Cheating in Coolers

[slapdash]

As documented in another thread, I've been playing quite a lot of "Coolers" on Boss recently (10 player STTs where the top 5 double their buy-in, minus rake, and the other 5 lose). There's quite a lot of low-level "cheating" in these. It seemed to die down for a while, but has recently restarted. For example, if it's down to the last six and the short stack is all-in or almost all-in, players will urge others to call. I actually don't think that this matters too much, as I don't think it's going to influence anybody very often, but it's irritating. More significantly, players will go all-in and say what they have (usually big PP or AK). This does matter, as if it deters another player from calling, then that seriously disadvantages the other players. Usually, if you get to find out, they're telling the truth, though a few players will show a bluff when everybody folds, which just seems stupid. Also, sometimes players say what they have before it's their turn to act, presumably to try to stop other players from betting. I'm not really sure how to deal with this. I've never said anything, because in this form of poker you don't want to make enemies: in the later stages you're frequently going all-in to steal the blinds, and you don't want a larger stack to call you out of spite. I suppose I ought to complain to Boss, but I don't really have any confidence that they'd do anything.

[AJ]

Re: Cheating in Coolers

More significantly, players will go all-in and say what they have (usually big PP or AK). This does matter, as if it deters another player from calling, then that seriously disadvantages the other players. Usually, if you get to find out, they're telling the truth, though a few players will show a bluff when everybody folds, which just seems stupid.

Is that cheating as such ? Poker is a game of psychology after all