PLO game I'm on the button. This is one of those hands where there is a big raise preflop and then no more action throughout the rest of the hand.

Two players in front of me and it gets checked down to the river. First player says he has nothing, hangs onto his cards. Second player has no action. I verbally say that I have a pair of 8s (or something similar). First player says that I'm good. Second player still has no actions. I remain still with my cards protected.

First player starts telling me to show my hand. I tell him that it's not my turn. He says something like that since I announced my hand I should show it. I tell him once again that it's not my turn. He starts getting kind of pissy.

Eventually player 1 mucks. Player two is then sitting there not acting. Player 1 tells me to show the pair of 8s. For the third time, I tell him that it's not my turn. Player 2 then motions to muck, and I show that I did have a pair of 8's (although, with me being the only one with cards, I didn't even need to show from my understanding)
The pot gets pushed to me and player 1 was all pissed that I wouldn't show my cards since I already announced what I had.

Does player 1 have any sort of point that I'm slowing the game? or am I just taking this too hard?

-d

Just table your hand and let everyone move on to the next hand.

Yes, by declaring your hand but not showing it you're making people suspicious that you don't really have it. This makes them even slower to show or muck. What's the point of not showing at least those two cards especially if you're just going to show them anyway?

On a practical level I'm rarely trying to force people to show in that spot in the off chance they actually had a winning hand they didn't see. They want to muck and move on to the next hand. There was no action so you aren't giving up much information by showing, so just show and let them muck.

If you're going to be one of those guys who won't show until everyone else has shown or mucked, just stay silent and wait for it to happen. It's annoying and slows down the game, but it's your right.

All 3 of you are slowing the game and being extremely annoying about it.

Honest question for you OP...

Why is it such a big deal to just show your cards in this situation? I want your honest answer.

One of my biggest pet peeves in poker is when someone announces their hand but doesn't show or table it.

You announced your hand. Why on earth are you refusing to show your cards?

All 3 of you sound awful for the game. Absolutely ridiculous to have an extended drawn out "you show, no you show" at any point, but even more so when there wasn't even any postflop betting, so no one is giving away any big information. Next hand, let's go!

OMFG SHOW YOUR ****ING HAND!

This is the one case where I will invoke IWTSTH (if the room allows it) on all three hands.

I would move to another table away from the 3 of you
NIT central

Okay thanks!
The main reason why I didn't want to show is because player 2 made no actions and I had no idea where he was at. If he wasn't in the equation, yes I would have just shown.

You bring up a great point though, that someone may have a better hand that they may accidentally muck, so I will keep this in mind.

-d

Why does it matter to you "where Player 2 is at"?

Because of the order of action. No point in showing cards if I don't need to, etc.

-d

If Player 2 mucks and then you muck without showing you had at least a pair of eights, I would call the Floor and ask him to chop the pot since nobody showed a winner.

90% of players have no idea what to do with or how to use any info they may perceive in seeing your hand so why slow the game

Look, if you have reason to believe you have the best hand, show your ***ing hand. If P2 says you're good, then you show and then he shows a winner, you just call him a ****ing slowroller and move on.

So we all can keep playing poker instead of watching you three guys mess with your zippers and rulers?

Do you think that showing your 4 cards in a pot that checked through on all 3 postflop streets gives any meaningful information away?

If so, do you think that meaningful information is not given away via your declaration of your hand?

Player 2 made no actions because he's never mucking ace high until he sees the winning hand.

You announced pair of 8's, player 1 said you're good. You should immediately show your hand so everyone can move onto the next hand

BTW, were you the PFR?

Well...

Then why bother announcing it?

All three of you deserve a swift KITN. Show your hand and move on.

Then why did you announce your hand?

Well after reading the comments, I have to agree with you. I will have someone kick me in the nuts - but I can't guarantee the others will get a kick in the nuts, since I don't know enough about them.

I will be much forthcoming should a similar situation happen in the future where I announce my hand. But most likely, I will just keep quiet about my holdings until it's my turn to show or I realize I have the winner.

BTW, the hand happened a while ago, someone asked who the PFR was, and honestly I don't remember - it may have been player 1, but not positive.

Thank you for your feedback everyone!

-d

You should have shown your hand just to get on with the game.

But you shouldn't have been berated. You were the least douchey of the 3 douchebags.

You should just show your hand. Especially in PLO, there's a non-zero chance that someone would accidentally muck a winner. You don't want to encourage them to flip up their cards. Especially true in a hand that's checked all the way down to the river, where (i) you don't give up meaningful info by showing your hand, (ii) you don't learn meaningful info by seeing villains' hands and (iii) without significant action the chance of V misreading their hand or mucking a winner is higher than in a big pot with lots of action.

I'm not sure I agree or disagree.

I feel like if you announce what you have and your opponent says you're good, you really should show. But there are two opponents and one didn't say it, so ... ugh.

With respect to the argument about not showing unless you need to, that's not a great argument.

Most hands are pretty standard. If you play well and show a standard hand, either they don't learn anything or they don't recognize standard play. You win either way.

The only time it really matters is when you've played a hand well but it's nonstandard. You want to hide those because it could tip them off to nonobvious strategy.

If you played a hand poorly, you should always show those so that everyone thinks you play every hand poorly. And of course you should try to have as few of these as possible but any decent player should admit that they sometimes make mistakes that they see immediately.