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You are the Tournament Director Series 3: Flopped Too Soon, Does the Raise Stand?

This one was send in by Eliza the editor of Poker Europa Magazine.

This ruling was made on the 5th June 2007 at the Grosvenor Club in Cardiff. Six players in a self dealt OMAHA game. Player 6 is dealing, 6, 1, and 2 have 100 each in the pot. Player 3 raises to 500, player 4 raises to 1000, 5 calls and player six (the dealer) passes. Player 1 calls, 2 passes. Before 3 can act the dealer turns over two cards of the flop and realises his mistake and replaces them. At which point player 3 re-raises. A ruling was asked for and the card room manager ruled player 3 out of the pot. Being player 3, I was furious, and would not accept this ruling. It was then decided to shuffle the pack and my raise stood. The following day I attended a meeting at the 'Vic' in London to clarify the ruling. I maintain that if the ruling to eliminate me from the pot stood, it would be the first time in 25yrs that I can remember a casino making a ruling that would cheat a player out of his money. The consequences are horrendous, it opens the door to collusion, and based on this ruling 5 players could have called, the 6th player raises and before the others can act, the flop is turned over making the raiser the winner of the pot. There was no clear answer from the 'Vic', but Jeff, the card room manager asked me to send you this scenario for your experts to give their opinion.

Comments please…

Matt Savage:
Player 3 has every right to raise the pot and should be allowed to do so.

Thomas Kremser:
Any flop turned to early does not stand. The action has to be finished first and cards (no burn card) have to be shuffled and a new flop has to be dealt.

Dave Lamb:
The raise from player 3 stands- he has a right to get his bet in, there has been no action behind him and he simply wants to complete his turn before there is a flop. The exposed cards should go back, and the action completed with a new flop.

Jeff Leigh:
Grosvenor’s rule was that once there had been 3 pieces of action (1/ burn card plus two flop cards ) then if 2 or more cards had been dealt the flop would have to stand, and any player who hadn’t acted would have a dead hand. In this instant because it was a self deal game then closer scrutiny should be taken to see if the player who hadn’t acted had been given opportunity to do so i.e, he wasn’t angle shooting in the knowledge that if he didn’t like the flop they would be burnt or shuffled back in which may then disadvantage ALL the other players who may have hit “their” flop. In this scenario I would have to look at the situation carefully before over-riding our standard rules and allowing the “aggrieved” player to make further action and shuffle the cards back in. It is possible that collusion could be a factor but the “aggrieved” player may not have been paying attention also. Self deal games are always a problem because they never have sufficient control which means some there are too many silly mistakes. The above situation is not black and white and even shuffling the cards back into the deck can disadvantage other players who had done nothing wrong.

Jack Effel:
The flop is reshuffled back in the deck leaving the burn card out. Pre-flop action is completed by all players. A new flop is dealt without burning a card. No one should be eliminated from the pot unless they choose not to call the raise. This is standard procedure in most card rooms.

Thomas Lamatsch:
There is a simple procedure: When the flop is dealt, before the betting round is finished, the flop doesn’t play. The whole deck, except the burn card, has to be shuffled up again.
Then the betting round has to be finished and a new flop is dealt without burncard.
Important notice, if the player 3 re-raises before, this action has to stay!!!

The Mob Verdict

It is important in any poker game whether self dealt or dealer dealt that all action before the flop MUST be completed before the flop is dealt.

Any flop that is dealt in part or whole is invalid if action is incomplete – even if it is just the big blind not taking his option by checking or raising.

Although Jeff makes an interesting point about angle-shooting it doesn’t really apply in this case. This is not a situation where the action has been checked around and the last player keeps his head down hoping not be noticed until he's seen whether he likes the flop. Player 3 was facing a raise and was going to have to either put some chips in the pot or fold his hand. The dealer clearly made a mistake by not waiting for his action.

Jack sums it up perfectly.

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