I usually go with intent, but in this situation, I think they did have to enforce it.

Candio recovered from this, hitting a runner-runner straight against pocket aces later in the episode to double up.

The hand starts at 2:00 in:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDW8RhjEO9Q

Here's a direct link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDW8RhjEO9Q#t=2m2s

I don't know what you think his "intent" was. But it's clearly a call.

I think his intent was exactly what Norman Chad said. He was hemming and hawing between calling and folding. His hand probably got ahead of his brain there.

That said, at some point, you do have to enforce the rule, especially with 3 tables left in a $9 million MMT tournament. And this was clearly a call under any reading of the rule.

But the dealer or the official standing there should have said something immediately.

Let him pull the chips back, think, and then muck (toss his cards forward). Then tell him he has to call?

Agreed, I thought this was yet another poor floor ruling at the WSOP. The pressure of the event and the money at stake should allow some bit of leeway from the strict interpretation of the rules. The opponent did not contest call/fold... floor should have let it go.

He mucked pretty quickly after fake calling. Rule is interesting, but at least it was the dealer and a TD standing there enforcing it.

He mucked quickly after he pulled his chips back. The dealer should have announced a call as soon as his hand went forward with chips. There was plenty of time for that to happen.

It was maybe 6-8 seconds after he pulled the chips back, plenty of time for the dealer or the TD to say something. What if he had fired his cards into the muck instead of just sliding them forward?

My gripe isn't with the ruling, it is with the timing of the dealer and TD stepping in.

It was maybe 6-8 seconds on TV but you really can't judge how long it was in real life. It could have been longer or faster depending on how the edited the shot.

That said I think it was clear that the dealer had time to say "Call" and he should have after the chips moved forward.

Funny how Candio proceeds to tilt like a mofo and suck out. LOLdonkaments.

Yeah, the floor/dealer has now queered the hand by not enforcing the rule immediately. They had plenty of time to force the rule before the poor bastard gave away more info about his hand (in this case, that he had a weak enough hand to consider folding, or perhaps in another case, that he had a strong enough hand to raise). Those WSOP floors make a lot of bad rulings and this is one of them. But only because of the timing.

Bad ruling. When it already happens and the opponent isn't contesting it and the dealer does nothing, it is over as far as I'm concerned. At least it happened to that annoying donk Candio, though.

I think it shouldn't have been a call.


Forward motion may be a call if there is action behind him. There wasn't, he clearly never released the chips. I think its a bad decision.

Yes, the dealer should have sad something as soon as Candio pulled the chips back. But that does not change the fact that the player did make a forward motion. The dealer did say something as soon as Candio tried to fold his hand.

Just because the other player did not protest is no reason to let a rule violation pass. Protesting here could have goven away the strength of the other player's hand.

Dealer's should be applying the rules whether a player protests or not.

This was a slow ruling but it was a good ruling.

Forward motion IS a bet in the WSOP no matter the action behind, ahead, or sideways. Psandman should know better.

Dealer can't say "call" because he can't clearly see the chips in his hand. It might be a raise. Only after he pulled back does the ruling happen that it has to be at least a call.

Got to disagree. Candio picked up the chips to call, extended his hand as far as it would go while watching the other player then pulled it back and after a short tank, pushed his hand in. IMO it's pretty clear that he got a read and tried to take back the call.

Are you saying that you are OK with the timing of the "ruling"?

Considering that he ended up calling the large river bet, I don't think he "got a read and tried to take back the call."

Why should I know what the WSOP rules in 2010 are? I didn't deal or play this year. It wouldn't surprise me to find out that they had lots of bad rules.

Looking at the rules they have online the only relevant rule I find is

Now to me it is pretty clear watching that video that no chips were put into the pot because to me putting chips into the pot would require them to be released. I understand that others may see this differently.


For thos ethat feel that forward motion make sthe action binding ..... let us suppose that instead of bringing back his hand, while it was in the air at the farthest forward point he said "I'm all in."

would that constitute a string bet? I mean you are saying that his moving those chips forward already constituted a call .... if that's the case it would seem to be a string bet.

I don't know, because with tv editing I don't know what the timing was. I just said the dealer can't say "call" when the guy holds a handful of chips at arm's length.

He could have gotten one read from the forward motion then make the bad call on the river because it looked like a steal. He isn't obligated to just make one bad move per hand.

Since two floors were involved and the dealer was also saying it's a call, it seems to be the rule.

I would point out that there is a difference between a bad rule and a bad ruling.

I don't particularly like the rule but if the rule is in place, it's a good ruling on a bad rule.

Its a bad rule ....

It might be a bad ruling .... thats part of the problems at the WSOP. You can assume that because a floor says its the rule its the rule. But when I dealt it different floors would tell you different things -- so which is the rule?

And in the past you might have watched Phil Hellmuth be abusive to another player and then not get a penalty and assume that there was no rule against being abusive to other players ....... you might have watched Jamie Gold's nonstop talk about the hands and assume that there was no rule against that .... but in both cases you would be assuming incorrectly.

Good point, no new information was introduced after the ruling was made. It became a vacuum.

I made a quick read of the WSOP rules and didn't see anything in there that indicate there was a forward motion rule.

When there is a forward motion rule in place, this is what it typically looks like

Nope... Candio did not watch the opponent, he was staring at the board when he made the so called forward motion - this is clear in the video. Dealer and floor delayed in the enforcement of a rule that, as RR points out, does not exist! More FAIL from WSOP staff.

I was surprised they called Candio's balk a bet. Particularly after the Cantu vs Losev event a couple years ago where the highest powers within the WSOP ruled that Losev wasn't bound to any particular wager by his forward motion even though the chips were on the felt. Candio never released a thing. Seems to me like Losev's balk was far closer to a commitment than Candio's.