"Burger King Hat Guy" allegedly walked away from Borgata poker table without paying $2k he owed to the pot

[Dan Druff]

There is a little-known law that all of you should be aware of when playing live poker.

Casinos CANNOT compel someone to hand over their chips.

This incldues both pit games and poker.

This is why casinos are so obsessed in the pits with you getting your money down in the betting area BEFORE they start the hand/roll/spin/etc.

If the money is sitting in the betting area, the casino has the right to take it.

If the money is NOT in the betting area, the casino cannot force you to give it up.

So let's say you're playing a poker cash game. On the river, you say "Bet 2000", and your opponent says "Call". If you flip up your hand before he puts the chips in the pot, he has a right to refuse to put the chips in, and you won't get paid! Now, when I say he has the "right", I mean by law, not by the casino's rules. The casino can (and will) throw him out and bar him from the property when this occurs, but they can't force him to pay you. This is why it's very important that your opponent actually put chips in the pot, not just say "bet" or "call", especially in pot-limit or no-limit games! Of course, if it's a longtime trusted player, you don't have to worry about this, but for most others, refuse to show your hand and refuse to act on any street until the money is actually in the pot.

This does not apply to tournaments, as players can simply be disqualified from the tournament for doing this, so they could not get away with it.

Anyway, you do have the right to call the police and file a complaint against the person if this happens, and you also have the right to sue them. However, the casino CANNOT force them to give their chips to you!

So back to this situation:

There is a Borgata regular named Tony Colamaria. He almost always wears a Burger King hat while playing (don't ask). Here is a picture of him:



Someone on 2+2 is accusing him of agreeing to go all-in for a 2k "flip" in PLO at Borgata, and subsequently not paying after losing.

For those of you that don't know, a "flip" in poker is referred to both players agreeing to go all-in for a certain amount blind, and then letting the board run out and the winner taking the pot. Each player has a 50% chance of winning, which is why it's called a flip.

2+2 user "Dangle" (claiming to be a 10-25 regular) posted the following:

Prefacing this post saying there is free money at stake here.

Situation: half four ago the guy who wears the Burger King crown is super tilted after busting at 5/10 PLO and comes back to the table with $2000. Asks for a 2k flip, third person who I am playing heads up agrees to sit out for the flip. Cards are dealt, I force him to verbalize pot repot etc. until we are all in for 2k effective. He flips over Aces and board runs out with two jacks and I scoop. I was pretty drunk at the time and unfortunately didn't have his chips put in the middle after the bets were verbalized. He free rolled me got up and left without paying the bet after realizing he has lost the hand. Floor says I have two options either press charges or have him permanently banned until he pays the bet.

I chose to have him pay up or be permanently banned. If anyone sees this guy in the borgata poker room please snap a picture notify the floor and pm me the picture. I will throw you $500 on the $2000 that is owed to me. Reputable 10/25+ reg here so my word is good. Thanks guys!

This was posted two days ago.

So basically, since it was PLO, they couldn't just go all-in blind in one action. They agreed to both say "pot", "pot", "pot", "pot" back and forth, until all of Tony's $2000 was in the pot. Indeed, according to the story, Tony kept to the first part of the agreement, by saying "pot" over and over until he was all-in.

Turned out Tony was fortunate to have been dealt aces, but they lost when the board ran out with two jacks, and Dangle ended up winning.

Dangle claims that Tony just stood up and walked away without paying, and Borgata could not force Tony to pay, as he had only repeatedly said "pot" but neither player had physically put any money in the pot.

He claims that Tony is banned from Borgata now.

You can read the 2+2 post here (scroll down to near the bottom -- post #22948): http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/19...index1530.html

Later, Dangle outlined it in more detail:

I will outline everything exactly as it happened. I hopped in the game around 7pm Sunday night (5/10 PLO). He was playing a short stack ($1000 minimum buy in) game just started and he seemed to be super lost. He was sitting directly to my left and we were very friendly the whole night, even to the extent of him asking for pointers and what to do in certain situations because he was fairly new to PLO. I get up around 1030 to go out to Mixx and he's down 2 or 3 1k buy ins at this point.

I return around 3AM and the game is three or four handed and he's still sitting below 1k. Game gets down to three handed with him on my direct left again and he seems to be pretty tilty so I assume he was down a few more shells. The third player in the game is another extremely friendly reg who plays higher with me and he can confirm the whole story btw. BK guy and third player get involved in a hand on a board of 853 rainbow where BK guy ships all in in the dark while the turn card is being dealt. Turn is 4, third player calls with the nuts and doesn't want to do any business, BK guy is pleading for him to do business and third player is saying no and the dealer hastily turns the river and it's a brick.

BK guy starts getting nasty cursing at the dealer saying he cost him money etc. Third player is actually nice enough to give the guy a ~$200 rebate! That's the worst part about this, that he received a rebate then tried to free roll. He comes back over to the table about 10-15 minutes later with $2000 in his hand. Asks for the flip, I say I'm in for a three way, third player says he's not interested. I say okay I'll still do it heads up, third player says that's fine and takes an absent button. Hole cards are dealt, I tell him to say pot and verbalize all bets like I've already said. All ins are verbalized and he snap turns over double suited aces (I think double suited, it was definitely aces for sure though) very proudly. I turn over my hand and it's AQJ8 double suited hearts and diamonds. Dealer shows flop of J5J and he snap gets up with his chips and starts walking away muttering to himself in raging tilt. I yell to the floor don't let him leave he keeps walking and he was gone before security even arrived.

I don't remember the dealer's name and I don't want to out them regardless. The floor came over filed an incident report with security and the supervisor after reviewing the tapes and I chose the option of having him repay the bet or be banned for life from the room. I chose this because it seems he plays there almost every day and I'd imagine the 2k will be less important to him long term than losing out on playing in such a good room.

FWIW about an hour after the incident I sit in a 5/10NL game and another reg tells me that after he had busted out when he received the refund, he sat down in their game and told the table he was going to come over and try to free roll us on a flip. I don't know if there's any truth to this simply because of who was claiming it.

Someone who supposedly knows Tony then stated the following:

Huh... I know Tony and this does not sound like him at all. And yes he is the only guy that wears a burger king crown on the reg in this room.

Yes he has tilt problems. And has been banned for 6 months for fighting in murmur once.

Well will be down for the fourth and see what he says.

... to which Dangle replied:

If you are friendly with him please discuss this with him or point him towards these posts. Feel free to PM me if he wants to get in touch and try to resolve this with a supervisor this weekend. Thanks!

Incidentally, 2+2 has a policy against naming players who are not famous, so they might actually censor both his real name and "Burger King Hat Guy" from the thread!

However, 2+2 is reviewing the situation and may leave it up if they believe a scam really occurred.

Obviously no proof that it really happened this way, but my gut feeling right now is to believe "Dangle".

[Dan Druff]

By the way, you might wonder why this seemingly-silly law exists.

It's actually there to protect players.

Let's look at it a different way.

Let's say you're playing in a shady casino, and you're beating them for $20,000 in blackjack, from an initial $1000 buyin, and now have $21,000 on the table.

You put out a $500 bet, get dealt 20, and the dealer turns over blackjack.

Instead of just losing $500, the dealer suddenly claims that you verbalized that you were betting your entire $21,000 stack on that hand, and reaches over and snatches all of your chips!

How could you prove that they lied?

You couldn't. It would be your word against theirs, and the cameras would only show the amount you put in the betting area ($500), but your verbal declarations (or lack thereof) would not have been captured.

Therefore, in order to prevent confusion and/or angle-shooting by either players or the house, the law states that all bets have to clearly be in the betting area in order to be valid.

This way, the camera tells the whole story.

If the money is in the betting area, it's a bet. If it's not in the betting area, it is not a valid bet, win or lose.

This extends to poker, except it applies to all streets during the hand.

Again, the casino can bar you for angle-shooting in such a fashion in poker, and the police can even arrest you, but the casino cannot force you to give up your chips.

Therefore, I strongly advise that you DO NOT ACT or showdown your hands until all money is in the pot, especially in pot limit/no limit games.

[Spdrwebb]

I have played at some casinos and when you declare all in they put an"ALL IN" button in front of you. Now the camera can see the ALL IN chip so I wonder if ou could Legally take your chips then????

[Dan Druff]

I have played at some casinos and when you declare all in they put an"ALL IN" button in front of you. Now the camera can see the ALL IN chip so I wonder if ou could Legally take your chips then????

That's a good question. Not sure about the answer to that one.

I am guessing no, because the dealer could put that there without your permission.

The whole point of this law is to force the PLAYER to physically put his chips into the betting area, thus removing the question as to whether or not he meant to bet them.

[MumblesBadly]

Hi. I'm new to the PFA Forum. I got interested after listening to a few or six episodes of the podcast. Fun and informative stuff.

But to the point: I just joined this forum to add my impression of this story even though it is a few years old. For background, I was a regular in some of the AC poker rooms a few years back, and played with this guy a number of times when he would "slum" at the lower level NLH games. And the accusation against him mentioned above doesn't surprise me.

Perhaps I am too critical of the ethics of other players, but I recall BKHG being an unrepentant angle shooter who I didnt like playing with because of that tendency, even though his usually jovial, humorous manner -- and of course his hat -- gave novices the impression that he was just kind of nutty. After enough time, though, I came to the conclusion that he used this as part of his shtick to disguise his angle shooting. That's why, for whatever it's worth, I'm not surprised by this story.

[Dan Druff]

Hi. I'm new to the PFA Forum. I got interested after listening to a few or six episodes of the podcast. Fun and informative stuff.

But to the point: I just joined this forum to add my impression of this story even though it is a few years old. For background, I was a regular in some of the AC poker rooms a few years back, and played with this guy a number of times when he would "slum" at the lower level NLH games. And the accusation against him mentioned above doesn't surprise me.

Perhaps I am too critical of the ethics of other players, but I recall BKHG being an unrepentant angle shooter who I didnt like playing with because of that tendency, even though his usually jovial, humorous manner -- and of course his hat -- gave novices the impression that he was just kind of nutty. After enough time, though, I came to the conclusion that he used this as part of his shtick to disguise his angle shooting. That's why, for whatever it's worth, I'm not surprised by this story.

Thanks for your commentary here.

This is actually common for scammers and angle-shooters. They try to put on an otherwise pleasant or lighthearted demeanor, so people won't be suspicious of them.

A scammer is rarely an outright jerk to everyone he meets.

[sevencard2003]

Hi. I'm new to the PFA Forum. I got interested after listening to a few or six episodes of the podcast. Fun and informative stuff.

But to the point: I just joined this forum to add my impression of this story even though it is a few years old. For background, I was a regular in some of the AC poker rooms a few years back, and played with this guy a number of times when he would "slum" at the lower level NLH games. And the accusation against him mentioned above doesn't surprise me.

Perhaps I am too critical of the ethics of other players, but I recall BKHG being an unrepentant angle shooter who I didnt like playing with because of that tendency, even though his usually jovial, humorous manner -- and of course his hat -- gave novices the impression that he was just kind of nutty. After enough time, though, I came to the conclusion that he used this as part of his shtick to disguise his angle shooting. That's why, for whatever it's worth, I'm not surprised by this story.

Thanks for your commentary here.

This is actually common for scammers and angle-shooters. They try to put on an otherwise pleasant or lighthearted demeanor, so people won't be suspicious of them.

A scammer is rarely an outright jerk to everyone he meets.

i got banned (luckily only 1 week) in the commerce once (most places ban much longer and it never goes away) because i grabbed the chips out of some old ladys hand who was going to put them in her purse and leave without paying because she was angry at the dealers ruling about a card coming back. i did get the money though, and later i realized i shouldnt done this, but i was too mad not to at the time. when u are homeless, and u see someone ripping u off for $100 or so, u blow up