just noticed this, nice run..... sorry things didnt pan out better for you.

Ha yeah that's a giveaway. Thanks for sweating me in the event and the kind words, was good to get to catch up a bit on Sunday night in the poker room. Hope you ran well during the rest of the weekend, and see you next year if not before hopefully (and welcome to Twoplustwo!). We're both pretty easy to pick out of a crowd.

Ty luke as well, good to have put a face with another twoplustwoer on this trip.

Thanks Jack and Congrats on taking down 13th!

Thank You for the update. I guess I will be going to Choctaw this week for some more live experience.

Cya next week

I got 6th sigh....Structure was really bad late b/c everyone took a long time to act. Def a luck box tourney in the end. We just didn't see many hands at all. The winner was easily the worst player of the final 20 IMO. He didn't even know how to bet correctly when I sat with him at the end of day 1. It was frustrating watching everyone around me pick up big hand after big hand but i guess thats how it goes

Congrats Ben, wish you woulda won.

And I will admit that the tournament was ran better this year than last year. I guess the place is improving every year.

I think what it comes down to is that for a tournament that was started 6 years ago at a place that pretty much refuses outside help or input, they have done a pretty good job of putting together a tournament series. They do listen to their customers and try to make improvements every year.

The problem is that they still fall well short on several issues of a series ran by professionals. There are industry standards for issues that come up at all of these tournaments, and if they would hire a Jimmy Sommerfeld or someone to come in and help them out for a few weeks the series could be world class.


The main issue is the bolded issue here, the tournament still runs way too fast. As I expressed to you in a PM, the WSOP runs tournaments with 1500-2000 runners all summer long that are over in 3 days and nobody complains about their structures.

As far as I can tell, the only reason the 40 minute levels and larger level jumps are used is because the tournament staff wants to be out of there at an early hour. I can promise you almost no players would complain about playing from noon to 2am like every WSOP event runs all summer long. It's the staff at Winstar that wants to get out of there by 9 or 10 or 11 pm that makes the decision to have a house friendly structure and too-early start time. Please correct me if I am wrong on this.

Again, I do commend you for the time you put in here and I commend Winstar for trying to improve their tournament every year. Maybe the next improvement will be hiring a world class tournament director for the series to make this a world class event.

Suggestions for winstar. They did a much better job than last year and I am sure will improve next year as well....

1) Start each player with 8 green chips. Why the constant changemaking for several hours of play.

2) 1 hour levels and play later in the day if needed. The 40 min levels ended way too early. This is a 2k buyin with a 2.8 million prizepool afterall.

3) Add a 1200 2400 level. Going from 1000 2000 right to 1500 3000 right near the money isnt fair to the players.

4) Get rid of the dealer bank. Having a dealer bank with 120K in chips is ridiculous. Color up chips at the end of levels as needed. There should never be a working stack of chips in the dealers rack as far as Im concerned. Allowing a dealer to color up chips out of every pot for several levels with 120K in chips at their disposal can only lead to an error. The chips were not even balanced out either. Floor people came around and collected thie chips from the dealer banks without even accounting for the entire 120K worth.

5) Have a dinner break of at least 45 minutes. A 30 minute dinner break on a saturday night doesnt even allow you time to get somewhere and order food. Be reasonable on this.

6) Use Day 1A as a barometer. If day 1A finishes at 2k 4k for example, do not allow Day 1B or 1C to go past that. What happened this year was Day 1B went almost through 3k 6k to get to the money while 1A stopped at 2K 4K. This created much larger stacks on 1B and also didnt give a fair shot to the short stacks.

Every player I spoke with would have preferred continuing playing at 2k 4k until the money was reached, rather than moving on to 3k 6k, on Day 1B since that is where 1A stopped.

If Day1B finishes earlier than 1A, there is no way to control that, but considering that the field sizes increase each day, that would be unlikely.

In addition to seconding all of Allen's suggestions above especially the constant making of change, so annoying, I have a few myself.

1. Hire a professional tournament director.

2. Never cap an event like this. If you don't have enough dealers bring more
in, no excuses for this.

3. Hire a professional tournament director.

4. Bring back all the hot river chics walking around the room. If you want to
keep a bunch of poker players happy, hot chics are a quick fix.

5. Hire a professional tournament director.

6. Tell your hotel staff if they hear complaints from River Participants that
travel across the country to be here they are canned.

7. Hold all pre-lims in the same room the river was in.

8. Lastly, I will spare giving all the structure and setup flaws and simpy
leave it at hire a professional tournament director.

Im the guy who 4bet shoved AK on the bubble on you, you eventually called with QQ, for what i think was a pot for the chip lead on day 1a.

Good playing with you,

Hugo.

Good playing with you
Likewise, Hugo.

That was a terrible spot I put myself in. When the short stack shoved and I saw QQ, I wanted to isolate him. I should have just gone all in first instead of raising 60% of my stack and giving you a chance to put my to the test.

What a brutal decision two from the money! I decided I was either going to have a big stack coming back or I would be done. I couldn't see coming back short stacked with that structure. I thought to myself, "Do I want to cash or do I want to have a chance to win?"

If you had AA or KK then I would have been very unfortunate. I figured it was more likely AK or maybe even JJ and you knew I was aware of the bubble and could fold a lot of hands there. I was hoping the short stack may have shared one or more of your cards, so that if you had AK I would be in okay shape.

I was fortunate to have my hand hold up.

Can someone forward my suggestions to the powers that be there, or at least greg raymer.

I'll mention them to the room manager.

they really don't care...several people have voiced their opinions. That poker room has great action but is not well run. They really don't care what the players want. $$$

Rather than mention, would prefer if you printed out and handed to him.

As the poster said above they really don't care, in the past at least. I have seen tons of posts like the one Allen and I posted above at the conclusion of four straight River's and they have changed few things for the better. I am hoping that Mr. Raymer will finally take the feedback from 2p2 and use his Main Event Champion superpowers to drill it into their thickest of skulls.

Probably also be good to not announce that they will be coloring up the black chips during break, then after all that is done and players are on break to color up larger chips.

i lost approximately 16% of my stack to a color up mistake.

I had 128,100 sat there and waited to see if my 100 chip turned into a 500 chip. after it did not, i left. When I came back they had colored up 40k in chips, and gave me 4 5k chips insted of 4 10k chips they also had in the well.

i do not think anybody should color up chips without player option to be at table to verify all is correct.

Same dealer miscounted another players chips about 2 hands prior to break.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/10...21/index4.html

"I am escorted off to get my winnings. They made a big announcement over the speaker system, “In 152nd place, from Plano, Texas, Craig Savage!” and I received a round of applause. "

Very observant...almost.

My post was #805, In post # 812, 1-secret-1 posted a link to the same trip report as above. He admitted he outed himself.

*eyebrow arch*

Your poker room employs humans. Let's just say on one occasion, I've seen a very suspicious seating order.

On one occassion I saw a WSOP dealer kill an all in player's hand. That does not mean it is common place.

The poster claims it happens all the time. It does not.

When you hear complaints about the Winstar poker operation remember alot of the decisions made are made by non-poker execs. i.e. the daily tournament chip colors. Obviously no input from a player or a dealer probabably someone in marketing.

As far as seating certain players over others that are waiting..I've not seen that done and I've played for several years. There are a handful of players who seem to get preferential seating in the daily tournaments but I think that is due to medical issues.

But I would like to see them clean the chips....I see players kill time between hands scraping a dark goo off the chips and unto the table...no telling what we're subjecting ourselves to by handling them.

All in all I am glad we have this poker room, and echo all the comments about Dealer Guy.

Hi all. I've posted ITT previously, and have been reading it all along. I've noted a lot of the things that people are pointing out as needing attention by the poker room, and will pass along all ideas I agree with. If you have further suggestions, or want to reiterate things you've posted already or seen and agreed with ITT, feel free to contact me on my website, www.fossilmanpoker.com. You can PM me here as well, but using the contact button on my website will be more effective please.

Also, a big thanks to Dealer-Guy, who is also on top of these things, and has been passing them on to management.

Thanks, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

I played with him yesterday in the Friday tourney at Winstar.....

Seems like a nice guy but luckboxed has to be an understatement of monumental proportions!