Case of the Mondays (Part I: 4/8 Hell)

After a great night's sleep and a morning of forum games, I decided to catch the Monday night NFL games while playing some cards at Capitol. Ahhh it feels good to be off for a full day, I don't get too many of these.

So I arrived around 330pm or so and was first up on the 6/12 list, so I decided to jump into an open 4/8 seat. My table was AMAZING. I mean I saw some dude call two cold on the flop with J3 of diamonds on a black A87 board only to hit runner runner gutshot. How does that happen? I had at least three people at the table playing this horribly, and everyone else wasn't much better.

You know the trick to winning at these types of tables though, right? Right. Your cards have to actually hit and hold while dodging landmine after landmine. It's a task easier said than done.

The first big hand I played at this table I raised a live straddle ($8) on my direct right to $12 from the six seat with AQ of hearts. The girl had been playing crazy and was definitely a maniac. Seat one flatted my raise (he was the guy that showed down J3 of diamonds earlier), and it folded around to the small blind who called. The girl in seat five whose straddle I raised made it $16 to go. I capped and we saw a flop four handed with $80 already in the middle. Weeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

The flop came out 355 with one heart. Not a great flop for my hand, but it wasn't terrible either. SB and the straddler checked, I bet, seat one called, small blind folded, and the girl in the straddle called. No surprises here...I could be ahead, I could be behind, these two could have anything. I decided I was betting until something told me to stop.

The turn was actually a great card: the seven of hearts. Now I had a couple overs as well as the nut heart draw. The girl checked, I bet, and again both called. The river was a non-heart four, making the board 35574 i.e. freaking ugly. I was now definitely worried that one of these two could have a six, and I definitely did not want to bet/fold this hand at this point with all the money in the pot. I guess a good play would be bet/fold here, but I opted to check behind the straddler and watch seat one bet $8 into the pot of about $128. The girl folded and flashed K8 of hearts (ugh put a heart out one time), leaving me alone to call $8 with the possibility of winning $136 if the seat one was bluffing or betting a weaker ace-high. I'm not good enough to fold getting 17 to 1 against a guy who I already described as being awful, so I called and he showed A6 for a rivered straight. Of course A6 had to get there, oh well, I got my money in really well in this hand, and I didn't even make a pair.

After that hand I lost with K9 of spades, missing a combo flush/straight draw from the BB and that caused me to buy another rack of chips. Yikes. The only big pot I ended up winning at this table was with a pair of jacks that managed to hold, I think I might have picked up a smaller pot somewhere else along the line, but maybe not. After this hour of hell and a couple of 4/8 players leaving and endangering the table of a possible break, I decided to take my 6/12 seat. I had asked to be rolled once already because of how good this 4/8 table was, but alas, it was not to be. Maybe next time I can capitalize on them. I ended up cashing out a little over $200 in orange chips, unfortunately I paid for 300 of them.

Look for part two sometime tomorrow, I'll break down a wild ride at 6/12 that saw me swing down, then up, then down, and then...well, you get the idea.