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This column is dedicated to looking at a single hand and dissecting it to help poker players better understand the game and the mindsets of some of the top players in the world. Let’s focus for a minute on Dan Harrington’s hand at the World Poker Tour Championship at the Bellagio in April.

Dan’s in late position, blinds are 1500-3000 with a 400 ante. The buy in was 25000. Harrington raises 10,000 with K-9 off. One player calls, the big blind. Flop comes rainbow 2-10-5 rainbow. Obviously Harrington misses here, but could this help his opponent? Big blind checks, and Harrington makes a continuation bet of 12,000. Big blind calls. Interesting. So what’s Harrington thinking here? “I think he has a small pair or paired the 10.” Next comes the turn, 7h, which puts a flush draw on the board. Another continuation bet by Harrington, this time for 26000. Still, the BB calls, but “He thought about it a long time…” River comes 8h. If the BB was looking for a flush, he made it, or possibly the straight.

At this point Harrington is thinking “He has a pair and he thinks he’s going to make stand on the end, and he hopes I check on the end.” Now at this point we see that Harrington has nothing, but with good poker position and his betting patterns, this is a wonderful opportunity to pull off a bluff. After all , it won’t look suspicious as the betting signifies that Harrington has something, even though we know he holds a muck if he’s challenged. And unfortunately this time he is. He pushes 60000 in forcing the BB to bet his whole stack. And he does. And what does the BB turn over? Pocket fours. Now there’s lots that can be said for the bad play by the pocket fours, but in the end, it just goes to show you that even with the most advanced technical skill, such as that shown by Harrington, sometimes our love of our hand throws off any logic and “should have happened,” moments.

Still, it speaks volumes that Harrington was able to predict the poker hand so accurately.