OMAHA 8 V HOLD’EM! There’s a belief among a lot of poker players that Omaha 8 is somehow a lot more of a “crap shoot” than Texas Hold’em. In my opinion it’s the simple fact that Omaha 8 pots tend to be much larger than the average Hold’em pot which gives rise to this mistaken idea. Omaha 8 is a fast and furious game with lots of raising and re-raising which all adds to the impression that it’s more of an out and out gambler’s game. In fact this isn’t true. Rather than a game likely to be won by chance it is even more likely that skill and experience will bring home the bacon in a hand of Omaha than it will in a hand of Texas Hold’em. So why is it then that for every ten Texas Hold’em players there is only one Omaha 8 player? The truth is, and any experienced professional poker player will confirm this fact, it’s much easier for a top quality player to win at Omaha 8 and so by simple deduction, it’s much more likely an inexperienced player will lose. This rather obvious tilt in favour of a well qualified player as against a novice is Omaha 8’s Achilles heel in the popularity stakes. Funnily enough, Omaha 8 requires less funding than an equivalent game of Texas Hold’em. The reason most new players hit a stone wall with Omaha 8 is that the starting hands are far more difficult to evaluate than they are for Texas Holde’m. In the latter case it’s pretty easy to decide if you are actually holding two premium hole cards. In Omaha you have four hole cards and the options open to you are more complex in all directions. A skilled Omaha player should beat a relative newcomer to the game three times out of four. This is a very bad ratio for a new player and probably the main reason Hold’em is much more popular.
GOOD AS GOLD, MAYBE NOT? The background story to the monster $12,000,000 World Series of Poker haul presented to Main Event Winner Jamie Gold is more like something from an Al Pacino movie than real life. Apparently $6,000,000 of Gold’s payout remains inside the cash cage of the Rio Las Vegas imprisoned by a Federal Court injunction granted to Jamie’s one time collaborator Bruce Crispin Leyser. Leyser claims that a “saved cell phone message” on the day of the Main Event’s final table is the “smoking gun” which proves Gold and Bruce had a pre-arranged agreement to split the pot 50/50. This agreement goes back to July when Jamie and Bruce allegedly had an arrangement to recruit celebrities who would promote and wear the Bodog brand. Gold doesn’t seem to dispute that a cut was agreed. The disagreement has a risen over the amount. I guess neither individual was imagining it would be $6,000,000. Let’s hope one of them has the sense to fold before the U.S. lawyers take down “the entire pot” in legal fees. My money’s on the lawyers, the only breed on earth who can wipe the floor with the world’s best poker players.
