That's a phrase that I've simply heard enough of, and now it makes me chuckle. It usually follows one of two plays. A player bluffs at a pot, or someone calls on a draw that was priced out of the acceptable range.
In the first instance, my favorite answer has to be "I knew I had you beat". Not everyone follows the Erik Lindgren adage of "bluff small, bet big". Some players do quite the opposite, and bet bigger when bluffing to help force their opponents out of the hand.
If someone picks up on that, they can tell when a player is not betting as though they have a hand. They are betting as though they don't have a hand. And that can lead to an insightful call.
Of course not all calls are the result of insight into betting patterns. Some come because of the personalities. After all, it is a game between people, using chips and cards. I liked this response to the question . . . "I knocked you out of the game on Wednesday. I figured you might try to push me around tonight".
It had nothing to do with the cards. Just a personality clash. And I can see that happening in a lot of games (not the Wednesday thing, the personality clash). Some people are just prone to not believe other people. A prime example of this is finding a macho guy that will always call the women at the table. It has nothing to do with the cards, it's a personality thing.
I also like hearing "I had a pair". It pretty much means that if you wait until you have a hand, and they catch any part of the flop, they'll give you their chips. But, a lot of players don't bother waiting.
I watched one player win a tournament getting the better part of his chips on two hands where others decided to push against his pairs. Once AK fell to pocket 9's, and to end the game AJo fell to a landed pair of 6's (high pair of the flop).
Those are instances of calling the bluffers down. The other hands usually involve players that chase hands, and catch. In fact, I know one player who describes his whole evening in terms of whether he's landing draws or not. He rejoices in telling me "Boy, am I sucking out tonight!".
These are players that, quite frankly, everyone at the table should know are apt to throw in chips on a draw. And, they usually have interesting responses to the question like "I always hit flushes on a Thursday", or my favorite "Fives have been coming up a lot, I figured there was a good chance I'd land a five".
Those guys are more entertaining than the ones who find themselves so far into a pot that they fell they are either going to hit, or walk away crippled. So, they'll call with everything they have since they want to either get lucky and double up, or just go home without prolonging the agony.
They usually give the least entertaining answer of "I had to". And, they may be telling the truth.
In the end, if you're bluffing and getting caught, asking "How can you make that call?" is probably silly. And if they land a high-priced draw, well, you want them to overpay for draws. Over time it will result in a lot more chips in your stack than theirs.
Still, some of the answers you get to that question can make me chuckle, while revealing something extra about the game and the players at the table.
This page last upadted April 3rd, 2007.
