1/3 NLH - Effective stack is $300 and Hero covers the villain. The main Villain is a older guy in his 60s or 70s and plays a bit tight. He just reloaded $300 after getting stacked by another player who turned a straight against his top pair.

To the hand - Utg+1 limps and Hero, otb, opens to $15 with QcJs. The main Villain, BB, tosses 3 green chips and quickly tells the dealer he meant to call and accidentally threw in wrong chips. The dealer tells him he cannot take his bet back and his raise stands. Villain seems to be frustrated and goes all in blind before the flop. Utg+1 calls $75 and Hero tanks and calls.

Flop (pot ~$225) - Q67 rainbow. Villain is already all in for additional $225. Utg+1 folds and Hero?

I don't understand the action here. BB accidentally tilt raised $75, the dealer makes the action stand, so now he's annoyed and all in for $300? How does that happen? UTG+1 then calls for $75 when BB is already in for $300?

I guess you are saying BB raises $75, UTG+1 and hero calls, then BB shoves the rest before or while the flop is being dealt but its not at all clear from how you described it.

Next, no-one knows if its an angle without knowing this guy's cards so its a weird question given you know the answer and we don't. Probably since it's hard to imagine accidentally throwing in 3 green chips instead of red ones but whatever, you know and we don't.

Last, now that you already called off 25% of your stack, why are you wondering what to do when you hit top pair? Either fold pre (which you should do without special reads which you failed to provide) or call it off now.

You’re effectively facing 300 preflop, not 75, because he moved in dark. Knowing that, I’d fold QJ for 75 more.

Since you called the 75, I’m snapping the dark all in with top pair.

…And watch and stew as villain cackles maniacally and talks about how he owned you when he turns up KK+

Sun Tzu said, “All war is deception.”

I've seen that "Oops! grabbed the wrong chips. Meant to call" preflop raise from an old guy >10 times. I think one single time it wasn't aces. (but kings)

The flop all-in with action open preflop should never be a binding bet and the dealer should address the situation immediately.

Villain goes from wanting to just call $15 to wanting to put in his whole $300 stack? Knowing that's the action, fold to the $75 raise.

Yes definitely an angle. Yes fold pre. Calling the $75 is really terrible.

You shouldn't have raised QJo vs tight villain, you definitely shouldn't have called a 3bet with it and yes, it was probably an angle, but you had no business being in that pot.

This same angle with the same 3 green chips has happened at my casino. It was a dealer (playing as a player) that pulled the angle. Half the card room doesn't tip him any more.

This is a fairly common angle and so well known that sometimes experienced players will even say it as a joke.

If it was actually a mistake players have a few options on how to mitigate it in friendly games - the simplest one is asking floor to unwind the action and allow him to call.

When this behavior is exposed as an angle or is extremely likely to have been an angle, its good practice to notify the floor - its possible it takes corrective action, or at least puts him on the floor and other player's radar for future rulings/angles he may attempt.

The norms of a table can be quite different depending on rooms/stakes etc. but good floors will have no trouble at all diagnosing the situation.

Even if by some miracle he is telling the truth and didnt mean to throw in 3 greens, the blind allin is almost always KK+ despite the fact he merely called pre. In fact a lot of nitty old farts will limp AA/KK otb, SB, whatever just because they're that bad, but then spastically go allin trying to 'mix things up' or who knows what.

Wouldn’t his hand at showdown tell you if it were an angle?

I'm fine with the raise preflop.

Action is confusing, but with the limper coldcalling the hugenormous raise for 1/4 of stacks (WTF?) we can't just overcall for this huge price, so easy fold. And if old guy actually somehow shoved out of turn with preflop action still pending and limper still called anyways (huh?) then even easier fold. Kinda looks like the limper is tarping with a huge hand, and meanwhile the book is still out on what the old guy might have.

What the old guy shows up mostly decides whether he was angling. If he ends up showing down AA/KK, then yeah, obviously he was angling. If he ends up showing down some piece of cheese, then he was legit steamed and just lost his marbles.

On the flop it's a pretty trivial call getting 2:1 with TP.

Hand is a gong show, imo.

GcluelessNLnoobG

Thank you for the replies. My question was should I fold preflop knowing that these kind of actions from Villain are almost always angling.



Result - Hero called and the old guy showed up with AA.

I guess people would do anything to gain an edge.

You should fold preflop even if you didn't think it was an angle. You have QJo which is certainly behind the calling range of a tighter player from the blinds.

FWIW an important piece of information here is that villain is an older guy. The vast majority of old people have been playing poker for a long time. The odds of a 70 year old guy deciding today was a good day to try out poker? Marginal. Somebody who isn't new to poker is 100% aware of the fact that his bet is going to stand anyway. If it was an accident, the most likely thing for him to do is trying to fake strength by acting like he did it on purpose.

It's the same thing as the fake fold followed by "oh, I'm the big blind?" before putting in a raise. That results in 5 guys at the table rolling their eyes and the village idiot going all-in just to get snap called.

You're being far too hung up on whether the old guy is / isn't angling. The most relevant part is the EP limper just limp/called $75, which means he is likely destroying our Q high offsuit. This is the part that makes preflop an easy fold.

If the limper folded then it would have been much more relevant to focus on the actions off the old guy, likely erring on the side that he's angling. Heck, he's even crushing us with a lotta hands that he didn't plan to angle with and now in a rage is happy enough to get it in (such as AK/AQ/KQ/QQ/JJ).

GcluelessfocusingontherightthingnoobG

No, you should fold preflop because you have a dogshit hand and you got 3bet for 25% of your stack.

I see dealers allow players to “correct” their mistakes pretty much every time. Would be funny if he called the floor and explained that his angle must stand.

This is not a guaranteed result but its probably better than half the time. For this reason I would angle him back by just folding to the $75. I would also mark this player as an angle shooter and have no problems any time I sat with him tell the table he's an angle shooter and why.

Fold pre. Even if Vil isn’t angling the UTG+1 took a strong action and may easily have Broadway cards that dominate your hand.
What a jerk. I’d be pissed as hell. Tell other people in the room what he did and call him out publicly when you sit at his table next time.

I saw a guy pull this angle, combine it with another angle, stack a nice rec player, and call it "good poker".

While I wouldnt fall for this particular angle, if I ever somehow felt I was legitimatley angled I'd make sure to **** up every hand they were in going forward. Accidentally card showing, telegraphing mucks, just straight up commenting on my hand etc until the floor gets called telling me to STFU.

Lastly we definitely need to establish an allin preflop range against a maniac since you thought there was a chance OMC jammed air. Even if someone shows they shipped 72o I'm not getting it allin with Queen high. The preflop call was atrocious no matter who you're up against. You basically want to have Ace high minimum here and some pocket pair like 77+.

The angling POS's I've played against are all older gentlemen. You're asking what you should do in this situation, but really you should be asking what you should have done pre-flop. If you think there's a good chance of an angle, then fold your marginal hand. He's not angling a pair of 3's. I'd fold here.

Calling QJos in this situation against anyone is really suspect largely because you lose so much to AQ,AJ, AQ, AJ. You need to fold. If it turns out the guy had a big hand, I'd also call the floor and make a deal of it. Make someone feel like the POS they are. Let others know. Then when you see the guy again, you can let people know he's a POS. The floor can't do anything but call people out on their BS.

This type of thing only works if people don't know about it. I know people who've welched on a side bet and I let the table know every time. I do similarly with the really tight people at the table.

Calling out nits is rude and unnecessary. Why are you killing their action?

I think the $75 bet looks stronger when it’s an “accident” than when it’s not. In my mind I’d be laughing at the old man for telling me he could easily have be crushed.

In a 1-3 game a tight old guy would be very well aware of where his green chips are.