Posted by Johnnymac 10:36 AM
Quick Vegas Report

I'm not going to write a typically long trip report post because I personally hate reading them myself and they all seem to sound the same: "I was up big playing $2-5 NL at Bellagio then this fish walked in and took all my money on the worst beat ever but the drinks were flowing and I'll go back because that place is full of awful players who will never be as good a poker player as me." Or something like that.

We were out there from Thursday night until Monday morning, which, in my opinion, is a great way to do Vegas because there is time on both Friday morning and Sunday night to play the poker tournaments that usually aren't offered on weekends and still time for the jusual Vegas hijinks and sports betting in between. Sunday night rooms are usually VERY cheap, as well, if you wait until Sunday morning to make a reservation like we did.

Anyway, to get to the main points:

Hotel: We stayed at The Venetian. This was my first time there and it was very nice. Canonico scored a pretty good rate for Thursday and Friday nights ($179 both nights) and a very expensive rate on Saturday ($440) for the same room. Thing is, the room just has to accumulate 6 hours of aggregate poker time between all of the guests in a particular room and you can ask for and receive the discounted poker room rate, which we ended up paying $250 for Saturday night. That was a bargain. Like I said, we didn't originally have a reservation on Sunday night and when we inquired on Saturday about staying an extra day, they said they hotel was booked solid but that we could squeeze in for $540 on Sunday morning. When we asked the same thing on Sunday morning that quoted us $169 for one more night. This isn't inconsistent - it's just good ecominics, because the expected value of the room declines rapidly the close time gets to it being unbooked and empty.

As far the hotel itself, the Sports Book and the Poker Room are very close and very convenient and the Coffee Shop is a Grand Lux cafe (just like the one in Houston) which was very good and very affordable. We ate there 3 times on the trip, including a free meal on Sunday night thanks to the poker comps that we accumulated in the two days we had played. My only complaint about the place is the number of tourists who walk around taking pictures and getting in the way, especially at the entrance that is right next to the poker room. Otherwise, the whole place is great, even if it's a little bit large.

Poker: During my last two trips to Vegas I was seduced by the $1-2 NL games that are available just about everywhere on the trip. And on both of those trips, I ran into some huge beats (some bad, some just unlucky) that took bites out of my bankroll $200 at a time. I thought about both of those experiences for a very long time before I went on this latest trip, and I realized that while I enjoy playing No Limit and I think I could ultimately be successful at those games, I'm not made of money and my bankroll simply isn't large enough for me to withstand many of those losses, especially with a pregnant Mrs Johnnymac sitting at home and already not a big fan of my gambling. This means that I would just be scared money at the table and that's not winning place to be.

So, upon consideration, I resolved before this trip to stay away from the No Limit and to only play in a couple of tournaments and the small limit games, that, as I learned, are beginning to make a comeback on the strip with people getting tired of No Limit for reasons similar to mine. This was a good decision - my results were spectacular: I played 25 total hours of $4-8 limit spread over three days and two casinos and I pocketed $724 in winnings. That is more than 3.5 big bets an hours, which is a-ok with me.

This is not to say that the entire run of LL holdem was fun or pleasurable, because sometimes it was not. Watching guys take down huge pots with runner runner baby flushes against bottom two pair after I had thrown away the suited Ace against action on the flop was VERY frustrating. But a funny thing happened early Sunday afternoon - I caught myself beginning to steam and count my dwindling stack of chips when I realized to myself that after 4 hours of boring non-winning play, I was only down $67. Couple that with my winnings at football, and I wasn't that bothered anymore. And besides, just like losing slowly for a while was pretty backbreaking, when the cards came I generally got paid off huge by the same guys who would bet any made hand to the end. It was a wash and it was definitely more fun than sweating a NL game with scared money.

This got me thinking.

Chris Moneymaker won the WSOP, and the poker boom began, just over three years ago. Since that time internet cardrooms have flourished and all of the casinos in Vegas have opened new flashy poker rooms where previously there were only a handful in a couple of places (Mirage, Bellagio, Binions). Similarly, right now there is a huge demand for NL games because that's the kind of game that many of the newer players are familiar with from television and the internet. Now, here's the deal - the internet isn't there anymore. And furthermore, like me, there are a lot of players who simply cannot afford to continually throw money into these No Limit games much longer, especially when there are games and tournaments available with smaller financial requirements that offer the same tangible casino experience save for a smaller total amount of money in the game. This weekend at Venetian, while there was indeed a $1-2 NL game that didn't seem to break for the entire time I was in the casino, during peak times there were just as many, if not more, $4-8 and $8-16 games going as there was total No Limit games going on, and I think this is because some people are starting to get tired of losing money as rapidly as No Limit allows it to be lost. This is why up until 2 years or so ago, casinos didn't offer NL at all because it drove off the bad players way too quickly. Now there is demand and plenty of new players willing to try their hands (no pun intended), but from my observations this weekend it seems that demand is starting to level out.

Here is my prediction: I predict that within 5 years, at least one, and possibly two, of the big flashy rooms at MGM, Caesars, and Venetian will close, and furthermore, I predict that No Limit poker will begin to die out again and be replaced with more Low Limit games instead. And I am also pretty sure that almost all of the more ancillary rooms, like those at TI, Harrah's, and Bally's will also close up shop within this period, too.

I am not predicting that poker will dwindle back to where it was five years ago, where there were ZERO no limit cash games available, but I believe we are beginning to see the end of the poker boom. There might be a NL game or two in a room, and it might be full on the weekends, but I think we will soon see a return to our vocabulary of terms like, "10-20" and "20-40" and the disappearance of "2-5 No Limit" and others.

Just a prediction.

Also, with regards to poker, Canonico and I both played in the $65 MGM tourney on Friday morning and the $180 Venetian tournament on Sunday night. On Monday I lasted until just after the break, basically getting blinded out because of cold cards and the presence of plenty of tourist types who made the concept of bluffing worthless during the early part of the tournament. I fared better in the Venetian tournament, there out of 50 players I won a few large pots early and lasted until the final 18 when I made a move against the most aggressive guy at the table who usually folded to any sort of action back at him but who happened to hit a set of kings in the one hand that I chose to try and steal from him holding JT. I had a monster draw to both a flush and an open-ended nut straight and missed both when I was pot-committed* on the turn.

Sports: I bet on a lot of football this weekend and making no single wager greater than $20, including a couple of three-teamers that hit, I won ~ $375 on both pro and college football. I'll write more about this in my football post that I need to get written ASAP.

Other: Since we were there ostensibly for Darryl's bachelor party, we did indeed have a night on the town on Saturday. We had dinner at StripSteak (brand new restaurant and excellent) at Mandalay and then walked over to Luxor and saw "Fantasy" (None of the guys there were big fans of wasting money at some of Vegas's other "attractions", or if anyone did want to go, they didn't speak up). Dinner was excellent and the show was at least better than Crazy Girls. I would, however, like to suggest to the management fo the Luxor that even though he is a talented performer who added to the segues in between dancing sets, the Black Guy comedian does not need to come out unexpectedly and start breakdancing during the middle of the opening number when all of the girls have just removed their tops and the audience members are just starting to enjoy the show. I'm not trying to be racist, but that simply isn't one of my fantasies, no matter how much I've had to drink.

After the show we walked over to MGM and burned money playing Blackjack for an hour or so. Here, I need to point out that Darryl, the bachelor boy, double his money every single time he sat down to play blackjack this weekend. He was slightly down at poker and slightly down at football, but was still a winner for the weekend. Now keep in mind that he didn't pay for anything except for his plane ticket and you can see why I hate Darryl. HA.

Summary:
Add it all up and it was probably my best Vegas trip ever in terms of winning wagers, if not money won. I won enough to pay for my whole trip with $100 left over as profit. Thing is, I'm still going to owe Canonico money when he gets his credit card statement later this month, because the big winner was Mrs Johnnymac. See, she always wants a present when I go to Vegas and this time she got an Hermès scarf. I can't win.

But we still had fun. Football post coming.


* Footnote: I normally don't believe that there is such a thing as being obligated to call a bet simply because the pot is of a large enough size, especially in a cash game where one can go back into his pocket and reload and wait for a better situation, but the rules are different in a tournament, especially in later stages when the choice is between being crippled or greatly strengthened. Thus when I say I was pot-committed in my story about the Venetian tournament, I use the phrase as a matter of convention when in reality the question is really one if stupendously magnified implied odds relative to the size of the bet and the alternative of being knocked out of the tournament. See Malmuth, Sklansky, and Harrington's books for more on this subject.

1 Comment(s):

Posted by  Junelli, at 9:49 AM, October 19, 2006  

All evidence to the contrary. I disagree that NL is fading away. If you look at most cardrooms, the NL games are always going strong. At Lake Charles 2 weeks ago they had 6 tables playing $5-$5 NL (more than I've ever seen).

They also had 16 tables of $3-$6-$12. That also was no surprise. Low limit poker has always been more popular than NL because many people can't afford the NL games, and aren't willing to risk losing their entire bankroll in one hand.

In Houston cardrooms, you'll have a very difficult time finding a limit game these days. You can occasionally find a $20-$40 game or a $10-$20 game with a full kill, but I haven't heard of a $3-$6-$12 or $4-$8 game in Houston in over 3 years.

I love limit poker and agree with most of your comments about the ability to grind out a win. It's certainly not as exciting as NL, but it's not as hard either. You can be drunk and tired, and still know exactly what to do. In fact, online I play almost exclusively limit poker.

Over the past 4 years I've learned that the swings in NL are just absolutely sick. Although I know that poker is a game of skill, too often I have seen beginner players win enormous amounts of money while I cannot stop hemorraging it. If you don't get the cards, it's very hard to win in NL against average or better opponents. Of course that's true to limit as well.

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