Some people think that all poker players are liars. All poker players sometimes lie; that’s definitely true. But in my experience most players don’t often lie during a hand. They may misrepresent their hands, or mislead you, especially after the hand is over, but seldom will they tell an outright lie while a hand is going on.
But even if people might avoid lying, many people love to verbally and ambiguously mislead. Ways of misleading, but not directly lying, are saying things like:
- “I’ve got a good hand.” (Good in comparison to what?)
- “I’ve got it.” (Okay; what is it that you have?)
- “You should let this one go.” (Why should I let it go?)
- “I’ve got K high,” when they’ve got pocket kings.
- “I’ve got a pocket pair,” when they have quads.
- “I’ve just got a pair of queens”, when their pocket queens makes a set.
A player who successfully misleads opponents accomplishes several things: he avoids the pain of lying, he doesn’t look like an asshole, and, of course, he gets his opponents to act contrary to their best interests.
Jamie Gold is a perfect example of someone who excels at (or at least very much enjoys) misleading his opponents. He seldom out-and-out lied during his talkative performance at the 2005 WSOP (or his television appearances since). He did not want to appear an asshole by lying. Rather, he used ambiguous and misleading talk to try to achieve his goals. (And of course ran hotter than God.)
Take as a case in point a hand from the no-limit cash game show Poker After Dark where Jamie Gold successfully misled Alan “Boston” Dvorkis. Alan was pretty short-stacked and raised with QT. Jamie looked down at pocket kings and raised Alan all-in. Jamie kept insisting to Alan that all he (Jamie) had was King high. Gold even gets more specific and says (twice) that he doesn’t have KQ. He even shows Paul Wasicka his cards and asks him if he has KQ; Paul honestly says “nope”. Then Alan says he’s getting the right price if Gold has AK; Gold says “I said I have K high; I don’t have AK.” (It’s such a ridiculous, retarded bit of poker you really have to see it to believe it.)
These statements led Alan to eventually call, thinking that if Jamie had KJ or weaker then Alan was getting acceptable odds. When Alan called, Jamie flipped over his kings with the sheepish announcement, “The highest card in my hand is a king.”
Needless to say, Boston wasn’t pleased with this. But Jamie Gold could successively counter any accusations of being extremely under-handed with the argument that he had technically been telling the truth. I think this is an example of the kind of thoughts that go through your typical verbally tricky player’s mind; they want to trick you, but they don’t want to have to lie to your face to do it. They want to get the thrill of being a liar and/or cheat without actually being one.
Being familiar with the type of tricky, smug player Gold is, Boston could have easily deduced Gold had a pair of kings in that spot. When Jamie Gold tells you, “I’ve got K high,” which is an ambiguous statement, your wheels should start spinning as to why he’d tell you this. It would seem like a really mean-spirited thing for Gold to straight-out lie in that spot. With some players this could still be possible, but in this situation (on television, in a seemingly friendly game of “equals”, and the fact that Gold is a “world champion”) I would consider a bald-faced lie very unlikely.
At the same time, Gold is not the type of player to straight out tell you his vulnerability in such a situation. When faced with such an ambiguous statement in such a weird spot, intended to make you think Gold is weak, a pair of kings could be logically deduced.
I found your site today and really liked it.
Great read, thanks.
Terrific post.
Seems to me the tap-tap-tap noise from his “this is stupid” meter had Boston steaming a bit. I haven’t seen Gold that much, but I don’t remember him ever using any persona but the smarmy smug self-important playa type you fear will show up to take your daughter out. When Boston asks him specifically, “and you don’t have 2 kings – it’s K high?” JG becomes irritated and tells him he’s abusing Gold’s generous nature. “Make your own decisions” from him sounded like “I’m walking here!” from Hoffman.
Which is not to say I could have pulled it apart at the time. But I was kind of expecting Boston would.
Haha. I just today finally got your reference to Midnight Cowboy. I knew you were referencing a Dustin Hoffman movie, but when I was rereading this I remembered the scene you’re talking about…
Actually, Jamie Gold is a tough read. In his earlier days, you could read his mood better than his words; he seemed to exude genuine cheerfulness when he had a good hand. But he’s probably gotten more aware of that, and now decides to show irritation when he has a monster. Anyways, I think it’s a mistake to believe that you can logically deduce KK from JG’s response. He could have K2 and still easily give the “don’t take advantage of me” schpiel. It wouldn’t be lying, and he’s played enough poker hands to give any line at any time.
I missed him saying the “Don’t take advantage of me” stuff. I find it unlikely he’d basically try to tell Boston he’s weak if he wasn’t super strong. I think he might try that kind of weird reverse psychology with other types of more ambiguous statements/behaviors, but in this case, him telling Boston basically “I have a real weak hand” was something he’s much more likely to with a strong hand. Of course, you’re right; anything’s possible and Gold does switch it up in other situations. I’d be very surprised to see another hand where Gold acted in a similar way and was not strong. I know he’s capable of acting really tricky, but in this case I think it’s a spot where Boston was obviously on the fence about it to begin with, so Jamie’s goal was to tip him toward the calling side. And as long as he could do that without lying, he would try to do that.