Rick's Cafe Americain

Ferrari has provided an explanation of his “all in” rule.  It was a bit long for the comments section, and it warrants posting in its own right, so here it is. My response has been relegated to the comments of my own post.

Iggy, the ball is in your court.

I have no recollection of the hand between me and Swish or any subsequent discussion. None. Zero. I don’t think it was me.

Whether I have reached into my pocket before or not is besides the point.  The general rule of the table has been for people to “go light” for good or evil. (I think evil.) I just figured going light was a misguided attempt at courtesy. I guess I apologize for playing along. When in Rome, etc. I never would have guessed that all-in was in any way improper or an advantage - and I don’t think it is. 

As for Coach’s suggestion, if going light is the norm then the ATM distinction is irrelevant, as the table has always been willing to give a player credit at our crew’s home games. The player can just trot out to the ATM after the hand.

Finally, I don’t understand your aversion to “explaining.” Any beginning players that need an explanation of hand value would do well to hear an explanation of table stakes. It is simple and clean and - if you are really going for a casual and fun game - keeps the cost of the game from really getting out of control.

Oddly, this has never come up in any of the home games I’ve been involved with.  If a player runs out of chips, we have always allowed them to “pull from the pot” to cover any bets that they want to call through the end of the hand.  If they win, great, no need to buy in again.  If they lose, they have to buy in and match what they pulled.  If it’s a split pot, they slide what they pulled to the person with the other half of the pot and then chop the rest.  If the player loses and doesn’t want to continue playing, a simple exchange of cash (rather than a buy-in) is done with the winner of the hand.  If he doesn’t have the cash, table credit is always an option we have used.

This keeps things neat and easy.  I suppose that allowing a player to declare “all-in” keeps it neat and easy too.  The point is that it really needs to be one way or the other.  A hybrid rule just seems to encourage cheez.

I think that of all of Ferrari’s enumerated reasons for allowing people to dip into their wallets, (h) and (i) are the most valid.

Ashpnxma ... I agree completely with your comments (I think of going light as being the functional equivalent of going into your wallet).  The one difference is that my game is not always between a close knit bunch of friends and therefore table credit is not always an option.  I obviously would have loaned the money to Ugarte, but that was not what he wanted (which may have had something to do with the fact he was pretty sure he was going to lose the hand).

MORE POKER???? ARRRGGHHH… I am shocked, shocked to find so much gambling going on at Rick’s.

(Somebody hadda say it...)