Raise

Embedded in this little story about the poker playing television celebrity, Elix Powers is an example of a mistake that's very common among dealers (and even floormen in some places).

In the story he doesn't say what the blinds are but I'm guessing 2/5. So the relevant bets are Player B (Big blind) puts up a $5 blind, Player O (Opener) makes it $20, Player R (Raiser) makes it $50 and player A (All-in) makes it $90, and is all in.

The really bad ruling is that Player R is not then allowed to re-raise. I guess because the all-in bet wasn't "twice the bet".

The actual rule is that a raise must be at least the size of the last raise, not the size of the current total bet. The $50 bet represented a $30 raise, so Player A could have made it $80 and that would qualify as a raise.

This is misunderstood by so many dealers that I don't even bother to correct them anymore. I've just given up on the whole concept of expecting competent dealers.

Be careful what you say

I'm playing in a sit-n-go, not really paying attention much, just playing very tight. My chips are dwindling some, we're down to 6 players. The guy on my immediate left says in chat "I'll take a hand any time now".

What does that tell me? It tells me that he's just waiting for a hand, not really playing situations. He's the short stack with about 1,000 chips, I'm next with about 1,200. Next hand I'm the button, he's the small blind, the chip leader is the big blind with over 6,000 chips.

It's folded to me. I have a couple of mid sized unsuited cards. Since the big blind has such a large stack I figure he's likely to call a steal attempt from my short stack so normally I'm just folding here. But after that comment from the small blind I figure a steal is a sure thing to work against the small blind, so rather than having to worry about a call from either of them I only have to worry about that big stack on the big blind. So I try to steal. It doesn't work, the big blind calls, but I get lucky and flop a pair, get a call for the rest of my chips on the flop from overcards and double up.

I'd have never doubled up that hand if the short stack hadn't made his witty comment.