It seems like some of my favorite bloggers have been writing about bad beats this week. I also joined the whine-fest by including a couple hands I played the other night on Full Tilt.
Now I want to tell you of my all-time worst beat.
It was a warm summer night in Las Vegas several years ago. I was sitting at a $2-4 limit hold-em game at the Plaza, playing some cards, visiting and enjoying a few adult beverages. Sitting in early position, I looked down at pocket threes and called. As is the norm in a low-limit game, there were several limpers before the button raised. Everyone called and we saw a flop of 7c,3d,6c. I bet my set and got a couple of calls, including the pre-flop button raiser.
The turn was the 8h. Once again, I bet my set and it was folded to the button, who raised. I put him on either an over pair or a set of eights and called.
The river was the case three, giving me quads. I bet $4 and the villain raised to $8. I now had him solidly on pocket eights and betting his full house, which was no good. I was absolutely giddy and re-raised to $12.
The dealer then announced that because we were heads-up, there was no cap on betting.
SAH-WEET!
Villain raised again and we went back and forth for quite some time until we had around $200 in the pot. When he finally just called, I knew I had him and tabled my quad threes.
He looked at my hand, then slow-rolled the 4c,5c. Did I forget to mention that the case 3 was a club, giving him a straight flush?
Oh crap! You could hear the whole table go "Oooooohhh."
There could have been a dinosaur walk in the Plaza and take a dump on my shoes and I wouldn't have been more shocked than I was to lose that hand.
In poker lingo, pocket twos are known as "ducks." At the local games I play, in my honor, "ducks" are pocket threes.
There was a happy ending though. I did win a $25 high hand jackpot!
OMFG! That happening in the Bizarro World of Full Tilt is one thing, but LIVE?
ReplyDeleteThere's no getting away from quads.
Ha - I'll be calling threes ducks at my next home game too. Great post.
VJ-
ReplyDeleteYep, I was surprised to say the least.
I never figured out why he finally just called. I still had money behind and it was certainly going in the middle. Maybe he didn't realize he had the nuts.
Thanks for the comment!
Duck, that's some hard cheese right there. I think if I lost with quads I might just tear the joint up. I DEFINITELY would give the villain an earful for slowrolling me.
ReplyDeleteG-man-
ReplyDeleteYeah, it was a rough one. And I probably should have said something about the slow roll, but I was speechless at the time.
Oh well, it's a great story and only cost me a couple Benjamins!
Thanks for dropping in!
Oooh bad beat tales. Wheee! Ok. Back in the day. When I was super awesome at the game. I had QQ. I flopped quads on a QQK flop. My opponent bet the flop for me. The turn is a rag. I bet the turn. My opponent calls. The river is a king. I say to myself "I absolutely know that he has KK.". I however had way too much committed to the pot so I paid off the river with my small amount left and took one of my only quad over quad beats ever.
ReplyDeleteGeez Waffles, that sucks!
ReplyDeleteToo bad you weren't playing on Absolute Poker at the time. Their bad-beat jackpot would have paid five figures.
Thanks for the story!
Wow -- I am fortunate to have never taken that bad of a bad beat.
ReplyDeleteOne time in Las Vegas two guys kept re-raising each other (same kind of situation like you had) until one guy finally said "I am just calling in the hope that you learn a lesson here." He called and turned over the stone cold nuts! I always wondered if people thought he should or shouldn't have done that. Some thought the best way to teach the lesson was to take all the money.
lightning-
ReplyDeleteI'm not a big fan of speeches at the table. Especially if someone is just being a jerk like the one you described.
If they give you a speech while betting, run for the hills, they usually have a monster hand!
Thanks for dropping by.