# The Loser is the Winner **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 19, 2004, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964 "2004-10-19T02:50:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/41 "2004-10-20T17:23:18Z")
> [@xash](#): > > **Aeschines** , please leave political comments out of GQ. > > - **xash** > General Questions Moderator Oh, come on. It was a joke. It’s not a serious attempt at political commentry. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/42 "2004-10-20T20:03:00Z")
> [@](#): > > There are different forms of lowball. Straight low-ball and hi-lo split exist. Typically in hi/lo split games, A-2-3-4-5 is the lowest hand. So what happens if that hand, taken as a straight, is also the highest hand in play? Does the holder of that hand get the entire pot, or does he have to decide if he’s high or low? And wouldn’t that hand be considered “ace high”, even if it’s not a straight, and therefore be higher than, say, 2-4-5-7-9? ---
**Author:** ![ccwaterback](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/df705f/32.png) [@ccwaterback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ccwaterback)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/43 "2004-10-20T20:15:39Z")
We played seven card hi-lo declare at the end. So when the game is basically over, you declare whether you are going hi, lo, or both. Then another round of betting proceeds. If you go both, you have to win both, that is, if you lose on either the hi or the lo, you lose. We played A-5 is perfect low and also a straight (maybe even a straight flush). ---
**Author:** ![Duke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e8c25b/32.png) [@Duke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/44 "2004-10-20T20:25:28Z")
> [@Trunk](#): > > There’s a famous example of a soccer game where a team somehow advanced to a next round if they lost, but didn’t advance if they won or drew and the team was trying to score on itself at the end of the game. [Here ya go.](http://www.snopes.com/sports/soccer/barbados.htm) Snopes’ explanation is the correct one; needless to say, the whole Barbados-Grenada Carribean Cup saga was a confusing one. They should have stuck to cricket… ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/45 "2004-10-20T20:36:55Z")
> [@ccwaterback](#): > > We played seven card hi-lo declare at the end. So when the game is basically over, you declare whether you are going hi, lo, or both. Then another round of betting proceeds. If you go both, you have to win both, that is, if you lose on either the hi or the lo, you lose. We played A-5 is perfect low and also a straight (maybe even a straight flush). This is more-or-less the way I’ve always played. An ace to 5 straight is fairly commonly known as “the wheel” or “the bicycle.” AFAIK, A to 5 lowball is the most common variation of lowball poker, with straights and flushes ignored. Also, Aces are counted as low, so a pair of aces beats a pair of twos in Ace-to-5 lowball. In Ace-to-6 lowball, flushes and straights count. In Deuce-to-7, flushes and straights count, with the added caveat that aces are always high (thus the wheel would only count as an ace high, not a straight.) ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/46 "2004-10-20T20:39:18Z")
> [@Duke](#): > > [Here ya go.](http://www.snopes.com/sports/soccer/barbados.htm) Snopes’ explanation is the correct one; needless to say, the whole Barbados-Grenada Carribean Cup saga was a confusing one. They should have stuck to cricket… Wow. That’s awesome! I wonder if there’s any video footage of this game out there. Sounds like a riot. ---
**Author:** ![kidchameleon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/898d66/32.png) [@kidchameleon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kidchameleon)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/47 "2004-10-20T20:59:09Z")
The bookies lost on Superbowl 13, despite the fact that they’re _supposed_ to always win. ---
**Author:** ![Gangster\_Octopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a8b319/32.png) [@Gangster\_Octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gangster_Octopus)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/48 "2004-10-20T21:26:27Z")
In golf it is traditional if you get a hole-in-one you have to buy everyone drinks. OK so it isn’t winning and losing, but it is in the zen spirit of the OP. ---
**Author:** ![Shade](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2bfe46/32.png) [@Shade](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shade)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/49 "2004-10-20T22:20:49Z")
> [@Duke](#): > > [Here ya go.](http://www.snopes.com/sports/soccer/barbados.htm) Snopes’ explanation is the correct one; needless to say, the whole Barbados-Grenada Carribean Cup saga was a confusing one. They should have stuck to cricket… Not quite in this league, so to speak, but I think it’s not uncommon that in the (soccer) world cup it could be better to lose. The first round has 6 (iirc) mini-leagues of 4 teams, the top two of each go through to the next round, but normally a winning team plays a second team, the idea being that the best teams don’t knock each other out immediately. But a surprise result in another group can mean that if you come second you play a weaker team than if you come first, so if you’re ahead on points, it could be wise to give some away. ---
**Author:** ![z\_z\_z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b2d939/32.png) [@z\_z\_z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/z_z_z)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/50 "2004-10-20T22:45:31Z")
> [@Shade](#): > > Not quite in this league, so to speak, but I think it’s not uncommon that in the (soccer) world cup it could be better to lose. The first round has 6 (iirc) mini-leagues of 4 teams, the top two of each go through to the next round, but normally a winning team plays a second team, the idea being that the best teams don’t knock each other out immediately. But a surprise result in another group can mean that if you come second you play a weaker team than if you come first, so if you’re ahead on points, it could be wise to give some away. Speaking of football (soccer) there is also the scandalous game between Austria and Germany, in the preliminaries of the 1982 world cup in Spain. See [Fußball-Weltmeisterschaft 1982 – Wikipedia](http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fu%C3%9Fballweltmeisterschaft_1982), if you can read German. Both teams knew what they had to do that both teams advanced to the next round, and they did it, in an obvious mutual agreement. This even caused a rule change. In this case, the Austrians settled with a close (0-1) loss to get to the next round… ---
**Author:** ![Valgard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/7feea3/32.png) [@Valgard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Valgard)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2004, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964/51 "2004-10-21T00:00:01Z")
How about a situation where the loser loses but (or because!) they display better sportsmanship - they lose the game but are acknowledged to be “better” (say from a moral standpoint) than the winner. Sports movies are full of these things - “Rocky”, “Mr. 3000”, “Tin Cup” and “Mystery Alaska” for example. They’re all a bit different from each other but sometimes it’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you play the game… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-loser-is-the-winner/269964.md?page=2)