One Wild Ride On The River, Wish You Were Here

Poker Bloggers are the sharpshooters that come down from the hill after the battle to shoot the wounded, in this case, the dead. I'll give it my best shot.

I'm talking about Gus Hansen blowing a huge chip stack in heads up play against David Chiu who won the $3.38 million first-place prize.

I am stunned.Oh well, That's Poker!

Gus, you learned English by listening to Pink Floyd albums. Gus, you were voted one of People magazine's sexiest men alive in 2004, Gus, you hold the record for winning the biggest pot on High Stakes Poker against Daniel Negreanu.

In your own words Gus, "If nothing is at stake, what's the point?" You have three WPT titles anyway. You couldn't pick up another WPT title, but still snagged the biggest payday of your "career" as a Pro Gambler.

Buying into a WPT event , unlike buying a car is a gamble that the future will represent an improved version of the past. And who knows whether that will be true? The cards don't have memory, and poker doesn't think.

It's not so much about "counting your outs" and "folding AK in a raise, re-raised pot"-- that cause-effect relationship stuff. It's more about the anti-poker game--situations. A collection of situations you haven't played yet; of the things you don't know.

There is a massive collection of unknowledge,the anti-hands that contain all the hands that may still change your poker life. That's what we mean by saying, I "pulled a Gus".

Gus Hansen's logic makes what you don't know far more relevant than what you do know. I considered that many of my Jackpots and big hands were caused and accelerated by their being unexpected.---of me being an anti-gambler. The upshot is that:Knowledge leads to action but lack of knowledge can also lead to action. At least, that was the case when Gus got rivered:

It took just 22 hands for Hansen to clear the final table. Chiu would need another 56 hands to take the chip lead and two more to close the deal. In the final hand, Hansen flopped bottom two pair and got the rest of his stack in on the turn. Chiu held As-9s and picked up a flush draw to go with his top pair on the Ac-10c-8s-5s board. The three-time bracelet winner would eventually make the call, finding out his hand was behind, but live. After the river Ah gave Chiu trips, the hand and ultimately, the title.

HOLDEM-Too Random to Be Left up to Chance

When it comes to NLH, what you don’t know is far more relevant than what you do know. Consider that many huge hands can be caused and sped up by their being unexpected, that case eight on the river for a suck out, a four card flush or in Chiu's case, trips on the river.

9/11 or Virginia Tech,... we retrofit a narrative to tell ourselves that someone should have seen it coming because we ourselves could not have been that stupid. And yet, we are no better prepared for the next one. Likewise, Gus played like Gus, and was on heavy steam throughout the tournament. Top two pair heads up, was good enough to shove all-in. It's when what is right is wrong with your game---the turn and river---changing things up that takes you from hero to zero.

Economically important things are consistently unexpected, in that people underestimate, on average, the probability and impact of improbable events We are chronic explainers-once an event happens we try our hardest to say I told you so and explain it...but that's poker-It is an infinite game;the overall phenomenon of NLH has no end. It is always a frontier, always on the edge. AND Gus is defintely one of the edgiest!