Response Time

Back home. And back online. Played last night for an hour or so, two-tabling some PLO25. Had played about a hundred hands and was up a pittance (five bucks or thereabouts) when Vera asked if I’d run to the store for some milk and juice.

No problemo, was my response. I closed one table, then put the tic in the little “Sit out next hand” box just as the cards were being dealt on the other. Hmm, aces. Other two cards not so bad, either -- . I leaned forward. Guess I’ll have to play this one.

I was UTG+1. Folded to me and I raised it pot to 85 cents. I’d been raising in other spots and with other holdings, so my bet didn’t necessarily announce to the table I had aces. Whatever it did announce, several players quickly responded by calling. Six players (including me) stayed for the flop, making the total pot $5.10.

I remained ambivalent. Unlike some Omaha players, I don’t mind letting aces go when faced with an unappealing board. If an ace or flush draw doesn’t pop out here with those first three board cards, I’m out the door and on my way to the Food Lion.

Flop came . Faster than you can say "Waco Kid," the small blind bet out $4.85, leaving himself only five or so bucks behind. The action was on me.

You’ve been there, I know. You’ve had a reasonable little session and have already made up your mind to leave, when suddenly you find yourself plunged into do-or-die territory. Whatever happened here was gonna color the whole friggin’ session a bright, cheery rose or dismal, charcoal gray.

I had $19.55 left in my stack. Of the other players acting after me, all but one had me covered.

If I someone other than the short-stack called, I’d surely be an overall dog to make it to the river unscathed. I did have my own open-ended straight draw, though (minus the clubs), to go with my top set. What to do?

I couldn’t fold. Didn’t really want just to call, either, although I suppose I could have waited to see if the turn was safe. Could I have . . . ? Nah, I couldn’t. I had to push. I bet as much as I was allowed -- $19.40 -- leaving me just fifteen cents behind.

Player to my left thought a bit, then pushed his entire stack ($27-plus) in as well. Then another dude called. The short stack called, too, of course, so we had ourselves a four-way all-in with two cards to come. Total pot was $88.50, although I was only playing for about $70 of that.

This was on Stars, so it was not until the hand concluded that I got to see the others’ cards. Turned out three of us had flopped sets. Coupla guys gunning for flushies, too. Here’s how Two Dimes calculated all of our chances with two cards to come:



(EDIT [added 3/25/08]: I didn’t quite enter the cards into Two Dimes correctly, so these percentages aren’t right. I was, in fact, better off than this. See MacAnthony's comment -- or click here for the gen-u-wine figgers.)

Turn was the , and the river . Made it! A smile on my face as I ran out the door. Such is PLO (sometimes).

By the way, for some reason my hands weren’t saved to the hard disk last night, so this morning I requested the hand history from PokerStars suppport. Got an answer within an hour-and-a-half telling me they were on the case, then the hand histories were sent about an hour after that. Most reading this blog know it already, but no one beats Stars for support.

Finally, while we’re on the subject of getting responses, I did want to make sure you saw a couple I received in relation to last week’s posts.

On Monday of last week, I wrote about Full Tilt Poker’s new agreement with CardRunners, pointing out how the decision to allow the CardRunners guys to create temporary “alternate” accounts appeared to violate one of the Kahnawake Gaming Commission’s “Regulations Concerning Interactive Gaming.” I wrote an email to Full Tilt asking them about it, and they did respond to me on Friday. I appended their response to the post. Also, I’m seeing over on Two Plus Two their plans to create so-called “educational” tables to handle these CardRunners folks, so it does appear Full Tilt took heed of complaints & queries about the original plan.

You might also check out the comments on last Friday’s post, “PPA Can Do Better.” All three of the PPA State Directors mentioned in that post came around to leave thoughtful replies, which I do appreciate.