The poker room at Pensacola greyhound track opened yesterday and I have to say exceeded my expectations by a mile. Here are a few of my observations.

-The room has 25 tables with maybe a dozen lcd tv's
-The Floor staff seemed very competent and courteous
-The dealers that I had at my table were experienced and from what I can tell were mostly ex Biloxi dealers.
-The service staff was excellent and for the most part very cute
-They have massage girls for a dollar a minute(minimum 5 min)
-I didnt eat or look over the menu but a few players at my table had the club sandwich wich looked great and the fries were thick cut
-most na beverages are complimentary.They have a full bar.I had a few heinekens that were $3.25 I think
-They spread 1/2 and 2/5 nl also Fl and SL as well as stud and Omaha
-If you like tournaments you will have to wait till Feb 6th
-Age limit is 18 and up
-Hrs are 12pm-12am Sun thru Thurs and 1pm to 1am Fri and Sat

IMO its as good as it gets for legalized poker in P'cola(well at least until they hopefully raise the buy in limit in July).

awesome!

how was the action? is it as fishy as ebro? i would expect that since it just opened there are probably a bunch of people who don't know how to play who want to give it a try.

Never been to ebro so i obv cant comment. There was one player that probably really had a clue at my table and a few older guys gambling it up.

but hey man its the live pokers so alot of donks and short stack noobs

sorry for the a bit offtopic question:

are buyin limits going to be raised for a sure fact in july?
to how much? and in the whole florida?

This offtopic question is ontopic here:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/57...hb7001-689968/

Read the OP first, it'll answer most questions.

Cliffs: Legislature has a bill together and it looks like everybody's aboard. The poker/parimutual law changes have all been negotiated and everybody agrees to the changes. Nothing's official till the Legislature convenes, of course, but it looks happy.

The poker room at Pensacola Greyhound Track opened on Wednesday, January 27th, 2010 at noon. Their hours are noon to midnight Sunday-Thursday and 1pm to 1am Friday and Saturday. The room has 25 tables -- 8 with Shufflemasters. Soft drinks are free.

They do take a bigger drop than neighboring Biloxi poker rooms and Ebro Greyhound Park. Here's the drop:

$1 Rake at $6, $16, $26, $36, and $46 ($5 max)
$2 Jackpot drop at $10
They do have a "No Flop - No Drop" policy.

They also do not limit the number of raises in the no-limit games as Ebro does. Max buy-in is still $100.

Half of the Jackpot drop funds the Bad Beat Jackpot which is quads beaten. The other half funds various promotions. The only promotion announced thus far is a $25 payout for a full house or better Monday-Thursday. They pay the first 20 of the day. On Thursday morning, after the 20 full houses were paid out, they announced that they would be paying $25 again on the first 100 full houses starting at 7pm.

Many of the dealer you'll recognize from Biloxi and Ebro. Operations were running pretty smoothly on their first 2 days of operation from what I could see. Since the poker room is at the top of the greyhound track seating area it gets pretty cold in the evenings since 3 walls are nothing but glass. The tables are pretty cheap and rock/wobble quite a bit, but the cloth is top notch and the rails somewhat average. They seat 10 per table (as opposed to only 9 at Ebro). The chairs are new, but solid vinyl seats and backs as opposed to the cloth type, so if you're in the seat a while expec to get a little sweaty. The chairs are the cheaper 4-legged type with no height to tilt controls like the better chairs at the Beau Rivage.\

Their chips are the cheaper chipco knock offs (ceramic types) in denominations of $1, $5, and $25. No Grand Opening chips were issued. The $1 chip is shown below.

No poker information or link is posted on their website (http://www.pensacolagreyhoundpark.com).

Yes, very fishy. Fishier than Ebro. When I arrived today at noon the guy in front of me at the desk was asking what game bets the least as he never played before and saw it on TV.

A new $1/$2 nl table opened and I sat with $100. Within the 1st orbit there were four rebuys (one guys rebought 3 of these) and 2 bust outs (guys lost it all and left). I saw $30 to $40 all-in pre-flop bets called with J-3 off and with 8-7 suited. I also saw a guy just call the river on a 2-K-2-K-T board with K-7. It's no-fold'em hold'em, so you'd better come with the nuts, because no one's laying down a hand, but they are willing to pay you off.

I suspect it'll be this way for the first 4-6 months.

"Boston Rob" of Survivor and Amazing Race fame was playing in the $2/$5 nl game on opening night and the game built around him. Not sure how he did, but there was plenty of action.

I suspect this weekend will be packed. Can't wait.

Their 1st tournament isn't until Feb 6th. It's a $120 buy-in with a $5k guarantee.

i've turned 200$ into 1200$ the past two days, played maybe 6 hours worth of hands. Fish Fish Fish...

What games do they have? I am looking for $1/2, $2/4 or $3/6 limit. Or is it all just no limit at this point? Is there any Omaha 8 or stud?

Great to have another room that is closer.

They dont spread 1/2 limit although they have 2/4 limit.Not sure about 3/6. Yes there is Omaha and O8 and stud.

I played there wensday and I noticed this. With $100 max buy in, no matter how bad the players are, can a winning player beat these games? It seems almost impossible.

Some of the dealers aren't that great. I was playing 1/2 nl and I went to use the bathroom after I folded under the gun. I also walked around for a bit then went to my table. When I got back I was two deals away from hitting the big blind and the dealer said I had to post the small and big blind in an frustrated tone. I told him i'd rather just sit out and wait 'till I'm in the big blind 'cause I didn't want to post, put 1 dollar of dead money into the pot then have to post two hands later.

He said that was ok but when I got in the big blind I still had to post the dead $1 for missing the small blind the previous round. I told him he was incorrect and he cut me off in mid speak and told me I was going to have to post the $1 or he was gonna call the floor. I went to the floor myself and they agreed with me and when I got back to the table the guy tried to play it off like he didn't want to get scolded by the floor person. I even stood up out of my chair while I waited for the big blind to hit me and he kept dealing me in when i told him not to.

I know it's only a buck but it's the lack of understanding of the rule and his unwavering conviction and rudeness in his stance. anyways

Another thing. I used to play many home games in pensacola and one of the chip runners at the dog track is a known cheat. He would stack decks in a tourny and cash game he hosted at his house and at other games. Big time wpt player of the year Johnathon Little (before he became big time) was at one of the games when the dude got caught. I know he post on 2+2 so If he wanted to he could verify.

I know that chip runners aspire to be dealers, sort of how bar backs aspire to be bartenders. Should someone Let the management at dog track of this?

Interesting.Which one? Name or a description of him would be a good headds up.Or you could PM me if you dont wanna post it. thanks

Stocky, big one with kind of slicked back hair, parted in the middle.

If there's a $100 max buy-in, how is the 2/5 nl game different from the 1/2 nl game?

1/2 nl min buy is $40, 2/5 is $100 min/max

I havent played the 2/5, however alot of the 1/2 tables play like a 2/5 with 4 or 5 players putting a live straddle and random donks opening to like $20.

Their bad beat jackpot got hit 2 hours ago. It reached just over $9,200.

I wasn't at the table but racked up just over $1,500 playing $1/$2 no-limit.

Off to Ebro tomorrow where they're paying out $100 every 15 minutes for high hand in the room.

This is the 3 week period where dealers are being evaluated. So if you've got a bad one please mention it to the floor person, shift manager, or directly to William, the poker room manager. And don't forget do the same if you've got a good dealer.

I would be shocked if Alpha1243 wasn't affiliated with the room in some way.

A few of my friends left my casino to get jobs up in Pensacola, so I hope it works out well for them.

I was there when the bbj hit, sitting two tables away unfortunately.

Game is fun, and I love playing the short stack, but when I build chips in front of me, I like to see a bunch of money on the table. In any case, most of the people at my table had no clue what they were doing, so it'll probably be worth going back, since it's slightly closer than Biloxi.

The dealers seemed fine, imo.

A hundo every 15 minutes at Ebro sounds great. Wish it was closer to me.

What are you overall impressions of the players at the dog track. They all think they know a lot but suck...of course then why do I try to bluff them everytime only to be called off by bottom pair...so who sucks, maybe me.

Anyway, honestly I think they are definitely worse on average than anything you would see in a poker room in biloxi. Curious of any other opinions.

Is this even legal?

During the last hour of play 5 nights a week Pensacola Poker Room has a promotion where the first 10 full houses (or better) receive a $120 seat into their Saturday tournament. That $120 comes out of the jackpot drop. (They take a $2 jackpot drop at $10 in the cash games with $1 going toward the bad beat jackpots and the other $1 towards promotions such as this.) Adding these 50 “free” seats enables them to reach the weekly $5,000 tournament guarantee.

Now here’s the questionable part. It’s a $100+$20 tournament, so of the 50 x $120 = $6,000 given away in free seats they’re raking $1,000 for the house and putting $5,000 into the tournament prize pool. Isn’t this just a slick way to rake the jackpot drop?

Is this legal or plain genius by the poker room manager? Thoughts.

P.S. Hours of operation are changing on March 1st to:
Sun-Thurs: 1pm-1am
Fri-Sat:: 2pm-2am

The Hold'em Bad Beat Jackpot was hit again - this time it reached just over $47K. That's twice in just under a month. It's now at $27K.

all the good ones do it

I asked one of the managers if they actually put the 120 into the tourny or just gave the seat away without putting the money in. I was just glad to know they were actually putting the money into the prize pool.

Oh and FWIW, dont bluff. You will get called with 22 and better preflop and bottom pair or better after the flop.

What are thoughts on the rake of the cash games? I am wondering how long the games will go with the rake that high.

The reason we have so many choices on where to play is because these places are finally making money on poker. Rake that we all complained about for years as being too high at $3, wasn't enough for these casinos to make any profit from. Now that they are, everyone has poker and we have lots of choices. I'd like to see the rake lower too, but if these places start getting into rake wars, some will close down, then the monopolies get to raise the rake again and you have no choices.

Maybe you are missing the point...I am not saying a 3$ rake is too high...I am saying a 7$ rake is too high and I guarantee you it will kill the game in the pensacola area eventually. The question is how long can the games go on with that amount of money coming out of them?

And I am sure there have not been any rake wars in Pensacola before and the greyhound track has the monopoly