Open to the fact that I know very little about what goes into scheduling tournaments, and what the organizers are optimizing for and what other people's response functions look like, so just going to throw this out there from my perspective and see what people think.

I was a pro from 2010-2012 or so, then played a reasonable amount while in school and doing a startup from 2012-2105, and in 2015 took a full time job at a hedge fund which I enjoy. I miss poker and I'd like to play more, but the way these tournaments are scheduled makes it nearly impossible for me to play unless I am willing to take a huge amount of time off, which is usually worth substantially more than the tournament equity.

Mostly, my complaint is that tournaments often run 1-A on a Saturday, 1-B on a Sunday and then Day 2 from Monday onward. They also don't schedule other attractive tournaments (specifically high rollers) at convenient times.

For example, consider the upcoming WPT in Montreal:

Days 1A-1C are Fri, Sat and Sun, and the 2-day 10k HR is Mon and the 1.5k is Tues.

Why would that HR be on Monday? Why not hold it Saturday instead? We could fire a bullet on Friday, play the HR on Saturday and fire a Main bullet Sunday whenever we bust. You lose Main bullets from people who would have fired 3 but now don't fire Saturday, but you also gain HR entrants that you would have lost due to them still being in the Main on Monday. (And you gain total entrants, from ppl like me who won't come under the current sched but would for this)

You could even mitigate this further by saying that people who play the HR are allowed to use two of their three bullets on 1 day rather than 1 bullet per day. The only reason I can see for this policy in the first place is that you want to make sure people stay all the days, but if they're playing the HR they are staying anyway.

If it were scheduled like this, I'd come play, but as is I am guaranteed to miss Monday and often going to miss Tuesday from work as well... and I might not even get to play the HR either.

Also, why aren't there ~1-2k one-day turbos on Sat and Sun from people who are there all weekend but make it through on Fri or Sat?? EPTs do this, and it's great. You get way more poker packed into the weekend.

If you're going to do it this way, then at least incentivize me to make a 9 day vacation out of it and take the week off (like PCA) with tons of events concurrent with the Main if you bust. But as is, there's just the HR and a 1.5k on Tuesday.


For an even worse example, consider the Borgata Winter Open:
Day 1A is on a *Sunday* and Day 1B is on Monday. They also have no tournaments on Tuesday. Not to mention the damn thing goes until Friday. That means you could make like 12th or something for not that much money, bust Thursday, and miss four days of work... or mincash and miss 3 days.. or not even cash and miss 2. For me, literally any outcome other than a final table would suck.

There's only one "second chance" tourney on the Tuesday. There's no way I can take all these days off to play the main, likely not even cash, and then not have other stuff to play. How do people with jobs play this??? Don't you want incentivize people with jobs to come play?


The WPT in Maryland is less egregious, but a perfect example of a tournament I would've played had the schedule been moved up a day. Day 1-A on Saturday, 1-B on Sunday and the HR on Monday. Move all those up, and I'm there. Or, if it's as-is, at least give us something good to play on Sunday! I get that maybe this will stretch Saturday too thin and you don't have room, but there are other ways around that too.

I get that it probably works out OK for people who are local, and I'm new to the East Coast, but it seems like there are so many big cities around here that are close enough to play these if the schedule is accommodative, but too far if the schedule is not. (i.e. If I lived in DC I could play the HR after work, but from NY or CT that's not possible).


An example of tournaments that are easy for people with jobs to play are the ones at Foxwoods:
Day 1A on Friday (would be even better if Friday started at 2 instead of noon), Day 1B on Saturday
Day 2 on Sunday
HR Sunday afternoon
Final Table on Monday (if Main is 3 day)

Friday is usually an easier day to take off than Monday and/or you can also take off work early and play Friday without taking a day off unlike Monday. If You started Friday Day 1 at 1 or 2pm instead of 11 or noon, that would be awesome... Only missing Monday if deep is a totally reasonable tradeoff.

Or, do it like PCA, where people can take the whole week off, knowing ahead of time that even if they bust the main on Day 2 or 3, there is a ton of other stuff for them to play.


Again, there's a lot I don't know. How many people travel vs how much are you trying to cater to locals? How many people are there like me who will or won't travel based on days missed vs. people who happily miss days and you want to keep them around longer for hotel bills + gambling revenue? How much do logistics of having enough tables etc. drive these decisions?

But, just my $0.02 on how I'd do things a little differently if the goal was to make people like me with jobs who still want to play poker happy.

Maybe high roller tournaments aren't targeted at plebeians who are heavily tied down by their work schedules.

In Montreal, I would assume that there are logistical reasons for why you can't have the HR day 1 on the same day as any main event day 1.

The Borgata's schedule has several smaller tournaments after the main.

Learn how to play cash games instead of tournaments, then you won't be at the mercy of tournament schedules.

I for one would play every Borgata Main if they did what Parx does, Day 1s on weekdays + 1 saturday flight Day 2 on Sunday and Last Day 3 on Monday

Idk, I know a lot of really, really, really rich people who like poker. They like HRs because it's a chance to win a prestigious tournament against a small field and they get to play good players. Some of them don't work much, so it doesn't matter when you hold it, but lots of them still work and would be willing to go play stuff on weekends but a day of their work is so important that there's no way they'd go play on a random Monday.

The Borgata's post-main tournaments are pretty weak compared to what they offer in the couple days before the tournament. If they had a 1-2k every day plus maybe like a 5k highroller on one of the days, I think some people would be way more likely to play the main. The current main sched is pretty nuts in terms of expected work days missed.

I rarely venture into NVG but someone kicked me this thread-I agree on almost all counts.

I've ceased playing Borgata for those exact same scheduling reasons-in order for me to realistically play the tournament, I have to take Mon-Wed off of work, almost regardless of expected results, because I have to factor in a full travel day coming back. Contrast that with your standard WSOPC main where I can generally plan on taking off only Friday, travel Thursday evening, and then take off Monday as necessary.

Similarly, WPTs that have day 1s Fri/Sat/Sun makes it less likely for me to go. Montreal was Fri/Sat of Thanksgiving weekend the first year they held it, and now it gets half as many entrants not being on Thanksgiving weekend and going with an extra day 1. I can't see that as a coincidence.

I generally don't play HRs but I believe most of your points in regards to them are correct. The further into the week they get pushed, the smaller the field will be. Tourneys that have day 2s on Sunday and an HR starting at like 2pm would seem ideal to me, but I don't know if that would bear out better in numbers compared to the option you offer.

Finally, I've always thought that a survivor tournament on subsequent day 1s of a tourney that qualifies a large field would do well. I'd be more likely to play 1A of tournaments if I knew there was a 1k or 2k survivor that takes place on 1B or 1C where I can win something reasonably big without sacrificing a ton of time.

I agree with both GB and Bizzle.

I think as more people who find themselves in spots like GB and I (found our ways from professional poker to working a job, but still want to play big tournaments), tourney series should find ways to accommodate people who have a working schedule but still want to play reasonably big tournaments. This is something that WSOPC, MSPT, and HPT have done very well IMO.

I think the following setups would make me way more likely to take time off and travel for series than a lot of the ones listed.

Main Event:

Day 1's Thursday, Friday, Turbo flight Saturday morning
Abbreviated Day 2 Saturday afternoon to evening
Day 3 Sunday, play to completion whether that's Sunday/Monday/Tuesday, doesn't matter.

High Roller/other side event:

2-day event starting Sunday


I'd also be fine with more events/series that just had one day 1 Friday, then a slightly lower buyin event starting Saturday. So for a WPT $3k, make it a true freezeout rather than having multiple day 1's. Then have a $1k or $1500 with a quicker structure starting Saturday.

Yep! I'm also in NYC, but have never been able to justify playing a Borgata Main because day 2's are always on Tuesday and it's just not worth the time off work up front.

The WSOPC very intentionally caters to people who have weekends off with their Friday/Saturday Main Event day 1's (and now most stops have a $2-$3k high roller on that Sunday as well)... I've never quite understood why other stops do not, but I've heard anecdotally that it can have to do with hotel capacity/room prices, and a place like Borgata would never schedule a Main or kickoff event over a weekend because of that (even if it almost certainly would result in a bigger field).

It's tilting though, I'd probably play twice as many tournaments a year if they were scheduled differently.

Poker rooms make more money off cash games than tournaments. While tournaments sometimes drive cash game traffic, rooms should be careful that their tournaments don't cannibalize cash games. Maximizing the number of entries in tournaments may not be what is best for the room.

I don't think it is good for poker rooms to cater too much towards people whose only gambling is poker tournaments. Those players are not as valuable as people who also play cash games or slots or pit games.

Highrollers mostly cater to people who make their own schedule but I see no real reason why they couldn't play on the weekends if players wanted it to be that way. Those players are more elastic with room rates anyway, so that shouldn't be an issue.

@GoldenBears I'm sure you're still in contact with the US high roller guys from back then who are still playing (Scott Seiver, Bryn Kenney..), did you ever ask them about it? I don't see a reason why SHR regs wouldn't be onboard with a change if that would bring in more recreational players. Basically everything in those events cater to them anyway, so why not adjust the schedule if that's something they would prefer?

I'm pretty sure it's a good thing for a casino to cater to business people who are willing to drop $25k-$100k on poker tournament entries.

I'm mostly talking about the tournaments that are available in the northeast, which are like 1.5k-3.5k mains and 3k-10k high rollers, not the 100k SHRs... for those, I am pretty sure they schedule them directly in accordance to when the recreational players can make it and do a good job of that. (I haven't played one of those since 2013 or 14, but even back then they were pretty savvy about scheduling them)

Well yeah, unless those people are gonna drop that money on blackjack and craps instead or into cash games where it's likely to get raked over many times before disappearing form the economy.

It's a question of balancing that (tournaments aren't great for casinos) with the fact that there are at last some customers (some of whom who have chimed in ITT) who aren't even showing up in the first place due to the tournament scheduling

While everything you've said has merit, why not just adapt and play cash games? They are a much better proposition for someone who can't pre-commit to playing all day several days in a row.

no trophies & no glory

pass

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7NxEj4A1Cg#t=1m40s

Hardly post in 2p2 but I share the same sentiments as OP

I work as a trader in a prop firm in Asia, and I often find it difficult to travel to play poker tournaments due to huge opportunities costs, which isn't helped by poor scheduling.

Single day high rollers should be on Sat
Main events should start thurs-fri and end on sunday (in the finance/biz world, it appears that it's better to start the weekend early instead of beginning the week later)
Weekends should have more single day and turbo events

Knew before I opened this thread that there was going to be some thinly veiled brags, OP did not disappoint! He even included a nice paragraph long bio detailing his situation which is totally irrelevant, get over yourself brother.

Speaking just for Montreal, for which I'm very familiar with the logistics of Playground, I think it could work like this:

Fri: Main 1A at 11AM; HR Day 1 at 2PM
Sat: Main 1B at 11AM; HR Day 2 at 2PM (to completion)
Sun: Main 1C at 11AM

It has to have two of the three Main starting flights on Sat/Sun to meet the guarantee because not enough players would play 1A/1B on Thurs/Fri to enable Day 2 on Sunday. I know this means Day 2 on Monday, but I don't see how this can be avoided and meet the guarantee.

For the HR, it would be difficult to schedule Day 1 on Sat / Day 2 on Sun because of the risk of needing the tables for the Main.

They could schedule evening turbos like you suggest (e.g. $1k Turbo at 8PM), but they usually cram in more satellites for the Friday and the Saturday evenings to get as many people into the Main as possible.

As some have mentioned, cash games are where they make their money, so I don't think they want to add more daily turbos because that could draw Main Event tourney bust-outs from lucrative cash tables (even though I'd prefer that too, since I feel the same way about cash as GB, and usually just drive 15 mins home when I've bust my tourney rather than be bored stiff with the cash game grind).

I hadn't even noticed, way to be insecure man, who cares if he brags, he still brought up some valid points

I am in the same situation as OP, live in NYC and work a finance job, and go to Foxwoods specifically because of the scheduling issues around work. It is difficult to justify taking 2+ days off work to play a poker tournament just to play the early stages. If the rest of the East Coast tournament stops would adopt the weekend warrior friendly schedule that Foxwoods has, they would earn my business.

Parx does, although I guess if you win it goes until 4 A.M on Monday Night.

Good post, I definitely agree with making changes for major tournaments to accommodate people with other commitments during most of the week (after all, "rec players" with other jobs are generally worse than professional players, and probably in everyone's benefit to include as many of them as possible).

I don't think this is just a NYC/east coast issue, would be great if this applied to all the major series main events, or at least the big $3k-10k ones with huge guarantees eg lapc,shr,borgata.

Kind of funny I posted a tweet about this during Borgata main, and a few random people replied that they just use their vacation days. Kind of lol if people have only a few weeks of vacation and allocate a decent chunk of it to play in a few poker tournaments. Granted most tournaments just end on day 1 or 2 for many people and don't take that much of the week, but for Borgata for example with Day1b Monday and Day 2 Tuesday that is absurd.

Borgata usually has more than 1,000 entries in their $3300+$200 main events. So they pull in $200,000+ from just the main events.

This might be more revenue than what is made than their cash games for the three weeks or so of their tournament series.

Calculate their expenses.

A hedge fund guy can't fit a poker tournament into his schedule?!?

That sounds terrible.

Every time I look at a tournament schedule I just assume the organisers think poker players don't work day jobs......maybe they're right

Last year's Montreal HR had 41 entrants. This year's guarantee will be reached at 30 entrants. But the entire poker room should twist itself into a pretzel to accommodate a few more rich guys (and the whopping $300 rake they provide).