Heads up on the river in PLO, about 150 in the pot. First to act, with roughly 350 behind, says "all in." One second later, the in-position player throws in one chip. One second after that, the dealer says "the pot is 156." All players at the table and the dealer agree on these facts.

On a board of A77x7, the players show AKxx and 7xxx, in turn. The first player (naturally) claims that he only owes 156, the second player claims that he is entitled to the entire stack.

Some context: this is a small card room with inexperienced floorpersons and management. Player 1 is a player we would like to keep around. Player 2 is an experienced veteran of the game. I would appreciate as complete an answer as you can give so I can best educate the floorpersons as to how this should have been handled.

In the old days, you could bet more than the pot, if you were heads-up. Your opponent could call the full amount, or call the proper amount (in this case, $156), or any number in between.

But that's one of those rules that sounds crazy to 95% of the world, who never heard of poker before the WPT existed. "But it's Pot Limit!", they cry, thinking I'm the crazy one.

I would not expect the staff you describe to know the "traditional" rule--then again, I've seen a bunch of rules evolve since then, so that one probably did, too.

I don't think the circumstances here establish a clear intent for the action to exceed the pot. The dealer announced the amount of the pot, albeit after the insta call and neither player indicated that they felt that the bet was more than that until the cards were shown.

Now obviously the player with the nuts thought the bet was all in or he would have raised.... But that may just as well meant he thought the bettor had less than the pot, not that they were betting beyond the structure of the game. He made a mistake. If he spoke up when the dealer announced the pot size we could have clarified what the action was at a time where it seemed more fair. As it is I think the bet stands as a pot sized bet only.

What a great time to 'all' learn together. The semantics in PLO are touchy. This is not a time for 'action given and accepted' as you can run into in some NL spots.

In this case here the Floor should explain that a player can't bet 'all-in' if it's beyond the value of the pot. Player 2, as the supposed experienced player, should know that tossing in one chip is only a call unless it's tied to his own verbal 'all-in' declaration.

The use of 'all-in' (and even 'pot') in a PLO game is/can be an attempt at an angle. We have no context that it is/was an angle here. I witnessed a hand where a player announced 'Pot' on the River when he only had about 15% of the pot in his remaining stack .. and kept the chips 'out of view' from his opponent. What is the Dealer to do? In that case the player knew that if he had said 'all-in' his experienced opponent would've asked 'how much?' but the use of 'Pot' might be enough to get him to fold out due to all the chips in the middle.

This is a pretty easy ruling and Player 2 should've know better than to toss out a single chip without first verifying or indicating that he was also 'all-in'.

From the semantics standpoint the Dealer should've announce "The 'bet' is 156, not all-in." Although the use of the word 'Pot' is probably fine, saying 'bet' is more exact and in this case is moot since Player 2 mistakenly insta-called with the nuts and chips behind. GL

I had a variation of this happen to me where villain just calls my pot bet without pushing all in on turn and proceeds to show the winner on the river and I’m like I never called the difference. It’s an awkward spot because I would have called the river or the difference as it wasn’t much more but if someone shows you their hand before the action is complete I every right to refuse to pay off the difference right?

I ended up just paying the difference to save the fooor from coming over and creating a scene over <100 dollars.

I blame the idiots who don’t just say repot or all in and just push chips in....

For all I know if he loses hand he refuses to pay the difference and just angle shot me for his bus fee home.

There are definitely rooms that would rule 'action offered and accepted' here.

I never knew how it was back in the day, thanks for pointing that out youtalkfunny! But the only time I've seen a similar situation happen, albeit for a significantly smaller difference between stack size and pot size, somewhere around $30 in a 1/2 game, the floor ruled that the first player lost his full stack. His reasoning was 'action offered and accepted'.

In pot limit when a player tries to bet more than the size of the pot, their bet is brought down to the correct amount. OP was no different. The first player bet more than the pot. The 2nd player called. The dealer announced the size of the pot before either player showed their hands. If either of them wanted to object, this was the time to do so. Certainly not after seeing the results of the hand.

My ruling: Bet was $156 and called only.

I could see it possibly being action offered and accepted if the dealer did not clarify the pot size before cards were shown.

This is reasonable. Unfortunately, the guy who thought he was calling an all-in has a reasonable point as well. Under those old rules, if you wanted to call an amount less than the all-in, you made that clear, and that was RARE. I've seen plenty of over-bets dealing PLO, but I don't know if I ever saw a partial call.

I should note this wasn't unique to PLO--it applied to limit, as well. It was usually seen when two players wouldn't stop raising, and when it became clear neither planned to stop, one would just shove all-in. The other could call one bet, the whole amount, or any number in between. I got to do this twice as a player: both times, I had a straight flush against a guy who thought his A-high flush was the nuts.

It's 156 and it's not even a close decision

It's up to the player to understand the bet he is calling before tabling his hand.

It's a pot sized bet of $156. This is not a spot where I would ever use accepted action.

Situations like this are pretty common in plo, here the difference between players stack and pot size makes the decision easier for floor

When a player's stack is 1.5x or less the legal pot size I think you should generally treat their bet as all-in if the other player doesn't say anything - for convenience and self-protection. If a player says all-in consistently when they have more than pot, its an angle, and the floor shouldn't enable him.

Similarly, you should hold a player who calls an oversized bet to the same standard, they can't say nothing and try to settle for less only if they lose.

Dealer awareness helps a lot. When all-in is not a legal bet, its best if dealer comments right away.

If we go to the old days, we would say the dealer was out of line for mentioning how much was in the pot. Here the dealer did mention the pot size, the players didn't object that they intended to bet more, So I would rule the bet was $156 as the only person that clarified the bet size as the dealer.

If we change the story to the original bettor betting "all in" and the other player calling with no clarification. player 1 would owe his stack.

Also in this spot, after the dealer's clarification, I would permit the second player to change his call to a raise.

Why do players even say all in while playing a pot limit game unless they obviously have less than what's in there? Just say pot FFS. There are two reasons a player would say all-in in this situation:

1) they're just stupid
2) They're angle shooting


The guy calling the bet in the OP has no argument here. He needs to know that an all in of more than the pot is just a pot size bet. He also should confirm the size of the bet before acting otherwise he is calling the max bet which in this case was the pot.

Because as someone (or some people) pointed out, at some places or at some time in the past it was a valid bet.

This is where dealer experience really helps. A dealer who snap knew the rules and also snap identified the bettor's confusion would have immediately stopped the action and clarified the bet before the caller acted.

Could the dealer tell the players to not table their cards, clarify the bet as $156 and then give player B the option to change his action into a raise? If player A isn’t angling, he should be OK with that.

3) They're used to playing NL games.
4) They actually don't realize that their stack > pot.
5) They're trying to be intimidating and hope to induce a fold (angle).
6) They're 99.9% sure that all the money is going in anyway.
7) They're too lazy to ask how much is in the pot and then have to count it out.
8) They somehow think it's cool.

IMO

i've never dealt a small PLO game (no one at the table has more than $1k stack) that wasn't full of players who had no clue how the game worked. They just wanted to click the "bet pot" button, and could not understand what part of that could get complicated.

The argument put forth by player 2 is the following: "if someone bets more than pot, and the bet is not corrected before all players have acted on it, then the bet stands based on action offered and accepted." Is this rule generally applicable but this case is an exception, or is this rule generally incorrect?

Also, thanks a lot for your help!

If the bet is greater than pot in PLO, then:
All-in = pot

You say the pot was about 150, then dealers says pot is 156. I assume the pot is exactly 156.

Player 1 says Allin. Which obviously is a pot bet of 156.
Player 2 throws in a chip to call the allin/pot/156 bet.

Player 2 is “experienced”.
Player 1 obviously is inexperienced. He can’t beat 22xx. Prolly thinks he has 2nd nut.

Player 2 can’t tell 350 stack from a pot that is 156? Come on. Not like the pot was 275+. It’s not even a close visual.

Bet is 156 and a call by player 2. Imo.

Lesson learned for both players.

i've also have dealers who can't even properly calculate the pot try to tell me an incorrect bet. ie i bet 225 into 360 and a guy throws out a raise to 1400 and the dealer says 1400. he's wrong and i'll put in exactly 1035 if i have it in chips, and if not then i'll put in 1050 or 1100 if i don't have small chips. In no way does a dealer who can't do there job properly make a bet bigger than is allowed.

If the player calling knows "all in " actually means "all in up to pot, and if I have more than pot left it's just a pot bet" and he says call then he has every reason to expect to just be calling the 156 in the op's scenario.He has a hand to play he shouldn't have to do the dealers job for him also.

It would be nice if dealers could actually deal plo properly instead of having a ton who think their job is to sit in the box, space out and have us throw money at them.

it's up to the dealer to do their job.
the dealer not doing their job doesn't mean someone can over bet the pot.

most players don't know what's in the pot so I agree with you they should just say pot.

it also infuriates me when someone is facing a bet of less than the pot size and asks the dealer either "what's in the pot?" already or "how much can I make it?" the dealer should not answer those questions and should only tell the player what's in the pot when they're actually betting pot. the reason the dealer has to know what's in the pot is bc that is the maximim someone can bet -it is not so someone lazy/stupid/not paying attention can figure out their pot odds.