hand over mouth

[Toro]

I don't know about the rest of you but I'm kind of surprised that a lot of the top pros, Hellmuth in particular, put their hand over their mouth after they bet or are otherwise involved in a hand. I mean, are they incapable of maintaining a good poker face and have to resort to this?

That being said, in this weeks WPT at Foxwoods, I thought that the eventual winner, Hoyt Corkins, had the absolutely best poker face of all the final table participants. The guy didn't so much as twitch during any hand he was involved in.

[ZManODS]

Ok he might not of twitched but he went all in with 83o twice and god caught.

I was rooting for him to lose.

[Rushmore]

In the fairy-tale land of "tells," one of the biggies has always been that the hand over the mouth indicates a bluff.

I think many players now realize that one's oral posture (how's THAT?) IS indeed tough to maintain, regardless of one's poker prowess. Therefore, they have "reclaimed" the hand over the mouth by ALWAYS putting the hand over the mouth, regardless of the play they're making.

It would appear I have overthought this a bit.

[brick]

Hi Rushmore,
I agree with you. I don't think you're overthinking it.

I think Phil has resorted to the most reliable method to hide facial expressions. He puts his hands over his face.

[baggins]

i agree with rushmore and brick. i've seen a lot of players do this classic gesture. in all different scenarios.

[Porcupine]

I have also noticed that players do it in all kinds of situations. Mostly, the players aren't acting, to me it just appears to be a common nervous habit. I was in a home NL tourney this week-end, and players (most of whom I've certain weren't doing it on purpose) were always putting their hands over their mouths, often with good hands.

[Toro]

I think some have misinterpeted my view on this. I don't think that it's a tell at all. They do it all the time, whether they have a good hand or are bluffing so there's no tell. I just thought that World class players wouldn't need to cover their mouth, that they could pull off a bluff without giving something away without the hand over the mouth.

[TimTimSalabim]

[ QUOTE ]
I mean, are they incapable of maintaining a good poker face and have to resort to this?

[/ QUOTE ]

And Corkins was wearing sunglasses for his health?

[Toro]

A lot of the top pros wear sun glasses so they can check you out without you being aware of it.

[Easy E]

who raised early in the show with 72?

[Rushmore]

My point was that they do it on purpose, and clearly so, in an effort to negate any possible tells. Hellmuth, for example, is so obvious about it that it couldn't possibly be an indication of weakness.

You've seen him do it. Do you think it's just an idiosycratic mannerism that he is unaware of? Obviously not. Therefore, I posit that he does it on purpose to supress any other, less voluntary, mannerism.

To be honest, this seems obvious to me.

[Toro]

I think we're in total agreement on why Hellmuth and others do it. But you keep missing my point. I'm just surprised that someone who has been through the wars as he has would find it necessary to use a crutch such as this to as you have described it "supress any other, less voluntary, mannerism".

[Rushmore]

Nah, I saw your point. I just think that the thinking is that if flexing one's elbow in such a way that one's hand covers one's mouth will save you 2% of any leaked information, why not do it?

But I agree with you generally. I was playing NL at Foxwoods yesterday, and certainly didn't feel any need to cover my mouth, nose, ears, or eyes.

My ass? Yes. But none of the rest.

[Toro]

I haven't been able to get down to FW as much as I used to and as much as I would like in the last several months. You mentioned that you played in a NL game but I don't remember FW spreading NL games on a regular basis, only during tourney time and occasionally some PL on Tuesday nights.

I've become a NL fan after playing some in a recent trip to LV and also on-line. Can you give me some info on this such as buy-in limits and blind structure and if this is now a regularly spread game down there?

[Rushmore]

Well, it IS tourney time (The N.E. Poker Classic), but I think the NL is going to be going pretty regular.

The game I was in yesterday was blinds of $5 and $5, with deep money and 3 soft spots. It was clearly 7 guys waiting to pounce, and it played as such. I'd say it was all-around a pretty good game.

I gotta tell you, though...

There must have been 500 people in the damned poker room...ALL GODDAMNED DAY...and they never got a holdem game bigger than 20/40 even up on the board. Very disappointing and sort of baffling, really. Nobody seemed very interested.

The 20/40 I was in for three or four hours was totally out of control. Four and five players preflop for 2, 3 or 4 bets. Every hand. Three times I lost to sets flopped by pocket pairs smaller than that with which I was raising preflop. What can you do? Anyway, it was an amazing game, really.

There was a $50/$100 Omaha game going, but one look at the lineup said no freakin chance. It looked like there MIGHT be one soft spot, but that wasn't gonna do it. Was that Chris Darden in the game?

I played in two $80 satellites, won the second one ($500 lammer and $150 cash). That was good. But man, oh man, they act like they've never run a satellite before. The dealers don't know what's going on, there's no brush, there are paper lists just laying around with 20 and 30 names on them, there are players milling around aimlessly, wondering what the hell is going on, etc. Very shoddy, indeed.

But hey. The buffet was great.