In Praise of Dealers

Poker is a business. In Alberta, where I live, legal poker is played in card rooms attached to casinos which operate under the watchful eye of the Alberta Gaming and Liquor Commission. I don't know the percentages, but my understanding is that a certain percentage goes to charities - so don't imagine that these places are making the same profits that the places in Vegas make. Poker, unlike slot machines, requires a fairly high level of staffing. Dealers, floor managers, cashiers, waitresses, and cleaning staff all have to be paid. I can't imagine how difficult it would be to try to schedule staff for a poker room. I have walked into a card room at 10:00 am and found two full tables playing with two or three other guys waiting to get in the game. I have walked into this same room at the same time one week later and found nobody at all. How can you schedule staff for a business like this?

Dealing poker must be a very tough way to make a living. You would have to work weird hours as most rooms are (I am guessing) busiest between 8:00 pm and midnight. You would have to have an absolutely amazing short term memory and math skills. The rake is calculated based on the size of the pot so dealers must have a piece of their brain constantly adding up individual bets to know the pot size. Another part of their brain has to remember which players need to have change returned to them. For example in $1/$2 NLHE, the most common game in my part of the world, players are issued stacks of red $5 chips but bets can be any size, so several players can call a $12 bet with three red chips and the dealer has to constantly be making change - in this case giving back three white $1 chips. The dealer also has to keep track of the button - not as easy as it sounds when lots of players "help" the dealer by moving the button themselves.

Most difficult of all, I think, is when a player losses all his chips and rebuys at the table. When this happens a runner comes over to the table and collects money from the player, tells the dealer the amount, and goes to fetch the chips. Even though the player doesn't have chips yet, he or she is still able to play in the next hand. It sometimes can take a minute or two for the chip to arrive and until they do the dealer has to remember the all the bets the player has made and take the total into the pot when his chips come.

They have to deal with multi-way pots - keeping everything straight when there are side pots on top of the main pot.

A dealer has to do all of these things at top speed - the poker room makes its living on the rake, so they want as many hands as possible to be dealt.

On top of everything else a dealer has to be polite to the customers, even though quite a few are just plain assholes, border-line racists and sexist pigs. Fun!

I have no idea how tough their job is. I have only listed a few of the things that I have observed, but I imagine that they are are under a whole lot of other stresses I don't know about. Working in a high stress environment, being surrounded by gambling and booze must tempt quite a few of them to enter into a very destructive lifestyle. A year or so back a dealer at my favourite casino died of a drug overdose.

Be kind to your dealer.

Watch You Mouth

At a casino, discussing a hand in play that you are not involved in is a strict no-no. In a home game, openly speculating on who has what might be part of the fun (If it is a very friendly game that no-one is too serious about) but things are more serious at a casino. By saying what you think somebody has you are effectively giving advice to the players still in the hand. This is beyond bad etiquette - it is against the rules.

At the casino yesterday I witnessed a had where two players went all the way to the river. Mr.Hair-Gel was betting as if he had a strong hand - bets of two-thirds the pot on both the flop and the turn. Mr.Loosey-Goosey was just calling and I (and probably everyone else at the table) suspected he was on the flush draw. The river brought a third club to the board and some idiot who was not in the hand turned to Mr.Hair-Gel and said. "You've been rivered!"

This is a bad thing to do. Basically, this moron was telling Hair-Gel how to play his hand. One of the most basic rules of poker is that each player has to make independent decisions. Getting help is cheating and offering opinions is forbidden. Both players in the hand I witnessed hand every right to be upset, but Hair-Gel said in a remarkably calm voice, "You can not comment on hands you are not involved in, Sir." I found this odd if only because Mr. Loosey-Goosey was the one who was being negatively effected by the comment, but I guess the sting of falling behind on the river made Hair-Gel testy.

Play resumed with a noticeable new chill in the air. The idiot behaved himself from then on, but had he continued to break this rule I have no doubt he would have been told to leave.

If you are thinking about making the leap from home games to the casino remember to never talk about what you think other people are holding. Even if you are in the hand, it is only acceptable if you are playing against a single opponent. Saying what you think one player has is giving information to the third player in the hand - and this is every bit as bad as commenting on hands you are not involved in.

Slow Rolls Revisited

It's funny. Last Saturday I wrote a post (Eight Months and Eighty Two Posts Later) in which I basically bragged about how I had gotten back to even lifetime. I said I was going to proceed with caution. Then what do I do? I break my bankroll rules and lose $200.

Two days ago I wrote a little post (Slow Rolls) in which I said I don't understand why people get so angry when they get slow rolled. Well, after my crummy day yesterday ( Getting Run Over) I understand that annoyance. In the hand I described where I busted out, the lady who beat me made a runner-runner full house for a virtually unbeatable hand. Did she have to wait so long after I showed my pocket kings to announce they were no good? Quite frankly, suffering a bad beat is bad enough without having salt rubbed in the wound. Earlier I had a guy river the nut flush on me when I was holding two pair, and he also slow-rolled me and that pissed me off a bit too.

Still, I think there is little point in getting angry about slow rolls. Getting angry will just put you on tilt. Shrug it off. Put it behind you.

Easier said than done.

Slow Rolls

Many player say that "slow rolling" is pretty much the worst thing you can do etiquette-wise at the poker table. A "slow roll" occurs when two players have a showdown, all the cards have been dealt, all the betting is done and it is time for the players to reveal their hole cards. If one player has a particularly strong hand (even an unbeatable hand) yet still waits for his opponent to show their cards first before revealing the stronger hand, he is said to be "slow rolling" - the height of bad poker manners. Why is it so bad? I guess it is rude to make your opponent wait to see that they are beat. I personally don't understand why people get so upset by it. I mean if a guy has a winning hand and wants to lord it over me, then whatever. I really don't care.

The point I try to remember is that for many other players, this is a serious issue, so I do my best to never slow roll. If I have a great hand, particularly the nuts, I try to reveal it the moment the hand is over. It is always nice to see what cards your opponent played - it gives you insight into how they play the game and that information could come in handy later - but I think it is even more important that you don't ruffle any feathers. Remember, the other poker players are your "customers" so treat them well. Don't insult them.

String bets and betting etiquette

If you have never played poker in a casino card room, you may find your first trip intimidating. Every card room has its own rules and some of the things you might do in a game at a friends place may not be allowed. It is a good idea to try to familiarize yourself with the rules beforehand to avoid costly mistakes. Most card rooms have their rules posted somewhere, but you will be able to pick up most of them just through careful observation.

When you sit at a table, you will usually be given the option to "post" - that is no matter your position, you can put in the amount of the big blind and you will be dealt in right away. I recommend not posting but waiting until the big blind comes to you - this gives you the opportunity to just observe as few hands.

Many rules revolve around the way you handle your chips. Most (but not all) poker tables have a betting line and any chips you push over that line are committed. If you grab a handful of $5 chips, reach over that line and drop a couple on the felt, you might be told that the rest of the chips in your hand are also committed to the pot. Similarly, you can not put three $5 chips over the line, then go back and grab another three $5 chips and put them in as well. The only time you would be allowed to bet in this manner would be if you announced your total bet before you started moving your chips.

The reason these rules exist is to try to eliminate "string betting". A string bet is a way some players try to get a read on an opponents strength. They might move a whole bunch of chips of over the line and then, seeing a look of glee on an opponents face, pull some back. Or they might see a look of disappointment in their opponent and so go back for more chips. Some players still try something like this by grabbing a big stack of chips and pretending they are going to bet them, just to see your reaction. Just remember that in most places the bet isn't made until the chips cross the line, so don't give your hand away!

Some tables don't have betting lines, and you need to be very careful about how you place your bet. I played at one such place where the rule that was any chips you took out from your stack where automatically committed to the pot, so be very careful! I find you can avoid trouble if you get in the habit of verbally announcing the size of your bet - once you do that then you are committed to that bet, and you are usually free to move your chips anyway you like.

Here is a scenario I have seen dozens of times: Someone in early position raises and a player acting after them who wasn't paying attention bets less than the raise. Oops. Sorry pal, but either you kiss those chips goodbye or you make up the difference (and this is one instance where a player is allowed to move chips in two motions). This happens frequently and the offending player often blames the dealer for not announcing the raise loudly enough, but of course its his own fault.

If you bet or call out of turn, those chips are also committed.

Any cards that cross the betting line are considered dead. Some casinos will consider your hand dead if the cards are even touching the betting line, unless they have a card protector (a chip, a lucky charm, whatever...) sitting on them. It is a good idea to use a card protector to prevent the dealer from accidentally mucking your cards. If another player carelessly throws away his hand and his cards mix with yours, your hand will also be dead if you don't have a card protector.

There are a lot of other rules of course and each place is different, so take the time to familiarize yourself with the local customs.