To ensure we avoided stray Halloween visitors, we made our first poker visit tonight to The Sports Page. It's perhaps the best-known sports bar in Columbus, and we've enjoyed their version of a "Scrambled Dawg" for years as a dinner to go with big-screen games.
The Sports Page also has become known as a busy poker spot, with tournaments three nights a week. So we had plenty of competition, and faced several big challenges....
BLINDS: 100/200
IN THE POCKET: K-J of hearts
Because we ate a Scrambled Dawg before the tournament, we started with double the normal chip stack -- 10,000. But after winning the first pot of the night by making a diamond flush on the flop, we're down to about 7,500. When a player across the table raises to 500, we hope history will repeat itself. Several players call.
ON THE FLOP: Qh-Jc-8h (as best we recall)
The man who raised doesn't slow down, betting 2,000. A man between us calls. Now we have to think a moment. This is the flush chance we hoped to see -- but the bet is so large that we'd lose a lot of chips if we call and we're wrong. (We also suspect a bigger bet on the turn is coming.)
"I'm tempted -- but I'll fold," we finally say.
ON THE TURN: 2 of hearts
Ouch! The hand plays out to reveal the big bettor had two pair. We were the only one with two hearts, and could have gained a small fortune.
We show our cards afterward, and overhear someone to our left say something about "calling a raise pre-flop" and following up on it. That big bet on the flop probably was designed to scare off flush-chasers -- and we admittedly lacked the backbone to follow through with our hope nearly realized. (Hmmmm; there could be a lesson there for another post.)
We reached the one-hour break, but then tried to fight for our life with A-8 when a high-card 8 showed up on the flop. But a 6 which also was showing gave a man to our left two pair (8-6), and he eliminated us in about 31st place.
MINISTRY MOMENT: "Did I ever show you this?" we asked a man to our immediate right. We showed him the "Jesus as your Savior" coin. When we asked if he agreed with the message, he nodded -- barely.
UPDATED POKER SCOREBOARD: 83 final tables in 203 nights (40.9%) - 15 cashes.
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