Story: ALL-IN THE FAMILY

After sharpening my skills at the $10 tournament tables on Partypoker.com for about six months, I recently decided to enter a few larger events.

One particular tourney that interested me was the Party Poker Million, in which, for a $600 buy-in, players have a chance to win part of a $1 million payout. Not really wanting to fork over the $600 (plus $40 for the house), though, I entered a satellite tournament three days earlier. I paid the $30 (plus $3) entry fee, played flawlessly against 174 other players, and eventually won the tournament and earned my pass to the Big Show!

At the time, there were only 450 players registered for the $1 million tournament, and 250th place would pay a minimum of $1,000! On the day of the event, I left work late and didn’t sit down at my home computer until 20 minutes into the tournament. To my great surprise, an additional 1,800 people had apparently paid the full $640 for a crack at the $274,000 top prize.

I settled in for what promised to be a fairly long evening — but not before making the mistake of telling my wife that I expected to win some big cash that night. My wife actually watched the first hour of play and saw my chip stack grow from 1,500 chips to nearly 46,000. When she eventually left the room — with yours truly in sixth place overall — she smiled (I’m sure she was pondering which to buy first: a car or kitchen cabinets). During each hourly break, I would update my wife and mother-in-law as to my current status, and they would advise me on how they might spend my winnings.

After the second hour of the tournament, I’d slipped back down to 11th place, out of 942. After the third hour, however, I’d worked my way back up to fifth place, out of 612. By the end of four hours of play, I was second out of 319 and had been moved to table number one. At this point I could have simply hit the “Post Big Blind and Fold” button, turned off the computer, gone to bed, and woken in the morning to a 10th-place finish and an extra $39,000 to my name. But, of course, I didn’t. Instead, I started stealing pots right and left because I was the bully and other players merely wanted to hang around to get their grand by finishing in the top 250.

At the Hour Five break, I announced to my wife that I was just 4,000 chips out of first place and there were only 259 players remaining.

On the first hand after the break, I was dealt pocket queens in the big blind position. After a small raise was called by three players, I re-raised a modest sum. All but one of the other players called. As the flop came Q-10-7 rainbow, I banged my knee painfully on a nearby filing cabinet. I was too excited to pay any attention to the pain, though; my heart was pounding and I was sweating, breathing fast, and basically jumping all around (it was probably good that I was playing online, rather than in a casino!).

The player next to me made a sizable bet, and everyone else folded around to me. I slow played my trips by calling. The turn card was another 10, prompting my opponent to make the same sizable bet he’d previously made. I figured him for trip 10s, but since I now had a queens-over full house, I went all-in. He called, and flipped over his Q-10. As I celebrated my impending victory, he typed in the obligatory “GG” (good game). But then lightning struck. The river produced yet another 10 and suddenly he had quads. Just like that I lost half my stack and was knocked down to 27th place. Although I was obviously disappointed, I thought to myself, “Well, I’m still in the running for $10,000 and, anyway, the night is still young.”

I was immediately reassured when, on the very next hand, I was dealt A-A. Unfortunately, everyone folded to my tiny trapping raise . . . but a win is a win, and I’d protected my small blind.

Amazingly enough, I was dealt another high pair, jacks, on the following hand. I raised and three people called. The flop was K-J-4. I stared in disbelief. I had trips once again, with a chance to regain my stack. The player to my left, the chip leader at the moment, made a decent-sized bet and put his neighbor all-in. I just called. I felt a real rush of adrenaline when the turn card produced my fourth jack! The player to my left bet, and I quickly called all-in. I’d figured him, correctly, for a kings-over full house. A quick chip count revealed that I was going to nearly triple up and become the new chip leader in the tourney. I was just one card away from being rich again.

Then the final card appeared and completely ruined my night. You guessed it, my opponent’s fourth king. For the second time in three hands, I had been beaten by quads. Not only had the golden prospect of winning $274,000 been rudely snatched away from me, but I didn’t win $39,000 for 10th place, either. In fact, I was knocked out of the tourney in 253rd place and, shockingly, finished entirely out of the money. I didn’t even walk away with the $1,000 that I was “sure” of getting.

Yet, as devastating as my two bad beats were, they were nothing compared to the verbal bad beatings I received after telling my wife and her mom what had just happened to “their” money!