Soft Play

[Guernica4000]

Need some advise in how to deal with couple’s soft play.

I host a fun monthly tournament with 30ish players with a $40 but in. We usually have some BBQ, drinks and poker. I get a good mix of players including many couples.

The other night during a hand at the final table two of my friends (husband and wife) got heads up before the flop. The flop was Q85 (check-check) the turn K (min bet-call) the river 2 (check-check) wife shows 55 for trip 5s on the flop and hubby shows 88 for trip 8s on the flop. When the hands were exposed many players at the table made some comments, mostly in good humor but with a bit of sting to them. The game continued but the hand/play kept being brought up by the more experienced players. As luck would have it and to make matters worse the wife won the tournament resulting in more comments and calls to me the next day.

So I realize that one solution might be to un-invite the couple or one of them but is there another way?

As I said it is a friendly game with a bunch of friends and there is really no way of knowing if the other couples aren’t doing something similar without such an obvious hand coming up between them. Actually when I talked to the husband the next day about their play he said that he has seen couples over bet pots, make big lay downs or slow play against there significant others and didn’t understand what the big deal was.

There is a little truth to his statement because it has happened that the husband will make a bet into his wife and she will fold saying something like “I hope you enjoy the couch tonight” or someone will say “you know it is a long walk home” before folding. The table usually laughs and play goes on.

The biggest problem here was that it was the final table and they both had monster hands.

Has this happened in any of your games? How did you deal with it? Any suggestions on what I should do?

My next tourney is in a couple of weeks so any suggestions are welcomed.

Thanks in advance