Heads Up

by Brian Mulholland | Published: May 11, 2001

Last issue, I stated that some heads-up customs in poker clash with certain fundamental principles that define the game. Let me now add that some of these customs are at odds with certain explicit rules of the game, as well. Right now I'm looking at a poker rulebook whose phrasing is quite standard, and I find these words: "The splitting of pots among players will not be allowed under any circumstances in any game. All hands must be played to completion." Hmm. "Under any circumstances" – there certainly isn't anything ambiguous about that phrase, is there?

So, how do we reconcile the practice of blind-chopping with either (1) the above rule, or (2) the fundamental principle of risk vs. benefit that defines the game of poker?

Well, one way is to formalize the following distinction: Since the blinds didn't choose to enter the pot voluntarily, we'll allow them – when they're the only players left before the flop – to retrieve their bets and move on to the next hand. I believe there are inherent contradictions left unresolved in that premise, but I'm not too concerned with them now, for the simple reason that I think blind-chopping is here to stay, and I have no desire to spend my time tilting at windmills. What I am concerned with is the mutated practices that this exception has led to.

One such deviation that is occurring more and more frequently stems from the misunderstanding that the exception is triggered when the preflop pot comes down to two players, regardless of whether or not those players are both the blinds. This means that a player who limps into a pot from early position can later annul his own action, on the (totally arbitrary) basis that there didn't happen to be any other callers – even though the noncallers share no such option. Clearly, as noted last issue, this practice violates the principle of equal risk vs. benefit that's at the heart of poker. And it just as clearly violates the rule that states pots can't be chopped and that all hands will be played to completion.

Not surprisingly, exceptions based on a faulty premise lead to other exceptions, as well. If a player who limps in with a call can chop, can he do so if he raises? I mean, what's the next logical step in this pattern? Well, the other day I saw a player – we'll call him Player X – raise an Omaha high-low kill pot from early position. The person next to act, Player Y, held naked aces (A-A-6-9 rainbow), and since Player X is notorious for raising from early position with low cards, Player Y was faced with one of those reraise-or-fold decisions. He agonized for a very long moment before deciding to dump rather than pump. Everyone else folded, too, whereupon Player X looked at the big blind and said, "Wanna just chop?" The big blind nodded, Player X flashed his A-2-3-4, they both took their bets back, and Player Y went ballistic. "Wait just a minute," he objected. "You don't move me out of a pot by putting in a double bet, and then when it turns out you're not getting enough value for your low draw, just decide to reach into the pot and take your chips back. No way!" A floorman was summoned, and the one who arrived was brand-new to the job – I happen to know for a fact that, unfortunately, he had received virtually no training for that position. He listened, intensely confused, and finally confessed that he couldn't see what the problem was. "It's just the two of you, right?"

Player Y attempted to explain to the tenderfoot floorman that the jeopardy that he had chosen to decline by folding was the very same jeopardy that Player X had chosen to assume by raising, and that therefore this risk should remain just as surely alive for the raiser as his own cards were dead, until the hand was completed. "In other words," he continued, "the reason my cards entered the muck in the first place was that the other fellow's money entered the pot – and he has no more business retrieving his money than I have a right to retrieve my cards. Any chopping involving players who've voluntarily entered the pot, especially with a raise – well, it just ain't kosher."

The floorman looked at him as if he were speaking a foreign language. He had that deer-in-the-headlights expression that revealed a glaring unfamiliarity with the traditions of the game he was now paid to supervise. A more experienced floorman eventually clarified the matter both for the table and his younger partner. That's the good news. The bad news is that such clarifications are becoming increasingly rare. And the reason for that, sadly, is that more and more floorpeople are left untrained, not only in the rules and fine points of the game, but in the habit of thinking in terms of the fundamentals that govern the game. After all, such a habit would yet again lead back to this question: What is the next logical step along this road?

Well, if players are allowed to (a) limp in before the flop without their action being binding, and can likewise (b) raise to eliminate some risk from a hand and then choose to void all jeopardy, the next logical step would bring us to ©, where a player can raise, another player can reraise, and when everyone else folds including the blinds, these two can chop – even though neither of them was a blind. Now you've got two players exempting themselves from the intrinsic risk of poker, even when both enter the pot voluntarily. And since the blinds' chips are in the pot, it also means that these two players, in effect, will be contracting to split other players' money – they'll be turning a profit with no risk whatsoever. Is that poker? This leads to (d), where two players can chop on later rounds (after all, why should there be one set of rules for preflop betting and other rules that apply to flop, turn, and river betting?), then to (e), where players offer rebates for a third player to fold so that the two remaining players can then chop, and eventually to (f), where three players chop a pot.

Think I'm exaggerating? I've got news for you – I've seen all of these things happen, and more than a few times. And these little games have nothing whatsoever to do with the game of poker.

How did we arrive at this point? There are two main reasons. First, the seeds of partnership and contract that were planted when blind-chopping was introduced to the game have predictably sprouted; in fact, they're beginning to spread like weeds. Second, we got there because poor training means fewer floorpeople who are in the habit of looking at situations in terms of fundamentals – and asking questions framed in essentials. When the criterion for chopping becomes distorted – when it shifts from blind hands to two hands – an experienced floorman recognizes the difference, and can effectively communicate that distinction, thus educating both the players and the dealers. He also understands the difference that indifference makes – and that looking the other way leads to precedents that threaten the integrity of the game.