Icing the Kicker and Running It Twice

Forgive me another football-related post today. I realize there are other things going on in the world that certainly rate as slightly more significant, all things considered -- including within our little poker world where the WSOP Europe Main Event is today playing down to an eight-handed final table (with none other than Phil Hellmuth enjoying the chip lead with nine players left as I hit publish). But yesterday I was listening to some commentary about last weekend’s NFL games and heard something sorta interesting (and poker-related) I thought I’d share today.

I’m locked in on these NFL games once more thanks to being in this “pick’em” pool in which we’re trying to predict winners of all games. Trying to defend my title, in fact, after lucking out last year to finish first in the sucker.

Had a decent Week 4 in which I managed to be correct with my picks for 12 of the 15 games. Much better than the previous week when I only got 6 of 16. (I blame the replacement refs, of course.)

One of the games I missed this past weekend was the New York Giants-Philadelphia Eagles game from Sunday night. I had the Giants, but the Eagles prevailed 19-17. Like many NFL games, this one came down to the wire with New York missing a potential game-winning field goal at the end.

With 10 seconds left, the Giants’ kicker Lawrence Tynes -- who had hit all 10 of his FG attempts this year, in fact -- lined up for a 54-yard field goal try. Employing a much-used strategy that many NFL watchers have complained about over the last few years, Philadelphia called a timeout a split-second before the ball was snapped. The play continued, with Tynes missing the attempt wide left. But since the timeout negated the play, the Giants were able to try the kick again.

The second time Tynes kicked the ball straight down the middle but just a yard or two shy of the crossbar and it fell short, ensuring the victory for Philadelphia.

What I wanted to write about concerned that strategy to call a timeout in order to disrupt a team attempting an important field goal at the end of a game -- the so-called “icing the kicker” strategy that often results in a kicker ultimately attempting the field goal two times with only the second attempt actually counting.

The number-crunchers have looked deeply into the strategy, ultimately coming up with statistics showing that calling a timeout might have some small effect on kickers, although not a big one statistically. Over on ESPN’s “stats blog” they reported this week that since 2001 kickers are hitting 81% of those late-game field goals when no timeout is called and 76% when the timeout is called. Sounds like the difference is a little wider when it comes to overtime field goals.

Anyhow, I was listening to sports radio yesterday, ESPN’s “Mike and Mike in the Morning” program that serves as suitable background noise when doing other tasks. To be honest, a lot of the commentary and so-called “analysis” by the show’s hosts, Mike Greenberg and Mike Golic, can be superficial and rarely enlightening. Like a lot of sports radio, they talk about sports like fans, not really bringing much insight beyond what any of us could pick up by watching the games ourselves. But they’re entertaining and likable, and occasionally hit upon some decent topics of discussion. Besides, it’s fun sometimes to hear fans jawing about a game we’ve also watched. (Here’s a post from last spring in which I complain a little about the lack of depth one encounters in most sports commentary.)

Yesterday I was listening to Monday’s podcast of the “Mike and Mike” show, a kind of digest version of the lengthy show they do each morning, and as they talked about Sunday night’s Giants-Eagles game the topic of icing the kicker predictably arose.

Golic mentioned how Michael Vick, the Philadelphia quarterback, said after the game that he hated the strategy of calling a timeout to try to psyche out the kicker -- this despite the fact that his own coach, Andy Reid, had employed it. “I don’t believe in icing the kicker,” Vick was quoted saying in USA Today. “You let him kick it, and if it’s in, it’s in.”

Neither of the Mikes are fans of icing the kicker, either, and they went on to talk about how calling that timeout at the last moment does give a kicker a kind of “warm-up” attempt which might in fact be useful when it comes to long field goals such as the one Tynes faced on Sunday.

Greenberg went so far as to say “the one thing I would never do is what Andy Reid did last night... [and] give a guy a second chance to try a long kick.” In other words, since longer kicks are (for most kickers) more difficult, he would rather avoid giving a kicker a first attempt that didn’t count as it might improve his chances of making the second one. “It’s like letting a guy with a 12-foot putt with a big break in it try it twice,” said Greenberg.

That was the comment that made me think about poker and the somewhat popular strategy of “running it twice” in cash games -- you know, those spots where players are all in and agree to have the remaining community cards dealt two times with each result determining where half of the pot goes. Our friend the Poker Grump wrote about the topic and facing the decision himself not too long ago. Here’s an example of players running it twice from an old episode of High Stakes Poker:

In the hand, Todd Brunson and Sam Farha get all of Farha’s stack in the middle on a flop with Farha leading with bottom two pair versus Brunson’s top pair of queens. Farha is a 70% favorite to win the hand, but they agree to run it twice. As it happens, Brunson wins the first time by making trips, but Farha’s hand holds up the second time and the pair split the pot 50-50.

Going back to icing the kicker, Greenberg was suggesting that by calling a timeout Andy Reid improved Lawrence Tynes’s chances of hitting the second field goal because the kicker benefitted from getting a practice attempt. Tynes and the Giants were taking a “long shot” -- literally -- and Greenberg didn’t like the idea of doing anything to make it easier on New York in such a situation.

Similarly does Farha let the underdog Brunson have a better chance of making his hand by running it twice. As Greenberg made his point I found myself thinking about whether or not it might be more or less prudent to run it twice in poker according to how big of a favorite or underdog one was. After all, as Greenberg was suggesting, it did seem that to let a kicker try a long field goal more than once was perhaps a less recommended strategy than might be the case for shorter kicks.

However, there’s a key difference that causes the analogy to break down. Only the second try actually meant anything for Tynes and the Giants, whereas both results counted for Farha and Brunson.

Still, there remains a kind of parallel between the two situations. In fact, when Vick argues to “let him kick it, and if it’s in, it’s in,” it sounds a lot like what Phil Laak is saying -- as PokerGrump quotes in his post -- regarding his decision to stop running it twice and to “embrace the variance.”

Like Vick and the two Mikes, I’m not a big fan of icing the kicker, either, and if I were to guess I’d bet they’ll probably institute a rule in the near future designed to prevent the practice. But my objection doesn’t really concern the effectiveness of the strategy (or lack thereof).

Rather, as I was alluding to last week, there are already too many examples of “do-overs and didn't-counts” in the NFL thanks to all of the replay challenges after every score, turnover, and other instances when coaches are able to throw the red flag and dispute calls. I’d like to be able to watch plays happen and know they were meaningful and counted, and not always be wondering if what I just saw was going to be rethought and revised. Then again, I’m a spectator, not a participant. I understand those actually playing the game aren’t going to be as ready to “embrace the variance” of human error in officiating.

But as far as icing the kicker goes, I think we might safely get rid of that particular variety of “running it twice” in football.

From the Annals of Bad Timing

Today marks the two-month anniversary of Black Friday. Seem like it’s been longer than that to you, too?

Of all the many consequences of the unsealing of the Department of Justice’s indictment and civil complaint on April 15, there was one kind of personal one that I’ve been wanting to share. I’m going to have to be a little bit vague with some of the details, I’m afraid, but you’ll still get the gist of the story, I think. And then we can laugh at my pain together.

As I’ve mentioned here now and again, I’ve been doing a lot of freelance writing about poker for various publications and sites. One publication in particular asked me some time ago about possibly writing a feature for them at some point, and after several months of talking about it an assignment was finally delivered. I had several weeks on which to work on the story, which gave me a chance to research the piece thoroughly as well as to try to contact various individuals in the poker world for comments, too.

The story concerned what had been a very prominent issue in poker for quite some time. I’d commented on the issue at least a couple of times here on Hard-Boiled Poker, I know, and it was one that many others had noticed and formed opinions about. Had to do with the many poker TV shows and how on several of them -- including the most popular ones like “High Stakes Poker” and “Poker After Dark” -- the PokerStars pros and those from Full Tilt Poker were for various reasons unable to compete against one another.

I ended up digging fairly deeply into the background of the situation, noting a number of different explanations for why the PS guys and FTP guys were not getting to play on the same shows. Most of it was related to the sites’ sponsoring of the shows, but in many cases the situation wasn’t as cut-and-dry as it might have seemed from the outside. That is to say, just because one site sponsored a given show, that didn’t necessarily mean players from the other site were prohibited from playing on it. Like most everything to do with online poker, it was a highly complicated situation.

For the piece I spoke with a number of individuals, including several pros from both sites who regularly appeared on the shows. There were a number of different opinions and views, with some on both sides articulating a desire to resolve the impasse and even coming up with some ideas about how to do so. I also was able to get quotes from the shows’ producers, too, who clarified that while they certainly were involved with the casting of the shows, they weren’t preventing anyone from playing due to a particular site affiliation.

That was one aspect of the article I was especially desirous to have reported, since I think many believed erroneously that the shows’ producers were somehow making decisions about who could and couldn’t play. To refer to just one example, while PokerStars was sponsoring “High Stakes Poker” this season, neither Stars nor the “HSP” folks were saying Full Tilt guys couldn’t play on the show; rather, that was a decision made by FTP.

In addition to talking to PokerStars and Full Tilt pros who appeared on the shows, I also was able to contact some other very prominent players who weren’t affiliated with either site and who also often played on the shows. Interestingly (I thought), some of those non-affiliated players declined to comment on the story, not wanting to get in the middle of the battle between PS and FTP.

Anyhow, like I say a lot of time and effort went into the piece. I had about six weeks to pull it all together, and I’ll admit it was a satisfying feeling finally to submit it just a couple of days prior to the deadline I’d been given. Maybe even felt a little bit proud about the whole thing.

When was that deadline, you ask? Ah, yes. Friday, April 15.

By dinner time that day I already knew my feature couldn’t possibly run. The entire story was written within a context that had suddenly become utterly obsolete. It was like I had carefully crafted a long, detailed account of a petty little civil war in a country that had suddenly been successfully crushed by another much larger and more powerful one.

Perhaps another, related story could be told, one concerning how the warring factions might have been better off focusing their attentions on other, more pressing matters than their bickering with one another. But the one I’d written was no longer relevant at all.

Of course, looking back on it, I wonder how much it really mattered before. I mean, it seemed important at the time. But in the end, no matter how the whole battle between the sites ultimately went, all of the really good looking girls would still go out with the guys from Mohawk ’cos they got all the money.

Changes at “High Stakes Poker”

Was hearing late last week some of those rumors about the upcoming seventh season of “High Stakes Poker,” set to kick off on February 26 -- a Saturday night -- on the Game Show Network. Most concerned a possible host change, with Gabe Kaplan, part of the show since its premiere in 2006, apparently not coming back either for this season or the next.

The guys on Ante Up! floated something about it on their show last week (the 2/3/11 episode). Quoting a “trusty source” -- possibly another ex-HSP host, A.J. Benza, who has been a guest on their show more than once -- they noted that Kaplan had been “fired” and replaced with “another funny a-hole.” (The quote certainly sounds like Benza.) After mentioning that tidbit on the show, they additionally included the news in their show notes afterwards.

Now we know for certain. When the shows begin airing later this month, Kaplan will no longer be at the mic commenting on the action and cracking wise. Rather, Norm MacDonald (“Saturday Night Live,” Dirty Work), another comedian, will be taking over the hosting duties. Kara Scott will be returning as well as a co-host, and apparently for those with 3-D televisions the show will be watchable in that format, too.

MacDonald is in fact a poker player, showing up at small events and satellites in L.A. and at the World Series of Poker over the past few years. He did a turn on an episode of “Celebrity Poker Showdown” once back in 2004. He also was one of the first guests on the Two Plus Two Pokercast back in early 2008 (episode 5), and gave one of the best (and funniest) interviews those guys have ever had on that podcast.

But his poker resume obviously pales in comparison to that of Kaplan, who was there playing at the WSOP way back in the late 1970s. A long-time cash game player (at times for high stakes), Kaplan’s tourney résumé is mighty impressive, too, and certainly helped qualify him for the commentator’s role.

I always enjoyed Kaplan on the show, so like many my initial response to the news that he had been replaced was not positive. Nor was I that enthused by the news that no Full Tilt Poker pros will be on Season 7, either, although I don’t mind seeing new faces. (See Kevmath’s Bluff piece for a full rundown of the players who will be appearing.)

The sorta-surprising news of Kaplan’s “firing” and MacDonald’s stepping in brought a couple of other, similar changes to mind.

One was from back in late 1997 when MacDonald, after having hosted the “Weekend Update” segment on “Saturday Night Live” for four years, was suddenly fired by Don Ohlmeyer, then president of NBC’s West Coast division. While MacDonald frequently appeared in other segments on SNL, including doing a hilariously-half-hearted Burt Reynolds (a.k.a. Turd Ferguson) impersonation on the recurring faux-“Jeopardy” spoof, he was best known on the show for anchoring the “Update” desk.

Somewhat controversial, that, and perhaps made even more memorable by MacDonald’s subsequent appearance as a guest on the “Late Show with David Letterman” on which Letterman offered a lot of pointed commentary about Ohlmeyer.

Kind of a similar scenario, I suppose, though on a smaller scale, with a much-liked host being suddenly yanked. Only this time MacDonald is the one stepping in rather than shipping out.

The other, similar change the story brought to mind was when “Monday Night Football” brought in Dennis Miller -- another comedian and “Weekend Update” alum -- back in 2000 to deliver color commentary.

Miller lasted a couple of seasons on MNF, though his frequent obscure references (a big part of his schtick as a comedian-slash-political commentator) didn’t land that often with the average sports fan and the entire experiment is generally viewed as having failed. In fact, last year TV Guide listed Miller’s stint on MNF among its “25 Biggest TV Blunders.”

Despite the title of the show, the stakes are much, much lower when it comes to “High Stakes Poker” and changes to its cast and format. Not really sure how MacDonald is gonna pull it off, to be honest, though as one of those who enjoys his humor I’m at least curious to watch how he does. And how the new cast of players do as well.

The fact is, while MacDonald’s contributions will most certainly affect the success of the show, it’s the players who matter most. And when it comes to attracting and keeping an audience that extends beyond hardcore poker fans (as GSN obviously wants to do), it’ll be the personalities of the competitors -- and whether they help create and maintain interest -- that’ll determine the show’s fate.

In other words, as much as I like Kaplan as a host, I think replacing Ivey, Dwan, Antonius, and the other Full Tilters will prove much more challenging here than will replacing Mr. Kotter. Here’s hoping all those non-FTPers on the Season 7 line-up -- all great players, obviously -- can prove successful at the game of entertaining, too.

Raising the Stakes for Poker on TV: “High Stakes Poker”

Found time yesterday to catch up on the first five episodes of “High Stakes Poker” of 2010. These mark the start of the sixth season of the Game Show Network series which first aired in January 2006. The format of the show has remained essentially the same from past seasons, although with a couple of changes this time around.

The show returns to the Golden Nugget where it began in Season 1 and had returned for Season 5. One big difference is the removal of A.J. Benza who had previously joined Gabe Kaplan in the commentary booth. With Benza gone, Kara Scott has joined the show to host short segments and interview players.

The removal of Benza from the show garnered a lot of reaction on the forums, including a still-ongoing “Online Petition to bring Back AJ Benza for HSP” thread on Two Plus Two. For those joining that cause, the thinking is the “HSP” hosting/commentating formula had worked well for the first five seasons, so there was no reason to muck with it.

I, too, liked Benza’s contribution to the show. Despite being a funny guy himself -- Benza’s initial appearance on the Ante Up! show (in June 2008) was one of the funniest episodes of that podcast I can recall -- Benza mostly played the straight man to Kaplan on “HSP.” The pair (both Brooklyn natives, actually) seemed to have great chemistry and added a lot of flavor to the proceedings, both with the poker commentary and the humor.

So I wasn’t necessarily happy either when I’d heard Benza wouldn’t be returning, although that doesn’t mean I’m not glad to see Kara Scott on the show. When I first saw Scott at the 2008 World Series of Poker Main Event, I’d known she’d been a presenter or host on a couple of different poker shows in Europe, having worked on “Poker Night Live” and with the European Poker Tour. Scott made a deep run in that year’s WSOP ME, finishing 104th. I remember writing a little about her in a recap about one of the Day Twos here and having written a post about her late in the day over on PokerNews.

Scott does well, I think, in her somewhat limited role on “High Stakes.” I was surprised, actually, at how little screen time the producers give her, though in the short interviews both her poker knowledge and ease before the camera serve her well. This week, Jennifer Newell and I wrote a new “He Said/She Said” column for Woman Poker Player in which we discussed the subject of women and poker shows, and we both ended up remarking on how we thought Scott was underused on “HSP.” You can read those pieces here: He Said / She Said.

Meanwhile, Kaplan still gets to crack wise often enough. There do seem to be a few more quiet stretches with Benza gone, but Kaplan carries it well enough, and I remain a big fan of his humor and his poker commentary.

There are a couple of other small format changes to note. I’m noticing the frequent use of a graphic now and then to update us on stack sizes at the table -- a plus. (The minimum buy-in for the game is $200,000, with two players, Phil Ivey and Tom “durrrr” Dwan, having bought in for $500,000.) Also, Daniel Negreanu is hosting a brief “Did You Know” segment that is interesting enough, I guess.

What remains most interesting -- and the biggest reason why the show tops my list of faves on teevee -- is the poker. Many fascinating hands already on these first five episodes. I’m not gonna rehearse them here, both because I’d rather not spoil ’em for those who haven’t watched and intend to, and because I can’t hope to provide real analysis, but just share the reactions of a poker player/fan.

The first episode was dominated by Phil Hellmuth’s swift downfall, a rapid sequence that kicked off the season with a delicious sampling of schadenfreude. Although Kaplan says something about prop bets being forbidden this season, there have been several discussed already, including that big one involving Phil Ivey going vegetarian for a year. Meanwhile, Ivey once again shows his incredible acumen at the table, Negreanu struggles once again on the show, and other players come and go.

This most recent episode (the fifth one) was probably the most entertaining to watch so far. There were several all-in hands, though with a couple of exceptions most were not caused by the stacks being short but rather were consequent to a series of postflop decisions. One especially interesting hand took place between Jason Mercier and Ivey, a hand which Mercier recounts in an article from yesterday over on PokerListings.

Of course, the big highlight was the hand between Phil Ivey and Tom “durrrr” Dwan that concluded the fifth episode -- kind of a jawdropping hand on the order of the one from last year involving Dwan, Barry Greenstein, and Peter Eastgate. Ivey starts the hand with over $1 million, and Dwan with around $750,000. Watch and enjoy yourself:



I was saying last week how I hadn’t had a lot of time for watching poker on teevee. But if I’m only going to watch one show, this has got to be the one, yes?

TV or Not TV

As a child, I watched lots of television. Didn’t distinguish me much. We all did it, just about. Except for that new kid with the fussy parents who wouldn’t let you come in past the foyer when you went over to see if he could play. Word was they didn’t allow TV, for whatever reason. Or maybe it was just one hour a day. The rest of us, though, we watched and watched and watched.

I remember coming home from school and watching “All in the Family” and “Match Game” back-to-back. Both shows were filled with adult-themed references my elementary-school-sized brain couldn’t hope to follow. But I watched nonetheless. ’Cos, well, it was what was on. Then I watched the next show and the one that came after that. Did homework in there somewhere. Ate dinner. And somehow I became a reader, too, despite all the hours in front of the tube.

It really wasn’t until I got to college that I finally turned the TV off. Much, much more interesting things to do, it turned out. Gradually over the years since then I began watching again, but in the last couple of years or so TV has once more begun to fade away from the day-to-day. Vera and I have two sets, but weeks go by without the one upstairs being turned on. The downstairs set gets played a few times a week, though usually it is sports (my choice), home shows (hers), or “30 Rock” (both). And that’s about it.

All of which is to say, I’m almost never watching poker on TV anymore, despite the preponderance of shows available to watch. Sometimes I’ll go online to see an episode or three of “Poker After Dark” or “High Stakes Poker,” or perhaps to catch the latest “Poker2Nite,” but usually doing so is an afterthought -- i.e., not something I’m actively seeking out or for which I’m scheduling time.

I did happen to see some of the WSOP Europe coverage on ESPN (or ESPN2) the other day. Caught some of that “Caesars Cup” won by the Europeans against the Americans (and Canadian). The show was somewhat interesting to follow, although the poker was hardly compelling since the crazy-fast structure meant it was all-in-all-the-time. The “doubles” matches -- especially those “alternate bet” ones that had teammates taking turns street by street -- presented a couple of curious moments, but again the big, big blinds tended to mute whatever novel strategic questions might have been suggested by the format.

I also caught the first episode of the new season of “High Stakes Poker” a couple of days ago, which remains a very entertaining and engaging show, I think. I had been prepared to come away with some sort of opinion about the decision to remove A.J. Benza as co-host and Gabe Kaplan’s straight man, and to introduce Kara Scott in a different role (not commentating but interviewing players). But I was too distracted by Phil Ivey and the others gobbling up Phil Hellmuth’s $200,000 stack of chips within the first half-hour. (I’ll try to watch a few more episodes, then come back down the road with some sort of review of the current season.)

I remember hearing the guys on the 2+2 Pokercast talk about how they almost felt sorry for Hellmuth there. I guess I understood what they meant -- was a pretty desperate stretch of hands for the Poker Brat -- though I can’t say I shared the sentiment.

No need to feel sorry for Hellmuth today, of course, as he is currently the chip leader with 27 players left at the World Poker Tour Bay 101 Shooting Star event. Close behind are Hassan Habib (2nd) and Andy Seth (3rd), with Matt Keikoan (5th), Faraz Jaka (7th), and Chau Giang (9th) lurking. Jonathan Little and Scotty Nguyen still have chips, too.

Could make for a good TV final table down the road, I guess. I’ll watch, if there isn’t something else to do.

(Post title via the 1973 comedy LP by Phil Proctor and Peter Bergman, one of those Firesign Theatre side projects. “Give Up This Day” still cracks me up. “Good bless you, and God night, and please don't touch that dial...”)

Tom’s Adventures in Durrrrland

Barry Greenstein keeps what they call an “audio blog” over at Poker Road called “Tips from the Bear.” His entries come fairly infrequently, with some being genuine “tips” and others just recounting various hands or happenings. In the latest (dated 3/9/09), Greenstein discusses that amazing hand from the most recent episode of High Stakes Poker -- the final one of the episode primarily involving himself, reigning World Series of Poker Main Event champion Peter Eastgate, and the guy everybody’s talking about these days, Tom “durrrr” Dwan.

“This hand will be remembered for a long time,” Greenstein begins, using the same sober tone he always employs when doing these audio blogs. I think he’s right. Already been a bit of buzz on the intertubes about it, and I imagine the hand will continue to receive a lot of attention over the next couple of months as people discuss it even further on blogs, forums, podcasts, and elsewhere.

If you have not seen the hand, I don’t want to spoil it for you. Before reading any further, take a look:

As Greenstein points out in his audio blog commentary, stack sizes are very significant here. Greenstein says he was one of the shorter stacks at the table with about $230,000. Meanwhile, Eastgate had bought in deep (and had won a few pots), and so had about $500,000 in front of him when the hand began. Dwan also had something in the neighborhood of a half a million. All of which means we’re talking hundreds of big blinds in each stack -- nearly 300 or something for the Bear, and twice that for Eastgate and Dwan.

To describe the action: The blinds are $400/$800 with a $200 ante. Greenstein picks up under the gun and open-raises to $2,500. Incredibly, all seven of his opponents call the raise. Dwan starts it by calling from UTG+1 with . Then David Benyamine calls with , Eli Elezra with , Ilari Sahamies with , Daniel Negreanu (button) with , Eastgate (small blind) with , and Doyle Brunson (big blind) with . Total pot is $21,600.

“Who opened this pot that got seven callers, that’s all I want to know,” says a sheepish-looking Greenstein.

The flop comes . As Greenstein says on his audio blog, about as good a flop as he could hope for (aside from flopping a set) when holding pocket aces and facing a table full of opponents. Eastgate checks his trips, Brunson checks, and Greenstein leads out for $10,000 -- just under half the pot. Dwan, who has paired his ten, then raises to $37,300. “I don’t know what he’s doing,” says Gabe Kaplan on the commentary. “He’s gotta know that Barry’s really got a hand here.” It folds around to Eastgate who silently calls Dwan’s raise. Greenstein calls, too. Pot now $133,500.

The comes on the turn, and both Eastgate and Greenstein check. Dwan (who has the weakest hand of the three) considers for a good while, then fires out $104,200. Eastgate folds, perhaps worried that Dwan has ace-deuce or something, and a very pained-looking Greenstein also folds. Dwan wins the pot.

Once the hand is over, Elezra pipes up to say “Barry fold the best hand.” Technically true, as Eastgate had gotten out, but I am not sure what Elezra thought Eastgate might have had. “Well, he had the best hand,” says Dwan, pointing to Eastgate as he stacks his chips. Dwan goes on to say he’ll make a side bet that Eastgate had the best hand, and it sounds like Brunson takes him up on it. Kaplan rounds out the commentary saying the only other player he could imagine making a play like Dwan’s would have been the late Stu Ungar.

I’m not even going to pretend to try to analyze this hand. For that, go listen to Greenstein, whose 17-minute commentary in his audio blog gives us novices a lot of other things to think about here. Instead, let me just list three reasons why this hand is so friggin’ fascinating to small-time punters like myself.

For one, the action is especially peculiar, utterly unlike anything we’ve ever seen previously when it comes to poker on television. The majority of televised poker is tournaments, where such “family pots” rarely occur (and are even more rarely shown). They don’t occur in cash games that much, either, especially high stakes games. As Greenstein says in his narrative of the hand, he open-raised and “something happened to me that has never happened to me before in an eight-handed game,” namely, the whole table called. Things get even weirder post-flop, and seem even more so to a lot of us given that we see the hole cards. So the sheer novelty of the hand is one element here.

Secondly, seeing the worst hand manage to push out not one but two better hands is also something most of us find amazing to watch. Those of us who call ourselves recreational players (or amateurs) watch a hand like this and with all three players discover that we are probably not personally capable of having acted the way each of them act. Take just the turn action: most of us cannot imagine ourselves betting out like Dwan, nor folding trips like Eastgate, nor folding pocket rockets like Greenstein. The whole hand thus has an “uncanny” feel to it wherein we recognize it is the same game we play, but we also recognize what we are watching is wholly unfamiliar to us.

Finally, the fact that the hand involves these particular players makes it all the more interesting. Thanks to his frequent participation over on Poker Road and on the forums, his well-regarded book Ace on the River, his long-term record of solid play, and his humor and generosity, Greenstein rightly occupies a fairly central position in our little poker world. When we watch High Stakes Poker, we’re usually more intrigued by a hand involving the Bear than a hand, say, between Benyamine and Elezra. Eastgate also fascinates, thanks to his youth and status as the 2008 WSOP Main Event champ. For a variety of reasons, we want to see how this youngster is going to handle himself on this difficult, challenging stage.

Then there’s Dwan. Of the “Durrrr Challenge.” Cover boy of the February 2009 Bluff. “He posterized me,” says a humble Greenstein in his commentary. Indeed, Dwan is poker’s current Michael Jordan. Dwan makes this hand happen, of course. But his involvement ensures it fascinates, too.

Earlier in the episode, in response to a false claim from Dwan regarding the strength of a hand he had folded, Kaplan cracks “He lives in a little cabin in Durrrrland.”

Dunno where that is. But, like Alice, I think we’re all becoming curiouser and curiouser!