Exposed card on initial deal

[Glenn Doyle]

Hello all. I'm just wondering about your opinions on the current rule regarding an exposed card on the initial deal.

If any card except the first or the second card is exposed on the initial deal it is replaced with the burn card. I'm not a fan of this rule for the reason as follows. I'm going to give an example to illustrate clearer:

10 handed NLH tournament.
The first 20 cards off the deck are players hole cards.
If any of them flips (except the first or second) they are replaced with card #21 which is meant to be the burn card.
During the short period of time that the dealer is giving the player the burn card and then placing the exposed card on top of the deck, the first card on the flop is being shown.
If this card is marked and a player has knowledge of this they are at a massive advantage knowing 33% of the flop before it actually comes out.

My suggestion to a change of the rule is that if any card flips (due to dealer error or not) it is declared a misdeal providing substantial action hasn't occured. I would like to hear other members suggestions on this rule and also what options we could have if substantial action has occured in the hand when a card flips.

Apologies if I haven't explained this too clearly. I hope you understand.

Glenn.

[K-Lo]

This is a really good point, although I'm not sure the best or only solution is to declare a misdeal. The other option is to treat the the dealer-exposed cards as a mucked card, give the replacement card, and then burn again before dealing the flop. The only issue with this is that only 2/3 of the original flop is preserved; however, your point that if the top of the first flop card is marked could certainly justify varying the contents of the flop.

[Glenn Doyle]

Yes your point is a good one also. I'm personally not the biggest fan of prioritising to keep the boards cards the way they are. I believe they should all be there original way or all different. The only exception I have off hand to this is when a board card gets produced prematurely.

You are probably correct about declaring it a misread not being the best solution so I thought I'd try get more opinions.

Thanks for your input K.

[pokerfish]

IMO misdeals take WAY too long.... and when was the last time you noted not only a marked/flawed top card, but knew what it was? I think the current rule is fine as it keeps the game moving. With the clock running and a player's chips becoming less valuable with each limit, misdeals are the last thing we want to encourage.... also, this opens up for more players to take shots. Imagine if they really did that?

Jan Fisher

[Nick C]

I agree with Jan. In addition: calling a misdeal when any player has a complete hand, would be a very unpopular decision. Imagine the dealer taking away your pocket aces because he flipped the next players card! I'm also not in favor of altering the proper board.

I also can't understand how substantial action could take place before the deal is complete?

How many marked cards are there in this deck?

The best solution is to keep it the way it is.

[Glenn Doyle]

Thank you guys for the replies. I'm starting to agree with you all.

It was just an incident that arose as a local tournament and I thought about it afterwards.

Plus just in relation to the substantial action before the initial deal is complete - I have seen it happen although it is very rare.

[K-Lo]

Yes, although I agree with you that, in theory, there could potentially be an issue, I think the chances of this set of circumstances happening (i.e. someone marks or knows of a marked card, AND can recognize it, AND the one above just happens to be the one that gets exposed, AND it is not one of the first two cards, AND the mark happens to be clearly visible after the replacement card is dealt, AND the person who knows the card remains in the hand....) is probably so small practically speaking that it would be overkill to change the entire rule just for that. But I do respect the fact that you've put your mind to the risks.

[Tristan]

Agreed.  It is a valid concern but when you really break it down it is statistically a very small risk (even knowing the marked card, it's 1/52 chance that it would show at that point and that doesn't include deck positioning by the dealer, etc.) and it wouldn't be a popular change by the players...I could already picture what Negreanu would have to say about that change!

[Glenn Doyle]

Yeah that is all very true. When it first came up I thought that's going to have to be changed but now after further thought it's better the way it is.