Jinxed James

James is a friend. James is a friend who lives next door. James loves poker. James is just not very good. He's not bad. He;s not good. This my friends, is James' biggest problem. His mediocre ability costs him money all the time. Call it luck or variance, either one just kicks him squarely in the junk.

I would venture to guess that all thing being equal, James would be about a break even player. That would be true, I am sure, but you see, James is jinxed.

James has occasional flashes of brilliance. He has huge brain farts. Most of these are attributed to alcohol and bong hits. But James' biggest problem has nothing to do with staring hands, pot odds, implied odds, reverse pot odds, percentages, or even gut feeling. He is just plain unlucky.

I have seen him in one session get AK in against AQ and lose. Get one outed on the river. Get AA cracked by 22.

The funny part for me is that every time he gets it in a head, I get that all too familiar feeling that he is gonna get sucked out on. It's like a wave of doom sweeps over the basement that we play in, as if to say, "here we go again".

Well it happened again last night. It was James' announced last hand of the night. James has this quirky thing he likes to do. He min raises. Usually doesn't mean a thing accept he is probably drunk. Well, he min raised under the gun. We were five handed. John, immediately to his left, raised. It folded around to James who then min raised John. John pushed all in. He was the big stack and had James covered. James insta calls and shows AA. John moans "cooler" and flops over KK. Doom began to creep over the room. I swear the light got a little dimmer. Faint deep drum beats floated in through the screen door. The music seemed to muffle. A black bird hit the sliding glass door. It was twelve a.m., but I swear it happened.

Flop

JT4 rainbow.

Turn.

Q

River

A

Q falls and I would have bet my stack that the straight was coming. The worst part is James started to stack the chips. We had to inform him of the straight. John started to talk as he does sometimes. Rationalizing the outcome. I told him to just be quiet and drag the pot. The hand spoke for itself. It was gonna happen no matter how it went down. James, to his credit, laughed it off and went out to smoke. That is just how he rolls. And that is just how his cards run. James would have gone home up $50 for the night. He was counting it in his head. You could see him doing it. Instead, he had to go home and tell his wife he lost again.

She is another story.