playing 1/3 NL @ the bike, effective stacks about 80$

utg+1 opens to 15, i call on button.

flop XXX all clubs, i have tptk no club, he checks

I grab about 20 1$ chips from my stack in one hand and in one motion I begin cutting chips in front of me in stacks of 5$. As am betting, I noticed villian reaching for chips and he slams them in front of him like saying “ am calling whatever it is”. I notice this out of the corner of my eye, and as am cutting the 2nd stack lf 5$ chips, i say all in..I never released my chips or reached backed or have announced anything..

Villian begins crying and says I can’t do that.

Floor is called over and they rule that such a bet is not legal.

Was this the correct ruling?

Whatever you had in your hand is the bet.

Verbally declare or move the entire bet in one motion and you'll never have this "problem"

Depends on house rules.

Some rooms have rooms have a rule that says once you move chips forward to cut them, that's the maximum amount you are allowed to bet. In that case, you can't go all-in unless you brought all your chips forward.

Either ask what the house rule is or cut chips behind your stack and bring your bet forward once you are done.

Again, that's a house rule. Lots of rooms let you bet whatever amount of what you brought forward in your hand. So you don't have to bet it all unless you want to.

Either

1. your forward motion was a bet of $20....

2. or there's some silly "betting line" rule in force and you bet $20 (although I wouldn't expect the Bike to do that)...

3. or you hadn't actually made a bet yet until you finished your bet, and so slamming down chips was a bet out of turn.

This will differ by room, but by saying "All in," you seem advocate the third interpretation as your preferred one. Fine. He bet out of turn, but you bet in turn which changed the action to him. Now he can act on the all-in bet. Were you expecting his out of turn bet to be ruled as a call? Even with your preference out of the three rules, that's not how it works. Perhaps (if this was your thinking) you should try to win at poker instead of shooting angles.

In truth, I think the first rule is the best. With your forward motion you simulated a bet of $20 in order to elicit a tell and then wanted to change your own action afterwards. This shouldn't be allowed and he should get the chance to act on your $20 bet. It sounds like the Bike agrees with me. But even if you get your choice of the three, there's still no way that you get to change to an AI bet and have OOT action stand.

If his action really bothers you, then try this: just reach for your chips but don't make a forward motion. If he slams down chips out of turn (which he shouldn't do) then ask for a ruling. If it's ruled a bet out of turn then check/raise all-in.

Nobody acted out of turn. OP was working on his bet when his opponent pulled the oldest 'please don't bet too much' move out of his hat by moving around his chips to signal that he's going to call.

"I noticed villian reaching for chips and he slams them in front of him like saying “ am calling whatever it is”"


I agree with you in that I think OP had already bet. But in OP's contorted view, he clearly hadn't yet bet--otherwise he'd be admitting that he had already placed a bet but wanted to change the bet size which is obvious nonsense. Also in OP's view, his opponent had already committed to calling any bet of any legal amount, which is of course ridiculous. And I'm just saying even if we grant OP, for argument, that (1) he hadn't yet bet (2) his opponent had put chips out in some sort of possibly binding poker action, even with those two strained interpretations, he still changed the action by betting all in so the action was no longer binding.

I doubt the opponent did anything out of turn but OP thinks he did, so the way to exploit that is to get a ruling and then check if he actually did bet.

No, OP didn't bet yet. That's the whole point.

OP didn't bet, villain didn't call. OP was cutting chips and villain signaled that he is going to call, but with an action that is not considered to be binding in any well run card room.

Very standard situation where one player takes his sweet time to figure out his bet sizing while his opponent does everything he can to make the bet as little as possible. Just shenanigans / mind games, nothing else.

but if conditional statements are not enforced - it leads to angles. And usually angles from regs against new players. That leaves them feeling cheated

The London Empire - used to have a few players that would give conditional statements against new players, then they could act on the information...

'I'll call anything, etc'

If the new player jams - they fold

If he checks or bets small - they got their cheap showdown

This was a few years ago - I hope they have a new rule to stop this sort of thing

If a player makes a conditional statement - I think as that is scummy - they should be held to it

'If you bet I will call' - then if you bet they must call

'If you check then I will check' etc

This exactly.

makes sense. I was just curious because I often grab a stack, let say 14 1$ chips, and as am cutting I realize I don’t have enough for the bet I want, and then would say something like “ 18$” as am cutting, and would reach back into my stack for 4 addtional chips. Dealer/players @ other casinos wouldn’t have a problem with this. But now it was and wasn’t sure if I was breaking a rule this whole time.

So you take 20 $1 chips forward into the betting area.
Cut out $5, then as you are counting out $5 more you want to say "All in"
Right?

What did the Floor say your bet was? The full $20? The $10 you had already cut out? Your choice of $10 to $20? Did he say why you were not allowed to go all-in? Did you ask him?

lol there was no conditional statement made. V was simply pre-cutting out calling chips even though no bet had been made, to try and convince hero to avoid betting a large amount.

This *feels* like a bad ruling to me, but without being there to see it, I can't comment. Most likely this pissed off V was trying to plead his case and explain the situation in the way most likely to get the ruling in his favor. The caller is usually the one who is angling, trying to make it seem like your chips cut out constitute a bet, or more commonly that any errant hand motion/chip shuffling you did was a check.

As stated by others, this will 100% depend on the individual room's rules. There is no standard rule on this at all and every room has it's own rule. In my room your bet would have been all in. In some rooms your bet would have been $20. In other rooms, your bet would have been whatever you wanted it to be up to a max of $20.

One of my favorite subthreads, from 2008:

But back to reality. I'm generally all for shutting down angles and making games newbie friendly. It's why I advocate forward motion, reject "You can fold but you have to leave your out of turn non-call in the pot," etc.

In this case although it's really hard for me to believe that someone would take "I'll call anything," literally, it's a slippery slope. So it's probably best just to nip this in the bud. Probably the best way to nip it in the bud at small stakes games is to let the dealer say, "That's not a binding declaration." I know, OPTAH and we don't want meddling dealers, but I like keeping games friendly and making anglers sad.

At higher stakes, players should be presumed to know this isn't binding and the dealer should keep quiet.

The difference is, in that case it's plausible that you meant to put out $18 and just aren't good at estimating chips. But in the OP, why did you move $20 out if you intended to go all in? I don't know how much you had in front of you, but if it was more than about $25, it's not plausible you intended to go all-in and just didn't grab enough chips.

I've seen players go all-in and have to be reminded they had a chip covering their cards. That, or allowing a few stray normal-denomination chips to play in an obviously intended all in, is pretty common.

Both things are true (opponent trying to plead his case; caller often being the angler here). But I don't see that he did anything outrageous here. If he held out 20 chips but planned to fold to a $20 bet then that's debatably dirty. (I'd say it's dirty and should get a warning.)

But it's not clear to me that that happened, only that OP wanted to change his amount and then hold the other guy to a call. Maybe I'm misunderstanding?

D,

In the old days, you could take a stack, cut it out, go back to your chips and grab another stack, cut it out, and keep going back to your chips as long as it was a continuous set of motions.

I’m not aware of any cardrooms in California or Vegas where that’s still the case.

Only at a cardroom where that style of betting procedure is allowed would you be able to start cutting out a stack of twenty chips and then switch it to an all-in bet.

If you didn't get your chips to the betting line, IMO you are just playing with your chips and so is your opponent. You can announce all-in and he can then decide whether to call or fold.

But house rules are still rules. So if I adjudicate in my own home, you are fine but in a casino, what their rules are is what's applied.

Were,


Re-reading the post, I see he didn’t clarify that he was cutting chips in the betting area. I assumed he was, because otherwise the ruling made no sense.

If he was cutting the chips in an area where it wouldn’t have counted as a bet unless he pushed them forward, then he hasn’t done anything yet and can make any action from check through all-in.

I've never played in a room that does this, but don't some rooms classify anything in front of your cards as the betting area?

Yes, there are rooms without a betting line where moving chips from your stack forward means those chips are the maximum you can bet. That’s where ‘forward motion’ comes into play.

To avoid situations like that, you should cut your chips behind your stack, not in front of it unless you know that house rules allow for you to do so.

Isn't New Jersey like this?

There are rooms where the front of your cards is the betting line.

Yes. And imo it's by far the best rule.

As long as you know the rule.

Correct, as I cut 2nd stack of 1$ chips, I notice his gesture/angle and then announce "all in".

Villian ends up mucking as Floor was deciding -_- but still gave us the ruling for future instances.

He didn't state why though, just that I couldn't do that.

I wasn't intending to go all in, my intention was to bet 18$, I grabbed about 20$ in 1's to make this bet and began betting, at which point villain made his gesture/angle.

As far as the guesstimating goes, in the 18$ example where I grab 14$, where do you draw the line? 19? 20?25?30?

Also, wasn't holding villain to a call. Just wanted my bet to stand.