Bird, I am honest, but not a grinder. There's no grinding over 10-20. Grinders are meat at 20 and higher. Absolute meat. "Grinder" isn't quite the "N" word of the poker world that "nit" is (thanks again, Heath), but it ain't no complement. Use it sparingly and accurately, please.
About Stu Ungar, he did wear those little blue glasses at the time, and I remember thinking it was odd, I'd never seen such glasses in a game before.
He was a drug addict. You could look at his nose and tell how bad.
He was put in that tourney by xxxxxx.
But I don't know if he was a cheat, or if the WSOP was a fix, and none of the above is evidence. And of course Stuey's dead now, God rest him.
These GCA guys talk a lot but show nothing. They seem to know about cheating from another time and place, from the era before poker went public in this country.
But.....
There's a break in poker. Over 40-80, things become VERY different. You can't just go out and play. You've got to do some setting up. There's a lot of game playing OFF the table, which I hate. Borrowing, staking, piecing, arranging. At the least, people are taking pieces of each other, or flat out partnering, which, even without overt cheating, can lead to a subtle collusion effect. This is especially a problem in tournaments, but I don't play those.
But still I don't think there's much if any overt (mechanics or collusion) cheating going on, and as yet these GCA accusers haven't shown any real evidence. I think, really, all public mid-sized games are honest, and PROBABLY most big ones are as well. That's just my guess.
There's this about cheats and poker: poker pros obsessively observe their opponents. And I find it difficult to believe that one can cheat at cards and never be the least bit hinky about it. I find it hard to believe I couldn't pick up a cheat's tells. But of course you can always hypothesize cheats so good they're undetectable, not just by the mechanics (I grant that undetectability) but by their personality. But again, I've known more than my share of criminals and lowlifes (haven't most of us who live in the gambler's world?) and hinkiness is hard to hide.
Also, it's easy for people to think they were cheated, from bitterness about their losing.
I've many times seen people, not good players, go on streaks when they first start playing, run up a BR, assume they're good and not just lucky, move up in stakes as their BR increases, and when the cards finally break even on their silly butts, assume they are then getting cheated.
I've seen absolute idiot players sit down in our local big game, a pot-limit, lose, and later mumble about being cheated. Guys with NO chance, guys your mother could beat with a rank-of-hands chart and her pie-baking patience, crying foul. In a game I have inside knowledge of, where I could see the tapes if I wanted, and thus know there's no cheating in. And it's a big enough game to warrant cheating. (These GCA guys also made some allegations about that game, which is where they lose me, personally.)
I've heard many times allegations about the Asians in the LA clubs, including the 40's, colluding. They aren't. What happens is you sit down and you're the only white guy AND the only one who isn't a regular there AND they play off their knowledge of each other AND you make more mistakes because you don't have that knowledge AND you lose when you're used to winning AND it feels funny and bad.
That's not the same as being cheated. That just means, yeah, there's HFA in poker.  |