“The usual suspects” could refer to the familiar faces around the table this week, but it’s about the hands we were dealt, players‘ attitudes to those hands, and the outcomes in this particular game. First, I’d like to tell you about some amazing hands I played this week.
I’d like to… but there were none.
The lack of any quality hands could explain my “Walk Of Shame” (sixth place) after I outrageously tried bluffing Rusty’s 2 pairs, except that my impatience had jumped the gun to take that accolade. It all seemed so unfair that, time and again, Rusty was getting great cards, and was steadily building a monster chip stack. But I was hardly alone in my misery.
Zack shoved when he flopped a straight draw, only for Rusty to reveal he’d already flopped the nut straight – 4 left. Janne was low-stack and got 2 callers when he pushed all-in pre-flop. I was expecting Rusty to take another scalp, but he demurred to Hadley’s push after she paired her Queen.
Tom picked up pocket As (which he always expects to get busted) and managed to get all his chips in just as Hadley flopped 2 pairs with the usual suspects – her trademark “dirty diaper”. When did you last see 23off cracking AA? It was obviously Tom’s self-fulfilling prophecy that did it.
Hadley had been closing the gap on Rusty’s lead, and heads up with Tom’s chips added, now had momentum. Rusty was in need of another big hand, and remarkably picked up pocket AA again! Maybe he has no interest in history, maybe he doesn’t share Tom’s pessimism regarding the bullets. Whatever.. I can’t say. What I can tell you is that on the turn, he not only had his over pair, but also a draw for the nut flush. Obviously Hadley had already made her flush, and with no reprieve, Rusty was on the ropes.
In a final hand that simply doubled down on the day’s main theme, Rusty had AA for probably the fifth time in the game, and despite the T23 flop, shoved his remaining stack. In an even more remarkable hand, Hadley showed that again (possibly the sixth time this week) she’d played those usual suspects with uncanny success, again flopping 2 pairs to crack the bullets.
Keyser Soze may be mythical, but a dirty diaper can be a game-changing monster.