Four Minutes to Midnight

There is no time when I feel older than when I speak to my children. So much has changed over the course of the last two or three decades that what seems like only yesterday to me, seems to them like an alien landscape from another dimension. Try explaining the coal miners' strike in the 1980s, for example, or the poll tax riots. There just is not a frame of reference in today's Britain for the upheaval and conflict we experienced back then. Similarly, the Cold War and the threat of nuclear Armageddon now looks like a bad plot device in a B-movie. Did people really believe that the world could be destroyed through our own stupid, war-like impulses? Well, yes they did. One of the long forgotten dramatic devices from that period is the "Doomsday Clock". This was a fictitious timepiece that tracked how close to the end of humanity we were coming, with twelve midnight being the time for the final farewell. I can't recall how close we really got, but certainly four minutes or closer was what the analysts thought. Then boom.

Poker rarely has such insights of drama. It is not really a place for nuclear explosions of insight or understanding. As I have written several times, one of the exasperating aspects of the game is that the plays of an idiot and the plays of a genius can often seem identical. How they play the hand is the same, it is what is going on inside their heads which is different, and without telepathic powers, you never get close to that midnight of understanding that you really do know more than your opponent, and that explosion of insight that you are, poker-wise, better than him.

But sometimes you get close.

Here is an example from a recent hand of seven-card stud high-low I played online at the $10-$20 level. Seven-card high-low is a strange game in that how the game is played online is completely different from how the theorists describe the game. These authors say that people often pass when they hit bad on fourth street, when in reality this is so rare, it is surprising. They say that small pairs are deadly, yet often a foe will call right to the river with a pair of two's unimproved if he is heads up and puts you on a low. There is also a lot of compulsory betting, with the best board making the bets on every street, regardless of the hole cards.

The nuclear hand in question had me with a seven-low in five cards and my opponent with three fives showing. He bet into me, I raised, and he called. This is fairly standard play. Just numerically, he's something like 20-to-1 against having a full house or better at this point, and with this being high-low, where many more starting hands are likely to involve three low cards, the real odds are in excess of this.

The next card brought him a two, and myself a fourth diamond showing. I did indeed now have a nut flush to go with my seven low, and my opponent looked like he either had a draw to a wheel with his trips or a full house made. My opponent went to war. It was pretty clear that he felt he had the better hand and not for the first time, I regretted the cap on four bets to a round. I would have gladly bet the entire world at this point, and it seemed pretty clear my opponent felt the same. The poker clock of doomsday finally struck midnight and it became clear to me that I knew more about this game than my opponent. Can you see why?

Basically my foe was in a zero equity-to-scoop situation, caused by the fact there are only seven cards in seven card stud! As long as he could not draw to a higher flush, there were no cards he could have on sixth street or hit on the river to jeopardise my holding. This is more applied common sense than it is applied mathematics. In seven cards, if you have a full house, you cannot have a low. Therefore, if he already has the high, which I cannot beat or improve to beat, my low half is safe. As an obvious corollary to this - or perhaps not too obvious to the villain in question - even if he makes the wheel on the river, he then cannot improve on his trips and my half of the pot is secured with the flush.

I was in one of those perfect storm moments in poker. Rare, but priceless, in any high-low form. I had zero chance of losing, with significant chances of scooping the entire pot, yet with a foe who simply did not realise this.

Well, this story does not have a perfect ending; the villain hit his full house on the river and we put in another four bets. I suspect if he had hit a worse seven than mine he would have done the same and then cursed his luck.

These poker apocalypses can be very valuable for several reasons. Firstly, you can firmly peg an opponent into the idiot or genius category. Secondly, and vitally, when the clock strikes midnight you can gain a valuable weapon in your armory of how to play the game.

David has played poker all over the UK for the better part of a decade. Originally a tournament player, now focused on cash play and almost entirely on the Internet for the last three years, he makes a healthy second income playing a wide range of games. David is also an Omaha instructor for CardRunners.com, a leading source of online poker instructional videos.