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You Make the Read – I Sure as Heck Couldn’t
As a writer for Full Tilt at this WSOP, I’ve spent a fair amount of time observing the pros as they ply their craft. I also play a bit of poker and I happen to think I’m pretty skilled. But occasionally, while observing the world’s best, I’m reminded of just how much I have to learn. This hand serves as a perfect example.
This hand went down in Day 2 of the pot-limit hold ‘em event, and the two players involved are both renowned players and bracelet winners. For reasons I’ll discuss later, I can’t reveal the names of the players involved. For this post, I’ll just call them Kramer and George.
With blinds of 1000 and 1500, Kramer raised in early position to 4500. It was folded around to George in the big blind, who called. Both players had around 60,000 in their stacks.
The flop came Ac 8h 8c. George checked and Kramer bet 7,000; George called. The turn brought the 4h and both players checked. The river was the 3h. George paused briefly, then fired10,000. Kramer thought for a period of time, then raised, making it 24,000 more to call. George thought, then folded and Kramer raked a substantial pot.
The hand struck me as strange. I mean, why no action on the turn and all those fireworks on the river? And then the fold – what was that about?
I tracked down the players a little while later and asked them about the hand. George confided that he had a busted King-high flush draw and was betting because it was the only way to win the pot. The check on the turn also gave him a sense that Kramer was weak. OK, I thought. Fair enough.
And Kramer? Well, he had even less. He thought that George had a medium Ace,and that given the dangerous nature of the board, George wouldn’t be able to call the raise.
So, in sum, they both sensed weakness and they were both right. The one who was in the position to make the most aggressive move was the one to take the pot. This is clearly a more sophisticated version of the game than I play.
Now as to why I won’t reveal the player’s names. In my conversations with the players, I leaned that they discussed the hand during a break. It seems what they told each other was very different from what they confided to me.
It’s brutally hard to put these guys on a hand.
