Poker Night 172: A Way Out of No Way

An angry crowd of people wanted to put Jesus to death well before Calvary. "But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way" (Luke 4:30).

What happened to us at Lil Kim's Cove wasn't quite that dangerous -- but we endured an onslaught of big-betting poker players to the end, and finished in second place! Perhaps we should have seen it coming early in the tournament....

BLINDS: 25/50

IN THE POCKET: 7-7

We're one off the button, at a table filled with people who love to make big pre-flop raises. But in this hand, the players merely call. Fine by us; we do the same.

ON THE FLOP: 7-10-2

Very fine by us. And it helps our slow-playing cause that our sumo-wrestling trainee "Buddha" bets 500 ahead of us. We call; everyone else folds.

ON THE TURN: 7

That's not simply fine -- that's fantastic! We make quads for the second time in four live tournaments! But remember the rules: the hand must be played to the river to get a quad bonus. So when Buddha bets 500 more, we say in a semi-reluctant tone: "500 more."

ON THE RIVER: 6

Buddha may be fearing he's outgunned, because he now checks.

"I'm all-in," we announce -- and Buddha throws in his cards before we can finish counting chips. Then we show our 7-7, for 5,000 bonus chips. Unlike last week, it draws an almost who-cares reaction from the table.

That was the only hand we won in the first hour, and we had 9,000 chips at the break. Then we made a move early in the second hour with two big pot wins, including an all-in bet with two pair. But rising blinds and small losses drained us again, and we dropped to a minimum 500 chips. Yet helped in part by confusion over combining to a final table, we reached the second break with that 500 moments before the blinds came.

The second "color-up" jumped us from 500 to 5,000. We joked about how we wished our real-life investments could increase ten-fold like that. Then serious stuff happened in our favor: the real merger to the final table, and a draw putting us one behind the dealer to provide extra time. An all-in K-10 bet, which led to three 10's. Other players betting big to "steal pots," only to lose and go bust. A push which led to a "win" with three of a kind -- only to have our opponent say he'd topped us with a straight, but the cards were picked up before he could claim it.

An amazing double take-out with four players left (in a hand we folded) left us heads-up with about 40,000 chips! Then the Tournament Director proposed a settlement: our opponent (who the Director correctly noted had us "crushed" in chips) would get $40 and the Lil Kim's "bucket of beers." We'd get $10 for second place. Fine by us.... really fine.

The lesson from this is that the old phrase "a chip and a chair" is true in poker. Big comebacks from little stacks can happen. It's happened to us several times -- and we're thankful to God when they do.

MINISTRY MOMENT: "How many here believe in the tooth fairy?" the Tournament Director asked our table early in the second hour. Only a couple of hands went up. (Ours did not.) In their behalf, the director tossed a gold chip worth 5,000 on the table for the upcoming hand.

"How many believe in the Easter bunny?" the director asked next.

A woman to our left had a feisty answer: "I believe in Jesus!"

"Amen to that!" we said -- sharing a high-five with the woman. "And when Jesus comes, He'll bring something even better."

The woman admitted she wasn't sure about that. The rest of the table seemed stumped. Do you know what we're talking about? An upcoming post will explain.

UPDATED POKER SCOREBOARD: 71 final tables in 172 nights (41.3%) - 13 cashes. Combined with Monday night at The Red Barn, we had a $15 week!

NATIONAL LEAGUE OF POKER TOTAL: Full tournaments - 53 point wins in 303 games (17.5%), 23 final tables, one cash.

POKER STARS.NET TOTAL: Pretend cash games -- $10,618, down $115.

Chips on the table, not on your shoulder

We asked for your thoughts about the woman who refused to give a chip count, when a player across the table asked for one. She claimed merely displaying the chips for him to count was a "courtesy."

Maybe so, but it struck us as a very limited form of "courtesy." Perhaps the minimum daily requirement -- based on competitiveness, mixed with a dose of legalism.

We happened to do a Bible study on love after we posted our question, and were reminded of this: "Honor one another above yourselves." (Romans 12:10) The New American Standard Bible says, "Give preference to one another with honor."

Consider also I Peter 4:9. "Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling."

To us, this means being willing to give someone what they ask -- within reason, of course. Counting your chips for someone else seems reasonable to us.

(In fact, we've never followed the Kenny Rogers musical advice: "You never count your money when you're sitting at the table.")

But who's counting?

An interesting dispute came up at our poker table Thursday night -- and we're not sure what the right answer is. Perhaps you do.

A woman bet 2,000 (as best we recall). A man then asked her for a chip count.

"I don't have to give you that," the woman said.

"Yes, you do," the man answered. "I want to decide whether to raise."

The woman then displayed her chip stack -- a very unsorted stack, since she had won the previous pot moments before.

"All I have to do is show them to you," she maintained. "Count them for yourself."

She called the display of the chips a "courtesy" to her opponent. What do you think of this? Our answer will come in an upcoming post.