Last night I sat right next to actor James Woods for 4 hours at Foxwoods. We were playing 2-5 no limit, and we chatted the entire time. Today, I found out that he is rumored to be a genius, with an IQ just higher than Plato, Galileo, and Stephen Hawking, and just a hair below DaVinci and chess champion Gary Kasparov.
We talked about Warwick politics, statistical probability, Swine Flu, cellular proliferation, the ethics of border closings, and Family Guy. For what it's worth, his "genius" didn't really wow me. As a matter of fact, he may be smarter than me, but if I had to guess I'd be right up there with Galileo and Hawking. (kidding). Mostly we talked about poker. We see the game the same way, and I correctly guessed his hand several times, and he did the same to me. There was also an NBA player (Josh Boone of UCONN and the New Jersey Nets) at our table. He is a really nice kid and took the game seriously, which impressed me given that he could lose a few grand and not really feel it. I ended up with a small $145 win.
On Friday night, I had worked my way up to +$725 after about 12 hours, when the following hand came up (warning : detailed poker description to follow) :
In a 2-5 no limit game, I was dealt AK under the gun (first to act). I raised to $30, and was reraised by a weak player to $100. Against a strong player, I would likely fold here, but I knew that his range included hands like AQ, QQ, JJ, and 1010, all of which presented good opportunities for me. I had about $1200 in front of me, and he had $700 The flop came KK5, giving me 3 Kings. I decided to play this hand "fast" meaning aggressive. Most players at this level try to trap their opponents with such a big hand. Knowing that I was against a weak player, I thought the best disguise for my hand was to make a large bet that looked like I was trying to bluff and steal the pot. I bet $150, and he moved all in almost immediately. Just as quickly, I called and turned over my monster hand. Sheepishly, he said "I have sevens". He obviously thought I was bluffing, and went all-in to make me fold. My plan had worked perfectly, and I was about to take his $700, book a $1400 win, and go to bed. I was over a ninety percent favorite, after all.
The turn card was an awful 7, giving him a full house. It's hard to describe how crappy that felt. I had played my ass off for 12 hours, found a great spot for a lot of chips, and the deck punched me in the stomach.
Anyway, "that's poker!" It's going to happen again, so I have to get used to it. I took a few days off and shook off the bad energy. I am feeling good and have 20 hours scheduled over the next 2 days. A thousand dollar session awaits.....
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