Omaha Hand of the Night

Played good poker last night here at Danang — good in the way that my friends thought I was playing crappy, even though \”most\” of the time I was not. So my overall results hinged on a single hand of Omaha … one where I\’m not sure whether or not I did the right thing and just got unlucky, or if I woulda-coulda-shoulda played it differently and better.

OK, so it\’s $.50/$.50 PLO. My starting cards are Q-Q-7-8 double-suited. There are about a million limpers pre-flop, I am one of them, and Adam in late position raises it to $4 … which about half of us call.

The flop: Q-J-10.

OK, so I\’m pretty happy with my top set, but I realize my hand is hardly great. A-K already has me screwed — heck, so does K-9 — so really, I\’d like the board to pair.

It checks around to Adam, and he bets like $10 or $12. Thankfully no one pops him for the pot … just a couple calls. So what do I do? Is this where I raise pot to either take it down now when I am likely ahead? Or is this where I raise pot — which is gonna cost me north of $50 — to find out where I am?

I decide to just call, to see what the turn brings. (There is also a flush draw out there.) Because really, while my hand is great, I\’m not sure how great it is, and I am thinking I\’d like to give the board a chance to pair as cheaply as possible.

\”I think this hand is going to be a big part of our Omaha education,\” I say.

\”You\’re probably right,\” someone (Thum?) responds.

So the turn is a King. Eesh, not a great card for me … but at least it will be easier to get away from my set if necesary. We check all the way around.

The river is a jack. Perfect. My paired board … giving me Queens full of Jacks. I think about what I want to do as Thum comes out betting $30. Tulsa goes into the tank … I definitely want him to call, or maybe raise (because he doesn\’t realize his tanking in and of itself is a tell) … but he folds. OK, so now it\’s on me, and I have a pretty monstrous hand. I quietly analyze all the boat possibilities. I really like the line-up, because there are so many other boats out there — K-J, Q-J, etc. — that I beat. In fact, really, all I have to be afraid of is K-K. And based on my discussion with Thum last week, I am very confident he doesn\’t have it.

So while I could just call since I don\’t have THE NUTS, I also am aware that I want to maximize my strong hands … especially when it\’s me against Thum. There\’s such a strong likelihood he will think I think this is a good situation to bluff. (Because he knows I know he never really showed much strength throughout the hand.)

Anyhow, I raise the pot, which effectively puts me all-in for another $150 or so dollars. Thum instacalls, saying, \”I\’ve got the nuts\” as he reveals his quad jacks.

Here\’s the thing … it wasn\’t a shocker to me. A bummer, sure. But I knew there were two hands out there that beat me. K-K and J-J. I also know that in Omaha, even with an unpaired board, a king-high flush is shit, or at least nervous happiness.

So should I have simply called with my Queens full of Jacks? I tried to think of it in numerical odds, with the goal of maximizing return over the long Batface haul … like there was a 20 percent chance he had kings, a 5 percent chance he had jacks, a 25 percent chance he had jack-shit or a straight, and 50 percent chance that he would have a losing boat he would call with. But for all those calculations, in the end it really was just too much math and I shifted to \”fuck it\” gear because I liked my ballpark estimations.

But i can\’t deny that single -$200 instead of +$200 or what coulda been just -$50 hand made all the difference for an entire session.

Buy-in(s): $300 (3)
Cash out: $181.50
Net: -$118.50

Highlght: Apres-poker darts +$50