All Caesars poker rooms across Nevada launched the Mega Beat Progressive Poker Jackpot earlier this month. It started with $200k to be paid out if some luckbox got his quad aces cracked. For every $100k more dumped into the drop, the qualifying hand also drops. So at $300k, all you need to lose with is with quad kings, at $400k quad queens …
I tried to hit it last week — flopped quad bullets at Planet Hollywood with two fish betting into me — but couldn’t lose to win.
After I relayed the story to a math-minded pro friend who told me that, because of the board, there was no possible hand that could have beat me and I should have raised at some point prior to the river.
Meanwhile, Yahoo Answers told me the odds of losing with a hand as weak as quad eights (see: $800k on the Mega Beat scale) are “not good.”
But for this new Caesars Megabeat Jackpot, it doesn’t have to be you: 20 percent of the jackpot goes to the player with the losing hand, and 10 percent to the player with the winning hand; But 70 percent is distributed to players at all Caesars properties in the state. Because of this promo, they’re not offering high hand bonuses. Which means I was a few days late for being good enough to actually win with quads. Is that a bad beat?
Goodbye Rakeback
For most of last year, poker players in Las Vegas could find at least one place to earn something of an hourly wage on top of the chips they collected at the table. But that trend has all but vanished in 2013. Poker rooms have essentially stopped encouraging grinders to fold all day long.
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Quad queens at the Wynn, a few hands after losing with quad jacks. Read below for the best bad beat jackpots in Vegas.
This is not a bad beat story, though it starts with one.
This is a story about bad beat jackpots, and the lack thereof.
Playing a 1-3NL game the other day, I raised to $12 in late position with JhJd.
An older man — here’s him as a younger man, seriously — called on the button, one of the blinds called and the limper directly to my right called.
The flop was a dream: Js5c7c. And it was checked to me, so I bet big, hoping to build it up with one of the suckers stupid enough to call my preflop raise.
To my delight, the button moved in for $150. The blind folded and the limper contemplated.
“Please call, please call, please call,” I thought.
And he shoved for $200.
Oh boy, dreams do come true.
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The Los Angeles Times is reporting that a L.A. County Superior Court Judge has thrown out a lawsuit brought by two poker players against five L.A. County casinos in which the players had contended the casinos falsely advertised their jackpot games in which a buck was taken from pots for the jackpot as being “no purchase necessary.â€
In May 2009, poker players Dennis Chae and Jeff Kim sued five L.A. County casinos — the Bicycle, the Commerce, Hawaiian Gardens, Hollywood Park, and the Hustler — arguing that the $1 taken from the pots in jackpot games didn’t jibe with the casinos’ claim the games did not require a purchase to play. Judge Emile H. Elias ruled both that players couldn’t sue to recover gambling losses, and that Chae and Kim “chose to play the games despite the knowledge that they would be charged†the jackpot fee.
In a state law dating back to 1989, jackpot games are considered “illegal lotteries†in California if they require a fee to win. Since the mid-1990s, casinos have therefore advertised poker games in which a jackpot is taken as “no purchase necessary,†a disclaimer which apparently includes a promise to deal jackpot games without a fee upon request.
Sounds sort of like those giveaways at McDonald’s in which one doesn’t technically have to buy a Big Mac and fries to play, but folks rarely ask to play without buying something. As Commerce Casino general counsel Andy Schneiderman explains, “there are very few players, if any†who request to play jackpot games without paying the fee. Schneiderman also notes that all the games the Commerce offers “are approved by the state, including jackpot games,†and so the casinos were confident they’d win the case.
Read the full article here.
Pokerati sources embedded in Atlantic City are reporting that the Caesar’s-AC poker room recently paid off the biggest bad beat jackpot in East Coast history … only to have that followed by some more bad beat jackpots hit at other poker rooms nearby:
The biggest bad beat jackpot in AC history went off 3 days ago for over $ 550,000. Quad threes vs Quad Aces. then on the same day 2 other bad beats went off in other casinos. Total of almost $ 1,000,000 issued.
This should be a semi-fascinating case should it not get insta-folded as frivolous: Two “recreational” California poker players, Dennis Chae and Jeff Kim, have sued the Bike, Commerce, Hustler, Hollywood Park, and Hawaiian Gardens casinos — alleging that the dollar-a-pot raked for bad beat jackpots makes them illegal lotteries.
In a 2005 advisory, then-Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer cautioned casinos that the promotions violated state law unless players were allowed to win the jackpots without paying the fee. It’s the same legal principle that requires McDonald’s to give away game pieces for its popular Monopoly game to consumers who ask for them, regardless of whether they buy anything.
On its surface, the lawsuit seems like a hustle. I’m not sure how much in damages are they’re seeking, but the suit requests class-action status and hopes to enlist 10s of thousands of poker players as plaintiffs. But at the same time, Chae and Kim may have a technical point, at least to the extent that casinos advertise these promotions. We’ll have to see about how the finer details of rakeage break down according to California law. Honestly, can’t see this getting too far … but then again, it’s hard to say how many people might jump at the chance to score some rebate and slightly improve their EV retroactively.
