Part 1 here.

Here’s the second hand of the situation I described in the previous post thusly, “My least favorite situation in poker: getting correct odds to call a large bet when you expect to lose a majority of the time.”

In a live 1/2 NLHE game at Foxwoods, six players limped in, the small blind completed, and I checked from the large blind with pocket 6s. There was $16 in the pot, and the flop came Jc 6c 5c. Playing a set on a three flush board is one of the toughest situations in hold ‘em. I usually play these hands fast, operating on the assumption that I’m probably not up against a made flush, but that numerous flush draws are likely out there. In the cases where someone DOES have a flopped flush, things can get ugly fast.

The small blind bet $15, and I made a roughly pot sized raise to $60. The small blind looked at me angrily, and said, “You have the ace of clubs? That’s the only thing that can hurt me.” Basically, he was telling me he had the king-high flush and didn’t want to get out drawn. Two people folded, and a middle position player pushed all-in for $165. It folded around to the small blind, who pushed all-in for a total (including the initial $15 bet) of $204. I decided the small blind was telling the truth about his king high flush, and decided the middle position player, who had been quiet and not aggressive, also likely had a made flush. It was also possible he had a pair plus the nut flush draw. It was possible this player would have just limped with AJo, so I had to consider that as well.

I also decided that I was not up against a set of jacks, as pocket jacks would likely have raised preflop. The hand was now down to a simple pot odds decision. There was $445 in the pot, and it cost me $144 to call. I had everyone in the hand substantially covered, incidentally. I mentally calculated my pot odds at 3:1 in my head (round the pot up to 450 and the call up to 150, and it becomes an easy calculation. The precise pot odds were 3.09:1).

A set vs. a made flush is a roughly 2:1 dog. How did I know that? Because I’d worked it out at home long before. And now you know too. And knowing is half the battle. Getting 3:1 pot odds for a 2:1 draw means I was substantially priced in. In other words, I needed to put $144 in the pot knowing that two thirds of the time I was going to lose. That’s a crappy situation to be in. Like I said, it’s one of my least favorite situations in poker.

Before going on, here’s some precise odds, calculated using PokerStove.

My set vs. two flushes where two cards are in the deck which can make a straight flush (i.e. one player has 7c 8c or 4c 3c and the other player isn’t holding any of his outs):

Set of 6s: precisely one shot in three, 33.33%
King high flush: 57.475%
SF Draw: 9.19%

My set vs. two made flushes where it would take two runners to make a straight flush (this is what I was actually up against it turns out):

Set of 6s: 35.55%
Flushes: 64.45% total between them

My set vs. one made flush and one pair with nut flush draw:

Set of 6s: 30.122%
Made flush: 45.183%
Pair + nut flush draw: 24.695%

You can see that even in the worst case detailed above, I’m at worse a ~2.3:1 dog. (Of course, if a set of jacks was out there, I would be down to 1 out).

I called. The small blind had Kc 7c. The middle position player had Ac 4c. The final pot was $589, and I had an expectation of ~$209. My $144 call, thus, had a profit expectation of ~$65.

The outcome? I don’t even remember what the turn and river cards were. They didn’t pair the board, and I lost the hand.

Note that these aren’t bad beat stories. I got my money in expecting to lose and lost–the best hand held up to win in every case. If faced with the exact same situations all over again, however, I would make the call all over again. Being able to make those sorts of calls is an important part of being a successful poker player. It also highlights why bankroll considerations are important. It’s not hard to lose a number of such big pots without winning one, so you have to be deep pocketed enough to absorb those hits. Otherwise, you’re setting yourself up for a situation where you cannot afford to make profitable calls, and that’s a very bad spot indeed.

Posted by Beck as Poker at 4:55 PM PDT

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I’ve decided to write up two hands I played in which I was faced with what is, for me, my least favorite situation in poker: getting correct odds to call a large bet when you expect to lose a majority of the time.

I knew what I was doing at the time. I knew I was probably going to lose the money I put in the pot. And I would do it again. If you can’t make calls like this, you’re giving away a lot of value over the long run, and should be embarrassed to call yourself a poker player.

Here’s the first hand:

First of all, I didn’t play this hand perfectly. You can make arguments for different action in at least two spots. Nonetheless, the big money decision on the end was made for me by the pot odds, which is why I detail the hand.

In a 1/2 NLHE game at Foxwoods, two players limped in, and the button raised to $15. The button raised a wide range of hands, but saved the larger raises (this qualified as one of his larger raises) for pocket pairs. Could be deuces, could be aces. He had been controlling the table fairly well, and I had been looking for a spot to play back at him. I looked down at 3d4d in the small blind and decided this was the spot. I called, and everyone else folded. (Can you spot the first place I could have played this hand differently? Yeah, easy fold ordinarily, but you can argue I could have played back at him with any two cards. Since I was to his immediate left, I could have just waited until I had position on him, which would have been better, but c’est la vie).

The flop came 2h 6d 7d, giving me a 12 out draw to a very strong hand. I checked, my opponent bet $25, and I check-raised to $75. I think both he and I felt the vibe that I had been looking to check-raise with almost any hand at that point. Ideally I could have disguised that, but what was done was done. He pushed all-in, and now I had a tough decision.

He had me substantially covered, and I had $170 behind. I was getting almost exactly 2:1 odds (2.09:1 to be precise, but at the table, doing the math in my head, I rounded it to 2:1), and I began thinking my way through the hand.

The real dilema was deciding whether my opponent had a set or an over pair. Against an overpair, with 12 outs, I knew I was almost in a coin flip against him (about 55% to 45%, or 11:9). Getting 2:1 pot odds, that meant I was definitely priced in to call. Against a set, however, I was a slightly worse than 2:1 dog, and was maybe, maybe not, priced in to call.

At that point, my opponent actually helped make my decision for me. “Are you trying to figure out if you have the best hand, or are you trying to figure out if you have the right odds?” he asked me.

“I know you have the best hand. Technically, I actually have the nut low right now, but I have 12 outs,” I honestly told him. “I have the three-four of diamonds.”

“Ooh. Now I don’t want you to call. I’m holding a diamond, by the way, so you only have 11 outs, not 12,” he informed me, clearly not wanting to gamble in such a large pot.

“Oh, so you don’t have a set?” I replied. In the moment, I was thinking he probably didn’t have a set of deuces, though that was possible. I just blurted out the set comment without thought, but it hit its mark by chance. He looked crest fallen, and replied, “No, I don’t have a set.” I could tell quite clearly that he was telling the truth. So he had an overpair, and I was priced in.

“OK,” I declared, “This is my last hand of the night, win or lose. I call.”

We turned up our hands. He had pocket tens, with the ten of diamonds.

Before I finish the story, let’s figure my expectation: There was $526 in the pot. I had 41.818% equity in the pot (I’m using PokerStove to calculate equity. It’s a free download. Every player should have it. Go download it now if you don’t have it already. And no, I’m not getting anything for pimping PokerStove. I just admire useful software when I see it). That means I had an expected win of $220. Subtract out the $170 call, and you get a $50 profit from the hand from calling.

I don’t enjoy risking $260 for an expected profit of $50. Taking risks like that substantially contributes to variance. I could have just smooth called the flop and, potentially, the turn, and put far less at risk. I also might have won far less, as my opponent might well have slowed down if a diamond or straight card came. However, I also had some fold equity as well, and if you never check-raise a player’s continuation bets, he’s never going to slow down against you. Anyway, enough of defending my questionable play, here’s how the hand ended:

The turn was the ace of spades. The river was the eight of hearts. I lost the pot and went home.

Posted by Beck as Poker at 11:40 AM PDT

5 Comments »

I am such a lazy blogger. I’ve had lots of thoughts and ideas and hands that would make for good posts, but just haven’t thought to write it up. Would you believe I was once a three post per day blogger for six months straight? (It was politics, not poker, but you get the idea). Anyway, I’m back, at least for now. Hopefully my erratic posting priorities haven’t driven away all the regular readers. Maybe if I had a few more readers, I’d be inspired to write more often…. [You actually think that's going to work? No, but worth a shot.--ed.]

Posted by Beck as Poker at 11:11 AM PDT

1 Comment »

In October I wrote about the scandal at Absolute Poker, and included the following warning:

AP and UltimateBet are now corporately linked, so you may want to consider leaving UB as well. I intend to as soon as I clear my remaining bonus there, on the grounds that they will be paying me more in bonus than I will be paying them in rake. Well, that and contrary to what Phil Hellmuth has bragged about in their latest run of commercials, their software sucks. (At least it does for me.)

 
Ten days ago, UB confirmed what had been long suspected:

The investigation has concluded that certain player accounts did in fact have an unfair advantage, and that these accounts targeted the highest limit games on the site . . . The fraudulent activity was enabled by unauthorized software code that allowed the perpetrators to obtain hole card information during live play.

A couple nights after that, while still in the process of clearing that bonus, this happened to me while I was there:

Getting Hand History Information…
—————————————————————-

Hand #53825458-2663 at Sheffield ($1/$2 Hold’em)
Started at 02/Jun/08 02:26:26

Mike is at seat 0 with $105.25.
hotpistol is at seat 1 with $4.75.
CHLuke10 is at seat 2 with $98.50.
Whangdoodles is at seat 3 with $28.
newwestman is at seat 4 with $113.25.
WyldeOne is at seat 5 with $90.
ilanbaba is at seat 6 with $19.75.
opponet is at seat 7 with $10.
Sterling7777 is at seat 8 with $77.75.
Dirty_Thien is at seat 9 with $100.
The button is at seat 7.

Sterling7777 posts the small blind of $.50.
Dirty_Thien posts the big blind of $1.

Mike: 4d Qs
hotpistol: — –
CHLuke10: — –
Whangdoodles: — –
newwestman: — –
WyldeOne: — –
ilanbaba: — –
opponet: — –
Sterling7777: — –
Dirty_Thien: — –

Pre-flop:

Mike folds. hotpistol folds. CHLuke10 calls.
Whangdoodles folds. newwestman folds. WyldeOne
folds. ilanbaba folds. opponet raises to $2.
Sterling7777 calls. Dirty_Thien calls. CHLuke10
calls.

Flop (board: Qh Jd Ah):

Sterling7777 bets $1. Dirty_Thien calls. CHLuke10
calls. opponet raises to $2. Sterling7777 calls.
Dirty_Thien folds. CHLuke10 calls.

Turn (board: Qh Jd Ah Qd):

Sterling7777 bets $2. CHLuke10 calls. opponet
raises to $4. Sterling7777 calls. CHLuke10 calls.

River (board: Qh Jd Ah Qd Ad):

Sterling7777 checks. CHLuke10 bets $2. opponet goes
all-in for $2. Sterling7777 folds.

Showdown:

CHLuke10 shows Td Kd.
CHLuke10 has Td Kd Jd Qd Ad: royal flush.
opponet shows As Ac.
opponet has As Ac Qh Ah Ad: four aces.

Hand #53825458-2663 Summary:

$1.50 is raked from a pot of $31.
$.50 jackpot contribution is raked.
CHLuke10 wins $29 with royal flush.
—————————————————————-

This triggered the Bad Beat Jackpot, at that point nearly $165,000, and I walked away with an almost $3,800 share.

And thus, perhaps, the oldest ethical dilemma in poker resurfaces. It had long been known that the first poker games, the ones swindlers had set up on Mississipi riverboats, were all completely rigged. When a friend asked legendary gambler Canada Bill, “Don’t you know this game is crooked?”, Bill reportedly answered “Yes, but it’s the only game in town.”

UltimateBet is not the only game in town, and I know this. I’m only staying until I’m done with the bonus, and then I’m gone, and there’s not a jackpot big enough to entice me to stay (though, I must admit, the 9% interest both UB and AP give to members of their top-level loyalty program comes damn close). Between the bonus money, the rakeback account I have, and some of the other rewards, my net contribution is minimal.

But still, I do feel a little bad contributing rake money to a shady organization. And even without the moral quandary, I don’t really feel like I earned this money. Even though I’m not mostly a tournament player, there’s something a little disconcerting about the fact that I won more money when I folded Queen-Four offsuit under the gun than I did in my two biggest tournament cashes combined. In fact, you can add my second-highest score again and it gets to roughly how much I won for sitting back and watching four Aces square off against a royal flush.

So, with that in mind, you will probably find me making multiple charitable donations to my fellow poker players and more than a few cocktail waitresses in about one month’s time. I should be easy to spot. Look for the guy having the time of his life.

Edit 6/8 5:39 PM: For more information, here’s the giant 2+2 thread on the subject. In addition, the 2+2 Pokercast interviewed Paul Leggett, COO of Tokwiro Enterprises, which owns UB and AP. A brief discussion begins at about the 30-minute mark, followed by the interview, which starts about 45 minutes in. (But listen from the beginning for some entertaining discussion on the WSOP, specifically some bizarre prop bets.)

Posted by Mike as Ethics, Gambling, Quotes, Travel, Vegas, WSOP at 10:36 AM PDT

4 Comments »

I saved the second time I was dealt pocket aces that day for the last story to tell because I think it’s the most interesting from a hand analysis perspective.

UTG, I looked down at two black aces and just called the big blind. My intent was to re-raise, and given the raising frequency at the table, I was pretty confident I would get my chance. Foolhardy me! Eight people saw the flop in an unraised pot, and already the hand was off to a rough start.

Things looked brighter though after I flopped the nuts. The flop came Ac Kh 6h. With so many people in the pot though, I was done taking chances, and bet $35 into the $40 pot. Everyone folded except for one person–a player I had seen make a number of loose calls in the past. I had a better read on this player than on anyone else at the table, so I was fairly happy to get a call from him. At that point, there was a very wide range of hands he could hold, but a flush draw seemed most likely.

The turn was an off suit jack, but I remained unworried, as the only hand that could beat me would be a queen-ten which would have hit an inside straight draw. I bet $100 into the $105 pot, confident that any draw my opponent had would happily take the horrible odds offered and stay in the hand. Much to my surprise, my opponent now raised. He raised the minimum amount, making it $100 more to me.

Time to put him on a hand. First of all, I had picked up on a tell. When my opponent had a strong hand, he would slide way back in his chair and lean sharply forward. He looked like a defensive lineman getting ready to tear straight for a quarterback. Given this guy’s build and appearance, I honestly think he probably was a college football player once upon a time. He literally seemed like he was assuming a three point stance when he had a big hand. That’s exactly my opponent’s posture at that moment, so I could dismiss all weak holdings, bluffs, and draws.

This guy had a made hand, but it was one he couldn’t raise with preflop. He definitely wasn’t afraid to raise a lot of limpers preflop, so I dismissed A-K, A-J, and K-K from his range. I decided that K-J was very unlikely as well. First, he probably would have raised with it preflop. Second, he might have folded it on the flop. Third, I think he would have been a little more cautious with that holding. Fourth, I don’t think his Strong Hand Tell would have been so pronounced with that weak two pair. While I concede it might be a mistake to dismiss K-J from his range of potential holdings, at the time, that’s exactly what I did. That only leaves two contenders: Q-T and 6-6.

Some of you might be thinking he wouldn’t have Q-T there because it would be an inside straight draw. You would be making the mistake of projecting the way you play onto another person. In reality, I had early on seen this player draw at inside straights with much worse implied odds. As it is, if he got all-in, he would make enough to justify calling a pot sized flop bet with only 4 outs.

If he had 6-6 then I had him crushed. If he had Q-T then I had 10 outs to win. I was getting about 4:1 pot odds on a 3.4:1 draw, so I happily called. First though, I decided what to do on the river. I didn’t want to have to think about it after the card was dealt, so I decided to think about it before making the easy turn call. That added the benefit of making my hand seem weaker, and increasing the likelihood of getting paid off if I filled up on the river.

If I missed, I would check, my opponent would bet, and I’d have to think about calling. He had about $350 left in front of him, and I had him covered. There was about $500 in the pot. There were three ways he could have 6-6, and sixteen ways he could have Q-T. As such, I could expect to be ahead 3/19 of the time. If his bet was greater than 3/19 of the pot size (inclusive of the bet) then I would need to fold, otherwise I’d need to call. That’s a bit of a tough calculation to do in your head at the table while under pressure, but it’s surprisingly easy to guesstimate. 3/18 would be one sixth, which is 16 2/3%. 3/20 would be 15%. So if the bet size was much greater than 15% of the new pot size, I’d need to fold. With 500 in the pot, and given the flop action, a bet of $100 or greater would seem normal. A $100 bet would bring the pot up to $600, and 15% of 600 is 90–dictating a fold. Basically then, I decided I would fold to any bet $100 or greater, and call any bet that was smaller.

Take a minute to take this thought process to an even higher level. I was against an average-at-best opponent, but imagine if I’d been up against a top player. That player would himself be able to do all this reasoning, seeing that I would reach the conclusion I just reached. That would inform him that if he had 6-6, he needed to bet over $100 in order to get me to fold my winners. As a consequence, I’d have to make much looser calls against a top opponent (especially since I wouldn’t be able to eliminate the chance that the player was bluffing were it not for the tell–a tell I wouldn’t expect to pick up on a top player).

I also needed to decide what to do if I filled up on the river. This is another interesting conundrum. If my opponent has 6-6, then I make more money by check-raising. Betting into a paired board represents the full-house, and a scared bottom full might well just call. If checked to, however, he would certainly bet, and would probably have to call the raise. Conversely, against Q-T I’d probably make more money by betting out, as he might not bet the hand, but would probably call a reasonable bet. I decided to bet out $150. The times he held 6-6, betting out would probably cost me about $150 in opportunity (since I wouldn’t get to set him all-in with a check-raise), but against a straight, checking would probably cost me about $150, as I think that’s a bet he would call given the size of the pot. Since the straight was the more likely holding, I decided to bet out $150 on the river if I filled up.

The river was the eight of hearts for a final board of Ax Kh 6h Jx 8h. I checked, and my opponent said something about the heart killing his action and checked behind. Yeah, all that work figuring out what to do on the river was for naught.

I showed my set of aces, and he turned up Q-T for the win with a turned inside straight.

Posted by Beck as Poker at 4:34 PM PDT

14 Comments »

This past weekend, I found myself in a pleasantly soft 2/5 NLHE game in Atlantic City. Even better, I caught good cards for most of the seven hour session, including being dealt pocket aces four times. They held up twice. I decided the story of those four hands would make an interesting post, so here it is.

The fourth time I was dealt pocket aces was the least interesting. I raised, got one caller, bet the ragged flop, and took down the pot.

The third time was one of the losers, but I somehow managed to lose the minimum. There was one limper, and I raised to $25. Two loose players called, and the big blind–a young player of marginal skill–called. The limper folded. The flop came J-9-5 with two hearts (I did not hold the ace of hearts). Action checked to me, I bet $60 into the $107 pot, and only the big blind called. Interestingly, I had intended to bet $75, but accidentally came forward with too few chips. Then, rather than draw undue attention by acting weird and pulling my hand back to grab more chips, I just went with the $60 level. It would not have made any difference in the outcome of the hand, but it did save me $15. The turn was the last card I wanted to see: the ten of hearts. My opponent checked, and I checked behind. I don’t even remember what the river was, but the action went check-check, and the big blind turned up jack-ten offsuit for top two pair.

When I turned up my hand, the big blind commented, “Oh, I should have bet!” Clever fellow, wasn’t he?

The first time I was dealt aces was in only my second orbit of play after arriving at the table. I was sitting on about $425 in chips. The player UTG, who seemed relatively tight, open raised to $20. I was second to act, and re-raised to $40. It folded around to the big blind, who called, and the player UTG called. The flop was nine high and ragged. The action checked to me, and I bet $80. The player int he big blind check-raised to $160, and the player stuck between us folded. Now I had a tough decision. Basically, I needed to decide if my opponent had a set. He had shown signs of being a pretty loose preflop player in earlier hands, so ace-nine was possible, as were the over pairs.

The key realization at this point in the hand is that you’re not really being faced with an $80 call, you’re being faced with a call for all your money, as your opponent will almost certainly be getting the money in unless he’s on some sort of strange stone bluff. I asked him if he had a set, and he laughed and joked back with me. He seemed easy going and relaxed and genuinely happy with his hand, which was worrisome, but I ultimately decided that he probably didn’t have three-of-a-kind (key word: probably). I decided that he’d be trying harder to suppress his excitement if he had a hand that powerful. So I called.

Then I called his $100 turn bet. Then I called his $70 river bet. The small river bet was actually the scariest one of all. The decreased bet size seemed like a suck bet designed to vacuum a few last drops of money out of a marginal hand. My opponent then turned up his hand: pocket kings. He had set a good trap, successfully disguising the strength of his hand preflop, but wound up trapping himself against the one possible superior hand.

I had given serious thought on the flop to simply pushing all-in after the check-raise, and indeed, had I done that, I would have made a little more money on the hand. Conversely, I would have lost more money on the hand had I been behind. There was a greater risk though: that a hand like pocket tens or jacks would have folded, and that bluffing hands would all have to be abandoned. It’s impossible to do an EV calculation here without knowing the frequency with which he would have bluffed or semi-bluffed that flop, but on the whole, I think the decision is very close to break-even. Regardless, all but about $50 of my money got into the pot anyway, and it was a great way to take a lead early in the session.

When the hand was over, one player commented something along the lines of, “Great call. There were a lot of big hands possible there!” He was referring to the final board which was something like 9h 6d 4c 8h 6h. What the commenter completely failed to realize is that the only reasonable hands I had to worry about based on the action were pocket pairs. It hardly entered my mind that my opponent might show down a flush or a straight.

Posted by Beck as Poker at 1:17 PM PDT

1 Comment »

I had the an exchange with another player in a no limit game at Foxwoods a while ago where I had to bite my tongue and smile. It wasn’t easy. Now I’m going to respond.

First of all, here was the situation and conversation as it unfolded:

I raised with a pair of tens before the flop and got three callers. The flop came with a ten and two clubs. I bet about three quarters of the pot. Two people folded, and a decent player called. The turn was a brick, I bet half the pot, the other guy called. The river was a club. I checked, and my opponent checked behind. I turned up my hand and said, “Set of tens.”

He asked, “Why didn’t you bet the river?” I responded, “I was worried about the flush.” At this point, my opponent went into full on lecture mode, declaring, “Oh please, do you know what the odds of me actually having two clubs there is?” I made no response. “Seriously, do you?” “Not off the top of my head I replied,” and left it at that, my tongue crying out in pain.

OK buddy. Here’s my answer.

You’re asking the wrong question. It doesn’t matter what the odds are of you being dealt two clubs; what matters is the odds of you having two clubs given all the action to that point. On the flop, I have to worry about three people who might have two clubs, so the chances that’s what I’m up against is tripled for starters. That you are the one who called my flop bet doesn’t suddenly decrease the chances of one of the three of you holding two clubs. And while a great many of your potential holdings would have been folded to my flop and/or turn bets, none of the holdings that include two clubs would have folded. So what you should really be asking is, “What is the conditional probability that you have two clubs given the range of hands you could be holding after the action in the hand to that point?”

The next question should be, “What’s my expected value of a bet given that range?” If I bet there, there’s a certain number of hands you’ll fold–probably a pretty large chunk of the hands you might be holding at that point–turning my bet into a pointless exercise in increased risk. Some of the time you’ll call with a worse hand, and I lose money there by not betting into those hands. Some of the time you’ll call with a flush, and some times you’ll raise with a flush, at which point I have a hard decision and a very good chance to lose a lot more money. So while the two clubs hands only represent a fraction of your potential holdings, they have to be weighted very heavily as they’re the money-loss-causing fraction of your holdings. Any more questions smartass?

Incidentally, the odds of being dealt two clubs are 1/4 * 12/51 = 1/17 = 5.9%. Of course, with three clubs on the board (and four other cards definitively eliminated), the chances are decreased to 10/45 * 9/44 = 1/22 = 4.55%

Posted by Beck as Poker at 11:55 AM PDT

2 Comments »

So, Beck will be in Vegas in mid-July, and Mike is talking about trying to go then because that’s around his birthday.

However, my birthday is June 5th — the day the WPBT 2008 non-event starts. I’ll be 30 and what better way to celebrate my 30th birthday than donking it up with poker bloggers?!

But, that’s also when summer school starts, and a trip to Vegas isn’t exactly the most responsible thing to do as I try to finish out school. Hmm. Decisions, decisions.

Posted by Jaxia as Life, Travel, WPBT at 1:41 PM PDT

4 Comments »

The following exchange happened last night at Foxwoods between myself and the player to my left. Believe me when I say that this is a conversation you never want to have with me… or anyone for that matter.

Me: “Dude, you have a straight flush!”
Dude: “I know!”
Me: “So why didn’t you raise???”

The board on the river was 7h 8h 9h Th X (I don’t remember the last card, but it wasn’t a heart). Dude checked, the other guy in the hand bet $50, and Dude called. Then he turned up the jack of hearts. As soon as I spoke, the guy looked up and realized that his Victim had more chips. He simply couldn’t see them because of the way Victim’s hands were positioned. Furthermore, Victim didn’t have any hearts in his hand at all, and wouldn’t have called another cent, so honest mistake and no opportunity cost.

Sadly, that’s not the first time I’ve seen that happen. The other time was much worse. There was a one gap four card straight flush on board. The hapless fool on my left checked, the next player to act bet, and the hapless fool, after thinking about it for a while, decided to call. All he had was a medium-high card of the suit, and he only called given the chance that his opponent was bluffing. As you’ve no doubt deduced, that medium-high card gave the hapless fool a straight-flush. His opponent had the ace of the suit. And they were both deep stacked. the error cost him well over three hundred dollars.

So please, folks, please. Don’t ever make that mistake. Really. Every time the last player to act on the last street merely checks or calls while holding the nuts and more cash behind, a puppy dog gets drop-kicked.

You wouldn’t want to be responsible for drop-kicking a puppy dog would you?

Posted by Beck as Poker at 4:53 PM PDT

5 Comments »

I’m going to be in Vegas over the weekend of July 11 for my bachelor party. Any and all readers of the site are encouraged to let me know if you’re going to be there at the same time. Donkey poker shall be played in excess.

I’ll toss up another post on the subject when it gets closer to the actual date, but I wanted to mention something now while the airfare is still cheap enough to buy without taking out a second mortgage.

Posted by Beck as Poker at 4:23 PM PDT

2 Comments »