Poker Night 277: That Was Then

"It's hard to beat... lucky."  An ellipse was added to that sentence to replace a couple of expletives -- expletives uttered by a frustrated player tonight at Lil Kim's Cove.  One man at our table was hotter than Death Valley in July, turning all kinds of pocket cards into winning hands.  But as that man said at one point, "Any two cards are good before the flop."  The key is in waiting for the right cards to come....

BLINDS: 500/1,000

IN THE POCKET: 10-10

We've played patiently for more than an hour, and have absolutely no pots to show for it.  The chip stack has dropped slowly, and now we're dealing at a table of five with 3,500 chips left.  Mr. Small Blind already is all-in for his last 500.  So when players call to us, our decision is easy.

"I'm going all-in," we announce.  After all, remember all the pocket pairs which worked for us Monday night?  (But then again, 5-5 brought no help earlier at this table.)  Two of the remaining three players call -- a husband and wife, as it happens.  So we have three pots: a main one (1,500 for the small blind), Side Pot 1 (ours, worth 9,000 as best we figure) and Side Pot 2 between the couple.

ON THE FLOP: 2-2-Q

The wife checks.  "I'll check.  I have this pot won," the husband says.  Such big talk -- but he's the man who's been rolling.

ON THE TURN: 3

What happens when a married couple plays poker? Joint checking! (Tee hee.)

ON THE RIVER: 6

The couple checks again.

"I've got a boat," the big-talking husband says -- as he turns over Q-2!  He plays a marginal hand and hits the jackpot again.  He tops our tens to take us out.  And Mr. Small Blind never even bothers to show his cards -- then makes that quote about luck we mentioned above.

Final result: a tie for 17th place -- and a reminder that for all the talk by poker pros about the skill of the game, luck plays a big factor as well.

 MINISTRY MOMENT: "What's the battery for?" a man asked as we set an old nine-volt on the table to mark our spot before the game began tonight.  "Is it for good luck?!"

Nope.  "It's my card protector, and -- lucky battery!" we said with a laugh, knowing how silly that sounds; "It's a reminder to me that I receive power when the Holy Spirit comes."

We think this did as we should have expected -- throwing the questioner a real curve.  "Do you believe the Holy Spirit exists?" we asked to follow up.

"Yeah, I do," he said -- and then he explained the Holy Spirit connection to another man across the table.  He said he believed in that Spirit, too.  We'll have more to say about this moment in a future post.

UPDATED POKER SCOREBOARD: 102 final tables in 277 nights (36.8%) - 16 cashes.

NATIONAL LEAGUE OF POKER TOTAL: Full tournaments - 172 point wins in 758 games (22.7%), 59 final tables, 7 cashes.  UFC 3-card knockout - 3 point wins in 16 games, 2 final tables, 1 win.

We reached the final table in a 611-player "turbo tournament" earlier in the day.  There was an amazing ending to that game; look for it here Friday.

POKER STARS.NET TOTAL: Pretend cash games - $61,657, down $1,595.