Most of the time, the poker gods are vicious bastards who love to torture the righteous and reward the bad guys. But every so often a moment of sweet justice slips through the cracks.
For beginners, a ‘slow-roll’ is when a player takes an unnecessarily long time to call with the obvious best hand when there is no strategic reason to do so. There are moments in a multi-player pot when it makes sense to call slowly with ‘the nuts’ in order to deceive other players into thinking you are weak. A true ‘slow-roll’ only occurs when the pot is heads-up or if every other player is already all-in. The slow-roll is universally considered to be horrible poker etiquette and is the best way to create instant enemies at the table. In fact, taking your time to call or turn over the winning hand is the worst possible thing you can do at the poker table (short of actually punching somebody). Everyone hates a slow-roller and it’s always nice to see a little justice in this world. Most of the time, the poker gods are vicious bastards who love to torture the righteous and reward the scumbags. But every so often a moment of sweet justice slips through the cracks. Let’s take a look at 5 moments when poker’s worst criminals actually got what was coming to them.
Phil Hellmuth Slow-Rolls Then Loses With AA To A3
If you’ve followed this blog you know the rules by now: If there’s a negative list, Hellmuth is on it. While this is a somewhat friendly game against other pros, the fact remains that if his opponents did this, Hellmuth would have been furious.
Dwyte Pilgrim Slow-Rolls, Celebrates Early, Then Gets Unlucky
Pilgrim is a jerk twice in this one. First he slow-rolls with that silly little speech before calling with the worst hand. When someone is all-in for their tournament life, it’s incredibly disrespectful to make them wait unnecessarily for your decision. There’s no strategic reason for it and it’s just plain hurtful and rude. Secondly, Pilgrim celebrates early, disrespecting the game and his opponent.
Sam Abernathy Is Slow-Rolled And Taunted Before Hitting A Miracle River
This hand feels like something scripted. The slow-roll with the bad acting is cringe worthy and it’s hard to believe that a real person would do this. The triumphant arm raised in the air as the board is run-out multiplies the cringe factor. That 6 on the river seems too good to be true. It’s hard to understand why this slow-roll happened. Sam Abernathy is a very good poker player, but she also uses her looks and personality to manipulate men at the poker table (as she absolutely should). A huge part of her live strategy is to be nice and friendly to get her opponents to like and underestimate her, so there’s just no way she did anything to make this guy angry and justify the slow-roll. In all likelihood, he’s just an asshole and got exactly what he deserved here.
Andreas Flops Nuts, Slow-Rolls Then Loses To Rivered Boat
Andreas’ behavior in this one is so unbelievable that it makes you wonder if there isn’t some backstory we’re missing here. However, it’s hard to imagine anything that justifies this slow-roll, and it’s nice to see that river justice.
96 Year-Old Slow-Roller
Okay, so in this one the slow-roller wins but I still had to include it. The guy is 96 years old! He can’t even stack his own chips! When you’re that old and still sharp enough to play in the World Series of Poker, you can slow-roll anyone you want. Until then, just turn over your damn cards.
Photo source: https://www.pokerstrategy.com/news/world-of-poker/The-craziest-slowroll-of-2016-(so-far)_95490/
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