Who was wrong at this tourney?

A friend of mine and I recently played a No Limit tournament and he thinks that he was ripped off. Here is what happened. It was pretty late (blinds were 600/1200 and everyone started with 4000) and a lot of people were getting knocked out. At his table he has just posted the big blind and eventually folded his hand. He was then asked to move to a second table where the only open seat was the small blind. So he then had to post a small blind and then on the next hand post a big blind with left him extremely short stacked. Nevertheless he had to go all-in on his big blind hand with junk and was knocked out. He was really mad saying that wasn't right that he had to post so many blinds in a row (especially since he was short stacked to begin with). Was this the tournaments fault for not seeing that they were moving him from a button position to small blind position or should he have said something? What is the common standpoint on this for tournaments when you are asked to move? Could he have simply waited for a couple hands and then sat down at the empty seat thus skipping the blinds? Thanks.

This is actually something that I am curious about as well. I do not have much live tourney experience. The only time this came into play for me when I was moved to another table we simply waited to deal me in until after the button had passed me. this is how I understood the correct way to do it was so I had no problem not being dealt in for a couple of hands until the button had passed me.

Anyone have anymore info on the correct way to do this?

Online, at least, if you come in at the BB, you post, if you come in "at the SB" you wait until the button passes, as this would mess up the blinds for the other players as well, but you don't have to post once the button passes. All other positions you're just dealt in.

Yeah he should have got a free pass until the button passed him. Go to Home Poker Tourney And look at the Poker rules section. They have an extensive write up on dead button and moving player rules. All rules are according to Robert's Rules of Poker. Pretty standard and universally accepted format.

Why didn't they just move the person who was at his table that was in the vacant spot? I think he got a bum deal too.

I've seen it happen all the time at a regular casino's tournament (not online)..Not sure exactly how it works, but, I've seen it time and time again.

In most tournaments I have seen (and the way I prefer to play it)

If you move to another table, you cannot come in on the small blind, or the button. If you are seated where the small blind would be, you have to wait until the button passes you.

If you are moved to a new table in the middle of the tornament, you do not have to post a blind to start playing at that table, unless you happen to be seated at that position in the table.

Whoops sorry about the original post. I was backwards, I meant at the second table he was seated once again in the big blind spot and then the next hand posted the small blind. So in 4 hands he posted big blind, then small blind (table A) and was then moved to table B where he was seated in the BB position and had to post BB and then SB. Thus he posted 4 blinds (total of 3 big blinds) in 4 hands. I told him that it is probably just part of the game in tournaments but he was really mad (and I can't say I blame him either when those 4 blinds were over 80 % of his stack. lol )

Originally Posted by TeABaG_

Whoops sorry about the original post. I was backwards, I meant at the second table he was seated once again in the big blind spot and then the next hand posted the small blind. So in 4 hands he posted big blind, then small blind (table A) and was then moved to table B where he was seated in the BB position and had to post BB and then SB. Thus he posted 4 blinds (total of 3 big blinds) in 4 hands. I told him that it is probably just part of the game in tournaments but he was really mad (and I can't say I blame him either when those 4 blinds were over 80 % of his stack. lol )

This makes a lot more sense. What you did was not wrong, but it was not good for him. It was both fair and un-fair.

In the future, you can make a choice. If you sit in the big blind, you can choose to pay the big blind, or you can choose to sit out these hands until the button passes.

When the player has the choice, he will always be happy.