Sometimes, poker is just about convenience. Maybe it’s a rainy day, and you’ve got nothing better to do than visit the local casino. You find yourself joining a $2/3 NL hold’em game, looking for a bit of entertainment to pass the time. Other times, it’s about the demands of the game itself. Every year around June, the World Series of Poker (WSOP) draws in serious tournament players, and you know there are two types of people: those who are at the WSOP and those who wish they were there. For cash players, the same mentality applies during major events like the Super Bowl or March Madness. They know that the serious cash games are about to get even more serious, and they clear their calendars for it.
And then, sometimes, those motivations align perfectly. For Lee Jones, it happened when his wife was recovering from knee surgery and their sleep schedules were out of sync. It was 5:00 AM, and after realizing he was wide awake, Lee had a brilliant idea. He decided to check the poker games at Bay 101 casino and found out that there were two active $2/$3/$5 games and a third that was about to break. Normally, he wouldn’t have bothered, but with his wife in good hands and his son sleeping over, Lee found the perfect opportunity to indulge in some poker action.
The allure of playing poker at this early hour wasn’t just the convenience—it was the prime opportunity to prey on overnighters. Lee knew from experience that people who had been playing all night were no longer playing their best. He reflected on Brad Owen’s vlogs, where Brad would show up at the casino early in the morning, knowing full well that he was catching the crowd that hadn’t left since dinner the night before.
Upon arriving at the casino, Lee found a spot at one of the $2/$3/$5 tables. As he sat down and ordered breakfast, he quickly started to observe the players. From the expressions on their faces, it was clear who was winning and who was stuck. The players who had been winning the most were chatting, folding hands, and barely engaging in the game. Meanwhile, the players who were stuck seemed more eager to play pots, likely hoping to recover some of their losses.
For Lee, the goal wasn’t to engage in high-variance confrontations with the winners. Instead, he planned to wait for a good spot against the players who were most likely to be less disciplined after a long night of poker.
His opportunity came when he found himself in a hand with a player who had clearly been struggling. The opponent raised to $25, and Lee, holding A♣️4♣️ in the big blind, called. The flop came 4♦️-2♠️-9♣️, and after the opponent bet $40, Lee called, hoping for a favorable turn card. That turn card came in the form of the A♦️, giving him two pair. With a pot of $135, Lee check-raised to $270, sizing it up perfectly for a river jam.
The opponent sighed—an action that, while seemingly a bad omen, Lee knew meant that the player wasn’t confident. After calling, Lee knew his two-pair was likely good, and when the river came 8♠️, Lee made a bet of $100. The opponent sighed once more before folding, and Lee was able to scoop up a nice pot.
As the table filled with fresh players who were just starting their day, Lee realized that the overnighters were no longer his prey. The game had shifted, and it was time to cash out. Lee made a profit almost equal to the winnings from that one hand and headed home, ready for a much-needed nap.
Hunting overnighters may seem like an easy gig, but as Lee Jones shows us, it’s a strategic and often exhausting endeavor. You have to know when to strike and when the predators themselves become the prey.
