About the tourney next Saturday, if I show up at something like 7 AM where would I go to register? The cage (presumably the one over by the new room) or will there be some sort of registration desk?

last time there was a registration desk in the ballroom where the tourney was held.. I have no idea what time it might open..

I had no problem registering around 10:30 the morning of, but it looks like you might need to get there earlier (as you planned) this time based upon some of the comments in this thread..

you can also pre-register at the tourney registration window at the cage closest to the poker room if u are in town ahead of time

DISCLAIMER: I am NOT an employee of Showboat so any of this information may be entirely incorrect and you should confirm with the poker room

Damn, I somehow dodged the Mikes, and don't remember an Allison, a Steve or a Marco. And no Rod, either. Too many Fredrico's, Luis's and PJ's (? some two-letter acronym or other). Not only was I card dead, I was dealer-dead too!

I had no complaints about the floor. I spent some time chatting with several of them, and they seemed nice and friendly - particularly a young, thin guy who just seemed thrilled to be there.

LOL. Rod speaks the truth. There are literally 4 Mike's all at once during the late AM and early afternoon. Sometimes it works out that we follow each other, sometimes 3 or all 4 of us in a row. So basically if you are named Mike and want a dealer job... LOL

I guess I haven't had Flavio deal at my table at Showboat yet. Is there really a Flavio at Borgata and another at Showboat? Just doesn't seem like that common of a name.

He's a floor manager at the Showboat. Sorry if my post was unclear on that point. I don't remember all that many dealers at the Borgata because so few of them are very poor or very good; they're almost entirely competent (but not excellent) in my experience.

How early in the morning on a regular weekday does the 1/2 NL game get going at Showboat, and how many tables are active? How juicy are the games?

Just want to compliment the Showboat after another fun visit. Played in the 2PM yesterday and 11AM today and, as always, it was another enjoyable time.

There was one incident, in the 2PM tourn yesterday, where we came back from break and one of the players had no chips in front of them when we returned. There was some confusion as the player (and I) had just been brought to the table about 5 hands before break and the dealer had gotten switche dto our table just as we went on break - so no one remembered him even sitting there. Sounded like his chips had gotten mixed up during the chip up on break. The floor (the man with the beard? I don't know his name) handled it well and found the mistake, and gave him back his stack.

Other than making the final two tables in the 2pm but missing the money, I had a very fun time. Hope I can make it to the 50k next weekend.

Yea its fun when me and the other Mikes follow eachother. I hope I wasnt too chatty to offend someone.

His name is Favio guys, I am happy you were impressed with our floor staff. Just please call him by his real name when you see him to thank him or something next time

I was wondering why there was $3 in the bad beat box on the table the O8 game was on today....thats a cool idea.

Anyone have an idea on this?

I have played the 1/2 game overnight on several weeknights and left with it going around 9am, my guess is it pretty much always runs, gets to multiple tables in the early afternoon, and goes at least 3-4 tables strong many nights.

There is almost always 1-2 1/2NL games running in the morning now. After the 11am tourney gets going more games open. We usually have a solid 4-5+ NL games going during the week and as many as 6-9 on the weekend. Sorry I didnt even notice the post to answer the question.

Wow sooooooo much to comment on....

Regarding the tournament this weekend (7/12/08).

1) You can register anytime (until maybe an hour before the tournament or so) at the cashiers cage next to the poker room. If you are standing at the front podium and facing into the casino..the cage is about 50 feet around to your right....on the right of the spirit bar, right next to the bathrooms.
(as for when they are going to transfer the registration from the cage to the ballroom, just give the room a call and they should be able to give you that info...if you are their at 7am on saturday, just go to the cage and you will be able to register).

2) I was speaking to the PR manager this weekend and if I remember correctly he said they have room for 45-50 tables in the ball room, plus there is room for 7 - 8 tables right outside the poker room(though I doubt they will use those as its all the way on the otherend of the casino). The last tournament in March'08 had 474 people (45 tables - 450 + 24 alternates). I believe they are selling 500 seats and then going to an alternate list, so if it is a complete sellout, with alternates (of course depending on how many people bust out early) I would estimate the top number at about 550, but who knows...

3) I will not repeat the complete stucture as xxrodxx did that in earlier post, but the basics are $225+25, $10,000 chips, 25 minute levels, 25-50 starting blinds, ante's start 4th level.

4) The Tourney is $50K guarnteed Prize pool...regular payout structure...if it hits 500 players that's $112,500 in the pool, with first place at around $30,000 (i would guess) and probably paying 45 spots.

5)THER WILL BE SEXY WOMEN IS SOME FORM OF MINIMUM TYPE CLOTHING (BIKINIS?) CARRYING THE ROUND CARDS

Regarding future bigger, deeper, longer tournaments. I was speaking with the PR manager this weekend and actually asked him about this. The big problem he has is that he has to share the "ballroom space" with the other things that the showboat does. They do not have a "conference center area" like Borgata, Ceasars & Harrahs do, so they are somewhat limited in that way.

This is why the structure is not a little more generous...they do have to finish the tournament in one day. The PR Manager wants to do bigger events and is constantly working to get the casinos management to free up the space for him...

If the tournaments like this weekend's keep doing better and better (which they have been) then there is a greater and greater chance that we'll see some bigger, deeper-stacked events...

Speaking about the games spread:

This weekend I tried to get a SHO game going and a 1/2 PLO going on Friday evening....we had 3 people on the list and I had the floor calling it out for about 2 hours before we just bagged it...

We did get a $5-$10 NLHE ($800 min/$2000 max) going on Saturday, full table from 2p-8p before it finally broke up when the daytime players left for the day, the remainder (4 People) moved down to $5/$5 and we had 2 5/5 games going for most of the night and into the early (3am) morning, what happend after that I don't know as I went to bed.

On the weekends the normal mix of games is:

4-7 - 1/2 NLHE tables
2-5 - 2/4 LHE
1-2 - 3/6 LHE
1-2 - 2/5 NLHE
1 - 5/5 NLHE (sometimes 2 or sometimes 1 5/5 and 1 5/10 on really big weekends)

There are usually 3 to 4 people on a list for some form of Omaha or Stud, so if you are interested show up and push for the game....

Going to end this post here...will post a separate post about the dealers....

Regarding the room/dealers in general:

Let me just say I am not a dealer at Showboat, but I do play there often and actively talk to the floor people, pit managers and Poker Room manager when I have suggestions or I "hear" things on this board that sound like good ideas....

First off, just so people know the way things are set up at Showboat....

Hierarchy at showboat is:

Poker Room manager (usually in the room during the day)

Pit Managers (usually two on duty)

Floor People (these people are also refered to as D/Rs or Dual Rate, which means they have been promoted from dealers, but sometimes will deal to help out, keep their skills up, etc)

Dealers


If you feel a dealer is "not up to snuff", at some point, quietly go find a "pit manager" (it will say so on their name tag) and just let them know about it...the best way to get the best dealers are to help the staff make them better.

In general, I would say 35% of the dealers are very good, run a tight game, keep the action moving, etc... about 25% are good, but might have something that they can improve on whether its speed, distraction, not "running" the game, etc... about 30% just seem new and are "getting their legs under them" and then there is about 5-10% (which translates into about 4 - 6 dealers) that have some glaring issues, usually speed, disinterest in the game and a real lack of being able to "control the game". I am not going to go into names or anything as I think all of the dealers are nice people and friendly and the "bottom tier" are just either not cut out to be dealers or just need a little more training.

As I play at Showboat a good deal (play tourneys at Borgata), I obviously like the room and on the whole think it is well run with professional Managment & floor personal and on the whole solid to very good to excellent dealers (plus serval of the women dealers are extremely hot and a pleasure to look at while playing cards, even if their uniforms are perhaps some of the ugliest I have ever seen...let these poor people wear a nice "lacoste" type cotton knit polo shirt, would look so much classier)....

Anyway those are my thoughts....let the flaming commence

I think both posts were well said and the description of the dealers in the room was spot on. Esp the shirts haha

Sounds like you had a great time. Hope to see you at the 50k event this weekend and good luck! BTW, The floor's name with the beard is Matt.

I am not a big fan of the new shirts, but of the 4 dealers I spoke to last week (2 poker room, 2 blackjack pit) all prefered the new shirts over the old ones.

Probably one of the best posts I've seen that describes our staff at Showboat. We do have some of the friendliest dealers in town and we seem to all get along. That is pretty rare in this town. Some places you see some very rude dealers, and at Taj I even saw some dealers ready to fight each other over something very minor. Along with Rod, I will most certainly second your statement on the uniforms..

Btw, how did you do in the Sunday 2PM? I left at 4PM that day. If you're curious how I know who you are, you told me last week. lol I'm the Mike that dealt to you in the 200-400 level before the 1st break.

The new shirts are definitely more comfortable than the old ones. It doesn't seem quite as warm underneath the lights as before. However, what I don't get is the stripe on the left side of them that has the logos and the poker hand (Why they chose a hand of 7-8-9-10-A is beyond me.. lol) I don't particularly like the color too much, and the maintenance on these shirts are a lot worse. The old ones were easy to take care of.. wash, dry, iron.. These ones we can't iron and are encouraged to get dry cleaned instead of washing. PITA if you ask me..

I don't mind the color but I think they are like 10x less comfortable, maybe I need to work mine in a bit but the collar rubs on my neck and its pretty abrasive.

I found out from Gino what the hand on the shirt is all about.

for those who don't know the new shirts at showboat show a poker hand of

7 - 8 - 9 - 10 - A (different suits).

According to Gino there is a variant of 5 card draw played in Europe (especially france) where they only use 32 cards, and the 7-8-9-10-A is the lowest straight you can have...with the Showboat being the whole MardiGras, New Orleans, French Cajun thing going on it make sense in some weird way....

I still think it would be so much better for dealers to wear some sort of polo/golf shirt....I am going to talk with Chris, see if I can get that to happen....

any playing in the 50k this weekend? Anyone know starting time, and if there will be cash games going during this time?

The tourney starts at 12PM. If you haven't registered yet, it would be wise to show up an hour or two early to avoid the rush of registrants. If you will be there before Saturday, you can register anytime at the cage by the poker room, or try to win a seat in one of the $25 + $5 single table satellites they will be running.

As for cash games, there will be plenty of cash games in the poker room as the 50k tournament will be held in the New Orleans Ballroom. All of the regular daily tournaments are cancelled, however, that opens up more room for cash games. As people start getting knocked out of the tournament, the cash games will fill up for sure. During the last tournament, pretty much the whole room was filled up with deep waiting lists. Should be the same this time too..

Would be nice to see the polo style shirts, but I doubt anything can be done since the uniform change was property-wide. Even the valets have shirts like the ones we have now with the only difference being the logos on the stripes are different. Maybe if we can get a vote from all of the dealers, perhaps they can change the shirts if we can get enough votes.

Ya im def not going to play the tournament due to working, but i will def will be there for the cash games .... people will drop out of tournament and hit the bar (talking about bad beats) up before hopefully being a fish at the cash game