I have two good friends, “Thelma” and “Louise,” who are married to each other. I’ve been friends with Thelma for more than a decade, Louise about half that long, and Bonnie and I happily attended their wedding last year.
Thelma is very bright and has been successful at a number of things. She’s also very well-off financially. She’s a pretty strong video poker player, but doesn’t concentrate on learning all of the smallest details. “Why spend hours memorizing rare hands that will save me a tenth of a penny once every two years?” she asks. “I don’t need the money and life’s too short to spend my time on shit like that.” (If you don’t like that language, take it up with Thelma — not me.)
Thelma and Louise are both Seven Stars in the Caesars Entertainment system where they each annually earn a cruise or two on Norwegian Cruise Lines. They also get “free” cruises from other casinos. They could do more, but most years they cruise “only” four or five weeks a year. They’ve been to all the ports, so often they just stay on the ship.
They like to compete in onboard trivia contests, which often happen daily or twice daily on the cruises. They are smart, have good memories, and onboard competition isn’t always so tough. Plus, the ships tend to recycle questions, so anybody who has been at 200 or more onboard trivia contests in the past few years already has heard at least 75% of the questions. Combine their intelligence with this frequent-cruiser innate advantage and they usually win these contests.
Not this year.
On a cruise they took in March out of New Orleans, there were two MIT grads on the cruise, “Brian” and “Larry,” who normally play at Harrah’s Atlantic City. These two guys are friends, but not a couple. They brought their families with them on the cruise and beat Thelma and Louise’s trivia score quite handily. Not exactly like winning the Nobel Prize, but you have to be very smart and well-read to pull that off.
Anyway, after the cruise was over, several of the cruisers spent some time at Harrah’s New Orleans — including the four principals in this story. Brian was playing the 98.9% 15-9-4-4-3 version of Deuces Wild — Liam W. Daily and I call this pseudo NSU in our writings — on a dollar Ten Play game.
He was dealt A♥ K♥ Q♥ T♥ 7♥. This is not a close play at all. Holding the 4-card royal flush is worth a bit more than $98 on average per line and keeping the flush is worth exactly $15 per line. Brian held all five cards for a total error of $830! Thelma was close enough to witness this, but not close enough and quick enough to offer Brian $200 for the hand instead of the guaranteed $150 he was going to get.
Thelma called me up that night. “He’s a brilliant guy. If he can beat me at trivia he must know quite a bit about EVERYTHING. He’s Seven Stars so he’s used to casinos. HOW CAN HE MAKE SUCH A SILLY ASS PLAY? You have to write about this!”
Since I was two thousand miles away when this happened, this is all speculation on my part. Here are some possibilities:
a. The hand was actually A♥ K♥ Q♥ 9♥ 7♥. Maybe Thelma didn’t see it clearly and Brian’s play wasn’t a mistake at all. (Don’t tell Thelma I suggested she might have been in error. She could hurt me!)
b. Brian had a momentary “brain freeze.” It happens. Even among geniuses. (Well, it does to me, anyway).
c. Brian is normally a blackjack player and rarely plays video poker. He’s wealthy enough that even $50 a hand is “slumming” for him.
d. Brian was celebrating that night and in his “medicated” state, he’s not nearly as bright as he is when he’s cold sober.
A more interesting part of the incident to me was Thelma thinking she could buy the hand for $200. This would have been a good result for both parties according to her logic. Brian would get $200 rather than $150, and Thelma would get a result worth $980 for $200. Win-win for everybody!
Except, W2Gs complicate the situation. One or more $4,000 royals are possible here (which include $240 state withholding for each one in Louisiana. Once you cross the W2G threshold, each $10 straight, $15 flush, or $125 wild royal is also taxed at 6%). What should they do about those? (Technically Brian could end up with ten wild royals which would create a $1,250 W2G. This is a rare enough possibility that we can ignore it.)
Thelma could easily afford to fade those expenses out of her share of the winnings because these costs only kick in when she scores at least $4,000, minus the $200 fee she paid Brian. But his card was in the machine when the hand was dealt and they may or may not be able to talk the Harrah’s employees into giving Thelma the W2G and not Brian. If Brian wasn’t able to trust Thelma to keep her end of the “I’ll cover W2Gs” bargain, this would not be a smart move for him.
All in all, it’s WAY too complicated to negotiate between strangers. If Thelma and Brian had spoken on the cruise (which could have happened — I don’t know), then Brian likely already would have known that Thelma was a smart lady. When he looked at the hand again, he might have realized his mistake and just “unheld” the low heart before he hit the draw button. In that case, Thelma’s interference wouldn’t have done her any good. It would have simply given Brian more EV and Harrah’s New Orleans less.
It could also have easily happened that if Brian corrected his hand per Thelma’s suggestion, he might have ended up with $40 (two flushes and one straight) rather than the guaranteed $150 he was going to get previously. Brian’s family might have then all scowled at Thelma for making such a “bad” suggestion to Brian.
Sometimes you just can’t win.