One of the wildest calls you’ll ever see has led to allegations of cheating in poker.
Robbi Jade Lew was in a hand against former “Survivor” contestant Garrett Adelstein on the “Hustler Casino Live” stream on Thursday night.
Lew had Jack-three offsuit, while Adelstein had the seven and eight of clubs.
The flop came out: 10 of hearts, 10 of clubs, nine of clubs.
This meant that Adelstein had an open-ended straight flush draw, while Lew had effectively nothing. Adelstein had a 70 percent chance to win the hand at this point — any club, jack or six would give him a near-certain win. Lew called Adelstein’s $2,500 bet.
This is where things turned — pun somewhat intended — very bizarre.
Fourth street brought the three of hearts, a card which helped neither contestant. After an initial bet of $10,000 from Adelstein and a raise to double that from Lew, Adelstein went all-in for $129,000.
At this point, Adelstein had a 53 percent chance to win. At a slight disadvantage to Adelstein’s actual hand, but holding nothing besides a jack-high, Lew astoundingly called the bet.
The river brought nothing to help either side, and Lew won the hand with jack high, four kicker.
It was such a bizarre call that Adelstein accused her of cheating. On the stream, Adelstein shot Lew a death glare, to which she responded, with a laugh, “You look like you want to kill me.”
The announcer on the stream was saying that Adelstein would ordinarily congratulate an opponent for a “hero call” like the one Lew made, but that his glare was “literally the most disturbed look that I’ve ever seen Garrett give.”
Her initial explanation was that she thought he had ace-high — a hand that would’ve been better than hers — before saying that she just thought he was betting so high against her because he didn’t have “s–t.”
Things only got more bizarre from here.
After the two had a private conversation, Lew gave Adelstein the money back from the hand. Why did she do that?
“I said that I wanted minimal destruction and asked, ‘What is going to make you happy?'” Lew told the table. “He said, ‘To give me my money back.'”
She then claimed that she misread the three — the turn card — thinking that it gave her a low pair against what she believed was a bluff. She said that she thought she had jack-three.
Lew said that she would “win the money back” that she gave Adelstein and “I’m not gonna deal with drama.”
After the event, Adelstein gave a lengthy explanation of why he believed Lew was cheating, saying that her call in this moment did not mesh with her previous betting patterns, and alleging that a way to cheat during live-streamed poker would be to have some type of vibrating device that tells you when you have the best hand — or having possession of a card reader.
A curious aspect of this situation is that when Lew called, she had less than a 50-50 shot to win. One would imagine that if she had a clairvoyant knowledge of the exact hand he was holding she would’ve folded on the turn when he went all-in (unless she somehow knew both what his cards were and what the river would be).
In any event, Lew claimed that she was “cornered and threatened” by Adelstein during their off-camera interaction.
“I read the man and make a hero call after he shoves on a turned brick card,” Lew tweeted. “Get over it. I’ll say it again like I’ve said it before: ‘I’m not playing nice in the sandbox anymore.’ Make it right @GmanPoker Or don’t. #IDGAF I’ve already moved on. I’ll make it back either way.”
She continued: “Garrett blocked me. Guilty as charged. What an honest man. He cornered me & threatened me. If he has the audacity to give me the death stare ON camera, picture what it’s like OFF camera. I was pulled out of the game & forced to speak to him in a dark hallway. Full details to come.”
