There Are No Good Ways To Bust The Main Event, But Busting It As a 99.9% Favorite May Be The Actual Worst Way

There are no good ways to bust the WSOP Main Event. It's an event you look forward to all year, you dream in your head for months on end about how the event is going to go for you, and then everyone besides 1 person out of the 10,000 person field accomplishes the goal. Sure, cashing is great. Final tabling sounds wonderful. But on the other hand, most people leave disappointed. Some bust outs are boring and standard- you lose a flip. But others are painful. And then there is a whole other tier that is not just pain, but makes you rethink your life. That is this one:

Off the jump the red aces are 87% favorites to win. But hey, the AK is suited, so it will win 1 out of 10 times or so. Fair enough.

On the flop, that's all she wrote. No spades, the aces flop the set, and another king would just make a better full house for the AA. 

A 99.9% favorite to win the hand. AK is looking up flights home. It's over. Goodbye. 

But then the turn comes….

And AK's odds have SKY ROCKETED all the way up to 2.27%! Too bad buddy is already in an Uber to the airport, because as you already saw, the King of diamonds spiked the river, making runner runner quads, and the most improbable way to bust out of the Main.

If you're a 99.9% favorite in anything and then lose, I don't even know what you do. I guess just change your name, move to Alaska, and start a new life. For a deck of cards to be shuffled so perfectly to go from 99.9% to 0% is as close to "impossible" as it gets.

As for me, my Main Event was as boring as it gets. On day 1 I opened 33, the button 3bet me, and I called. The flop came T93, I check/raised, he called. The turn was the Q, I bet, he called. The river was the K, I checked, he bet massive, and I sigh folded. He said he had JJ. After that hand I basically didn't win a pot. On day 2 I came in with 27.4k (35bbs) and the first level was just disgustingly boring. No cards, no spots, no nothing. Check folded from defending the BB a couple times, won the blinds twice shoving QJhh and AK, and them busted with AK vs 99. 

As far as Main Events go, this was just a big fat nothing burger. I think I've been spoiled by having awesome and dramatic Main Event runs in the past, but they aren't always going to be that way. Sometimes the card distribution just isn't in your favor, it is what it is. To be honest, I'd rather lose as a 99.9% favorite, at least then I'd have an exciting story to tell. Mine was just boring. A few years ago I busted as a 94% favorite on the turn, AK vs AQ, and he spiked a Q on the river. It's just how this game goes sometimes.

Honestly, every time I play this tournament I consider myself very lucky and fortunate, and I understand it won't always go my way. I was able to cash it last year and was hoping to start a little streak, but it wasn't meant to be. Now I get to return home and start prepping for next year's!