Wrapping Up a Win

Sometimes the best laid plans end up with a crying three old over a broken Lego Happy Meal toy from McDonald’s and a parent holding a class 5 migraine storm from trying to be in three places at once.

The plan last weekend was to introduce myself to the esteemed leaders of Minnesota Poker Magazine while they were at Canterbury covering the Twin Cities Poker Open this past weekend (look for coverage in your next issue). Since the wife declared a kid-free day for herself I would treat the kids to my natural environment and place a few trifecta bets while glancing at the $4/$8 with half-kill Omaha 8 game.

But, instead the Maple Grove community center pool’s siren call was too strong as watching the kids wear themselves out on the water slides and rope climb while I collected too many UV rays on the portion of my body the spray-on sunscreen didn’t reach.

The water cooled down the kids and the worn-out parent but while laying out a poker hand actually popped in my head from a recent tournament session I had online (fair warning most of my play is online since casinos and home games aren’t exactly warmed up to games outside of Hold Em’ at the moment, but soon the mixed games will take over the world!). While playing the third hour of a PLO8 MTT on Stars I was sitting with just over 10BBs looking for a hand to go to war with but not necessarily shove preflop. A-2-5-6 (suited in clubs) folded to me in middle position as I popped in for a pot-sized raise. The cutoff came along as did the two blinds to see a 3-4-Q rainbow flop with one club.

In the very technical Omaha-speak this was considered a dream flop, but the blinds both checked as I made the very easy decision to try to grab the money in the pot without a showdown with another pot-sized bet, committing myself to the hand with only scraps left in my stack. The cutoff liked his hand too and min-raised to get the rest of my chips in turning over A-2-Q-X (X meaning the card did not matter here).

Who’s ahead?

Hold Em’ players would point out the pair of queens and in this case you’d be correct. Despite my super-wrap draw and any card that doesn’t pair the board giving me the nut low, but his A2 also took away the 8 as I would only get 1/4^th of the pot. Of course when the board hit a seven on the river giving me the straight he probably threw the cat when I 3/4^th him for the rather large pot (both of us had the nut low 7-4-3-2-A) as I would go on five hours later to a final table finish while he sat in the chat box for the next hour berating my bad play.

The answer is neither player played poorly here, if you’re not pushing draws on Omaha-Hi or Omaha 8 (much like LHE) this game is not for you. NLHE players lose sight of that since their entire stack is at risk and pushing a flush and/or straight draw isn’t always optimal play. In Omaha if you’re not gathering up a big enough pot and settling to just check-call to hit those draws you’re losing money in the long run.

David Aydt is a PokerStars blogger and beer snob who -- when he's not working 40 hours/week, playing softball, or hanging with the family -- savors poker for a quiet evening. Visit David's poker blog at nickleanddimes.blogspot.com