How to Eat Eggs: Playing the Aussie Millions

 

“Yeah well, sometimes nothing is a real cool hand” – Paul Newman, Cool Hand Luke

The American – round-faced, good-humoured – looks at his cards then looks at me, “all in”. He pushes his chips into the middle.

I suck in my breath and sit back. Such a big bet. I look over at the American and he gives me that crooked smile he’s been smiling all day.

 

A bet of 17,000 into a pot of 6,000. I look at the board. Seven-Eight-Ten, two spades; and look at my hand: King-Ten. The way this American has been playing today, he could have a whole range of hands that beat me: two Jacks, two Queens, two Kings, hell, he could have Ace-Ten. There are a few draws there of course – two nines or a flush draw being the most obvious. Most hands have me beat, and the draws will end up beating me half the time.

I can throw away my cards and still have double the average chips.

A lot of reasons to fold.

I look over at him again. He’s smiling that crooked smile, but his eyes didn’t match the grin.  

And something else I just can’t place, but I can feel; right down to the pit of my stomach. He doesn’t have it.

I push my chips in the middle, “call.”

 

“What we have here is a failure to communicate” – Paul Newman, Cool Hand Luke

It’s late January again. I love this time of year, when I make my annual trip to Melbourne: catching up with friends, having a few beers, reading a good book.

Oh yeah, and the Aussie Millions is on – the best poker tournament in the country by far.

In addition to my playing a few tournaments myself, I’ve bought some action in my mate ‘Eggs’ – a poker pro trying to quit the game and make it out in the real world. This Aussie Millions tournament is his last shot – one last job – before going straight. And he’s going for the biggest heist in Australia – the Aussie Millions Main event and a crack at the 1.6 million dollars.

We call him ‘Eggs’ after the time he boasted he could eat 50 eggs. Being a movie buff, and egg lover, he was referencing the famous scene from Cool Hand Luke, where Paul Newman’s character (‘Cool Hand’), bets that he could eat fifty eggs in one hour. In the movie, after a tortuous struggle, he does so, taking down the proposition and winning every cent in the prison camp.  

However, in the case of our friend Eggs, he ate five eggs before starting to complain about the bet, suggesting that the bet was off. The five of us who bet against him wouldn’t hear of him backing out.  Three more eggs and he tried to run from the room, before stumbling over the edge of the carpet and throwing up on his girlfriend’s bookshelf. She’d been telling him all day the bet was stupid.

She left him a week later.

She was right about the bet; but, such is the life of a poker player. Don’t try to change us, baby.

Fortunately for Eggs, he’s a damn good poker player. And during the Main Event, he was playing well and building his stack. As made it through the first day and progressed through the tournament, he started to dream the dreams every poker player does when playing a big-field, big buy-in event. He confessed to me what he was thinking: buying an apartment, maybe going back to university, buying free-range organic eggs by the dozen.

Knowing more about tournaments than Eggs (he’s primarily a cash game player), he occasionally asked me for advice. There was some discussion about optimal strategies at various stages of the tournament, but I won’t bore you with that here. What was interesting was the discussion about his opponents.

But before I continue, let me explain: I’m the mature aged student of the poker world. I’ve studied harder than just about anyone: read every poker book, every magazine, every forum. I come to each table and each hand with knowledgeable enthusiasm. I have an opinion on every pot; I approach the game with insufferable seriousness. I’m the one you most enjoy seeing cop a bad beat, the one who most visibly seethes with the injustice of being the victim of terrible play.

So I also happen to know a lot about the people who play. I was able to quickly scan the list of opponents Eggs was playing each day and give him the run down.

Eggs, on the other hand, takes pride in knowing nothing about the poker world outside Crown. As a man yearning to break free of the profession of poker, he paradoxically knows very little about the world he inhabits.

So Day 2 of the Aussie millions we had the following text message exchange:

Eggs, “there’s an older guy who’s just sat down on my right, drunk, suspect he’s a whale. He spoke to Phil Ivey earlier”

Me: “that might be Dan Shak.”

Eggs: “he’s an idiot”

Me: “He’s won 4.5 million, mainly in high-roller events, he must have some idea.”

Eggs: “He’s terrible.”

Dan Shak went on to 4^th place in the tournament for 400k.

I looked up his table and saw Brandon Adams was also sitting on it.

So I texted: “Brandon Adams is on your table – he’s a successful high stakes player and teaches a course on game theory at Harvard.”

Eggs: “Well, he played 83 suited against me badly.”

Me: “Ok, sure, just saying he understands the game.”

Eggs: “He sucks.”

Ego, I guess is a good thing in poker. Pushes one to play higher stakes, play without fear and fuels a desire to win. They are all good things. Assuming opponents are idiots and having contempt for – of all things – information, well, I really don’t get that.

But I’m not sitting in the Main Event, on the bubble, in the third day. I’m not sitting there with 1.6 million on the line. After a tumultuous bubble, Eggs managed to cash. He got KK in versus AA, began to walk away from the table, and the board ran out 23456 for a split pot. Five cards away from zero money and a whole bunch of heartache, and the poker gods granted him a stay of execution.

In the end, he didn’t get the apartment and the weekly delivery of gourmet eggs, but he got 20k. Not bad for three days’ work.

[Dragline has repeatedly knocked Luke down during a boxing match] 
Dragline: "Stay down. You're beat." 
‘Cool Hand’ Luke: "You're gonna hafta kill me…" 
[struggles back to his feet] 

So while Eggs made a run, got close, and ended up five figures to the good, I got belted time and again on the felt. I won’t go into the details. Mine was the lot of hundred, even thousands of others at the Millions: taking their shot, going for glory, and ending up with little more than a handful of exciting moments and a bad beat story. That’s poker.

The point is getting back up off the canvas, no matter how many times it knocks you down. Making good decisions and not letting the vicissitudes of the game crush one’s soul.  

So after a week of wailing, gnashing teeth, and storming away from the felt in silent fury, I had one more crack. I got up again to fight one more tournament.

The American’s smile drops for a moment, then returns again. He taps the table. “Good call.” He turns over and Ace and a Queen for nothing.

The turn is a deuce. The chip lead is now within grasp. Finally, finally, I’ll be in a position to go deep in an Aussie Millions tournament.

The river is the Queen of Hearts. The table groans. I curse.

The huge pot gets pushed to the American.

Sometime nothing can be a real cool hand.