Final table floor decision

[lmcjaho]

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Also, how on earth did this happen?
Did he push his chips out and say, "all-in" and then the dealer snatched up his cards? Seems kind of weird.

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A friend of mine mucked an all-in players cards once which resulted in the guy losing on the bubble of a satellite-type payout structure (top 20 advance, just surviving into the top 20 is all that matters).

Apparently the guy had been folding the whole time my buddy was at the table by moving his cards about 1 inch to the right (he was in the 1-seat) and had even snapped off a peevish response along the lines of "if I wasn't folding they wouldn't be there" when my buddy told him the action was on him once earlier in the night. So apparently what happened on the hand in question was two other players had moved all in and the 1-seat moved his cards aside to push his chips into the middle of the table - well, since he had been folding in that exact manner all day my friend instinctively grabbed his cards and swept them into the muck...

The best part of the story is the guy didn't even notice until the turn (all action was on the flop) was out and the third burn card was down, at which point he starts shrieking "Where's my cards?!" - and my friend realizes what happened and calls for the Tourney Director... Who informs the gentleman that his cards are gone and he is SOL.

So maybe the guy in the OP had a similar history of folding by pushing his cards to the side, and then he did the same motion to make way for his chips and the dealer just reacted the way he had been "programmed" to by the guy's previous actions... [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

[RR]

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Also, how on earth did this happen?
Did he push his chips out and say, "all-in" and then the dealer snatched up his cards? Seems kind of weird.


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In a recent dealer evaluation the dealer finished dead last.

[psandman]

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I would add all-in player's as a protected class as everyone sees their chips in the center and htey have bet all their chips so they do not have a chip to protect their cards.


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I've never really bought the excuse that a player who is all in didn't have a chip to protect his cards, because there are other ways to protect your cards, many players bring trinkets for just that purpose, and almost all of us have fingers we could keep on the cards.

[psandman]

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2) Since there has been absolutely no action after his all-in I see no real harm in returning his entire bet.

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It doesn't matter that's there's been no action after. He called two other all-in bets. You're possibly depriving those two players of his chips that they would have won.

Also, since it's a tournament, you're affecting all other players since seat 10 may have more chips than he would have had if he lost the hand.

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Lets say that the dealer had mucked the cards before the player declared he was all-in. Those players are still deprived of the chance to win the chips.

There is totally fair way to solve this problem, but treating it as though the muck came first seems to be reasonable solution in this scenario

[TMTTR]

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1) Is that the number 1 rule in poker is to protect your hand, the player here failed to protect his hand. To the extent that his all-in bet may exceed the previous bets you return those chips and he is out of luck on the rest.


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Since our friendly psandman has taken up the fight here on all other issues, I will challenge this point: Protect your hand certainly is not the "number 1 rule in poker." To say so is dealer/floor hyperbole in order to shift the blame to the player for what is most frequently a dealer f**k up. That is why the rules as written (and as should be enforced) allow hands to be rescued from the muck whenever possible.

Discuss.

[psandman]

There are many number 1 rules in poker.

As for shifting the blame from player dealer to player I don't think that is the point of the rule. And I don't think the blame needs shifting. I believe that almost everytime a hand gets "mistakenly" mucked it is combination of the fault of the dealer and the fault of the player. Some instances the fault is more on one side then the other, but it usually a combination.

As for rescuing hands from the muck. I don't have a problem with rescuing identifiable cards form the muck. But once the cards get mixed into the muck to the point that they can not be identified this is not an option.

I certainly never want a hand to be killed because of an error I made (even if a significant part of the error was the fault of the player).

[TMTTR]

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There are many number 1 rules in poker.

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Good answer.

[AngusThermopyle]

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Rules of Poker:

1. There are many number 1 rules in poker.


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[pfapfap]

According to the last Robert's I read, protecting your hand was Rule #2.