Sunday, May 18, 2008

I knew I'd pay for that....

I dished out a bad beat in a tourney tonight, my KK vs opponent AA. I had a sneaking suspicion the villain had AA preflop, too - he raised a funky small amount, twice, but I usually push KK to the limit like it's AA (as Harrington advises). We got all the money in and I saw the bad news.
Flop come 3s Ts Jd. No help there. Turn comes 9c. Hey, now - 2 Kings or 4 Queens make me a winner - 6 outs for a 12% winning chance. River comes Qc and I knock out my opponent.

I had a feeling the poker gods wouldn't let me get away with this one for long. We get down to four handed, and it's very early - blinds are still small, so there is plenty of juking and diving.

Get into the small blind with Ah4h. I've been raising the big blind at an above average frequency, and he calls fairly often, so I decide to just complete this time and hope for a big hand (can be a mistake, probably not here, though).

Flop comes As 3c 5s. I lead out with my pair of Aces, he insta-calls. Nothing much here, he's done this before, but I am wary that maybe he has an Ace with a better kicker, or even 2 pair.

River comes a lovely 2c, giving me a straight. I lead out again, denying flush draw odds, but he calls anyway. Ok, I've got him on an Ace now, maybe 2 pair, maybe the same thing I've got.

River comes 2d, pairing the board. That could be trouble, of course, but you can't worry about those things in fast moving tournaments. I'm 80%+ to win against a random hand, 90% to win against Ace-x, I need to bet out and hope he's got an ace here. I bet and he shoves. Ok, then. Well, maybe I'm beat, but like I said, there's no way I can fold a straight here. I call and he shows 55 for the boat. Ouch.

Turns out I was WAY behind on the flop, then WAY ahead on the turn, and crushed on the river. And the poker gods get even. There are only 4 hands that beat me (AA,33,55,22), and he had one of them.

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