Tales From the Floor

Bad Beats

At our little cardroom, I charge $5.00 to listen to the, “So this guy called my raise with Jack-3…” stories, so the last thing I want to do is write about them. Some of our more colorful regulars, however, don’t seem to be as immune to the bad beats as others are, so the stories of what happens after the beat are probably worth discussing.

Bearded, burly and surly Teamster John has never learned to handle the suck-outs with dignity. One night last month, he left his usual punching bag (his rig) at home and walked to our club in search of a game. This was good news for his fenders but bad news for his body shop and, as things turned out, not so great for his friend Crazy Mike. Anyway, after the inevitable felting, Teamster John disappeared without a word from our little club for the short walk home. He returned about two hours later with Crazy Mike (who was still in his pajamas, by the way) to tell his story. Apparently, Teamster John decided to take his frustrations out on some trash cans by the side of a local business. While we presume the trash cans were innocent, they did turn out to be booby-trapped, and set off a silent alarm inside the business. While the understanding and gentle methods of our local law enforcement personnel are not the topic here, suffice it to say that Crazy Mike wound up in his jammies at the local bail bond office. After retrieving Teamster John from the jail, they both bought back in and played awhile, so it was a pretty good late game that night.

There is some debate about how Concrete Dan received his moniker. Some of our regulars claim it is because he pours concrete for a living, while others believe he is so-named for his inability to grasp abstract concepts. After a week of losses, Concrete Dan started poor-mouthing, talking about rent, car repair costs and other items of no interest to the other card players. After one particularly tough evening, he stormed out and punched through his windshield, bringing his losses from $1200 to $1400 for the evening. One of our players rushed out the door to calm him down when they heard the shattering glass, the end result being two more buy-ins and an additional $300 loss for Concrete Dan. No one knows if this had a positive effect on his personal finances.

In our cardroom, the current record for number of broken chips after a single bad beat stands at seven ($35 in chips). Competition remained stiff until we adopted the “you break it, you bought it” policy, so it appears Hippie Frank will retain his dubious title. A gigantic man of considerable emotion, Hippie Frank had a promising sports career in college, although no one has yet dared to ask him which sport he actually played. He apparently took a break from college life to experiment with mind-altering substances and just lost track of time. Gainfully employed when he first came to our little cardroom, he took a break from corporate America to try playing poker for a living. It’s been two years now, so I figure Hippie Frank lost track of time again. Anyway, it does appear that the lack of a steady paycheck affects a person’s attitude toward the bad beats.

Is there a moral here? I guess if you are struggling with bad beats, keep your day job, pay your bills and take your pills as prescribed!


“Tales From the Floor” is written anonymously by the manager of a small Northern California cardroom. Johnny Coldeck is widely known for his tirades and has coined several phrases which are now widely used in poker. The phrase, “I can’t beat that kind of skill!”, when spoken after a suck-out, is actually under copyright and should not be used without prior written permission. These days, he combats the emotional swings of bad beats with a simple strategy; always get the chips in way behind and fire the dealer who doesn’t get him there.