This isn't about Harry Potter: I realize I have become fairly obsessed with HP recently. I really don't think about this as much as I post about it, but my public identity has become A) Harry Potter, and B) everything else.
However, I do other things in life, including weekly poker night at the seminary on Saturday nights. This last Saturday I lost money for, I think, only the second time this year, but it came on an interesting hand. So, for those of you who care about poker (which may be nobody), here is what happened. I'll tell you what I had, and figure out what I did wrong (or right) in this hand.
Blinds are 5 cents/10 cents. I'm the dealer and I have KJ of clubs. There are five players in the hand. The first two to act both fold, so I raise to $0.30. Ken in the small blind and Josh in the big blind both call.
The flop comes 7clubs/8clubs/10hearts. Ken checks, Josh bets $0.30, I raise to $1.00. Ken and Josh both call.
The turn is a 6 of hearts. Ken checks. Josh bets $2.00. OK, now it gets interesting. I have committed $1.30 to the pot, so the pot is $3.90 before Josh's bet. So I have to commit $2.00 to a $5.90 pot. I'm assuming at this point that Josh has a 9, so he made his straight and I am losing, but I can take the pot with a 9 or a club. That leaves me with potentially 12 outs out of 45 unknown cards. That's a little better than 1/4, which is about what I'm getting on my call with implied odds. So, I make the call.
Then things really get interesting.
Ken goes all-in behind me. Now, Ken had about $10 before this hand started, Josh had about $12 and I had $7.30. Josh calls immediately.
Oh dear. So now I have committed $3.30 to the pot and I have $4.00 remaining. The pot I can win is about $18.00. So, basically I am getting 4-18 on my money. In other words, if I'm getting 22% to win I should be making this call.
I ran the numbers. I'm thinking they both have a 9. If they have nothing else of import I can win the hand with one of the two other 9s or the other 8 clubs. So, best case I have 10 outs. 10/44 (plus the two unknown cards from their hands). 10/44 is... 22.7%... brilliant. So I'm right at that boundary. I decided to go for it and make the call. Probably the wrong decision.
Ken shows 9/9, and Josh has 10clubs/Qclubs.
Disaster. Josh has two of my clubs, so I'm only getting 8/42 or 19%. My outs are the other two nines, and the remaining 6 clubs (2,3,4,5,6,A). Sadly, the river came up blank.
So... was I right or wrong? What would you have done? When would you have gotten away from the hand, or would you?
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