There's an All-Star NBA player who stops in our room seemingly every time he's in town. He was in last night. He's usually "earbuds in and speechless" while he plays, but tonight he was smiling and chatting. Two interesting things from my down:

--Two guys who had been stiffing me all week, were suddenly tipping. I guess they wanted to impress their new friend.

--I couldn't hear what this was a reply to, but I can imagine, because at about 9:30 pm he chuckled and told his neighbor, "Well you tell her this my Xth year, and I've been out a LOT later than this! And in a lot rougher shape!"

(he was gone by 10 pm)

Not that I had to guess, but looking at the schedule confirms it is the same one who always comes to Casino AZ.

I am sure there are high limit regulars that make sure they are there on nights when he is likely to be in town.

Somebody asked him if he should really be out late partying the day before a game. Which was kinda funny because he wasn’t drinking and it wasn’t that late. I think it was just somebody trying to strike up a conversation with him. He’s a good guy - I don’t follow NBA but he seems like one of the more congenial players that I have come across.

More like Adam "Cap-man" Jones, amirite?

Confirmed .. This Player likes to triple-barrel bluff as much as he triple-doubles in the NBA. He and a much taller friend used to hit up Poto in Milwaukee as well. His friend went on to more 'golden' pastures a few years back. GL

NJ man, unemployed for 15 years, divorced last October ... claims 200M+ lottery winnings on a ticket he almost left in the store the day he purchased it.

No mention of kids, but NJ is an alimony state ... guess who was on the phone with him shortly thereafter?

Poor guy will probably be left with ashes in 4-7 years after being perfectly fine with his minimal previous existence. If there was ever a case for taking the 20 year payout. GL

"Poor guy" is wrong choice of words.

I've recently come to believe that I don't *want* to win that kind of money, as SO many "winners" end up crying about how it tore apart their families and friends, and they wish they'd never won that money...

...but I haven't been unemployed for 15 years.

In general, the type of person who plays the lottery is not the type of person who handles their finances well

I have never purchased a lottery ticket in my life. Not a scratch off, not a powerball, never even gone in on office pools.

And this is from someone who has made $1k+ bets on BJ and have had some low 5 figure losing days.

Denying the antecedent, nicely played.

I tend to agree with this, although all of us think we would be different. My wife and I have talked about just living on cruise ships for a couple of years, 'home' schooling our kids around the world as a way of disappearing before picking a place to settle down.

I would be perfectly happy with 2x the amount of money I need to keep the mail from showing up month to month. And then building my own nest egg from there. That obviously is the (modified) Dave Ramsey way of wealth building and it certainly would come with less outside expectations. GL

We have a daily tournament most nights at 6:30 PM. It usually wraps up around 12:00-1:00 AM. The big one is on Wednesdays, we give 'em extra chips and longer limits, that can stretch past 1:30.

But Mondays are the Double Stack. We give 'em WAY too many chips. If I'm in the box when the final table begins, I like to crack, "Congratulations, players--you made it to the halfway point of this tournament!" They chuckle--then they wonder if I'm kidding.

Last night, the final table convened at midnight. When I left at 1:30, they had only lost one player. This tournament is NEVER over when I work my full shift and leave at 2:00. I have no idea what time it usually wraps up.

AND THE PLAYERS *LOVE* THIS! It sounds like *punishment* to me, I'd never sign up for something like this. I'll never understand it.

As a player, that sounds like good value.

I'll show myself out.

Sounds like that tournament structure needs some adjustment.

Although - way before I was a dealer I used to play in a weekly tournament that started at midnight. It was great fun and good value I thought because the other players were drunk and/or falling asleep. I now realize it must have been torture for the dealers.

There's been some adjustments made to higher BI tournament structures so that the FT average stack is well before the push/fold chart stage. I've been touting The Orleans Friday night tournament for years as well as the WSOP Rio 'nightly'. These tournaments usually wrap up between 3-4 AM with mostly happy campers.

I suppose it all comes down to what you're trying to get out of it. The WPT streams on PokerGo have been awesome this week for the tournament viewer with multiple 80-100bb stacks, which allows for 'poker' to be played out.

Although it is surprising that a Monday (start of the work week for most) night tournament would run so late ... not sure the Player pool. GL

Nah man, not me. Gimme the 200M please.

Ditto. I can get new friends.

And you can literally make a new family too.

(Short Stack doubles up)

SS: Thanks, dealer!

YTF: I'll not take the credit...lest I be forced later to take the blame.

SS: (sincerely) No, you GET the credit! Because *your* fingers are touching those cards, you have more power over this than anyone!

YTF: Well...my BUTT is touching this chair, so I guess the chair gets half the credit, too.

And this is where yet another youtalkfunny line is stolen by me.

My line about "This is a game of skill, you played it quite skillfully" will still be in rotation, however (especially when they kind of didn't).

Now that things have settled down a bit, here is the third/forth hand story I've heard.

We have screens showing the current high hand and the amount of time left until it resets. With 1-2 minutes left, there is a bet and everyone else folds. The winner apparently says something about having quads lower than what is showing on the board then throws his cards forward face down. The dealer grabs the cards, turns them over, and tells the guy to wait until the reset. The whole table waits, then the dealer calls out the high hand and the guy winds up winning.

Another player must have reported it to gaming, who very quickly suspended the dealer's license and he has not been back since. This is the first time I know of gaming getting involved to this extent.

Hope the toke was worth it. What an idiot.

I love YTF post and one liners but this is not his. Exact words may be different but this is an old one.

Wow, that sucks. Dumb move though. Yeah, I would never get involved to that extent where it holds up the game.

When I see new faces in the room and a hand goes down where it's very, very likely they have a high hand or promo hand, before I scoop their hand into the muck, I'll say something like, "You know about our high hand promotion, right?" I don't see a problem with this.

I remember one time where there were two deuces on the flop, the hand proceeded, then this player wins the hand accordingly, and it was a big pot where he raised every street then got a fold to him on the river...

As he goes to pick up his cards to muck them, I say to him, "You know, if you have quad deuces it pays bonus money, right?" And he goes, "It does? How'd you know...?" and he flips over quad deuces. "Wow, thanks dealer, I almost mucked it..." and he asked me what it was worth and gave me 10% out of his pocket in cash.

I can't imagine a reasonable cardroom stakeholder having a problem with this interaction.

Which probably means that there will be 4 stories to follow that describe in painstaking detail how each author did the exact same thing and got raked over the coals.