The Poker Project (playing and writing about poker in the U.S.)
12-03-2014
, 12:16 AM
12-03-2014
, 12:28 PM
played a Sunday session at Casino del Sol. Ran well early but got sloppy in a few places with my sizing. Hand two is kinda interesting I think.
Hand One--Line Check
I stacked Villain with AJhh on A
T
4J when he instashipped over my turn bet with A2. So I know that he raises combodraws/nonpremium hands. I make it $13 over a limp with A
K, same villain flats with $125 to start the hand. Flop Q
J4 (32). My issue here is with flop and turn sizing. I bet $20 on the flop, which created an awkward SPR on the turn (90/72). Is the best line here to pot flop and ship turn?
Hand Two (crossposted here: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/17...sions-1493294/)
Stack sizes got awkward, leading to tough decisions on the turn and river.
Reads
V1: ($180) Young kid who's probably a marginal winner in this room, plays tight/abc, seems to overvalue hands in general. Got stacked twice after bricking draws (or some kind of hand, he didn't show) in multiway pots.
V2: ($500) just sat down and won a big pot, players had been talking about him before he got to the table, I suspect that he's a loose donk.
Hero (covers): has a winning image, has shown down only strong hands. I've been pretty active preflop, tight post.
The Hand
V2 limps in MP, V1 raises to $13 from CO, Hero calls otb with A
5, V2 calls. fwiw I'm not calling vs just V1, but V2 calling behind makes this a standard flat for me
Flop 3
45 ($42)c, V1 bets $25, hero raises to $65
My sizing is small since I'm bet/folding if V2 4bets.
I think that V1 bets AK/AQ/AJ here and may even stack off with them, which is great (we have 76%).
He can also have AA-TT, although his flop sizing is kinda small. If he commits with these hands, we have 35%.
Overall I see this raise as both a semibluff and a thin value bet.
As played, V2 folds V1 flats weeeeee
Turn 3
Maybe the nut worst card to get any better hand to fold. SPR is like 180/90
I check, River K
, he snap checks. I can't resist trying to bluff him off 88-QQ on this river and shove. He mutters about getting coolered and playing bad and calls pretty quickly with JJ.So, overall, I like raising this flop, will jam most turns, and regret my river bet.
***
Back in Arizona for a week and planning out the next leg of my trip, which will be the West Coast (San Diego --> LA --> San Fran --> Vegas pt 3?).
Going to be reading, writing, and working on my game for the next week. Just downloaded Flopzilla.
All's good!
Bob's Bankroll: 4.9K
12-04-2014
, 08:35 PM
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote (Penguin, 1996)
"They divided it, then settled down to chewing it, each chomping on two and a half sticks of Doublemint, Dick's favourite flavour (Perry preferred Juicy Fruit)" (181)
Read this book just as it came back into the news. Over the years, Capote's account has been challenged as embellished, fictionalized, untrue. Answers may be coming: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/...e-light-of-day
For those unfamiliar with the plot: the novel "details the 1959 murders of Herbert Clutter, a farmer from Holcomb, Kansas, his wife, and two of their four children. When Capote learned of the quadruple murder, before the killers were captured, he decided to travel to Kansas and write about the crime. He was accompanied by his childhood friend and fellow author Harper Lee, and together they interviewed local residents and investigators assigned to the case and took thousands of pages of notes. The killers, Richard "Dick" Hickock and Perry Smith, were arrested six weeks after the murders, and Capote ultimately spent six years working on the book."
Why is this book so good?
Objectivity. As George Plimpton put it, "In Cold Blood" is remarkable for its objectivity--nowhere, despite his involvement, does the author intrude. In the following interview, done a few weeks ago, Truman Capote presents his own views on the case, its principals, and in particular he discusses the new literary art form which he calls the nonfiction novel...(http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/12/2...interview.html).
Capote: "it is necessary to have a 20/20 eye for visual detail--in this sense, it is quite true that one must be a "literary photographer," though an exceedingly selective one. But, above all, the reporter must be able to empathize with personalities outside his usual imaginative range, mentalities unlike his own, kinds of people he would never have written about had he not been forced to by encountering them inside the journalistic situation."
Exhaustive Detail
What was Perry and Dick's favorite gum? Capote knew.
"after it all quieted down--after Perry and Dick were arrested--that was when we did most of the original interviews. Some of them went on for three years--though not on the same subject, of course. I suppose if I used just 20 percent of all the material I put together over those years of interviewing, I'd still have a book two thousand pages long!"
[/I](Plimpton) How much research did you do other than through interviews with the principals in the case?[/I]
Oh, a great deal. I did months of comparative research on murder, murderers, the criminal mentality, and I interviewed quite a number of murderers--solely to give me a perspective on these two boys. And then crime. I didn't know anything about crime or criminals when I began to do the book. I certainly do now! I'd say 80 percent of the research I did I have never used. But it gave me such a grounding that I never had any hesitation in my consideration of the subject.
The Writing
"But it was her eyes, wide apart, darkly translucent, like ale held to the light, that made her immediately likeable, that at once announced her lack of suspicion, her considered and yet so easily triggered kindliness" (18)
Notes
The translated French epigraph is:
Brothers that live when we are dead,
don't set yourself against us too.
If you could pity us instead,
then God may sooner pity you.
dream scene (189)
Perry and Dick in the car, from Perry's perspective; Perry and Dick in the car, from Dick's perspective. splattered dog (103-108)
INTERVIEWER
How does one arrive at short-story technique?
CAPOTE
Since each story presents its own technical problems, obviously one can’t generalize about them on a two-times-two-equals-four basis. Finding the right form for your story is simply to realize the most natural way of telling the story. The test of whether or not a writer has divined the natural shape of his story is just this: after reading it, can you imagine it differently, or does it silence your imagination and seem to you absolute and final? As an orange is final. As an orange is something nature has made just right. http://www.theparisreview.org/interv...-truman-capote
"They divided it, then settled down to chewing it, each chomping on two and a half sticks of Doublemint, Dick's favourite flavour (Perry preferred Juicy Fruit)" (181)
Read this book just as it came back into the news. Over the years, Capote's account has been challenged as embellished, fictionalized, untrue. Answers may be coming: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/...e-light-of-day
For those unfamiliar with the plot: the novel "details the 1959 murders of Herbert Clutter, a farmer from Holcomb, Kansas, his wife, and two of their four children. When Capote learned of the quadruple murder, before the killers were captured, he decided to travel to Kansas and write about the crime. He was accompanied by his childhood friend and fellow author Harper Lee, and together they interviewed local residents and investigators assigned to the case and took thousands of pages of notes. The killers, Richard "Dick" Hickock and Perry Smith, were arrested six weeks after the murders, and Capote ultimately spent six years working on the book."
Why is this book so good?
Objectivity. As George Plimpton put it, "In Cold Blood" is remarkable for its objectivity--nowhere, despite his involvement, does the author intrude. In the following interview, done a few weeks ago, Truman Capote presents his own views on the case, its principals, and in particular he discusses the new literary art form which he calls the nonfiction novel...(http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/12/2...interview.html).
Capote: "it is necessary to have a 20/20 eye for visual detail--in this sense, it is quite true that one must be a "literary photographer," though an exceedingly selective one. But, above all, the reporter must be able to empathize with personalities outside his usual imaginative range, mentalities unlike his own, kinds of people he would never have written about had he not been forced to by encountering them inside the journalistic situation."
Exhaustive Detail
What was Perry and Dick's favorite gum? Capote knew.
"after it all quieted down--after Perry and Dick were arrested--that was when we did most of the original interviews. Some of them went on for three years--though not on the same subject, of course. I suppose if I used just 20 percent of all the material I put together over those years of interviewing, I'd still have a book two thousand pages long!"
[/I](Plimpton) How much research did you do other than through interviews with the principals in the case?[/I]
Oh, a great deal. I did months of comparative research on murder, murderers, the criminal mentality, and I interviewed quite a number of murderers--solely to give me a perspective on these two boys. And then crime. I didn't know anything about crime or criminals when I began to do the book. I certainly do now! I'd say 80 percent of the research I did I have never used. But it gave me such a grounding that I never had any hesitation in my consideration of the subject.
The Writing
"But it was her eyes, wide apart, darkly translucent, like ale held to the light, that made her immediately likeable, that at once announced her lack of suspicion, her considered and yet so easily triggered kindliness" (18)
Notes
The translated French epigraph is:
Brothers that live when we are dead,
don't set yourself against us too.
If you could pity us instead,
then God may sooner pity you.
dream scene (189)
Perry and Dick in the car, from Perry's perspective; Perry and Dick in the car, from Dick's perspective. splattered dog (103-108)
INTERVIEWER
How does one arrive at short-story technique?
CAPOTE
Since each story presents its own technical problems, obviously one can’t generalize about them on a two-times-two-equals-four basis. Finding the right form for your story is simply to realize the most natural way of telling the story. The test of whether or not a writer has divined the natural shape of his story is just this: after reading it, can you imagine it differently, or does it silence your imagination and seem to you absolute and final? As an orange is final. As an orange is something nature has made just right. http://www.theparisreview.org/interv...-truman-capote
12-07-2014
, 08:03 PM
Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich (Free Press: 2002)
Blurb: "Robin Hood meets the Rat Pack when the best and the brightest of M.I.T.’s math students and engineers take up blackjack under the guidance of an eccentric mastermind. Their small blackjack club develops from an experiment in counting cards on M.I.T.’s campus into a ring of card savants with a system for playing large and winning big. In less than two years they take some of the world’s most sophisticated casinos for more than three million dollars. But their success also brings with it the formidable ire of casino owners and launches them into the seedy underworld of corporate Vegas with its private investigators and other violent heavies."
Good: Mezrick's book was a thoroughly enjoyable read. I didn't want to put the book down. His blackjack explanations aren't overly technical, he doesn't waste time on unnecessary backstory, he nicely describes characters and scenes. Perhaps best of all, the book has a ton of flashy, fast-moving action. No surprise that this book, and the subsequent movie 21, were so popular.
Bad:
Mezrich makes **** up that didn't happen; he sacrifices a fidelity to factual events in order to improve the plot. This is obviously an issue for any work of "nonfiction," but there seem to be especially egregious examples in this book. To be fair to Mezrich, the fine print states that "The names of many of the characters and locations in this book have been changed, as have certain physical characteristics and other descriptive details. Some of the events and characters are also composites of several individual events or persons."
Nevertheless, there's a difference between creating composite characters or changing names and flat-out inventing scenes. As John Chang, one of the inspirations for the character Mickey Rosa, put it, “I don’t even know if you want to call the things in there exaggerations, because they’re so exaggerated they’re basically untrue."
The basic issue is this: “When the public learns that a small piece of a supposedly nonfiction story has been fictionalized, they begin to doubt everything in that story, and when they begin to doubt a particular story then the doubts occur in their mind about whether they can trust any work, or any work of nonfiction,” says Roy Peter Clark, a senior scholar at the Poynter Institute.
more on the book: http://tech.mit.edu/V128/N17/21.html
and on the movie: http://www.historyvshollywood.com/re...tblackjack.php
Notes
"At its heart," Damon continued, [Vegas] is all about greed. We build the casinos because we want to take your money. You come here because you want to ttake out money. The rest is just window dressing--how we lure you in, how you justify it to yourself when you get back home" (64-65)
"Kianna had helped him burnout a sea of low cards--hitting over and over again through an urgly run until the count started to turn--and now the show was bursting with color. Kings, queens, jacks, and aces, springing out with each flick of the dealer's wrist" (112-13)
Kevin Lewis says that blackjack is the only game in the casino that is beatable over an extended period of time (252). Given the presence of poker, this seems obviously false. Not sure if he'd put poker in another category?
Cliffs: Bringing Down the House is a ton of fun to read. Thanks to Kevin Lewis aka Jeff Ma, Mezrich was handed a great story that he spun into a good read. But, to this reader, he undermined his credibility by doing so.
Blurb: "Robin Hood meets the Rat Pack when the best and the brightest of M.I.T.’s math students and engineers take up blackjack under the guidance of an eccentric mastermind. Their small blackjack club develops from an experiment in counting cards on M.I.T.’s campus into a ring of card savants with a system for playing large and winning big. In less than two years they take some of the world’s most sophisticated casinos for more than three million dollars. But their success also brings with it the formidable ire of casino owners and launches them into the seedy underworld of corporate Vegas with its private investigators and other violent heavies."
Good: Mezrick's book was a thoroughly enjoyable read. I didn't want to put the book down. His blackjack explanations aren't overly technical, he doesn't waste time on unnecessary backstory, he nicely describes characters and scenes. Perhaps best of all, the book has a ton of flashy, fast-moving action. No surprise that this book, and the subsequent movie 21, were so popular.
Bad:
Mezrich makes **** up that didn't happen; he sacrifices a fidelity to factual events in order to improve the plot. This is obviously an issue for any work of "nonfiction," but there seem to be especially egregious examples in this book. To be fair to Mezrich, the fine print states that "The names of many of the characters and locations in this book have been changed, as have certain physical characteristics and other descriptive details. Some of the events and characters are also composites of several individual events or persons."
Nevertheless, there's a difference between creating composite characters or changing names and flat-out inventing scenes. As John Chang, one of the inspirations for the character Mickey Rosa, put it, “I don’t even know if you want to call the things in there exaggerations, because they’re so exaggerated they’re basically untrue."
The basic issue is this: “When the public learns that a small piece of a supposedly nonfiction story has been fictionalized, they begin to doubt everything in that story, and when they begin to doubt a particular story then the doubts occur in their mind about whether they can trust any work, or any work of nonfiction,” says Roy Peter Clark, a senior scholar at the Poynter Institute.
more on the book: http://tech.mit.edu/V128/N17/21.html
and on the movie: http://www.historyvshollywood.com/re...tblackjack.php
Notes
"At its heart," Damon continued, [Vegas] is all about greed. We build the casinos because we want to take your money. You come here because you want to ttake out money. The rest is just window dressing--how we lure you in, how you justify it to yourself when you get back home" (64-65)
"Kianna had helped him burnout a sea of low cards--hitting over and over again through an urgly run until the count started to turn--and now the show was bursting with color. Kings, queens, jacks, and aces, springing out with each flick of the dealer's wrist" (112-13)
Kevin Lewis says that blackjack is the only game in the casino that is beatable over an extended period of time (252). Given the presence of poker, this seems obviously false. Not sure if he'd put poker in another category?
Cliffs: Bringing Down the House is a ton of fun to read. Thanks to Kevin Lewis aka Jeff Ma, Mezrich was handed a great story that he spun into a good read. But, to this reader, he undermined his credibility by doing so.
12-17-2014
, 03:18 PM
Manning the Man-Shed in San Diego
Why play poker when you can hang in the Man-Shed? I spent a few days at UCSD, where I saw some experimental art. Matt, an MFA student presenting his final thesis (basically an art exhibition), spent the summer building a peepholed plywood shed. Then, with the help of the sexy Men of Craigslist, he filmed some risque bizness in said shed. And so it was that a modest domicile became the Man-Shed. The exhibit was neat in a sleazy, confusing way. More proof that most art flies way over this guy's head.
Drove up to San Francisco with a friend to attend her film showing. Met cool people and toured the city, which is one of my faves.
We took the slow(er) route south, seeing the Pacific Coast Highway and Big Sur. The weather was dicey but we made it alive.
Also met Aesah of 2+2 lore! Be sure to check out his thread if you haven't yet: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/17...poker-1182301/
No poker has been played. That will change in the next few days, though. Heading to LA, where I'll be checking out the Commerce and the Bike. LESS DUE THIS
Why play poker when you can hang in the Man-Shed? I spent a few days at UCSD, where I saw some experimental art. Matt, an MFA student presenting his final thesis (basically an art exhibition), spent the summer building a peepholed plywood shed. Then, with the help of the sexy Men of Craigslist, he filmed some risque bizness in said shed. And so it was that a modest domicile became the Man-Shed. The exhibit was neat in a sleazy, confusing way. More proof that most art flies way over this guy's head.
Drove up to San Francisco with a friend to attend her film showing. Met cool people and toured the city, which is one of my faves.
Spoiler:
We took the slow(er) route south, seeing the Pacific Coast Highway and Big Sur. The weather was dicey but we made it alive.
Spoiler:
Also met Aesah of 2+2 lore! Be sure to check out his thread if you haven't yet: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/17...poker-1182301/
No poker has been played. That will change in the next few days, though. Heading to LA, where I'll be checking out the Commerce and the Bike. LESS DUE THIS
12-18-2014
, 01:20 PM
Oceans 11
Played a short session at Oceans Eleven. Here's every hand I played. Feedback appreciated as always.
Hand One
This first one turned out to be the most significant. Fifties asian guy raises to 16 from the cutoff ($200), I flat with QQ otb. This is the first orbit so neither of us have reads.
Flop T84
($35), he bets 20 I call.
Turn 7 ($75), he bets 50 I call.
River 4 ($175), he shoves 100.
He needs to be bluffing or value-betting worse 27% here.
KK/AA/TT (15 combos)
JJ (4-6 combos)
ATs (1 combo?...unlikely but possible)
AK/AQ/ random spazz (?)
Readless, seems close. I called and he showed
Hand 2
UTG + 1 same Asian guy, who's turned out to be a passive station, limps UTG. I fold ATo. Seems too loose to iso
Hand 3
Raise Ako UTG+1, two calls, bet 20 into 36 on 833.
Hand 4
Raise AK UTG +2 (next hand), same older station and young SB call. Flop J78, I bet 20 into 36 old guy calls
Turn 3 ($76)
I bet 20 he calls
River bricks, we both check he wins with AJ
Hand 5
raise 55 utg to 10, fold to $50 reraise
Hand 6
Positionally aware, straightforward tag raises 20 utg into a straddle, I flat kk utg+2, bb calls
checks to me, I bet 40 into 60 on QT6, they fold
Hand 7
Same Positional tag raises 10 on button, which he's done 4/5 times when given the chance (I've folded every time). I call with JJ.
Flop K43 ($22), I check/call.
Turn J, ch/ch
River 6, I bet $25 he calls.
I think that I should be leading this turn since he'd been c-betting most flops and giving up/potcontrolling the turn.
Hand 8
15 with AKhh over two limpy station, I check behind on Q43 and fold a brick turn.
Hand 9
I raise A7o from the cutoff, BB calls and c/folds to me on 943 rainbow.
Hand 10
Splashy station raises to 10 from mp, asian guy flats from CO, I raise to 40 otb with QQ and they both fold.
One theme from this session is my tendency to flat with bigger pairs. The last hand is the only time when I thought one or both villains would call with worse.
Played a short session at Oceans Eleven. Here's every hand I played. Feedback appreciated as always.
Hand One
This first one turned out to be the most significant. Fifties asian guy raises to 16 from the cutoff ($200), I flat with QQ otb. This is the first orbit so neither of us have reads.
Flop T
84 ($35), he bets 20 I call. Turn 7
($75), he bets 50 I call. River 4
($175), he shoves 100. He needs to be bluffing or value-betting worse 27% here.
KK/AA/TT (15 combos)
JJ (4-6 combos)
ATs (1 combo?...unlikely but possible)
AK/AQ/ random spazz (?)
Readless, seems close. I called and he showed
Spoiler:
Hand 2
UTG + 1 same Asian guy, who's turned out to be a passive station, limps UTG. I fold ATo. Seems too loose to iso
Hand 3
Raise Ako UTG+1, two calls, bet 20 into 36 on 833.
Hand 4
Raise A
K UTG +2 (next hand), same older station and young SB call. Flop J78, I bet 20 into 36 old guy callsTurn 3
($76)I bet 20 he calls
River bricks, we both check he wins with A
JHand 5
raise 55 utg to 10, fold to $50 reraise
Hand 6
Positionally aware, straightforward tag raises 20 utg into a straddle, I flat kk utg+2, bb calls
checks to me, I bet 40 into 60 on Q
T6, they foldHand 7
Same Positional tag raises 10 on button, which he's done 4/5 times when given the chance (I've folded every time). I call with JJ.
Flop K
43 ($22), I check/call. Turn J, ch/ch
River 6, I bet $25 he calls.
I think that I should be leading this turn since he'd been c-betting most flops and giving up/potcontrolling the turn.
Hand 8
15 with AKhh over two limpy station, I check behind on Q43 and fold a brick turn.
Hand 9
I raise A7o from the cutoff, BB calls and c/folds to me on 943 rainbow.
Hand 10
Splashy station raises to 10 from mp, asian guy flats from CO, I raise to 40 otb with QQ and they both fold.
One theme from this session is my tendency to flat with bigger pairs. The last hand is the only time when I thought one or both villains would call with worse.
12-18-2014
, 01:38 PM
How do you like the SD games?
12-19-2014
, 04:06 PM
Hunting Fish: A Cross-Country Search for America's Worst Poker Players by Jay Greenspan (St. Martin's Griffon, 2007)
Stumbled across this book a few weeks ago. After skimming the preface and Amazon reviews, I decided that it was a must-read. Guy drives around the country, plays poker, writes about it. Sound familiar?
Manufacturing a Plot: From Foxwoods to the Commerce
Greenspan, a poker-playing writer--or is he a poker player who writes?--sprinkles in (1) history and descriptions about his poker road trip, which takes him from the East Coast to the South, Texas, the Southwest, and eventually California; (2) ruminations on the poker lifestyle, including table etiquette, taxation, the language of poker, the difference between tourneys and cash, tilt, the loneliness of the road, and the ethics of "hunting fish"; and (3) a personal narrative that includes his desire to make it as a writer, family drama, and, most significantly, life with his new fiance, Marisa.
One of the difficulties of writing about poker—especially cash games—is that it lacks narrative arc. The game goes round and round, pots are won and lost, and you leave when you leave. No surprise that the best poker nonfiction tends to recount a major tournament, which offers a perfectly packaged plot in the form of a dramatic final table and hefty payouts. But Greenspan isn't buying into the Main Event; he's seeking out backwoods games with strangers. His three-month goal is to build his bankroll so that, when he arrives at the Commerce in LA, he can hop in the 10/20 games. “To find out if I could beat the guys who regularly played for high stakes, I'd need a deep bankroll—at least 35,000.” He needs to boost his current roll by 15K—and manufacture a plot in the process.
Crafting a Poker Persona
From his first session at Foxwoods, Greenspan paints himself as one of the "good" players at the table (4). He's a fish hunter. Once, at Foxwoods, Greenspan successfully bluffed Chris Moneymaker (he showed, of course). Once, in Vegas, “after a couple of memorable encounters against Erik Seidel, he asked me, 'Are you a pro?'” (41). Cool story bro.
The whole narrative is written from Greenspan's perspective, so we get a detailed sense of his thought process--which is to say of strategy, of how to play (or misplay) hands. Without getting into details, my sense is that, when it comes to poker prowess, Greenspan is like many of us: he thinks he's better than he is.
I don't care much care if Greenspan's "good" or not--whatever that means. I'm more concerned with the ways he crafts his persona, which, in almost every book of poker nonfiction, involves a tension or trade-off between the writer-as-player or the player-as-writer. Which is it?
Jim McManus, Colson Whitehead, and (if memory serves) Anthony Holdem adopt what I'd call the "aw-shucks" approach. They poke fun at themselves as poker players, acknowledging and even reveling in their amateur status (Holden's subtitle to Big Deal, One Year as a Professional Poker Player, is at least partly tongue-in-cheek).
Al Alvarez more or less skirts the issue entirely, preferring to cast himself as a curious outsider whose poker skills are irrelevant to his task of portraying Vegas highrollers.
And then there are narratives written by established pros: Broke by Brandon comes to mind, as do a ton of autobiographical strategy books that I haven't read (take your pick: Gus Hansen, Negreanu, Helmuth, Matusow, Barry G).
Greenspan's attempt to talk intelligently about poker strategy, and his tendency to see himself as a excellent player, hammers home a key point about poker narrative: it's very hard to accurately assess your own talent, or to "see" yourself through the eyes of your opponents (or readers).
The Poker Lifestyle
Greenspan is clearly uneasy with the poker-playing profession. On the one hand, his concern is ethical. More than once he'd asked himself: "Is this a way for a decent persona to make a living? Or...Can someone who continually exploits the comparative ignorance and stupidity of those around him be considered a good person?" (182).
On the other hand, it's pragmatic. Can life as a poker pro, with all its instability, prevent a stable future with his fiance? Early in the book, Greenspan struggles to reconcile competing goals: padding his roll and buying Marisa a ring. “Before my cold stretch started,” he writes, “I could have peeled twenty to forty hundred-dollar bills off my roll and handed them to a Hasid on Forty-seventh Street, who would ensure that I was getting the best deal since the Louisiana Purchase, but that wasn't an option anymore. I needed that money for my bankroll” (7). The dilemma resembles a tamer version of Dostoevsky's disastrous gambling sprees, which forced him to repeatedly pawn his wife's clothing (and his own).
The best part of Hunting Fish, imo, is Greenspan's honesty in writing about himself. I just wish the rest of the book, especially the poker content and the plot, was as admirable, but it just isn't. After two hundred pages of a fairly repetitive formula--drive somewhere, play poker, talk to people, drive somewhere--Greenspan arrives at the Commerce with enough money to hop into the $10/20. With more money and confidence than when he started, he's ready to answer the two questions that, in his opinion, any aspiring poker pro must ask:
1: Can I beat the games? (219). "Clearly the answer was yes," Greenspan writes. "I have the intelligence and spirit that will allow me to profit for years to come...I doubt I'd ever be a millionaire, but I'm confident that I could put together a tidy six-figure income for a long time" (221).
2: Do I really want to do this fifty hours a week for decades? "Here the answer was equally clear," Greenspan continues. "No. After only three months of intensive daily play I was tired and frustrated, my mood continually sour. I wanted to be home with Marisa...I wanted to be in New York. I wanted a family. I wanted a life that was a little closer to normal" (221). And so, with the second, tougher question answered so clearly, Greenspan leaves the poker life behind.
Notes and Questions
the poker world as an inverted pyramid--fish at the top, pros on the botton (201-2)
Dad's email about poker (194)
Cliffs
Jay Greenspan's Hunting Fish is a clear step below other, more familiar poker narratives by Jim McManus and Al Alvarez. But it does offer a valuable glimpse into the poker lifestyle; think of it as a companion to David Hayano's ethnography Poker Faces. Greenspan writes honestly--and, at times, eloquently--about the live grind.
Stumbled across this book a few weeks ago. After skimming the preface and Amazon reviews, I decided that it was a must-read. Guy drives around the country, plays poker, writes about it. Sound familiar?
Manufacturing a Plot: From Foxwoods to the Commerce
Greenspan, a poker-playing writer--or is he a poker player who writes?--sprinkles in (1) history and descriptions about his poker road trip, which takes him from the East Coast to the South, Texas, the Southwest, and eventually California; (2) ruminations on the poker lifestyle, including table etiquette, taxation, the language of poker, the difference between tourneys and cash, tilt, the loneliness of the road, and the ethics of "hunting fish"; and (3) a personal narrative that includes his desire to make it as a writer, family drama, and, most significantly, life with his new fiance, Marisa.
One of the difficulties of writing about poker—especially cash games—is that it lacks narrative arc. The game goes round and round, pots are won and lost, and you leave when you leave. No surprise that the best poker nonfiction tends to recount a major tournament, which offers a perfectly packaged plot in the form of a dramatic final table and hefty payouts. But Greenspan isn't buying into the Main Event; he's seeking out backwoods games with strangers. His three-month goal is to build his bankroll so that, when he arrives at the Commerce in LA, he can hop in the 10/20 games. “To find out if I could beat the guys who regularly played for high stakes, I'd need a deep bankroll—at least 35,000.” He needs to boost his current roll by 15K—and manufacture a plot in the process.
Crafting a Poker Persona
From his first session at Foxwoods, Greenspan paints himself as one of the "good" players at the table (4). He's a fish hunter. Once, at Foxwoods, Greenspan successfully bluffed Chris Moneymaker (he showed, of course). Once, in Vegas, “after a couple of memorable encounters against Erik Seidel, he asked me, 'Are you a pro?'” (41). Cool story bro.
The whole narrative is written from Greenspan's perspective, so we get a detailed sense of his thought process--which is to say of strategy, of how to play (or misplay) hands. Without getting into details, my sense is that, when it comes to poker prowess, Greenspan is like many of us: he thinks he's better than he is.
I don't care much care if Greenspan's "good" or not--whatever that means. I'm more concerned with the ways he crafts his persona, which, in almost every book of poker nonfiction, involves a tension or trade-off between the writer-as-player or the player-as-writer. Which is it?
Jim McManus, Colson Whitehead, and (if memory serves) Anthony Holdem adopt what I'd call the "aw-shucks" approach. They poke fun at themselves as poker players, acknowledging and even reveling in their amateur status (Holden's subtitle to Big Deal, One Year as a Professional Poker Player, is at least partly tongue-in-cheek).
Al Alvarez more or less skirts the issue entirely, preferring to cast himself as a curious outsider whose poker skills are irrelevant to his task of portraying Vegas highrollers.
And then there are narratives written by established pros: Broke by Brandon comes to mind, as do a ton of autobiographical strategy books that I haven't read (take your pick: Gus Hansen, Negreanu, Helmuth, Matusow, Barry G).
Greenspan's attempt to talk intelligently about poker strategy, and his tendency to see himself as a excellent player, hammers home a key point about poker narrative: it's very hard to accurately assess your own talent, or to "see" yourself through the eyes of your opponents (or readers).
The Poker Lifestyle
Greenspan is clearly uneasy with the poker-playing profession. On the one hand, his concern is ethical. More than once he'd asked himself: "Is this a way for a decent persona to make a living? Or...Can someone who continually exploits the comparative ignorance and stupidity of those around him be considered a good person?" (182).
On the other hand, it's pragmatic. Can life as a poker pro, with all its instability, prevent a stable future with his fiance? Early in the book, Greenspan struggles to reconcile competing goals: padding his roll and buying Marisa a ring. “Before my cold stretch started,” he writes, “I could have peeled twenty to forty hundred-dollar bills off my roll and handed them to a Hasid on Forty-seventh Street, who would ensure that I was getting the best deal since the Louisiana Purchase, but that wasn't an option anymore. I needed that money for my bankroll” (7). The dilemma resembles a tamer version of Dostoevsky's disastrous gambling sprees, which forced him to repeatedly pawn his wife's clothing (and his own).
The best part of Hunting Fish, imo, is Greenspan's honesty in writing about himself. I just wish the rest of the book, especially the poker content and the plot, was as admirable, but it just isn't. After two hundred pages of a fairly repetitive formula--drive somewhere, play poker, talk to people, drive somewhere--Greenspan arrives at the Commerce with enough money to hop into the $10/20. With more money and confidence than when he started, he's ready to answer the two questions that, in his opinion, any aspiring poker pro must ask:
1: Can I beat the games? (219). "Clearly the answer was yes," Greenspan writes. "I have the intelligence and spirit that will allow me to profit for years to come...I doubt I'd ever be a millionaire, but I'm confident that I could put together a tidy six-figure income for a long time" (221).
2: Do I really want to do this fifty hours a week for decades? "Here the answer was equally clear," Greenspan continues. "No. After only three months of intensive daily play I was tired and frustrated, my mood continually sour. I wanted to be home with Marisa...I wanted to be in New York. I wanted a family. I wanted a life that was a little closer to normal" (221). And so, with the second, tougher question answered so clearly, Greenspan leaves the poker life behind.
Notes and Questions
the poker world as an inverted pyramid--fish at the top, pros on the botton (201-2)
Dad's email about poker (194)
Cliffs
Jay Greenspan's Hunting Fish is a clear step below other, more familiar poker narratives by Jim McManus and Al Alvarez. But it does offer a valuable glimpse into the poker lifestyle; think of it as a companion to David Hayano's ethnography Poker Faces. Greenspan writes honestly--and, at times, eloquently--about the live grind.
Last edited by bob_124; 12-19-2014 at 04:15 PM.