Monday, Monday... Off from work this week to tend to any number of things including getting the room ready for an unprecedented session at my beloved
Godfather Club; the
150th running of the bulls poker style in what I like to call
The Executive Game.
The two and half years this game has existed has gone by quickly. Almost as fast as the 10 or so years that I was in retirement from hosting and committed my poker time to a select few home games where I had some unforgettable times and many good memories. Power through the time I "played abroad" as I called it, and back to my early days of hosting and you'd find yourself at a tiny 110 year old farmhouse smack dab in the middle of the Frogtown neighborhood in St. Paul. You find between 5 and 10 diehards working to start a regular game.
"I got it! The Poker Family!" said The Bacon Eater, my first ever Craigslist recruit. He always called me Godfather from the first time I met him and I suppose that's where it came from. We'd move all the furniture in our tiny house out of the front room in the colder months and set up the table and play two sometimes three sessions in a weekend. We had guys like Big Slick and his dog Babe who'd be at the house after work on Friday even before I got home waiting for me to arrive. He and the dog would basically move in for the weekend. There was Pockets, Skinny Tim, Sgt. Rod, Jakester, Black Bart, GMan, and the list goes on, and on, and on... The early days... In the warmer months we played in the detached garage, three tables of cash play. I'd lean back, swaying from the homebrew I had cases and cases of, and look across the room... "Holy cow!", I thought, "What have I done? This can't go on forever for about a million different reasons." And it didn't.
I made the move to the bar scene and found an amazing game in the town where we live presently only 15 minutes out of the city and from "The Game" at the Frogtown Card Club. I played at the bars to make new contacts and look for a good game so I could take a well-deserved break from the near 500 sessions I spread in St. Paul. I got lucky and found a couple of great games. My time away from hosting turned into a full on retirement from poker for a few years. I was playing a lot and life was getting busy with our oldest getting ready to finish HS. A new neighbor moved in next door and spotted my table, lonely but loved, hiding in the garage and asked me to start a game. My wife was skeptical but didn't object. My oldest daughters boyfriend, fiancé, and now husband was interested and became my second in charge at GFC. We built the first two of the 8 or 9 tables I've built since I got back in the game and The Godfather Club and its Executive Game were born.
I brought the game back as a weekly tournament to see who had an appetite and who I could count on as future regulars. One Friday night as one of the tables we were building had come out of detailing someone suggested we "break it in" with a low-stakes cash game. We did and the doubleheaders were born; cash on Friday and a cheap STT on Saturday. Well, the cash game prevailed and I spread them twice a week for the remainder of the winter and spring. With Summer coming, because I had done this before, I took it down to Fridays only. This Friday will be the 150th running of the Executive game here at GFC over the last two and a half years. The game hasn't changed much from a hosting point of view; consistent game, tolerate no BS, mix it up w/ tournaments, mixed games, spread food, meet the needs of the players, always be recruiting, and know that you're the only one that really cares if the game is successful or not. If the game falls apart people will eventually wind up elsewhere.
Being in charge is great but it can be tough. Every decision you make affects every facet of everything else and at the end of the day you're completely alone with it all. That's why this time around I did it a little differently. My son-in-law, who banks the game, is also my second in command. Initially, he was my "Lieutenant" (you get one) and I installed a small group of regulars who I could count on and made clear they'd be privy to behind the scenes thoughts and decisions and that I would rely on their opinion when asked as well as their loyalty and confidentiality. It remains a small group of Captains as they're referred to but as I redesignated my son-in-law from Lieutenant to full on Underboss, meaning that ownership of the game is his at any moment it becomes necessary and the expectation is he won't mess it up. My top Captain moved into the role of Lieutenant. I rely on these players at least as much as they know but probably more. Their support has quelled my concerns as I have had to remove players, make small adjustments in structure, how we run week to week, and even make and then double back and unmake decisions. Hosts, have a hierarchy of your inner circle and use them to help steer your game and maintain your sanity.
I'm proud of what the
Poker Family stands for which is to say if you play here regularly or semi-regularly, you fit in. Now, nobody completely fits in everywhere. We need variety in personality yet, all of us somewhat subscribe to the notion that poker really is an analogy for life. I've always been a "build it and they will come" sort of guy. This is true when it comes to establishing a game. What they won't tell you is that once it's built you have to find a way to make them go home at some point yet have them not being able to wait to come back.
I'm sure I'll make a post or two as the week wears on relative to what I consider to be this historic event upcoming. We'll see.
Poker good.
Artwork Credit
@TheOffalo
Aluminum Cover Cards by
@Potsie1
