Three Mistakes in One Hand

I did pretty well in this year's World Series of Poker main event, making it through four-and-a-half long days before succumbing in 144th place. I thought that would at least give me bragging rights within Card Player, but it was good for only third place among our columnists. (My congratulations to Matt Matros and Phil Hellmuth.) Surprisingly, it's easy for me to choose one hand to recount from the thousands I played. No other hand even came close to being as sick as this one.

We were halfway through day four, and I had 380,000 in chips, which was about average. The only name player at my table was Shawn Sheikhan. I knew no one else (although I later learned their names from various online blogs), and none of them struck me as being especially tricky. After having been at the table for five hours, I thought I had a pretty good line on what each of them was capable of doing.

With the blinds at 4,000-8,000, I was in the small blind. Peter Traply was under the gun, and he made it 20,000 to go. He had moved to our table two hours earlier with about 700,000 in chips, but had since lost almost 200,000, although not in any spectacular confrontations. He simply had taken some smallish pokes at various pots, but then conceded when he did not win on the flop. His raise to 20,000 was smaller than the standard raises had been up to that point, but it was certainly acceptable.

Our table had been fairly tight, with almost every pot being played heads up. But this time, Judet Christian (who went on to finish 22nd) called from middle position, Stephan Hornet called from the cutoff, and Bill Seber called from the button. As I said, this was quite unusual, so while none of them necessarily had monster hands, I also knew that nobody was calling with suited connectors or anything remotely fishy. At worst, they had small pocket pairs or hands like A-Q. Possibly, they had even better.

While I was considering which hands I might call with, I looked down and found pocket queens. Jeez! I figured to have the best hand, plus I simply needed the chips that were out there. Winning the pot uncontested would add almost 100,000 to my stack, and I had no problem with that result, especially being out of position. I wanted to raise an amount that appeared to make me pot-committed, even though I could still fold if things got crazy behind me. So with that in mind, I made it 140,000 to go. (Mistake No. 1: I raised too much. I could have accomplished the same thing with a somewhat smaller raise.)

The big blind folded, and now the action was on Traply. He immediately looked over at me and asked, "How much does he have left? About a quarter million? OK, I'm all in." He did it in about the same amount of time that it took you to read it. Christian acted next, folding what he later said were pocket jacks, and I have no reason to doubt him.

The action was then on Hornet, who had about 200,000 remaining. He had been playing tighter than anyone at the table, and now he looked particularly torn. It was as if he had a hand that was too good to fold, but he still knew that he probably should. He even looked around for the French reporter who had been sweating him, not for any sort of advice, but as if he knew he would be going out on this hand, and he wanted to make sure the reporter caught it. After some time, he caught the reporter's attention, and then pushed his remaining chips forward. Seber folded, and the action was back on me.

Unquestionably, my gut instinct was that Traply had pocket aces, possibly kings. As I said, he had previously taken some shots at smaller pots, but he had never committed his entire stack like this, and I did not think he would do it without the goods. His undersized initial raise from under the gun, combined with the speed with which he pushed all in, had me convinced. But, naturally, I was not going to fold pocket queens without giving it some serious thought.

Unfortunately, my thinking started to get a little skewed. If anything, Hornet's hesitant call should have given me more reason to consider calling, since I almost certainly had him beat, and possibly dominated. But, it actually had the opposite effect, since I now knew that I would get to see Traply's hand. Somehow, I found psychological value in being able to know for sure that I had correctly laid down pocket queens. (Mistake No. 2: The added value of Hornet's chips should have carried much more weight toward calling than any psychological benefits would have carried toward folding.)

I stood up, shook my head, and laid my hand down. Almost immediately, Traply looked at Hornet and said, "You've probably got me," at which point I cursed and backed away from the table. Traply turned up K-Q offsuit, and Hornet produced A-K. I don't normally play results, but this one time, I really couldn't help it. If an ace or a king came, I was going to say a silent thank you to Traply for having saved me money with his insane play. Unfortunately, the final board came 7-3-3-8-6, at which point I lost my cool a little. I looked at him as if he were from another planet, having risked all of his chips on such a bizarre play.
Hornet was, of course, celebrating his win, and I was left shaking my head at my bad read. (Naturally, that was Mistake No. 3. I really thought Traply had aces or kings. Never in a hundred years would I have pegged him as being capable of making a play like that with K-Q.)

As I said, I usually try not to play results. But this time, when I had my best chance ever to go very deep in the main event, it was hard not to consider, "What if?" Had Traply simply done the sane thing and laid his hand down, I would have ended up in great shape. Christian might have played his jacks, and, either way, Hornet still would have played his A-K. Given the final board, I would have had close to 700,000 if only Hornet had played, but potentially more than 1 million if Christian also had come along and committed his entire stack. Instead, I was down to 240,000, and never made a significant recovery. I lasted another 10 hours of play, but was short-stacked the entire time, and I could trace it all back to that one sick hand.

Did Traply make a good play? On one hand, he had me convinced that he had queens beat. After dishing out some good-natured ribbing, Sheikhan admitted that he absolutely put Traply on pocket aces, so at least it wasn't just me. Plus, whatever else I think about the play, it certainly took guts, and I commend him for that.

On the other hand, he defended his play by saying that he put me on a steal, which was hardly the case. Plus, when you take a step back and consider that he risked his entire stack with K-Q against four tight players who had shown some willingness to enter the pot, it seems sketchy. I'm still torn about whether it was a good play or simply a reckless one.

But in the end, I guess I'll never be the right person to look at it objectively.

Matt Lessinger is the author of The Book of Bluffs: How to Bluff and Win at Poker, available everywhere. You can find other articles of his at www.CardPlayer.com.