The inmates are running the asylum

Played at the Imperial Palace tonight, only my fifth time there (mainly because of unpleasant noise and smoke issues).

There was an Asian guy on my right who repeatedly folded out of turn. Two consecutive dealers politely asked him to be sure to wait for his turn.

Then he did it again. The player two to his right was taking some time to decide whether to call a raise. Mr. Impatient looked right at him and then just picked up his cards and chucked them toward the dealer. He wasn't in a hurry to get up and go have a smoke, or any such thing. It appeared that he just got tired of waiting, and wanted his turn to be done so he could zone out again. It was so obviously intentional that for the first time I said something to him: "There are still two people ahead of you." He said, "I just don't care."

So I turned to the dealer (the third one in the box since this has been going on) and told her, "He's been acting out of turn all night, and it's obviously deliberate. He has been warned by both of the previous dealers about it."

Now in my mind, there is only one thing for a dealer to do after witnessing the player's conduct and hearing the report that he has been warned about it by the two prior dealers: Call the floor. It's obvious at that point that the player isn't responding to ordinary reminders and requests, so it's time to put some teeth behind a warning.

Right? Isn't this obvious?

Instead, the dealer just said, "I know," and then carried on as if I hadn't said anything of significance. This stunned me. Does she really care so little about keeping control of her game?

Maybe ten minutes later the guy left. At that point the dealer turned to me and confided, "He plays here all the time, and he always does that. We tell him not to over and over again, but he just keeps doing it."

So I ask the only logical question: "Why do you put up with it?"

She said, "We can't do anything about it. The floor has to take care of it, and they won't."

Ah. So maybe there is more to the story. My first thought was that obviously the floor can't and won't do anything about it if none of the dealers report the situation. But if it's really that chronic, the dealers may have developed a form of "learned helplessness"--over repeated encounters, they have learned that they call the floor, the guy gets another warning, and that scenario repeats reiteratively without anything more ever occurring. Giving up on it is still not the correct reaction for a dealer in that spot, but it's at least understandable.

Were I a dealer there, I would call the floor over to deal with it every time the guy did this. Sooner or later, the floor staff is going to get sufficiently annoyed at having to handle the same situation a hundred times in a day that they will either kick the player out or formally instruct me--in front of all of the other players--that this player is to be allowed to act out of turn whenever he wishes to without further comment or action from the poker room staff. Then at that point, I get to ask whether this treatment is unique for this player, or whether I, as the dealer, should allow everybody to act in whatever order they choose to. I also get to talk with the poker room manager and ask to have that floor decision put in writing into the house rule book. That would make an interesting item for visiting Gaming Commission representatives to look at.

Of course, all of that bravado is easy for me to muster from my safe, unemployed player's seat. If I had reason to think that my employment was viewed as expendable, perhaps I wouldn't actually turn out to be so brave and audacious. But at least I'd like to think that that's how I'd handle it: kick the problem upstairs over and over again until it actually gets resolved. I can make myself pretty damn hard to ignore when I try.

The player has obviously learned that reminders and warnings never amount to anything more than empty words, and he just doesn't care what impact his actions have on the integrity of the game or on the other players, so he continues doing what he has always done. (This is rather like Phil Hellmuth and his repeated "warnings" from the WSOP staff, which never turn into any actual penalties, so he ignores them and continues his ill-mannered behavior unabated.)

If this dealer's implication is correct, then it's a failure of the floor staff. From my little slice of watching tonight, I can't judge who is more to blame, the dealers or the floor. But one way or the other, this is a piss-poor way to run a card room. What's the point of even having rules if, when challenged, you're ultimately not going to enforce them?

The Imperial Palace hereby joins the Tropicana on the Grump's Dishonorable Mention Roll as a poker room that does not care about rules or player's ill behavior.


Their appallingly lax approach to the rules notwithstanding, I picked up a nice little profit during my visit tonight, as well as the nice commemorative chip shown above.