Another Mucking Blog

What’s Crackin Poker Peeps!

Vinny Vegas here, fresh off another Vegas trip (mucking crazy) with a tourney review for yas.

Luxor
Time: Daily 10:30 AM & Noon
Buy In: $35
Starting Chip Stack: 3K
Starting Blinds: 100/200
Blind Periods: 15 Min
Re-entries: No
Players: 2 tables with alternates
Pays: Top 3
Dealers: Morning crew so nothing special.
Poker Room: It’s the Luxor. Probably one of my favorite chill poker rooms in Vegas. Small but always a good crowd.
Tourney Notes: These tourneys are the great way to start your day. You can stumble out of bed at 10:15 or 11:45, pop a few Advil to deal with the effects of the night before, and onto the POKER! The blinds go up fast so your either short stacked or doubling/ tripling up before you know it. This is due to the fact most hands that go to show down are crippling and result in all-ins on the next hand played (if you survive the first show down). Don’t expect to be able to get a good read on players before playing a hand or you’ll be blinded off. It’s intended to be a fast tournament so even if you go deep it wont take more than a couple hours to cash leaving you plenty of other time to go get drunk/ play some Pai Gow/ call a hooker/ play some black jack/ take the hooker back to your room / check out the Lion King at Mandalay Bay/ marry a hooker? What!  Bottom line, the relaxed morning crowd and cheap buy in of this tournament can’t be argued with, so despite the fact its a crap shoot, it’s still fun.

I’m out!
-Vinny Vegas.

What’s Up Poker People!

We just got back from Labor Day in Vegas and have a fresh new batch of Tourney Reviews.

This time we played tribute to all of the station casinos off the strip and you know we cashed with the Locals! Cha Ching!

Sam’s Town
Time: Dailey 10 AM
Buy In: $23
Starting Chip Stack: 500
Starting Blinds: 5/10
Blind Periods: 20 Min
Re-entries: No
Players: Average of 3 tables for 25 players
Dealers: Friendly to the locals but didn’t give a muck about the Mucksters!
Poker Room: Nice but nothing spectacular.
Tourney Notes: The first hour of play was LIMIT HOLD’EM before they switched to NL. Not a big fan of the Limit as it allowed many players to play their hand all the way to the river witch allowed for many chances to suck out! Once the NL kicked in we did much better. In addition the crowed of this tourney had local senor citizen written all over it not to mention that old folks home soup smell.
Final Thoughts: Don’t go to this casino if your looking for a young crowd or many donks as all of these veteran players must have more experince than we have been alive. However, if your looking for a cheap way to get some Limit hold’em tourney experience this is the place!

Jokers Wild Casino
Time: Daily 2PM and 6:30PM
Buy In: $38.00 ($28.00 + $10 rebuy)
Starting Chip Stack: 5,500 (start with 3,000 + the additional 2,000 rebuy and an additional 500 chip that you get if you register 30 min before the tourney starts with a players card. And the cool thing is you get a free mucking gift for signing up for a players card. Yeah, we got a 6 pack of coke (AKA a mixer for our rum) and the poker room manager didn’t mind that we had to many beers and kept forgetting our coke after each table change. The nice manager kept bringing it over to where we sat.)
Blind Periods: 20 min for the first hour and then 15 minutes after that.
Starting Blinds: 25/50
Re-entries: For the first our.
Players: 20 players, 2-3 tables.
Dealers: Friendly and skillful dealers who have seen it all. They do everything from cracking jokes about how the guy in the 10 seat smells bad to discussing our poker styles after the tourney.
Poker Room: A 4-table room with one of the best poker managers out there. Very friendly.
Tourney Notes: These tourneys are probably the best bang for your buck. At $38 George Washingtons you get a pretty nice chip stack eliminating a chance at a crap shoot! And believe me no one likes to shoot crap!!! But aside from that the crowed was made up of locals who were very familiar with each other. Some were the young gun type who had recently moved to Vegas and others were the Veterans who have been playing poker at least 3 decades before we could utter the word “Muck”. The best part about Joker’s Wild is if you play the 2 PM tourney, make final table, and cash, you still have about a half hour before the next tourney starts so you can take those winnings and mucking do it again!!
Final Thoughts: Just want to say thanks to every one over there at Joker’s Wild! Seriously, this casino is one of the most enjoyable places to play. From their amazing poker room staff to their awesome bar (most economical place to get trashed) and to the knowledgeable locals you meet, this place gives any newbie to the station casino circuit a grand education and warm welcome of what lies off the strip!

Club Fortune Casino
Time: Tues, Wed, Thurs 6PM and Sat 4PM
Buy In: $40
Starting Chip Stack: 3,500
Blind Periods: 15
Starting Blinds: 25/50
Re-entries: No
Players: Limited to 2 tables max.
Dealers: Some of the friendliest dealers and poker room managers. Always called players by their names (even the Mucksters who had just sat down for the first time in this casino)
Poker Room: A brand new poker room with great lighting and a staff that is trying really hard to please every player.
Tourney Notes: If you want a cheap laid back tourney that feels more like a home game this is the place for you. While the crowd is mostly older locals they are all very friendly and are willing to check pots all the way to the river just to keep the conversation going a little longer. However, if your looking for a more competitive experience this may not be the place for you.
Final Thoughts: This casino may be a long ways from the strip and the crowd may be older than the kind you get your noodle wet with at Tao Beach but this casino has gone the extra mile in making you feel welcome and wanting to come back (the Las Vegas Sun agrees). Their rewards program looks like the took the Gold Card brochure and copied it prize for prize that include everything from Wii Fit, Cuisinart Wine Coolers, to brand new slot machines. Not to mention the dealers and the poker room manager go out of their way to call you buy name and when my All-In pocket Aces got cracked by a runner runner the whole room went “Damn Son! That’s a bad beat”. So they gave me a cool consolation prize despite the fact they didn’t have an Aces cracked prize for tourneys.

I’m Out!
-Vinny Vegas

Debbie’s Shout Outs
OK, Debbie Deuce Dallas here with a few shout outs for all you hot Young Guns and all my Poker Playdies (what’s a Playdy? Just imagine a sexy poker chick with Beyonce’s Single Ladies song in the background).

Hard Rock Casino is my new favorite place to play! While I busted out early and had to go off and let Vinny Hustle his way into the money, I took a few shots of Patron with one of the many great dealers (Kimmi you rock girl!) Seriously! Any young poker player should check out this room. It’s beautiful, like the dealers (probably hottest dealers in Vegas), and the crowd is full of many young, fun players! Not to mention they’re “Johnny on the spot” with the cocktails and you know we Mucksters totally need our cocktails aka more shots!

Planet Hollywood Casino offers the latest tourney on the strip. 2AM!!! But the party doesn’t stop there. OH NO! This tourney is the closest thing to a drunken hold’em club. With a great combination of inebriated mid 20’s guys and gals it’s the best place to flex your poker skills while the top music is pumping. Seriously! It should be called “Club Hold’em!” It’s got it all! The hotties, the douches, the scantly clad girls, flashy lights, the scandals, and of course the drinks!! And for the $60.00 dollar buy in it sure beats a cover charge! Not to mention my quad kings knocked out a big time shit talker

Jokers Wild has got a great staff and great tourneys! I just want to give the tournament champion (who knocked me out in the #2 spot) Holly, a big shot out! Mad props girl! You were totally were knocking out people left and right and had some great hole cards! With 2 hot chicks finishing 1 and 2 it’s no wonder those boys walked away griping!

KISS
-Debbie Deuce Dallas