The "three-bet" is used by a lot of professional poker players pre-flop to make a statement about their hands, and sometimes steal a pot. If an opponent raises, your re-raise is the three-bet. We had an opportunity to try it out tonight at Lil Kim's Cove....
BLINDS: 100/200
IN THE POCKET: K-K
That's a nice way to start -- and having won a couple of early pots, we have room to maneuver with about 12,000 chips. A man ahead of us raises to 1,500. He's also won a few pots, most recently with a couple of pocket pairs. The man to our immediate right calls.
"Pocket pairs again?!?" we ask before looking at our cards.
"Again," he claims.
We look, and decide it's time to play hardball. "I'll raise," we announce. It's to 3,500, and it chases most of the table away. The original raiser calls, as does the man between us.
ON THE FLOP: 5-5-7
The man who started all this goes all in with little hesitation, for about 4,600. He's won a few nice pots himself, including a couple with pocket pairs -- one a few hands ago with pocket Aces.
"I'm down," the somewhat-stunned man between us says. We think out loud for a moment as we pull up our stack.
"I can't believe he has pocket Aces again...."
"I don't," our opponent says.
"No pocket Aces?"
"No pocket Aces."
Thank you very much. "Well then, I'll call."
"....which means he must have pocket Kings?!" someone else at the table guesses. Yup, we do -- and show our Kings. Our opponent is scorched, as he shows 10-10.
ON THE TURN: 8
No flush is in play to burn us back.
ON THE RIVER: 6
Our opponent is out, and we're suddenly above 22,000 chips.
We appreciate an honest poker player -- but this case was like a local driver we read about online earlier in the day. Police pulled him over, and he openly admitted using marijuana minutes earlier. A puff of smoke from the window gave him away, as much as the odor. Tells like our opponent made don't happen often, but it made our decision much easier.
An even tougher decision came in the second hour, when we had A-8 and two 8's appeared by the turn. The river was 7, and our bet of 4,000 was met by an opponent raising 20,000. It left us with 1,000 extra -- and after pondering a moment, we concluded she was "bluffing big" and we called.
"I have a full house," she declared -- showing 7-7. What a river, and what a blow.
But we rallied with A-8 in the big blind for a "Broadway straight" to make a comeback to 6,000, and almost reached the final table from there. Forced to go all-in with 7-4 of spades in the small blind, we came up one spade short and lost. We now have "trip nines" in July -- ninth place three Thursdays in a row. But this one eliminated us one hand short of the final table.
MINISTRY MOMENT: "How are you tonight?" we asked a man who sat down next to us.
"I'm good," he said. "How about you?"
"I'm trying to be good," we answered. "But sometimes, that isn't easy. We want to do good, but the bad side wants to slap me in the face."
This exchange paraphrased a section of the New Testament. Open question: can you name the book and chapter we were mentioning? Leave a comment with your answer; the correct one is coming soon.
UPDATED POKER SCOREBOARD: 100 final tables in 262 nights (38.2%) - 15 cashes. We've now officially gone one year without winning money in local tournaments.
NATIONAL LEAGUE OF POKER TOTAL: Full tournaments - 156 point wins in 709 games (22.0%), 54 final tables, 7 cashes.
POKER STARS.NET TOTAL: Pretend cash games - $50,121, up $425.
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