You make the ruling: Do the big chips play in this "all-in" push?

[Rick Nebiolo]

The following incident occurred in a a medium size NL game in a LA card club. Sorry about the DOS style graphics but they should be good enough to give you guys the idea of what the situation looked like. The dashed lines represent the rail and the X's and Y's represent stacks in front of the two involved players.


1. Each "X" below represents a stack of twenty $5 chips ($100). The "Y" stack in front of Player A consists of six $100 chips on the bottom and fourteen $5 chips on top. The bottom of the "Y" stack is not clearly visible to Player B as he is on the end seat where the table curves away (can't do curved lines in DOS [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]). These chips would barely be visible to someone standing behind as the rail blocks the bottom chips in the stack.

There is already a substantial pot. On the turn/river (doesn't matter) Player A pushes all-in. Player B calls. At the showdown Player A has the best hand. Player B starts to cut off seven of his ten stacks to pay off Player A. Player A then shows that he covers Player B with his $100 white chips (in LA white chips are the big chips). A huge argument erupts attracting the attention of the floorman. Player B claims he thought he was only calling a $700 bet. Player A says his white $100 chips have been in that spot for the last hour or so and they clearly play. Also note that Player B never asked for a count before calling.

[NOTE: Periods in graphics below had to be added after preview of post to maintain spacing.]


XXX.................XXXXX
XYXX................XXXXX
----------------------------------
Table Rail is actually curved here so
the Y stack is out of view of Player B
----------------------------------
Player A............Player B
Seat 4..............Seat 3


You are the floor. What is your decision?



2. Let me change the way the stacks are arranged just a little as follows:

XXX.................XXXXX
YXXX................XXXXX
----------------------------------
Table Rail is actually curved here so
the Y stack is out of view of Player B
----------------------------------
Player A............Player B
Seat 4..............Seat 3

Same situation as in 1. above. What is your decision now?



3. One more time. Let's add more stacks but the situation is essentially the same.


XXXX.................XXXXX
XYXX.................XXXXX
XXXX.................XXXXX
----------------------------------
Table Rail is actually curved here so
the Y stack is out of view of Player B
----------------------------------
Player A............Player B
Seat 4..............Seat 3


Same situation as in 1. above but with more stacks and now the $100 chips are completely out of view. What is your decision now?


Also appreciated are comments regarding the following:

What decision would you likely get in your home club or area?

What should be the fair decision if you wrote the rules?

~ Rick

PS Any interesting "chips/money" not in clear view stories also appreciated.