Maybe my best 2-4 story ever

Sunday (yesterday) I played the afternoon tournament at Harrah's Atlantic City with Cardgrrl. She busted out fairly early (flopped two pair versus flopped straight, as I heard it), but I managed to hang on quite a long time. I finished 7th in the field of 45. Sadly, only five got paid, so I was the next-to-bubble-boy, which is quite annoying; 4 1/2 hours of work for nothing.

Anyway, when there were just two tables left, I had gotten critically short, so shoved with suited K-7 when it was folded to me in middle position. I got called by the woman to my left with A-Q, and she won, which then left me in desperate need of chips. When I was in the big blind, there was a raise followed by a reraise from the tightest player at the table, who had not three-bet the entire time I had watched him, so I had to let that go, much to my chagrin.

Next hand I was small blind. I think I started the hand with 6000, and had to post 1000 of it for the blind. The button raised to 8000. I had 2c-4h. Two live cards, surely, AND the most powerful hand in hold'em! I shoved.

My opponent had Q-10. The flop looked bad for me: Q-10-3, giving him top two pair. But I had nothing to fear. After all, I had the 2-4!

The turn card probably didn't scare my opponent: A harmless-looking ace. But I knew what that meant, and, in a move that is exceptionally rare for me, I even verbally called out what the river would be: "Five!"

Sure enough, the dealer paused for dramatic effect, then whipped down the five of clubs. Wheel for me! The table went wild!

I pulled out my cell phone and snapped a picture just before the dealer whisked away the cards. He has, at this point, taken my hole cards and tossed them on top of the board cards after mucking my opponent's cards and pushing the pot. There's action and I wasn't holding very still, so things are blurry, but you can still see the results:





On the very next hand I more than doubled again when my 10-10 bested somebody else's suited A-9.

I wish the end of the story were that the dramatic runner-runner save had propelled me to a $1200 first-place cash, but it was not to be. That, however, cannot be laid at the feet of the mighty Deuce-Four, which fully performed up to its legendary reputation.

Cardgrrl had come over from her cash game when she heard that I was in trouble and was standing at the table to witness this. She even tried to take a photograph of the hand, but was stopped by the tournament director. Apparently this casino is among the more paranoid about photographs. (They were so busy stopping her that they didn't notice that I was doing the same thing at the same time.) But, sadly, she still does not believe. In fact, today during a $2-5 NLHE cash game she outdrew my flopped second pair/top kicker to make a straight on the river using her own 2-4, but still refuses to accept its supernatural strength. I don't know what it's going to take to make a convert of her.

Standard odds calculators will tell you that my probability of winning after that flop was about 3.6%, and 9.1% after the turn. But my faithful readers and I know the truth: it was a 100% lock from the get-go.

All hail the Deuce-Four!