Kevin Martin's Crazy Bad Beat Live on Twitch

Have you ever had a beat so bad national media covered it in the news? This is what happened to PokerStars Team Pro Kevin Martin.

Martin, a 25-year old Canadian poker pro’s live stream of the $109 Sunday Wrap-up tournament on PokerStars has made it into the online publication of USA Today, one of America’s most read newspapers. This is not the first time Martin has appeared in the mainstream, not poker-specific media: in 2017, he won the fifth season of the reality show Big Brother Canada.

What got him media attention this time was a nightmarish bad beat he suffered. With 25 people left in the field, Martin shoved his 22 BB stack from the big blind over a cutoff open with AK off. His opponent called and tabled the same hand: Martin had the Ace of diamonds with the King of hearts while nikitos2308 called with the Ace of hearts and the King of diamonds.

Martin got understandably excited on the turn, the ten of diamonds gave him a better flush draw - any card of the same suit falls on the river and he wins this all-in pot. Except for one - the Queen of the diamonds on the river gave his opponent an “almost Royal Flush”, a King-high straight flush beating Martin’s measly Ace-high flush... 

To break down how bad this beat was by the numbers, pre-flop both players had a 0.74% chance of avoiding the chop and taking the whole pot; while on the turn Martin’s equity shot up to 15.91% while the probability of a split pot was 81.82%. Nikitos hit his only out on the last street.

After recuperating from the shock, Martin managed to drive his remaining 2 BB-stack to a second place finish in the tournament which earned him $5,489.52.

A very similar hand played out in the WSOP Main Event back in 2012: Hungarian pro András Koroknai 5-bet shoved his AK off pre-flop, he got called by Ladouceur with the same hand - with his tournament life at risk, Koroknai hit a flush on the turn taking down a giant pot that allowed him to make it to the final table.