foxwoods dealer mistake - what to do?

[dankhank]

i made a trip to foxwoods for the first time in several months this week, and unfortunately had a bad experience in literally my last orbit of the trip. i felt very helpless when it happened and am wondering if i could've done anything differently. also, i simply want to post about it to vent, and to point out the quality of dealers at foxwoods.

so this afternoon i'm playing in a 2-5 NL game, killing time just before i head home. an early position player raises to 15, a few people call, and i see QQ on the button and raise to 65. the original raiser calls, all others fold. flop comes T84 and i bet 125. my opponent calls, leaving him 150 behind. i have him covered by a lot. turn is a blank, he checks, and i say all in and wave the back of my hand towards the center of the table, as people often do when declaring themselves all in.

(i verbally declared all in because all i had left in front of me were stacks and stacks of red chips, and it seemed much easier to verbally state something, rather than cut out $200 or so in reds and push them to the center. in retrospect however, i realize the dealer, a cute young woman named johana, was probably too inexperienced with poker to realize that it would be a natural move for me to move all in verbally there. also i don't talk loud at the poker table, and in fact earlier in the hand when i raised preflop she didn't hear me say raise, and my neighbor had to confirm i did say it.)

as soon as i say all in and wave my hand, the dealer burns and flips over the river, a jack. i say "wait wait what are you doing" and my opponent, who heard me say all in (as did the people sitting next to me at the table) also tells her to stop. the dealer says she didn't hear me say allin, and thought i said check instead.

the floor is called over and he gives the ruling i expect: the jack should be put back in the deck, the deck reshuffled, and a new river card comes out. my opponent says, "i have a problem with this, because that jack helped me." i knew i was ahead on the turn, and this comment leads me to think he has AJ. however, i don't know for sure - i figure maybe has JJ, and the J gives him a set that beats me. anyway, i just stay quiet as i don't see what i could do to change anything. before he made that comment i really wanted the river to stay, and even after he said it, i wouldn't have complained if the jack stayed and we flipped. my opponent indicates at some point that he was going to call before the dealer burned and turned.

as the dealer reshuffles (she does this wrong also and the floor basically guides every move, since she is flustered) and burns i say, "no ace please," since i figure that's what he's looking for. oh, and i flip over my queens before she deals, so he knows what he's chasing.

the new river is the so-called prettiest card in the deck, the ace of spades. my opponent says, "i got you" and flips over AJo. i'm steamed and say to the dealer something about how she can't be making mistakes like this, that we're playing for a lot of money here. she is still shellshocked i guess, i sort of am too, and it takes me a second to realize i need to push some of my chips across to mr. AJo. i ask how much, the dealer says "i dont know" and eventually i figure out i owe 155, to complete the ~$750 pot going his way.

i stand up and walk away to whine to the floor for maybe 10 seconds, saying, "i have to b*tch about this a little, that was f'ing ridiculous," and the floor agrees he would be mad, but i can tell he really doesn't care at all. i say to him, "cmon man, put her at a [censored] 2/4 table, she can't cost people money like this." my neighbor at the table says how it sucks as i rack up my chips, but i'm not expecting any sympathy, this is a poker table, i get it. i leave without playing another hand as i'm really mad and don't see how any good can come from staying.

anyway, it was a tough feeling to get screwed out of a pot by such an inept mistake. i normally don't play that "small" at foxwoods, and for the rest of my trip i don't have any complaints about the dealers who were on the "hold'em back wall" of the room (this table was in the middle of the room). in fact the dealers were better than usual. a few of them i recognized from six months ago - good dealers such as john, jason and kristian. i am quite sure that with another dealer, the whole situation wouldn't have happened. however after my experience at this table i suspect the dealers are much worse in other parts of the room.

it really sucked, not being able to do anything. i could've gotten angry and made a scene, or i could've b*thced out the dealer and made her feel bad (maybe i did a little), but i am just not that kind of person. in fact i was standing there and i was like, i don't even know how to make an angry scene. i don't have the energy for it. i haven't yelled at another person in years. i wasn't going to beg for a comp or for my opponent to give me some of the pot - i'm not that kind of person either. so meek old me, i just took it from behind and went home quietly, although i did swear under my breath as i walked through the blackjack and pai gow tables.

in retrospect i can think of a few things i might've tried differently to perhaps make the situation better for me (and mainly here i was trying to devise ways to get myself some of the pot), but i would be curious to hear how other people might respond in this spot, before i give my thoughts.

i am doing this partially to vent and partially to comment on the quality of dealers at foxwoods - because i think they deserve it. the mistake this dealer made is simply unacceptable. the dealer turnover at foxwoods is huge, and quite frankly, in the future i see mistakes of this magnitude happening more often rather than less.

anyway, eventually i got home to cambridge and i was able to count my blessings and do some drugs, and the whole incident is starting to slide off me like all the other bad beats to which i've become accustomed.

[xtingshun]

I'm not sure I know of anyone who would have handled this any better than you did. I can def. see myself berating the dealer for a little while, but in all honesty what can you do??? Abso. Nothing

I guess just move on and run far away from any table she every deals again.

(Theres a dealer at a local casino I play at that is like death to me, and when she comes into my table I will sit out)

[Randy_Refeld]

This is a common error. You get the money in and you get a random card for your money. It is unfortunate when it turns out liek that, but if you truly feel the dealer cost you money in that spot you should consider a different hobby.

you might also stop using the hand wave.

The problem with the hand wave is that it is used to mean, all-in, check, and fold so players who insist on using this move are just asking for trouble

[Jeffage]

An error was made in that the dealer burned and dealt the river before your opponent could make a decision on your all-in bet. Thus, the river card is invalid and can't stand and you or your opponent do not have the option of letting it stand. This would allow too much room for one of you saying they want it b/c it helps or want another free shot if it didn't - basically your opponent can't decide on his turn decision with knowledge of the river.

Proper procedure was followed and a random card is a random card - this process was just as likely to help you as hurt. But I agree, the dealer made an error and should pay more attention and it would be annoying. But oh well, this stuff happens - don't hurt yourself by taking any unclear or "quiet" actions, particularly with a green dealer in the box.

Jeff

[lerxst337]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not sure I know of anyone who would have handled this any better than you did. I can def. see myself berating the dealer for a little while, but in all honesty what can you do??? Abso. Nothing

I guess just move on and run far away from any table she every deals again.

(Theres a dealer at a local casino I play at that is like death to me, and when she comes into my table I will sit out)

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This is absolutely retarded! If you make a bet, make the bet in a manner that can be easily interpretted. The wave the hand while whispering all-in move is so very WPT. Trust me, you move your chips forward, and the dealer is much more likely to recognize your bet.

Secondly, I doubt we see this post if the "real" river card was the ace, and the "dealer's fault" river card is a blank. Sure, the dealer was in error, but it didn't make a difference in the hand from an EV standpoint. Add to the fact that you contributed to the dealer error, I have very little sympathy. A river card is a river card, get over it.

The real error--you called "no ace." We all know live poker is rigged.

[Ulysses]

You asked if you could do anything differently, so I'll give you a couple of suggestions.

1: Make sure that your declaration is loud and clear.

2: You said your opponent only had 150 left. When you say all-in, push a couple of stacks out that clearly cover him.

These are the kinds of things you can do to help prevent this type of mistake from happening.

However, while it's annoying when you end up losing when you "would have won," this kind of mistake (just like accidentally exposing a card) happens all the time. Sometimes it works out in your favor, sometimes it works out in your opponent's favor.

Sometimes the dealer accidentally flips up a card when dealing that would have given you Aces. Sometimes one of your opponents was dealt 99 and the flop comes A92 and you would have busted him had the card not flipped up.

In each of these situations, though, you and your opponents got random cards, and the board had random cards. Whether or not those cards were the ones that were "supposed to be there" is irrelevant.

Sometimes the dealer shuffles the cards one more time than standard or gives them an extra scramble. You don't complain when you get crappy holecards after that happens, do you?

[dankhank]

this is sort of related: the night before this hand happened i was laying in bed thinking how i have never once protected my hand (putting a chip or chip protector over it) and how neglecting to do so has never cost me a pot. i thought, if i lose just one big pot in my whole life because of not protecting my cards, then it's worth the hassle of never going to the effort of protecting.

i didn't want to push two stacks of red chips in the middle in this hand, because i don't organize my chip stacks into even numbers that can easily be pushed. i just make a few big stacks of however many chips and keep stacking.

i see now how one act of carelessness is related to all the others. so i wonder how many big pots in general i have to lose before i'll switch up and get a little more disciplined at the live tables. thanks for the comments, i will end with a quote from myself:

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anyway, it was a tough feeling to get screwed out of a pot by such an inept mistake.


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[AngusThermopyle]

in fact earlier in the hand when i raised preflop she didn't hear me say raise

So you insist on making your next raise in a soft voice followed by a hand motion that can just as easily be interpreted as "Go ahead." Maybe a loud, clear voice and actually shoving in enough stacks to cover your opponent isn't "cool".

To make you feel better:

as the dealer reshuffles .... and burns i say,

If she did burn, that was another mistake (at least in all the casinos I have played in).

[Rick Nebiolo]

You've already got good advice from Diablo, Randy and others but I'd add a few comments.


[ QUOTE ]
this is sort of related: the night before this hand happened i was laying in bed thinking how i have never once protected my hand (putting a chip or chip protector over it) and how neglecting to do so has never cost me a pot. i thought, if i lose just one big pot in my whole life because of not protecting my cards, then it's worth the hassle of never going to the effort of protecting.

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I can't see where protecting your hand is hard. If you don't protect your hand you probably lose more than one pot and it could be huge. It also has another upside in that a good card protector covers most of the card and somewhat reduces the advantage an opponent would have if the card is marked. Barry Greenstein has a reference to the importance of this aspect of protection in his book.

Quick story I've sort of told before: GF/Hero routinely ignored my advice to protect her hand, especially in the seats next to the dealer. A few years ago she decides to call me on her cell just before flopping a straight in a 20/40 game at Commerce. She has a ton of chips in front of her blocking her view in the one seat and proceeds to put in massive action on all streets. She didn't see that her hand was scooped up after the flop - a reasonable mistake given the muck is about two inches from where she had her hand. From my cell I heard the whole mess and didn't feel sorry for her. She is still somewhat careless and I don't get it.

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i didn't want to push two stacks of red chips in the middle in this hand, because i don't organize my chip stacks into even numbers that can easily be pushed. i just make a few big stacks of however many chips and keep stacking.

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I thought there is an obligation to keep stacks in even or discernible numbers in no limit. Not doing so slows down the game, as you will often be asked for a count anyway. For a winning player this has to be -EV.


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anyway, it was a tough feeling to get screwed out of a pot by such an inept mistake.

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I'm hoping you realize that it was mostly your mistakes but from the wording of this post I'm not sure.

~ Rick