A very interesting ethics situation and a Bellagio Floor ruling

[Woolygimp]

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Obviously you don't play NL. Your solution is ineffective, and creates more gaps than it fills.

When someone calls out of turn, it's not as easy as 'just go all-in, and he'll fold'. According to your 'rule', I'd be calling prematurely the <u>majority</u> of rivers that I am bet into. And there's no sarcasm there, there's very little downside to it and this would be one of the best angles ever.

$25 in the pot, out of a $500 bet.

'I call'

Ok sir, you can fold and leave your $25, or you can bet more and the gentlemen that called out of turn gets the option to fold if you add more.

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Of course, if bettors simply placed their chips forward in a continuous motion or even more simply just stated an amount, none of this Hollywood crap would happen.

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I never declare my bet size. In live poker, a lot can be determined from someones voice. I always color up my chips, and use large denominations so betting isn't difficult for me. I go out there, and cut it down across the betting line, and when I'm finished that is my bet.

None of this hollywood crap would happen if people would play in turn. The rule is fine.

[Woolygimp]

If you read what I posted up top, someone did this to me and successfully picked off one of my bluffs, cheaply.

A couple weeks later, the same guy did it to me...again.

In NL, the structure is such that on the river you know who your opponent is. The bets are also large enough that there's no common room for error like a simple pre-flop out of turn mistake. When someone is going across the line with dozens of chips, only a blind person, someone with downsyndrome, or an angleshooter would call out of turn.

I know you play limit, and I respect that. But there are some obvious differences here that you would have to play NL to understand. A river bet isn't two green chips. It's often entire stacks of reds/greens/ and some blacks.

Also, most NL pots are more likely to be heads up, or three way and the action on previous streets makes it really hard for you not to understand who you're playing against. I'd say almost impossible.

When this was done to me, the guy was looking right at me while I was cutting my chips down over the line and said, "Nick, I call."

Seriously, does it get anymore blatant than that?

[MasterShakeJr]

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I always color up my chips, and use large denominations so betting isn't difficult for me. I go out there, and cut it down across the betting line, and when I'm finished that is my bet.


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I've admittedly never played live NL, so I'm pretty naive here, but why wouldn't you cut your chips behind the betting line instead of across it? This way you could put the entire bet out in one motion. Then if anyone said, "I call" while you were cutting chips you (or the dealer) could simply say that there's no bet to call yet. Or is there some nuanced psychological thing I'm missing?

[Woolygimp]

You know how hard it is to 'slide' entire stacks? They usually tip over.

Try sliding about 6 stacks across felt, and let me know how it goes.

Generally, it's also a good rule to retain your composure and keep it consistent whether you are value betting, or bluffing. This is usually done by keeping things simple, and the more you complicate it the more you can reveal.

That's why I don't verbally bet. That's why I cut down my chips across the line.

It's easy, quick, and gets the job done.

[MasterShakeJr]

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You know how hard it is to 'slide' entire stacks? They usually tip over.


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Didn't think of that. Fair enough.

[AngusThermopyle]

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$25 in the pot, out of a $500 bet.

'I call'

Ok sir, you can fold and leave your $25, or you can bet more and the gentlemen that called out of turn gets the option to fold if you add more.

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The case in point is $400 in a $460 pot.
Unless you advocate taking five $5 chips, cutting them off, going back to your stack, getting $25 more, repeat, repeat, repeat.

If you are saying a player has a stack of $25s with a $300 pot, cuts off one, and before he can do anything, his opponent says "Call", that is not the case under consideration. It would be logical to assume the bettor might place all $500 in the pot, and he should be allowed to, and the opponent should be required to call the $500. But to let him say "I bet $30,000" and force his opponent to call all $30,000 seems a bit much.

[Woolygimp]

When someone says call, they are saying "I will match your bet."

So the person still in the motion of betting still has the option of finishing his bet and setting it's size. If someone makes this mistake, and it's an honest mistake then they are better off playing go-fish.

It's my experience that it's almost never a mistake, and is commonly an angleshoot.

Rules should by definition not be open to interpretation, nor should they be ambiguous.

If you say, we'll the better should only be able to bet so much...
Well then that gives the advantage to the guy breaking the rules, he can do this anytime someone is about to overbet the pot ....i.e. bet 3k into a 1.8k pot.

I act out of turn commonly, but it's almost always pf. Not when my opponent that I've been betting back in fourth with on 3 previous streets goes across the line with a handful of chips.

[AngusThermopyle]

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Well then that gives the advantage to the guy breaking the rules, he can do this anytime someone is about to overbet the pot ....i.e. bet 3k into a 1.8k pot.




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Simple, don't take a stack of $1000 when you intend to bet $3K, and cut off $200 stacks hoping to get a 'read' on your opponent as you are doing it.

And again, the OP ends up being a $2000 bet into a $460 pot. You really think, by the description, the player had any intent of making that size bet?

[MicroBob]

Some n00bs get really excited in the heat of the moment of a live game and really jump the gun saying "i call" or "i raise" when the action is yet to get to them. This can happen both pre-flop and post-flop.

I don't doubt that in many situations it's just a ploy to get the guy to stop placing chips out there prematurely or some other kind of angle. But some of the premature I calls can certainly be of the honest-n00b-mistake variety.

Everybody has to have a time where it is their first time playing live in a casino. Not to mention that some people play when they're pretty drunk.
Presumably, you wouldn't mind if these first-timers or drunks stepped right into the 5/10 or 10/20 NL game since they are likely to be massive donators.
If there is some sort of innocent procedural error to be made by them like this I really don't think it should cost them their whole stack by a bettor potentially slowing down his chip-cutting to try to induce an "I call."

Again, I don't think that's what happened here. But assuming that everybody knows what they're doing and that honest mistakes post-flop don't happen is not correct imo.

[Overseer55]

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When someone is going across the line with dozens of chips, only a blind person, someone with downsyndrome, or an angleshooter would call out of turn.


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QFT.

I was originally on the fence about this issue...I now agree with you completely.