Incredible "Fake Bet " By Gus Hansen Carib WPT

[Dan Mezick]

is that kind of handful-of-chips-forward-and-back gesture actually a legal motion? it's got to be an infraction. If not it will be soon--

[Dynasty]

[ QUOTE ]
If not it will be soon--

[/ QUOTE ]

Why? Is there an International Poker Federation which will force all casinos to play by a standard set of rules?

[Sponger15SB]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
If not it will be soon--

[/ QUOTE ]

Why? Is there an International Poker Federation which will force all casinos to play by a standard set of rules?

[/ QUOTE ]

yes, its at

www.internationalpokerfederationwhichforcesallcasi nostoplaybyasetofstandardrules.org/thisisajoke.html (http://www.internationalpokerfederationwhichforcesallcasi nostoplaybyasetofstandardrules.org/thisisajoke.html)

[Nothinghead]

the link doesnt work /images/graemlins/confused.gif


/images/graemlins/grin.gif

[Dan Mezick]

Tournament Directors Association

A quick scan of the codified rules is interesting.

Rules Part 1 (http://www.cardplayer.com/poker_magazine/archives/?a_id=13834&PHPSESSID=88782b1be222f9e1e3b5f3340030 87d4)

Rules Part 2 (http://www.cardplayer.com/poker_magazine/archives/?a_id=13864)

Rules Part 3 (http://www.cardplayer.com/poker_magazine/archives/?a_id=13892)

Tournament Director's Association Web Site (http://www.pokertda.com/)

[ohgeetee]

It's the equivalent of a balk in baseball, or a string bet IMO.

He got Daniel's reaction to a bet without making a bet, which isn't exactly ethical. They didn't have cameras on Daniel at the time, but it would have been interesting to see how he reacted, and to get a rundown from Daniel as to how he thinks it affected him.

It was an angle shoot at its best.

[27offsuit]

[ QUOTE ]
It's the equivalent of a balk in baseball, or a string bet IMO.

He got Daniel's reaction to a bet without making a bet, which isn't exactly ethical. They didn't have cameras on Daniel at the time, but it would have been interesting to see how he reacted, and to get a rundown from Daniel as to how he thinks it affected him.

It was an angle shoot at its best.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm sure you would get a reaction from the opponent every time, first time only.

I thought it was both incredibly brilliant and incredibly shady at the same time. I know I'd never try it in my game and I'd also be pissed if someone did it to me, although that surely won't happen now.

[Dan Mezick]

You have to give him points for creativity and psychological brilliance. It was a priceless moment in poker history and actually a huge clue about how he thinks.

A pivotal aspect of Gus' brilliance seems to be his procedures involving pausing before betting. The TV absolutely does not tell the whole story, but on balance he seems to avoid frequent eye contact with opponents. He also seems to have reduced the pre-action pause to a kind of extra-sensory art form.

Perhaps the way he pauses (duration of pause, rythym of Gus-behavior during the pause, time to think, time observe, semi-prompts aimed at opponents, time to think about freshly observed info, etc) is what provides him with what appears to be clairvoyance but is actually very obtainable opponent information. This info is gained via a highly sophisticated and well-developed set of very specific and repeatable pre-action techniques.

Watching him fidget before each bet is fascinating. He's literally teaching us how to play. Defeating Hoyt Corkin is certainly a big deal and teaches alot by example. Hansen has extended the state of the art in some sense with this pre-action pausing behavior which seems to provide him with so much information.

Because of the way he naturally does this, I suspect the "fake-bet" manuever was likely not premeditated and simply a spontaneously manifested extension of "the way he thinks" about poker, when the action comes to him.

In this case he took it too far and the chance we will see a rule developed to address this has to be near 100%.

[Ghazban]

Have you seen him play in real life? I'm just curious. I don't think you can attribute terms like "brilliance" to his preflop fidgeting unless you've seen him do it enough to know what's a genuine play and what isn't. You certainly don't see enough hands on TV to make that claim, nor do you get to see both him and the opponent during these motions. If you saw the PSI where he sucked out badly twice in a hour show, you might not be giving him so much credit.

[ThePopinjay]

this should NOT be outlawed. keeping a good poker face is part of the game, if you can't handle it stick to the net

[SossMan]

Clearly you've never played with the Northern California "Check w/ chips" crowd.

Ingredients:

Handfull of chips
Supposed Trikiness
A River Scare card
A hard check meant to look like a bet

[Richie Rich]

While Hansen's "supernatural poker skills" may be incredibly useful in tourneys, I've heard from other 2+2'ers (who have actually seen him play live) that he plays full ring games rather poorly.

[Sponger15SB]

oh yeah, i hate these types of people.

they'll take a stack of 20 out and then check, when it comes to calling or raising, you'll never know until $12 chips fall out of their hand instead of $6

[sthief09]

[ QUOTE ]
Clearly you've never played with the Northern California "Check w/ chips" crowd.

Ingredients:

Handfull of chips
Supposed Trikiness
A River Scare card
A hard check meant to look like a bet

[/ QUOTE ]


the check with chips is also known as the "please don't bet because I really don't feel like paying you off even though I have to" check

[27offsuit]

[/ QUOTE ]the check with chips is also known as the "please don't bet because I really don't feel like paying you off even though I have to" check

[/ QUOTE ]

Or the "I'm rich beeyitch".

Put something on those lips.

[Dan Mezick]

hansen plays poorly in no limit ring games? This would surprise me since his skills seemed tuned to nolimit.

I would not be surprised if he was really bad at limit, since that game does not appear to suit him.

[crockett]

Some of these repsonse just amaze me. That have to immediately put a stop to that crap and nonsense. WWF wrestling here we come. Why do you think there are some many rules in Professional sports. Because some whack job always has to push the grey areas. Hell, let's bring back string betting. Maybe we'll have guys slowly setting there chips down and just before they touch felt pulling them back. Or say Call....(big pause) NOT! Then we talk about the brilliance of these advanced (read unethical) moves here. C'mon. If this guy wants to be acclaimed as a genius he needs to start calling all in's with Q9o and then sucking people out (oh yeah he already did) not goofball plays like I see your 100 ........ and raise you.......NOT...I'm pulling my hand back. When poker was orginally played he would have got at least a good butt whoopin' if not more. But now with T.V. the closer it gets to the Jerry Springer show I guess the more some people enjoy it.

[SpeakEasy]

I played in a single-table NLHE tournament, down to final 3 players, in which the the guy next to me would routinely "check" by reaching out and tapping the table with a large stack of chips.

Heads-up against this guy, the first time he did this "chip-check" on the flop, it was oddly disruptive to my play. I heard him say "check," but my brain started processing: "Wait a minute. He reached out with a stack of chips. Isn't that a bet? How can he check by reaching out with chips?" Now I'm not thinking about my next move, I'm thinking about his chip-check.

The second time this happened against me, it induced paranoid thoughts: "When he reaches out with chips, then checks, is it because I'm giving off a tell? Did I flinch? Blind rapidly? Reach for chips to call what looked like a bet? What did I do?" Silly.

Several hands later, I realized that it wasn't me at all, but that he routinely checked in this manner. Probably a habit he developed long ago which does, from time to time, overtly throw a player off and induce a tell or even a comment.

In the end, this chip-check experience had the unintended effect of making me think carefully about my reaction and the process by which I make my next move: maintain stoic posture regardless of other player's action, observe player's full action to completion (regardless of whether its a check, a bet or a "chip-check"), think about my next action before moving my body, then execute action.

[rjc199]

I couldn't believe that move when I saw it. I thought for sure that it was going to be a string bet.

[Daliman]

definitely an amatuer move, and DN wasn't going for it, believe me.

[eyekast]

lmao /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[-Syk-]

What exactly is a string bet anyway? Is it when somebody bets, and you match the bet and then decide to raise after a pause? As if you're looking for information as to whether the guy wants a raise?

And is the proper way to raise by announcing raise and making two motions. One to match the bet and the other going back for the chips to raise?

[Nottom]

[ QUOTE ]
And is the proper way to raise by announcing raise and making two motions. One to match the bet and the other going back for the chips to raise?

[/ QUOTE ]

As long as you announce that you want to raise, then this is OK. Of course there is nothing wrong with doing it all in 1 motion.

The raise itself on the other hand must all go out in one push. If you aren't able to put that many chips in, then you can simply announce the size of your raise and put it out in more than 1 motion.

[-Syk-]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
And is the proper way to raise by announcing raise and making two motions. One to match the bet and the other going back for the chips to raise?

[/ QUOTE ]

As long as you announce that you want to raise, then this is OK. Of course there is nothing wrong with doing it all in 1 motion.

The raise itself on the other hand must all go out in one push. If you aren't able to put that many chips in, then you can simply announce the size of your raise and put it out in more than 1 motion.

[/ QUOTE ]

Gotcha. So it's perfectly legal to announce raise, make the first motion to match the bet and study for a moment and then decide the ammount to raise?

[Dan Mezick]

A reading of the WPT rules is at worst highly instructive and at best a kind of weapon at the table.

Interesting detail: String bet rule violations have to be identified by players at the table, not the dealer, tourney director or anyone else.

Therefore, if a player displays a string (or any kind of variation, such as a creative "quasi-string, neo-string or semi-string" kind of move,) the burden is on the other players to recognize it and call it.

This move by Hansen was so unique, what do we actually call it?

Negreanu certainly recognized it as borderline neo-string behavior, but for whatever reason he decided to do nothing. He seems very image conscious and this might have informed his decision to non-react while in front of the cameras.

Perhaps Hansen pre-meditated, measuring the man and deciding this would probably be the case. Perhaps he didn't and the move was 100% spurious and implusive.

But when analyzing Gus Hansen as the subject player, somehow I doubt that.

The move is not strictly a string, as he never put chips in. There is a rule about 'chips forward' but the Hansen chips never touched the table. His hand with chips went forward of his stack, then back, with the entire round trip in his hand the whole time.

It was actually a unique moment in televised poker history that will change the rules. The incident also revealed aspects of character in both players.

When they further codify the rules to prohibit whatever this is, it will likely be referred to in the poker culture as the 'The Gus Hansen string' or similiar.

[Smasharoo]

Negreanu certainly recognized it as borderline neo-string behavior, but for whatever reason he decided to do nothing


Well, Holmes, it might be because Hansen then put the same amount of chips in to call that he had motioned with, not to mention that Daniel wanted a fold in any case.

If Daniel had wanted a call and Gus decided not to call after the same motion, I'm sure Daniel would have mentioned it to someone. Image concious? Talk about burning down the forrest to find some clear space to build a fire. I hope you don't overthink opponenets actions like this in a game.