PhantomMut

PokerStars Game #9954333637: Hold'em No Limit (100/200) - 2007/05/17 - 00:46:51 (ET)
Table 'Naef II' 9-max (Play Money) Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: Dr MaD23 (39700 in chips)
Seat 2: THRELOS (22536 in chips)
Seat 3: Beit Lahya (33300 in chips)
Seat 5: pay pito (20500 in chips)
Seat 6: phantommut (54300 in chips)
Seat 7: chavoyan (33000 in chips)
Seat 8: jkwon1727 (35800 in chips)
Seat 9: ys74 (152228 in chips)
THRELOS: posts small blind 100
Beit Lahya: posts big blind 200
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to phantommut [5c Ah]
pay pito: calls 200
phantommut: raises 1200 to 1400
chavoyan: calls 1400
jkwon1727: folds
ys74: calls 1400
Dr MaD23: calls 1400
THRELOS: folds
THRELOS is sitting out
Beit Lahya: calls 1200
pay pito: folds
*** FLOP *** [As 5s Th]
Beit Lahya: checks
phantommut: checks
chavoyan: checks
ys74: bets 5000
Dr MaD23: folds
Beit Lahya: folds
phantommut: raises 47900 to 52900 and is all-in
chavoyan: folds
ys74: calls 47900
*** TURN *** [As 5s Th] [4h]
*** RIVER *** [As 5s Th 4h] [2c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
phantommut: shows [5c Ah] (two pair, Aces and Fives)
ys74: shows [8s 3s] (a straight, Ace to Five)
ys74 collected 113100 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 113100 | Rake 0
Board [As 5s Th 4h 2c]
Seat 1: Dr MaD23 (button) folded on the Flop
Seat 2: THRELOS (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 3: Beit Lahya (big blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 5: pay pito folded before Flop
Seat 6: phantommut showed [5c Ah] and lost with two pair, Aces and Fives
Seat 7: chavoyan folded on the Flop
Seat 8: jkwon1727 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: ys74 showed [8s 3s] and won (113100) with a straight, Ace to Five

Let's start with some really bad play by Da Mut.

Update 2/22: But first first....

The player in question told me he's not the player I questioned below the fold. Roger, apologies, but the doppelganger thing has some negative consequences....

Back to the original post....

On PokerStars, in the cutoff holding 89 off-suit. UnderTheGun opens betting with two thousand PSD. SexySnaky (not her real name; solid player, a bit passive pre-flop) calls, as does one other before me. It's a family pot, and I've got one of those hands that can get paid nicely if it hits, so I call.

Button folds, small blind folds, big blind folds, so the pot has something like nine thousand PSD in it.

Flop is 89K rainbow. Score!

Checks around to me, I bet pot. UnderTheGun and SexySnaky call. I figure UTG is being DUMB, but SexySnaky worries me. Pot is now something like 26,000 PSD.

Turn is the Ace of diamonds, putting two diamonds on the board.

SexySnaky goes all in, having me barely covered.

My spidey sense is absolutely zinging. It's one of those "I know I'm beat" things, but I could not put her on a hand, and there's a lot of money in the pot, maybe she's just got aces and a nut flush draw, and I flopped two pair, dammit, and, and, and,....

So I duck into a phone booth, put on the outfit, and out comes Dutch My Inner Donkey. I call.

SexySnaky shows pocket kings. The only way I could have won after the flop was runner-runner 8s or 9s to make quads. By the time I called her all-in I was drawing absolutely dead.

Of course, if I'd stopped to think about what I could actually beat that might have elicited her bet, as opposed to worrying about being bluffed, that should have been the easiest lay-down in the history of the universe. I couldn't beat Aces up. Couldn't beat a set. The logical hand for her to have at that point was AK, which nukes me only slightly less thoroughly than what she held. But I called anyway.

That was quite possibly the worst hand of poker I have ever played.

Aside: After slow-playing the kings to perfection, I have no idea why SexySnakey decided she needed to go all-in there; any rational player (and I think she has me as a rational player, because we have taken each other's chips in the past) folds 99% of the time to that raise, with a 1% chance of calling with a total brain fart. Maybe she had me on A8 or A9, and thought I'd caught two pair on the turn, and maybe she was worried I might catch a river ace for a winning boat. If she had me on holding pocket aces then going all-in when the ace hit the turn would have been butt-stupid, because she would then be pushing with one out, and I don't think she's stupid. So I'm perplexed in retrospect.

Bottom line: a donkalicious time was had by all.

But I'm not (and SexySnakey certainly isn't) the Joker referred to in the title.

When playing, I try to follow Ray Miller's advice:

"Work fast. Throw strikes. Change speeds."

He was talking about pitching, but I think it applies to poker too.