The Fish Tour - Part Six

It was the first live game to be played using the Fish System and I was resolved to have fun no matter how many hands I had to fold. There were eight total players, one of whom I had told about the Fish System and who said she would try it out as well. I produced two index cards listing the top 24 hands along with some notes about the betting rules. The game was set up as a play money game, each player starting with $354 in chips. Blinds were $1 and $2, the game was no-limit Texas Hold'em and I got to deal first. Because it was a bunch of friends sitting around the table to play for the first time together, there ended up being a lot of talking and less playing that I thought there would be; in the end there were only 23 hands played before I busted out. Out of the nearly two dozen hands, I folded 16 pre-flop as the system dictated. Of the seven hands I played, I won zero pots. I had a few close calls, but in the end I sat back to watch the rest of the table playing poker with my chips. The first hand I played was Ad 8d, the lowest possible hand I could have and stay in the pot, and I was happy to see it. I was still very cautious, however, not wanting to get so excited that I threw away money. The flop brought me another Ace, so I bet $10, which was high for the table. One of the problems with this table, though, was while hardly anyone would bet more than a few dollars at a time most of the players had no problem calling bigger bets, which made it hard to protect small hands; like my pair of aces. When I had nothing better by the river and other players were betting and calling $20, I folded. Turned out to be the right play as a player with two pair took the pot. That hand was pretty representative of how my night went. Wait for a top 24 hand, play it aggressively, get nothing better after the flop, fold to other player’s aggression. In Field Test Two-Part B I will go over the rest of the hands, the end result, and what lessons I learned about the Fish System.