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 he Guardian Poker Column |
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| Victoria
Coren |
| Friday Aug 4th, 2006
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How to play poker
(How to play has been running from issue 16) |
Las Vegas is as hot, dry, mad, glittery, wonderful, lonely
and soulless as ever. The World Series of Poker, and its attendant circus,
rumbles on. I have been to a cocktail party where the waitresses were all
topless, and the comedian Norman Pace was playing a one-table tournament in the
kitchen. I have watched the top Dutch player Marcel Luske take to the stage at
the Hard Rock casino, and croon If You Don't Know Me By Now to a bemused yet
screaming crowd. I have seen Tobey Maguire, Ron Jeremy, Lennox Lewis and Brian
McFadden from Westlife sit down to play the World Series. (I'm not sure that
21st-century poker is surreal enough; I've been waiting for a fifth First Day
featuring Floella Benjamin and my auntie Muriel.)
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I have heard stories of the infamous Doyle
Brunson "roast", from which Pamela Anderson stormed out in a huff after the
compere said, "Doyle may have 10 World Series bracelets, but Pammy's had a
thousand pearl necklaces." I have seen 100 acrobats tumbling to the strains of
I Am the Walrus, in the first show to open at the Mirage hotel-casino since its
regular star performer, Roy of Siegfried and Roy, was mauled by one of his own
tigers.
Oddest of all, I have seen a man with 7,000 chips, in the
$10,000 hold 'em world championship, the most significant poker tournament in
the calendar, call a pre-flop raise of 600 and then call an all-in re-raise of
3,700, when his hand was AJ. That knocked the acrobats, the topless waitresses
and the huffy Pammy into a cocked hat. AJ? For more than half his chips? Before
the flop? As a call.
What possible cards could he give his opponent, to
make AJ a good hand to call with? I was able to witness that bizarre decision
at close range, just before seeing the board come down 8910 6Q, throwing my AK
into the muck, saying, "Nice hand", and walking away from the World Series for
another year.
Luckily, I hadn't personally paid the $10,000. The lovely
people at ParadisePoker.com paid my entrance fee, in return for my wearing
their logo on a T-shirt and trying to induce a lot of people to stare at my
chest. (This is Las Vegas. I reckon they got a fair deal.)
Before the
tournament, the great British player Jeff Duval told me: "You must be patient,
and without fear." My personal World Series run is over, but I would like to
pass on that excellent advice - and not just for poker tournaments.
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