The Queen of Diamonds

Several weeks ago I pulled my World Series of Poker bracelet out of the vault for our annual pilgrimage to the WSOP main event. After three years of procrastination, I finally took it to my jeweler Scott to have it properly fitted. He removed five pairs of diamond-studded horseshoes, which he suggested making into a pair of earrings for my wife, Olga. Wow, what a great idea! It's not easy finding just the right jewelry for my wife, and this was perfect because this year she was going to play in the "big one" for the first time. With five diamond-studded horseshoes dangling from each ear at the WSOP this year, she quickly adopted a new nickname, "The Queen of Diamonds."



Olga and I were both assigned to day one of the main event. With a field of 5,619 and potentially very long days, we entered the tournament with low expectations and high hopes. On day one, we prayed that we wouldn't make any big mistakes and that at least one of us would survive to play on day two. My day one was uneventful and ended in disappointment before the dinner break. I quickly got over my disappointment when I realized that Olga was still in it and could win it.



Here are some highlights from the proud husband:



In the middle of day one, Olga slowly built her stack up to a healthy $20,000 when she picked up the dream team, A-A. Some young guy in front of her, with $10,000, raised, Olga reraised, he went all in, and she called. The guy flipped up his hand, 10-10, and Olga was feeling pretty good, being a 4-to-1 favorite. As it sometimes happens, he made a set on the turn. Surprisingly, my wife was not upset! The guy had only $10,000, and after doubling him up, she still had about $10,000 left. She could have been out of the tournament, but she was still alive. She was laughing along with the rest of the table, saying, "Well played!"



After the dinner break, I had been watching Olga for about an hour. She had played few if any hands until I saw her raise from under the gun. She got one caller in middle position. The flop was J-9-8 rainbow. I was thinking to myself, does she have what I think she has? Olga and her opponent both gave their hands some thought, and then followed with a sudden outburst of betting, raising, and all in, in which it was hard to tell who got his/her chips into the pot faster!



The poor guy had flopped a set of jacks against the official Varkonyi family hand of Q-10, and the kicker to the story is that the queen was the queen of diamonds. Olga had flopped the nut straight and was lucky that it held up after blanks hit on the turn and river. Now, her stack was back up to $20,000.



Later, she picked up a pair of queens, including the queen of diamonds. Before the flop, she raised and got one caller. The flop was Q-4-2, giving Olga the top set, and they both checked. The turn was a deuce, giving Olga the top full house. The only hand that could beat her at this point was quad deuces. Olga bet and her opponent went all in. After briefly speculating whether this particular player would call a preflop raise with 2-2, she called. It turns out that her opponent was slow-playing A-A until the turn, when they got all the money in. The river didn't help him, he got knocked out, and Olga was now up to about $40,000 in chips.



During the last couple of hours of day one, many of the players were exhausted and started playing very loosely, as well as being loose-lipped. Olga was able to capitalize on this and turn her average stack into one of the chip leaders. One guy raised and said, "When you guys raise, I fold. Once in a while, you can fold, too." It seemed to my wife that he was sincerely saying, "I have something good, but not that good. I've almost made it to day two, I'm tired, and I want to go to sleep. So, why don't you guys just let me have the blinds and antes this time." When it was Olga's turn to act, she asked him how much he had left and put him all in. His cards went flying into the air. He was very upset, saying, "You know I cannot call with this." He had an ace – and the queen of diamonds! She finished day one with $80,700 and was in 46th place out of the 1,864 players remaining after the three day-one sessions. Following a similar script, Olga finished day two with $209,500, 43rd out of 571 remaining players.



It was very late on day three with about an hour and a half of play left for the day. All of the remaining players at this point were in the money. About 240 players were left with $2,000-$4,000 blinds and a $500 ante. Olga had an above-average stack of around $350,000 in front of her. She raised to $15,000 with A-Q offsuit (not the queen of diamonds), and a small stack of about $60,000 reraised all in. The all-in player did not look very confident. She called his all-in reraise, he had A-10, and my wife was almost a 3-to-1 favorite at that point. A 10 came on the river and he doubled up. She still had around $290,000 left, which was still an above-average stack.



On the very next hand, she looked down at A-K offsuit in middle position and again raised to $15,000. This time a guy with a comparable stack to Olga's reraised to $60,000. And again, her opponent didn't look confident. Olga sensed weakness and decided to push all in. He started thinking, asked for her chip count, and decided to call with his suited A-8. Olga was almost a 2.5-to-1 favorite. Her opponent hit an 8 on the turn, and with no help on the river and her opponent having her covered by a few chips, she was eliminated. She received condolences from Mike Matusow, who was sitting at a table beside her and went on to win $1 million at the final table. Later, we speculated as to whether the guy called her because she was female and he wasn't going to let some woman push him around. I was delighted that Olga had made it into the money during her first appearance at the big one!



Beware of "The Queen of Diamonds." She's coming to collect chips from a tournament near you! My apologies for being a gloating husband …

Robert is the 2002 World Series of Poker champion and the instructor on the WiseGuys on Texas Hold'em videos, starring some famous actors from the Sopranos. The videos are very informative, as well as entertaining, and are available at www.wiseguyson.com.