One of the craziest hands of the year
On the last episode of ‘The Chip Race’ of 2024, poker pro and World Poker Tour (WPT) Global Ambassador Xuan Liu joined Dara O’Kearney and I for a strategy segment. A very experienced tournament player, Xuan has made two European Poker Tour (EPT) Final tables, at the PCA in 2011 and in San Remo in 2012. She has also played high stakes cash games for much of her impressive career.
the straddle was on and the game was playing looser than a wizard’s sleeve
Our normal modus operandi is to let the guest pick the hand and Xuan chose a wild hand that she played at The Lodge Card Club. The hand occurred towards the end of a live-streamed $5/$10 game when the straddle was on and the game was playing looser than a wizard’s sleeve.
Xuan’s analysis was top-notch as she broke down the action on every street from every player’s perspective, peppering in some important insights about her opponents and the table dynamics. Unsurprisingly, a five minute clip of what happened went viral as it was dubbed ‘one of the craziest hands of the year.’
Pre-Flop
Right out of the gate, Xuan corrected a couple of graphical errors. In cash games, stacks sometimes get topped up unbeknownst to the TV production crew and not every straddle is spotted. On this occasion, her stack was actually $20,400 at the start of the hand. It is also worth noting that there is a straddle to $25 and a blind bet of $50 juicing the pot to $100 in dead money before anyone has looked at their cards.
With that in mind, Xuan was effectively first to act from the Hijack and she looked down at A♦️A♣️, a very favourable spot already given the dynamics. She raised to $400 and Mike Corvette flatted in the Cut-Off with Q♣️J♣️ off a stack of $13,700. The action folded around to the straddler, a player who goes by ‘The Kid.’ Playing $21,500, he also made the call, holding A♠️Q♠️. Dinho, who made that blind bet of $50, took very little time before announcing all-in for $1495 with K♥️K♣️. Xuan very nonchalantly threw in the call as did both Mike and The Kid.
During the strategy segment, Xuan explained that she opened to the rather large sizing of $400 for two interconnected reasons. Firstly, her opponents were generally quite inelastic (larger bet-sizes didn’t tend to change the perceived playability of their hands) and secondly, it was the second last hand of the night and the game had gotten a bit splashy.
She was happy that the stack-to-pot ratio (SPR) would be sufficiently low
Xuan explained her decision to just flat as a willingness to throw some rope to the other players who would likely fold if she isolated. She was happy that the stack-to-pot ratio (SPR) would be sufficiently low, even multi-way, with the beautiful premium hand that is pocket Aces. Deception was also a factor in her calculation as it would be likely that one of her opponents would connect with the flop and commit chips into a dry side pot in bad shape.
Flop
On the flop, the pot was $6005 and it came J♠️4♠️3♠️. With the flopped nuts, The Kid checked his A♠️Q♠️. Xuan elected to check her A♦️A♣️ and Mike bet his Q♣️J♣️ to $1150. Playing it slow, The Kid just flatted and Xuan flatted behind.
While some inexperienced players would be inclined to bet their hand in Xuan’s shoes, she rightly checked, giving herself the opportunity to get more information rather than ‘protecting’ her potentially vulnerable hand. Mike, on the other hand, did decide to commit chips with his marginal holding, wagering $1150 into a dry side pot.
The Kid made a neat check-call with the nut flush, hoping to bring Xuan in behind and happy that at least one player is willing to commit chips. There are times when it is better to fast-play a strong hand but multi-way with a low SPR, this was not one of them. He was happy to set the trap and unfortunately for Xuan, she had a hand that could fall into it.
Turn
On the turn, the total pot is $9455 ($6005 in the main pot and $3450 in the side) and it came the 4♦️. Once again The Kid and Xuan knuckled it over to Mike who this time bet $3300, roughly a side pot sized bet (~30% of the total). The Kid called and with plenty out there now, Xuan decided to rip it in for $12,775. Mike called really quickly for his $10,055 total and The Kid took very little time to fold his hand.
Xuan agreed that Mike’s snap-call must have spooked The Kid
“Whaaaaaat?” I hear you say. That’s right you read it correctly. The Kid quickly folded the nut flush. Breaking down the spot, Xuan agreed that Mike’s snap-call must have spooked The Kid. Of course quads or a full house were possible but given the size of the pot and the action, there was just not enough reason to give Xuan and Mike that much credit. His hand could beat value and in those situations, it is never wise to relinquish your strong hand.
With The Kid bizarrely out of the way, Xuan went from needing to hit a 4-outer to needing to fade just 4 outs. The players agreed to run the river twice and it came the 6♣️ and 3♥️, Xuan holding both times to scoop a massive $32,865 pot. “What sort of voodoo magic did you concoct to win this huge pot?” I asked Xuan. With perfect deadpan delivery, she explained to me that there was a full moon that night.