[frob23]

I play a weekly couple of tournaments with some local people. It's made up a a couple of dealers and other random people. It's invite only and very casual because most people know the others. There are a few good players, some average players, and a couple truly terrible players who still have a good time anyway. We usually start with two tables but have started with as many as three at times. It's a good game and I am turning a solid return from the games (I have about an 80% ROI for the tournaments). The game is very social and very friendly and 1st and 2nd almost always chop 50/50 regardless of chip-stacks when it gets heads up. I've been on both sides of 50/50 chops where the chips were nearly 30 to 1.

So we were playing last night and the blinds were at 1000/2000. I was the chipleader with a little over half the chips in play. The SB, for this hand, was to my left with about 13000 in chips and he was solidly second in chips although behind me. The two of us had all the significant chips in play and we were almost sure to chop 1st and 2nd. When the hand in question begins, we were on the bubble. There are 5 players left and 4 places play.

Hero: 27000
SB: 13000
BB: 1275

That's right... the BB was all-in for less than the BB. The two other people involved fold. I call and the SB completes. I have a Kc6c which is not a great hand but I am looking to just get this over with.

Main pot: 3825
Side pot: 1450

At this point, the BB turns his hand face up. This was a huge error and we immediately pointed it out to him. Because, it was now possible to know if one of the still active players beat the all-in player and to play accordingly. The BB has J-9.

Flop: 2-5-7 {check, check}
Turn: Q {check, check}
River: A {bet 4000, fold}

I can't possibly call the bet on the end with K-high. And I am not too worried about it because I know the SB can see the BB's hand and should be able to beat it or he wouldn't have bet. As I fold, I comment, "You'd better have something."

The SB turns over 10-8... and wins the side pot with 10-high. The BB wins the main pot with J-high... effectively tripling up. A player no longer involved in the tournament grabbed my mucked hand and flipped it up (which is an issue for another time) because he knew I wouldn't be calling, even in that spot, without a little something. When everyone sees that I'd been moved into folding the best hand... and that the SB's bet kept the whole table out of the money... it was chaos.

This move was bad enough if the BB's hand was unknown. But with it face up... and knowing he couldn't beat it... the SB wins the dumbest tournament move of the year award.

Also, it might have made sense for me to do such a thing because I was the massive chip leader and had been abusing the bubble to threaten people with busting out. Although, I don't like to do such things. The bubble conditions were good for my stack. I was keeping a lot of pressure on the short stacks, including the SB, and making it hard for them to get chips. In this spot, it makes sense for me to want to keep the player in because it lets me continue to grow my stack with little risk. But for the SB, there was no such advantage. In fact, the very next hand he tried to make a move and I put his entire stack at risk and he had to fold... losing much more than he gained in that previous hand.

So... he was just being insanely dumb. And it drove even me crazy. I think it killed the rest of the table when he did manage to make it to heads up and we ended up chopping... there should be more justice in the world.