BLOG – Slowrolls and live etiquette; the fine line between genius and idiocy

BLOG – Slowrolls and live etiquette; the fine line between genius and idiocy

Wednesday, 3 November 2010

If you haven’t done so already, check out the article about Daniel Negreanu. Kid Poker felt that his Hungarian PokerStars colleague Martin Hruby slowrolled him with the nut straight against his top two pair; taking several minutes to call a bet.

I can’t really comment on that particular hand but this gives me the opportunity to segue into some other topics. I’m good at meandering.


Basically, Negreanu bet out and Hruby called holding 7-6 on a K-5-8-9 board against Negreanu’s two pair. I mean, he has the nuts but it’s the final table of a major tournament with six figures for seven players. When your claim to fame is being Eastern Europe’s chief poker export for two wins at the Czech Poker Festival – impressive, undoubtedly, but only $50,000 – then you can pause for a second and consider a full house and/or flush when you have the nuts.


If not... well, I was playing a live tournament last week where I moved all-in on the turn of a Q-T-4-Q board with A-J and a turned flush draw. My opponent, a middle-aged woman who seemed a little clueless, thought for a few seconds, stared hard at the board and called. I flipped A-J thinking I had at least four, maybe even seven, outs against her hand. She had Q-T and I left.


Now, in her mind she faced an all-in bet and spent a few moments seeing if her hand was good. Evidently deciding that I didn’t have a second queen of hearts up my sleeve for quads she called. Now, that’s a slowroll but a forgivable one – she wasn’t a good player and she simply wanted to double check she had the hand she thought, it’s fair enough though it irked at the time.


Hruby, though, is a poker professional. He had over $250,000 in tournament cashes prior to his second place finish at EPT Vienna so when he has the nuts he should really know about it. Basically, whether or not Negreanu is out of line in taking out his frustrations on Hruby largely depends on that river card.



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