Stories from the WSOP Main Event

Here are a few mostly unrelated stories from the first two days of the 2008 World Series of Poker Main Event, which began yesterday, all as reported by PokerNews, plus my comments on them.

The "All In" Paddle

Many poker fans will remember the debacle involving the Milwaukee's
Best "All-In Button" back in 2006. The idea behind it was for players to be able
to push the button into the middle in lieu of moving in towers and towers of
chips. Naturally, there was a great deal of confusion regarding the button, and
some pros were so horrified at the concept that they immediately threw it away
upon arriving at their Day 1 table.

In 2008, we now have the "All-In Paddle." Given to the dealers only, it
resembles something one might use to bid at an auction. The paddle will be
raised to notify the floor of all-in-and-call situations at each table.

Mercifully, there have been few paddle sightings thus far in the opening
hour of the Main Event.

I don't have anything worthwhile to say about this year's "all-in paddles" for use by the dealers, but I find the characterization of the 2006 trial of the all-in button puzzling. I thought the all-in button provided to players was a great idea. I still think that, in fact. Yes, it caused some problems, when players thought they could toss it in as a joke and not have it count. They quickly learned, though, that such action was taken in about as much humor as TSA screeners have when you "joke" that you have a bomb planted in your suitcase.

The great advantage of players having an all-in button is that it eliminates the problems of players not hearing a verbal all-in declaration. This can happen because of the ambient noise in the room, because of a player's hearing loss, music playing in earphones, just not paying attention, etc. Doyle Brunson was knocked out of the 2004 Main Event because of exactly this problem, and it would not have happened that way if he could have had an all-in button to push into the middle of the table. In fact, I suspect that his accidental elimination was one of the prime factors behind the eventual implementation of the all-in button. (See here for details of the Brunson story.)

I never heard of any problems with the trial other than the clowning around. I also never heard of whatever complaints professional players had about the idea, mentioned in the PokerNews post. Then again, I wasn't nearly as tuned in to the poker world then as I am now, so I could have easily missed such discussion. If any readers know what problems or complaints led to the trial lasting just one year before being abandoned, I'd like to hear about it in the comments section. What made it a "debacle"? Absent anything horrendous, if I were in charge, they'd keep using the all-in button.

She Said, She Said

Erica Schoenberg raised to 525 from middle position and a woman in the big
blind called. The flop came 7h-4s-10h. The BB checked, Schoenberg bet 700, and
her opponent called. The turn was the Kd. Again the BB checked. This time
Schoenberg bet 1,500, and again was called.

The river brought the 8s. The big blind checked, and Schoenberg bet 2,500.
Her opponent tossed out a 5,000 chip, though didn't announce her bet.
Schoenberg, thinking she had been called, turned over her hand -- Kc-10c, kings
and tens. Her opponent, thinking she had been called, showed hers -- 6s-5d, a
rivered straight.

Schoenberg, seeing she was beat, was obviously not putting anymore chips in
the pot. After some discussion, it was ruled as if she had folded to the
check-raise. Schoenberg now has 12,000.

If this is really what happened, then it may be the worst floor ruling in the years that I've been paying attention to the WSOP. There's a lot of variability from casino to casino in the details of their poker rules, but one constant (at least I've never come upon an exception) is the oversized-chip rule. This says that in both cash games and tournaments, a player facing a bet who places into the pot a single chip that is larger than the amount of the bet will be deemed to have only called, not raised, unless the player announces a raise before the chip hits the felt. This is true even if the chip is large enough to constitute a full legal raise, and even if the player has plenty of other smaller-denomination chips that he could have used to make the call. (The latter is a frequent protest of a player who learns about this rule the hard way. "If I had wanted to just call, I would have put in one of these $100 chips, not a $500 chip!" Too bad, dude.)

This is not an obscure, infrequently-resorted-to rule. In fact, it comes up on nearly every hand of poker that is played, at least at the $1-2 no-limit games that I frequent. In the majority of hands there is at least one player who limps in for the amount of the big blind by putting out a single red ($5) chip without saying anything. Both he and the other players all rely on the rule to know that this is a call, not a raise. It is absolutely inconceivable that any dealer or floor person at the WSOP doesn't know of this rule, or that the WSOP doesn't abide by it. In fact, it is codified in the 2008 WSOP rules, at #55: "Putting a single oversized chip into the pot will be considered a call if the player doesn’t announce a raise." (Of course, that doesn't necessarily mean that they will always abide by it, as we have documentation of other cases of tournament staff disregarding the written rules.)

Schoenberg's opponent's offering of a 5000-denomination chip in response to a 2500 bet should absolutely have been deemed just a call.

Actually, this ruling is, or would be, so off-the-wall bizarre that for once I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the WSOP staff, and assume that it's PokerNews that got the facts wrong, or at least omitted something crucial. I contacted the blogger who wrote the story, and he admitted that he wasn't sure it was right, and the reporter who had relayed the facts to him had apparently been similarly uncertain that he had all the necessary details. Given that, frankly, I think that PokerNews shouldn't have run the story in the first place. If they do, in fact, have something wrong in the report, then they have falsely made the WSOP tournament staff look like they either don't know their own rules or are making incredibly stupid and arbitrary decisions. They're perfectly capable of such, but before making that accusation, I'd prefer to be as certain as possible that the facts really do indict them.

[Edit, July 5, 2008] I think I must have had a stroke at some point. Somehow I read the PN post as implying that Schoenberg was required to match--and lose--the full 5000 that her opponent had put in. That would indeed be a horrible decision. But it doesn't say that. Somehow my brain translated the statement that Schoenberg had folded (or that it was decided to treat the situation as if she had folded--same thing) into saying that the decision was that Schoenberg had called the raise, then mucked. That's not what it says.

Look at it this way: There are only two possible functional outcomes--either Schoenberg loses just the 2500 that she initially bet, or she loses 5000. It's kind of strange, rules-wise, to conclude that her opponent's raise was valid and that Schoenberg folded to it, but the end result is the same as if her opponent's action were interpreted as just a call. The proper decision would be that her opponent just called. But either way, Schoenberg loses 2500, not 5000, so in practical terms it doesn't really matter much what labels are put on the actions.

Of course, nothing that I wrote above explicitly says that the final decision was that Schoenberg was forced to forfeit 5000. But it would be dishonest of me to deny that that's what I was thinking when I wrote it. Besides, I wouldn't have deemed the whole thing worthy of a rant if I had been thinking that the outcome was that Schoenberg just lost the 2500. My apologies for basing that whole grump on a misreading of the PN post.

Finally, these last two stories are just for amusement, and don't need further comment. When you have somewhere between 5000 and 8000 poker players churning out hand after hand through a 14-day tournament, you're going to get all sorts of astronomically improbable card combinations, such as these two (one from yesterday, one from earlier today):

Quad Aces are Good, Right? ... RIGHT?

Motoyuki "Moto" Mabuchi raises to 850 in middle position and the button
calls.

The flop is Ax-Qd-9x and both check. The turn is 10d and Moto bets 1,600.
The button calls. The river is Ad and Moto bets 2,500. The button raises to
8,500 and Moto reraises all in.

The button calls. Moto shows Ax-Ax for quad aces, but the button has Kd-Jd
for the royal flush. Moto is eliminated in stunning
fashion.


Knocked Down on All Fours

Huge roar from across the room just now as we had an all-in on the
river with the board showing 4d-Kh-Qc-Qd-4c.

The one who was covered showed 4h-4s for quad fours. His opponent
turned over Qs-Qh for quad queens.

I tell ya, tournament poker is SO rigged!