Rules of the Game: Part VII

Many new players are coming into brick-and-mortar (B&M) cardrooms for the first time. They have played online and in home games, but may not know the rules and conventions of live cardroom play, and might get tripped up. As a public service, this series explains many of the rules, some perhaps unwritten, that newcomers may not have encountered.

Protect the Other Players
This controversial rule often does not specifically appear in rulebooks. Nonetheless, it is at least an unspoken part of cardroom etiquette and behavior, and often turns out to be the morally responsible action.

How do you protect the other players? If you see the dealer make a mistake, as, for example, about to award a pot to the wrong player, it is your duty to try to rectify the matter. This becomes controversial when it involves technicalities. If at the showdown a hand is tabled and is clearly the best hand, yet the dealer starts to push the pot to another player because the dealer has misread the winning hand, some player must speak up to correct the situation. This doesn't happen very often in hold'em, but hands are sometimes hard to read in Omaha, particularly in the split-pot version.

Tabling a hand means spreading the cards faceup on the table. Where the controversy comes in is if a player shows his cards to you but does not spread them on the table. Instead of spreading them, he is about to throw them away. Perhaps you notice that the player has overlooked his hand and has a winner. Many players and poker writers believe that it is not your duty to draw his attention to this. They say, "One player to a hand" and "It's not your business to read someone's hand for him." In fact, most agree that in such a situation, you must not say anything. But if a hand is spread, even briefly, and that hand is the best, it is entitled to the pot. The dealer might misread the hand, muck it, and start to push the pot to another player. If so, you must speak up.

Now, if the player next to you shows you his cards and you can see that he has a winner, but he apparently does not realize it, it is not your business to say anything. But if the hand is tabled, you call attention to the dealer's mistake, and someone tells you to mind your own business, perhaps accompanied by saying, "One player to a hand," you'll know that not only are you doing the right thing, but in fact you're obligated to do so.

Similarly, if you see that someone puts the wrong amount into the pot and the dealer does not correct the bet, it's up to you - or anyone else at the table - to say something. This particular situation is always fair to at least one person, either the one who has put more than he should into the pot or the player who is about to be shorted because he doesn't notice that an opponent called $90 instead of $100, whether intentionally or not.

Another way to protect other players is to help them not expose their cards. Newcomers, particularly those whose only playing experience is online, might not realize they're exposing their cards when they look at them. If you can see the cards of the player next to you, you can protect her by politely saying, "Ma'am, I can see your cards when you look at them. I can try to avert my eyes every hand, but in the future, the person next to you might not always be so considerate." Say this maybe once more if the person persists in exposing cards, and after that, you can be secure in knowing you did the right thing.

Years ago in a lowball game, the player directly opposite me held his cards such that anyone near him could see them. I said, "Sir, your side of the table has an unfair advantage. They can all see your cards every hand, but that's not fair to us on this side of the table. Could you just show your hand to the whole table each deal to make it fair for all?" Unfortunately, that did not do the trick, but I certainly tried.

Some players with questionable ethics consider that card-exposing beginners - and it's not just beginners; some who have been playing cards for decades still expose their holdings unawares - are fair game. Such miscreants think that as long as they don't slump right down to table level to peek at their neighbor's holecards or don't dislocate their necks craning to the side, they've done nothing wrong. But it's an unfair advantage and certainly morally wrong. Beat the other players on the strength of your skills, not on what many would term out-and-out cheating. If a polite hint doesn't work, you might consider talking privately to a sympathetic floorperson.

Michael Wiesenberg has been a columnist for Card Player since the first issue in 1988. His latest book, The Ultimate Casino Guide, published by Sourcebooks, is available at fine bookstores and at Amazon.com and other online book purveyors. The Official Dictionary of Poker should see a new incarnation within a year. Send recommendations, riddles, and remarked wrongs to [email protected].