Birthday Tournament Summary

Birthday Tournament Summary.


Today was my second annual birthday poker tournament. I’m not real big on birthday celebrations, but my wifes family makes a big deal out of it, and that I do something for my birthday. So, why not Poker? Well, maybe because none of them know how to play and trying to explain strategy to them is not exactly very effective.

We had nine players and it basically went like this:

Random Relative: How much is it?

Me: its $40 to call. Or you can fold. Or Raise.

Random Relative: Ok. (calls $40)

Relative to the left. How much is it?

Me: $40. Or you can fold. Or Raise.

Second Relative calls 40.


Repeat that eight times a hand. Hand after hand. What kind of masochistic poker enthusiast puts himself through this? I kept trying to get them to limit their hand selection to at least somewhat decent cards, and to bet when they had something, but it was no use. Just about everyone played every hand, and checked arround whenever possible.

I got crippled relatively early on. The first big hand I lost tried to get cute with A9 after I flopped an Ace. My mother-in-law check called all the way down with big slick. I pointed out that was why you don't play weak aces, but I don't think they understood.

The killer hand was against my wife. She limped ahead of me and I made a big raise with wired cowboys. Everyone else actually folded, and she calls. She thinks I’m just bluffing her. The flop is 789 and she bets. I raise big and she calls. The turn is another 9. She makes a tiny bet and I make a huge raise. If she has nines, so be it, I think I have her beat, and hopefully my large betting will get other people to try betting once in a while. The river is a 5 and she makes another tiny bet. I call this time, not wanting to risk thowing any more money away when there were so many hands out there that could beat me. She had JT for the flopped straight and I was all but eliminated.

About halfway through I think my dad finally stated to get it. He still couldn’t figure out how much the blinds were, or the value of the chips, but he did learn to raise when he had a hand. Unfortunately no picked up on the fact that whenever he raised he had something and they continued to pay him off. Patience isn’t exactly his strong suit though and he ended up giving away his chip lead after we were down to three.

That left my wife and her uncle to go heads up. My wife is actually probably the best player there. She’s watched enough poker on TV with me to more or less have a feel for things. Of coarse she still played entirely too conservatively, but I could defiantly tell that things were starting to click.

The two of them had way too many chips for a heads up battle. The problem is they would pretty much bet at nothing, yet call almost anything, so it would either check around on every street, or one of them would min-bet and the other would call. And then they would both show down crap and I would point out that if they would just bet maybe the other person could fold.

The lowlight of the night comes after they both checked through the river on a board with four hearts. My wife turned over her hand [3h 6d] saying I have a pair of sixes.

Actually you have a flush.

Her uncle timidly turns over his cards [Kh Ts] and says I don’t have anything.

No, you also have a flush. King high flush takes it.

So much for them getting the hang of it part.

My wife ended up finishing in second place, with her uncle taking home first prize. And afterwards she actually wanted to talk strategy, so maybe there’s hope for her yet.

Maybe next year I'll have some required reading before the tournament so that they can at least use some strategery.