Superlow

Old-time lowball players predict the demise of their game. Perhaps rumors of its death, as was Mark Twain's, are greatly exaggerated; however, signs of the struggle increase regularly. California's Bay Area cardroom scene, with which I am most familiar, has two lowball venues: the Garden City Casino in San Jose and the Oaks Card Club in Emeryville.

Garden City usually has one $20-limit game going, sometimes two. Sometimes, sadly, though, the game dies, to be revived only with difficulty. My usual session is Friday night, and always when I come in, a game awaits me. That wasn't so recently, though. Four names were on the board. I played hold'em for an hour until they actually managed to get a game started. Up until a few months ago, the game would go all night; now, it frequently breaks at 1 a.m. or 2 a.m. (Curiously, this frequently happens at about the time I quit. Are they trying to tell me something?) Up until a year ago, Fridays and Saturdays often had both a $30-limit and a $20. Now, I don't see a $30 even once in two or three months. One recent Saturday night, the game was going strong when I arrived at about 5 p.m. Second on the list, I was in the $6-$12 hold'em game for an hour before my seat opened. I quit at 11:30 p.m., with the game already looking shaky despite having just filled up after having been short for an hour. I hadn't even finished my transaction at the cage when I saw the rest of the players heading my direction.

I often play $120-limit at the Oaks on Saturdays. That game generally starts at 9:30 a.m. Recently, I quit at 2:30 p.m. Usually the game is going strong when I quit in the late afternoon or early evening, and the same was true at mid-afternoon on this day. However, I was told that by 7 p.m., the game was shorthanded, and remained that way. Normally there is also a $20-limit game, one populated by seemingly the same group of old-timers who were playing in the '70s. This day's game did not start until after lunch, and I've been there before when there's no game.

I'm not denigrating either location. I'm pleased that I can play lowball in the Bay Area, and the games at Garden City and the Oaks are almost always excellent.

I have less familiarity with Southern California. I play at the Normandie Casino when I'm down South. Usually there is one $15-$30 game, sometimes two, and sometimes a $20-$40. I'm told that Commerce Casino and The Bicycle Casino sometimes have games, usually at fairly high stakes. I also hear that a few Central Valley and Sacramento clubs have lowball. But of the hundreds (thousands?) of cardroom tables in California, those devoted to lowball likely can be counted on two hands.

I hear that Mississippi also has a few games, although not what I'm familiar with. I believe they play triple-draw lowball at stakes that would not be comfortable to a low roller. I don't know where else to find lowball.

Why is lowball dying? It's due to the popularity of faster-action games. Players prefer hold'em, Omaha, and seven-card stud because of their four and five rounds of betting and because of structures that encourage multiway play. The liveliest low- and medium-limit games often regularly have four, five, or more participants in a hand. Contrast that with the average lowball contest of two players, and the attendant necessity of six players having to sit idly by waiting for the next hand, and you can readily see why few new players want to jump into a lowball game. Add to that the unplayability of the great majority of lowball hands and you see why hold'em players and the like get discouraged about not being able to play many hands. Lowball encourages tight play; tight play means not participating in many hands and not giving much action on those that are played. In hold'em, even those whose playing requirements are "any two cards" can go on a rush and win a number of hands before the inevitable catches up with them. The same is true with seven-card stud high-low eight-or-better. But even the livest live one soon realizes that three paints plus a 7 and an 8 is not a very promising start, and that even the two-card draws come through seldom enough that pursuing them is a sure bankroll destroyer. But in a lively hold'em game, even someone who plays "only" suited connectors, pairs, and A-X in position and a few more hands out of position and in multiway pots gets the thrill of playing a third or more of the time. Seven-card stud presents similar possibilities.

At one time, more than half of California's cardroom tables were devoted to lowball, with limits attractive to any wallet, from $1-$2 games to $150-$300 and higher, and no-limit in similar ranges (although with fewer games; now, I doubt you can find more than one no-limit lowball game in the entire state). Generally, the smallest game you can find now is $15-$30 in Southern California and $20 in Northern California. That's a bit high for a beginner, and another reason why the game is dying.

Action, action, action! That's what the live ones who used to liven up the lowball games before hold'em was permitted in California crave, and now they go elsewhere for their action. The lack of scintillating action is the nature of lowball, but I propose to remedy that situation.

With the publication of this column, I offer a new game to a slavering poker public, Superlow, that will have the action players flocking back to the lowball games. Superlow has enough action for anyone, and for those who like having five concealed cards, plus the ability to draw to improve their hands, this is the answer to the otherwise sedentary nature of lowball.

Here's what gave me my idea. I once heard a lowball regular say that the way to foster action in the game would be to introduce an extra round of betting before dealing the fifth card. That way, the rocks couldn't sit around waiting for pat hands and premium one-card draws. They would be forced to gamble or else go broke putting up blinds. I take that premise a step further.

Superlow has four rounds of betting, a response to the hold'em competition. It has three betting levels – say, $4-$4-$6-$8 or $10-$10-$15-$20. There are three blinds, as in the existing game. The blinds might be $2 for the dealer, $2 for the middle blind, and $4 for the big blind, or $5 for the dealer, $5 for the middle blind, and $10 for the big blind. Each player receives three cards facedown, as in the current form of lowball. There is a round of betting starting with the player to the left of the big blind, and the game is bet-or-fold for the first two rounds. As is the case in the current Southern California-style double-limit (also called spread-limit) game, the opener can limp in or come in for a raise. This would build pots, and also leave dead money for the remaining players to win. After the betting is equalized, a fourth card is dealt to each active player. There's another round of betting, this time starting to the left of the dealer, and still bet-or-fold. After the betting is equalized, a fifth card is dealt to each active player. There's another round of betting, this time with players able to check and call – or raise. After the betting is equalized on this round, players draw. The last round is the same as the lowball we currently know and love, with the sevens rule in sway. Pots would be much larger than in the current stale form of lowball, because of both the increased number of betting rounds and more players having speculative hands at each round. The tight players may not participate without good low cards at each round, but they will find themselves out of many pots, and their losses will not be made up in those few pots in which they participate to the end. Having two cards and one brick in three cards, some will fold, but action players will hope for at least one more good card, so as to end up with a good one-card draw. Most players who start with three good cards and get a bad card for the fourth will elect to continue, hoping for a good card as the fifth – thus still having a good one-card draw. Some will continue with three or four mediocre cards, hoping to end up with a pat hand that will beat any one-card draws. And sometimes, even a tight player will start with A-2-joker, catch a king on the fourth card, join (albeit reluctantly) in the spirited betting of that round (hoping for a good fifth card), catch a queen, but remain for the two-card draw enticed by all of the money in the pot. Superlow is a game that forces players to gamble, and as such, should woo many of the action players away from their hold'em and stud games.

In a spirit of sharing and nobleness, and a desire to attract new blood to lowball and bring back the action-deprived deserters, I place this game in the public domain. I hope cardrooms concerned about the loss of their lowball action or wanting to offer more alternatives for their customers will feel inspired to introduce the game, to which end I ask no royalties. All I ask is recognition, that my name be attached somewhere (probably in the rulebook) as the inventor of this game. What I have presented here is merely an outline of the mechanism of the game. Any cardroom that wishes to introduce it, please contact me in care of Card Player for detailed rules and procedural considerations.