It touched the muck - it's DEAD!

[psandman]

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No one mentioned the fact that one card (the ace) was visibly shown, while the other card (insignificant to the result of the hand) was the card in question.
From my experience, sometimes people will purposely show one card (usually when it is the only significant card for showdown) and will muck the other card. When this happens the dealer will say you need to show 2 cards and then it is shown and he is awarded the pot. I don't recall ever seeing a player penalized for doing this.

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I usually only see this happen when they put both cards in front and only flip one, not really mucking the other. I can't imagine someone actually mucking the kicker for a hugely contested pot intentionally. Does this actually happen?

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Sadly this does happen. I'm not sure what these people are thinking. I suppose that they think that their opponent will not want to win this way and will muck their hand when they are shown they are beat with one card.