Not sure the best way to broadcast this to all of 2+2 ...

Turtle Creek Casino in Traverse City Michigan is closing their poker room on March 31st.

In a mandate to deplete the promotion fund they are awarding $10K per day to the 'best' beaten hand.

So in very simple terms ... If your King High Flush gets beaten by the Ace High Flush and no Full House or better hands lose for the rest of the day, then you win $10K!

This is running each day starting Sunday March 3rd so if you don't mind a little snow or you want to check out some smaller ski hills in your spare time, this will be the place to be for 30 days!! Good Luck ...

How many tables do they have? Regardless I doubt you see any money with a K hi flush

At best I see 3-4 tables running in this room, maybe 6 on the weekend, but who knows with the promotion going on and lots of folks are in the off season up there that work the wine and fruit industries.

Remember it has to be the losing hand. My local casino can go 4-5 hours with 3-4 tables running without someone getting AAA-full (or better) for a HH promo, much less a Full House losing a hand. Granted without the AAAxx requirement there's a lot more available to lose with!!

I would assume that you only need one card from your hand to play. Can you imagine a straight flush on the Board and someone scoops the pot but misses out on chopping $10K? Interesting thought ... GL

I happened to be around incidentally when they closed the room at Hard Rock Biloxi, kinda similar situation. The short story is, it was impossible to get a seat, the tables were full of zombies playing 20h+ straight.

Nope.

From their website:

Thanks ... Good to see them update the website. Just can't imagine that this is not a +EV event for anyone who can afford or find cheap housing for the month (and has limited daily responsibilities). GL

Assuming all 10 tables are full your expectation from the promotion is $11 an hour. $22 if on average 5 tables are full. I think they struck a good balance with this being great for the locals but probably not good enough to bring in out of town grinders

Yeah, nothing to fly across the country for.

However, last time I played there they could only fit 6 tables in the room, and I don't think they commonly get more than 4 running even at peak times. The promo will probably draw people in, though.

Bummer, I enjoyed that room.

It's significantly better than the "nearby" options of Odawa and Soaring Eagle, IMO. If I still lived in the area I probably would give up poker rather than play at either of those places.

Is Odawa the room in Petoskey?. That's how I ended up at Turtle Creek the first time -- nothing happening in Petoskey, so my wife and I made a road trip out of it. We just went straight to Turtle Creek on future trips up north. Soaring Eagle is just depressing all around, though I've never made it into the card room.

Yeah, Odawa is in Petoskey. Action is really low there. They only get regular cash games on the weekends. I think the staff and regulars are nice but the management is atrocious. I got banned from there under silly circumstances and was completely ignored when I sought to be re-instated, even after a year and then two years.

I got banned from all table games, including poker, for card counting while betting minimums at blackjack. I do know how to count cards and was even open about it if the topic came up because I had decided I wasn't going to use the skills and risk getting banned at a place I played a lot of poker. I am down a few thousand overall at the casino and have paid thousands in rake at poker as well. I thought I would be fine if it was blatantly obvious I wasn't counting especially given that all the staff knew and (I thought) liked me.

You got banned for counting while it was blatantly obvious that you weren't counting?

I mean it would be blatantly obvious to anyone who has any clue about how counting works. I suppose not obvious to someone clueless. I never exceeded the table minimum and I wasn't using indices because I didn't even know what the count was.

The guy that runs table games is a doofus. I doubt he is competent at his job at all. There is a guy playing there who got caught stealing tournament chips from small buy-in tournaments to re-introduce them into larger buy-in tournaments and I know he got punished somehow, but he's still playing there. They have a max bet on all table games of $300 and won't exceed that for whales because they're scared of action.

With Turtle Creek closing their poker room there are no reasonable alternatives for locals. Maybe some underground games will pop up or people will just move to unraked home games.

Soaring Eagle finished up a major remodeling of many parts of the casino, which included moving the poker room into a brand new enclosed area with 'free' food and beverage inside the room for active Players. I can't say much about the 'hit or miss' action in the room but they've made an effort to keep their facility modern. Tables are much farther apart and the room is relatively smoke free and quiet. They need to get off their horse and work things out with the HPT before another venue latches onto them. That was a driving force for Players to make at least 2-3 visits per year to that room. Gun Lake has really cut into the poker business at both SEagle and FKeepers. GL

some people will play short handed on graveyard and will just ante and all will draw to the end and hit the jackpot for the day. or might get tricky and start a 5 card draw or seven stud game.

Talked to a couple of 'real' Players who headed up that way and they indicated that this was a zoo (as expected). There is a special call-in number that starts at 8AM and by 815 or so they have already started a waiting list. 'Magically' the higher end reg card holders have picked up the poker bug and 'somehow' end up on the top of the list .. at least early on this month. They may get bored or run out of seed money to just sit there all day and look for hands.

The 'weakest' losing hand so far has been a King high Flush losing to an Ace high flush. GL

It is standard and documented at some casinos for high level cards to receive priority on wait lists. Nothing hidden or nefarious. Just the way it works.

made a 4 hour drive yesterday to play one time before they closed for good. had been there 10 years or so ago and no game was going. called in and was 52 on list so made first seating. very well run as far as loading the tables to start. great atmosphere and played at a nice table. didn't understand how the bb was working but didn't really care either. bonus was meeting 2 former college roommates who live in traverse city - hadn't seen either in 45 years. also big win of $28, Then went down to gun lake and lost it and more playing plo

Last chance to get up there!!

It appears that the 'preference' at 800 AM was to any 'live' person standing in line at the designated pit area. Then they started to answer the phone.

The games don't start until 200 PM, so you then need to find something to do until then (hopefully play slots/pit) and they end at 1200 AM.

Obviously poker isn't the best 'per square foot' profit center for a casino and they should cater to the masses ... It's just very disappointing that there's no live poker above the 43rd parallel (Mount Pleasant) in the Lower Peninsula. GL

poker makes for a complete casino. people need other diversions and say a guys wife may play slots while he takes a break from losing at bj and plays poker.

if they only see sq. foot they should then eliminate the food and even the parking lot then.
and make all the restrooms smaller.

Wow, that’s sad to hear they’re closing. I rather liked that room.

Some of the scenarios are
Slots and tables no poker
Tables and poker no slots
Slots and poker no tables
Slots no tables no poker
Tables no poker no slots
Poker no tables no slots

In locations where all of these are legally possible, which is the most profitable usually? Which is least if it even exists?

Other than keno which a dead person can literall6 win at, slots are by far the easiest for the player and poker is by far the hardest to play well. Maybe even hardest to play at all. People are generall6 gambling to have a good time and relax not work hard. I am very glad there are some who are clueless or nearly so as it makes it easier for me. I don’t work hard enough at poker to beat a bunch of pros and I don’t want to. I don’t have to because poker is recreation for me not a livelihood. I am +ev but not nearly enough to make as good a living as I do in my job.

I told Tony Bigcharles about the promotion. He and a friend went up there and played. They got some tables shares.

Glad they were able to go up there. Hard to say what happened to this room. They used to fly in Jen Harmon or other Pros from time to time for their 'famous' WSOP ME seat tournaments. I indicated that there were some issues between 'the big' game and staff which resulted in that game going off site. There really isn't that much winter economy in that exact area of Michigan either, certainly not anywhere close to the summer economy.

Things change ... my kids have outgrown Great Wolf Lodge for the most part so I don't really know when I'll be back in that city. It's just sorry to see any room shut down when poker is doing so well in other areas right now. GL