Similar to "Who Shows First", But a Bit Different

The TDA rules mentioned are same as cash games most places. The tournament v cash difference is for all ins. Tournaments all hands that make to showdown must show. Cash if you are loser you don’t have to show. Heck winner doesn’t have to show if he doesn’t want the pot but that is just silly case.

The funny thing is in tournaments when a person is all in before the river and there are two or more opponents the dealers don't always show mucked hands on the river.

For example when I am all in and there have been no bets on the river I will typically turn my hand over immediately. Sometimes other players will muck their hands and the dealer will put them in the muck pile and ship me the pot. Usually I don't say anything when I am in the hand on the off chance that the other player actually has a winning hand but misread it. If I have the nuts I might ask to see a hand if I want info on that player's range.

When I am not in the hand, I usually do request to see all hands because those are the rules and I do want to see the hands...

I always show my hand immediately in situations where I am certain I'm good.

This one sounds a bit marginal, as the OP only had one pair. There are definitely times when I've called down with like ace high and the opponent says "You're good" but actually had fourth pair. In this situation, I will wait to show, or at least ask something like "do you have a pair?".

If the opponent had said "queen high" in this case rather than just "you're good", I would show immediately, unless I've seen the opponent miscall their hand at showdown before or I otherwise suspect they are an angle-shooter.

My experience of people refusing to show is often bullying behavior. Many years ago at Foxwoods prior to the TDA rule change (so winning hands had to be shown regardless of whether all other hands on the river had been mucked) a guy bet on the river and a woman called and he not only didn't turn over his hand but he started telling the woman she had to turn over her hand. He did this three times. On the third time I said to him that he was the one who needed to turn his hand over because she called his bet. He then started screaming at me and called the Floor over to tell me to shut up and never be allowed to say that again. The Floor told him to shut up and said that I was correct and he needed to show his hand or muck it. Which he did (muck his hand). And the woman had to show.

Now when a player refuses to show their hand in a tournament they often try to act like what they are doing is acceptable and normal. But really its just somebody trying to bully another player into showing their hand first. Whether its because they want to see the hand, because they don't want to show their hand, or because they think maybe they could win but they don't want to show their hand unless its the best, I don't really care. Its just an attempt to get what they want at the expense of another player.

If the player whose responsibility it is to show their hand is refusing to do that and isn't mucking then if you are blaming the other player for the delay I don't think that is right. The other player does not have to be taken advantage of because the player who should be showing or mucking is not doing either.

slightly amusing take on those refusing to show first...

yesterday I had a dude berate me for not showing first and used all the arguments that have appeared in this thread and others, about how I was afraid to show my bluff, I didn't know the rules of the game, I was slowing down the game, blah, blah, blah. It was quite an angry rant.

I listened and when he finally paused to breathe, I asked the dealer to tell him who needs to show first. Dealer told Villain the proper order for a no action river, that V needed to show or muck first.

V argued with the dealer and I sat back and enjoyed the show. Finally the dealer runs out of patience and demands show or muck.

V sits silently a few seconds debating his options, checks his cards 2 or 3 more times, and then works up the courage to show his Q hi failed OESD.

I turn over the winner. I had bet flop and turn with AT for 2nd pair. Dealer pushed me the pot and before I could stack the first chip, V goes on another rant about how his prior rant was not really about who has to show first. It was because I was trying to be table captain, I'm slowing the game down, and I don't know the F-ing rules.

V was having a bad day and on at least his third rebuy.

This is the exact kind of situation I was describing in my post above. I'm not saying you did anything wrong, clearly villain was the one in the wrong.

Still sometimes it's better just to "let them win" and keep the vibe of the game light.

I can't even count the number of times that I've seen a situation like this occur, creating a tense atmosphere. Then within minutes a whale that was going to be perfectly content to donate 5 buyins over the next hour or two gets up and leaves.

Yeah you made the bad player feel bad. This is exactly what I’m trying to avoid by just showing when I think my hand is good.

In fact in this situation I would have said “I have a ten” and then he nods that it’s good, I show it.

False.

It gives him the information that his opponents knew what his hand was. They knew if he had a monster or if he was bluffing. A good player will use the knowledge that his opponents knew his hand better than they will. He will adjust and change speeds better than they will react.

Older players will recognize this in one of two ways. Back in the day, a tight player could sit down at a table, bluff an early hand, show the bluff, and then fold for two hours and many of his bad opponents would still think of him as a aggressive buffer and call him light.

Or the opposite, an aggressive player can steal pot after pot and show the occasional decent hand and his bad opponents will always think he has it. Those are two early 2000's extreme examples, but they show the point that a good player knows how he is perceived by his opponents. Showing hands is part of that.

Sorry, it's quite ridiculous to think you're the one gaining more information from showing your hands than are your opponents.

Maybe you should just play every hand face up, since you will be so good at reading what your opponents think after seeing it.

I'm surprised to find anyone on these boards to whom this concept is new or ridiculous. Why do you think we ever voluntarily show our hands?

If you have only played in games where your opponent's knowledge of your hand is stronger than your knowledge of your opponent's knowledge of your hand then you might have always been the sucker.

Of course there can be reasons you might want to show your hand, but those would be specific to the situation, not just because of a situation like the OP.

Ok. If you say so. I disagree but that is probably reflective of our playstyles and where we gain our advantages.

Now that is ridiculous considering I was talking about showing after action was completed. Not even close to the same.

If I show a particular hand (such as a bluff or an extremely loose call) I know own EXACTLY how much of a bluff it was or how loose of a call it was.

That misses the point though.

It isn't about what I am showing, it is more about how they will react to that information. Most mediocre players don't know how to play at different speeds, or if they do they overcompensate. Even fairly good players fit this description.

For example, if I end up calling a player really loose (say with bottom pair or even Ace high) and they say I am good and I show when I don't have to, for a large chunk of the player population they will react in one of two polarizing ways. They will either never ever bluff me again (meaning I can confidently fold to every raise they ever make), or they will overcompensate and try their hardest to successfully bluff me off of a hand lots of times (meaning I can continue to call them light lots of times or at minimum make it easy to get a really good physical read off of them because they are trying too hard).

For a vast majority of players, showing my hand when I don't need to makes playing my future hands against them fairly easy because most players will react in one of two polarizing ways that are easy to figure out which is which.

Sure there are good players who will synthesize that information and properly adjust, but most will fail to properly adjust even if they can synthesize the information properly.

I have a character flaw. I admit it. My gut reaction when attacked is to attack back. It's actually an improvement for me to just sit back and say nothing when, as in this case, the guy is laughably wrong.

Also poker for me is a game I play for fun. So sometimes I do things that aren't optimum EV$ but are EV+emotionally. If I played the game fairly and it drove a jerk into a nonsensical rage, I'm ok with that.

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For JimL -

Do you think if you were in the OP situation and showed your pocket aces even though you could have won the pot without showing, would that inspire your opponents to significantly change the way they play against you in very exploitable ways?

Probably not (there might be missing details that might change my answer, but as written, probably not). I also don't think I am giving away significant information by showing first with AA as it is fairly standard, maybe not a definite call, but nothing that shouldmake people play differentlyagainst you. Unless there are extenuating circumstances it is a big nothing burger either way.

Again, this goes to my point of when showing (even if obligated to show to win a pot), we should be aware of what information we are giving away and how other players will use that information. In this case the information isn't very significant so it doesn't really matter either way.

So just like what I said before, voluntarily showing your hand can be appropriate and useful in certain situations, but not like the one in the OP.

Many times I will call light if I trust my read and I have been occasionally burnt showing first when they say "you're good". I might have bottom pair or A high and they show some garbage that just happens to be better than my garbage.

When I don't turn over my hand when I don't have to it's because I don't want to have to shift gears when it isn't my choice.

Yesterday at Parx in a 2/5 NL game I was in position with 65s. I called a flop and turn bet with draws and decided not to bluff the river with my flush and straight draw because I blocked so many potential draws. So my opponent said he missed and waited for me to show. But I didn't because he had raised preflop, cbet the flop, and bet the turn and I was playing the board and i said nothing. So he mucked his hand and I won a $200 pot. But I did have to turn my hand over and that did not make his day. My guess is that if previously I had always turned my hand over when my opponent said they had missed that the guy might have realized I had nothing.

About 15 years ago I mucked a winning 9 high hand on the river and the guy turned over a 7 high hand to win a similar sized pot (20/40 LHE). Maybe a little bigger. So things sometimes do come around.

Basically the only time I turn over a hand on a checked river in position in tournaments or cash games is when I was the last to bet on the turn (or flop). Probably because that was the way the game used to be and probably should be, except card rooms don't want dealers to have to remember what happened on prior streets. If my opponent checks I often just turn my hand over in those situations. But I will always have strong preflop hands so opponents will see me as a tightish OMC. I win mostly but I don't actually care when I don't. I usually don't have to adjust because the table saw my hand.

There are advantages to turning over a hand when it is on you and you missed. Once at Foxwoods I bluffed a river with missed flush draw and when I turned my T high hand over when called my opponent misread my hand and the board and thought I had rivered a straight. so he mucked his hand. The reason i do that is I saw it happen at the Borgota many years ago when a guy bluffed was called and turned his hand over like he had the nuts. The other player shrugged and mucked their hand.

That reminds me, I used to play with someone at the Borgata who, when he bluffed the river and was called, would not only turn over his hand like it was the nuts, but also put a $1 chip on it as a tip for the dealer, which also partially obscured what his cards were.

Think that's the only angle shot I've ever heard of that I can respect.

Did you ever see it potentially work when playing with him? Obviously you can't know for sure i guess but say he had just a high card and the opponent called a big river bet.

This was a 10/20 LHE game, so the river bet wasn't that big.

And really I only noticed him doing it once, when he tried it on me. I think he had mediumish cards which looked like it could have been a straight if one card had been a bit different.

It didn't work, I squinted and maybe even asked what he had, but I didn't muck my winning hand. I'm sure he had done it other times with some success though.

I show mercy to the whales, that's it.

To anyone else running bluffs and shying away at showdown

I'll happily pause and allow you to make a fool of yourself on top of it, if that's what you choose.

I enjoy catching a thief and watching them squirm.