My posts generally run long, this one probably will run to chapters including the old story that broke me of trying to break everyone I played.
For starters, Get-a-Grip and his opponent weren't gambling. They both knew each other's game and they were wagering on the outcome of each set. There is a difference between wagering and gambling on something you can't control or predict.
Had Get-a-Grip lost his opponent would have taken his money without a second thought! Both players are trying to win the other person's money, often every bit of it they can. Which I will mention, that might have been the guy's last fifty in the bank, that didn't mean he didn't still have $49 in there! He probably has a well known group of people he can touch for a few dollars too.
I can't say that what anyone in this thread has said is morally wrong, purely a matter of viewpoints.
Many years ago I started playing with a small group that didn't consider a person was beaten until they lost every dollar they had on them and anything else they had with them they would play for, pre ATM days. Gold chains were popular and I won them by the pound. Usually tossed them to the bar maid, gold chains weren't my thing. Sticks, belts with fancy buckles, boots, western shirts, cars, tools of a person's trade, dope, not much I haven't played for. I wouldn't play for guns or women, about all I didn't play for. I didn't have a use for the dope but I found it entertaining to escort the loser to the bathroom and make them flush it! I didn't keep clothes or tools of the trade, after seeing the ratty cars I won I didn't keep them either although I had planned to.
Before long my goal was to bust the opponent flat, it didn't matter who. This went on for a couple years. I was well pleased with myself. Staying single until my mid-twenties myself I never gave any thought to these guys maybe having responsibilities. It was a hard world I lived in anyway, they were doing their best to bust me too.
A man came into my local watering hole with a couple bar tables one evening toting a hinged cue in a case, wanted to gamble. Strangers were my meat by general consensus. We started the usual three or five dollars, seemed to be an unwritten law even if we both knew we would be playing for money the bet always started small in a bar. Didn't take long before we were at twenty a game. Nice guy courteous and polite, friendly. Didn't take long to see he was outclassed though.
He should have pulled up, he couldn't seem to make himself do it. He was obviously under a lot of pressure and knew he was overmatched but he kept putting another twenty on the table and I kept taking them until he was busted.
My gambling persona was pretty polished by then and "customers" that would drop a hundred or two in the seventies were worth cultivating. When he went to the door I stepped out with him, uninvited. I just intended another handshake and a "so long." He stopped and lit a cigarette at the door and I looked over to the only strange car in front of the place. It was cold out, in the high thirties, low forties. A woman and baby had been sitting in the cold car the last couple hours. I ambled over while the guy smoked his cigarette. He hadn't asked for a walking stick and for no good reason why, I hadn't offered. Still early in the evening, not dark yet and it hadn't been a real long session.
When I got to the car I motioned for the lady to roll the window down. Small baby and she was pregnant again. I talked to her a few minutes mostly to the effect to get her husband away from pool tables, he wasn't good enough to gamble on them. I guesstimated I had taken one sixty or so off of him best I could recall so I gave her eighty. Told her to tell him I had given her twenty and keep the rest in reserve for the baby. I doubt she did but that I had no control over.
For the last couple of years I had delighted in playing just a little better than the other player, barroom banger or shortstop, which was about how I rated. Teasing them along and milking them dry, particularly the jerks and small time hustlers that thought they were hustling me, was a pleasure in life!
Now I couldn't help but wonder how many times I had taken food out of families' mouths and light bills in the winter time. That was the death of a pretty good hustler. I still played pool, still played for money, but I never tried to bust people after that. I did sometimes but it was their doing, not me leading them on.
We all have to work in our own comfort zone. I have known dozens that had no bottom, others whose conscious bothered them playing for the table or a beer. A beer was all I would gamble for with a friend, if the game was right I would bet the farm with some people and have.
Hu
