HOME TORUNEY KNOCKS

I’ve seen so many bad beats in the home tourney that I have a lot of apologies to make to the online sites I use to criticize. The thing that happens most to me is the flush chaser who hits despite the wrong calling odds. I don’t really even think about these things unless it knocks me out of the tourney, and in the last month flush draws have ruined a set and top two pair. All-in with KK even fell to A5o which put me on the rail only to see same guy blow the chips on his next wrong call.

Now nobody likes to hear other’s tales of bad beats and I’m not unhappy that I get calls on these hands especially since the laws of averages should catch me by the rest home if I drive safely and refrain from extreme sports.

But I just have to tell what happened in Monday’s home tourney. With two limpers I call half a bet with 55. The flop is T53 rainbow. The game is so aggressive that I don’t even think of betting here. Anybody with a ten will be betting and the button man would probably bet two over cards especially if one is an ace. The blinds move fast on these games and 7 of the 8 remaining players had an M of under 10. Even if it’s checked all around I’ll take a chance that someone could wind up with a wheel. It goes check, check and then Mike, the button guy, bets 3000 into a 1600 pot.

As I start counting my chips Mike says, “Oooh, I didn’t know you were in the hand. I wouldn’t have bet so much.” I have 3600 altogether so I push my last 600 in on top of his bet and he makes the pot odds call and says, “I made a big mistake” even before I turn over the set of 5s that make him wince. The turn is a Q and the river is a T. Now I figure that I must have been a 90-95% favorite after the flop. Later I learned that I was a 98% favorite. Even after he picked up a Q on the turn, I was still 90%.

Mike apologized profusely and said he would have been much more careful had he knew I was in the hand. “You’re tricky.” He said.

“Too tricky for my own good” I replied. “I would have been better betting out.” In reality he probably would have called any reasonable bet with top pair and when he hit second pair on the turn we no doubt would have been all-in before the river.

It shows the beauty of online poker. No matter how bad the beat, I can just enter another tourney instead of having to drive home.