Sorry, I know I promised an "Ask Moses" post today, but the situation dictates you allow me to vent today.  I'm venting because I was knocked out of a tournament last night with the best hand.  Not because the other guy sucked out on me, but because the deal didn't know the rules.  And to lose because of incompetence is simply unacceptable. 

Here's the situation, the results, and WHAT SHOULD HAVE HAPPENED.

Final 6 players, I have A-J.  One raiser, and I call.  Flop comes Jack high, he bets, I move all in.  Simple enough, right?  WRONG!

The dealer proceeds to deal the turn card without even paying attention to my action.  If you are going to deal, you need to pay attention.  What is the hurry? 

And what was the turn?  I don't know, because I'm not even looking.  I'm WAITING FOR THE OTHER GUY TO COMPLETE HIS ACTION.  But of course, its an Ace. 

And here is where it all goes crazy.  The dealer doesn't know what to do.  So the other player in the hand proceeds to tell him to take the Ace off the board, stick it in the deck, and deal the next card in its place.  WHAT?  ARE YOU SERIOUS?  But of course, the dealer does what the other guy tells him to do.  And of course, I don't get the Ace again, because he put it where it couldn't be played!!!

Here's the problem:  The other guy NEVER called my All In.  NEVER.  The cards were dealt out and he was declared the winner, because he turned over K-K, and only then did he say "Of course I would have called the all in".  BUT HE DIDN'T!  And if "Of course he would have called the All In, then the ACE STANDS!!!"

And I'm told oh so sorry, too bad, see ya later, have a great day.

Several problems here, not the least of which was that the guy who stood to knock me out was allowed to decide how to handle the situation (wrongly) and the guy that was dealing was also to benefit because he was in the game also, and he moved up closer to the money.

Another problem is that he never explained to me what he was doing.  One minute I'm all in, the next I have two pair, the next the other player is telling him to remove my two pair and replace it with another card....and he follows the directions to a tee.

Now, here are the ONLY TWO ACCEPTABLE SOLUTIONS to what happened, and I hope that in your home game you have the common sense to do what is right, and not what the player who benefits tells you to do.

1.  The easiest solution is to declare the hand dead, return the chips to all the players, and redeal the hand.  PROBLEM SOLVED.

2.  The CORRECT solution would have been to pull back the turn, place it in the deck, AND RESHUFFLE THE DECK!!!  It simply is not fair to remove one of my outs from play, and to tell the guy that has to call me that you have removed it from play (placing it anywhere in the deck other than the top two cards removes it from play), and then allow him to make a decision knowing that my out is GONE. 

If he had handled it via #2, I would have accepted any outcome.  But he didn't.  He just took one of my 5 outs and burned it, and told the other guy he had burned it (because the other guy TOLD HIM TO BURN IT!!!)

Yeah, I'm a tad bit upset.  I expect if you volunteer to deal all the time you should know what you are doing. 

Now that being said, I'm not mad at the guy.  He's a great guy who is always willing to volunteer.  And I'll be right back there playing again next week.  Life does go on, after all.