dead button?

[icekohne]

was in a game last night and there was a disagreement on what to do when the small blind got knocked out, he would of been the dealer for the next hand, do you play a dead button? i would just like to know the rule so when it happens again...

[xDiamond_CutteRx]

It actually can vary from place to place. A dead button is the easiest solution, the other being that the BB gets the fortunate turn of skipping his SB and inherits the button directly.

I prefer a dead button myself. It gives the previous button position for effectively two hands in a row, but IMO it's more fair that letting a player skip a blind.

[golddog]

It actually can vary from place to place. A dead button is the easiest solution, the other being that the BB gets the fortunate turn of skipping his SB and inherits the button directly.

I prefer a dead button myself. It gives the previous button position for effectively two hands in a row, but IMO it's more fair that letting a player skip a blind.

+1

[HalfSugar]

I've never heard of someone skipping a blind. We always play a dead button in this scenario so that no-one skips anything.

[xDiamond_CutteRx]

I've never heard of someone skipping a blind. We always play a dead button in this scenario so that no-one skips anything.

PokerStars will let people skip blinds if the situation comes up. Not sure how they handle it on WSOP/WPT.

[LeeG]

Everywhere I have played you can't be SB without being the BB first other than on first hand. In cash games, you might end up with 2 BB and a SB or 2SB and a BB, but in tourney, button is always frozen until both players have payed a BB and a SB.

Saw this at a recent FT. Button Seat 1. SB and BB both eliminated in hand. Button stays at seat 1, Seat 4 posts a BB. Next hand, button still on 1, and 4 is SB and 5 is BB.

[HalfSugar]

Saw this at a recent FT. Button Seat 1. SB and BB both eliminated in hand. Button stays at seat 1, Seat 4 posts a BB. Next hand, button still on 1, and 4 is SB and 5 is BB.

That's what we do at our home game and I would say it is the fairest way. I would argue that position is a less important factor to worry about here than people dodging forced bets.

[raisebot]

I've never heard of someone skipping a blind. We always play a dead button in this scenario so that no-one skips anything.

PokerStars will let people skip blinds if the situation comes up. Not sure how they handle it on WSOP/WPT.

WSOP and most (if not all, not sure about WPT) tourneys use the dead button rule. Some old school places (Binions in downtown LV comes to mind) use the forward-moving button rule (but only in their cash NL games, tourneys and limit use a dead button).

I guess one could argue that the forward-moving button rule promotes a bit more action, since there will always be at least a small blind and big blind already in the pot, regardless of a player just going bust.

[lwestatbus]

As xDiamond wrote PokerStars does allow you to skip the BB in cash games if the SB leaves or busts out. There is an unpleasant corollary to this which is that if you are UTG and waiting to post your first BB, if the about-to-be SB sits out, you get skipped and have to wait until the button passes you and then post an additional BB for your first hand. This has happened to me more than once. To add insult to injury, in at least one case a few years ago, I had to post the big and small blind when this happened but I think they've fixed this.