I was playing in a 719 runner 'Sniper' (Bounty Hunter) tournament on Absolute this evening and experienced both the highs and the lows. Early on I had a piece of good fortune, and more than doubled my starting stack, when I flopped a set after calling a min-raise with pocket 2's
I had folded pocket 5's a couple of hands earlier, to an all-in, and would have made a set on the flop there - so I was set mining again, and was lucky enough to hit.
There were two other players in the pot, and I had them both covered, so I bet the pot (enough to put them both all-in), hoping one would call; both called and flipped up A-K and Q-J respectively; two-pair and an up/down straight draw - so I still had some cards to dodge.
The turn was the 4d, putting two diamonds on board, but there was no flush draw for either player, so I just had to dodge a Ten, Queen or Jack on the river. I was expecting the worst, but amazingly (one time) my set held up and I was in great shape.
I shipped half my stack a couple of hands later, when I called an all-in with pocket 7's and ran into pocket 8's. But I was patient and picked my spots and after 2 and 1/2 hours of play I had made the money (just). I'd taken 4 bounties on the way, so I'd more than covered my buy-in, but was in the bottom 10 of the tournament so would have to move quickly to be in with a chance of laddering and possibly taking down a good prize.
It was the first hand after the bubble, and the player to my left (in the BB) had announced, in the chat-box, that he was going to go all-in on this hand (not great etiquette), but there had been action before me from a very short stack who had pushed his last $5k, or so, and I had a decision to make, as I was holding pocket 3's.
I decided that I had to take a chance in order to progress, so I pushed all-in over the top, hoping that the BB had picked up rubbish and wouldn't stay true to his word. No such luck - he shipped it all-in, covering us both, so now it was in the lap of the gods. The cards were flipped up and the first player showed Ah-6C and the BB showed Kh-Qh.
I was dancing when the flop came down Ac-Kd-3s, both had hit their top pair, but I had hit my set and was in a great position to treble through and rocket into the top 10 of the tourney.
One of them was going to need runners to beat me, as any trips they might make would give me a house. Joy quickly turned to concern as the turn brought the Js, giving the BB a straight draw - now only a Ten on the river could end my tournament. There's a maximum of 4 in the deck, which makes me about a 90% favourite - but, hey, what are odds when your tournament is at stake against a bigger stack player - in my experience it's 100% that I am going to lose.
You can easily guess what's coming next - yes, the Th pops up on the river. I couldn't believe it - how freaking insane is that.
I've posted some bad beats on this blog, usually when I'm all-in with a pair against overcards, and they catch their card on the river - but to go runner-runner and make a straight after I had hit my set was just one of the sickest beats I have ever taken.
An hour has gone by since that hand, and as I write this I still can't believe it.
It's yet another one to add to my list of 'big stack gets all-in against shorter stack and sucks out' stories. If this doesn't prove my theory that it's impossible for a short-stack player to beat a bigger stack when all the chips are at stake then nothing will.
It's just so hard to take after you've played your A-game for nearly 3 hours. I got my money in good (I wasn't dominated by an overpair), so was ahead pre-flop, hit the flop, so was massively ahead, then lost to just about the only 2 running cards that could bust me.
It's going to take a long time to shake this one off.
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