History in the form of a river flush

With all this talk of chip-slinging and card playing, some folks might have been left with the misimpression that this thing they call poker is commonplace here in the islands. In fact, it is not. As I've stated a couple of times before this post, never before tonight has a legal hand of poker been dealt in the Bahamas.

Just after 11:15 tonight, though, I heard my name come over the intercom. I made my way through the crowd and learned it was about to happen: the first-ever hand of live, cash-game poker in the Bahamas.

It was a $20/$40 hold'em game in the very front of the room.

Unlike the super-sat which was already in progress, players had to buy their checks directly from the Atlantis casino. Under the watchful eye of casino management and the gaming commission, a chip runner handed out the racks of red.

The players, most of whom looked to be pretty experienced in the ways of poker, didn't seem to notice the gravity of what was about to happen. See, this was a first. No one had ever done what they were about to do on this island.

I took a perch on a nearby chair and sweated a guy in the eight-seat who was about to have a very bad first hand. He glanced up at me and I said in a quiet voice, "I'll move as soon as this hand is over." He gave me a look that said it was no big deal, but I can't imagine having my stumbly frame towering over him made him feel very good. Still, I readied my camera and fired off a few test shots. Posterity and all, you understand.

After a fairly long chip-buying process, Steve, the dealer shuffled like he would on any other day and dealt out the cards. The two-seat bet out, the five-seat raised, the eight-seat re-raised. Before it was said and done, it was capped and we saw a fairly ugly flop. It's only redeeming quality was that it held a couple of hearts.



As it turned out, the flop wasn't as ugly as I thought, because the five and eight seats went to war, eventually scaring off the two-seat and piling a stack of redbirds high enough that I thought Steve the Dealer might get caught in an avalanche. The turn was a blank, but the betting continued.

Somebody whispered to me that the eight-seat was holding KK.

"This isn't going to turn out well," I thought.

No doubt, with that board and that kind of pre-flop action, the kings had to be ahead, unless the five-seat was holding aces. I won't say what made me think this, but I was pretty sure that wasn't the case.

The river was the two of hearts and I resigned myself to the fact that this hand had just gone the way of the flush.

Sure enough...



The five-seat was holding AT of hearts. He raked a pile of chips that was as red as his tabled hand. And he cheered. I think it was less of "I won" cheer, than a "let's get this party started" cheer. Or something like that.

As it turned out, the winner was a guy named Jonas (aka Jona2 on PokerStars). He'd just traveled 20 hours from Denmark.


Jonas, another Great Dane

And just like that it was over. Steve dealt another hand and live poker in the Bahamas continued unabated.

So far, the room here has been running very smoothly under the direction of some veteran managers and dealers. Hopefully, the Bahamian folks like what they see.

How could they not?