The "King of Poker"

I met and played the self proclaimed “King of Poker” two nights ago.

You haven’t met the “King of Poker”? Then you probably haven’t played much at the Palomar Club on El Cajon Blvd in San Diego lately. The Palomar neighborhood is not known, as one of the nicer area of San Diego.

But the crime rate around the club is decreasing. There hasn’t been a player “pistol whipped” for at least three months. I have only been solicited once on my way out in the past six months and the bar that was right next door has been sold and become part of the remodel/expansion of the club.

It has been well over a year since the daily pattern of two players leaving the table at the same time and stepping next door for a couple of drinks and returning to “cap” every pot pre-flop. Ah, the good old days.

There is a daily, colorful cast of characters, speaking at least 11 native languages at the 6 poker tables. This audible smorgasbord is mixed with shouts, curses and loud bangs coming from the pai-gow table, as the players try to wake up the pai-gow gods, by banging the metal dice container furiously on the table, shouting in languages only previously heard on the National Geographic Channel.

In walks a Iraqi who owns his own cab, and writes his initials on the board: K.O.P. Everybody who has played with him before knows what they mean. “The “King of Poker” is in the house.
He takes the available seat two to my left at a 1/3 No-limit game and begins to give a non-stop, manic, monologue to the player to my left pointing to his initials, still up on the board, and declaring himself the "King of Poker." He speaks like a machine gun fires bullets, in quick bursts, and gets more and more heated up, the more he speaks.

He folds his first hand after waving it a few inches under the nose of another player declaring “you see, you see, I throw this because I am a very good player and that is why I always win. This is my second job… you see, you see, I make $2,000 last month” as he proceeds to take a small wad of $20’s out of his pocket and begins to wave it around toward all the players loudly proclaiming “I will have all of your money by 2 A.M”. (Closing time is 2 A.M.)

He throws almost every hand away, after trying to show it the dealer or to a player next to him, while he continues a non-stop monologue that reveals he could benefit from medication.

He finally wins his first hand with pocket Aces. It is a very small pot, because it has become obvious by now to almost everybody at the table that he plays only premium hands. So he gets no action, when he comes into a pot, which is at the rate of about once an hour. But, he runs a non-stop commentary on every hand played by anyone. He also reminds us that he is a “patient man who thinks, thinks, thinks, as he taps his temple, and that he knows what you have almost before you do, because he can “read the cards””.

He says he is not like us other players… “he reads poker books, he thinks about poker all the time, and when he loses a hand, he goes home and takes out a deck of cards and plays it over and over again and comes back and wins that hand next time.”

He goes on to tell us he takes $20 and gives it to his one child, then another, then another, then another,….. I lost track after he named his fifth child and often stopped listening as soon as he began talking. I knew I was going to win a large pot off of him or “bust him” because I was catching and playing a lot of suited connectors and he only played the top 8 premium hands like the book he read told him to. I hope nobody ever tells him that strategy was written for limit.

The table would have a few minutes of wonderful silence, when he would run outside for a cigarette, about every 10th hand and miss a hand or two.

The Palomar club has an entire glass front opening up on the sidewalk. Players who smoke, would often run out between hands to puff on the cigarettes they had left burning out there.

When the King of Poker would win a hand he would slap the cards face up and fire out… “you see, you see, you see, I knew I would win”.

Finally after four hours, I got into a hand with him. He raised and I re-raised with 10s,Js. He called. The flop came (Qh, Ks, As) for a nut straight for me, with a royal flush draw.

I checked and he made a big bet. I glanced at him two or three times, each time he told me “throw it away, throw it away, I will show you, I will show you.”

I knew he didn’t have a clue so I just called. The turn came a 7. He bet enough to put me all in “save your money, save your money, I don’t need all your money he declared.

I called and quietly turned over my hand, while he slammed down pocket aces and said “you see, you see, I win I have three aces. He quieted for a moment while the realization of my straight came over him, and then the river produced a 5. He quickly walked out and began puffing very fast on his cigarette.

He came back a few minutes later and said “he had the better hand, he should have won that hand and I was lucky, but he was a better player. I said yes “you are the king” and agreed that I got lucky. (What I meant was I was lucky, I was playing with someone who didn’t know how much they didn’t know, and that they were willing to share that information with everybody at the table.)

The final hand that knocked out the King of Poker wasn’t by me, but by a player who had 10 times the maximum buy-in in front of him. By the stacks of chips in front of him, it was obvious he was a good player, or had a very great run of cards. I did watch him wield his “large stack” very well a number of times making it too expensive for some to call him, as he threw in enough chips, to make the odds unfavorable.

The King of Poker came in for a big raise on the dealer button. Everybody folded to him except the big stack who called. The flop was A,K,8 with 2 diamonds. The big stack checked and the King declared. “no, no, no, check,” he then bet ¼ the pot. I knew, and I am sure the big stack knew, the “King of Poker” had either three Aces, three kings or AK paired.
The big stack called the small bet. He then checked the turn, which was another blank, and the “K.O.P” bet out the same small amount. (I am sure he thought he was being clever to keep the other player in the pot. Not even knowing he was giving away pot odds to make the call almost mandatory)

As the river is being “peeled off the deck”, the big stack says "make it a diamond", and sure enough it is a 2 of diamonds. The big stack moves in a large enough stack to cover the remaining chips the King has. The King instantly, yells out, "all-in" and without a second hesitation shoves his remaining chips in and slaps down pocket Aces for trip aces. The big stack shows his two little diamonds for a flush. The king is grinning like a fool, and bobbing his head up and down saying you see, you see… three aces, as he is waiting for the dealer to push the pot to him.

As the dealer picks up the two diamonds and puts them in front of the King of Poker, the dealer states “he has a flush”. You can see the amazement and disbelief come into focus on the features of the King, and he jumps up, and storms out of the room without a sound.

He puffs, and puffs, while pacing in front of the casino. Then he comes back in walking fast, past the table toward the bathroom. I couldn’t help myself, I said “I think the King is going to sit on his throne for awhile.”

He comes out a few minutes later and a player asks him if he wants us to save his seat for him?

He waves him off with a flapping of his hand and without a sound, in a cloud of nervous energy races out of the room.

The King is dead… long live the King.

A turkey in the oven.....

Wow, it has been a week since I last posted. I thought it had been about three days.

I have been playing and winning since the last post so I am pretty upbeat. I am planning on playing again tonight I just haven’t decided where.

I always have about 7 choices, within roughly, the same driving distance. For me personally, I am not affected greatly by the Unlawful Internet act, but I am sure that there are many, many, others who have been greatly impacted by it.

I did leave Party Poker, (who would want to be a part of a party, where there are no Americans allowed there anyway?) I figured out how to get some money to Full-Tilt and have been playing there just a little, in the spirit of defiance, to this “dirty” piece of politics. I would rather play live, then on the Internet, but I am frustrated and angry about this right being abused in the name of morality by an unethical political act.

I took the RV over the weekend, and went to Sycuan for two days and a night. I really thought I would be in Vegas a lot this month, but Caren wanted Pokey and me, around while she goes through some real challenges at work.

Our relationship works for us, because we both, are committed to telling the other what we need from them, when we do. Of course, being committed to hearing, responding or negotiating, in response to what we hear, from the other, is equally important.

Tomorrow, she has scheduled some dental surgery, so I will be the designated driver, while she drugs up, before, during, and after to deal with the anxiety, pain, and effects of the dental work.

So, there will be no live poker for me tomorrow. That’s one reason why I am going to play again tonight. Maybe, I will play a few small tournaments on Full-Tilt tomorrow night while I am home taking care of her.

I am planning on putting a Turkey, in the oven, when we leave, for the dentist, and the house should be nice and warm and smell good when we get home.

By the way I played with the self-proclaimed “King of Poker” last night. I will tell you all about it in the next entry.