I've made a hero call on the river in a heads up pot. The villian has said good call and briefly showed his cards and threw them to the dealer and they went facedown and touched the muck. A player at the table then says you had a straight and the cards are retrieved and turned face up and the pot is shipped to him.

What is the ruling here? He did show his hand for a second but then they definitely touched the muck.

First off other player not in the hands needs to shut up.

Second, if the hand wasn't tabled it doesn't matter what he had, they aren't tabled so he can't win.

Third, when they touch the muck face down they should be dead. Period.

House rules *may* vary but I probably would ever play in a place where he his hand wasn't dead.

Totally disagree. He showed, and cards speak, and all players have a responsibility to make sure the pot gets pushed appropriately. The muck is not a magic card eraser, and the cards got shown first anyway.

V gets a warning to table his hand appropriately and gets the pot, imo.

I hope we are just disagreeing here on what actually happened, not on the rules.

If I look at my hand, show it to my buddy next to me and then throw them into the muck face down they are dead. 100%.

If I show them to the person next to me, *try to table them* but do it like a douche and throw them towards the dealer and they flop upside down and they *touch* the muck, then they might be live.

But the act of showing them to my neighbor is not tabling my hand.

that is a live hand in almost all casinos, as it should be. My question tho is, showed his hand to whom? once the hand is tabled that is all she wrote, ship pot to best hand. hand never got mucked. (mucked hand would be irretrievable in the discard/muck pile)

Not sure where you play, but if you don't want to play in a casino where this hand is live, your options are going to be pretty limited. This hand is going to be ruled live in the vast majority of card rooms in the US.

First, a floor might already rule the hand was tabled when the player showed the cards around. That might depend on various factors including house rules. Some floors will insist cards have to be on their back on the table, others won't.
Second, the muck in a well run card room is not "magic" and cards simply touching it are not automatically dead. Also, a potential OPTAH violation would not kill a hand.

The villian was in seat 2 and he showed the cards to seats 3 and 6 and then threw them face down towards the muck. After the dealer starts shipping me the pot seat 6 says you have a straight and the cards are retrieved from the muck turned face up and then the pot is shipped to seat 2.

I can't recall a room where showing someone your hand is tabling it. And mucking your non-tabled hand should really make it dead.

I guess I'm just in the wrong / out of touch with current rules then.

"Briefly showed his cards" means what? Waved them in their air? Turned them face up on the table, then turned them back over?

"touched the muck" means what? Or, specifically, were his two cards obviously identifiable and retrievable?

If he tabled his cards properly so that they were face-up on the table, even for a short amount of time, then he should win no matter what.

If he did not, and he just "showed" them to a few people, or to the table, then it gets slightly more interesting.

First, the other player at the table who told him he had a straight should shut the **** up. The floor should give him a warning not to do that again. Everyone can help read hands that are tabled, but no one should help another player read his hand until it is tabled.

Second, if his cards are identifiable and retrievable, then in most rooms that play with the usual ruleset, his hand can (and should) be ruled live. There is no "magic muck" that kills cards. Cards are dead when they are stuffed into the muck and become unidentifiable and irretrievable. In this case, villain still wins.

Depending on how long dealer left his mucked hand out there without pulling them into the muck (allowing the other player to say he had a straight), the dealer may need to be given some retraining. But that doesn't affect the fact that villain still wins.

If, and only if, villain did not properly table his hand faceup onto the table, and if his hand became irretrievable and unidentifiable (either by his own "turbomucking" action, or by the dealer pulling his cards into the muck pile), then his hand is dead, and you should win.

1) "Briefly showing" your cards may or may not be tabling them; if they were displayed to the entire table, most places would consider them tabled (though some would require that they actually had been placed on the table), but if they were just shown to a neighbor, most places probably would not consider them to have been tabled.
2) IF they were tabled, they're still live and pot should be pushed to the best tabled hand. Once a hand is tabled, mucking it doesn't kill its claim on the pot and cards speak.
3) If they were not tabled (i.e., just flashed), they are still live in most places if they are readily retrievable and clearly identifiable. But rules on this vary a lot from room to room. Some places will kill an untabled hand if it is simply released facedown over the line or toward the dealer; some when it merely touches the ("magic") muck. But in many/most rooms, this hand would still be live.
4) Player not in hand is out of line to comment on straight ONLY if hand was not tabled. Once it is tabled, all players are responsible to see that hands are read and pot awarded correctly.

Ooooh, the magical mystery muck is coming your way!

I don't know what the OP meant by "briefly showed his cards" for certain. To the dealer? To his friend only? To the whole table? I think this makes a lot of difference as to how the ruling should be made in this case.

Totally agree that cards touching the muck , not intermingled , will often be ruled live, depending on room policy.

In the rooms I play

1. This is a violation of OPTAH-warning to the guy who said 'You have a straight'
2. Cards were not tabled, therefore cards do not speak. Flashing cards is not the same as properly tabling a hand
3. Cards are identifiable, therefore hand is not dead. in a room with a magic muck, the cards would be dead. But in most rooms where they rule that identifiable rules can be retrieved, this is a live hand.

And no, someone else violating OPTAH cannot kill the hand.

So really, three different ruling here, but the bottom line is that if the hand can without a doubt be identified, then it can be ruled live.

The muck is irrelevant here. The villain said "good hand" and threw his cards forward.

If he tabled his hand before this then villain wins the pot. If he never tabled his hand then hero wins the pot. Whether or not the cards are anywhere near the muck or are identifiable has no bearing on the ruling.

but player tabled his hand before dealer mucked them... how is that not a live hand?

Maybe you should start using conjunctives if you disagree with a ruling. It's a little strange to say "If he never tabled his hand then hero wins the pot" when in fact hero did not win the pot in this situation, no matter if villain tabled his hand or not. It's not like the poker room will change the ruling on a hand a couple of days later.

Like everybody else, you're voicing an opinion. Please don't make it sound like saying "good hand" concedes the pot in every card room in the world.

He never said it was tabled.

And I have a hard time agreeing with Bolt above if the hand is retrievable. He wasn't facing action. He's not folding.


Sucks that the hand was retrievable and it sucks that someone read the guy's hand for him. Consider the scenario a bad beat but really the best hand won. Obviously, kick in the nuts and serious warning to whoever blurted out about the straight if the hand wasn't actually tabled at any point.

OK, but it still depends on what " tabling his hand" means in this particular situation. Rulings will simply vary at the descretion , of Dealer/Floor like they do with many other kinds of problems. If he showed his hand to the table, even briefly, then many rulings will likely allow his hand to be live , some won't of course. I don't see a hard and fast rule that will cover this everywhere.

I think OP already clarified that the other guy showed his cards only to the two players next to him. So I guess his hand wouldn't be considered "tabled" in most card rooms.

The only declarations that I have ever heard of being used to kill a hands are declarations used to induce a muck from the other player. I am not aware of rules that would automatically rule a hand dead in the situation you described. A verbal declaration of 'Good hand' is not universally considered to kill a hand.

Some places will rule cards thrown forward to the muck as dead. Other rooms (probably the majority) will rule cards that are retrievable as live. So yes, whether or not the cards are identifiable is usually pretty relevant.

Guess that would be right for sure. I did not see the clarification , only that he "briefly" showed his hand.

Post #7 is where OP added some clarification of how things went down.

Yeah so I didn't see the hand until it was retrieved from the muck. I'm not 100% sure the dealer knew what the hand was either. The correct hand won in the end I guess though.

Not to single you out since several posters did the exact same thing, but I've never understood why people will open a thread and then immediately post a comment based on just reading one or two posts, rather than reading the thread first to see whether their comment is even relevant anymore.

So you can avoid group-think.