Rocking hammers to beat down cancer …

Or, The Hammer Reigns Supreme Over Nearly Everyone …

The tournament was brutal. I kept making do with junk all night - the highest pair I had was pocket jacks. After that, I caught a pair of 10s which ran into queens and rivered a straight to win. I caught a pair of 9s that resulted in this doozy:

$5 + $0.50 Tournament (4828390), Table 7 - 25/50 - No Limit Hold’em - 4:27:44 ET - 2024/06/28
Seat 1: puckett101 (3,285)
Seat 2: Tripten (2,165)
Seat 3: mcmoney28 (855)
Seat 4: NiceUnderground (3,665)
Seat 5: _Skyody_ (3,320)
Seat 6: Swinganamiss (2,335)
Seat 7: TheHappyBurrito (1,285)
Seat 8: 72master (1,985)
Seat 9: billyHo10281 (1,155)
TheHappyBurrito posts the small blind of 25
72master posts the big blind of 50
The button is in seat #5
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to puckett101 [9c 9s]
billyHo10281 folds
puckett101 raises to 300
Tripten folds
mcmoney28 raises to 855, and is all in
NiceUnderground folds
_Skyody_ folds
TheHappyBurrito folds
72master folds
puckett101 calls 555
mcmoney28 shows [9h 9d]
puckett101 shows [9c 9s]
*** FLOP *** [5c Ac 3h]
*** TURN *** [5c Ac 3h] [Tc]
*** RIVER *** [5c Ac 3h Tc] [Qc]
mcmoney28 shows a pair of Nines
puckett101 shows a flush, Ace high
puckett101 wins the pot (1,785) with a flush, Ace high

Yes. It really happened. And wow.

As tons of people keep saying, “That’s poker.”

But here’s the amazing thing about the tourney (besides me reversing a recent string of bad luck, final tabling and finishing 6th for a nice cash payout when my pocket fives ran into Ac-Jd and the board came up Kd-4s-8h-Kh and, purely for the hell of it, 8d at the river to make two pair with top kicker against Our Hero) - The Hammer was utterly dominant. It was more dominant than A-J, a hand that took out at least two people (myself included). The Hammer induced folds, gave the big blinds walks and resulted in this little beauty here:

$5 + $0.50 Tournament (4828390), Table 3 - 800/1600 Ante 200 - No Limit Hold’em - 7:05:31 ET - 2024/06/28
Seat 2: IZZY412 (18,448)
Seat 3: BiggES77 (49,220)
Seat 5: preacher76 (39,580)
Seat 6: puckett101 (17,615)
Seat 7: PostModernBoy (21,266)
Seat 8: LaParka (47,371)
IZZY412 antes 200
BiggES77 antes 200
preacher76 antes 200
puckett101 antes 200
PostModernBoy antes 200
LaParka antes 200
PostModernBoy posts the small blind of 800
LaParka posts the big blind of 1,600
The button is in seat #6
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to puckett101 [6c 3h]
IZZY412 folds
BiggES77 calls 1,600
preacher76 folds
puckett101 folds
PostModernBoy calls 800
LaParka checks
*** FLOP *** [8d 6d 4d]
PostModernBoy checks
LaParka checks
BiggES77 checks
*** TURN *** [8d 6d 4d] [4s]
PostModernBoy bets 3,200
LaParka calls 3,200
BiggES77 folds
*** RIVER *** [8d 6d 4d 4s] [5h]
PostModernBoy checks
LaParka checks
*** SHOW DOWN ***
PostModernBoy shows [2d Ac] (a pair of Fours)
LaParka shows [7d 2h] (a straight, Eight high)
LaParka wins the pot (12,400) with a straight, Eight high

Players pushed all-in with it pre-flop and showed after they folded - for a while, it felt like a WWDN tourney. It was utterly beautiful.

One hand in particular got me thinking though. We all know about outs, but what about the opposite of outs? I’m thinking of this, not to get all meta on you here, as poker’s equivalent of dark matter - the cards that can hit that are utterly meaningless to either player and yet decide the contest. Here’s the hand that got me thinking:

$5 + $0.50 Tournament (4828390), Table 15 - 40/80 - No Limit Hold’em - 4:45:13 ET - 2024/06/28
Seat 1: puckett101 (6,575)
Seat 3: crazi_ivan (3,570)
Seat 4: Dwill13 (1,870)
Seat 5: veritaslost (5,935)
Seat 6: pod300 (1,515)
Seat 7: francys (4,325)
Seat 8: PostModernBoy (3,875)
Seat 9: BBC111 (4,635)
BBC111 posts the small blind of 40
puckett101 posts the big blind of 80
The button is in seat #8
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to puckett101 [Ah Qh]
crazi_ivan calls 80
Dwill13 folds
veritaslost folds
pod300 calls 80
francys calls 80
PostModernBoy calls 80
BBC111 calls 40
puckett101 raises to 480
crazi_ivan calls 400
pod300 calls 400
francys calls 400
PostModernBoy folds
BBC111 folds
*** FLOP *** [7c 5c 4c]
puckett101 bets 2,080
crazi_ivan folds
pod300 calls 1,035, and is all in
francys folds
puckett101 shows [Ah Qh]
pod300 shows [Ac 8h]
Uncalled bet of 1,045 returned to puckett101
*** TURN *** [7c 5c 4c] [2d]
*** RIVER *** [7c 5c 4c 2d] [9h]
puckett101 shows Ace Queen high
pod300 shows Ace Nine high
puckett101 wins the pot (4,150) with Ace Queen high

I’m chip leader, I bet big before the flop because I’m tired of limpers. Amazingly, three people called a 6x blind bet pre-flop with blinds of $40/$80. I was stunned. The flop was bloody ugly - all clubs and low cards, me with nothing. So what do you do as a chip leader with a possible flush on the board and nothing but two overs? That’s right! BET THE POT! It should be a game show, like Press Your Luck - have little poker whammies dancing around - we could call them suckies for suck outs.

At any rate, I had one caller - Ac-8h. Nut flush draw. Gutshot straight draw. Any 6, 8 or club makes their hand. Crap. 15 outs. That’s 54% to make the hand before the turn. 35% after the turn.

As I was sitting there hoping for blanks, it occurred to me that:

1. 18 cards had bean dealt, all but four of which had been discarded.
2. Three cards had been dealt on the flop with one burned.

That means 30 cards remained in the deck with 15 possible outs (and people grousing about how the 9 they threw away woulda won the pot, dammit!). What about my outs? Any card that isn’t a club, 8 or 6. I don’t need a queen or an ace - I just need blanks … poker dark matter, if you will. I need the absence of meaningful cards, the absence of poker stuff, if that makes sense.

So are those also outs? Or are they something different? And do we count / consider those in the same way? We certainly don’t seem to consider them unless we’re watching tournament poker and someone is praying for their tournament life that only blanks hit the board, but - when we’re counting outs - maybe we also need to start thinking of the inverse of outs - not cards that will make our hand, but cards that will nullify or negate the impact of our opponent’s hand.