M-League 2019 Finals: Games #7-8

Game 7

Raking In the Tenpai

In the first half of the game, all the players were very good at their defensive game. Whenever a player called riichi, they were able to keep were able to successfully bring the game to an exhaustive draw.

The player who took advantage of this the most was Mizuhara. Whenever she called riichi, the other players defended. With tenpai payments at the end of the hand, she was able to gather a good amount points, even though she loses her riichi stick. Let’s take a look at how much she got at each ryuukyoku:

E1-1: +500 (+1500 payments, -1000 riichi)
E2-0: +1000
E2-1: +2000 (+3000 payments, -1000 riichi)
E3-2: +3000

As you can see, 6500 points is quite a lot for not winning a hand. With the tenpai payments, Mizuhara was able to separate herself from the rest of the competitors.

TILT

Highlight video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-4_s30_p526

In E4-3, something unusual happened. Uchikawa was in last place he needed a good hand during his dealer turn. Uchikawa took a look at his hand and was frustrated at how bad it was. He discarded a tile and stopped. He took a look at his discard and realized that he had made a mistake. He forgot to take his 14th tile.

Having only 12 tiles in hand, the players paused and waited for an announcement. When the announcement came, it announced that Uchikawa was now agari houki, also known as having a dead hand in English. When a player has a dead hand, the game continues as normal. However, the player with a dead hand is not allowed to make any calls (including winning and riichi), nor are they allowed to declare themselves tenpai at an exhaustive draw.

This isn’t the first time that something like this happened. Earlier this season, Suzuki Taro accidentally drew his first tile twice. These mistakes generally attributed to how the tables can be programmed. The AMOS REXX II, the model that they use for M-League, can be set to automatically gives each player 13 tiles at the start of each hand. However, the dealer still has to make their first draw. The convenience of having the tiles given to you may make you forget to draw at all, and thus causing these dead hand situations.

Taking the Pot

Highlight video: https://abema.tv/video/episode/444-4_s30_p526

After the dead hand announcement in E4-3, the hand continued as normal. With 3 honba on the table and a riichi stick left over from the previous hand, any win would have an extra 1900 as a bonus. Mizuhara, Hinata and Uotani all had very good hands in the first row. Mizuhara’s hand had dora and the chance for sanshoku, Hinata had a few pairs and an ankou, and Uotani had a clear honitsu. The first one to make a move is Mizuhara, who calls riichi on a 25p wait. With the pot on the line, Hinata decides to chase and call riichi on a 3p kanchan. With the pot growing to 3900 for Uotani, she decided to push her hand, making a call despite it making her furiten. It was eventually Mizuhara who won the hand when Hinata discarded the 2p. Mizuhara won the hand with Riichi/Dora 2/Aka 1 for 8000+900+2000

Yakuman Iishanten

In S4-0, Mizuhara was in the lead and could now relax a bit. As Uchikawa pushed to get out of last, Mizuhara stayed closed, giving herself a chance to win and multiple options to bail if the time comes. Her hand grew to have 5 pairs, making it an easy chiitoi candidate. Then she drew an ankou, and then another (This situation seems familiar…). Suddenly, she was iishanten for suuankou. This was the 4th time the Pirates have been iishanten or better for yakuman during the finals.

The dream didn’t last long though. When Hinata called riichi, Mizuhara did the responsible thing and bailed. The hand ended in ryuukyoku, with Hinata and Uchikawa both being tenpai.

Yakuman Iishanten

(Wait, didn’t I already do this?)

In S4-1, Mizuhara was in the lead and could now relax a bit. As Uchikawa pushed to get out of last, Mizuhara stayed closed, giving herself multiple options to bail if the time comes. Her hand started out with six unique terminals and honours. Since her hand was 4-shanten (3-shanten for chiitoi) with very bad waits and little chance of winning, she decided to discard some middle tiles so she has some safe honours later. With the first few draws, she drew more and more unique terminals and honours. By turn 9, she was iishanten for kokushi, waiting on the white dragon and 1s. This was the 5th time the Pirates have been iishanten or better for yakuman during the finals.

Despite the kokushi developing at an incredible speed, Uotani was faster. Uotani won the hand with Ittsuu/Dora 1/Aka 1 for 1000+100/2000+100, ending the game.

Final Scores

	Player	Score	Final Score
1st	Mizuhara Akina	57200	+77.2
2nd	Uotani Yuumi	30100	+10.1
3rd	Hinata Aiko	14000	-26.0
4th	Uchikawa Kotaro	-1300	-61.3

Standings

Though the Pirates gained some ground, the Phoenix remained in 1st place. Both the Abemas and the Sakura Knights struggled this game, getting further from the top.

Page 1: Before the Games
Page 2: Game #7
Page 3: Game #8