FLOP LAG... the poker gods must be crazy

I believe in the unreasonable theory that there’s a life force dictating the rhythm of poker, much for it’s own amusement.  As much as I play by the laws of game theory and math, I’m still a poker-Gods guy.  It’s fun for me and like any other theist position it’s as silly to argue as it is to argue.  I believe that when facing a raise, if you look at one hole card at a time, it’s never the rag first.

  You will always see the card you’d call with… then the three of clubs.  I notice that whenever AA gets beat in a hand, the next hand characteristically flops and ace.  I chart the preposterous occurrence of three poker cards adding-up to 21, whether in hold-em or the 3 card casino poker games, which only stops when you switch to blackjack.  I believe for my own amusement that there is a reason for this, which reason must be that the spirits are watching and having a laugh.

As an exercise in gear shifting, I sit this night in a low stakes- no limit hold-em game.  Here the level of play is perfectly matched to this $50 1-2 NLHE.  All are serious players who are less sloppy than unsophisticated, and I’m getting my brains beat out.  I’ve so far lost a double buy and a minimum buy, and I’m now playing a short-buy. 

This particular house boasts a very well seeded bad-beat jackpot, Aces full of 10’s or better, beaten by quads or better.  And therein lies the key to this session.  The poker gods amuse themselves with these two consecutive hands. 

First, I’m on the button when the cutoff raises to six, three times the BB, into a six dollar pot.  I wake-up with J-10 of hearts and call, two players call behind me.  The flop comes As, Jc, 5s.  Check down to the cutoff, who bets 8 in a posture that’s screaming continuation bet on a big fat miss.  To test this theory I raise with middle pair to 24, a little more than half of my stack.  Fold back to the bettor who goes all-in.  Having left myself with 18 dollars, I decide to call and begin packing up to go home.  Turns out we were both right, his two queens missed the flop but still had my jacks.  I turn the 10 of diamonds, it holds and I remain in the game.

So here comes the very next hand, in which we both fold before the flop.  There’s 3-way action.  The flop comes Qh, Qs, 9h.  Two players act and we see a turn card. It’s the 8 of hearts.  

Lets review.  My J-10 hearts on the previous hand was against his pocket Queens.  Had this been the board, he flops 4 Queens and me an open-end straight flush-draw.  I assume he’d check 4 queens, I don’t know if I bet the draw but what does it really matter?  I turn a straight flush and we whack-up a jackpot that seeds at 10 thousand, and sat that night at $36k and change.  The very next hand.

So you tell me, is there some wicked sense of humor dictating the game we know and love?  Impossible to say.  But dumb luck and odd circumstance never feels this funny in other parts of life.