I was reading an autobiography of a guy whom I’d never known to be a poker player when I came across this rather detailed account of a big 5-card stud pot he once won. I’d be very surprised if anyone who hasn’t read this book himself were to guess the author. I’ll give one hint in addition to those embedded in the quote: this hand took place in the late 1940’s.
John, one night, was playing in a game I was in. After the first two cards were dealt around the table, I had an ace showing. I looked beneath it at my hole card; another ace – a pair, back-to-back. My ace showing made it my turn to bet.
But I didn’t rush. I sat there and studied.
Finally, I knocked my knuckles on the table, passing, leaving the betting to the next man. My action implied that beneath my ace was some “nothing” card that I didn’t care to risk my money on.
The player sitting next to me took the bait. He bet pretty heavily. And the next man raised him. Possibly each of them had small pairs. Maybe they just wanted to scare me out before I drew another ace. Finally, the bet reached John, who had a queen showing; he raised everybody.
Now, there was no telling what John had. John truly was a clever gambler. He could gamble as well as anybody I had gambled with in New York.
So the bet came back to me. It was going to cost me a lot of money to call all the raises. Some of them obviously had good cards but I knew I had every one of them beat. But again I studied and studied; I pretended perplexity. And finally I put in my money, calling the bets.
The same betting pattern went on, with each new card, right around to the last card. And when that last card went around, I hit another ace in sight. Three aces. And John hit another queen in sight.
He bet a pile. Now, everyone else studied a long time – and, one by one, folded their hands. Except me. All I could do was put what I had left on the table.
If I’d had the money, I could have raised five hundred dollars or more, and he’d have to call me. John couldn’t have gone the rest of his life wondering if I had bluffed him out of a pot that big.
I showed my hole card ace; John had three queens. As I hauled the pot, something over five hundred dollars – my first real stake in Boston – John got up from the table. He’d quit. He told his house man, “Anytime Red comes in here and wants anything, let him have it,” he said. “I’ve never seen a young man play his hole card like he played.”
It probably was an advanced/effective play at the time, but I love how he acts like slowplaying is such a revolutionary, unpredictable tactic. Let’s see, the action goes check bet raise raise and then a guy with an Ace showing check-calls three bets cold, what could he possibly have?
And if these other guys aren’t folding small pairs to that action, then it seems inconsistent to say that John the “clever gambler” could have anything with his second raise. If he’s actually clever, he should always have a pair of Queens, since those other guys seemed intent on calling him down with underpairs.
Personally, I’d have been much more impressed if the author had bluff-called John’s 3-bet cold on 2nd street, kept calling with nothing, then bluff-shoved on 5th when John hit a queen and he paired his ace, successfully bluffing John off of trips only to show a deuce in the hole. That would have been jaw-dropping poker.
Anyway, can you guess the author?
Detroit Red?
Correct. I forgot there were literates reading this blog. Everyone else can still play as long as they don’t google “Detroit Red” to cheat. I don’t think that’s a well-known nickname, though I could be wrong.
Ha. Malcolm X, eh? I don’t remember that from his autobiography, but who else could “Detroit Red” be?
FDR
Malcolm x is correct. I was pretty impressed by the sophistication of his analysis, especially for an amateur. He mentions that he considered gambling professionally but didn’t think hed make enough to support his friend and himself so he turned to burglary instead.
-Andrew
Are you reading the Autobiography? That’s my favorite book. His transformation is so inspiring. It should be required reading for any American.
For some reason I didn’t remember the nickname … I’m not sure I can wholeheartedly agree with “anonymous”; I personally find Malcolm X’s legacy to be a mixed bag.
What do you mean by mixed bag?
Obviously he did a lot of f’d-up things early on in his life, but the way he was able to learn tolerance after going through so much and having the foundations of his beliefs shocked so many times is really remarkable.
There aren’t very many modern American biographies that are more instructive and inspiring.
I don’t want to comment too much on my reactions to the book yet since I haven’t finished reading it. I will say that I’ve found it to be difficult reading. I agree with nearly everything he has to say about race relations in the US (less so on subjects like women and religion), but I find it very difficult to get past all of the “white devil” stuff.
At one point Malcolm recounts a conversation with a white student on this subject and tries to explain that he is referring to “the collective white race” rather than to any individual white person. Truthfully I have only a vague sense of what that really means. And in another conversation with a white student, he says flat out that no matter how well-meaning she is, there is nothing she can do to help.
Part of what’s frustrating for me, I think, is that he may be right. His recounting of the “Farce on Washington” and how it was co-opted and neutered by the involvement of probably well-meaning (though the author doesn’t assume this) white money and leadership.
I get that this isn’t really the point of the book, and I don’t mean to take one of the great works of African-American literature to task for what little it has to say about white Americans. On the whole I’ve found it to be both engaging, as a narrative, and fascinating as a treatise and a work of sociology. But as a well-intentioned white guy who does a lot of work in poor black communities, including Malcolm’s Roxbury, it’s hard for me not to get hung up on these passages.
Why do you have such a problem getting through the “white devil” stuff? Malcolm is very forthright about his past prejudices and I don’t know how far into the book you are, but his outlook and personal philosophy changed drastically near the end before he was killed. When reading it too you always have to keep the context in mind. You must not only remember what was going on in American society at that time but also Malcolm’s personal history up to that point. Can you honestly say that you understand his experience and therefore that you can reasonably be so put-off by his remarks?
I remember reading the Autobiography too and having those same thoughts, like damn Malcolm why can’t you see that it’s racism period that causes all this strife, not just racist violence between whites and blacks, but it’s really hard for me to hold it against him given all that he experienced and how perceptive he was. Once you finish reading it, I doubt you’ll have the same feelings about some of his comments in the early parts of the book.
It’s not that I’m offended or hold it against him. Just the opposite really – his pessimism concerns me precisely because I believe he knows what he’s talking about. Obviously some of it is rhetorical and/or recruitment strategy, but the general theme that white people probably couldn’t, and in any event never would, rectify the lingering damage of racism is pretty convincing. That’s what I find disturbing.
It’s a pretty common theme in Marxist/revolutionary thinking that piecemeal reform can actually do more harm than good by staving off more radical change. That’s pretty much exactly Malcolm’s analysis of what happened to the March on Washington.
Sorry if that’s a little incoherent, trying to play a bunch of tables of PLO right now.
Foucault, keep reading. The end is worth it.
I read it awhile ago. His trip to Mecca was pretty inspiring.
(For what it’s worth I’m a white guy).