Ethan “Rampage” Yau knows that if you have air on the river, you’re only going to win the pot if you force your opponent to fold. Most of us get nervous trying to pull off a $20 bluff, but over the weekend, Rampage took little time to risk $628,000 with nothing but Ace high on Hustler Casino Live’s highly-anticipate “Million Dollar Game.”
Blinds were $500/$1,000 with a $2,000 straddle. Rampage, holding A♣-7♣, raised pre-flop to $9,000. A regular named “Handz,” sitting directly to Rampage’s left, simply called with Q♠-Q♥. Another player named “Pav” also called with K♥-8♦.
The flop of J♦-Q♦-T♣ was a big one for Handz, giving him a set of Queens. Rampage had a gut-shot straight draw and a backdoor flush draw, while Pav had an open-ended straight draw.
Rampage checked and Handz did the same, disguising his strong hand. Pav bet $15,000. Rampage quickly check-raised to $50,000 and Handz called. Pav, seeing the jig was up, folded.
The turn produced the 2♣, giving Rampage the nut-flush draw, but Handz was still comfortably in the lead. Rampage dialed it up, betting $175,000 into the $142,000 pot. Handz called again, still looking like he might be trying to hide the real strength of his hand.
The river was effectively a brick, the 5♠. Rampage had missed his draws and the only way he could win now was to bluff. And bluff he did. Representing A-K, Yau went for it, moving all-in for $618,000, significantly more than the $492,000 pot.
Handz pondered his move. Only straights had him beat and he was very clearly worried that Rampage had that A-K. After some thought, Handz folded. Rampage held his cards out face down, about to muck them as he was being given the pot, but then he decided to toss them onto the felt face up to the delight of the rest of the players who got to see that won the $1.1 million pot on a bluff.
People are already calling it the best bluff of the year and definitely the best one in Hustler Casino Live history. Chris Moneymaker’s bluff against Sammy Farha heads-up for the World Series of Poker Main Event bracelet may be more significant historically, but for the amount of money at stake on top of it being live-streamed on an extremely popular show, it will be hard to beat Ethan Yau’s move for a while.
