Ok this came up the other day and I want to know what the consensus ruling is. 2 players all in preflop, player A lets the player on his right see his cards (does not table them). Board runs out a other all in player tables his AA, player A throws his cards face down into the middle (does not touch the muck pile), dealer has not grabbed them Yet. player on the right says to player A what are you doing you made a straight. Ruling?

If Player A gets his cards before the dealer gets them mucked I say its a live hand. Player to the right has to walk around the poker room and get punched in the face by all players, and staff.

Player A mucked his hand. It is not live even if the cards are retrievable. Push the pot to player B.

Player C gets a KITN and is told as strongly as possible never to do that **** again.

This is not the most common ruling to a hand thrown away at showdown (as opposed to when facing a bet)

Oh yeah?

Player A has the opportunity to make a claim for the pot. He opted not to and pitched his cards face down towards the dealer. If Player A attempts to recover them on his own, I would allow it as long as the cards are retrievable. However, if A only does this because another player violates OPTAH, he's not getting the pot IMO.

KITN to A's neighbor, and likely to the dealer also. If somebody pitches their cards forward face down, it should be buried into the muck in about half a second.

The over-riding principle is that at showdown the best hand wins. If player A's cards get turned face up and he has the best hand, he gets the pot because he has the best hand.

I don't like giving the pot to the straight here, because not only his "friend" violated OPTAH, but he did himself as well. He should never have shown his cards to the guy sitting next to him, so he should not be allowed to profit from having done so.

They were all-in. How is this different than if he flipped them up for the whole table before tossing them face down and someone he didn't know called out the straight?

there are two issues here

1. OPTAH
2. Forward motion

It's going to be ruled according to the individual house rules.

Just because the cards didn't touch the muck, they were still mucked in the middle of the table face down. That's a muck. Had the player himself realized he just mucked a straight and turned them over himself, that's one thing. But another player that saw his hand can't coach him. That's a violation of OPTAH.

What is the penalty for OPTAH? I've never seen it be a dead hand.

If the penalty was a dead hand, you could deliberately get another players hand killed.

Sounds like the cards are in the middle of the table, clearly identifiable. To me, that's a live hand.

Where I play, its a live hand as long as the player flips them back over before the dealer sweeps them into the muck.

The dealer should have pushed them into the much the second the other guy said something if he hadn't already. Now I just want to give a KITN to the dealer.

Yup, not close, 1 player per hand

Next time you face a big bet on the river, a random guy on your left tells you to "just call because that guy is always bluffing" which leads to the floor declaring your hand dead for a OPTAH violation. How would you like that?

This is a bit dangerous. You are saying that someone else, outside the hand, effectively has the ability to control whether or not a hand is live or not.

Let me give an example. Let's say the board is four to a flush. One player tables top pair, no flush. The other player pushes his hand forward, having missed his straight. He realizes he has a flush and reaches for his cards, but right before he does so, another player says 'No one has a heart?'

By your logic, you have effectively allowed a party not in the hand to kill the first players hand.

There is way too much precedence against this being true.

Even if the cards DID touch the much, if they are clearly identifiable, they are not necessarily dead, as well.

again, it's going to be room dependent. Where I mostly play if cards are mucked face down with forward motion across the line, it's a muck.

A couple weeks ago someone mucked a hand face down then quickly realized his kicker was good, and immediately turned them back over. They went to surveillance and then ruled the hand was live since his hand was still over it. Every room is going to be different.

I really thing touching or not touching the muck is a little overrated.

If not otherwise addressed by room rules:

If the hand is shown, best tabled hand wins.

Not killing a hand for OPTAH.
Will issue warning/penalty to player(s).


It's also possible that player on right (POR) isn't correct. Maybe he is just messing with player A? Maybe he made a mistake in reading the hand/board.


If the dealer, who hasn't yet mucked the cards, proceeds to muck the cards. Then AA gets the pot.

If the player is able to grab and show the cards, best tabled hand wins.

If the player directs the dealer to show the cards... well, I just don't know if a dealer can show them, or if that at least tells the dealer not to muck them.

Throwing cards forward face down means something only when facing a bet. Then it is a Fold.

At showdown when you throw your cards face down, mucking your hand, your hand is dead only when the cards are picked up by the dealer and placed on the muck pile.

I have seen clearly identifiable hands that the dealer has picked up but not placed in the muck pile be considered dead. I have also seen them declared live. That will be room or Floor dependent. But I have never seen a hand at showdown that was within reach of a player, that was retrieved by the player, be considered dead. Regardless of what anyone else said at the table.

In fact I have seen on a number of occasions a dealer not put a mucked hand in the muck pile because the dealer knew the hand was a winner or good for a chop. IMO the dealer waiting for the player to retrieve his hand and not immediately shoving it in the muck pile, is a OPTAH violation.

IMO the penalty for the OPTAH violation is not serious enough. I have only ever seen a player get a warning for this behavior. I would kick the player out of the room for 24 hours without a warning. That is a serious breach of poker rules and could very well be considered cheating based on the circumstances.

There's a pretty sizeable difference here. In your example, the player still has possession of his hand. You can't be sure that he wasn't going to call anyway. If the player in OP still had his cards when his neighbor told him he had a straight, I'd still give him the pot. If he had mucked, and then before the dealer killed his hand he had stopped the dealer and say "Wait, I think I have a straight", I'd give him the pot.

However when the players throws his cards forward toward the dealer, that is them saying "I'm not going to make a claim for the pot", and if they only attempt to retrieve them because of another player, then I'm not giving him his hand back. To me, that it entirely different that your scenario or the other ones I mentioned.

Heh, this exact situtiation happened to me a few months ago. Lol live poker

The ultimate problem is that we don't know if the player would have retrieved his "live" hand in time if the other player hadn't spoken up. I have seen many players (myself included) realize their mistake and grab their hand back.

The only way to fairly deal with this is to ask the player if he thinks he would have reached for his hand if the other player hadn't said anything. I have never seen this done. I think the casino realizes that this would be bad for business because it would force their patrons to either lie (and be seen as jerks) or tell the truth and look stupid for having mucked the winner and not getting the pot on top of it. The current solution follows the dictum that the best hand should win at showdown.

FTR I don't think that the current solution is fair. But I don't think there is anything that could be done at this point that would be fair. That is why I would like to see the OPTAH violator thrown out. So people realize through word of mouth that doing stuff like this will always get them thrown out. And maybe this kind of thing would happen less frequently.