Cell phones at the WSOP

Breaking news during the WSOP used to be about somebody getting arrested in the cardroom, or getting too drunk to stay in their chair, or Becky skimming from the dealer toke pool, or something like that.

More recently breaking news is about really bad floor decisions. Some recent news from the 2007 WSOP is more about a good floor decision but one where the WSOP staff made it a lot harder than it needed to be to get it right.

I haven't blogged about it but I did make some comments in an rgp thread when the topic turned to whether or not Singer was trying to shoot an angle. Read the OP in the thread if you don't know what happened.

To the suggestion from some numb nut that his hand should have been killed just for letting the phone ring because the phone ringing might have been a signal I said.

> The ringing [or buzzing,whatever] could have been a message in itself.
>

So could me walking behind a player and saying, "Hi Charlie". So could me
walking into the room wearing a red shirt.

What's the matter with you people? We have to ban red shirts, it might be a
signal.

Fucking idiots. Do all of y'all work for Homeland Security or something?

Cheating with signals from a telephone is not a reason that cell phone use is banned. It's simply because it's disruptive and rude. That's the reason for the rule. Not because he might be getting "information". Even Harrah's execs aren't that stupid. Players get information all the time. Hell, I can walk up to you and talk to you while you're in a hand and that's not against the rules.

What the guy did was turn his phone off, so that the ringing would not continue to disrupt. That's exactly in the spirit of the no cell phone rule, is what he's supposed to do. Here's how I said that in the rgp thread

What is this "gaining information" nonsense? That can't possibly be the reason
for the rule. If there had been a text message (that he had not looked at)
would the ruling be different.

The reason for the rule is to not delay or disrupt the game, it can't possibly
have anything to do with gaining information because they don't outlaw red
shirts also.

Idiots.

When someone quoted Nolan Dalla to demonstrate that I was mistaken about the reason for the rule I said

Nonsense is nonsense.

If Nolan is right, then the only conclusion to draw is that WSOP management is
incompetent. But, if that's true then you can't depend on anything Nolan says.

So which is it? He's either wrong, or he's right and that means he's wrong.

A lot of people don't seem to understand the concept of angle shooting. Angle shooting is not against the rules. When somebody suggested that what Singer did was within his rights, therefore it was okay, I said.

Being within your rights is part of the definition of angle shooting slime.

Angle shooting means using rules in ways that they are not intended to gain an
unfair advantage.

If it's not within your rights it's called cheating.

Some people think anything that doesn't violate a rule is acceptable. I don't
really want to spend much time around such people. They aren't nice and they
can't be trusted.

Angle shooting is legal but it's just wrong under my personal moral calculus. That's not the case for everybody. I understand that. But floor rulings should never be made which encourage angle shooting or reward it. It really isn't good for the room and the rooms reputation.

It called angle shooting, however you want to try to frame it.

Angle shooting is always within your rights, it's part of the definition. It
just depends on what kind kind of person you are whether you decide to shoot
angles are not. Some people, I guess you're one of them, think that angle
shooting is just fine, there's nothing wrong with it, that anyone who doesn't
shoot angles when they can is just a sucker. But it's still angle shooting.

The guy just seems to never stop looking for another angle to shoot. In an interview with pokerlistings.com he said

So not only do I feel like I got the wrong call, the floor person didn't do his job in letting me appeal to a higher authority before he made the ultimate decision. Anyway, I went on to lose the hand and get knocked out. I feel like I should get my money back from the tournament. I really feel like I should've been allowed to play it on another Day 1, but that didn't happen; I guess I didn't pursue it enough.

The more the guy talks the slimier I feel when I read what he has to say.

Here's what I said about Singer's incessant whining

Singer was not an injured party. He had nothing to do with the cell phone. HIs
claim to injury is simply that his attempt at shooting an angle failed.

Had the rule been misapplied, Singer would have benefited. But that doesn't
make him an injured party when the rule was not misapplied.

A lot of people are talking about it.

Ramblings of a mad man has some really strong thoughts. Singer made a bad play on a draw hand and wants a fucking do-over card?

Micheal Craig shows us why FullTilt hired him to pimp blog for them. David Singer, in addition to being a talented and experienced tournament poker player, is an attorney and nobodies fool. He immediately motioned to the dealer to declare the hand dead, which would have awarded him the pot. (David Singer is a paid prop player for Full Tilt)

Pokerhaus.com thinks angle shooting is always the right thing to do. I have to agree with Singer. Apparently you can’t take your phone out for any reason during a hand and if you do then your hand is declared dead. Singer and Bloch’s hands were declared dead in previous tournaments when they took out their phone. (I don't know the details but somehow I'm going to guess that Singer's hand was killed for some reason other than touching his phone, maybe like using it to make a call or to answer a call).

Knowing that Singer is a lawyer explains a lot.