Will I Ever Publish Another Blog Post?

Well, the question answers itself, doesn't it?  If you are reading this, the answer is decidedly yes!

OK, so I guess what I mean then, is this my last blog post?  Will I ever publish another blog post after this one?  

I think so. I intend to, anyway. Maybe another one very soon.  

I just noticed that my last post was published in November of last year.  November!  Long time, no blog!  

My productivity was already waning even before the initial lockdown hit, and after that, well, the lockdown took away my will to live write. And my material. Even though I have some posts "mentally" written, forcing myself to get in front of a keyboard has been exceedingly difficult.  Plus, I've been busy, mostly with personal stuff that I can't talk about but also with things like taxes and Vegas trips.  

Did I say Vegas trips?

I did, I did.

If you don't follow me on Twitter, you might not know that I have been to Vegas twice since Mid-April.  Yes, twice.  If I can shake off the writer's block, I should be able to crank out a few posts about those trips, now, shouldn't I?

Yes, I should.  Perhaps of equal note, remember that poker room out in Ventura that I was my go-to room for many years when I was home in L.A.?  Well, I was sure it was never going to re-open, but somehow it did!  Back in February in fact.  And I've been to it several times and although none of the game reports were that exciting, I certainly feel that I owe your folks a review of the new location   So there's that.

And I have a doozy of a story that only tangentially relates to Vegas, about what I went thru to get a credit card that I wanted to have in my wallet before my most recent Vegas visit.  I estimate that it will roughly be an 87-part post, so decide for yourself if you really want me to shake the writer's block.

So I do have some material.  It's just a matter of forcing myself to write it up.  Fortunately my pal Don came up with a series of text messages about the hell he recently went through trying to escape the parking structure of a major Vegas casino/resort, and even before I asked if I could run them as a guest blog post (which I was about to do), he volunteered to have them published in this here blog.

So I at least have one, mostly pre-written post that I can get up fairly quickly.

Hopefully more after that.

So, as I used to say whenever I ran a mult-part blog post, stay tuned.

And so.....if I get back to writing regularly, maybe I will be comfortable enough writing that I won't have to rely on the crutch of using the word "so" so many damn times in a post.

To finish this off, here's a pic of the kind I know my readers always used to look forward when I published regularly.  In fact, I'm quite sure that pics like these are the main reason you all miss my blog.  Enjoy!

I Played Live Poker....Seriously! (Part 1)

Driving Around in Circles (Part 1 of 2)

The title is accurate. Unfortunately, I got a little carried away and wrote so much preamble, I won't get to the actual poker until part 2.  So unlike me to get so wordy, I know.  Don't worry, the second part is written and I will post it in just a day or two.

But on Saturday, August 29, I actually played poker.  Real, live poker.  And not some seedy little underground home game.  Nope, it was totally above board, real live poker an in actual brick and mortar card room.  Actually it was full-fledged casino, in fact.  In California, yet.

So no, I didn't go to Vegas.  And no, Emperor Gavin Newsom did not come to his senses and deign to allow casinos and card rooms to open in the state he rules.  In fact, he came out with new guidelines for re-opening the state's economy that are virtually impossible to ever meet until COVID-19 completely disappears.  Basically, if it is up to Emperor Newsom, the state won't re-open until NASA is able to send astronauts to Uranus and back.  That's only a mild exaggeration.  It really looks like we are locked down for the rest of the year.  Or perhaps we will open up completely on, say, November 4.  We'll see.

But although he no doubt thinks he is, Newsom isn't quite God. Many years ago, CA made a deal with a number of Indian tribes to allow casinos on their land.  Due to agreements with both state and federal authorities, casinos on Indian land are not subject to most state laws. The Indian lands are basically sovereign nations within the state of CA.

Thus, Indian casinos in CA are very different than the card rooms in the state.  The Bike, Commerce, Player's Casino in Ventura…..they are all card rooms.  You won't find a slot machine in any of them.  They do have table games, but they have weird rules because it is against CA law for anyone to play against the house.  That's why poker is fine.  For blackjack, someone other than the house must bank the game.  You can't bet against the Bike.  You bet against a third-party that is the banker.  In reality this third-party is usually just a big corporation unrelated to the card room but just as big, financially speaking. Somehow there is a rake or a "collection" involved so that both the house and the banker make money.  Of course just like any blackjack game, the odds are stacked against you.

But in these Indian casinos, it's pretty much just like Vegas.  For one thing, there are slot machines.  Boy are there slot machines!  I believe that a few years ago there was a proposition on the ballot that would allow the CA card rooms to have slot machines.  You can bet the Indian gaming lobby spent a boatload of money advertising against it, and it failed. The table games play like Vegas table games.  And the poker plays like….well poker.

So when the Emperor shut down the state in March, there was really nothing to stop the Indian casinos from keeping open and operating as they had been.  But they all shut down, at least initially. I think they, like everyone else, had safety concerns, and for sure they didn't want any bad publicity from an outbreak. Not sure if they were worried about legal liability since they are sovereign nations.  But they all shut down, to the best of my knowledge.

In fact, in the brief period when Emperor Newsom had come to his senses and started re-opening things, I'm not sure all the tribal casinos re-opened.  But then, three weeks later, the Emperor freaked out and closed everything back down.  There was no reason for the tribal casinos to close, but most did.  I believe that the only one in Southern CA to either stay open or re-open shortly after a brief close was a new one, Jamul Casino in San Diego county.  A few in Northern CA opened around the same time.  But nothing near me.

The nearest Indian casino to me is Chumash, north of Santa Barbara.  I have been there once, many, many years ago when I was a limit player. I don't remember much about it other than it wasn't worth the drive.  If I recall correctly, the limit game I played (2/4 or 3/6 most likely) had either a kill or a half-kill, which I have always disliked.  It's a long drive, and it's on some less than great roads, and it takes you thru a wonderful tourist town called Solvang, which is great to visit but not to drive through if you're mostly anxious to play poker.

I was surprised that Chumash stayed closed during the second lockdown.  But finally the other day, looking through Bravo, I saw they had games running.  I think they re-opened August 21.  But I also saw that another tribal casino had games running—Morongo Casino, out near Palm Springs.  I believe they re-opened around the same time.

It started to occur to me that I now had two choices if I wanted to play poker badly enough (and of course badly is the only way I play poker). And I started considering it.

Google maps told me that Chumash was slightly closer but a somewhat longer drive.  Morongo was just a straight shot down Interstate 10.  Easy Peazy.  About a 90-100 minute drive.  A long way to go for an afternoon, but doable.  Although I had never been inside, I do recall driving it past it once over 20 years ago when I had a meeting out past it for work.  I remember being rather surprised to see a casino out there in the middle of the desert, in the middle of CA.  This was long before I was playing poker.

Well, I'm sure you all read my second to last post (here).  You know how I feel about having been under house arrest since mid-March.  You know it has been driving me more than a little bit nuts.  The thought of actually having something to do, someplace to go on a Saturday, had great appeal to me.  But I'm not crazy (at least, not totally crazy).  I had concerns of course of catching the virus. Would it be safe?

I had decided that Morongo would be the preferable choice, especially since they had 1/3 NL ($100-$300) as opposed to 2/3 NL (I assume $100-$300).  I checked their website and their safety protocols looked pretty solid.  I began thinking more and more of scheduling a trip out there to check it out. 

I didn't rush over there because I naively thought we might just be days from California opening up and that poker rooms nearer to me would be available.  Like Bike or Commerce.  Or in a perfect world, my Ventura room. After all, that spike in hospitalizations and deaths that sparked the Emperor to shut us back down had passed.  Everything was looking positive.  Surely we could open up again. I really thought that. Silly me, fool that I was, I gave Newsom way too much credit.

On Friday, August 28, Emperor Newsom released his new guidelines, and as I've indicated in the opening of this post, the guidelines are a joke.  A sick, sick joke. No chance of a poker room under the Emperor's control opening any time soon. 

That pretty much clinched it for me.  I wasn't going to playing poker in CA anytime soon.  I was so sick of being locked up in my house, seeing no one, doing nothing. And I finally had something to do other than going out and picking up fast food (and, on occasion, eating it at a table outside of the restaurant). And of course, of course, I sure did miss playing poker.  Man, did I miss it.  I even missed getting felted with the dreaded pocket Kings (although I missed that more like you miss a toothache when it finally goes away).

But now there was an additional reason to drive out to Morongo and try to play some poker.  It was to say, "F*** you, Gavin Newsom!" The Emperor hates it when any of his subjects has a good time, or even tries to have a good time. He hates those Indian casinos that he has no control over being open. It really pisses him off.

If I could have some fun and at the same time piss off Emperor Newsom, well that might just my new definition of a perfect day. Man, I do love those Native Americans.

So it was no coincidence that it was the very day after His Royal Highness released his new, impossible-to-meet guidelines, that I found myself driving east to find the Morongo casino.

I wasn't sure what the food situation would be when I got there.  It appeared they might have had some indoor dining available (again, totally prohibited by Emperor Newsom, but this is sovereign land) but I wasn't sure.  I thought about stopping at some fast food place on the way, but decided I didn't want to take the time.  I had a quick, early lunch at home and hit the road so I could get there as soon as possible.

The first 2/3's of the drive out there is identical to the one I take to get to Vegas.  Thus, when I approached the I-15, which I'd take to go to Vegas, the toughest thing to do was to drive right past it and keep going straight. It took a lot of self-restraint not to head North on the 15, but I did it.  Then I was unfamiliar territory but Google maps did its job and eventually, after about an hour and a half, I could see the Morongo casino from my car.

It was then that Google maps totally failed me.  You see to get from the freeway to the casino, you have to navigate that traffic atrocity known as the "traffic circle." Or maybe they are known as "roundabouts" although there might be some distinction between the two.  No matter what you call them, they are the worst invention the history of mankind. Seriously, I cannot put into words how much I hate traffic circles.  They should be banned immediately.  Furthermore, the inventor of traffic circles should be water-boarded non-stop for the rest of his life (I assume a man invented him, I have too much respect for women to believe any female could be stupid enough to have come up with the concept).  If said inventor is already dead, I have no doubt that he is currently spending all eternity in hell.

Let me put it this way: If you told me Gavin Newsom invented traffic circles, I would believe you.

I am confident I handled the traffic circle you come to when you exit the 10 at the Morongo as Google instructed me, but somehow, as soon as I entered said traffic circle, I heard the beep from Google maps telling me that it was re-routing me because I was off the suggested route.

Did I mention there was some road construction all around the Morongo and near the exit?  Perhaps things were not as Google maps as expected.  Or perhaps what I assumed was the entrance to the traffic circle was an entirely different road.  Who the hell knows.

All I know is that Morongo was sitting right there, directly across the freeway, I could almost reach out and touch it.  But I couldn't get there from where I was.  Nope.  And Google maps was telling me to take this dinky little two lane road, barely paved, for another mile or so.  Parallel to the 10 but there was no place to turn to get to the casino.  So I started driving away from the casino, far away.  Oddly, the map program didn't tell me to turn around.  Just keep going.  Farther and farther away from my destination.

Eventually I came to a street to turn on.   Well that street actually took a left turn almost immediately after I got on it.  Maps didn't warn about this, but luckily I figured it out before taking another wrong turn (or in this case, going straight when I should have turned left).

Now I was north of the freeway (same side as the casino) and eventually I could see the casino again.  But then….the damn Google maps program told me to take the second (or whatever) exit from the upcoming traffic circle.  Oh f*** me.  Another damn traffic circle???  Yes.  By now I could literally walk to the casino from where I was, if only I could have left my car in the middle of the road.  Would have been a two minute walk. But no, I had to enter the traffic circle. Which I did. Or so I thought.  Nope, I missed the traffic circle.  I think it was just past where I had already turned.  And where I had turned was the entrance to the 10, going east!  So, not the way I had come from, but toward Arizona (I wasn't really that close to Arizona).  So I had to go another mile or so out of my way before I could exit the freeway and try again to find the damn casino.

If there was another traffic circle waiting for me when I exited freeway, I have blotted it out of my mind.  To my surprise, I was on a different street that paralleled the freeway, different than the one I had been on just a minute ago only to get on the freeway going to east. And as luck would have it, there was no damn traffic circle to navigate to enter the casino parking lot this time.  I was able to turn right into it!  Victory!

The parking lot is poorly marked.  After seeing one sign that said self parking this way, I couldn't actually find a lot that said self-parking.  And I saw no sign indicating there was a parking garage, so I assumed there wasn't one.  But once I was inside the casino, I did see signs directing you to the parking garage.  Wish I had known there was one and how to find it, it would have been preferable to parking outside in the desert sun.  Oh yes, this is in the desert, very similar climate to Vegas and hotter than my neighborhood.

But I found a spot near one of the entrances and got lucky, as it was the entrance nearest the poker room.  Of course before I got inside I had to be screened.  The temperature check was different from others I've seen.  You had to stand about 6 feet from the screener and lower your mask (masks were of course required).  Weird. The screener held something that looked like a small TV camera and pointed it at me, and somehow determined it was ok for me to enter the property.

Ordinarily I would check out the casino before heading to the poker room but I knew I'd be on the waiting list for a good long while so I'd have time to explore once I got on the list.  Now, although there is a big sign indicating the Poker Room is right next to the entrance I used, it turns out that poker room is down a long, dark hallway, hidden away from the main casino floor.  It was almost like entering a speak-easy.

What happened when I walked down that long, dark hallway?  You'll have to come back for part 2 to find out.  But I promise, I really will report on some live poker hands.  Honest!  Stay tuned. Or better yet, go to it right now, it's here.

Edited to add:  My pal Norm sent along this pic with his comment (see below), and of course it is perfect.  Thanks, Norm!

What Would I Do?

Often the most interesting hand of a session doesn't involve me.  That was the case in my latest visit to Ventura.  It involves a woman who took a really long time to decide whether or not to make a call.  I had plenty of time to analyze the situation myself while she tanked.  Let's see if you agree with my analysis.

The female player in this story seemed like a reasonably solid player, had been fairly active, had hit a few nice hands and had built up her stack to over $500.  The other player was the guy on my right, who hadn't played many hands at all.  He had worked his stack down to about $220.  From the few hands he'd played it would be reasonable to consider him at least somewhat nittish, or perhaps he was just really card dead.

I can't remember the exact action preflop.  I know the lady raised to $40.  I'm not sure if there had been a bunch of limpers or if maybe it had been raised and that was a three-bet.  It's not unusual for this game to see someone bet that much preflop as a first raise, especially after bunch of limpers.  I had no reason to think that she didn't have a big hand.

It folded to the guy on my right who called. He was the big blind. Everyone else folded.  I I had already folded under-the-gun. So it was heads up.

The flop was 10-10-4, rainbow.  The guy was first to act.  And he shoved.  Hmmmm….

The lady went into the tank.  She asked for a count.  It was $181.  That was a really large bet into a pot of around $80.  At one point she lifted up her cards rather casually like she was taking one last look before folding.  I was upset that perhaps the player on her left could see her hand because if she folded and she showed one player her cards, everyone should get to see them.  I wanted to know what she considered a $40 hand.

But instead, she flipped over her hand, and put the cards face up in front of her.  And she looked at the other player to see some reaction.  I guess here it's ok to expose your hand like that.  Some rooms it is not allowed.

Oh, I suppose I should mention that the two cards were both Aces.  I couldn't get any read from the profile of the player next to me, and apparently she couldn't either.  She continued to tank, she called for time, and you could almost see the wheels turning in her mind as she considered what to do. 

So I played "what would I do?"  What hand could he have where his donk-shove made sense?  If he had a 10, wouldn't it make more sense to bet smaller?  Hell, since they were heads up, wouldn't it make sense for him to check, assuming she would most likely c-bet, then he could check-raise?  I was thinking he really didn't want a call, did he?  A shove-bluff? 

The counter was that nothing this guy had done all day indicated that he was likely to make a move like that.

So let's step back a bit. What hands would he call a $40 bet with preflop?  Any with a 10?  Well pocket 10's, but donk-shoving the flop with quads would be such a horrible play you have to rule it out.  Ace-10, Jack-10, 10-9?  Even suited that would be a stretch. But not impossible.

More likely he'd call with a pocket pair, probably a big one.  But if he had Kings he'd likely have re-raised preflop, right?  Even likely with Queens.  If he called with Jacks, he had an overpair.  But with any overpair, he's got showdown value.  Would it make sense to shove Queens or Jacks there?  If she has Ace-King she folds easily, whereas if he checks he'd at least likely get a c-bet out of her. You don't want to turn a big overpair into a bluff at that point.  So I'm thinking that he likely doesn't have a big pair.

Is he bluffing with a small pocket pair?  Or even two unmatched big cards?  The thing is, there really isn't any draw he's afraid of on that board. Which is why a 10 is so unlikely.  I mean if the other card was a Jack or a 9, or if there was two of a suit, maybe he's so afraid of getting drawn out on that he shoves just to make sure it doesn't happen.  Wouldn't be a good move but I see people do it all the time.  But with this board, if he has a 10, he's not worried about it.

What about pocket 4's  Well, I doubt he's calling $40 pre with 4's.  But if he did and flopped a boat, why the hell would he open shove?  Of course there's always a chance she could draw to a bigger boat (it's happened to me recently).  But do you really shove with a boat because you're  worried about that?  I don't think so.

So for the last two minutes I sat there getting a bit impatient.  I had decided that she had to call.  I just couldn't think of any hand he might have where it made sense to shove other than some crazy bluff.

And so finally the lady shrugged and called.  And the dealer dealt two more cards. I don't remember what they were.  But when the river was out, the guy meekly said, "you're good," and mucked his cards face down.  And then he got up and left.  So I'm afraid I can't report to you what he had.

After he was gone, there was quite a discussion on the hand as the lady stacked her chips.  I wanted to be sure I remembered correctly so I asked her if he had indeed open shoved the flop.  He had.  I said, if he had a 10 why wouldn't he have checked and let you bet?  She said she felt the same way.  She knew it didn't make sense for him to have a 10 and play it that way.  But then she was thinking maybe that was exactly what the guy wanted her to think. Maybe he was making it look like a bluff so he'd call his monster?

Obviously she didn't let that thought win out in her mind.  She made the right call.  What do you think?  Am I missing something?

I had a modestly profitable session.  I three-bet with pocket Aces and didn't get a call.  I saw a flop for free from the big blind with 8-4 off (six-way flop).  Flop was Ace-10-8 so I called $6 and it was four-way. The turn was a 4 so I bet $25. One call.  I bet $50 on a brick and didn't get a call.

Next hand, in the small blind, I had Ace-King of hearts. A guy shoved his last $49.  It folded to me and I called.  The big blind folded.  He didn't show.  I liked the flop.  Ace-King-10  He couldn't have Queen-Jack could he?  The board blanked out and he didn't show after I showed my top two.  He said he had "kicker problems."

With pocket 7's I called a $6 straddle.  It was four-way.  The flop was Jack-7-3.  I bet $12 and didn't get a call.

With Ace-King I made it $15 after on limp.  It was three-way.  The flop was 10-9-9.  I made a c-bet of $30 and didn't get a call.

With Jack-5 in the big blind and no raise, five of us saw a flop of King-Jack-3, two spades.  I checked and called $10. (Edited to add: Originally I posted that the last card was a 5, indicating I had flopped two pair.  That was a typo. I just flopped middle pair and had trip Jacks on the turn)  The turn was good news/bad news.  It was the Jack of spades. So I had trips but had to be a bit worried about someone already having a flush.  I checked and called $25, we were now heads up.  The river was a brick and I checked, he checked behind and said he missed his draw.

I booked a $65 win.

Falling Into The Abyss

Have you heard about "The Abyss"?

That's the name of a tournament being offered at the Commerce as part of their coming tournament series. And it's unique.  As it says right on the structure sheet, "The Abyss seeks to become the deepest tournament in poker history."

Now, they are not making it the deepest tournament in poker history by starting with a humongous starting stack.  No, not at all. It's 20K to start off the tourney.  The buy-in is $360.

What makes this tournament the deepest in history are the levels on day 1.  Or should I say, "level" on day 1.  You see there's only one level.  It's 100/200 with a 200 big blind ante.  But that level remains constant for the entirety of day 1.  The blinds do not increase at all during day 1. All the day 1's (all four of them) will play exactly 8 hours (from 3pm-11pm).

Not only that, but the first two hours of day 2 continue at 100/200/200 for the first two hours.  So if you can keep your stack (or at least part of it), you can play a 10-hour level of 100/200/200. After that, the levels go to 20-minutes until level 25-28 (30-minutes), then levels 29+ are 40-minutes.

You can see the structure for yourself here.  You should definitely take a look at it.

What do you think?  I think my first reaction when I saw it was, "OMG."  Or perhaps it was, "WTF???"  It certainly is different.

I started thinking about the ramifications of the unusual structure.  It is going to play differently than any other tournament.  I mean for the entire first day (and then some), it's going to be more like a deep-stacked cash game than a tournament.  For all that time, there's no pressure on you to be aggressive to build that stack. You can certainly afford to be patient (really, really patient).

So figure a lot of folks would play tight.  If everyone did that, for the entire time, would anyone bust out?  Well sure, there are bust-outs in the first level of every tournament, just not a lot.  Not as many as there are in the 10th level, for sure.  And of course you will have some cooler hands that will bust even the tightest players, you know AA vs KK, that sort of thing.

But everyone is not going to just sit back and wait for Aces and Kings. And that wouldn't be the smart way to play anyway.  Be selective yes, of course.  No need to force the issue when you have plenty of big blinds to play with.  But the goal for day 1 would obviously to be to build up that stack.  And of course, no matter, people will bleed chips.  But going a few orbits without playing a hand, and just losing the blinds, will obviously be a lot less costly in this tourney than any other.

And no doubt, no matter the slow structure (at least for day 1), you can bet you will run into those players that you run into at any poker game you've ever played—the guys who love to gamble and who love to put pressure on you by being aggressive.  The guys who are willing to shove a lot to either bet you out of the hand or take their chances. In a cash game, these folks come prepared to dig into their wallets multiple times and keep reloading.

In this tournament, they can't quite do it, but they can re-enter the same flight one time.  So you may have people who are prepared to buy in twice a day for the four day 1's.  Ten buy-ins if necessary to score.

There's another interesting feature of this tournament I haven't mentioned yet.  You can buy in directly to day 2, for the first two hours of day 2, while the blinds are the same as they were for all of day 1.  So then the question becomes, why even bother with playing day1?

I mean, if you just show up for day 2, you will have the same number of big blinds as you would if you bought in at the beginning of day 1. In any other tournament that leaves registration open through the beginning of day 2, you will start off short-stacked, and the pressure to find an early double-up is enormous.  Not the case here.

Or is it?  Presumably, if you enter on day 2, you'll be facing some pretty big stacks.  Even though the blinds will be low, they'll be able to bet your off hands and you may just have to put your stack at risk anyway.  Now I talked to Justin Hammer, the Commerce tournament coordinator, via Twitter about his expectations for this event. Along with Matt Savage, Justin is the designer of this structure.  He is putting the "over/under" on the percentage of day 1 players who survive to day 2 at 50%.  That would make the average day 2 stack 200 big blinds.  Personally I think less than 50% will make it through but Justin is the expert.  In that case, you'll have half the average stack if you just plan to start on day 2, but of course they'll be many larger than average stacks (and of course some short stacks too).

So it seems to me if you are skipping day 1, you are putting yourself at a big disadvantage in trying to cash.  With so many expected to make it to day 2, this of course is not one of those tourneys where there's a payout just for surviving day 1, where you can bust out late in day 1 and get some money. However, they will pay the top three chip leaders at the end of each day 1 $360.  In other words, you'd get your buy-in back.  But only three players per flight get that.

Thus, if you are going to make it worthwhile to play this tournament, you need to score big on day 2, and the best way to do that would be to build up a nice big stack on day 1 during that 8-hour long 100/200/200 session.

But then you have to evaluate the day 2 structure.  You can't complain about the structure in a tourney that has the first level play for 10 hours can you?  Well….if you look at what happens after that, starting two hours into day 2 (right after registration closes), you see those levels are 20-minutes for the next 22 levels. Really, it's not at all a bad structure, except for the fact that it has the 20-minute levels.  Shouldn't a $360 tourney have longer levels?  Well the answer is, when you average out the length of the levels starting with a 10-hour level, it's very player friendly indeed.  But if you look at it from the standpoint of just entering on day 2, not so much.  It's all a matter of perspective. Of course, there's a $250K guarantee for this event, so that is a nice selling point.

One of the first things I thought of when I saw the structure was, this is set-up to be hugely favorable to the pros and the tournament grinders at the expense of the recreational players.  As much as we recs love the deepstack structures, it's true that the better the structure, the better it is for the better players.  In the long run, given enough time, they know how to extract the chips better than the amateurs.  This is extreme in that regard, giving those pros 10 hours to use that 100 BB starting stack to get the chips from the weaker players.

I decided to ask a well-known pro (and bracelet holder) about just that topic. I promised I wouldn't identify him but I'll bet you've all heard of him.  He agreed with me that the structure greatly favors the pros, but he pointed something else out that I hadn't considered.  He said the better regular players were likely to skip day 1 altogether because they'd have a better hourly waiting until day 2.  They'd more likely play a decent stakes cash game where they could make more money.  Interesting.

If all the good players don't show up until day 2, that edge they have from a deep, deep structure diminishes.  But if everyone just shows up for day 2, they'll all be playing a $360 tourney with a fast structure.  A bit ironic.

So I am really curious as to who shows up for this event, and when they show up.  Since this the first of its kind, no one really knows what to expect.

Will I be playing in it?  As fascinated as I am by the concept, I will not.  The thought of spending my entire weekend (Saturday, and then hopefully Sunday) at Commerce is not appealing.  Nothing against Commerce, it's an awesome poker room, but for me the commute is just awful.  I'd have to be there from 3pm to 11pm on Saturday and if I still had chips I'd have to make a return a return trip three hours earlier on Sunday.  Recall that the last time I played a two-day tourney at Commerce (here), I was kind of grateful that although I cashed, I didn't have to drive back down there the following day.

Also, there is no dinner break. In fact if you look at the structure sheet, there appears to be no breaks at all on day1!  I suppose they figure that with such low blinds the whole day, folks can afford to take their bathroom breaks during play and not lose much.  But squeezing in a dinner break that way seems awkward to say the least.

So why not just plan on playing day 2? Because, as I pointed out, I'd be facing a lot of bigger stacks in a tournament with a fast structure.  Not ideal for my style of play.  Actually the format for day 1 is ideal for my style of play, I suppose.  But I don't want to have to deal with the traffic to Commerce two days in a row when there's no guarantee I'd get a penny back on day 2.

Instead, I'll follow the tweets and see how other players react to this creative idea.  Even though I won't be playing in it, I think it's great that Justin and Matt are trying something so new and different.  Experiments like this can only improve the poker experience for players in the long run.  Way to go, Commerce!

Let me know your thoughts on this type of tournament.  Is there something I haven't thought of? 

Poker Season is Almost Here!

That's right boys and girls, poker season is just around the corner.  Soon it will be time for every poker player in the universe to descend on Las Vegas as that game of skill known as poker takes over Sin City.

I know this because I am currently working my fingers to the bone entering all the special summer series tournaments into the PokerAtlas database. And also because the last two columns I wrote for Ante Up consisted almost entirely of previews of all the summer series. Note: Forget about what you learned in school.  Every poker player knows that summer is from end of May to early July.

So since my days are consumed with all the poker series about to commence in Vegas shortly, I thought I'd take some time during my free time to share some thoughts with you.  Hopefully you've already seen part 1 of my summer preview (here).  The second part should be appearing in a couple of weeks, covering Planet Hollywood, Wynn, Binion's and Orleans.

So with all those tournaments to look at as I enter them in the system, I thought I'd talk a bit what events I'm thinking about playing.  Yes, after a long hiatus, I am planning to return to Vegas in June.  But with less enthusiasm than in the past.  As I've explained in multiple posts, I really don't like what they've done to Vegas.  They are doing their best to drive people like me away with skyrocketing room rates, ever increasing resort fees and parking fees and the virtual disappearance of quality (or even decent) low-cost food options.  It's getting to be too damn expensive to go to Vegas, and that's not even considering the possibility of a few bad sessions.  Even the increasing cost of gas makes it pricier for me.  You see, the incompetent morons who run California recently increased our gas taxes 12¢ a gallon.  True, once I get to Vegas I can buy cheaper gas….but it's a bit impractical to drive to Vegas just for a fill up.

Still, I'm not quite ready to completely write off Vegas, and if you're a poker player and you're ever going to go to Vegas, the poker season is when to go.  Even if you didn't ever play a tournament, the cash game action is insane this time of year.

And it sure feels like the poker season this year is the biggest ever—or at least since I've been working in the poker biz.  The WSOP has more bracelet events than ever, and I believe more side events too.  And then there's the Venetian.  Oh, the Venetian.  I hope you read my column just for the section on the Venetian summer series.  Getting that listed on PokerAtlas almost killed me.  They actually have 150 tournaments between mid-May and end of July.  And I had to enter every single one of them into the database.  I just finished on Thursday.  I don't want to say how long it took me but when I started they still had free parking on the Vegas strip. 

Seriously, I'm really looking forward to seeing the set up they have over there.  For most of the series, the events will be held not in the Venetian poker room, but in the Sands Convention Center.  I hear it is going to be a really nice venue, very roomy, a separate food court and who knows what else.  I'd make a point to check it out just to see it even if I wasn’t planning on playing any events.  But I think they have a tournament that has caught my eye and I will take a shot at.  It's the Nightstack, a $400 tourney with a bunch of flights spread out over June on various evenings starting at 6pm. I wrote a bit about it in my column.  It has a $1MM guarantee and each flight is in the money.  The top 10% get paid and the top 5% advance to day 2.  It's actually similar to WSOP's Giant tournament that they debuted last year.  The Nightstack has 30 minute levels all the way through, the Giant has 20-minute levels on day 1.  But the starting stack is bigger for the Giant (25K vs 15k).  Even though it doesn't have a guarantee, the Giant figures to have a lot bigger prize pool (last year's was over $3MM).  And the buy-in is close but the Giant is a bit cheaper at $365.  Giant's payouts probably start sooner although it depends on how many players each flight gets. Giant has a Day 2 and a Day 3, the Nightstack finishes on Day 2.

When I was analyzing the Nightstack and realizing it was similar to the Giant, I checked the dates of each to see if they were competing directly.  Well, none of the Day 1 flights are head-to-head (but even if they were, since there are so many flights, it wouldn't be an issue).  But, it turns out that Nightstack's Day 2 (it's last day) and Giant's Day 3 (it's last day) are on the same day.

When I first saw that, I thought that was too bad that they were competing like that, players would have choose one or the other. But then I thought about it some more and realized it likely wouldn't prevent anyone from entering both events. The Giant starts it's Day 3 (which will very likely just be a final table) at 2pm on 7/1.  Nightstack's Day 2 starts the same day at 5pm.

But there will only be a conflict if you make it to Day 3 of the Giant and Day 2 of the Nightstack.  Otherwise you're fine.  And making it to the final day of both of these tournaments would be a pretty nice problem to have.  I might suggest if you're good enough to make it to the final days of both of these tournaments, you're probably wasting your time playing in events that cost $400 or less!

But think of it.  Players who are in Vegas for most of the summer will be able to play both.  A lot of the Nightstack's dates are the Thursday before a Giant flight (which are all on Friday).  So you play Venetian Thursday and if you don’t survive, you can try the Giant the next night.  A lot of players are probably planning on firing multiple bullets anyway. 

The question is, if you make it to Day 2 in either one of them, do you give up on the idea of playing the other or do you give it a shot anyway?  You are going to be among a very few players to make it to Day 3 of the Giant, and will have survived a huge field.  It will be easier to make it to Day 2 of the Nightstack of course.

What I'm saying is, even if you're Doug Polk (and I'm pretty sure you're not Doug Polk), and you fired every bullet possible in both tournaments, it's still extremely unlikely you'd have your dance card filled with both final days on July 1.

But if somehow you did make it through both?  Well again, a very nice problem to have.  And actually, you'd have three of hours of play at the Giant before the restart over at the Venetian.  I guess your strategy would be based on how deep stacked you were for each event, right?  If you're the short stack at the final table of the Giant (but were deep stacked at the Nightstack), you just keep shoving until you bust the Giant or you get on a roll and can legitimately compete for a bracelet.  Even if you busted the first minute of day 3, you'd be getting a very nice payout.

OTOH, if it was the reverse, and you were the chip leader at the Giant but a shortie at the Nightstack, you play the Giant for as long as you can, and if that short stack at the Nightstack gets blinded off, you can pick up whatever money is coming to you from there at your convenience if you don't make it over there in time to play at all.  Meanwhile, your payout at the Giant would be huge.

The dilemma would be if you were deep stacked at both (and again, a great problem to have).  I suppose at that point you would get out the ICM calculator to help you decide which of the two tournaments you should prioritize.

But of course, it's a real, real long shot that anyone would make it to the final days of both of these tournaments.

Bottom line:  I may just be crazy to fire a bullet in both, and see if I can be that guy with the final day dilemma.  I'm not counting on it, but cashing in both would sure be nice and not completely out of the realm of possibility.

Despite the added bracelet events at the WSOP, nothing new appeals to me, so if I do play the Giant it will be my only bracelet event.  And again, I will keep away from the Daily Deepstacks as I have for the past few years.  The 3pm Deepstack became the 2pm Deepstack a few years back, and now has become the 1pm Deepstack (at a new, slightly higher buy-in, $250).  A few years back they removed the dinner break, which made it quite unappealing to me.  This year they put the dinner break back….but it's not until 9:15pm, too late for me to take advantage of it.  I could work around it I suppose, but when there are other tournaments around town competing with it that are lot more friendly to eating/meds schedule, I see no reason to.

Just last time I wrote about last year's WPT 500 at the Aria (here), and yes, I hope to play it again this year, assuming I still have money left by the time it rolls around in late June.  The $5 increase in the buy-in (to $570) won't keep me away. 

Golden Nugget will once again be running those $150 NLH tourneys most days at 1PM, with a $20K guarantee.  That's the tourney that really appeals to me for a variety of reasons.  I expect to try my luck there a few times.  The Nugget also has a couple of weekends reserved for its $200 Ultimate Re-entry events, with a $250K guarantee. They have 9 starting flights and I can see myself playing in that. All players who make it to Day 2 are in the money.

Planet Hollywood is running some $100 NLH tourneys with $10K guarantees.  I have to consider giving one of those a try, no?  Then they have some $250 "Low Roller" tourneys….multiple starting flights, payouts begin on Day 1, $200K guarantee.  Can I pass that up?   Oh and Orleans has a bunch of $150 NLH tournies with $25K guarantees.  Have to consider those as definitely playable.

Wynn has great tournaments as well, but I think they are a little out of my wheelhouse, buy-in wise.  And Binion's is mostly non-hold'em stuff, as I indicated in my column.

One thing I will point out is that almost all of these venues are using the Big Blind Ante at least to some degree, as I predicted (see here). The exceptions, as far as I can tell, are the Orleans and sorta/kinda Binion's.  I say that about Binion's because for their NLH events, they are going with Button Ante instead of the BB Ante, as I posted on Twitter a few weeks back. Some folks prefer the button ante because then the burden of that inflated ante and the big blind doesn't fall on the same player, it spreads it out better. The issue with that though is that there are sometimes hands where there is no player on the button, whereas there is always a big blind.  Binion's will handle this by having no ante when there is a dead button.  Players interested in that version of the single ante format can try that out and see for themselves if they like it.

But everyone else has at least a few tournaments with the Big Blind Ante, and both Aria and Wynn are exclusively BB Ante for their NLH events.  I think Golden Nugget is only using it for their championship event.  The others are using it for some portion of their events.  Oh and yes, even the WSOP is using it for a few of the bracelet events and some of the daily deepstacks.  By next year I bet it will be close to the standard.

Well that's about it.  I probably won't have the bankroll to play all the events that appeal to me unless I get a few early cashes.  I can dream can't I?  So what events appeal to you?

Note:  My last post was missing my signature gratuitous cheesecake pic.  So to make up for it, I've enhanced this post with a multiple pics of young ladies enjoying the summer.  Happy poker season!  

So Long November 9, Hello July 9

You've probably heard by now that there's a big change at the WSOP this year—no more November Nine.  Instead of delaying the final table for four months as they've been doing for the past several years, they are going to keep going and finish the tournament in July.  Well, they'll be a slight delay.  There will be two days off after they reach the final table.

The two days is fine.  It's being done for television considerations (like the wacky ways they schedule playoff games in all the major sports), but it makes sense.  The final 9 players will have played an awful lot of poker when they reach the final table—7 days of 12-14 hour days almost all in a row.  Nothing wrong with a couple of days to decompress and rest up a bit.  And it will give the media plenty of time to introduce the final 9 to the poker fans who are following along. 

I've always hated the long delay—it just seems ridiculous.  Imagine if they delayed the Super Bowl for four months after the conference championship games.  Although, I have to admit, on a purely personal note, it worked to my advantage last year.  The November 9 took place during my convalescence from my triple by-pass surgery, and the coverage then helped entertain me for a few nights when I wasn't physically able to do much more than watch TV.  But that was just a fluke.  I'm hoping I won't be recovering from open heart surgery again this coming November.  Or any surgery, for that matter.

Also it sounds like there will be a lot of live, contemporaneous  coverage of the early rounds of the main event on TV, both on ESPN and via live stream from Poker Central.  That can only be a good thing.  In the past, poker fans had to follow along reading written reports online, then watch three-month old recordings leading up to the live final table.  This seems so much better.  Kudos to the WSOP for realizing the November Nine wasn't really working and coming up with a much better delivery system for their product.

Of course, this change won't affect me personally, except as someone who will be following along as a champion is crowned.  I'm not playing in the main event.

But there are some other changes that might affect me more directly.  I already mentioned one a few months back, the new tournament, The Giant (see here).  Another change is a rule involving calling clock on players.  Players will be encouraged to call the clock on players who are tanking too long.  And when the clock is called, the TD may run it for less than 60 seconds at his or her discretion.  You can read about it here. 

The other change that caught my eye, however, has to do with food.  The highly unpopular Poker Kitchen is being replaced with a "Grab & Go Poker Kitchenette."  They really haven't explained what that means, but I'm assuming it'll be chips, fruit and premade sandwiches and the like.  Hmmm.  I understand the thought—they want to make it a lot easier and faster to get food during those 10 to 20 minute breaks.  Whether this will actually work remains to be seen.  I mean the sheer volume of players looking for food at the same time will still be a challenge.

But the other thing that really caught my eye was this:  "Hot dog carts will also roam throughout the tournament rooms, to service players looking for a quick tableside bite."

Now you're talking!.  Although not exactly health food, at least it's a hot bite to eat that can be consumed obtained without leaving the table for any great length of time.  Of course there are some issues here.

Eating what is essentially finger food while playing cards isn't ideal.  Too easy for mustard or onions or relish (but never, ever mayonnaise) to get on the cards.  And of course, you really don't want to touch the food you're eating with your hands after you've touched those filthy poker chips.  Perhaps the hot dogs will be served so that you don't have to directly touch them?

And I'd like to get reviews of the quality of the hot dog when this rolls out.  A good hot dog (such as Nathan's) is a wonderful thing.  But a bad hot dog—no thanks.

The reason I'm mentioning this is that it has me possibly rethinking whether to play in the Deepstacks this year.  I've played a few in the past.  But last year they made a change and eliminated the 30-minute dinner break.  Considering how crowded the place is, 30-minutes isn't really enough, but at least it's something.  But now, the first two breaks are 20-minutes and then it's 15-minutes after that.  I had no interest in playing them last year.

I've written here about how I think a dinner break for these long tournaments is necessary.  And the good thing about the tournaments around town during the Series is that most of the long ones that start mid-day or earlier have dinner breaks.  So why don't they have them for the 2PM, $235 Deepstack at the Rio?  It doesn't make sense to me.  That tournament is likely to run until the wee hours of the morning the next day.  With no easy way to eat.

Well until now.  Maybe you can get something to "grab and go" fast at the new kitchenette.  And we'll have to see how often that hot dog cart comes around.  Maybe, just maybe, I might consider playing in a 2PM Deepstack or two this year.

Or maybe not.  I'm still not sure that's the best tournament option for me.  Yes, they are hugely popular and create huge prize pools.  But that means you have to survive among a huge field to get the money.  Instead of outlasting 300-400 people at an alternative tournament, you have to outlast maybe 2,000-3,000 players.  Those are tough odds.

True, the number of players means more players are in the money.  But from what I've heard, the pay distribution for those who aren't near the very top is pretty bad.  I always complain about that, but my understanding is it's even worse for the Deepstacks.  Playing 15 hours to get less than double your buy-in back isn't an appealing thought.

Another issue for these Deepstacks is that the Rio is famous for not cooperating with the players when they want to make a deal at the final table. The players are on their own.  I've heard more than one horror story about a player collecting the money, which was supposed to be redistributed to other players as part of the deal, and just running out of the Rio without paying everyone off.  It's a bit scary.

So I dunno.  I'll have to see.  Right now the alternative tournament for me that I like is the $150 1PM tourney at the Golden Nugget, same as I played a few times last year.  That has a $20K guarantee (most days) and will likely easily surpass that most of the time.  To be honest, the juice for that is a bit high, but I think I have a better chance of cashing (both a min-cash or bigger cash) in that than in the Deepstack at the Rio.  There's also one-day events at Planet Hollywood for $200 & $250 that I may consider.  Those have $20K and $50K guarantees respectively.

Well, I still have time to figure it out.  I can wait until I hear some feedback from players about the various venues and tournaments.

What kind of tournaments are you looking for when you're in Vegas for the WSOP?