When you’re trying to become the world’s greatest professional poker player, the one thing you learn is to obey poker etiquette. For some professional players, that advice goes out of the window when playing in an intense game.
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We’ve taken a look at five times when the professionals have ignored poker etiquette.
Andreas Gann slow rolls
Slow rolling is one of the most unwelcome breaches of poker etiquette and occurs when a player with a very strong hand, whether it’s at the showdown or after the flop, takes an unreasonable amount of time in calling an all-in bet.
It creates a bad atmosphere at the poker table and in the case of Anderas Gann, turns his fellow poker players against him. When playing at the Paddy Power Poker tournament in 2015, he slow rolled against Donnacha O’Dea after flopping a flush.
After O’Dea went all-in and Gann eventually called they revealed their hands, and everyone at the table looked at Gann in disgust. The odds were looking long for O’Dea to win the hand with A6, but with the turn and the river yet to be drawn, there was still hope that Gann would be out.
On the turn, the seven of clubs was drawn. The final card was the six of hearts and the table and audience celebrated Gann being eliminated from the competition.
Mike Matusow flops before his turn
Making a move before it’s your turn can alter how someone plays their own hand, even if the player playing out of turn folds. That’s exactly what happened when Mike Matusow folded on Phil Ivey’s turn.
Tom Dwan drew a straight on the flop, forcing poker legend Phil Hellmuth to fold. Phil Ivey had red chips covering his cards, meaning Matusow was unable to see his cards. Believing Ivey had already folded, Matusow did too, but it turned out that Ivey hadn’t made his move.
There was a verbal altercation at the table in which Matusow claimed he couldn’t see Ivey’s cards, while Ivey said Matusow should have known who was still in any way. Ivey eventually folded and Dwan had to make do with a slightly smaller pot than he’d have liked.
Angle shooting by Ivan Freitez
The Venezuelan poker player Ivan Freitez caused outrage during the 2011 EPT Grand Final Madrid. At the showdown of the hand, Freitez had a full house, while his opponent, Eugene Yanayt, with a two pair, bet 275k. Freitez placed 275k down but said he was raising. After realising what he had said, he told the dealer he meant to say ‘call’ and that his English wasn’t very good.
At this point the European Poker Tour’s Executive Tournament Director, Thomas Kremser, stepped in and forced Freitez to min-raise. He also informed Yanayt that Freitez had done something similar earlier in the tournament when he had a full house.
With the new information, Yanayt had the opportunity to call Freitez’ raise to 550k or to fold. Much to everyone’s disappointment, he called, and Freitez won more money. Fellow players gave Freitez a look of disgust, while Kremser called what he did ‘ugly’. It certainly wasn’t in the spirit of the game.