Let's say you're the floor person, are you going to punish this player?

It's the hand before the break, a player goes all-in, then gets up and heads to the restroom. If his hand is the winner, is he getting paid? What if he has diarrhea? Does it matter how many players are at the table (final 2 players versus a full table)?

Abandoned hand rule. His hand is dead.

His hand should not be dead. How he should be subject to a penalty if he is not eliminated.

Killing his hand would circumvent the rules designed to prevent chip dumping

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I asked this direct question to three floors at the WSOP when I dealt it in 2017 and they all said his hand would be dead.


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Lesson #1. Carry on your phone a list of the rules if available.

My quick reading of the WSOP rules says nothing about a requirement to be at the table once you are all in. Now the WSOP has rule 1, so they can do whatever they want. As psandman wrote, it would be a bad decision to kill the hand due to chip dumping concerns.

I'll note that as a philosophy, I believe killing a hand is the worst decision possible in 99% of situations.

Look up the "abandoned hand" rule.


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I don't see why it's unreasonable... say I ate a bad burrito, I'm in a hand, OESD and FD on the turn, facing a bet, feel the burrito coming, shove, run to the bathroom. I'd lose my mind if I faced a penalty in the hand. I can't do anything else once AI so just play out the hand and ship me my cut if I win.

**** the pants

So getting up and walking 20 feet to your “rail” is perfectly fine, but going to the bathroom is not?

One time somebody tried to tell me a player can’t leave their all-in hand out of sight but had no answer when I asked if that meant that only walking backwards was OK.

I didn't get that specific with the question.


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I just looked at their rulebook and they are 100% wrong. In fact according to the WSOP rules that player is not subject to a penalty because he had no more action pending on the hand.

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As to your burrito defense. Poker tournaments do not suspend the rules because a player has an upset stomach. If they did then the tournament should have to stop for every player who needs to run to the restroom.

As a more practical approach a player who is I'll and facing the need to run to the bathroom on such short notice and in such dire need that they can't wait till the end of a hand should not remain in the tournament.... They should not want to remain.

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TDA rule:


WSOP rules:

Great, well thanks for stopping in.

You're very welcome, my input was useless.


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The problem here is that there are a bunch of circumstances where the rules contradict each other.

For example, what if a player is all-in on the blind and is not at the table when the last card is dealt to the button? By rule, their hand is dead. However, it's an all-in hand and this contradicts other rules.

Another example is that if a player abandons their hand, it is dead. However, this is contradicted when a player is all-in because "all hands that are all-in must be shown".

Again, I asked a bunch of floors at the WSOP the question "if a player goes all-in, then leaves to go to the bathroom, what happens?" And they told me the hand is dead. Period. That's what I was told, as a dealer, at the 2017 WSOP.

Now we have contradictions with TDA rules and WSOP rules.

Also, given the above (bathroom) scenario, who tables the hand if it is not dead?

What happens if a player goes all-in, is called by 2 players (there is now side action) and then leaves the table? Is their hand dead or live? Who tables the hand?

I guess this is why I was told their hand is dead. I was specifically told of an "abandoned hand rule".

On the other hand, to prevent chip-dumping, it makes sense why the hand should not be dead.

So I am kind of split on this one. Common sense would say to have the hand tabled, and if the hand wins, blind them out, right?

The dealer tables the hand. This is not a problem in a situation where all hands must be tabled.

There are a million places in all the rulebooks where rules may contradict each other. In general it is usually easy to make sense of this, because the more specific exceptions take precedence over the more general rule they except.

This case is also fairly clear cut because the rule specifically gives examples that mirror the case we are talking about: players leaving the table after going on in. Both the TDA and WSOP rules clearly state that doing so may be penalized. The penalties listed do not include killing your hand.

I can't argue about what 3 different floors may have told you at WSOP, but let's not get carried away about how unusual it would be to get bad information from floors, particularly at WSOP. If they told you that the hand should be dead, they are wrong.

I swear I remember seeing this happen at the WSOP many years ago. Scotty Nguyen was heads up and the other player asked the floor what would happen if he went all in then left the table. He was told his hand would remain live so he did it. I believe Scotty tanked long enough for the other player to get back. My memory is a bit fuzzy and a quick search did not turn up any videos of this.

It doesn't surprise me that floors will say the hand would be dead when asked about the situation in the abstract especially if you asked them at the same time and the loudest of them spoke first. Whether they would actually go through with it is another story.

Something sort of similar happened at my table at an HPT event once. All in on the flop, AA vs KK on a K high flop. The guy with the AA throws a tantrum and walks off screaming that he forfeits and is rebuying. He's already sitting down at his new table by the time the floor is up to speed and we finish gathering the chips he had thrown around. The floor instructed me to run out the board and award the pot. I was secretly praying for an A to come so I could see what would happen but alas, the kings held up.

I would not kill the hand here. It would provide a backdoor way for people to dump chips. In most situations we try not to kill hands and I would not put this in the same category as someone being all in for their blind or ante while they are nowhere near the table.

I know most of the prominent WSOP floors. I can definitely say Dennis Jones, Allen Ray, Shawn Balwin, and Charlie Ciresi would never say kill the hand of a player that was at the table, went allin, and then left the table. Most dealers would also be aware that killing an allin hand in a tournament is among the most egregious errors a dealer can make.


It was mentioned there is an exception when a player was never at the table during the hand, went allin due to the blinds/antes, and had their hand killed. This is more practical as the scenario almost always involves a player that has abandoned playing the tournament or, on much rarer occasions, suffered a penalty. It would make little sense to keep a player alive that no longer wants to play in the tournament and never returns to their table to participate.

That's what I saw, too. The "abandoned hand" rule applies when there is action on the missing player. Then I agree that the hand is killed.

Of course, we don't exactly how the question was posed. It is entirely possible that one or more of them weren't told/didn't hear the hypothetical player was all in.

Every WSOP final table has players leave their seats and group hug with the rail the second they are all in. According to their own rules, the floor would be killing hands left and right. Also if both all in players leave the table when they are all in, who gets the pot?

Televised table rules are a little different.

But I think we've all come to the conclusion now that the hand is not dead and player most likely gets a penalty for leaving their seat while all in (on a regular table)

I would not be inclined to give more than a warning for a first time offense by a player who was not otherwise causing issues.

This really doesn't implicate game integrity as the player has no decisions left. Its really about keeping this from becoming a inconvenience when all the chuckleheads who currently cover their faces with a scarf decide this is a more effective way not to give off tells.....

There's a possible game integrity issue if the player leaves long enough so that the opponent calls, the board is run out, and then someone aside from the cards' owner has to flip them over.

But the dealer is already doing that. Every time a player refuses to table their hand even though they are required to.