Two Palms stories

People often ask me how I select a place to play on any given day. There's no good answer to that, other than that it's highly arbitrary. Sometimes there's a confluence of reasons. Tonight was one of them.

The Palms has a new promotion. During NFL games on Sunday and Monday nights, whenever a team scores, they randomly select a table and seat, and the player in that seat wins between $50 and $300. (The amount is apparently selected at random from a list of quantities. $50 is by far the most common, though just in the past two days I've heard a couple of $100 and one $300 being called out.) I also noticed that the duration of the two ESPN Monday night games would be just enough hours to qualify me for the new weekly freeroll tournament at the Palms (12 hours per week, and I had already spent nearly 6 hours there in the last few days). Third, they just rolled out a new series of $5 chips, which I will be happy to collect while they're still new. Finally, I had an errand to run a short distance from there. So the Palms it was.

Two reportable stories for you.


"I can't believe he went all in"

I was in the small blind with 5s-5h. I'm in Seat 10, big blind is in Seat 1, with the dealer between us. There was one limper ahead of me, and I called. The big blind raised to something like $12. This is a guy I've played with before. He has a pretty wide range for pre-flop raising, and cares little about position. I also know that he will put in a continuation bet virtually every time if post-flop action is checked to him after he has raised. Both the limper and I call.

The flop is 6-7-8, all spades. It just misses being my third flopped straight flush in as many weeks. But an open-ended straight-flush draw is obviously full of potential for good things happening. I checked. The big blind bet $20. He would do this pretty much no matter what, so his bet didn't help me define his hand. The limper called, but looked troubled about it. My read was that he liked his hand too much to fold, but not enough to raise, and he would have preferred a free card. The pot was about $75. I had $102 left in front of me. I shoved it all in. I didn't know if the big blind would fold or not, but it was OK either way. I felt reasonably confident that the limper would fold and leave an extra $20 in dead money in the pot.

The big blind called rather quickly. Limper folded. The five of diamonds hit on the turn, giving me a set. The river was a blank. Three of a kind was good enough to beat the big blind's pocket kings, which included the king of spades (thus explaining his rapid call).

As the pot was being pushed to me, the Seat 2 player, who had stepped away, was returning, noticed the large pot, and asked Seat 1 what had happened. Seat 1 summarized things, speaking softly, probably thinking that I was too far away to hear him. He closed his summation with, "I can't believe he went all in with pocket fives when there were three overcards."

Well, I guess that's one way of looking at it. It kind of misses some relevant facts, though. It's true that had I known that the big blind had exactly K-K, including a spade, I would not have pushed there. But K-K of any suits is at the very upper end of the range with which he puts in a pre-flop raise (even from out of position; he's one who likes to try to steal the limpers' money with a raise from the big blind with nothing). Even if I could somehow guess that he had an overpair to the board, there's only a 50-50 chance that he's holding a spade, and even then, unless he has the ace of spades, he has to worry that I have it, and/or already have a made flush. He could be drawing nearly dead, even with the K or Q of spades. In short, given his range of possible hands here, I have a ton of fold equity with the all-in check-raise.

As for the limper, I'm confident he doesn't have a made straight or flush, else he would probably raise big to protect his hand (unless he miraculously flopped the nut flush or a straight flush). He could be on the nut flush draw or nut straight draw. If so, my 5x raise is not giving him correct odds to call. If he has two pair or a set, again I would have expected a protective raise, so I think those less likely, but I have lots of outs just in case that's what he has.

All in all, even after thinking about it for a long time after the fact, I conclude that it was an eminently defensible move on my part. It's not the only possible reasonable way to play the hand, but there's nothing crazy about it. Again, if I could have seen my opponent's exact cards, it's not what I would have done, but that's not an especially useful way of analyzing the situation. Knowing his wide range, there was an excellent chance I was already best, and with the panoply of draws I had, I was a big favorite against his range. It was entirely possible that I had 17 outs that would beat both of my opponents (9 spades, 2 fives, and 3 additional fours and nines).

But I gather from his snide little comment that he thinks I should have known how far behind I actually was, and retreated from his routine continuation bet with my open-ended straight flush draw.

Sorry, pal. I guess I'm just not that good.


The deuce-four strikes again!

Regular readers know by now that once in a while I go a little crazy with the 2-4 offsuit. (See story toward the end of this post and links therein for the explanation.) Why offsuit instead of suited? Well, obviously, because I can make two different flushes!

My favorite way to play it is on the button when there has been a raise in front of me. That way, when it hits the flop, it's an absolute blindsiding, because nobody is insane enough to call a raise with a 2-4! Those were the circumstances tonight, so I did my thing.

Four of us saw the most unbelievable flop: 4-4-2. Oh, please don't let me pee my pants before this hand finishes playing out! Flopping a full house with unpaired cards in the hand is about a 1/1000 proposition. Not quite a straight flush, but I'm not complaining!

First two players checked to the pre-flop raiser, who bet $10. I called, as did one early-position player. I don't remember what the turn card was. I didn't care much care, except that it put two hearts out there, and I was hoping that somebody would hit a high flush on the river. This time the raiser bet $20. I min-raised to $40, and got two callers. Yummy pot taking shape here.

The river didn't complete the flush. It was checked to me. I bet $60, which happened to be exactly what the raiser had left. Sadly, both he and the other guy folded. I showed my hand to tell the table: I am crazy and unpredictable--be afraid, be very afraid!


Those hands were nice, but I never got a high-hand jackpot, a football scoring bonus, or even a diamond flush (which, at the Palms, gets one entered into a drawing for three $100 cash jackpots the following morning). See how hard my life is?