Early College Days

Fall of Freshman Year
I played my first hand of Texas Hold 'em my freshman year of college. My roommate learned about the game from his future fraternity brothers around the same time that the game had exploded due to Moneymaker's seemingly epic win. I watched the fraternity play a few cash games one night and remember two things: 1) they were throwing around 20 dollar bills like they were hot cakes and 2) this fat guy kept showing me the hands that he was folding, one of which I specifically remember being Jack-four offsuit (J4o). I learned a few valuable lessons that night: 1) fat frat guys are rich and annoying, 2) I'm not joining a fraternity and 3) Jack-four offsuit is a bad hand. I stick by all three statements to this day.

In an attempt to fit in and be more "fratty", my roommate staged a few poker disasters in our dorm room with a couple other friends. I think I remember playing tight for the most part, basing my entire play on the fact that having a jack and a four is not good. Using my impeccable logic, I thus determined that the following hands were bad:

1) Jack-four
2) Jack-three
3) Jack-two

Finding little success in these games, I lost interest in poker and played very few hands for the rest of the semester.

Spring of Freshman Year
About a year before my discovery of online poker, I met my good friend Lil Mac. He, too, was a poker beginner. He knew about the game from television and one night asked me if I liked to play hold 'em. I told him, "I've played before." The first of many showdowns between Lil Mac and me occurred on the night before I had a government final. I had met the guy at a cousin's wedding about a week before, and he invited me to drive to San Marcos (home of Texas State University) to meet up with a couple girls he knew (I think he "knew" one more than the other). Being the hugest pushover of all time, I couldn't tell him no, even though I hadn't even begun to study. We drove down I-35 and met up with the girls at their apartment, and I informed him that I needed to be home by 2 a.m. and that I would be limited to 3 beers. Three hours and six beers later, Lil Mac again asked me if I liked to play hold 'em, to which I probably said something like "Hell yeah, I like to play hold 'em". Using Natural Light beers as chips (with a one case max bet), we began a game of heads-up Texas hold 'em at the girls' dinner table. I don't remember any details, but I do remember that after several hours of dealing the beer-soaked drinking game cards and becoming a case of beer in debt to my friend, I was ready to go home and study (I began studying at 5 a.m. and took the test at 10 a.m. the next day. I got a B). I didn't play a single hand of hold 'em for the rest of the semester and rarely hung out with Lil Mac. I do, however, owe him a case of Natural Light to this day.

Spring of Sophomore Year
During Christmas break of my sophomore year, I visited an old high school friend (who we will refer to as Texas Kang). Upstairs, his dad was using what I believe is a now-shut-down or little-used online poker room to play some play money online poker games. I don't know if it was cash games or tournament-style, but I just know that Kang offered to let me play some hands on his dad's account. I'm going to be honest, I was nervous. There were dollar signs next to the amount that I was betting, and, even though I was informed it was fake money, I get nervous when I see anything above the number 1 with a dollar sign next to it. I was also unsure as to how much these "fake" credits meant to Kang's dad. Anyway, I played a few hands and was immediately hooked. Upon returning to college, I immediately created an online account of my own. I used the same site as Kang under the alias Texas Tom or something. I played medium-sized buy-in play money sit-and-goes (SNG's). I kept track of all my results using Microsoft Excel so that I could determine how much profit I was making if I were using real money (what a nerd). The SNG's were 9-player tables, rewarding those who came in the top three (pretty standard). I calculated my profit, average placing and number of wins using Excel. My goal was, for the most part, to come in 3rd in every tournament. I chased gut shots, played any hand that could make a straight (e.g. 4-7 off-suit (47o)), and rarely raised pre-flop. I had no idea what was going on after the flop, but my results were very good. I thought I knew the game, and I was officially addicted.

Fall of Junior Year
The next Fall, I moved to a new apartment complex with an old friend from high school, who we will call Sasmo, and another friend, who we'll call Frosty. We spent the first week in a drunken haze, downing cases of Keystone Light and trying to meet women at the pool. One night, I got a phone call from an unknown number. The voice on the other end wanted to know what I was up to and asked me where I was living. Ten minutes later, I was drunk at the pool with my old friend Lil Mac. He had moved to the exact same complex as me. Coincidence? Not if you believe in the poker gods. Within a week, my first real game of tournament-style Texas hold 'em broke out at Lil Mac's apartment. Carrying an airsoft gun (as a joke), a cup of Powerade and Wild Turkey (nasty) and a deck of cards I meandered to Lil Mac's apartment for the game. Frosty and Sasmo came as well. One of Lil Mac's roommates (who is now my roommate, who we'll call J) also played. The buy-in was 5 bucks (which became the norm), and I'm not sure if any of us really knew how to play. I don't think we even finished. Either way, we were hooked.

The next weekend, Frosty and J stole a plastic fold-up table from an event at the apartment complex. We brought the table to my apartment, where it became The Table. We played beer pong, flip cup, drinking games and, most importantly, poker on this table. We allowed our guests to write whatever they wanted, in permanent ink, and kept track of the Longhorns' football games on The Table (we won the national championship that year, GO VINCE). The Table is in the cigar room of our current house, if you were wondering.

The standard poker games which occurred pretty much every other day of the semester had six regulars, described below (we all got somewhat better as the days went by):

Me: Weak, tight
Lil Mac: Weak, aggressive
J: Weak, Solid? (Not sure to this day)
Frosty: Weak, very tight
Juddy: Weak, loose
Five Dollar Dave: Weak, calling station

To us, we were the next generation of poker superstars. Throughout the semester, I watched a lot of Celebrity Poker Showdown on Bravo, so of course I had an edge on my opponents. However, the results weren't there, even though I knew to raise three times the big blind with a good hand. In order to do this, I had to have a list of good hands with which to raise three times the big blind. If memory serves me correctly, here's the list, in order of how happy I was to get the cards:

1) AA
2) KK
3) QQ
4) AK
5) JJ
6) Jack-Ten suited (JTs)
7) AQ
8) AJ
9) AT
10) KQ
11) KJ
12) QJ
13) KT
14) TT
15) Any pair
16) Ten-nine suited (T9s)
17) Ace-(any card) (AX)

I looked up a chart online and learned a little bit about positive expected value and things like that, but I rarely won. Honestly, Lil Mac usually took home the spoils. Second place got his money back. The games went on in typical fashion, and as I learned more and more about good starting hands, I got more and more pissed off to find that the other guys were winning while playing garbage. I often ripped the rest of the guys when they showed down trash cards and honestly had no respect for anyone except Frosty. Juddy chased too many gut shots, Dave couldn't fold until the river and Lil Mac simply outplayed me. J typically played top pair, but I can remember ripping him more than a few times for calling my standard pre-flop raises with hands like K9 or KT. Specifically, king-nine reminds me of a hand that led to one of my most famous poker quotes.

(The following format will be extensively used throughout the blog to describe specific hands)
Situation: $5 buy-in at Juddy's house. I'm not sure of the details, such as position or chip stacks.
Me: AXo
J: K9o

I think: I have an ace. I'm going to raise.
I act: Raise 3 times the big blind
Opponents actions: Everyone folds except J.

J acts: Calls.

The flop comes out, I believe we both hit a pair with our low cards and J's 9 beats whatever I had. After turning over our cards, I get huffy and say, "I just don't see what so intriguing about king nine." J didn't like the comment, but everyone else thought it was pretty funny.

To this day, I refer to King-Nine as "The J Hand". Anytime I'm in a flop with him and a king comes out, I still get a little scared or at least look over at Frosty and smirk. Honestly, I think J is a very good poker player and see nothing wrong with playing king nine in that situation. I just had no clue what was going on.