[AbeFroman17]

I truly don't know the answer to this, so I am hoping you guys can help me out. I play almost exlusively online, but was in Vegas over the weekend playing in the $2-5 NL game at Bellagio with a buddy of mine. Here is the situation:

Table is full with a mixture of half out of towners and half locals that all knew each other. My buddy raises in the CO to $20, button (local decent player) calls, SB folds, BB (local aggressive decent player) raises to $80. My buddy folds, button calls while BB is talking the whole time that he has a big hand. After my buddy folds but before the button decides, he is saying that he doesn't want to have to check this down. WTF? So, button finally decides to call and they see a flop of AQT rainbow. They check the hand down the entire way. BB shows AA and button shows QQ at showdown. Obviously, they had agreed at some point to not play big pots against each other.

So, my question is:

1. Is this unethical?
2. Is it standard in B&M games with "friends"?
3. If yes to #2, is this right?
4. What, if anything, should my buddy and I have done?

I would never think of softplaying against a buddy as that money is usually the sweetest of all. But, I didn't know what the standard is.

Thanks

Mac