Inspiration

Inspired by some of my online sessions today, I am going to define what exactly a bad beat is using my own words and a couple of audio/visual examples.

Here is my definition of a bad beat (some people's definitions differ a little bit): a bad beat is when, statistically, your hand, under normal conditions, would beat your opponent's hand, at the very least, three times out of four. In other words, when your hand is a 75% or 3-1 favorite. before the flop.

In sticking with the criteria, I consider this a bad beat statistically. To his credit, Gus Hansen played it beautifully, and Daniel Negreanu (in my opinion the best player in the world, period) remarkably almost mucked it, but Hansen had a 4% of catching the case five to take down the pot.


Now, a ton of people misuse the terminology "bad beat". For example, in Rounders (great movie) where Matt Damon turned the under full against KGB's big full, that's not neccesarily in bad beat in my mind. Pre-flop KGB is a HUGE favorite over A-9 of clubs with his aces. Now, if Damon won this hand, that would be a pretty bad beat. This hand is what's known as a "cooler", being beat by the only other hand that can possibly beat you.

I've had my share of both and I've also been on the other side. If you play any amount of poker I'm sure you'll experience them, too. But, the important thing to remember is to remain level-headed no matter what.