Royal Poker Blog

Check below for the Sunday Vegas recap. Maybe I can drag this report out until the next trip?

It's now been several months since Neteller left the U.S market. The common consensus was that unless new deposit methods could be brought online quickly then the player base of the U.S. serving sites would gradually erode into nothing (for the smaller sites).

PokerSiteScout has been reporting the impact on this page. I took their data and created a few graphs.



You'll need to click on the picture to make it legible.

My observations:

• Bodog and UB continue to shrink near oblivion. Bodog may now have righted the ship, but at what cost?
• PokerStars and Full Tilt show almost the exact same pattern. A continual drop in players for the first month followed by stabilization and growth in the second month. Is this due to the success of new deposit methods or simply growth outside the US?

Here's the graph of sites not covering the US market.



The huge iPoker growth is due to them acquiring several other networks. Party and Everest continue to get healthy. I would guess the growth here is players returning after initially moving to Stars or Tilt combined with new players from outside the US. God knows the sites are drooling over the possibility of tapping even a fraction of the Asian market.

This will continue to be an interesting situation to watch unfold.

We’re up early again on Sunday and once again it’s really jumping for Vegas at 7 AM. We play some craps (even I think) and slots (lost, duh). About 10:30 AM we hop on one of the CAT buses shuttling people to the race track. Dad has purchased a couple of Fast Passes that appeared to be a little cheaper than paying cash. Their real value would become clear later. We had seats, but others that boarded later had to stand. The cool thing about taking a charter bus or taxi to the race track is you get to cut through the air force base and avoid a bunch of traffic.

Leaving the city and cutting through the air base you really realize you’re in the desert. In all my trips to Vegas I’ve yet to visit the Hoover Dam or head out to Henderson. This was my first real trip out of the city.

The shuttle ride is no problem and we get to the track a little after noon; plenty of time before the 1 PM green flag. The race is a really good time. I’m certainly not hooked on this sport, but I would go again depending on time, price, location, etc. They actually ran out of beer before the allotted stop-selling-beer time. Was this intentionally smart or simply poor planning? I’m leaning towards intentional.

Afterwards it’s a madhouse getting back to the city. There are thousands of people lining up to ride the CAT buses home. It’s not chaotic, just really long lines. The cool thing for us is they have two separate lines at each station. One is for the people paying cash and the other for the Fast Pass holders. For each bus they fill the seats with Fast Pass holders and standing room with the cash people. So not only did the Fast Pass line move faster, but you also got to sit. It is slower going on the way home taking us just over 2 hours. From what I hear that’s not too bad though.

The rest of the evening is mostly a blur. I had another solid run at the IP craps table getting me close to even for the trip. During one hot role I hit a point and afterwards a craps dealer say “Royal, I need you to make sure your dice hit the back wall.” Apparently they did not on that particular role. I responded in a drunken slur “Ma’am, I’ll do my best.” I remember having dinner at Fat Burger and chatting with a couple of Germans. We also hit up the MGM, Excalibur, Mandalay Bay, etc. We capped off the night with some cheap Blackjack and penny slots at Casino Royale. Oh yeah, and about a dozen $1 Michelob’s!

As far as the PokerStars Sunday Millions is concerned anyway.

1712 entrants for a total prize pool of $1,712,000. First prize is only $353,185.60!

I'm too lazy to pull the old data, but this one of the largest $1050 Sunday Millions ever. So what does this tell us about the impact of the UIGEA? I'm not sure it tells us anything, except that Stars is extremely healthy.

This trip I actually took notes for one day. By Saturday the note taking had stopped and I’m now relying on alcohol dampened memories.

Even after staying up rather late on Friday night it was an early rise for us Saturday morning. Ahh the perils of being from a different time zone and perhaps not getting drunk enough to mitigate the difference. There was a surprising amount of activity for 7 AM in Vegas. We wrote it off as the Busch Race crowd and went about finding some coffee and something to chew on. Knowing I had some comp dollars left at Coast Casinos we decided to shuttle over to the Orleans.

Vegas fans probably know that Coast Casinos (Boyd Gaming) sold the Barbary Coast to Harrah’s a little while back. Well, the Barbary Coast is now called Bills. I guess they plan to tear it down soon enough that it’s not worth integrating into the Harrah’s system as they have a separate player’s club. The “Coast” portion of the Barbary Coast sign has been removed and the neon “Coast” does not light up any longer. With this in mind there was some question whether the Coast shuttles still ran to the Barbary. We were assured they did, but didn’t start until after 9 AM.

Since there was no hurry to get over to the Orleans we decided to walk up through Caesar’s, TI, etc. At TI we stumbled across a $5 craps table which is pretty damn rare even that early in the morning. Of course just as we buy-in they up the minimum to $10…but they’re nice enough to grandfather us in at $5. I stick with $10 bets and dad goes with $5. This time we both employ the pass line / come bet + odds strategy and several hot shooters later we both cash out ahead. This was my best single session of the trip at +$465.

We hit a few more casinos collecting $1 chips as souvenirs and eventually made it back to the Barbary Coast (Bill’s). The shuttle was no effort and soon we were at The Orleans. I’ve always been found of this place. Those first few trips to Vegas would rate very high on the best times of my life list. The Orleans was a major part since that was where we stayed. It’s funny how those first couple trips are such strong positive memories that I expect every trip to be like that. I’ve never had a bad trip to Vegas, but no trip has had the same magic as the first two did…

Anyway, we ate lunch at The Orleans and I played a little VP (lost of course). The rest of the afternoon was spent back at the Wynn where we watch the money bubble burst at The Wynn Classic. We had an interesting discussion about how you could tell the amateurs from the seasoned pros by their reaction to the money bubble burst. Several of the 18 remaining players exchanged congratulations and many pulled out a cell phone to report their good fortune. Johnny Chan, Scott Fischman. Michael Mizrachi and Mike Matusaw simply sat back down and prepared to get back to work. I’m not sure I even saw those guys smile. It was simply business as usual.

We took a customer of my father out to dinner and afterwards I hit the $1/$2 NL table at the IP. It was your typically $1/$2 Vegas table with mostly horrible players and two completely god awful players (CGAP). Thankfully the CGAPs had lots of chips. Unfortunately the one hand I caught against a CGAP resulted in me paying off almost half a buy-in. I had AT top two and had to call his river raise to see a straight with 35.

I played for a little over an hour without catching any premiums or even winning a hand. Finally CGAP #1 had to leave and CGAP #2 decided that KJ was worthy of calling a $500 all-in re-raise from the tightest player at the table on a flop of K94. Top pair J kicker is no good sir. With that it was time to find a new game…I choose bed.

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The flight to Vegas was fine, but getting on the plane was a different story. Unsure of traffic I left pretty early for the airport and ended up arriving two hours early. That's easily enough time for the relatively small Lansing airport. The Allegiant line was almost out the door. wtf? Apparently the ticket printer broke and they had to hand write all the tickets. The good thing about direct flights on small carriers is everyone is going to get on the plane in these type of situations. The bad thing is that the plane will be held...and it was. We arrived in Vegas about an hour late.

My dad was waiting in the airport and we shared a cab over to the Imperial Palace. He originally booked us at the Flamingo where he had Sunday / Monday comped. The problem was Friday / Saturday were running over $300. The good ol' IP hooked us up with Sunday / Monday comped and Friday / Saturday at $69 each. I's going to be a sad day when they tear that place down.

After checking in we quickly hit the IP sportsbook to place a few bets on the college basketball league championships. Final results: 1-2

Next on the agenda was a little craps. The old man got burnt betting the inside numbers and I did will with the standard pass line / come bets + odds. Our hotel package included two free dinners at the Emperor's Buffet and is was standard. Okay, not great...through free is good.

After dinner we walked over to the Wynn to watch some of the Wynn Classic. In between drinks and dog / pony bets at the sportsbook we saw the field thin to 27 players. The field was very impressive and looked this way at the end of the day.

1 Chris Roos Calgary, Alberta 374,200
2 Chan Giang Las Vegas, NV 279,800
3 John Racener Tampa, FL 266,700
4 Chris Moore Chicago, IL 244,000
5 Johnny Chan Las Vegas, NV 232,000
6 Mike Matusow Las Vegas, NV 218,800
7 Michael Mizrachi Hollywood, FL 199,800
8 Danny Fuhs Las Vegas, NV 189,800
9 Sam Grizzle Las Vegas, NV 185,900
10 Dapo Fadeyi Denver, CO 158,800
11 Toto Leonidas Los Angeles, CA 157,200
12 Mike Carson Las Vegas, NV 155,900
13 Allen Nguyen San Diego, CA 152,000
14 Doug Mackinnon Buffalo, NY 149,300
15 Zachary Hyman San Francisco, CA 134,700
16 Sang Yu Las Vegas, NV 132,700
17 David Levi Las Vegas, NV 111,400
18 Ted McNeely Myrtle Point, OR 97,800
19 Joe Cappello West Nyack, NY 96,600
20 Scott Fischman Las Vegas, NV 96,000
21 Cliff Josephy 94,200
22 Larry Wright McQueeny, TX 73,000
23 Robert Cheung Vancouver, BC 58,000
24 Stewart Spear Reno, NV 28,300
25 Thomas Fuller Boulder, CO 27,300
26 Allen Kessler Las Vegas, NV 24,500
27 Ted Lawson Las Vegas, NV 23,500

After the Wynn we headed back to the IP. Dad played a little more craps (lost) and I played my nemesis Stars Wars penny slots (lost). This trip I discovered several new and enjoyable penny slots. I'll post of those later...just for Grubby.

That's it for Friday.

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In other news / fun stuff:

• Lots of rumors floating around about the U.S. Government dropping the charges against Neteller founders. It's all rumors at this point. NETeller Hearing Friday Could Have Far Reaching Affects

• Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back: The Fucking Short Version

• Researchers find what may be a new state of matter

After only missing the Texas Tech / BC game I'm 15-1 after Day 1 of the NCAA tournament.

I'm back in town and exhausted. The race was fun, the craps was great and the poker was blah...

More to come

I ended up in the mid 90s last night in the $3 re-buy. It's all about the $6 /hr win rate baby!

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I found this discussion on PocketFives very interesting. A very successful MTT and SnG player, THE_D_RY, talks about re-buying too much in the 100R. Several top MTT players respond with their suggestions and statistics. It's a good read for anyone playing or has aspirations of playing those events.

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This here blog will be dark for a few days while I kill a few more brain cells in Vegas. Time to make some stories!

60-70 and we're at home. :(

We lost because of a horrible first half. The officials didn't help the situation and I'll provide statistics to back my argument.

14 and 1

The number of first half fouls called against us vs. the number of fouls called against them. Even if we did hack more it sure as hell wasn't 14x more.

3

The number of technical fouls against our team in the second half mostly due to frustration built by the first half joke calls. The best of the technicals fouls was on the bench when six of us let out a collective "WHAT THE FUCK!" after another horrible call. The funny thing is the calls were much fairer after the third technical.

6:06

The time left in the game when we shot our FIRST free throw. That's 33 minutes and 54 seconds into the game. They had over 30 at this point in the game.

Oh well, we still had a great season.

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$60 SnG grinders on Stars should stay away today. Several of the top SnG players have a prob bet going involving a large number of $60 SnGs. Here's the scary list of those involved.

gidders
Shepstar
inissint
allinstevie
thenut21
BC Pizza Guy
bigjoe2003
hg18l7
MCMATTO
MangosPapa
Bdubs3737
stpauli111

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On a similar SnG note it looks like everyone's favorite high volume player, RaiNkHan, has had a tough run as of late. Unless you consider a -$100,000 run to be normal...

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I'm sitting here trying to get my Vegas stuff organized and screwing around on the 8PM $3 rebuy on stars.

2 more days!

We won a very sloppy close game last night. We were ahead the entire second half, but it was never more than 7 points until the end.

We play again tonight in the semifinals.

We interrupt your normal poker content for a basketball update...

After finishing the season 9-1 our first playoff game is tonight. It was actually supposed to be last Thursday, but was rescheduled due to weather. If we win tonight we play tomorrow. Win that one and we play in the finals on Thursday.

The unfortunate part about doing so well in the regular season is they bumped us up a level for the playoffs. In reality this is the league we belong in...it's just going to make winning it all that much more difficult. The scouting report on tonight's opponent is they are pretty quick and like to drive the lane. We should have a size advantage and plan to let the big guys post up all night.

Wish us luck!

Like a certain blogger I’ve never been a huge NASCAR fan. I follow sports enough to have an idea who the hot drivers are and I know that Jimmy Johnson won the Nextel cup last season. Beyond that the intricacies are mostly lost on me. As an engineer I am intrigued by the idea of building a car that needs to travel as fast and efficient as possible for limited number of miles. Who cares if the engine blows at mile 501 if you cross the finish line first on mile 500? And as a sports fan attending a NASCAR race is on my list of things to do at least once.

So when my dad offered to get us tickets to a race I was interested. He sealed the deal by making it the Vegas NASCAR race. Next week at this time I’ll be back in my favorite town chilling with the old man. Dad seems really excited…Mom says he’s worried about keeping up. I know we’ll be hitting the craps table quite a bit and maybe I can even get him to play in a hold ‘em tournament or a 2/4 limit game. It’s going to be a great trip either way! Now is where I promise trips reports, even type some of them up and never publish. No promises this time.

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In case you missed it – Iggy is now back blogging at Guinness and Poker. I heard at one point during their break-up fight Linda was seen attempting to pry Iggy’s teeth from her ankle…kidding…kidding.

I'm getting sick of moving you around in my blog roll!

The WBPT event last Sunday came and went. I was registered, all set to play and took a horrible run of beats in a SnG set. With a darkened mood there would be no more poker that night.

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Wednesday marked the end of a crappy February. It was a black month...barley. I did make Gold Star VIP, but still require two months of Platinum VIP to have enough FPPs for a $1500 WSOP entry. That is a daunting task for my level of play and time availably.

Last night I sat down and ran through my horrible MTT results and found some interesting trends. I do very well in turbo / satellite events and not so well in events later in the evening. It’s actually gross how bad my Feb. numbers were for events starting 9PM EST and later. I don’t like playing poker until 2AM and my results clearly show that. Why would I ever start an $11 Rebuy at 10 PM? It’s also not uncommon to find a poker blogger consuming a pint or two and I’m no exception. This just compounds the tiredness.

For March the MTT plan is to start almost all events before 9 PM and focus even more on the turbo RA satellites. If I’m going to hit Platinum in this Vegas shortened month then SnGs will have to be my bread and butter. I’ve slowly been bumping up limits and last month my results in the $114s and $225s far exceed the shitty ass $60s.

Is anyone else going to be in Vegas next weekend?