Player Spashing the Pot?

[Pepper_W]

Ok folks, I have an interesting question for you.  This happened the other night in one of my tournaments and I was caught off guard with the question.  In our tournaments players are allowed 1 re-buy if they have 5,000 or fewer chips (up to the first break).  We run 20 minute blinds and were in the third blind round (300/600) about 5 minutes from calling the first break.  One of the players realized that he had 5,200 in chips and would be able to steer clear of getting involved in a hand, wanting to take an early break, but couldn't re-buy.  He called me over to the table and asked if it would be legal for him to voluntarily splash the pot 200 out of his chip stack.  The current hand had the flop showing with 4 players involved, but he had mucked his cards pre-flop. 
I've thought this one through and can find no rule anywhere that precludes the action he was requesting.   One of the live players started lobbying me in favor of letting him splash the pot since they are his chips and can do anything with them he wants.  Other players were in favor of the action as well.  So, I ultimately allowed him to splash the pot 200 and do the re-buy, but I'd like to get some feedback on this one.
One added note, the player who was lobbying me to allow it had flopped the nut boat and went on to win the hand.  I found it pretty interesting that I've finally found a poker player who could take chips from another player who wasn't even in the hand, but that's another story. 
Notwithstanding being able to tell the player to call the next blind and then fold, I'd like to hear your thoughts on allowing a player to splash the pot so that they can do a re-buy. 

The can of worms has now been opened, let's hear your comments.

Thanks
Pepper

[Nick C]

Pepper W,
 That is a NO NO. That is chip dumping at it's most blatant form. There was still time for the player to see the next hand and toss his chips into the pot, fold, and then rebuy.
That's how I see it.

[chet]

Nick has it 100% correct.

Absolutely NOT ALLOWED.  He has already folded his cards, he has NO RIGHT to do ANYTHING in the hand in question, other than to possibly ask to see a hand if he suspects collusion.  It is just as though he is not present.  If you allow him to do that how do you prevent a player from a different table from dropping some of his chips into this pot? 

This is at the least a HUGE ethical violation.

At least that is how I see it. 

Chet

[Pepper_W]

Good, I'm glad I'm on the right track.  He really caught me off guard and I made a snap judgment.  After thinking about it, I'm not going to allow this to happen again.  They have the option of calling the blind and then folding, but they won't be allowed to dump chips into the pot.  This was one of those things I've never heard of before and happened to be really busy at another table when the question came up.  I doubt it will come up again, but if it does they need to just play nice without the donations.
 

[Stuart Murray]

i generally find problems like these will be generated in structures that only allow a re-buy if x chips or below, change it to an add-on which can be taken as a re-buy and you will have no more problems like this, btw ditto previous responses.

Stu

[Nick C]

Stuart,

 That's a great fix! Problem solved.

[Spence]

i generally find problems like these will be generated in structures that only allow a re-buy if x chips or below, change it to an add-on which can be taken as a re-buy and you will have no more problems like this, btw ditto previous responses.

Stu

I agree with Stu here. If you still want to allow re-buys then the player must go broke first otherwise 1 add-on at the end of the re-buy period will alleviate your problem.

[Pepper_W]

My wife and I went through the responses since she helps me run the game.  In our game we allow 1 re-buy before the break and an add-on at the break.  We've decided that they must be felted before they can re-buy.  But, they may not put chips in the pot at any time unless they are calling or raising.   If they do, they aren't allowed to re-buy.

I appreciate all your comments.