Curious on how different cardrooms come to different conclusions here:

Two opponents go to showdown at the river. Say villain raises the river as a bluff and hero calls. Villains says you're good and motions to pitch but holds his cards. Hero declares his hand and mucks thinking he won the hand. Villain calls floor saying hero mucked his hand and villain deserves the pot. What is the correct ruling?

1. Does it matter if it is clear that villain intended to angle hero to muck the best hand?

2. How do you prove intent?

3. If it was an angle should anything be done to villain to discourage behavior in the future?

4. What if the heroes cards are retrievable even if they hit the muck?

There are bad angles. This seems to be worse than villain overdeclaring his hand hoping hero folds. Or are they the same?

Villain said, "You're good" and hero mucked winning hand. There's no angle here. Hero shouldn't do anything until villain shows or mucks first.

N/A. Hero shouldn't muck the winning hand.

Warning, penalty, 86.

Then hero wins the pot if he has the best hand. It's not good for the game to kill the winning hand because someone doesn't understand the rules.

Hero shouldn't muck his hand until villain shows or mucks.

If a certain intentional behavior can get you 86'd then I have no problem accepting that same behavior as a concession of the pot.

There isn't a rule that explicitly allows for this ruling, and so Rule #1 would be applied, and I don't expect most floors to make this ruling. However, I would consider a floor who does make it to be a very good floor acting in the best interest of the game and as a line of defense for newer players against scumbags.

I do not subscribe to the idea that only the tabled hand can ever win the pot in the absence of another tabled hand. As written, I do not care about a strict interpretation of the rules or awarding the pot to this Villain.

I don't care about proving intent either. Villain has shifted the burden to himself. If he can show me a hand with some showdown value against a likely bluff raise caller, then that could change things. Or if the action is something other than bet, bluff-raise, call, then that changes things too.

If a player says "you're good" and holds on to his hand like in the OP, and then the other player attempts to muck?? What, if any, responsibilty does the dealer have to get the cards tabled to determine an actual winner?? This is discussed on forums a lot, but I have never actually seen it happen live that I can recall.

I have seldom seen any player directly put his cards in the muck either. Usually the dealer pulls them in to the pile after a player tosses or pushes them forward. So does the dealer have some control here , especially in a situation like the OP, to get the cards tabled or not?

I don't think so, particulary when someone has voluntarily tossed in his hand face down like an idiot. OTOH, I would like to see a procedure like: at showdown, the dealer points to each active player (in the appropriate order) and says "show or muck", and the player has 5 seconds to table his hand or it is considered dead.

so people can just declare any hand, then muck their cards, and expect to win the pot?

How is this an angle?

Ok my OP wasnt clear enough so Ill try again. Hero picks his cards up, his neighbors see his hand, top pair. Hero attempts to table his hand but it flips and ends up face down in the muck. Interpret how u want as I didnt see that part.

Under normal circumstances most people jusr retrieve their cards right away and table their hand. Floor was called and I dont know what hero said but his hand was declared dead.

if his cards were retrievable they should have never been declared dead as long as the player turned them right side up.

It must have been a very strong "irregular " flip of his cards into the muck! BTW was his hand seen by anyone else but the guys on both sides. Seems kinda odd, all in all!

So the guy was trying to table his hand and NOT trying to muck? Does that not change a lot?

This is 100% different from your original scenario. In this case, there is zero angle shooting, the behavior of 'You're good' guy is irrelevant. If a player triesd to table but instead fouls his cards (drops them on the floor on in the muck), this is 100% dependent on house rules. In the case you described, this depends on house rules and whether or not the cards were identifiable. If this is a 'magic muck' room, hand is dead, blinds please.

The second scenario you described is so far removed from your OP that I am terribly confused.

As an aside, it is terribly common for a player to say 'You're good', 'good call', 'I missed' etc, and then wait for the other player to table their non bluff before mucking their hand. If the 'You're good' player was the last to bet, then you are within your rights to ask him to show or muck, but it is not usually an angle for someone to say 'you're good', and then hold their cards near the felt ready to release.

Thanks everyone. This all makes more sense now. What is the magic muck rule?

I guess from a floor and players perspective angling can happen from both sides. Always protect your hand and always table your hand at showdown.

There are a couple of rooms (Venetian?) where a declaration of "You're good." kills the V's hand and Hero wouldn't have to show. They were having an issue with regs saying this just to see Hero's cards and then turn over the winner.

A 'general' statement, like "You're good." or "I missed." shouldn't make any Hero feel like they can muck their cards and take in a pot. Always ... ALWAYS hold onto your cards until the pot is pushed to you!!

If a player makes a 'specific' statement, like "Ace", "Bottom end" or "9-high" (as in 9-high flush) they need to prove that statement by showing their cards. If it's found that they misled (intent or not) an opponent at showdown then they are open to getting kicked out for the day and labeling themselves in that room.

I have won a pot by waiting to show 'in turn'. My opponent in the BB and I were both chasing OES/FD and missed on the River. V started a rant about how the Dealer could miss so many outs picked his cards up and waved them around and finally just tossed them in towards the Dealer. The Dealer pushed me the pot and I mucked without showing. What the V didn't know was that I was at the bottom end of the draw with smaller flush cards. Angle? Not really, if a V wants to voluntarily muck 'in turn' then so be it.

As OP described, if Hero's hand is retrievable then it's live and can win the pot by being tabled. If the Dealer had 'fully' mucked the cards then V wins the pot due to a mistake by the Hero, not an angle by the V. The potential angle by V is calling the Floor over hoping to get a favorable ruling .. which would be a bad ruling in most rooms. GL

This sounds like far more of an angle than what Villain does.

That would be an extremely dumb angle on its own, but especially so if Hero thought he was catching a bluff (which I understand was just given as an example).

In most rooms, the cards are dead when they are irretrievable (mixed in with the muck and unidentifiable). The correct procedure should be that as soon as a player forfeits his hand (folds or surrenders his cards at showdown), the dealer should immediately pull them into the middle of the muck so that they are irretrievable. In cases where a player surrenders his cards, then realizes that he has a winner, if those cards can be identified without a doubt, most rooms will rule that hand still live.

In some rooms, any contact with a players hand and any part of the muck will kill the hand, even if the cards are still 100% identifiable. This is sometimes called a 'magic muck', as it has the ability to magically kill a hand.

1. Never make any action to fold or muck when it seems like you have the winner until everyone else has thrown in his cards and the pot is being pushed to you. Mistake by the hero.

2. This is absolutely an angle by the Villian IMO here, allowing for the possibility that he wasn't intending for it to be an angle. It completely brings into play the possibility of the Hero throwing his cards in, and the villian winning based on being the last one to hold cards. Which is exactly what did happen. He enticed the Hero into believing he automatically won the hand, when in fact tossing his cards in would cause him to lose the hand. If that's not an angle I don't know what is.

If there was no intention to angle, there was no angle. Angling is a deliberate action.

In the OP, there is a possibility it was an angle, but also a pretty strong possibility that the 'villain' held onto his cards because 1. He wanted to make sure that his missed draw wasn't somehow still good, and 2. He may have wanted to see the other players hand. if the other player was the last to take aggressive action, not releasing your cards is perfectly fine.

Under the OP's revised scenario, actions of the the 'You're good' guy become irrelevant, and it strictly becomes a matter of room rules regarding the recoverability of cards in the muck.

I think in the next clarification, Hero attempts to table his hand and he has three cards.

Thanks everyone. There will be no further revisions.

I hope "hero" learned his lesson.

"hero" should also be aware of house rules.

In some places, you no longer have to show to win, once the other players cards have been mucked. So always wait for the muck. Unless, you don't care about the table seeing your hand, then just table it and speed up the game.