The Rules of Neighborhood Poker According to Hoyle

1990

PREFACE

When Mr. Baby asked me to review his manuscript, I did so with great vigor.

Since Mr. Baby and I have been players at his biweekly poker game from the git-go, I felt qualified to incorporate my professional experience (publishing) with my personal interest (poker). I tried to see myself as one of the players described in Chapter 7, Vinnie, Speed, Roy, Murray, Felix, and Oscar, and thought that I was more of a composite of many than an embodiment of one. Once your game has become the institution ours has, doubtless you will appreciate Chapter 7 all the more.

The reason that I call the author Mr. Baby is a glimpse into the social pecking order of poker. His real name is Stewart, so once I became familiar with him, I tried the nicknames of Stewball (with reference to the Peter, Paul & Mary tune about a racehorse) or Stew Baby. Unfailingly, when I would call him Stew Baby, his pat response would be "That’s Mr. Baby to you, especially if I had just burned him in a spirited hand. For the last few years, he has put a Mr." in front of my surname, and now I always call him Mr. Baby.

Over the course of the life of a poker game, certain nicknames will evolve. At our current game, we have a collection of Mr. Baby, Big Al, Felix (as in The Odd Couple), Cherry (as in bing), Doug-Doug, and Smokey, to name a few. There is a greater degree of camaraderie involved with nicknames in a poker game, not unlike code names given to members of a secret society.

Certain rituals enter the game. I brought several of the more exotic games to the attention of the table, my favorite of which is Pyramid. (Once you have played Pyramid a few times, it will become apparent that the dealer has a huge advantage in structuring the flow of the game, but regardless of the advantage one always must have winning cards.) Many times when it comes to my turn to deal, I don’t have to announce the game because others do it for me.

‘Are we traveling to Egypt? or Do I see a sphinx in the room?" are common questions. And I don’t even answer. I simply deal out four down cards and form the pyramid. If I’m having a bad night, I will often point the top of the pyramid toward me.

I learned the game of Pyramid in the South from a pair of identical twins whom we used to call the Samoans. No, they weren’t from Samoa, but they were dark complected and resembled a tag team from some third-rate wrestling show. They were also known as the entry (1 and 1A, get it?) and John and Tom/Tom and John because when they first walked into a room you couldn’t tell one from the other, so saying both their names in both orders assured that you were greeting them properly. There was a tacit rule at the table that they would never go the same way in a split game, not take a card that the other needed. This is not technically cheating, but it is about as close as you can come without being guilty. The brothers dealt some games that had to be played to be believed, but Pyramid was one of their better contributions.

Today is Thursday, but it is an off Thursday, no poker tonight. One week from tonight, though, the gang will assemble on the East Side of Manhattan at 5:30, beers in hand, and Mr. Baby will answer the doorbell by throwing down the key from the third floor. I think that Stewart uses the key toss as a sobriety test to gauge how responsive the players are that night. Then we will all sit down, comment on the state of the Knicks, lie about how we did at the last poker gathering, and if the first hook lands in front of me, we’ll travel to the Land of the Pharaohs …

MR. DAY

New York

January, 1990

INTRODUCTION

They play a funny card game in Las Vegas. They call it poker. I played it there once. It didn’t seem like poker to me. For one thing, they always played the same game—seven-card stud. No wild cards, no dealer’s choice. Seven-card stud. The table was very quiet and all the players were very serious. It was like 2001: A Space Odyssey—you could only hear players breathing, in between bets spaced like chess moves. I bet a dollar. An hour later, I call. Seven-card stud, followed by seven-card stud, then seven-card stud—ad nauseam. I got bored.

You see, Real Poker is not supposed to be quiet and understated, it’s not supposed to resemble anything close to chess, and it’s rarely ever straight seven-card stud. Real Poker is Baseball—3s and 9s are wild and a 4 gets you an extra card. Real Poker is Two-Card Guts, or Spit in the Ocean, or Criss Cross, or Sevens Take All, or Five-Card Draw Jacks or Better to Open Trips to Win with One-Eyed Jacks Wild. Real Poker is as many silly variations on a poker theme as you can add, or teaching everyone a new game that you just made up and having it named after you as if you had discovered a new comet. And mostly, Real Poker is when five of a kind beats a royal flush, which could never happen in Las Vegas.

I tried to find a book on neighborhood poker, the way most Americans play poker, to improve my own fortnightly game. I visited the New York Public Library and found about twenty-five books on poker. They had titles like How to Play Winning Poker, Poker: Playing to Win, Poker Strategy and Winning Play, Winning Poker, Winning Methods of Bluffing and Betting in Poker, Winning Poker Systems—and so on. I got bored.

Real Poker isn’t about winning. Real Poker is poker as practiced in private homes and apartments in neighborhoods across the country. It’s about having a good time. None of the books I’ve found on poker is designed for you or me, members of the millions of neighborhood poker games—or for those of you who have never played the game but want to learn. This book is not about how to win at poker; this book is about the games poker players play, the wild and woolly variations that are dealt out at neighborhood dealer’s choice games. The questions this book answers are not How can you tell if someone who has just bet $1,000 with a pair of 3s showing is bluffing? but ‘Are Queens in the hole wild in Follow the Queen? or, In Night Baseball, do I have to match the pot if I get a wild 3? And, most important, Where’s the beer?"

I’ve included nearly 200 different games and variations, the count depending on your definition of variation. There are several variations of Baseball, for example, but I’ve counted it as one game since all the variations play similarly. But there are other games that, with minor variations, become whole new games.

You may be familiar with some of these games, but not by the name I’ve used or with the exact rules I follow. That’s okay. I make no claims of patent or originality; there are few poker games that are truly original. The only important thing is that you recognize the game when someone calls it.

But there is more to neighborhood poker than games. There is the ambience, the atmosphere at a neighborhood poker game. This atmosphere is created by the players and how they react to each other. They’re friends having fun, n t strangers in competition. Poker is a group of guys who get together once or twice a month to laugh, talk sports, drink beer, and smoke big, ugly cigars and who like to sit around and have a good time and maybe play a little cards. It’s macho camaraderie, doing something slightly illegal, that excites the rebel within most middle-aged poker players—along with the thrill of athletic-like competition without risk of serious injury to underused muscles. It’s half a dozen guys sitting in a cramped room for five hours, breathing secondhand smoke that would choke any resident of L.A. on a smog-alert day, eating brown or green sandwiches on stale bread, drinking warm beer, sitting in uncomfortable metal folding chairs, staring into bright overhead lights, foreheads and backs dripping wet with sweat, hair greasy, skin sticky, palms clammy, body smelly—then staggering home $150 poorer.

I know what you’re thinking. We’re not in it for the money? And, this is fun? I asked the players at my own game what keeps them coming back week after week. What made Felix say at the end of The Odd Couple: Marriages may come and go, but the game must go on?

Did I get deep metaphysical insights into the great cultural and social diversity of Americans’ leisure activities? How poker is a shared experience, a deep part of our human psyche dating back to the Stone Age and the primitive need for community? Or the underlying need for competition, brought on by the ego-crushing forces of everyday life? Is it related to man’s need for self-abuse, brought on by a guilty conscience of sins committed by thought and deed?

Are you kidding? I got Who cares? Shut up and deal.

That’s what I thought. It’s 5 & 2, no sandbagging, deuces wild and pass the potato chips. And we’re light an ante.

SECTION

I

POKER BASICS

Ihang out with a lot of regular guys, the type you can pass three or four hours with at the bar and grill, shooting the breeze about sports, women, rock and roll, and politics while hoisting a couple of cool ones and checking out the local talent.

I also hang out with some intellectual types. (I can’t help it—I’m a writer. I have to hang out with intellectuals. It’s part of my job.) These are the guys who dress in black no matter how hot it is outside, who read Baudelaire, who can explain the difference between atonal and dissonance, and who watch foreign movies with subtitles—by choice—and discuss what the filmmaker is trying to say over an espresso and a piece of baklava.

I also know more than a few executives, guys in gray Brooks Brothers suits, red silk ties, and wing-tip Oxfords who are responsible for such ail-American concepts as demographics, market share, and, best of all, return on investment.

Now, you’re probably saying to yourself, Okay, you hang out with a lot of different types of guys. What’s that got to do with poker? Well, I’m glad you asked. The diverse composition of my crowd has a great bearing on whether any of the following is going to make sense.

Every other Thursday night, I host a poker game that includes players from all three groups. On occasion we have new players. Some guys fit right in, no matter who they are. Other guys lose. And I don’t mean just lose. I mean they’re lost. Some guys, no matter how cool, intellectual, or savvy they are, don’t have the foggiest notion of what they have in their hand or of what is going on at the table around them. Raises and calls hit them from all sides. Hearts, diamonds, clubs, and spades swirl before them as if the deck of cards were thrown up in front of a fan. It always seems to be their turn to bet, and they invariably make the wrong one. They don’t realize how their betting, or lack of it, affects everyone else’s strategy, much less their own pocketbook. Whatever proud achievements they may have to their credit in the world outside my apartment, they’re hopeless incompetents with five cards and a stack of chips.

Sure, they understand the theory of poker. They know that a straight beats three of a kind. They know that if someone raises they owe more money to the pot. They know what a bluff is. But they can’t put it together. They don’t understand the practice of poker.

The point I’m taking the scenic route to is that poker is much more than being smart, knowing that a straight beats three of a kind, or understanding what calls and raises are. Poker is more than reading the subtle signs that reveal whether a player is bluffing or not. Poker is a synergistic combination of these elements and some intangibles that can’t be explained in a book. The guys you’d think wouldn’t understand Rambo are the sharpest ones at the table, while the guys who regularly read The Wall Street Journal leave the game with just enough money for cab fare.

The best way to understand the complete poker experience is to play. When we have a new player at our game, we suggest he pull up a chair, grab a brew, and soak in some poker atmosphere. He should watch three or four hands to get a feel for how we play different games, to get into the poker rhythm. He should ask questions about why a hand is dealt in a particular manner. He should play along over the shoulder of one player through an entire hand, hobnob and rub elbows with the poker hoi polloi and get into the spirit of the game before trying to get into some pots. He should be ready to lose and understand why he lost, so he can win later.

Make yourself a sandwich, grab a beer, and pick up the box that says Hoyle on it. Now say to yourself, This is a deck of cards.

Welcome to neighborhood poker.

CHAPTER 1

The Poker Primer

A is for Ace, which can be high or low;

B is for Bet, which makes the pot grow;

C is for Cards, which you must choose.

D is for Dollars, which you will lose.

In an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, the opening vignette featured a poker game. The deal came to Lt. Commander Data—the android (I told you anyone could learn poker). He shuffled the cards, then calmly declared: Seven-card stud. After the first Queen, one-eyed Jacks and low hole wild. Gordy, the blind engineer, muttered, Let me write this down so I can remember it.

Don’t worry about Data’s blathering. The point is that his instructions represented dealer’s choice in all its wonder. The dealer decides what game he wants to deal, and everyone must play, no matter how silly the game may sound. The game continually changes from hand to hand as the deal moves clockwise around the table, the play controlled by the whim of the new dealer.

But the poker basics—the rules of how games are dealt, what hands beat what hands, poker according to Hoyle, Scarne, or whomever—don’t change, even unto the 24th century. You won’t find five-card draw in New York that different from five-card draw in Portland, Oregon—or Portland, Maine, for that matter.

To begin: A is for Ace-high, which means you don’t have a pair or higher and the best card in your hand is an Ace. If no one else has a pair or higher, Ace-high is the best hand and will win the pot. If no one has an Ace, then King-high will win, and so on through Queen-high, Jack-high, etc. If you and someone else both have Aces, you compare the next highest cards. If you’re still tied, compare the third highest cards, and so on. If you’re tied after the fifth card, call Guinness.

A complete hand is always composed of five cards-just like the five fingers on your flesh-and-blood hand. Here is the sequence of winning hands, in ascending order:

High card, or Ace-high

Pair

Two pair

Three of a kind

Straight

Flush

Full house

Four of a kind

Straight flush

Five of a kind (in a wild card game)

Even non-poker players have a passing familiarity with this list. Card makers, such as Hoyle, include it with every pack of cards. It’s part of the three Rs of poker—Reading the cards, Raising the bet, and Raking in the chips. You can’t spell winnings without it.

People, however, make the mistake of believing that knowing this list means they know how to play poker. This is like saying that if you can count from one to ten, you can do calculus. Test anyone who evinces interest in playing in your neighborhood game. If he answers your Do you know how to play? query with a scholarly recitation of this list, politely tell him that there’s no room at the table (unless you really don’t like the guy and you can think of no better pastime than to see him shovel cash from his wallet to yours).

Since this list is the ABCs of poker, allow me to explain each hand. You may want to clip this list and keep it handy at your next game. It may not be necessary, but, as my grandmother used to say, it couldn’t hurt. Even simple things can be forgotten after enough Wild Turkey.

Ace-high is a hand with five mismatched cards, the highest of which is an Ace. Ace-high beats a hand in which the best card is a mere King.

A pair is a hand in which two cards are of the same denomination—two 7s or two Kings, for example. The other three cards are mismatched. If someone else has an identical pair—say you both have a pair of 7s—the winning hand is determined by the next highest card in your hand, the kicker. If an Ace is one of your three extra cards, and the other fellow only has a King as a kicker, you win.

Two pair is two sets of pairs—a pair of 7s and a pair of Jacks, for instance—and the fifth card is the kicker. When you announce your hand, say I have two pair, Jacks over, meaning that the Jacks are your highest pair. The highest of the two pair determines the winner of a hand. If someone else has two pair, Queens over, you lose. If you both have Jacks over, the player with the highest second pair wins. If you have two identical pairs, the player with the highest kicker wins. If you’re still tied, call Ripley’s (you already called Guinness).

Three of a kind is a hand with three cards of the same denomination, such as three 7s, with two unmatched cards. If two players have the same three of a kind, don’t call anyone. You’re playing with a Pinochle deck.

A straight is five cards in numerical sequence, regardless of suit, such as:

As you can see, the cards are not the same suit. In a straight, it’s the numbers only that count. A straight can start with an Ace—A-2-3-4-5—which is called a small straight, or end with an Ace—10-J-Q-K-A—which is called a high straight (not a big straight; no one said poker was logical).

A flush is five cards, all of the same suit—five hearts, five diamonds, five clubs, five spades—in no particular numerical sequence, such as 2-6-9-J-A of hearts. If two players have flushes, the one with the highest cards is the winner. For instance, if you have an Ace, you have an Ace-high flush and will beat a King-high flush. If both players have Aces, then the next highest card determines the winner. Holding a flush and losing to another flush isn’t cause for calling Ripley or Guinness. Just hope your host has removed all the breakables.

A full house, also known as a boat for reasons I’ve yet to discover, is a hand with both a pair and three of a kind—for instance, three 7s and a pair of 2s. When declaring your hand, you say, I’ve got a boat, 7s over, indicating that the three of a kind, the dominant set, is the 7s. You could be beaten by a full house with three 8s or any set of three cards higher than 7s. The pair is never a determining factor unless you are playing with wild cards that make identical sets of three of a kind possible.

Four of a kind is a hand in which you’ve been lucky enough to collect all four cards of one denomination—all four 7s, for example. Two players can hold identical four of a kinds only in a wild-card game.

A straight flush is a straight made up of cards of a single suit—4-5-6-7-8 of hearts, for instance. A royal flush is a high straight flush with an Ace: A-K-Q-J-10. In a hand played without wild cards, a straight flush is the highest hand possible and the royal flush is the highest straight flush and a sure winner. I’ve never seen a natural royal flush, but then I’ve only been playing poker for 20 years.

Five of a kind can be achieved only in a wild-card game. There are only four suits and, therefore, only four cards of each numerical value—four 7s, for example, or four Queens. You can get five of a kind only if you have wild cards in addition to your natural, or non-wild, cards. To get five 7s in a game in which the dealer has declared deuces wild, you’d need: four 7s and one deuce, three 7s and two deuces, two 7s and three deuces, or one 7 and four deuces. Five of a kind is a great hand to be holding and a lousy hand to lose to, especially if you’ve been betting heavily and smugly on a straight flush.

I’ve had five of a kind. More often—twice in one month, in fact—I’ve had wild card royal flushes, only to lose to five of a kind. I was betting heavily and smugly. They’re using my screams in the next Nightmare on Elm Street.

TWO’S COMPANY, TEN’S A CROWD

Neighborhood poker is best when played with five to seven players. The more cards used in a game, the better the hands tend to get since more cards in the deck will be in play. With four hands, you may use only half the cards in the deck, so the best cards may not even make it into someone’s hand. If you play with only four players, a pair may end up winning all the time, and that’s not exactly exciting. No one is going to do much betting with only a pair. Poker is exciting when a full house beats a flush and the winner rakes in fifty chips and some loose bills, not when a pair of Queens beats a pair of 10s and the winner scrapes in ten chips.

Six is the best number of players because you can play any poker game invented, and you can all fit around a medium-size table without being able to smell your neighbor’s nervous sweat. If you have more than six players, it’s tough to play five-card draw, one of the most popular poker games. In five-card draw, each player can replace up to three of his five cards with three new cards. That means each player can get up to eight cards. Multiplied by seven players, that’s 56 cards. There are only 52 cards in a deck. Even with two Jokers in play, which I hate, there are still not enough cards to go around.

Okay, you have seven players and you can get along fine without five-card draw. Seven players can still fit, if a little tigher—and smellier—around the table. But with more than seven players, its tough to play the most common poker game—seven-card stud. If each of eight players gets the maximum seven cards, that’s also 56 cards. Plus, with eight players, that table is getting crowded.

So, if you have fewer than five players, play Black Jack or Rummy. If you have more than seven, play a lot of six-card stud and wear nose-plugs.

CHAPTER 2

What You Play For

RAVELLI: Whadoyoo play for?

MRS. RITTENHOUSE: Oh, we just play for small stakes.

RAVELLI: ‘And trench fried potatoes?"

Animal Crackers

The Marx Brothers, 1930

It’s very messy to play poker for french fried potatoes. The ketchup tends to make the cards sticky, for one thing. But identifying the stakes—how much money you’ll be playing for—is the first question you’ll ask when considering a new game or satisfying a poker curiosity-seeker about your own game. Stakes describe the level of game you play—how serious the game is. The higher the stakes, the more serious the game. We play for small stakes (without the french fried potatoes) because we don’t like to be too serious. (In fact, now that I think of it, maybe it would be more fun to play for french fried potatoes. But I digress.)

The stakes should tell you how much you could lose in a worst-case scenario. Ask about this before you enter a game. I define a neighborhood game as one in which I won’t lose more than $50 on an average night. How much your possible losses will be, of course, depends on the stakes and how well—or how badly—you play. Admittedly, $50 is a completely arbitrary figure based on my socioeconomic status (i.e., a perpetually broke freelancer).

If you need a less restrictive definition of low-stakes poker, how about this: You shouldn’t lose more in one night than you would spend on a hot date. (But after you’ve lost $50 in a poker game, you don’t then have to suffer the further ignominy of a handshake instead of a kiss and not being invited upstairs.)

In more practical terms, stakes define the highest amount of money that can be bet at one time—the limit. In Las Vegas, the lowest limit I’ve found is a $4 game—no player can bet or raise more than $4 in one bet. Most neighborhood poker games range between 50-cent and $2 limit games.

Stakes are set by the guys sitting around your table—the house in neighborhood poker—who are trying to find the holy ground between If we don’t play for at least this much, no one will be bluffed out, and If we play for this much, I’m liable to be eating bologna sandwiches for the next month. The lowest allowable bet should be enough to force you out of a game if you only have an iffy hand. If the lowest allowable bet is too low, everyone will stay in every hand, which removes the element of bluffing. For poker to have any excitement, there has