I had been winning consistently at the 1-5 stud game at the Normandie Casino in Gardena. For almost every night over a three month period I had won at least $40 and now my bills were paid and my bankroll was over $1000 for the first time ever. I had promised myself that when I was ready, I would make my first trip to the Bicycle Club and play in a bigger game. So I took $200 out of the stack of twenties on my dresser, exercised, ate a good breakfast and hopped into my red Toyota Corolla FX and down the I5 to the Bike. <READMORE>

There was a long list to get into the 4-8 stud game and I thought that limit might be just a bit high for only $200 so I opted for the shorter list on the 3-6 stud game. I wandered around the rail checking out the high limit games for what seemed like forever until they finally called my name. I waved my hand high in the air, “I want that seat. Lock it up.” But the floor didn’t hear me (man that place was huge) and by the time I got there he had sold “my” seat. But at least he did put me back on top of the list. “Not a big deal,” I told myself.

Twenty minutes later I was sitting in the game and checking out the lunch menu. I had heard the Chinese food was very good so I ordered some Beef Chow Fun. “No bean sprouts,” I told the waitress. “They don’t agree with me.” I had played and lost two small pots by the time my food came and it’s no exaggeration to say the entire plate was covered with bean sprouts. “Not a big deal,” I said aloud, but I was beginning to wonder.

I scraped bean sprouts off my food and got back to business. “Now that’s more like it,” I thought as I found rolled up deuces in my hand. I brought it in for the minimum and waited patiently for somebody to raise me. Not only did I remain unraised, but everyone else folded and I collected the antes with my trips. “Alright, maybe it’s not my day,” I admitted to myself.

That feeling grew stronger as I played and lost starting with pocket aces, then with a JQK spades, and then again with kings up on fourth street. My stack was down under $50 and I was getting a little steamed. OK, maybe a lot steamed. As I mentally reviewed my play I thought that I really hadn’t made any bad plays but I was getting very unlucky. I was tempted to take my meager remaining money and leave but I had come to play and I was determined to see it through.

I sat up a little straighter in my chair, set my jaw, and looked down to find rolled up nines. “This is it,” I thought. “This is my reward. There is no way I am going to lose this one.” Out loud I said “I raise.” Well, you’d have thought it was feeding time at the zoo. Raise, reraise, and cap went the table and all but one of us were in for $12 before the next card. And what a next card it was for me, I paired my door card! Quad nines on fourth street. As they love to say on the WPT broadcast, fireworks were going off in my head. But I kept very cool as I joined the continuing party and 4 of us crammed $24 more into the pot. I had just enough for two more bets on fifth street and I quickly made a rough estimate that I was all in for about $200 as they continued to raise and make a side pot.

There were still three other players in at the river and they had all continued to raise, so the side pot was almost as big as the main pot at the end, but I wasn’t even envious. I was just happy that I would get out of there with my money back on this most unlucky of days. I watched as the guy who put in the last raise showed his fives full. The next guy disgustedly threw his cards into the muck. The one lady at the table said “Let me see if I filled up,” as she peeked at her river card. “Holy mother of God,” she said softly as she crossed herself and turned over all her cards. She had started with only a pair of tens, caught the third one on fifth street and the fourth ten on the river.

We all know what I was feeling. It’s sort of like a cross between getting kicked in the stomach and having your heart broken. As the dealer pushed the sidepot to the religious lady across the table from me I turned my cards up and mumbled “ But …I had quads on fourth street…”

Well, the next thing I know this nice, old lady almost jumps across the table and starts shaking my hand with a huge smile on her face. I am stunned. “What kind of psycho is she?” I’m thinking. “It’s bad enough that she rivers the best hand I’ve had in a long time, but to rub it in my face like this …”

I was so absorbed in my thoughts of strangling her with her cross on her chain that what she was saying didn’t register for a while. “I said YOU WON THE JACKPOT!” she screamed in my ear.

“What jackpot?”

“The bad beat jackpot. Your four nines were beat by my four tens so we both get a lot of money. Praise the lord.”

I slumped back down in my chair, totally drained from the roller coaster ride of emotion I was on and watched as the dealer and the floorman went through the required motions of verifying the hands. I found out that I would get 50% of the $5000 jackpot, the old lady would get 25% and the other 25% would be split by all the other stud players at the table. I also discovered that I was expected to tip the dealer, floor, pit boss and probably everyone else who worked at the casino, so about a half hour later I left for home with $2000 in my pocket.

I was still slightly in shock and very hungry so I thought I would take a slight detour home and pass through downtown LA so I could blow $200 of my windfall on the best sushi meal of my life. I was heading slowly down the right lane of a six lane divided road and a driver coming from the other direction tried his luck in beating the traffic and made a left turn. He did manage to get by the drivers in the left and middle lanes and ended up right in front of me. It turned out he was an illegal and had no license, much less insurance, so I never did make it to dinner that night.

It was only when I woke up the next day that my real mistake of my amazing day hit me. The way I was crushing the odds that day I should have thought to play the real longshot of the American dream. I should have bought a lottery ticket.
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