Eyes Wide Shut

I recently won a tournament with my eyes closed.  And I mean that almost literally.

I've done a lot of stunts in small buyin B&M tournaments - some of them in the name of experimentation and education, some of them in the name of prop bets, and all of them in the name of fun.

I once played a tournament without looking at my hole cards before the turn.  This was the B&M version of the old Masking-Tape-on-the-Monitor bit.  I would go through the motions and pretend to check my hole cards, but I would never lift them up high enough for me to actually see them.  This way, the table did not know I was being adventurous.  Instead of value, all my preflop and flop decisions were based on whether I thought the villain could continue.  If I was first in and in LP, it was standard PFR+FCbet.  All my FCbets were texture-based, so I wasn't firing a foolhardy 100%.  When donked to I would raise or call also based on texture.  Once we got to the turn, I would check to see wtf I had.

It was fun, but it did not get past level 3.

My latest stunt, however, won me the tournament.

I was playing a normal enough game of No Limit Texas Holdem all the way till the Final Table.  Then I met him.

I had not shared a table all day with him, so when the final two tables collapsed, he was an unknown.  His face was not familiar, so he had the "recreational player" icon immediately on my imaginary HUD hovering above his head.  He was in a crapload of pots - only missing hands when he had to go pee or grab another beer - so I had him at VPIP 70.  PFR 35.

It did not take me much longer to notice something, so I nicknamed him in my head - let's call him "Verbal."

Verbal struck me as a guy I might want to do business with, because he always meant what he said.  When he threw chips in the pot - be it a bet or a raise or a call - he would announce what he was doing.

"Bet three hundred."  And in would go three hundred in chips.

"Raise."  And in went more chips.

"Double."  And in went the extra stack.

"Call."  And then the splash of the chips into the pot.

Verbal was taking down many pots - many of them uncontested, and some of them with good showdowns.  I was about to be fascinated at his luck, until one river where another player called his final bet only to see Verbal muck without showing down.

The key note in that hand?  Verbal led out the river by tossing in chips...without saying a word!

I couldn't believe it.  It couldn't be that easy, could it?

But it was.  I observed even more closely and confirmed the behavior.  It did not take two orbits to convince myself - I mean, Verbal was playing so many hands the data converged fast.

Speaks?  Strong.  No Speak?  Weak.

I began riding Verbal - trying to get into pots with him as long as I was In Position.  He was a rabid Cbettor, so the plan was to see flops with him and see - NO, LISTEN - to what happens.

Announced his FCbet?  I mostly folded, sometimes floated to listen to his turn bet.  Wordlessly put chips in?  I raised my air and called my value hands.  It did not always play out perfectly - some hands that he quietly bet or checked became disasters when he decided to shove over my position-raises and float bets.  I guess those were the drawing hands...?  Still, I knew I had a huge advantage and a reliable-enough hand-value-barometer.

I was careful not to overuse my advantage, lest I tip him off.  I toned it down and used Verbal merely as an extension of my blind-steals:  to maintain just enough of a stack to stay relevant.  My new primary goal at this Final Table was to make sure Verbal stayed with me to the end.

It got to four-handed action and Verbal was in trouble, so I bluff-shoved into his short-stack after he announced a preflop raise.  Fortunately, his AKo held up against my 53s.  Whew!  Now Verbal is back with a stack that can hurt the other two.  And my image went from "solid" to "wtfishedoing."

I was worried about the decent TAG on my left, but Verbal took care of him.

Three handed.  The Fishy Regular on my right wanted to chop, but Verbal had the slight chip lead and wanted to play it out for fun.  Chop Boy - who was second in chips - started shoving every hand.  I began to worry.  If Verbal gets into this bingo game with Chop Boy, I may end up heads-up with the wrong guy!

Chop Boy stopped the madness for one hand suddenly, and I saw a flop with my pair of tens.  The flop came AJT.  I checked, Chop Boy bet, and I check-raised a quarter of his stack.  Chop Boy mucked his AK face up.  I was suddenly impressed but confused.  How does a guy go from "I don't give a flying you-know-what" to "I want to play good poker and have godly reads"...?

In the next hand, Chop Boy decided he did not care again.  Open-shove.

Hmm, open-shoves mostly, then plays a flop with AK...?  I wondered if I was in tourney poker heaven.  I reflected upon my morning and tried to recall the countless good deeds I must have done.  Saved eight cats from trees, four babies from burning houses, led twenty-one senior citizens across the street...

Yes.  Indeed.  I was a superuser, and I deserved to be here, three-handed with these two!

On the third straight hand that Chop Boy open-shoved, I looked down at KTs.  I decided it was good enough, had him covered, called, and put him out of his misery.

I was now heads-up with Verbal.  Down to just the Boss-Fight.  I could now play the mini-game I have been waiting to play since the Final Table started.  I tilted my hat down so low that I could no longer see my opponent without leaning my all the way back till the back of my head touched the floor behind me.  I put my hands in a position so I could cup my hole cards for my pretend-look routine.  When I was done pretend-looking, I would lean forward and rest my head in my arms so that I would not see the board.

I only looked at my chips, keeping track of what he must have behind.

I min-raised every button and Cbet almost every flop.  When he announced his call I would give up.  When he called quietly I barrelled off.

Verbal completed his button SB a lot, but when he raised it I called to listen to his FCbet.  I don't recall check-raising so much in such a short span.  It was going well.

He took to 3betting me a few times, so I kept listening.  He acted wordlessly on most flops, so I grinded him down further.

I checked my chip stacks:  he was now in shove-mode - with 6bb's or less.  We got it in and I doubled him up with whatever random trash hand I tried to finish him with.  I had not considered that part of this mini-game.  I did not know if I could finish him when it came down to preflop shovesville.

It went back and forth that way two more times.  I would grind him down without showdowns, then he would shove and I either doubled him up or gave up consecutive pots to chip him up again.  Third time was the charm.  He was short again and shoved preflop.  I called and actually had a hand.  My ATo outran his KQ and it was finally over.

I played poker with my eyes closed - well, not literally - and won.

The moral of this story is that we must strive to stay mindful.  Instead of adding to the din of voices that shout to the world "hey, look at me, listen to me!" we can be more productive by being part of that special population that focuses on staying aware.  Let's keep our traps shut, and stop broadcasting all the things we are doing.  Instead, let's keep all our receptors open and notice the heaven that we are already in.

This, to me, after all, is not a poker story, but a life lesson.