[bav]

All of these comments about straddles being binding if a re-straddle follows sound remarkably like the short debate we had at the table at the Rio that night. Folks don't like the idea that a straddler can renig just 'cause someone restraddles, but they have a hard time coming up with a rule that really fits well and doesn't look terribly different than how the BB is treated and isn't riddled with exceptions.

If I put out a straddle, and then someone spills 32oz of chocolate shake over the table and cards and into the auto shuffler... no, I do not have to stick around and wait 20 minutes while that is cleaned up, nor do I have to move to a new table if they decide moving will be faster than cleaning. If I post a blind or straddle soon as the previous hand is over, and the phone rings, I should get to yank it back and back away from the table and take the call. Or if a dealer is tapped out and I just don't feel like waiting for the rack count and want to hit the head. Or if a fill comes in and the world's slowest chip-counter and stacker is in the box. Or if the habanero enchiladas suddenly decide to come crashing back out at that instant. I just can't come up with a convincing excuse to try to treat a straddle differently than a blind, and by golly you can't commit me play a BB until the cards start coming out.

As for those folks claiming a straddle is action, well, no, I disagree. You can't have action until you have cards. Few places consider the statement "I'm gonna go all-in next hand" binding when the dealer is still shuffling. If that isn't binding, you can't try to apply that to a straddle.

And if you're gonna make a straddle binding, and someone wants to be absolutely sure they aren't going to be bound to it until the cards are moving, they can wait until the cards are cut and the dealer is pulling the first one off to drop a straddle on the table. And that should also cut off any re-straddle attempt unless UTG+2 is rocket-fast. So lotsa special straddle rules really don't fix anything.

And yes, this was a purely academic debate we had at the table at Rio. I know of no place in Vegas that allows re-straddles (though we've gotten away with it a time or two in various venues when the dealer didn't know the rules and didn't call the floor).