was at the poker room at the golden moon in philadelphia, mississippi when an odd situation came up. forgot how the hand went down but on the river, a player in seat 8 was HU against a player in seat 1 i was in seat 5 with nice view of table.

seat 1 flips over QQ for a pair of queens and seat 8 angrily flips over his hand saying 9s, indicating he had a pair of 9s. he actualy had the Kd and had the nut flush. i just kinda smiled but the dealer pushed the pot towards the QQ.

at this point the cards are in the muck and i alert he dealer that the player in seat 8 had a flush. nobody at the table could really remember but i was positive and tapes could have been checked to verify.

the floor came over and ultimately awarded the pot to QQ. man holding QQ was silent during all of this while the guy with the K flush was of course going nuts as this had acutally ballooned to like a $350 pot. perhaps the ruling was right perhaps not but the floor also seemed to use a poor reason as a factor in the decision making. player in seat 8 was known as a guy to not show down when he was called and just muck his hand if opponent showed winning hand instead of just tabling his hand like he should. floor told him if he would always just flip his cards over normally this sort of thing might not happen.

so
a) was it wrong of me to get involved since i wasn't in the pot
and
b) was the right ruling made
and
c) what does it matter if the guy is a known semi angle shooter

fwiw, every other ruling this floorman has made i have agreed with 100%

It sounds like the guy tabled his hand correctly. However, because seat 8 declared his hand I do not think he should be awarded the pot. Reading the board is an essential part of the game for players. If seat 8 didnt declare his hand and the dealer misread the board I would want it corrected. OP was correct not to involve himself.

Ugh, it frustrates me when dealers mix in all hands with the board and muck them before pushing a pot. You muck losing hands, leaving one clear winner. You push the pot. THEN you muck the board.

It doesn't matter what 8 says, cards speak. Since they had not moved onto the next hand, I say do what you can to verify. First, hope that the relevent cards are at least somewhat retreivable, see if you can reconstruct. If not, put the pot aside and go to the tapes and hope they can see something of value.

Dealer gets a KITN.

Although, I'm not sure why you think it's a problem if the guy mucks a losing hand without showing.

Yes, you should get involved, but BEFORE the cards are mucked. This would be the classic case of "now what...the cards are gone and people aren't agreeing on what was out there." If there's any way to verify the flush, of course he gets the pot. If only you saw it, while the dealer and other players and even the guy with the flush didn't see it, you can't take the pot from QQ. What would you have the floor do? Take the word of one player, given after the evidence is destroyed, who may have seen a heart as a diamond, or who may be working with the flush guy? If 8 people say "flush", it's pretty easy. If 1 person says "flush"... well...

And no, chucky, the guy under-declaring his hand is completely immaterial. Once a hand is tabled, it plays--cards speak. Obviously if he'd declared the flush or even simply not declared anything this wouldn't have happened.

How can the cards speak if the player is declaring? Doesn't that trump the cards?

Declarations of your hand mean nothging, your cards speak for themselves.

But I'm not sure if the OP is saying these cards were tabled, or if seat 8 flashed them then threw them down face down. That makes a lot of difference.

Words definitely do not trump the cards. If I hold high card ace and tell the table that I have a royal flush, I should not win. Same thing goes for OP's situation. The cards are the deciding factor here.

There is no penalty for under declaring your hand, there can be for over declaring.

If the King flush cards, were on their back, on the table so the whole table could see, the OP should have spoken up then.

If the King flush was flashed at OP, then mucked, OP should stay quiet.

Don't we have a post like this pretty much every week?

Cards speak, OP should have gotten involved earlier if he noticed (no more smiling!), fault lies on K9 for not reading the board, dealer for the way he/she mucked, and the rest of the table (including OP) for not paying attention.

Yes we do have these kinda posts bi-weekly.

However in this case it is not clear if K9 was tabled. If a hand is not tabled, the cards can not speak.

KITN for the OP. Either say something once you see it, or don't say anything at all.

Because THIS

"player in seat 8 was known as a guy to not show down when he was called and just muck his hand if opponent showed winning hand instead "

is a bull**** move

I thought this was pretty clear

"and seat 8 angrily flips over his hand saying 9s, indicating he had a pair of 9s. he actualy had the Kd and had the nut flush."

Unless we're supposed to assume that Seat 8's card flipped midair, letting OP see both cards, then landed face down....


KITN to the dealer for not doing their job, reading hands properly

+1

Reading the board has nothing to do with it, once a hand is tabled. That's why newer players are told to turn over their hand if they have any doubt, so they don't throw away a winner accidently.

I agree as well, OP. You might deserve a KITN for causing the ruckus

The reason I say its not clear is that the player may have shown his cards face up and then flipped them over face down angrily (this is something that I see fairly often). And absent that scenario the rest of post makes no sense to me . . . since it would be an easy decision to push the pot to the best tabled hand.

As seat 8, how do you misread a King as a Nine?

What I hate the most is when a guy like the 8 seat shows his cards to the guy next to him and then is about to muck them face down and the guy he shows his cards to goes "hey wait, you have a flush". If you can't read your own cards you deserve to lose.

My guess is there was a nine on the board. pairing his nine.

Guy says he has 9s and is a known troublemaker.
Dealer's not gonna try too hard to find a better hand there.

Hand is tabled, dealer should read it. Small KITN for dealer.

Big KITN for OP for not speaking up when the proiblem could be fixed easily.

My understanding of ruling is...Even though the pot was awarded, if it has not been taken by the player it was awarded to (e.g. put in his stack) the pot can be re-awarded. However, the dealer mucking the winning hand which apparently was clearly tabled and shown face up really messes things up. Unless, the mucked hand is still retrievable (has not been buried in the muck, but still clearly visible) then the floor should be able to award the pot to the correct player. At least this is what I have been told by a dealer on a hypothetical by an annoying player at my table one day. Does this sound right to you guys?

If thje hand was tabled it is irrelevant that that the dealer buried the hand in the muck. Cards that are seen and known can't be irretrievable.

However if there is dispute as to what the cards were then the fact that cards are buried in the muck wiould be relevant. By that I mean 1 player says it was K( of hearts, another player says the King was diamonds and the dealer says he deosn't know, if the cards are buried the floor is going to have a hard time knowing what the hand actually was, and barring other evidence will probably have to rule the hand dead.

Your faith in the security cameras may be misplaced.

a) Right to get involved. Try to stop the dealer from mucking the winner.

b) Since only 1.2 people saw the flush, floor decision was right. ( 1.2 people = you plus the guy who had the 'nines'. He only counts 0.2 because he should have been yelling about his flush before you had a chance to speak up if he really though he had the flush).

c) Decision should be based on what is right and fair. Even straight shooters are wrong sometimes and angle shooting douchebags in the right.