I think the confusion arises from the fact that you define ‘mucked’ differently than the house rules in that room and most other posters in this forum do.

Based on your OP, no hand was mucked. One player tabled his hand and the other one moved her hand forward face-down. None of those two hands is considered ‘mucked’ unless there’s a very specific house rule that states otherwise. In most rooms your opponents hand is considered mucked after the dealer takes possession of the cards and mixes them in the muck pile.

If you have been on the losing end of the same scenario in the same room and your hand was declared dead by the dealer after you turned it up to claim the pot, you should have called for the floor.

I'm sorry you had a losing session, but the best hand wins at showdown. It doesn't sound like her hand was mucked.

Have you've ever seen winning hands that were thrown in the middle of the table and the cards accidentally flip over face down? The player is allowed to turn them over and table them, so why would this be any different. I've also never seen anyone try to argue their hand is dead.

It gets a bit pedantic, but a player cannot muck a hand. They can fold or surrender a hand, but it isn't mucked until the dealer mixes the hand unidentifiably in with the muck. A hand is not truly dead until it is mucked.

In an all-in situation you cannot fold. You can surrender your cards, but they can be made live, as long as they are identifiable, under certain situations. A player realizing they had the winner and flipping them over is one of those situations.

The rules are very clear. The only reason why these threads exist, and keep getting created, is because it feels like a gut punch when you were expecting to win a pot, and then it gets yanked away at the last moment. Objectively, best hand was tabled, best hand wins the pot, no discussion.

There are some rooms with a 'magic muck' whereby cards are ruled dead, even if they are identifiable, if they touch any part of the muck, but those rooms are rarer.

If I'm in seat 1, I can sure as hell muck a hand. I just have to stick the cards in the muck.

By adopting this attitude, you're just setting yourself up to be massively slowroll-tilted by someone who can read your frustration.

Sigh....

OK, to clarify, the act of mucking is not synonymous with surrendering your cards, as mucking refers to the action, in typical operation performed by the dealer, of mixing the cards unidentifiably with the muck. The common misuse of the term 'muck' refers to the action of a player releasing their cards towards the center of the table, face down. This is, in fact, not mucking, and does not usually kill the cards.

In certain cases, a player acting atypically can directly muck their cards by intermingling their hand in with the muck, but this is done usually only to prove a poster on 2+2 wrong by defining an uncommon edge case.

I out pedanted the pedant!

I never understood this rule. If you throw chips over the line, you can’t pull them back 30 seconds later. How is throwing cards face down any different? If this were on the turn, can I pull my cards back if I change my mind? Never made sense to me.


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It's showdown and in the best hand should win. If you want to forfeit your chance of winning you can give up your cards and the dealer can muck them (or you scramble them in the muck if you're in seat 1/9 yourself). The thing with showdown is that you don't influence any more betting/action like chips do.

Someone actually did that earlier in the session and got called out/berated although the berater had no intention of claiming the pot. I defended that guy cause he clearly meant to show. This is different. Pushing your cards face down past the line is not an intention to show. Intent matters. If you have a couple blacks on top of a stack of reds and you start cutting out ten reds to call a $50 bet, would it be a forced raise if those blacks accidentally slid off and passed the line?

Because cards are not the same as chips. And showdown is not the same as a betting round.

There is no reason to equate these two situations. Also, the line doesn't really mean anything in most rooms, it's only there for decoration or to encourage players to put the chips in easy reach of the dealer.

I have now declared a blood feud with you.

I agree post 2 does cover the situation. But in my opinion if the mucked hand *touches* the muck even if the cards are identifiable the hand should be dead and not retrieved.

The person folding always has the option to open face fold. If they did that then the cards play because the hand is exposed. I truly believe this is just another part of the game. If you misread your hand and throw it into the muck that sounds like a YOU problem.

Stop

Actually "your opinion" on the ruling means very little. The opinions of the dealer/floor and the House Rules are what matter. And BTW in this example the cards were NOT thrown into the muck. There are some places where "touching the muck" does kill a hand I guess. They are not the majority of rooms. You have a right to not like this ruling certainly, but most of the time you will have to live with it or rack up.

What if the muck roams around and shoots a card at your hand?

This thread has been somewhat informative for me, clarifying the difference between a folded handed and a "mucked" hand.

At least it's clear to me, if the last to act on the river, when facing a bet, tosses his cards at the dealer, either face up or face down, they have folded, their hand is dead, and the bettor gets the pot.

But here's what I saw the other night. River goes check/check, and first to act, rather than tabling his hand, tosses it face down towards the dealer assuming he had lost. The second player then flashes the nut low while raking the pot. There was no drama or controversy, and it's entirely possible the dealer had fully mucked player 1's hand before player 2 showed. But had that not happened, could player 1 react to seeing player 2's hand, try to retrieve his "folded" hand from wherever it may be (dealers hand, in front of the flop, wherever it's identifiable), and table it claiming the pot? It seems like an unlikely scenario, but according to the replies here, player 1's hand is still live if it can be identified despite his initial intent to surrender the pot to player 2 rather than show his cards.

You can't fold at showdown.

YES. (I think he's got it....)

I'm pretty sure a clear intention to muck and hide that information is enough reason to kill someone's hand. Similar to the situation Koss described, I've seen a lot of people bluff on the river and snap muck their hand when called instead of showing. But what if someone called with ace high and flashed it and guy was triple barreling 33 which happened to be good? Are you guys saying that the guy who mucked to hide his hand should still be awarded the pot if the hand was retrievable? That would just be ridiculous.

why would it be ridiculous? a pair beats ace high. don't flash your hand and you won't have this problem

Eventually you'll read enough posts where you'll realize that your thoughts and opinions on it aren't going to outweigh the overwhelming evidence that says that these retrievable hands are live most of the time.

From Robert's Rules ..
Your hand is declared dead if:
(a) You fold or announce that you are folding when facing a bet or a raise.
(b) You throw your hand away in a forward motion causing another player to act behind you (even if not facing a bet).

And also this ...
Cards thrown into the muck may be ruled dead. However, a hand that is clearly identifiable may be retrieved and ruled live at management’s discretion if doing so is in the best interest of the game. An extra effort should be made to rule a hand retrievable if it was folded as a result of incorrect information given to the player.

And then this ...
FOLD: To throw a hand away and relinquish all interest in a pot.

Koss has it down, but you have to go all the way to the Glossary to define 'FOLD' and tie it all together.

The key here, as stated above although not clearly defined, is that a player can't 'fold' at showdown. They can attempt to muck but the cards may be retrieved. Within the definition of FOLD there is no mention of 'facing action' or Showdown so there is a crack in the door.

I think the door is 'clearly' shut when facing action. But a 'first to show' player could pull an angle at Showdown by tossing their cards forward in an attempt to get the other player to show before completing their muck. In Koss' example the other player 'offered' information that the FTS player took advantage of (even to the point of SOSA).

To say this doesn't happen .. not often, but not quite .. We had a hand back in the 'forward motion' days at showdown where Koss' example came to light and the Floor ruled 'the mucked' hand dead due to forward motion. Well, lets just say we had to call the Sheriff in to calm down the 'losing' player. GL

One of the worst personal examples of a discarded hand at showdown being ruled live in order to illustrate the point - and at my own expense.

Wake up with tens. Don't remember the exact action anymore - just that I bet it the whole way down on a board completely lower than tens with a pair showing.

At showdown, villain declares "2 pair" and I, relatively new and inexperienced, don't think about the pair on the board. I toss my cards away, disgusted. They land on edge, roll all the way from me in the 9 seat down to in front of the 2 seat and land - face up.

Showing my own two pair which beats the villain.

I say nothing except to admit that I intended to discard them. Floor is called, hand is ruled live, I win the pot.

Moral: You cannot fold at showdown, and a tabled hand is always live.