How do you rule here?

We are 4 to the flop of 8c2c2s and it checks around
Turn is the Kd. SB checks. MP checks. The button bets $20. SB folds. BB calls. MP picks up 4 reds and has them in his hand moving forward past his cards but just before he puts them down the dealer deals the river card. Its the Kh. Everyone sees it just before MP lets go of his chips and MP pulls his chips back.

The floor comes over and everyone agrees on the facts. MP agrees that his intent was to call the $20 turn bet. Everyone agrees that his chips were not on the felt or out of his hand yet when the river was dealt prematurely. MP does not want to call if the river is the Kh but is not arguing that he was calling until he saw it.

Does the Kh stay as the river card or does it get shuffled back in?

If it came out before the final player completed his action, then it is a premature card and must be shuffled back and re-dealt. But first, complete the action on the turn.

If last player is ruled to have already called (and there is no chance that he was able to still raise, say), then his money is committed and the river stands.

Based on how it was described, it is a close one. Generally, moving chips past your cards with clear intent to call or raise will bind you to a call or raise, but since we don't necessarily know which, we have to reshuffle.

This should depend on the rooms rule for what constitites action:

If moving the chips forward past the line constitutes a call in and of itself then the way this was described the call occurred before the card came up....

But if the call would not have been complete until chips are on the felt or released then the card was premature and should come back (the player could conceivably changed his action based on the card)

How do we not know if he was calling or raising? The bet was $20 and he has 4 reds in his hand which is outstretched past his cards and he has said nothing verbally. Not to mention he told the floor he was calling.

Hence the problem.....Ive seen different floors rule different ways.

But at that time, he still had the option to raise, at least in most rooms. I think it became less frequent over the last couple of years but there are still players out there who always collect calling chips and announce raise while they put in the call.

Since the player admits he was in the process of calling, I am OK with holding him to that call and letting the river card stand. But if he had said that he didn’t decide on his action yet, I think most room rules would have to rule the river card premature.

Have you ever seen Tom Dwan go all in? He cuts out the call and the last second before he drops it on the felt he announces all in. It's stupid as **** because it's very easy to cause confusion but it is possible.

I think that the ruling should favor having the natural card stand to protect the integrity of the hand.

MP tried to angle because MP doesn't like the river card and tried to slam on the brakes, but too late. This should not be rewarded. MP is clearly calling turn with the forward motion and has even admitted so as well. Nobody is disputing the intent of MP anywhere, which is very important to all of this in my opinion. Even though the physical act wasn't fully completed, common sense needs to be used.

When a bet is $20 and anyone grabs 4 red chips and gives forward motion past the cards, their intent is on a call the vast majority of the time, not raise. Of course by the letter of the law, they could still announce raise after forward motion begins, but how often do low stakes players realistically grab the exact calling amount and then raise?

Since a fold is out of the question, nobody is disputing MP's intent to call, and the call began before the river was turned over, Kh should stay.

Have you considered the possibility that the card helps him and he is now trying to make sure the card stays ... rather than gets shuffled back in? This is why the ruling should depend on what happened ... not on what the players says ....

Either the card was premature or it wasn't and its not up to the player to decide.

Obviously the card was premature because MP saw it before dropping his chips for a turn call. Nobody disputed that. I believe the question should be: since MP was clearly calling the $20 (and doesnt dispute that he was), should he be given an advantage just because he saw the card just before he completed his call?

I don't believe that MP is faking that he/she doesn't like the river in order to allow the river to stay based on the information provided. The entire table has agreed on the facts, making this more cut and dry to me. When the table agrees on the facts, and those facts warrant keeping the natural river, I think it's as simple as that.

It's easy to get into the weeds on what if's since a raise was still allowable according to the letter of the law. Like I said though, intent was agreed upon and that's key for a hypothetical ruling that I'd make. Why mess with the natural river if the whole table agrees turn action was completed before river came out?

I loathe when players all agree on something reasonable and the floor comes and rules some other way.

This would be pretty standard for me when I was playing. I guess I felt like I was doing the dealer a favor as even if I said "raise, another $50" or whatever, someone would ask for a count. I thought it made it easier for the dealer to pull in the $20's and just the raise is left on the table.

Now, I would announce my intentions prior to moving any chips forward so there wouldn't be confusion, but cutting out the call and announcing raise is not all that uncommon in the room I used to play in.

As described by the OP, that isn't the case here, but it does happen.

Maybe they don't all agree but somebody doesn't want to give up the information that the K hurt them .....

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It's a tricky one because if you call it a premature, you are essentially catering to MP who doesn't like that river card. Or at least it has that appearance. That's why the floor shouldn't listen to any of that and just pay attention to the facts and not perceived intent. Here it seems like the facts are that the river came out before the bet, so I would rule it a premature.

I have also seen plenty of players cutting out a call, announcing raise, and then moving chips forward at that point, first the call, then the raise. However, as you said, this isn't the case here and that situation is obviously much different.

It is far less common to see someone taking exact calling chips forward past their cards without saying anything and doing anything other than calling. The number is not 100%, but it's close, at least in my personal experience.

If it was up to me, players should be forced to bet whatever they bring forward if there is no verbalization first.

Regardless of whatever the official rules are, because it seems to differ from room to room, I also consider it an angle if somebody brings an oversized stack of chips forward and only bets/calls using small fraction. Forward motion without verbalization is just a gray area that needs to be tightened up significantly in many cardrooms, imo.

These hypotheticals can go on forever and that's the flaw with my position. It gives other players the opportunity to angle depending on whether the river helped or hurt them. If they liked the river, they can keep their mouth shut and/or agree that turn action was complete and the intention of a call by MP was clear. If they hate the river, they can argue motion wasn't complete by MP or whatever and make a fuss and force MP to "complete action" and then reshuffle and put a new river out because an opening was left for this argument to be valid. If the table is in dispute, then I would say a reshuffle and new river is necessary.

I concede there's not a 100% black and white solution to this scenario because somebody is gonna get the opportunity to angle and receive an advantage here no matter what. I just think that person should never be the MP based on the particulars in this case.

The floor has to rule in a way such that the outcome would be the same if MP hadn't protested. Imagine if he hadn't. As you said, everyone agrees on the timing, so MP drops his bet after the river is exposed. Now either the dealer does nothing and you have two players realizing that MP isn't protesting a premature river, or the dealer calls the floor and relays facts consistent with a premature card.

The only way the river ever stays out is if nobody mentions it. (Which could very well happen if the other players don't want to appear to be angling themselves.) If the floor is called over, the river is always coming back.

So you have to bring the card back here.

A thought experiment: What if MP reacts positively to a river card that everyone agrees is premature, then says he was going to call anyway?

(Alternatively, what if he reacts positively but says he wasn't going to call? Do you kill his hand and let the premature river stay?)

That seems extremely unlikely because if he had called instead of balking, the card almost certainly would have stayed even if it had actually been premature.

I hate taking the card back here because 99 percent of the time it is rewarding the caller for angle-ish behavior.

It should be about whether or not, by the rules of the room, MP had already called.

At FW this is a call and the river stays. Because the calling chips were moved past the player's cards before the river card was exposed.

Had the player said "raise" a whole different can of worms would be opened. If the player had argued that he wanted to raise, this would cause a ruling which could go either way. But then the player (who would be clearly angling here) would have to open the betting again and potentially face a re-raise.

In a room where the chips have to hit the felt for a bet to be considered complete, then I think the river has to come back because the player could have withdrawn his almost call for a completely other reason/tell.

And I loathe when players think that floor calls should be determined by a table poll.

They are poker players. They aren't thinking what's reasonable, they are thinking about what ruling is best for them and sometimes they happen to agree.

MPs action wasn't complete when the river card was dealt so it needs to be shuffled back into the deck.

I don't recall a "vast majority of the time" rule. As has been pointed out, we do not really know what his completed action would have been. Nor do we know if he really does or does not want the card to now stay.

If there was a chance he was not calling, then the card is premature and we follow that process.

There is no mention of any balk or delay inthe op. It only says the card came out early. That is by definition premature. That is also the only fact the table can agree on. They can't agree on anyone's intent unless they are mind readers.

Since the only fact that matters is universally agreed, the card was premature, this really is a black and white situation; just follow the rule as written.

It’s not rewarding him if we take the card back 100% of the time.

It only gets rewarded if you base your decision on what OP says or wants. Which is why it’s best to make your decision on what actually happened.

But there is no way this would ever happen. If I understand the situation correctly, it's nearly certain that the card would have stayed had he called as originally planned, despite it being slightly premature.

The balk is when the villain pulled back his chips after moving them forward to call.