Ace: It’s an emergency. We have to talk about this.

Seth: OH, LET'S GO right here!

BiSB: You could do a Gimmicky Top 20 about this video, and there would still be grievous omissions. It contains multitudes.

Ace: Let’s set the stage: Darren Rovell is playing his first online poker game ever. This surprises me, since I assumed he’d be one of the types who watched the World Series of Poker in 2005 and got obsessed because it was sports with money and that’s Rovell’s entire life. They’re playing Texas Hold ’Em and, in this video, he’s dealt a great hand: Ace-Queen suited (both diamonds).

Importantly, this is the table just prior to the hand being dealt. Rovell, naturally, is “DMoneyWinz,” and we should note a couple more things here:

He’s the short stack at the table. By a lot.

He’s also the big blind for this upcoming hand, so more of his waning money is going in the pot no matter what. Over 11% of his chips will be going into this hand before a card is dealt.

BiSB: Also, notice the chat, where he offers the insight that, quote, "I have no money left."

Ace: The first line of this is what some would call “foreshadowing.”

Brian: Darren Rovell is essentially my age, which means he is in the Has Watched Rounders 50 Times, Ten To Fifteen Of Them On Purpose age bracket.

Ace: This age group extends down to my generation thanks to Chris Moneymaker.

Brian: Every American male from my age to Bill Simmons's has a dusty DVD on a shelf somewhere.

Seth: /raises hand

Videocassette.

BiSB: John Malkovich should have won an EGOT for that role.

Ace: It’s almost impossible for someone anyone near his age/demographic/job not to get some poker knowledge by sheer accident.

HE COVERS THE CROSSOVER BETWEEN SPORTS AND MONEY.

Sorry, I’m getting prematurely upset.

Brian: Right. This is just setting the cultural context stage. Everyone on earth knows how to play Hold 'Em now. Let us embark.

BiSB: So, he at least recognizes that suited Ace-Queen is good. Bonus points there.

Seth: Should we discuss his choice of avatar?

Ace: I think it’s a default, another player has it too.

Brian: His alternatives appear to be a turtle, a fox, and an anime lawyer so I get the stogie chomping guy as an option. Turtle is tempting though.

Ace: Rovell also gets a little credit for taking coaching to heart and knowing he should fold the vast majority of his hands.

Brian: DOES HE

Ace: Now, does he apply this knowledge well? Stay tuned.

[After THE JUMP: The flop, the turn, the flop]

Ace: Our first indication that something is very wrong: Rovell, holding the Ace-Queen of diamonds, asks for a specific card on the flop: the King of spades.

That’s one of the worst cards that could come down!

Maybe literally the worst?

BiSB: Even before that, it's worth noting that he declares "LET'S GO," and proceeds to... not go. He limps in.

Ace: When he should absolutely be pushing all in with this hand. You have an Ace and something decent and you’re by far the shortest stack at the table.

Brian: You know those viral videos going around of "auntie" burning down the rims? This is the exact opposite of the moment she palms a basketball.

Once auntie palmed the ball... I knew pic.twitter.com/2cK7huqjVa

— Zoe (@YourFavoriteZoe) June 15, 2020

Ace: Thank you for bringing this into my life.

Seth: I too am ready for the next challenge.

BiSB: We'll give Rovell the benefit of the doubt and say he was just playing coy. For reasons.

Ace: He then flops Queens and seems wholly unexcited about it, for some reason. You have top pair with an Ace kicker!

Seth: It wasn't the King of Spades though.

Brian: He let a couple guys limp in so anything could be out there but yeah in the annals of Flops To See With AQ that is near the top of the list.

Ace: …and then he checks. Instead of, say, pushing all his chips into the middle as fast as he can.

Brian: Rovell isn't thinking like this but I think that's pretty defensible. The only thing you really don't want to see is a K and you've already shown weakness. Check-call would be pretty high on my list of actions.

Seth: He's the short stack, how much does he think he's going to get?

Ace: Fair enough. I think he should be pushing hard all the way here but he set himself up poorly by limping in pre-flop.

Brian: The most likely thing for the button to have is air so the only way you're going to extract chips from him in a pretty secure situation is to let him bluff you.

Ace: We will see quite soon that Rovell isn’t thinking on this level. But we knew that.

Brian: I may own Doyle Brunson books.

Ace: I had one of Phil Hellmuth’s in high school.

BiSB: Rovell owns seven copies of Adam Smith's "The Wealth of Nations." None of them have been opened.

Seth: Hellmuth's was in the bathroom long enough for the corners to curl up.

Ace: So, Sooz51 bets $120 after Rovell checks. Rovell has $315 left in his stack.

He calls.

BiSB:

Brian: This is like the second seal opening. I didn't think about stack depth in my above comment, now you're committed and shove.

Ace: Yeah, my big thing here is he’s wildly short-stacked from the start. He should’ve shoved with just about anything.

Seth: The calling is bold. James Franklin is actually impressed.

BiSB: The turn comes. It has nothing of value, which is a good sign for Rovell. And then... things... change.

Ace: “I got the pair of twos,” he says, as if that matters.

The twos are on the board.

Brian: The third seal opens.

Ace: Rovell… checks.

Brian: (again slightly defensible if button has air but only just)

Ace: It could be a trap, sure. Then he yells…

Seth: "Please I gotta win this..."

Ace: FOLD

Brian: He says the former like his children are starving. He bark-yells the latter.

Ace: THIS IS NOT A THING PEOPLE DO AFTER YOU CHECK BECAUSE YOU HAVEN’T ASKED THEM TO BET ANY MONEY

BiSB: He yells FOLD like he's Don Brown trying to induce a false start. Like the opponent can hear him and will accidentally hit the fold button. Which, there probably isn't one because WHO FOLDS WHEN IT COSTS $0 TO CALL.

Ace: I’ve jumped offsides in Madden when a friend has yelled “HIKE,” this could maybe work if the other player could, you know, hear him.

Brian: I need the Sklar Brothers to follow Rovell around narrating his poker exploits.

Seth: Somewhere on the internet is a person named Susan who feels a tremor in the force.

BiSB: So, instead of folding, his opponent bets the pot, which would put Rovell all in.

Ace: The boop noise of Sooz51 betting just after Rovells yells “FOLD” is absolutely killing me.

turn on sound

BiSB: This is actually great news for Rovell. He has accidentally induced maximum chippage from his opponent.

Ace: He keeps blundering into great spots!

He just has to do one thing…

Seth: But yelling "FOLD" has failed. He is devastated.

Brian: Opportunity to double up with top pair ace kicker and nothing on the board, this is a crime

Ace: He says, “aw, man.”

/sound of failure

BiSB: I have a theory here. Is it possible that Rovell sees his opponent betting $360, he thinks to himself "I do not have that much," and thinks he's required to fold?

Brian: i have the same feeling as I do when I listen to that Postal Service song where Ben Gibbard talks about "the goalie in the third quarter of a tied-game rivalry"

Ace: This theory holds water.

BiSB: Like, his opponent had outbid him on this particular poker?

Seth: I think he believes Sooz51 has the King of Spades.

Brian: That theory doesn't seem to be true because he talks about how small his stack is afterwards as his reasoning. He won't go all in because then he would be out, is what I think his lizard-brain thinks.

Ace: He should coach football. He should never play poker again.

BiSB: His alma mater just fired an offensive coordinator...

Brian: Alternatively, he should play poker again with me all day every day. The marketing guy for this poker site deserves a raise. The twisted brilliance to put the second-dumbest man in America as the face of your site.

Ace: “I couldn’t do it, Ev, I’m at $195,” he says, as $20 more leaves his stack because he’s the small blind.

Brian: All poker spokespeople should barely know what they're doing.

Ace: We haven’t even mentioned yet that Sooz51 had another Queen and a much worse kicker, making Rovell’s flop incredibly fortunate.

This hand was engineered for him to double up and then some.

Seth: What's great is the video loops so you're immediately reminded he was told to fold 80 percent of the time.

Ace: And it all comes together. He was doomed from the start, because he was born Darren Rovell, and then he said that.

BiSB: The intersection. Of business. And sports.

Brian: "Hello, friends, I'm Kid Rock. Come to Poker Site Dot Biz and find out if the man who wrote "Bawitaba" has the introspection and probability skills to ruin your bankroll"

Ace: The man has made a career out of copypasta-ing press releases from shoe companies, it should come as no surprise that he grasps onto one thing and cannot think for himself outside of it.

If you guys need me, I’ll be watching this on a loop for the rest of my life.

BiSB: I feel bad for Rovell's stack. But this is tremendous content.