Checking at a poker table

Was watching WPT on tv the other day and, i already kinda knew this, but the players all had a different way in which they checked. I think this could sometimes be misinterpreted by others players. Should there be some kind of "standard" way to check at a poker table?

The best advice I can give you is watch Chris ferguson on YouTube. Poker after dark is your best option to really watch a group of skilled pros battle it out on the felt. You should act in a repetitive way timing your checks,bets, re raises, all ins and even folds in the same time frame to not give timing tells. You could however balance you timing from semi slow to fast on a few rounds,then act different on other rounds faster or more timid to induce action or confuse people making them curious to possibly look you up, hope this helps answer your question.

There already is: tapping the table.

There's no hard and fast rule over whether you do it with one finger, which finger, your palm, your fist, or both hands and tap a little tune while you're doing it. But it is the universal signal.

As a dealer, trying to enforce one "universal" way of checking that's more specific than that would be a nightmare - imagine having to correct the players every time they tapped the table in the non-standard way, let alone trying to explain the whole thing to new players.

IMO the important thing is just that the player's action makes it clear to the dealer and players that they're checking.

Oz is right.

Players who try to be "cute" with their check at a table NOT on tv are few and far between in my experience.

In the tournament I was watching, one guy was sitting with his arms crossed and kind of tapping is own arm to check. Reminds me of the auctions you see where almost any movement could be considered a bid. In my home game we allow verbal checks, but we have played together so long we kind of know what's going on.

What I've seen primarily is that all players have a different way of checking and it seems all to be accepted. What I usually do myself is just doing the standard way and I really hope that there won't come a obligatory standard way since I have had some tells on people just the way they checked. It were bad players, but any information can come in handy. Furthermore, who cares it is often obvious whether somebody checks or not, so why a standard one?

Verbal checks are absolutely fine - in fact, it's verbal action that's binding so if a player said check then put some chips in the pot, their action would be a check.

The other thing to keep in mind, I guess, is when you're watching poker on TV you're only seeing a select few hands. While it's true that some players do have some different, "non-standard" ways of checking, you'll usually find that those players are at least consistent in the checking motion they use. So the guy that taps his own arm to check is probably doing that every time he checks.

If that's the case then I don't think it's such a big deal, as the dealer and other players who are sitting at the table hand after hand know that player tapping his arm means check.

Standard is check-raise.