Dealing with Disrespectful Behavior at the Poker Table

You raise to $16 pre, get two callers. I am assuming these are the blinds given you can't describe the action accurately and you are the button, but we'll round it off to $50 for the sake of it. Pot is $50.

You then bet $50 on the flop, get called in one spot. Pot is now $150.

You then bet $50 on the turn, get called again. Pot is now $250.

You then bet $80 on the river. Pot is now $330.

Villain then raises to $210. Pot is now $540. $130 on you to call.

Summary: Villain was wrong. you are being annoying. it's costing you money.

Villain would have been fine to say, hey pal, do you mind playing faster? and if you didn't their best practice would have been to talk to the floor away from the table.

and... as you've read many times by now, your behaviors at the table are doing you no favors. In general you'll get the biggest win rate by being a pleasant person to play with but beyond that not bringing attention to yourself. And almost no one is looking for tells.

(Aside: if you haven't noticed all the young pros are obsessed with GTO equilibrium solvers. They would make more money if they did look for tells, but who wants to be a corny grandpa from the era of Rounders when everyone knows that **** is make-believe? So they are leaving a ton of EV behind.

All the more reason you don't need shades unless you have an eye condition.
)

insulting the OP isnt the tone needed for this forum. They asked a legit "AITA" style question and seem open to modifying their own behavior.

Oh, so the sunglasses are to observe their tells. Well, fine, but you get that you've made yourself more conspicuous than you would by just staring at your opponent like you think you're on TV?

Moreover if you're at all competent, the only decisions where you really "need" time are so close that you're not leaking much if you forget some detail or miss a tell after the opponent cracks under your best initiation of the Eye of Horus.

Seriously, how often do you remember some detail at Six Minutes Forty -Seven Seconds that swings the hand to a clear call? You're just procrastinating.

Bring back limit poker. Ha.

Honestly if he acted like this but was yelling "Just act already" he would have been within bounds IMO. I really hate chronic slow play + tv poker cosplaying.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzC8SC55...

As a reminder of what that insult was in reply to:

OP is not even using sunglasses to hide his own tells — he is using sunglasses to hide that he is looking for tells. That has to be a minuscule, if not negative, amount of value.

A non-insult framing is that way way way more EV can gained from being able to sum a pot in real time mid-hand, let alone away from the poker table when OP provided and has access to the numbers to be summed.

It's not one-or-the-other obviously, but by getting your basic priorities in order and focusing your energy more efficiently, you might find that the whole sunglasses ceremony no longer registers on your list of interests.

I can put myself in your shoes a bit here. You're up 800, you just put 25% of your profit into the pot and are now faced with 130/170 more, which is a pretty big dent. You took some time to replay the hand in your head and to pick up anything from your opponent.

Put this spot on a Rec Player and you get different emotions .. If a Rec is down, it's a snap call. If a Rec is sitting on profit then they pause and typically that pause can be for an extra amount of time than normal. You could also say that this is a snap call by a Rec whose up for the day .. riding the rush .. and I agree that's totally possible as well. Just not for this OP as described.

Most Poker Players will pause in a spot like this one .. why not raise on the Turn? Why not go all-in? Then you're going over history with V to see if there were any other spots with this type of aggression at this bet sizing. Sure, it takes time. Other Players will see that they need to be good 20% of the time and just snap it off. (There really shouldn't be any discussion over the all-in or not, it's basically the same mindset.)

While this isn't a 'strat' post .. I think we do need to consider some strat that may have been going through OP's process during the behavior in question.

I still stand on mine, and other, previous comments. There's a time to take time and there's a time to not take time. If, as a Player, you are taking 'too much' time in all your decisions then the focus will be even more on the longer ones whether they merit thought or not.

Back to the OP .. how to handle the spot. While you don't owe your opponents any insight to your mindset, 'I' usually say something, after the hand, to the table in general with or without any specifics I think are needed. I usually do this by praising the opponent for putting me in a tough spot or I will downplay my experience and suggest that I'm having a really good session 'for once' and just didn't want to 'donk it all back'.

I rarely start off this kind of conversation by immediately being negative with the 'offender'. I will make some sort of comment about how it's my fault and I'll try to do better. We're playing Poker, while you do want to be sincere it's not a big deal (to me) to create some table talk that may allow the offender to feel a victory AND diminish some of the tension surrounding the spot. Obv, if it continues to the point of crossing a line with you, then you start to go up the ladder with your concerns. GL

There are a few different things in this thread that I identify with.

The first is how you reacted emotionally to what was going on. If other players are bothering you and making you feel uncomfortable, judged, anxious, unable to concentrate, etc. this is something that you need to address. When the feelings first start coming up that is where I look to handle them. If you don't they will continue to build up and you will eventually "explode" as you described and then look to take it out on a player who isn't even in the hand in question.

I come from an alcoholic home and was unable to even identify my feelings in the moment. Until I hit Al-Anon at age 29 I didn't even have a vocabulary for my feelings except Anger really. Now when I am experiencing anxiety or distress or frustration at the table I take a moment to experience the feelings, to acknowledge that I can't change what happened and that I have no control over other player's behavior at the table, and to focus on what I do have control over. My attitude, my behavior, and what I choose to think about. In short I say the Serenity prayer so I can have a moment of peace and decide how to address the situation based on what I have control over which is never what the other players are doing.

Like you I have poker glasses and I use them to watch other players without them being able to know that I am doing that. It can be very effective but I choose to use them infrequently (because I would rather be seen as somebody who isn't really paying attention). I will use them at a table where there are a bunch of other players wearing glasses. When I find myself in a situation where a player next to me is constantly trying to get under my skin or insult me I will put on my poker glasses so that I can insulate myself from the assault. It has only happened a handful of times in the last 10 years but when I put on the glasses it changes everything and it calms me and allows me to completely ignore the person who is trying to aggravate me.

I don't know from this experience you had if the players who were upset with you were mad because you were taking too much time in situations where you should have been acting quickly, were mad because you were winning big hands when you took a lot of time, or were mad because they were losing, or some combination. Regardless, in the moment you cannot react angrily. Just understand that they are upset and they are trying to get to you. Put up a shield wall however you can. Whether it is by putting on your poker glasses, making jokes to ease the situation, ignoring them, apologizing for taking time (like "I wish I were better at this..."). Just don't escalate it. If you do escalate you can be held responsible for what happens next.

I like that you left the game. It allows you to distance yourself and recover from the abuse.

If this is happening frequently then yes, you have to look at what you are doing that is inciting this and see if you can take less time on non-important decisions. If this is happening infrequently then figure out what works best for you. My emotional reactions that are devastating are rarely about other players at the table. It is mostly about bad beats. Because this happens often in tournaments I have had to learn how to deal with emotional distress so that it won't affect me moving forward. So when there are players at the table that are acting nasty (not necessarily at me) I have learned how to not focus on that. They want it to encompass all players so that they can dominate (just as my father did when he was angry and often drunk). By keeping the focus on myself I am able to deal with it without engaging. There are times when I will defend other people under attack because that is how I grew up (with a younger brother) but at that point it usually has already needed a Floor Manager to step in.

One last thing, when I played 20/40 LHE at Foxwoods there was a guy who hated me. It was because of a joke I made about the Mamas and the Papas regarding my father and his mother. The entire table laughed but he took it personally and went after me for the next 6 years. He was a regular as was I (on weekends) and he was brutal. I didn't have poker glasses at the time but I did have a sense of humor. Which I used to ease the tension. He never stopped hating me. But six years in a guy tried to bully me at the table. His intent was to get me unnerved and make mistakes and react and get upset and basically explode. The guy who hated me turned to this new guy and told him it wasn't going to work and it meant a lot to me that he had acknowledged me. The other thing was that I learned more about poker from the guy who hated me than anyone else or any book really. Every time I won a hand he would lite into me about how stupid I was and that I didn't realize his range (!!!) and he would explain exactly what I did wrong.

There are always silver linings. I hope this experience and thread can help you move forward in a positive way.

My mistake. Preflop, is correct. But on my $50 bet on the flop, only one player called, the other folded. So it went heads-up from there.

Thank you for your detailed and honest comments. I really appreciate that you took the time to address my problem.

While some of the responses may be a little harsh, I appreciate your response that you will self reflect and modify your behavior.

You don't have to like everyone at the poker table but respect is most often a two way street.

Why did you raise his last 40 and not just call? Seems punty.

Also play faster.

Do it the Patrik Antonius way. He told Zigmund in a live game after he made a provocative Patrik impression: "You can call the clock if you want, I don't mind."
Thats it. Zigmund backed up and gave Patrik all the time in the world.

Now they are friends, or have been.
Also it is clear that Patrik was emotionally affected by the impression of Ziggi.

It is normal to be emotional at times, but don't let another player get into your head, and think about certain counters before sitting down. Especially if you have an "enemy" at the table.

Be cool and always try to have the situation managed by the floor.
if the casino is runned in a shitty way, and the floor is even colluding with certain players, which happens in Europe, or Latin America, then switch the casino, or verbally manage the dude, by being cool, and making him look bad for insulting you and trying to get you on his level of quick and dumb decisions.

Also be critical about yourself. if you like to take time, it is even more important to fold/check certain nobrainer hands quickly vs fish.
Don't worry about timing tells vs fish in low stakes.
These people usually won't benefit.

Cheers.

One of the best posts in this thread.

Seriously.

Most reads should properly be made when a player is not in the hand and no one is paying attention to them anyway.

Your post is a masterclass.

If a player is truly better than their opponents, there should be very, very few situations where they have to think deeply about the situation. Furthermore, as you so clearly express, if there is any tension from having to take a long time, a good player takes responsibility for the length and humbly makes it about his oppenent putting him in a bad spot. A good poker player makes their opponents feel good so they continue to play. Even if the delay is warrented, don't tap the glass.

One of my biggest pet peeves in live poker is when a player, not knowing anything about another player, besides the fact that they either played a hand "wrong" or took too long to make a decision, call them "stupid", "an idiot", or "an ass", etc., only because poker's probably new to them when they know nothing about them, how successful they are or what they do in real life, but that's just me.

Corollary to this, Live LHE game last night, chronic slow rolling LP MA asian guy calls a capped PF 5 way pot with 25s. Turns his baby flush and it holds up OTR, slow rolls it ofc.

1 player who had already lost a couple pots to him(and lost this one with his set of 8s) starts in on him, another player from the hands joins in.

Slow roller plays to his blind, packs up his monster stack and leaves.

Don't tap the glass, goddammit.

'...good hand sir...' while you steam and plot to felt him.

Speaking of tapping .. what's this 'epidemic' of winning Players tapping the table and saying 'Nice Hand' while pulling in the pot? I'm seeing it in the local games as well as on the WSOP streams. So bad IMOI ..

Also .. when a Player 'snatches' chips in front of you when you muck or have tabled a losing hand. Just wait for the Dealer to move them or at least give the OK to take them. GL

That is adding a bunch of qualifiers to what I actually said. So much that it doesn't even match anymore.

I have absolutely no problem with new players playing slow. I am literally the last person on these boards who with attack new players. If anything, I am more likely to help them play better against the mediocre players than berate them.

Bro, it was the sick sunglass soul read that let him know villain was scared. So he went for the last $40. Haven't you been following along? #SunglassSoulRead #MaxValue

Hurry up and fold already /thread