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You Can’t Win if You’re Not Invited

The majority of us poker players are not buying into $10K tournaments where we can run our mouths because it’s good for TV. Most of us play in home games or small local rooms. In places like this you can’t exactly take on a Phil Hellmuth-like aura.

One of the reasons these games can be so juicy is that people are there to enjoy themselves and hang out with their friends. If you become the guy who was “Taking the game too seriously”, you are not likely to be invited back. It doesn’t matter how well you play, if you are not invited into the game, you can’t make any money off of people.

This is in the front of my mind this week because it occurred to me that I hadn’t been invited back to a particular home game in a long time.

The last time that I was there it turned out that I kept getting involved with the same person. First I tried to bluff him in a huge hand, he didn’t really appreciate that too much. Since I only knew 2 of the other 6 players there, some people would consider it rude to be trying to bluff these guys off of a huge pot in their own home game. I don’t think they wanted someone who was playing any kind of hardball to be in their game.

A little while later I made a pretty nice call against the same guy after he tried bluffing me. I believe I called him with 3rd pair on the river for a pretty sizable bet.

On what turned out to be the last hand of the night, I decided I wanted to play the 5-6 off-suit for a raise. The flop came down 2-3-J and I decided I was gonna see this one through. Since the jack was not likely to help my opponent, I figured that the jack was a card that I could use to bluff my opponent off of 8-8, 9-9 or another pair under the jack. I could also bluff him off of A-K or A-Q, so I liked my chances on this endeavor.

I reached into the old play book and smooth called him on the flop. The turn was a 10…this was just about the perfect card for me in this situation. I knew that A-K and A-Q didn’t improve, and the board was looking even worse for an underpair.

To my surprise, my opponent bet again into me. I thought this was an odd card to continue betting on. I wasn’t exactly sold on him having a huge pair, so I continued with plan A. I raised him on the turn for a pot sized bet. I thought this would be a solid move to push him off of all of the hands that I’ve mentioned above.

I certainly wasn’t raising on the strength of my draw. I guess I just flew off the hook a little and decided that I was gonna see this bluff through. He thought for about 5 minutes and finally called me. He flipped up 8-8. I was pretty impressed with his call. I’m not sure I could have made it myself. Of course, that’s me wanting to think I still made a good move.

Of course, he wasn’t impressed either when I hit the 4 on the river to make my straight. That had to really sting him after making such a great call against me…only to have me hit a gut-shot on the river.

Needless to say, I haven’t been invited back in a very long time. So remember, you can’t win if you don’t have an invitation.