#183: “Adventures in Doughville, Part II: KK = gg me”

I am not in the least bit superstitious but I do have a funny relationship with pocket Kings. A few years ago, myself and Nick ’rounder63′ Carrillo seemed to bust every MTT final table with the cowboys, prompting the shorthand ‘GG me’ every time we picked them up. Then last Summer, I was knocked out of 7 out of 8 consecutive live tourneys with them. So, like the Pavlovian dog that I am, I have this thing now where when I look down at Kings, I immediately picture myself lying on the bed back in my hotel room in 5 minutes time.

With 40 players remaining, it is fair to say that for the first time in the tournament, I entertained notions that I had a real chance of doing something special in Deauville. I was still below average but my early aggression on day 4 had got me into the 30-35bb zone and with that, given me some new weapons. I also couldn’t help but notice the distinct lack of big name pros left. That isn’t to say the remaining field didn’t contain some excellent players. It’s just I fully expected a plethora of ballers to make it down to the business end of the tournament.

Pokerstars Blogger Howard Swains approached me at the break for a brief interview, responding to online requests to provide some coverage on the last remaining Irish player in the field. (Dermot Blain was unlucky to bust just before the bubble and Feargal Cawley ran horridly to bust late on Day 3 having been amongst the chipleaders from the get-go.) I was happy to oblige as was Dara O’Kearney as it gave us the opportunity to give shout-outs to our ‘Firm’ bretheren and me the chance to express gratitude to all the people who bought pieces of my EPT action.

I returned to my table and within the first orbit, looked down at two black Kings in the HJ. I instantly saw myself lying on my huge bed in my plush room in the Royal Barriere. Nonetheless, I opened and was called by the small blind, the dangerous French Winimax pro Aurelien Guiglini. He check-called a flop of 322 and check-called again when another 2 hit the turn. The pot was about 180K and I had 205K behind. It seemed pretty clear to me that he had a pocket pair 33-99 with an outside chance that he was slow-playing/cagily playing 1010+ or stubbornly stationing a hand like A10-AQ. The river brought a 7 and he checked again.

At this point, I took a moment to consider the situation. My perception of his perception of me was that I was tight as we had played the latter levels of Day 3 together when I had been particularly card-dead. My perception of him was he was capable of folding a small-medium pair if my river-bet appeared too much like a value-extractor. I therefore decided that on the balance of his likely range and comprehension of my line, my best bet would be a larger one that did a better job of polarising me – in other words, the kind of bet I might make if I was bluffing or nutted. I thought about the overbet shove but rejected it as it seemed clunky and might just lay too bad a price for him to be a hero. I fired 118K and stared blankly down at the felt, hoping for a call.

Twenty seconds elapsed and he announced ‘All-In’. I looked up and stared at him in utter shock. This was the last thing I expected. I had just over 80K behind and the pot was half a million. Rubbing my face and muttering things like ‘I can’t believe you have 7s’ and ‘This is so sick, how the fuck can you have 7s’, I trolled through the disgusting maths of the situation. I only had to be good 13% of the time to justify the call but how often does he shove here without 33, 77 or AA (When the third deuce came on the turn, the player on the button leapt out of his seat screaming ‘Oh mon Dieu’). It was possible but unlikely that he was making a bad ultra-thin value bet with Jacks or Queens. It was possible but extremely unlikely he was bluffing. The problem was I was getting the price for ‘unlikely’. I stood up and called. He showed his 7s and I tossed my cards face-up in disgust.

Three scoops of ice-cream from Deauville’s finest Gelaterie did little to take the pain away. 38th place and 16K was obviously a satisfactory result but the nagging feelings of what might have been lingered long. Lying on my huge bed in my plush room in the Royal Barriere, I solemnly logged onto the Pokerstars Blog. Howard Swains had written an excellent piece on me, The Firm, my Blog and Irish poker in general, signing off with the line “…and fold kings pre-flop”. He might be onto something there.