a minute … did you just see what you think you saw? Did the big blind – a lifetime member of the Bad Actors Guild – just call the turn by splashing the pot and growling, "Put out another spade"?

He sure did, bless his heart, and what this performance tells you, as surely as if he'd taken out an ad in Variety, is that (a) he doesn't have spades, and (b) whatever he is chasing, if the river misses him with a spade, he's planning to fire.

The fact that it's a hopeless strategy doesn't deter you for a moment in your read; desperate players often resort to desperate measures, and you've seen him attempt this same futile tactic before. But while it's foolish for him to think the button would abandon ship for a single bet because a flush card hit the river, remember, it's a positional game – and your position, between the loose player in front and the tight one behind, offers you a more realistic opportunity. Why? Because when situated between a rock and a hard case, the difference between one bet and two can be all the difference in the world.

So, here comes the river, and it's bad news/good news. The bad news is that you miss your hand; the good news is that you miss it right, with another rag spade. The big blind fires. You raise.

This presents the button, a conservative player by nature, with real problems. Although he suspects the blind is making a play, he's shaken by your raise; and while your failure to pop him on the turn pretty much takes A-Q out of play, there are still any number of hands – a set of tens, jacks, or kings, K-J, or (if you were feeling frisky) J 10 – that fit both your preflop raise and subsequent play of the hand. In any event, it's suddenly occurring to him that whatever you've been taking this heat with, you've been taking it with something – and how likely are you to raise in this spot without some kind of big hand, bigger certainly than his one pair? He's got another problem, as well – the player behind him, who led at the river. He is the sort to chase runner-runner spades, and if that's what he's done, he's going to reraise – and if you're legit, this thing could get capped. Hmmm. And while it's entirely possible that one of you is making a play, how likely is it that both of you are? Does he really want to get trapped into calling two, three, or maybe even four bets – with one pair – to find out?

No, he doesn't. That's not the player he is. Knowing the player he is, and the player the big blind is, and employing the one to maneuver the other – well, that's the player you are. The only question is: Have you read the situation correctly? And the answer is: You're dead-on. The button's got A-K and no stomach to call, the blind's on a busted straight, and you, my friend, have observed, analyzed, and acted. That's what playing poker is – as opposed to just playing along to see what happens.

Good for you. Bravo. Well done.

Too bad you're not going to win the pot.

Huh? Say what?

Oh no, you're not going to be dragging this pot. Sorry, did you think you were? Nope, these chips are headed elsewhere. Why? Because the moment you throw out your river raise, the big blind, disgusted at the failure of his hopeless bluff, petulantly folds out of turn – flinging his cards into the muck like a spoiled child who's decided to take his wagon and go home. In so doing, he renders you as naked as the day you were born, because from the button's perspective, this changes … well, everything. The risk of having to put in three or four bets to show down his cards magically disappears, for now he needs to call only two. As for his multiple opponents, well, they've just been reduced to one. It's quite a trick, really – if you can get past the ethics – to transform, with just a flick of your wrist, somebody else's disciplined laydown into a nearly mandatory call. Ah well, the best laid plans of mice and men …

There's a moral to this story, of course.

Good players have more ammunition than their weaker competitors. Not only can they pick up extra bets by inducing loose players to do the wrong thing, they can pick up extra pots by maneuvering tight players, over whom they have positional advantage, to do what's "right." This is especially profitable because it can take a long time for tight players, determined to play "correctly," to catch on and start playing back. It's one of the reasons that solid-to-good is such a tough hump to clear. It's also why good players are so much harder to beat.

But when the action is compromised by childish tantrums, and outcomes are altered by the petty breaking of rules – when, without warning or justification, the position is removed, midhand, from a positional game – well, brother, you're on your own and all the skill in the world can't help you – or anyone else, for that matter – because when unethical behavior becomes the disorder of the day, the playing field isn't so much leveled as it is razed. Try playing poker on scorched earth. Everybody loses.

The only thing that will help you, and everyone else who respects and plays by the rules, is a willingness on the part of management to discourage those who don't. Words of warning by themselves won't do the job, for words that aren't backed up carry little weight. What's needed is enforcement, in the form of the same kinds of penalties that are successfully being utilized to ensure the integrity of tournament play. Live-action players are no less vulnerable than their tournament counterparts, and merit the same protection. After all, they're also playing for real money.

Deterrence deters; appeasement encourages. That's a hard truth, and facing it requires commitment and resolve. But, then, commitment, resolve, and the willingness to face hard truths – aren't those the same attributes you demand of yourself when you sit down to play? I thought so; and management should do no less. Indeed, just as the serious, committed player constantly strives to improve his play, so too must serious, committed management always be looking to raise its game – to the highest level.