Ghost house

One of the wonderful things about poker is that just when you think you've got it figured out, you discover that you're horribly mistaken! Last night, I played much too loosely; I hit the felt quickly at the first table I joined, and hit it even more quickly at the next table I joined. How much would you bet that I was able to refrain from joining a third table? Well, I wasn't, of course, and was on a bit of a tilt as well. And here's where the cruelest part of the cruel cruel nature of Omaha comes into play.

The cruelest part of the cruel cruel nature of Omaha is that you are only allowed to use two of your four hole cards. Not only that, you must use exactly two, to go with exactly three of the community cards. If you're an old hand at Hold'em, like me, this can make for trouble. Hold'em veterans see the best five card hand that can be formed from a pool of more than five cards in the blink of an eye. Hold'em doesn't care how many of your hole cards you use; you can use neither of them, one of them, or both of them. It's all one to Hold'em. Omaha, however, as I've mentioned, is another story entirely.

To the Hold'em pro, often Omaha hands will present themselves as fool's gold, or phantom hands. The Hold'em pro will see the great hands which can be formed if 3 of the hole cards are used, instead of only two. On the hand I rode to the felt for the third and final time last night, I was convinced I had a full house. Trouble was, it was only a full house if I used 3 of my hole cards, instead of only 2. In effect, it was a ghost house. Ouch.

During current Omaha session you were dealt 39 hands and saw flop:
- 5 out of 5 times while in big blind (100%)
- 5 out of 6 times while in small blind (83%)
- 23 out of 28 times in other positions (82%)
- a total of 33 out of 39 (84%)
Pots won at showdown - 3 of 11 (27%)
Pots won without showdown - 1

delta: $-6,000
balance: $1,030,930