Shh

Was anyone there when the High Hand at GLC rolled to $1400 early Sunday morning?

Has anyone here played at Joey Armadillo's in Niles? I go to Notre Dame and its the only place semi close that is 18+ that I know of, and was wondering if anyone has played there/knows what times the games run.

I've been to JArmadillo's ... Their business should take a hit with FWinds-SB opening up last week. From what I heard they only get 2-3 tournament tables and maybe one cash table afterwards (which was RxR the night I was there). There was plenty of action and the Dealers were fine. I'm just puzzled that they didn't have more Players to support 'the demand' that FW saw in that area to open a 10 table room! (Other than some people might be scared to even use JA's parking lot to turn around as the building/bowling alley are very aged.) GL

PS .. I was there during the Summer, so maybe they were busier during the college time of year.

GL High Hand was $600 at 3AM when I left Sunday morning and then rolled up to $1400 at 10AM when a SF finally hit, per a source. I think it hit $600 and $400 before the final hour came in at $200 at 1200AM. I didn't play much NL so I didn't really pay too close of attention to that board.

Looks like they just got a 1/2 NL going around 1030 or so today with 3 on the 1/2 PLO list.

There was a PLO Player asked to leave last night after he bent a couple of cards, which 'caused' a few more Players to pull out and basically shut down the 2/5 PLO table. If this Player had just left without issue it would've been fine, but he carried on verbally and was 'officially' banned for 24 hours by security. One source indicated that if you get three 24 hour bans then it graduates into 'more'. What's a bit puzzling is that he was only banned from the Poker Room, not the whole casino, per the source. GL

^ Also strange thing happened at my table early Sunday morning.... Security called the poker room multiple times telling the floor to have a player to pull down his hood from his hoodie. Apparently you cant wear your hoodie on your head but it's perfectly fine to bring a backpack in.. doesn't make much sense to me

The 'real' Grand Opening of the GL poker room is today at 1100 AM. They were very tight lipped about any of the promos that were going to take place and I didn't even receive a follow up email to the 'soft' opening for last week. There are actually two tables going right now at 430 AM!!

TV 3 was rolling in there yesterday and some of the players commented about not wanting to be on TV. I was pretty sure, and it was confirmed by one Floor, that when you enter their building (similar to a sports stadium) that you are giving them 'rights' to your image/likeness UNLESS you request a form to sign that would deny them that during your visit. The form we sign for MSPT events might be a more specific one for the MSPT ... or just a 'double check' to CYA. GL

Any word on if/when they might start running some tournaments?

1) Don't forget the 'Keepers Fifth Sunday $500 is coming up in two weeks. Make sure you get there by 845 if you want to avoid the wait list.

2) GL WILL have tournaments, just not sure when they will start. They want to make sure that they have their cash games running smoothly. They seem to have 'lots' of staff right now so hopefully they move forward 'soon'.

3) PLO is a hit at GL right now! There has been at least a 1/2 table running every day since opening and even a 5/10 table running on weekend nights. The 1/2 game will graduate into 2/5 some evenings depending on who shows up after 3-400 PM.

4) I've heard of an email and/or text 'plea' from one of the charity rooms for support of their game ... Whatever this is didn't include any of my digits. Not a surprise there since I'm so hard to get a hold of ...

5) Fairly decent information that Jack's will move into Westgate Bowling soon. From a look at the Millionaire Party Locator, that will start on Monday October 1st. Certainly a better 'room' for poker and this will put some distance between them and GL. Not sure how the food/beverage service will work if this makes it past the school year but lets see how things go first.

I think Westgate would make a better weekend poker spot, but this is a good start to keep this location on the map. I think King's could operate during the week at Russo's since Players may not want to drive the extra distance on a work night for a $40 tournament and also may not be looking to play longer cash sessions either.

I know in reality it's not really that far, but 'Players want to play' and the extra drive will 'earn' some players a spot on the wait list and/or lose out on cash hands. I estimate it will 'cost' you at least 40 minutes or more when you take the total drive/park/walk into account ... and add weather on that stretch of road as well once we get into December!! If you only have 3-4 hours max, and in some cases much less, available on a work night, that's a big portion of your time lost. I certainly am not a bigger fan of the S-curve lately when even as early as 345 I run into stop/go traffic .. With I-96 at full strength soon this should change a bit. Alpine can be a pain until after 600 PM during the week as well.

This would definitely affect food service as well IMO ... not sure if Russo's would see this as a boost to M-W or just a 'break even' change. Notice how once a new place opens up how the competitors will follow? I think this can be the case during the week with King's (if they open at 300 PM) and GL both being able to 'survive' but GL just has too much 'extra' to offer on weekends and having a room like Westgate farther away could be the ticket to 'local' GR poker on weekends. King's could even consider Sunday-Wednesday and pick up players that have been at GL during the day and want to be closer to home on a Sunday night!

I'm no Rocket Scientist (football or other) ... really . But IMO it's not wise as a poker community to 'allow' GL to run charity poker into the ground completely. It's up to us to let the charity rooms know what will work best and hopefully they can survive until things settle down a bit going into winter. GL

1/2 PLO still active at GL daily. Game got pretty big yesterday with multiple $1K+ pots .. at least one per Dealer down! WSOP Nick won an $1800 (like he needs it!!) pot that had some dark calling PF and a 3-way all-in OTF. Also tried the buffet at GL for first time .. not bad, but not earth shattering either, no complaints.

Drove by King's around 930 PM and they still had two tournament tables running with one cash game. I didn't stop in, just wanted to driver by because ... There are 'rumors' of an email or text being sent out that is a bit of a plea to continue to support the local charities by playing at King's. 'WE' have raised lots of funding for the good things that these charities try to offer. Some of them get a very large portion of their annual funds from the 4 per year dates they can be a part of these poker rooms.

GL is having high hands again this weekend for NL. They have promised to keep working with MGCB to push through more promotions soon.

GL bad beat hit last weekend .. our very own 'kid poker' Cody was the 'loser' in the hand. We were talking about the PLO BBJ and the 'loser' of the hand might actually net win less than the 'winner' of the hand when you take into consideration what the stack sizes might be and the taxes due on the actual payouts. Most folks don't get taxed on cash winnings very much, so that's where the 'winner' of the hand has an advantage in 'net' gain ... but still a gain and not to turn down this scenario in either case. GL

More strong HPT play over the weekend. JakeB followed up his win in Chicago with a min cash and earned some points towards the POY race ... so I assume he will be headed to Florida next month to partake in the 2nd to last event before they return to Chicago for the season finale. POY comes with some good perks .. good luck Jake. (The list online right now is not up to date.)

Spring Lake MarkM was part of the 4-5 players from Michigan to head to Colorado together. He ended up at the Final Table and busted in set over set fashion for 2nd place!! ($100K) Mark was 2nd in chips when FT started but he was bleeding chips until he made a huge call with 22 when a Player 3-barreled a low Board with KQ and that got him rolling back up to 2nd/1st pretty much the rest of the way to HU play. I think you will really enjoy the 'poker' being played at this FT even though the HPT lost their hole cards (again) about halfway through the stream. GL

GL PLO is still running daily. It usually starts out as 1/2 and then by 600 or so there are a new group of Players that want to upgrade to 2/5 due to the deeper stacks of the 'surviving' Players. The max BI jumps from 500 to 1500 but the game still has 'only' a $5 bring-in.

Firekeepers $500 this Sunday. Be there by 845 or risk getting wait-listed!! 9-10 hours might get you close to a $26K or better first place. GL

How often does 2/5 holdem run at Gun Lake?

Do you play in that game usually answer20? I’m looking forward to battling you!!

1) FK 500 numbers were down with no wait list that I saw. 1/2 cash was back up and running by the end of Level 2, which is VERY early. When I left with 30 minutes to go in Level 8 the count was 'only' at 319. Even with those numbers the FT went pretty late, past 1100, with what I believe was a 4-way chop based on Bravo info. Things didn't go my way with not one, but two, set over set spots. I didn't bust 'fast enough' to make it onto the 2/5 game so I headed to GL to try and win a truck!

2) GL 1/2 NL was probably a bit down but had both 1/2 and 2/5 PLO going by 600 with the 1/2 basically taking the roll of 'must move' for the 2/5 game. They had the 'normal' weekend $200 hourly high hand going for NL.

3) Interesting that a 6-year vet would direct their first post at me!! I'm honored, but will have to say that PLO is now taking a higher priority over 2/5 NL for me right now. As you will find 'advised' lots of places on this site, you need to game select based on what's important (and hopefully good) for your game. IMO there is a definitely edge for anyone with poker experience at the 1/2 PLO games at GL right now. I assume this will settle down by either people busting through their bankroll faster or increasing their skill in the game, both of which are bad for that stake level ... see #4 below.

4) 2/5 NL at GL will probably be a Friday/Saturday evening game. The starting table Friday afternoon was EXTREMELY nitty/tight and unattractive for a long session. When the player pool is small and plays that style it just doesn't bode well for long term, regular sessions ... or attracting new Players. I did hear that the game was much better late into the evening. Last Sunday night (I think) there were two 2/5 NL and no PLO running during the Lions game but don't count on that being normal IMO.

5) MSPT time has arrived, figure out how to play in some Sattys and/or grind your way to the $1100 entry fee ... couple days of work might get you over $200K!! GL

jacks room moved to westgate today at 3pm. did anyone play there?

Yes, forgot about that little piece of news yesterday. I'm still torn as to what charity poker should/can do going forward. Westgate is a decent and familiar room to most poker players in the area. It's just a matter of surviving this period of time when the 'new toy' still has some shine to it.

Certainly the days of two charities should be done, but this will allow the rooms to open earlier and avoid the shut down period which certainly would've hurt King's IMO. My initial thoughts for King's was to make Westgate the weekend room with the reason being that the further from Gun Lake it could get would be better for them. It would be interesting to see how Russo's would react to a change in the schedule. Both locations shut food and drink down 'early' on Sunday nights, but that really shouldn't be that big of a deal as most people don't drink on Sunday nights.

Of course the flip side to the argument is similar to the restaurant business (and Vegas) ... when a hot business opens then other similar businesses build near by and then they just duke it out for the customers. Why do we need two banks/gas stations on 'every' corner? Why does Walmart build down the street from 'every' Target and Meijer?

The emphasis will be on tournaments and it may be tough to keep a group of Dealers on board that aren't getting a lot of cash shifts. It wont be an easy task with the biggest item being communicating to the Players where the games are each day when changes are going to take place. GL

I'm interested in people's thoughts who have played the MSPT Q's at FK these last couple weeks. How are numbers vs last year? This tournament has gained a ton of steam, but I'm wondering if Gun Lake has cause more players to not make the drive down to try and qualify into the tournament? Or maybe they still have?

I'm hoping numbers won't be down this fall, but I consider it to be a possibility. Huge cash action has moved away from FK in terms of numbers and size of games. I'd be interested to see how much MSPT numbers are tied into the health of the FK poker room overall.

The $65s have taken a pretty big hit, but the $250s are about the same or more according to sources at FK on Sunday when I made the drive (after winning my $250 at GL on the way there ... ). They did have 120 for the Noon $65 today, which is about normal for 'week of'.

No love as I busted just before the end of re-entry (Level 4) and decided to hit the road back to GL for more cash. There were only 4 names on the 2/5 list at FK and two of them were still in the tournament! That's something you would never see at FK pre GL.

I didn't check the final count but they may have gotten to 150 entries on Sunday afternoon and only 54 Sunday night. Pretty sure that 34 people got seats in Saturday night's 250, so that would've been 170 entries.

I think FK will be fine this time around Thursday to Saturday ... unless GL has some Promo up their sleeve that they aren't talking about (which they should and should be advertising it!!). FK may suffer on Sunday when some Players may not drive to BC for 'juicy' cash leftovers but I think the lure of out of town Players will survive the Day 1s.

It doesn't help that WSOPc $400 preliminary event ($777,777 prize pool min) will be ongoing as well. With 2 Day 1s each Thursday and Friday Players can spend only $4-800 with a similar prize pool, but I assume a worse structure at least in the early goings.

It will be interesting to see if they set another record .. I'm thinking a lot of Players will make 'day of' decisions with A LOT of familiar faces at FK on Thursday. GL

Any word on tournaments at Gun Lake? I'm assuming that tournaments will start after the MSPT and the WSOPc. FW South Bend started theirs a month after opening, with 3 weekly tournaments. I assume GL will at the very least run something similar.

What seems reasonable to expect? Cash games are so strong at GL that I wonder if there is any room for a nightly tournament? Unless the tournament only draws 50 people or so, it would seem that GL would need more tables. I definitely see a Saturday and Sunday tournament that starts between 10am-noon that could draw at least 100 people with a $100+ buy in.

Nice to see the cash games doing so well at Gun Lake. Surpassed my expectations.

1) Still 'soon' and 'working on it' for tournaments at GL. They have multiple items in front of the MGCB and they work at their own pace. No, I'm not sure why they didn't have this stuff already taken care of, but I'm not sure when everyone was hired either.

I gave them my 2 cents about mixing things up the way FK does on Sundays. And yes, they may have to cap the starting field for weekday nightly tournaments, but I think it would be at 70 or 80, not 50-60 as King's has been doing. There's nothing wrong with a small wait list to help motivate Players to get there on time!! But there's also the idea that no matter how late you are that you can walk right into a seat as well!!

2) GLake did start some sort of food service program as of Monday. I believe that you will be able to order via I-pad in the room and they will bring it down when ready .. not sure, just my best guess.

3) As of right now (12:37) the $65 satty at FK has 'only' 62 entries, good for 15 silver tickets ... about half as many as yesterday.

4) The PLO table at GLake just started also ... so if you want to be a starter you should play on being there by 1130-Noon any weekday. You may end up playing NL for a bit, but it's worth the wait!! GL

Congrats to Answer20 for finishing 4th place at this weekend's MSPT

Sorry .. not 'this' weekend ... Got a guy to put in 120bb PF with QQ when he said he knew he was behind ... Q Turn, but I hit my 4 flush on the River!! Oops, it paired the Board. GL


PS ... MSPT drew 299 entries .. a new Thursday record. I had no issues with any of the new Dealers and our shuffle machine was replaced with minimal delay in our progress.

MSPT is a wrap ... I don't think they broke the record for total entries, but pretty easily beat the $1M again. A few WM locals cashed, including a few names I don't recognize but overall I'd say that Michiganders didn't 'protect' their home turf very well.

I think cash play was down at FKeepers as well. Gun Lake didn't help and WSOPc starting up in Hammond was a factor also.

No 'tournament' date at GLake yet. I think they fixed the software glitch with the Player's Cards but poker players are earning less 'card' tier credits than they were in September. So you should get an hourly comp of $1 OR 50 points (your choice as to how to use them) as well as some tier credits while playing poker. I snagged some nice silverware yesterday late in the day for 'earning' 200 points/credits 'that' day. Apparently they have giveaways on Monday afternoons and Tuesday evenings each week. They could do a better job in the poker room letting us know about the promotions going on ... but if we are down at 131 collecting gifts then it slows the game down!!

Played at Horseshoe Sunday ... wow, way weaker play than I expected at both 2/5 and PLO ... might be worth the extra 45 minute drive if I have a long session set up. There was a major Dealer issue for one down of PLO. He struggled, including letting a BB push out a $150 bet into a $65 pot and generating 2 folds before some Players spoke up about the 'illegal' bet. GL

I don't play poker for promotions...... but I feel if GLC is raking $1 per pot for promotions...... Then they shouldn't go a whole week without one. $7 pulled from $20 is ridiculous. And I don't believe the whole excuse they are throwing out

Is it not $4 from a $20 pot?

Of course that's still ridiculous.