I dealt a hand the other night that still has me completely baffled. The game was $25-$50 blind NLH. The party was just getting started, I had been playing in a $4-$8 Holdem game when I got picked up to deal this one. There was a lot of noise and general confusion as we waited for the brush person to bring chips to the table. A few of the players at the table were regulars. The 3s was from Colorado and the 9s was from Northern Idaho, just where I had spent my vacation a few weeks earlier. The 3s and the 9s knew each other…another poker game, another place.

The 9s, Mike, put a lot of chips into action, it was as if his hands were spring-tripped autoloaders. He liked to show his cards, heads up, when he was facing a large bet. In one hand he called a raise pre-flop and called a check on the Flop. The Turn gave him a four flush and a gut shot straight draw and when faced with an all-in bet, he turned his hand face up and exposed the 8-4 of Diamonds. He kept his hand in front of him, fiddled the cards back and forth on the table for at least two minutes before he decided to release the hand.

The very next hand, the player under the gun raised the bet to $200, Mike called without hesitation, the 1s called, and the 3s raised it to $1,500. The original raiser folded his hand. About the length of time it takes for one to bat their eyes is how long it took the Mike to think about calling the raise. It went to heads up immediately. The 3s jumped up and turned his back to the table. The Flop was A-K, little. Mike checked, and by now the three seat had returned to his seat and stated he was all-in.

Mike turned up J-J and started to fiddle with them. He kept his fingers on them while questioning the 3s… could he beat the jacks. They started talking about a deal. During this time the 3s never opened his hand. A few of the players got involved in a discussion about what kind of deal was feasible. It was my last hand of the down and it took at least eight minutes, a crowd gathered, Mike kept fiddling with his cards, and I sat patiently waiting for them to decide what they wanted to do. The first part of the discussion considered giving part of the pot back to the 3s and then running the cards for the remainder of the pot.

Finally one of the players suggested that all of the other players that were not involved in the hand just “Shut up!” That seemed to work fairly well, everyone got quiet. The three seat decided they had to count down all their remaining chips to see where they stood with the all-in. Mike had the 3s covered but not by much. Finally they agreed Mike would receive $1000 from the pot and the rest of it would go to the 3s. Several players wanted me to run out the board but as soon as it was suggested a lot of noise took place from the other players. I was told to drop the deck and push the pot, I did.

I had never seen anyone give up a pot without seeing their opponents cards. I puzzled over this for quite some time, even talking about it to a few players I knew, later in the night. Fortunately some of the mystery was cleared up for me tonight, the 17th. When I came in to work I ran into one of the players that had been in that game in the five seat. He was in the Sports Book visiting with several people. He took a moment to visit with me about the hand. He said what I had missed when I was counting out the bets as they were getting the pot straight, the 3s flashed his cards to Mike…he held K-K. Whew! I feel better now.