In June a record 160+ TDs from 26 countries attended Poker TDA Summit VI at the fabulous Venetian Las Vegas. These dedicated professionals volunteered time, money, and energy to make their votes count on matters of vital importance to our industry. Thanks to their efforts, the 2013 TDA Rules are in final review and scheduled for release the week of August 5th.
If you attended TDA Summit VI, we would greatly appreciate your sending in any comments or reflections on the event, along with any photos (and description of same) to: TDAGroup@PokerTDA.com.
To join the on-going discussion on tournament rules and management, visit the Poker TDA Forum. Also, if you would like to earn TDA Certification, click here.
Summit VI was made possible by our gracious hosts at the Venetian Las Vegas. Thanks are due everyone at the Venetian, especially to Kathy Raymond (Director of Poker Operations) and Tommy LaRosa (Tournament Director). Kathy and Tommy made sure the event ran like clockwork and contributed much to the debate during the proceedings.
The generous support of Genesis Gaming and the Global Poker Index (GPI) was also key to the success of Summit VI. Check out all the features of Genesis Bravo Poker and Bravo Poker Live and learn how these cutting-edge systems can help you attract and retain customers! The Global Poker Index is rapidly becoming one of the world’s most important player ranking systems and poker information portals. Visit the GPI website to learn more! Complete video archives of the Summit are available here courtesy of professional poker videographer Rob Perelman.
Lastly, a standing ovation is due our three new extraordinary TDA Board members: Jack Effel, Tab Duchateau, and Neil Johnson. Jack, Neil, and Tab bring years of global tournament experience to enrich the Association. Their leadership at Summit VI confirms the trust that over 2000 TDA members had in unanimously nominating them to the Board!
On behalf of the entire Association, thank you for your attendance at TDA Summit VI. We look forward to hearing from you soon, and will notify you when the 2013 TDA Rules are released.
This hurts me more than it hurts Tom …
https://pokerati.com/donkeybomber-suspended-from-team-pokerati/
But he will be back, we know it! And hopefully more strong and ambassadorial than ever. (Either that or expect him to start turning to the Dark Side.)
What’s crazy is you’d think this all coulda been resolved with a simple Twitter fight … but no.
I want to clear something up that happened during a hand in a $1,500 no limit tournament. I have heard that some are accusing me of using my influence to get a favorable ruling and/or that I took a shot to win a pot.
I’ll let Pokerati readers decide.
On the river, I bet. My opponent calls, to which I announce, “nothing.” My opponent does not turn over his hand, so I table my jack-high. He looks befuddled, picks up one of his cards so only his next-door player can see it. He does NOT table his hand. Only one player sees his one card, which is a queen and would be a winner. He takes his two cards face down and places them on top of the stub of the deck.
The dealer pushes the pot to me. Two seconds go by and everyone is kind of stunned. One guy at the table mutters “sick call” thinking the guy called and couldn’t beat a jack hi.
The dealer does make a little mistake by not mixing all the cards together to make sure that the hand is unidentifiable. Now my opponent looks puzzled and says, “Wait, I had the winning hand.” Yes he did, but he mucked it. Now he’s saying he should get the pot.
We call floor and tell our stories. The floor asks if the hand is identifiable. We all say yes. He leaves and comes back to the table and says that my opponent gets the pot. So I ask, “When is a hand ‘over’? And are you telling me that a player can muck his hand and then get awarded a pot?” He says, “hold on, I’ll be back.”
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At the World Series of Poker, they announce the event and coveted bracelet winners and then play the national anthem of the country they come from. Play stops at all the cash games and the players stand and remove their hats. When an American won, my table stood with their hands over their hearts and sang. I looked out over that vast sea of poker players and was overcome by emotion. The song always gives me tingles but there was also a love and astonishment at how wonderful the playing conditions have become for this sport. Yes, it is a sport.
The players’ manners are terrific today compared to the past. Johnny Moss was known for being abusive to dealers. Puggy Pearson was worse. He pissed on one once. Another Hall of Famer, Joe Bernstein, bit a dealer.
I cannot sing enough praise for the poker management of Harrah’s. I had long conversations with Bill Sattler, Director of Poker, and aslo Jake Reville, Cathy Klufer, and Carrie Jacobs. For twenty years, I taught management subjects at Texas Tech. The magnificent professionalism of Harrah’s management makes me wish I could go lecture on how great they are. I played in the cheap no limit where you only buy $300. I’ve never lost at the Rio, but only played there seven times. I’m not trying to beat the best in the world anymore. I’m too old.
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I recently set off a minor controversy when I mentioned to @Pokerati that a Red Rock Casino poker dealer complained that new Heartland Poker champion Rob Perelman (@veerob) didn’t leave a dealer tip at the conclusion of the tournament.
First, I do not know Rob at all and was not making an accusation against him. I merely passed along the information because I knew @Pokerati had been covering the tournament. Second, as with any tournament cash of any size, Rob is free to spend or not spend his money any way he pleases. (He later tweeted that he tipped $2,000 on his $158,755 cash. The confusion being that he left the tip the next day after most of the dealers were gone and not directly after the tournament.)
Still, I believe the practice of tipping is an aspect of poker that merits discussion. Certainly, there is no standard for tipping in cash games or tournaments, and a lot is left to chance when the casino and other players alike rely on winners to pick up the check.
You may not agree with me to tip 10% of winnings of more than $10,000 in a poker tournament, but you can certainly agree that .00025% is extremely low!
Mike Caro makes a number of salient points when it comes to tipping in both cash games and tournaments in his article from 2006 here. How one player tips in poker is probably no different than how the same player tips at a restaurant or when getting a haircut.
Some players think that the part of a poker tournament buy-in withheld from the prize pool should cover everything. I have heard that of the house cut for the HPT main event (a $1000+100 tournament), $50 went to Red Rock Casino and $50 to the Heartland Poker Tour. I find it a little incredulous that a Las Vegas casino would split the house cut 50/50, but it’s possible.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 17, 2010
Pokerati Game Releases Minor Rules Update for Version 2.0 Upgrade
without Revealing Real Facts Behind Brief Hiatus, Rumors of Discord
A 1/2 no-limit hold’em/pot-limit Omaha (round of each) game that has become known as “the Pokerati game” is preparing for its return to the Las Vegas felts with minor tweaks to its rules. The game has been called “high stakes action for low-stakes players”, “real poker for advanced beginners”, “festive high-stakes action for ‘advanced’ low-stakes players”, and “good times!” on Facebook and Twitter.
Key components include alternating rounds of the world’s two most popular games, running-it-twice, limited buy-ins, and small pre-flop betting in unstraddled Omaha hands — none of which were offered for low-stakes at licensed Nevada casinos until packaged as such by Pokerati, the most awesome and influential award-winning independent poker media outlet in the world.
“We are confident these changes that we’re not really pointing out will vastly improve the game and make it even more attractive to pros, PLO beginners, and players with plans to play in the November Nine,” said a spokesman for Pokerati. “Or they will be completely inconsequential.”
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PLO can be a wicked temptress and a sexy bitch.
Supposedly the Pokerati Game made on its own this past Tuesday around midnight, with @MattCWaldron duking it out into the wee hours with an unusually drinky Rex the Bald PLOcal. Not sure how the stacks ended up, but from what I hear it was some of the most vigorous song-game action the room had seen in a long time. (The Hard Rock background music tends to shift to nuevo-hip hop and variety metal during late hours, and then late-late pre-sunrise it’s a lot of classic rock.)
At last week’s game, I was pretty unhappy because things were going well until I put myself in my first difficult spot of the night. After I failed to hit my 4-outer running it twice, @JaKatkin tweeted:
And @pokerati’s implosion has begun.
10:47 PM May 6th via TweetDeck
Asshole! Katkin clearly had a read on me, as he sat to my left watching my stack dwindle post-tweet to zero, at which point I rebought and re-lost yet again. (How did he know!?!)
That was also the first week we played with officially published rules. However my one copy I had at the table got ruined when a drunk (but good player … think he mighta been a Mavenite) spilled my glass of champagne all over the nicely printed document en route to his seat in the game.
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Looks to be yet another fun night of 1/2 NLH/PLO round of each at the Hard Rock this evening. The Maven has been showing up on Thursdays with a few students lately. Apparently they think the Pokerati tables are easy pickins a ripe training ground or something? Though aggressive, the Mavenites aren’t really a threat once you figure out the whole of his poker training is basically push and re-push with any two cards. (Jk David … you’d never do that with Queens or better, right?)
The Pokerati Game — which started off mostly as a bunch of media donks and an uber-tight dude named Jackson — also seems to be becoming (as I’d like it to be) something of a must-play for out-of-towners … awesome 1/2 action that you simply can’t find anywhere else in Vegas. Seriously. Go ahead and try. It’s not the same game … And that doesn’t even get into all the promotional perks the Hard Rock has been feeding us.
Three tourists I know today are already gonna be there, which of course draws the vulturey locals who claim to “make a living” playing 1/2, but haven’t yet found enough success to be playing 2/5 or bigger. These Vegas grinders, I gotta say, are an interesting group … they don’t say much other than to call floor, appear to live for comps and free coffee, and may or may not have rent riding on an all-in with top set against the nut flush draw and a wrap … Run it twice!
Anyhow, after playing sporadically beta testing @HardRockPoker for about six months, and running into / working through all the nitty situational question marks that spring up, we’ve finalized and formalized the rules. So now, anytime the game gets going — as it did on its own Tuesday around midnight! — everyone can be on the same page about how we play Pokerati half-and-half at the Hard Rock.
Click here for an updated PDF of Pokerati Game rules suitable for posting on your bedroom wall. Or click below to see more immediately how we play it:
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Two rather distinct views of the World Series, a third of the way through the show, from @JeffreyPollack and Micon, both discussing their party animal ways:
For all J-Pollack V-logs, click here.
For the original Degen Update from the pseudo-media dude with revoked credentials (supposedly related to his video of a player smoking meth) and a tale of violence around a rule dispute in a $65 satellite, click here.
We knew it was only a matter of time, right? TJ Cloutier reportedly had quite the emphatic conversation with Jeffrey Pollack while the two were watching Phil Ivey’s final table — about a recurring rule violation that may or may not be getting out of control. The issue: Twittering at the table.
TJ’s beef (as told to me secondhand) was that even when players are not in a hand, they are violating tournament rules when they are texting under the table, in their laps.
Here’s the rule in question:
87. Cell Phone Rule: All cell phones and other voice-enabled and “ringing†electronic devices must be silenced during Tournament play. A player who wants to use a cell phone to talk, text, or email must step away from their assigned table or be subject to penalty. Any player using a cellular phone while in a hand with no action pending (player has gone all-in) will receive a missed hand penalty to be assessed on the next hand. No cell phones or other electronic communication device can be placed on a poker table.
Hmm, I dunno. I think it’s subject to interpretation — and frankly, imho, these are the problems with rules written (or approved) by lawyers, as opposed to writer-players. But what really surprises me in the above-described situation is that @JeffreyPollack didn’t twitter about it.
Just remember, whether you’re breaking a rule or not, you can follow all the peeps we’re following in the Pokerati Twitterverse here.
Benjo is back, just in time for the first ever “brasslet” ceremony, which raises a burning new question of poker etiquette that players never before had to consider: To stand or not to stand for the national anthem when you’re in the middle of a hand? Pauly and the Angry Frenchman also speculate on which will be the first non-American nation to book a WSOP win. I show up for the night shift, of course — just in time for hand-for-hand in the $40k — only to have Pauly fill me in on everything I missed between my arrival and my last reading of the Tao.
Tao of Pokerati at the 40th WSOP
Las Vegas, NV
Episode 11.5: Star-Spangled Hammer
3:08
[audio:tao/TaoPokerati_WSOP_Anthems_Benjo_05.mp3]
Episode 11.6: Night Shift
2:47
[audio:tao/TaoPokerati_WSOP_40KBubble_06.mp3]
More from @JustinBonomo (who is one of 89 out of 201 players remaining in the $40k NLH):
Oh man. Same thing if you fold out of turn. Even if its an accident, automatic 1 hand penalty. Wsop always makes the craziest new rules.
Click here for the latest $40k chip counts.
The $40k NLH is movin’ along … 111 left out of 201. One of the guys near the top in chips, @JustinBonomo, says:
Just broke 500k, but can’t believe new rule. Any card ACCIDENTALLY exposed is a 1 hand penalty. Dealers are instructed to always enforce it.
I tend not to like the absoluteness in the hands of a dealer, but then again, it is just one hand.
Click below to see who’s still alive and who’s busted:
(Chris Moneymaker is winning.)
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Why are there different rules at a WSOP Circuit event than the actual WSOP? Late entry to WSOP=full stack, WSOP-C your missed blinds are taken.
The World Series of Poker has released the rules for their 2009 event. There’s a couple of interesting changes from last year that will be interesting to see how they are enforced.
36. Harrah’s prohibits the use of obscene or foul language in any public area of the casino at any time. Any player who uses such language or makes a foul, profane, obscene or vulgar statement, or speaks abusively or in an intimidating manner to another player, a dealer or a Tournament staff member, will be penalized. These penalties will be levied based on Rules 31, 52 and 53.
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