[OnTheButton]

Our weekly games are 99% regulars.

Occasionally a friend brings a friend, but that is not often.

Last week one of the regulars brought a friend, whom has been to our home game once before.

I've done what I can to "train" the regular players that have no casino exposure to avoid the basic table problems. Including things like not acting out of turn, and announcing your action, etc.

Saturday night, a bit late in the evening, play on a hand is down to heads up preflop, a regular and the visitor mentioned above are the only two active players, and the flop is now sitting on the board.

Now I've always told my regulars to verbalize their action to avoid confusion. It is not too much to ask for them just to state "raise" "call" or "fold" to clarify their intent. This is particularly necessary when someone intends to raise and just starts pushing chips (string betting) out into the middle. I've also told them that particularly when they intend on raising, they should declare it, and then they can fiddle with their chips all they want until they are happy with their raise amount.

So the visitor checks the flop, and the regular says "Raise" and starts counting out some stacks of chips in the betting area. The visitor frowns and says, "Jeez man you're not making a "raise" you are making a "bet" since I didn't bet anything for you to raise. And since you are making a bet, and you are doing it in more than one motion you are string betting right now."

Regular says, "So what would you prefer I say then, since I'm raising the bet to $7.00..." (He is a little intimidated since he's never played poker at a casino.)

There is a little head shaking by visitor and mumbling about "They wouldn't let you do that in a casino..."

I stepped in and said, "I've done that in a casino MANY times. (Which I have) No, I agree that it's not 100% proper to say "raise" when there is no active bet, but by saying "raise" he is in-fact declaring he will be betting at least 2x the BB to open the betting against your check. Once you say "raise" you can count out all the chips you want infront of you so long as you actually make a raise."

He grumbled a little more about "home game rules" and play resumed shortly thereafter.

It left the regular player a little uncomfortable, (since he has never played poker in a casino) and I later told him, "You didn't do anything wrong, he was just being pissy and although technically correct about what you said, the intent was clear with your announcing "raise" before you started on your action. No casino would care less if you said "raise" to a "check" so long as you didn't just start making chip piles without saying anything at all."

So any opinions on how you would have treated this scenario, or if I handled it correctly or not?

[noelsarchs]

Originally Posted by OnTheButton

Our weekly games are 99% regulars.

Occasionally a friend brings a friend, but that is not often.

Last week one of the regulars brought a friend, whom has been to our home game once before.

I've done what I can to "train" the regular players that have no casino exposure to avoid the basic table problems. Including things like not acting out of turn, and announcing your action, etc.

Saturday night, a bit late in the evening, play on a hand is down to heads up preflop, a regular and the visitor mentioned above are the only two active players, and the flop is now sitting on the board.

Now I've always told my regulars to verbalize their action to avoid confusion. It is not too much to ask for them just to state "raise" "call" or "fold" to clarify their intent. This is particularly necessary when someone intends to raise and just starts pushing chips (string betting) out into the middle. I've also told them that particularly when they intend on raising, they should declare it, and then they can fiddle with their chips all they want until they are happy with their raise amount.

So the visitor checks the flop, and the regular says "Raise" and starts counting out some stacks of chips in the betting area. The visitor frowns and says, "Jeez man you're not making a "raise" you are making a "bet" since I didn't bet anything for you to raise. And since you are making a bet, and you are doing it in more than one motion you are string betting right now."

Regular says, "So what would you prefer I say then, since I'm raising the bet to $7.00..." (He is a little intimidated since he's never played poker at a casino.)

There is a little head shaking by visitor and mumbling about "They wouldn't let you do that in a casino..."

I stepped in and said, "I've done that in a casino MANY times. (Which I have) No, I agree that it's not 100% proper to say "raise" when there is no active bet, but by saying "raise" he is in-fact declaring he will be betting at least 2x the BB to open the betting against your check. Once you say "raise" you can count out all the chips you want infront of you so long as you actually make a raise."

He grumbled a little more about "home game rules" and play resumed shortly thereafter.

It left the regular player a little uncomfortable, (since he has never played poker in a casino) and I later told him, "You didn't do anything wrong, he was just being pissy and although technically correct about what you said, the intent was clear with your announcing "raise" before you started on your action. No casino would care less if you said "raise" to a "check" so long as you didn't just start making chip piles without saying anything at all."

So any opinions on how you would have treated this scenario, or if I handled it correctly or not?

Sounds to me like their is already a BB, so isn't it a raise if more than the big blind? He either calls the bb or raises from what I read.

[Strange]

I think that you are fine with the way that you called it. Many home games don't have a betting line on the table, so its a little dubious, what 'in front of you' means.

If you said 'Raise' then reached out to the middle of the table with a stack of chips, then reached back for another, then another, that's a string bet in my opinion.

If you count out three stacks in front of you, and then push them all forward you are fine. Or if you say 'I'll raise it 200' and then put them out one at a time, you are fine,as long as you end up with 200 out there.

The whole, 'that's not a raise, its a bet' argument, just bores me.

[BPTDirector]

OTB - you made the right call - so what, the guy said raise instead of bet, currently if not in the blind round the bet was zero, so anything BB or better could be considered technically a raise in the betting although as most of us know if it's first action for that betting round it can also more correctly be called a bet if a person wanted to be an a$$ about it.

I too have seen this many times in a casino with no correction whatsoever coming from the floor persons on duty at the time. If you are like most here, and I can see you are, you want to have it the most casino like as possible at your home game even though it is a home game, but this is no 'homer' rule. Good job is what I'd say to you, keep your regular buddy in the game, friendships are important, more important than the 'bet' vs. 'raise' as a first action call after the flop - WOW, the new guy must have been getting his back side handed to him to be this picky.

BPT

[Spaceman Spiff]

Bet or raise, the intent is basically the same here. You're right, bet is technically correct, but to me, saying "raise" isn't so incorrect that it opens up some kind of other invalid action. As long as he was piling up chips in front of him (behind the imaginary betting line), he's free to count and re-count as much as he likes. The only thing that matters is that it all goes into the middle in one motion. Or, as I've been trying to train my guys somewhat, just announce what you want to raise it to (or bet) and you can go back and forth as much as you like.

[OnTheButton]

Originally Posted by Spaceman Spiff

Bet or raise, the intent is basically the same here. You're right, bet is technically correct, but to me, saying "raise" isn't so incorrect that it opens up some kind of other invalid action. As long as he was piling up chips in front of him (behind the imaginary betting line), he's free to count and re-count as much as he likes. The only thing that matters is that it all goes into the middle in one motion. Or, as I've been trying to train my guys somewhat, just announce what you want to raise it to (or bet) and you can go back and forth as much as you like.

To clarify one point.

The "regular" grabbed a handful of 25 cent chips (as many as you can hold with a "claw hand" pick-up, about 20 usually for me) and moved over the table (about elbow distance) in-front of him and started "dispensing" $1.00 stacks of four 25 cent piles after declaring his "raise" to the checker.

The chip stack in his "claw" counted out to about $5.50 and as he was counting them aloud, he said "Let's make it $7.00" and grabbed another $1.50 from the stacks infront of him and rounded out the amount.

Would you consider this a string bet?

[coyote]

Originally Posted by OnTheButton

To clarify one point.

The "regular" grabbed a handful of 25 cent chips (as many as you can hold with a "claw hand" pick-up, about 20 usually for me) and moved over the table (about elbow distance) in-front of him and started "dispensing" $1.00 stacks of four 25 cent piles after declaring his "raise" to the checker.

The chip stack in his "claw" counted out to about $5.50 and as he was counting them aloud, he said "Let's make it $7.00" and grabbed another $1.50 from the stacks infront of him and rounded out the amount.

Would you consider this a string bet?

A. My first impression was that the vistor was arguing semantics, and is a NIT.

B. But, the way you describe the regular's bet, that is starting to get in the gray area for me. Especially if he's counting off the bet while watching his opponent. Could be construed as an angle shoot of sorts...not saying that's what he did....

When you lay out the money, count it out and then go back for more, that's starting to look like a string bet to me, regardless of what you called it, raise or bet.

[Strange]

Originally Posted by OnTheButton

To clarify one point.

The "regular" grabbed a handful of 25 cent chips (as many as you can hold with a "claw hand" pick-up, about 20 usually for me) and moved over the table (about elbow distance) in-front of him and started "dispensing" $1.00 stacks of four 25 cent piles after declaring his "raise" to the checker.

The chip stack in his "claw" counted out to about $5.50 and as he was counting them aloud, he said "Let's make it $7.00" and grabbed another $1.50 from the stacks infront of him and rounded out the amount.

Would you consider this a string bet?

Eh, as stringy as a very very stringy thing.

That doesn't make him a bad person, but I can see how it might spark off a comment.

[Spaceman Spiff]

Yeah, I'd say that's getting into a real grey area. All depends on what elbow's length is and what kind of motion he made and so on, blah, blah, blah. If he says, "let's make it $7," and then counts out $5.50 and has to go back for more, no big deal. But the way it sounds like this went, if I were in a bad enough mood I might call foul on that as well. Again, it all depends on where this counting out took place. If it's off to the side or right in front of his stack, then it's fine to me. But if he's getting out toward the middle of the table and the betting area, I'd only let him bet what he was able to "claw".

[MeridianFC]

Originally Posted by coyote

A. My first impression was that the vistor was arguing semantics, and is a NIT.

B. But, the way you describe the regular's bet, that is starting to get in the gray area for me. Especially if he's counting off the bet while watching his opponent. Could be construed as an angle shoot of sorts...not saying that's what he did....

When you lay out the money, count it out and then go back for more, that's starting to look like a string bet to me, regardless of what you called it, raise or bet.

I agree with the above. At first it sounded like the guest was someone with stickuptheassitis, but with the other information it sounds like he was not out of bounds but the bettor was.