A Q&A Session on Contract Play

The following Q & A session is an edited version of an exchange that took place between myself (A) and a reader (Q) with whom I shared my last column prior to its publication. I present it here as a follow-up because it touches on issues most commonly raised when the subject of contract play comes up.

Q: I'm not sure I understand what the big deal is about checking a hand all the way down.

A: Let's be clear – the issue under discussion is not two players who both happen to check to the end, but two players making a contract to do so.

Q: What's the difference?

A: The first is a case of players making independent decisions that happen to coincide. The second is a case of players making their decisions together.

Q: So … it's OK for players to check all the way as long as they don't say anything?

A: Again, let's be clear. It's OK to make independent decisions. Collaborating on decisions is out of bounds, whether done openly or covertly. As to players having arrangements with other players regarding the coordination of betting action – is it really necessary to say what that is?

Q: But when pots are down to two players, isn't that their business?

A: It would be if pots magically reached that point by themselves – but that's not how poker works. A hand in which I was recently involved should serve to demonstrate the point. In an Omaha eight-or-better game with a kill, I posted the kill and called a preflop raise with a dicey hand, anticipating that the price I was getting would justify seeing the flop. Unfortunately, the raise reduced the field to myself and two opponents who regularly engage in the kind of contracts we're talking about, and one of them proceeded to reraise. The original raiser now pounced, making it four bets, and I dumped the hand. This would all be perfectly legitimate except for the fact that before my cards even hit the muck, the capper gleefully declared – and I quote – "It worked!" Then, he instantly turned to his friend and cut a deal to check the rest of the way.

Clearly, this pot didn't just "happen to become" heads up, but did so as the result of action. Just as clearly, that action and the deal that followed it were related, the latter set up by the former.

Q: OK, that seems pretty shady, but are you suggesting that a player isn't entitled to try to buy a pot by betting you off it?

A: Of course a player is entitled to buy a pot, that should be obvious. What should be equally obvious is that two players can't make the purchase together.

Q: But if they're not actually chopping up the chips …

A: They're not? You mean, of two players who consistently orchestrate their betting in such fashion, secure in the knowledge of the standing deal that follows, the same one always wins?

Q: Hmm, I never thought of it that way …

A: In fact, not only do they increase their chances of winning more hands individually – thereby taking turns splitting dead money that became dead by virtue of concerted action – but in high-low situations such as the one above, they greatly increase their chances of splitting pots with what would otherwise be marginal two-way hands. This is because the value of such hands swells with the addition of dead money and the elimination of a third of the field, the prospects of which increase markedly as a direct result of the contractors acting in tandem. In a full split-pot game, this can be significant; in a shorthanded one, it's simply enormous.

Q: OK, I'm convinced. So, why isn't there a rule against it?

A: There is! It's one of the game's most fundamental rules, that of one player to a hand.

Q: Wait a minute, how is checking all the way down …

A: You mean, making a contract to check it all the way down …

Q: Fine. How is that a violation of the one-player-to-a-hand rule?

A: If Player A and Player B make a contract on the flop to check until the end, who is making the decision regarding Player A's future action on the turn and river? Answer: Player A and Player B are making that decision together. And who is making the decision regarding Player B's future action? Again, both players are making that decision collectively. If you're still wondering how that's a violation of the one-player-to-a-hand rule, I respectfully ask: How is it anything else?

I should also point out that in many cardrooms, another rule exists that covers the specific circumstance of two players making such contracts when a third player is all in. The rulebook in front of me not only declares such action to be unethical, but sufficiently serious to warrant expulsion from the casino. Unfortunately, even in cardrooms where the necessity of dealing firmly with such action is recognized as a matter of policy, in practice it's often a different story, for it's a rule of which many dealers and floorpeople are either indifferent or unaware.

Q: OK, here's something I've been meaning to ask. In the end, aren't such players really hurting only themselves?

A: The precise answer to that question is no – for while it's true that in many instances they're surrendering value to conform to an ill-conceived social code, they're not hurting only themselves. The hand I mentioned above is just one example, and unfortunately, it's the kind of thing one sees more and more. Exacerbating the situation is the fact that once players become accustomed to improvised, on-the-fly compacts, all sorts of variations proliferate, variations that carry additional benefits to the contractors.

Q: Such as?

A: Take someone who regularly limps in from up front with hands properly played only in late position – hands, in other words, that can't stand a raise and have a negative value in short fields. If he's one of those players who's come to regard the "fine art of the midhand deal" a constitutionally protected right, it won't be long before he starts making proposals to chop with the big blind in those instances when there are no callers: "Hey, it's just us two, no point in playing." If the big blind, motivated by a poor hand of his own, goes along, not only is the early limper relieved of any consequences of his poor strategy – consequences that the rest of us are subject to – but if it's a game in which the house takes the drop immediately after the flop, both players save on the rake, thereby deriving a situational edge unavailable to those who abide by the rules.

Q: You speak of edge, but is it really all that significant?

A: Yes, but you know something? We could get out our calculators and slide rules, and quibble about extent, but the real question is one of principle, not degree. Reduced to its essentials, that question is this: Should players have advantages in a poker game simply because they have a friend (or friends) at the table with whom they can make contracts, and their opponents don't?

Q: Is it really necessary to answer that question?

A: You wouldn't think so – but at a time when poker is welcoming so many new players who learn by what they see, it's certainly something that needs to be addressed.