First, let me say I wasn’t raised to deal well with praise. From a young age, I was instilled with negative reinforcement on a sedimentary level. Not that it’s anyone else’s problem. It’s just where I’m coming from, and I understand now that the intent was to teach me to set higher standards for myself.
With that in mind, I woke up in the cutoff yesterday with something like KT or A8 suited. I can’t remember which, only that everyone checked to me and I raised with a pot bet. The big blind called. It was one of the top-ranked MTT players, Mardy, and they were deepstacked. Not only did that open their range a bit, but the flop missed me altogether while including a whole bunch of straight and two-pair opportunities for them.
In retrospect, that probably means I was holding the A8 and the board was K-Q/J/T-x. Maybe Mardy remembers. However it went down, it looked like suicide to put in a c-bet, so I checked.
Mardy moved into the power vacuum I’d created, making a ridiculous overbet, something in the neighborhood of 6500 chips, which was a very wealthy neighborhood that I couldn’t afford. Then, while Mardy was adding my chips to their stack and we were all moving to a new neighborhood, someone gave the text abbreviation for ‘nice hand,’
Years of negative reinforcement rose from their sedimentary levels. Mardy had taken the hand down on the flop with an ordinary, everyday poker play. They hadn’t shown their cards. So what was ‘nice’ about the hand other than making me fold? I couldn’t think of anything I’d done to this third party to generate any animus, Was it that they didn’t have the intestinal fortitude to jam against someone who’d raised them preflop and admired it in someone else?
“Sometimes I wonder whether certain players know what a nice hand is,” I typed while taking pains to let Mardy know I had no problem with their play.
That sparked a table-wide debate. The flatterer said they were just being polite. One or two others backed them, suggesting that it was sporting to hand out compliments like participation ribbons,
But is it sporting? The loser doesn’t get a ribbon. Their loss is now being rubbed in their face by someone who wasn’t even involved and knows less than half the story. Often, half the table feels obligated to echo the shaming. In my view, only the loser should be dishing out compliments, or at least be the first, unless the hand was exceptional in some manner.
So, what constitutes exceptional?
The obvious answer is taking down a large pot. Getting paid off is what poker is about.
Catching a rare hand while taking down that large pot is cool, as well. On the other hand, if you believe that poker requires more skill than purchasing lottery tickets, which it does, you shouldn’t be accepting compliments for showing quads after everyone has folded and left you with pocket change. In fact, you shouldn’t show at all. You’re just saying, “Look at me, I don’t know how to extract value but I need your validation.”
Doubling up with a mundane hand is quite the feat, too, maybe more impressive than sending someone to the rail with your pocket aces. Let’s say you raise with a suited J9 from a middle position preflop. It’s a bit audacious, but then one of the blinds decides not to let you just steal their chips. Now you’re in a bit of a pickle. The flop comes K-9-x and, after the blind checks, you bet your second pair. They call and the turn transforms your pair into a ménage à trois. The instinct is to jam but you check, hoping the blind will think you have top pair and feel vulnerable. They hold off until the river, then put in a half-pot bet that you raise 2-3x. After thinking about it, they call and receive the bad news that they’ve been taken for the whole nine yards.
That is what I call a nice hand. You’ve told a convincing story, the blind hasn’t put you on the nines, and you significantly improved your stack. When I pulled that one off (not against Mardy) the ‘nh’ that followed felt earned.
On the other hand, I’ve had onlookers offer a ‘wd’ (well done) for checking down to the river with rags, catching a pair on the bank, and raking in a meager pot. What did I do well other than sit on my hands quietly waiting for the dealer to punish others for doing nothing but sit on theirs, too? That requires neither skill nor courage.
Which brings me to the third play worthy of admiration, bluffing a big pot with nothing but air. This one usually garners the fewest compliments despite probably deserving the most. We’ve all hero-worshipped con artists pulling one over on patsies in films from The Sting to Ocean’s Eleven to Now You See Me, Now You Don’t, but when it happens at our poker table, somehow we’re offended by the villainy? If that’s how you feel, then face it, you’re the next patsy on the list. On the other hand, if you begin plotting to bluff the bluffer and relieve them of the chips they’ve just won, good on you, you’re a poker player.
So, in the name of true sportsmanship, when you see someone taking down a huge pot with a monster, with pedestrian cards, or especially with the Emperor’s clothes, give them their full and deserved due, but, please, don’t offer faint praise just because their shoelaces are tied. It’s not a bluff you’re pulling off.
