Rules for Middlemost, faculty poker game
Editor’s note: A group of Cornell College faculty have been meeting to play poker for over 50 years. According to Professor Emeritus of Politics Craig Allin, “Possibly the game we play more often than anything else is a game I invented, which we call Middlemost Ehrmann. Only Truman [Jordan] and I ever met the man or have possibly even thought of why we call it that.”
Middlemost, originally known as Middlemost Ehrmann in deference to the former dean who introduced the game from which this one evolved, is a six-card stud game typically played as a high-low split. At faculty poker, house rules decree that the best low hand is A-2-3-4-6, because A-2-3-4-5 is a straight, but that is not essential to the game.
Play proceeds as follows: each player is dealt 3 cards face down, followed by the first bet.
The middlemost of these “hole” cards (and any other card of the same denomination in the player’s hand) is wild. The middlemost card is determined by arranging the cards from lowest to highest with the Ace counting as both lowest and highest. In the sequence 7-9-J, the 9 is wild. In the sequence 7-7-J, the 7s are wild. In the sequence A-7-J, either the 7 or the J can be middlemost, because A-7-J is also 7-J-A. Furthermore, a player contesting for both high hand and low hand is permitted to use the wild card selection most favorable for each. Because Aces are both high and low, the following sequences are all permissible: A-A-7, A-7-A & 7-A-A. In two of the three, aces are wild; in the third it’s the 7.
After the first bet, one card is dealt face up followed by the second bet. (Repeat twice.)
Each player now has three cards down, three cards up (six card stud) and at least one wild card. There have been a total of four bets.
When the six card hand is complete, play continues with the first of two “exchanges.” Beginning with the player to the immediate left of the dealer, each player in turn is offered the opportunity to discard any one of their six cards and to have that card replaced with a card from the deck. Down cards are replaced with down cards and up cards are replaced with up cards. The fifth bet follows the first round of exchanges, and the sixth and final bet follows the second round of exchanges.
The game concludes with a simultaneous “declaration” of intent to contest for high hand or for low hand or for both. Each player takes two chips out of sight below the table and returns with a closed fist. When all players are ready, fists are open simultaneously, revealing zero, one or two chips indicating the intent to contest for low, high, or both low and high respectively. A player contesting for both low and high is eliminated from both if beaten for either.
