Wednesday, April 18, 2012

The Evil Hand

Good afternoon everyone.  The 'evil hand' refers to the poker hand that I nicknamed while I was living in Las Vegas.  This happened when I was playing in a tournament at the Sahara one day, which is actually where I played a lot of tournaments when I lived in the desert.  I'm not saying that I played the Sahara tournament on a daily basis, but I have played more tournaments there than I have ever played anywhere else.  My notes on this particular tournament have me holding the 'evil hand', the Queen-Ten (of hearts in this instance, although the hand doesn't have to be hearts, or suited for that matter).  In conversations that I have had with my friends since this fateful day, 'evil hand suited' is how I now refer to queen-ten suited...  Anyway, there were 58 entrants in this tournament, and we were down to the final 18 when the blinds were at 1,000 and 2,000, and I was in the big blind.  I had 3,500 left in chips before the hand, so now 2,000 of those were in the big blind when I looked down at my queen-ten of hearts.  I ended up all-in preflop against (surprise, surprise) a bigger queen, the king-queen.  The board came out Q x x Q K and I was done for the tournament in 18th place.  I don't think that my play was horrible here considering that I was almost out of chips, but then I decided to enter the next tournament that the Sahara had on tap for that evening.  This tournament saw me as a runner for about an hour.  I limped with the 'evil hand' this time, and a queen came on the flop.  Have you ever played against one of those opponents that just LOOKS like they're bluffing?  They just have that look about them that they would try to bluff you...  Well, this hand ended up being called down all the way to the river, where my opponent ended up showing queen-jack (in retrospect, I have thought that maybe the villain had that look about him because he wasn't too sure about his jack kicker).  Let me interject here that a jack kicker is WORLDS BETTER than a ten kicker...  So, for the second time in about an hour, I was eliminated from my second-straight Sahara tournament by the 'evil hand'.  I took this story to work with me, and to the tables with my poker playing friends, and now I share it here with you, so all of you know that whenever I refer to the 'evil hand', I am talking about the queen-ten.  It looks kind of pretty (sort of), you "have to play it" (according to one of my friends) if it's suited, because you're 2/5 of the way to a royal flush, but BEWARE, it can get you into all kinds of trouble (imagine ominous background music here)...  In the future I will address my LEAST FAVORITE HAND, which is actually NOT the 'evil hand'.  I hope that all of you have a great day, that you don't call down players while you're holding the second-best hand just because they look 'sketchy', and I will see you again on Friday.
    

4 comments:

  1. Eh, most of the time I don't even bother playing this hand unless I get in cheap and I flop more than Top pair.

    But, i'm probably a nit

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  2. Wow -- one of my FAVORITE hands is Q-10 sooted -- preferably spades. I believe it kept me in a tournament at Caesars Las Vegas that I chopped with another player at the end.

    The key is not to overplay it, largely getting value in stealth straight hands or maybe flushes. Unfortunately, as you have mention, it is particularly vulnerable to being outkicked when the Queen is paired.

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  3. I should have noted that the evil hand is not allowed to be anyone's favorite hand... :)

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