Las Vegas Poker
Poker in Las Vegas! Poker Tournaments, Large and Small! Poker Tournaments at all hours of the day and night! This website is all about the fabulous world of Poker in Las Vegas, including up-to-date Poker Tournament Schedules.
Free Texas Holdem videos - beginner tips, strategy, pot odds, poker psychology and more
For as long as poker's
popularity lasts we will keep you informed and up-to-date on poker tournaments and poker rooms in Las Vegas. The Las Vegas Texas Hold'em poker scene is continuing to rapidly expand with new
poker rooms opening in various casinos and other casinos with existing poker rooms making room for more tables by moving to a
larger space or expanding their existing space. No Limit Texas Hold'em tournaments are featured at
more and more places on and off the Las Vegas Strip, downtown, and outlying areas such as Henderson,
North Las Vegas, South of Las Vegas, and everywhere else in the valley.
We are continuing to visit and re-visit every casino that offers poker and keep you informed of the
changes, the tournament schedules, the major events, as well as anything else related
to Las Vegas poker, especially Hold'em
Excalibur Electronic Tables a Big Hit
It wasn't all that long ago that the Excalibur had a big poker room near the sports book. Then their spread-limit games ($1-$3 and $2-$6) waned in popularity and by the time they tried to adjust it was too late, there were too many other good choices at and around the Strip/Tropicana area. They moved to a smaller area in the middle of the casino floor and offered terrible crapshoot tournaments with a lousy prize structure. Cash game action wasn't much either. Then, they somewhow became the guinea pig for something brand new, dealerless electronic tables. Within 6 months, things have turned around for the Excalibur Poker Room. They are now located near the sports book once again, a new, different sports book near the rear entrance, close to the downstairs Starbucks. The action there nowadays is quite lively, with turnouts for the 9 am $20 buy-in tourney routinely surpassing 60 players, with occasional 100+ players. Folks, we're talking 9:00 AM! Imagine 8 out of 12 tables fully occupied at an hour when many Vegas gamblers are just getting to bed from the night before. Out of the $20 buy-in, almost $18 is returned to the players in the form of cash prizes, an outstanding deal for any sized buy-in tourney in Vegas, but unheard of at the budget level. Some of the competition can only afford to give out 65-70% because dealers and staff have to be paid somehow. At the Excalibur, the staff is kept very busy, but since dealers are nonexistent, they can afford to give the players a good deal, and boy do they give the players a good deal. Recently, a promotion has been running Mon-Thurs such that if you play in the morning tournament, you can get $10 free for an ensuing cash game if you add $20 of your own money. Min/Max at the .50/1.00 NL table is $40/$100. $1/$2 NL is frequently seen as is $2/$4 limit. Other tournament action is at 1 pm ($30 buy-in), and 6 pm ($60 buy-in deep stack with 7,000 starting chips and 20 minute levels). For the time being there are also $20 buy-in 7pm tourneys Mon-Wed rotating 7-stud, Omaha hi/lo, and 7-stud hi/lo respectively and a $60 Thursday Omaha hi only tournament. Each of these bad boys have $100 per table added to the prize fund. Also, in May, 2009, when this article was written, there was a vibrant World Series of Poker Satellite series taking place with buy-ins of $30 - $60, the prize being a seat into one of the minor events coming up in late May/June. A raffle at the end of this series will result in 20 players playing off for a seat in the Main Event, The World Championship of No-Limit Holdem, which starts in early July this year. See the article below for a description of how the electronic tables work.
New Casino, Eastside Cannery, Opens with New Poker Room
A new 8-table poker room now exists on the Boulder Strip, in the East part of Las Vegas at the location of the razed Nevada Palace. Sam's Town is next door. It's a pretty nice casino, built for $250 million and owned by same firm that owns The Cannery in North Las Vegas and manages the Rampart Casino, adjacent to the Suncoast on the west side. The new casino is the first to be opened on the East side in more than a decade. The Eastside Cannery Poker Room spreads the usual games.
Hard Rock Opens "Poker Lounge"
The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino recently opened a new poker room with 18 tables. Dubbed the "Poker Lounge", it's a little different in that there is more noise, (rock music, etc) and has the feel of a nightclub, rather than a traditional poker room. All kinds of games are spread there, some at fairly high stakes, as the Hard Rock attempts to gain some of the big poker names. A full slate of tournaments, from a $65 buy-in 11 am tournament, to a $330 buy-in weekend 3 pm tourney, are offered. All the tournaments have 5,000 or more starting chips, including sit-n-goes, also offered there. The Hard Rock is located at Harmon & Paradise, on the East side. Paradise is the street that leads to the airport if taken southbound. Harmon is the one half way between Flamingo and Tropicana. The poker room is located near the main parking structure entrance. A short walk from there through some rock history areas surrounding a few shops and eateries, etc leads to the Poker Lounge.
Excalibur Re-Opens Poker Room with 12 Electronic Poker Tables
Excalibur Casino closed their poker room recently to take out the regular poker tables and install 12 new "PokerPro" tables, dealer-less tables with computer monitor screens for each of the 10 player seats and a big monitor in the middle of the table to display community cards and other necessities. A little like online poker, only with live people sitting around the table, the new poker tables save staffing costs for the poker room. The player deposits cash onto his MGM Mirage Players Card. Once the card is funded, the player needs to get on a waiting list for a cash game by swiping the card at a machine with a touch screen display in the middle of the room, then choosing which game he wants to get on a waiting list for. Once at a table, the player inserts his card into the slot and chooses the amount he wishes to play with during the session. Once he's dealt into a hand, the poker player cups his hands around the display of the face down cards and the touch-screen electronics displays his hole cards, hidden from view of the other players by the act of cupping of the hands. As soon as the player takes his hands away, the cards go face-down again. When the action gets around to the player, he has a choice of options at the top of his display, and once again touches the screen in the appropriate places to select his action, check, bet, call, raise, or fold. Each action is required to be confirmed before it is official. In the case of raising or betting an optional amount, the player hits the appropriate chip display with a finger or the corner of his player's card as many times as needed. As he is doing this, the amounts he is choosing is available for view by everyone, but he may retract and undo any time before hitting the "confirm button". This would be similar to a regular live game where the player is counting out chips behind the line before taking an action. Games spread on the first Friday night we were there, were .50/1.00 no limit hold'em, $2/$4 limit, $1/$2 no limit, and $2/$5 no limit. Omaha hi-lo was about to be played when we left. About 6 of the 12 tables were in use during that evening. If the new system catches on, look for other casinos to follow suit. A 10% rake was taken from each pot of the .50/1.00 NL game, capped at $3.00. Online poker is normally raked at 5%.
Online Poker Alive and Well
10/31/07
Despite scandals at Absolute Poker, whose owners or ex/owners were caught cheating in the very largest tournaments and the highest stakes cash games, online poker in general is doing very well, both in the U.S. where the game has been more or less banned for over a year, and everywhere else in the world as well. The sites that discontinued the U.S. market are mostly thriving without the biggest contingent of players and the ones that still allow players from the U.S. are going better than ever. Because of the scandal at Absolute, we don't recommend this site any more. Instead, our recommendations are the tried and true PokerStars and the lesser-known, but dynamite site Bugsys Club. At Bugsys, you can make a min deposit and then play all kinds of promotional tournaments to build your bankroll with little or no risk. Payouts are prompt, unlike so many of the other sites and like PokerStars, they still accept U.S. players.
New Poker Room at Planet Hollywood
by Mike Greenberg
Planet Hollywood (formerly the Aladdin) is a nice-looking new poker room located at the Las Vegas Strip near the front entrance to the casino. The poker room offers 12 tables with a variety of Texas Holdem games, and Omaha - if there is any interest. It has become an increasingly popular venue and it's is starting to get a bit crowded on weekends, but you’ll usually be able to get a table within 30 minutes.
Compared to the largest casinos, Planet Hollywood is quite a laid-back and comfortable environment - the plush chairs will allow you to sit back and observe as the poker games are played out in front of you. Read more...
U.S. Legislation appeared to be threatening online poker. And now Neteller has frozen every U.S. player's funds for an indefinite period of time in the face of legal battles regarding money laundering accusations by the FBI. However, although many major poker sites have shut down their rooms to U.S. players, others stuck with it, including some of the big ones, like PokerStars, Absolute Poker, FullTilt, UltimateBet, and Bodog. Business is brisk at these sites and others. Visit our friends at pokerteam.com for suggestions on other online sites as well as some great poker news and poker articles.
Qualify for the WSOP
The World Series of Poker is not one of the most famous and popular live poker events for nothing. You don’t have to qualify through an intricate points and rankings system, heck you don’t even have to be a reasonable poker player to take part. Just pay the $10.000 and get to playin’. After all, people who gained access this way in the past, turned out not to be such huge underdogs after all. Joe Hachem entered the tournament like that and he ended up winning it. This doesn’t mean you’ll guarantee yourself a place ITM, though, it just comes to show how just about anyone can make it huge in the WSOP. Most people (like me) do not have $10,000 they’d want to spend on a poker tourney though. Fortunately, not only is the WSOP not reserved for the good and recognized players, but it’s not even a privilege only or the rich to participate. You can qualify for it via different satellites. Read more...
Las Vegas Live Poker
Writing about live poker facilities in Las Vegas is one hell of a challenge, in the sense that I can’t possibly squeeze nearly enough information about the Vegas poker scene into a regular-length article. Well, I guess I’ll just have to single out those that are most representative of the world capital of gambling. With that in mind, what better poker room could I pick to start with than the Bellagio? Quite possibly the classiest poker room in town, the Bellagio is the definition of professionalism. Read more...
Playing in the 2009 WSOP
The 2009 WSOP has outdone itself with an unprecedented 57 Events. The World Series of Poker is offering a variety of poker variants available to be played in a wide range of buy-in denominations.The easiest way to play at the 2009 WSOP would be to directly buy-in. Buy-ins range from $1,000 to $50,000, with the No-Limit Texas Holdem Main Event costing $10,000 to enter. There are other ways to get to the WSOP. The most popular being satellite tournaments. Satellite tournaments offer players a chance to win a seat for a minimal cost. Satellite tournaments are offered in online casinos as well as land casinos. Satellite tournaments can be cheap or they can be expensive, either way, they are not an easy ticket to the main event of the WSOP. The easiest ticket to the main event of the WSOP is to pay the 10K to enter. Read more...
Fiesta Rancho Closes Poker Room
As of May 13, 2007, the Fiesta Rancho Poker Room is closed to make way for slots. With the closing, we say goodbye to a couple of nice little cheap buy-in tourneys, but Texas Station across the street, takes up the slack with a $30 buy-in noon tourney 7 days a week. Also, not too far away is Santa Fe Station which has a brand new quite large card room with a good tournament schedule. The noon and midnight tourneys at Fiesta Rancho were $25 buy-ins with a $10 rebuy for the midnight tournament. The 2 Fiesta casinos (Rancho and Henderson) and the Stations casinos share the same management group along with Green Valley Ranch, also in Henderson. Apparently, a consolidation was in the best interests of the group. The trend we are noticing in Las Vegas poker right now is that some of the smaller rooms are eliminating tournaments or in this case, the entire poker room, while other more established rooms are increasing their tourney schedule and drawing more entries for their existing tournaments. Poker in Las Vegas is definitely thriving, despite the hit taken by U.S. online poker.
Venetian's 2nd Deep Stack Extravaganza
Flopped the Nuts First Time Earlier in 2007
Deep Stack Extravaganza II, June 1 - July 1, 2007 promises to be everything version 1 was and more. Back by popular demand, players get excited about the format, losts of starting chips and many different styles of poker besides no-limit holdem, including H.O.R.S.E., Omaha Hi-Lo, and pot-limit Omaha. With a total prize pool of $1.6 million drawing 4,700 entrants in the first quarter of 2007, Venetian has decided to do it all over again. Visit the schedule and the press release here. This time, the tournament organizers have decided to go up against the World Series of Poker, which starts the same day, June 1, 2007, across town at Harrah's owned The Rio. Last time they went up against cross-street rival Wynn Resort and did so well, they almost immediately decided to up the ante on some of their regular tournaments too, so that now, every day at noon, there is a $300 + $30 or $500 + $40 buy event with a deep stack of chips to play with, whereas before their noon tourney cost was $110 + $15 + rebuy. The Venetian has one of the finest poker rooms in Las Vegas and I think people are catching on.
Plaza Eliminates Tourney Schedule
Sticks With What They Do Best, Single Table SnG's
With Binion's, Golden Nugget, and most recently Fitzgeralds downtown, all offering a generous tournament schedule, the Plaza decided to eliminate their tournaments altogether, slim down their poker room, and offer Sit N Go $40 buy-in events all evening long, extending their popular daytime schedule until closing. The buy-in was recently raised to $40 from $35. Previously, the Plaza held a 12 midnight tournament along with a 10am and 7pm event. The midnight event was not drawing the numbers they needed so along with the elimination of that one came the reduction of poker room hours from 24/7 to 10 AM - 2 AM.
Carlos Mortensen Wins WPT Championship
May 2, 2007 - Carlos Mortensen goes down in history as the first poker player ever to have won both of the 2 most prestigious titles in the game, the World Series of Poker Main Event Championship (accomplished in 2001) and the World Poker Tour Championship $25,000 buy-in Main Event, which just finished last Friday, Apr. 27. The win was worth $3.97 million in the 639 player tournament, which puts his career tournament earnings total at $8.5 million, good for a top 10 in lifetime earnings achievement.
Texas Hold’em history
The history of poker is a debatable issue, even though it has been the most popular card game for centuries. Poker is believed to have been mostly influenced by the German card game named Pochen and by the French game Poque, both meaning to knock. Read more...
Binion's $1 Million Grand Prix Event
April 2-7, 2007
Benny's Bullpen is the site of the Poker Event at Vegas Grand Prix. Binion's is the former home of the World Series of Poker. The scheduled prize fund for the $550 buy-in event is $1,000,000, but that figure is based on 2,000 entries. The first 4 days will be held in flights to accommodate all the expected players. Part of the auto racing spectacle scheduled for that time period in downtown Las Vegas, the tournament is part of a master plan to hold many large events at Binion's, an effort to bring back the glory days of poker to the downtown gambling hall formerly known as Binion's Horseshoe. A celebrity tourney is also scheduled Apr 7th as part of the poker festivities of the Grand Prix. Race car drivers are expected to play. For the main event, single table satellites are running now with $65 and $125 buy-ins as well as super satellites every day at 6 pm with $120 buy-ins. Binion's is completing a remodeling project which includes new carpet, new felts on the poker tables, and new wall coverings to replace the dark red.
Player Types You’ll Find in Las Vegas Card Rooms
Middle-stakes, no limit Texas hold’em poker games attract a wide variety of players with many different styles of play. Successful middle stakes no limit players will be able to quickly identify the different types of players and be aware of how to play against them. Here are some of the players you may see at your middle-stakes, no limit Texas hold’em poker table.
Caesars to Start Deep Stack Tourneys
3/15/07 - Caesars Palace has begun a true "deep stack" tournament Saturdays at 3:30 pm, with players getting 7,500 in tournament chips. The buy-in for the event is $300 + $30. The blind and level structure is just like their regular daily tournaments, blinds starting at 25-50 and 40 minute levels. Single table satellites are available to gain entry into this promising event. The Caesars regular daily events at 12 noon and 7 pm give 1,500 starting chips with an additional 3,000 chips for the single rebuy.
Hard Rock Expansion to Include Poker Room
3/12/07 - The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, located on Harman Ave. just East of the Las Vegas Strip, has been recently sold to a group called DLJ Merchant Banking Partners (DLJMB), and with the sale, as usual, comes new plans including a poker room. A new hotel tower and restaurants/night clubs etc. will also be built. The Hard Rock has been active in the celebrity poker area, but now, after expansion expected to be completed by 2009, another new Las Vegas poker room will be in existence. More information will be forthcoming as it comes in.
O'Shea's Builds Real Poker Room
Small Casino Tries to Get In On the Poker Action
3/12/07 - First they deposited a couple of poker tables by the main entrance, the pedestrian strip walkway just steps away. That got a little part-time action, then a unique poker table like no others that got almost no action, then a single conventional poker table up front, as before, but with a sign within sight that says "Poker Room" and now O'Shea's, the Irish themed casino nestled between the Flamingo and Imperial Palace, has built a real poker room, with 4 tables and a tournament schedule. Open 11 am till 5 am and 24 hours Thursday - Sunday, the poker room at O'Shea's has some heavy competition nearby because every one of the neighboring casinos has a larger poker room with an established clientele. The day I was at O'Shea's, there was nobody playing, 1/2 hour after opening time, but who knows, this place could be just right for some poker players. Give it a chance, stop by and check it out. It's close to anything you need there, including McDonalds, Caesars Palace, Bellagio, Imperial Palace, Flamingo, Panda Express, gift shops, a spray paint artist, an outdoor rock'n'roll bandstand bar, and a fun virtual ride kiosk among the other outdoor mall shops.
World Series of Poker 2007
Pre-registration begins
3/3/07 - Along with the announcement that the 2007 World Series of Poker pre-registration has begun, came a list of new Harrah's rules and clarifications of existing rules. Poker site endorsements must bear the .net suffix and the suffix must be no smaller than the site name. 3rd party entries will not be accepted if they're related to online poker sites that cater to U.S. players. This means of course that if you win a seat to the WSOP via PokerStars, or any of the other U.S. friendly online sites that are offering seats, they'll have to find an alternate way of entering you, perhaps the only way will be to give you the cash and hope you use it to pay for your seat. It will be interesting to see how this develops. A couple other new logo-related rules have been instigated for the 2007 WSOP, which will again be held at the Rio and begins with preliminary events June 1, 2007, while the $10,000 buy-in main event is scheduled for about a month later.
Caesars Hosts "Sweetheart" Event
Couples in Alternating Format
2/8/07 - Valentine's season brings a special kind of poker tournament at Caesars Palace on Sunday, Feb. 11, 2007. A guy and a gal can team up together and play for some decent money for a $220 buy-in and have a lot of fun competing for good cash prizes. Blind structures and pay-out structures are very similar to their regular noon and 7 PM daily tourneys at this 2nd annual tournament. With 40-minute levels and slowly increasing blinds, the event promises each year to be a favorite on the circuit for both amateurs and poker professionals alike. Last year, 43 couples entered, alternating between ladies and men at each level change. This year, I think the alternation occurs in the middle of each level, either way it's a blast!
Suncoast Opens New Poker Room
2/6/07 - Recently, one more poker room was added to the already well-stocked Las Vegas area poker choice list. Tournaments at 10 AM every day & 7 PM Sun - Thurs are featured with small buy-ins with a 75% and 83% return on buy-ins respectively. 12 tables in a spacious area back by the movie theaters makes for a very comfortable setting for Summerlin locals as well as visitors to this very nice casino/poker room. Oldsters galore are to be found at the Suncoast, a favorite among the retiree crowd. Summerlin is the world's largest master-planned community and is located in the Northwest part of Las Vegas. Go North on U.S. 95 (which is really West until the Rainbow curve), get off at the Summerlin Parkway and follow that West until Rampart Blvd. and the Suncoast is South just a short ways down Rampart.
Wynn, Venetian Schedule Special Events Simultaneously
2/4/07 - The Wynn Resort has entered the big poker tournament arena with the Wynn Classic, scheduled to begin Feb. 21, 2007. Across Sands Ave. to the South, the Venetian is holding a series of smaller buy-in tourneys ($330 - $540) at the same time, perhaps anticipating a big spill-over crowd from the Wynn. While the Venetian series, dubbed the Deep Stack Extravaganza, is probably just a temporary replacement of their daily slighly lower buy-ins ($180 - $200 or so), the Wynn Classic appears to be aiming at competing with the likes of the World Poker Tour and WSOP by holding events with preliminary tourney buy-ins ranging from $500 - $3,000 while sponsoring a $10,000 buy-in main event to conclude the series. Satellites begin Feb. 21, 2007, preliminary events begin the following day and the $10,000 buy-in championship tournament begins Mar. 8 with the final table Mar. 11. So far, we are not aware of any online satellite opportunities. Venetian's series is called the Deep Stack Extravaganza because a starting stack of 6,000 and 10,000 in chips is offered, which promises to make skill more of a factor in the volatile game of Texas Hold'Em. Omaha 8 or better, H.O.S., and Pot Limit Omaha are given 1 day each during the series which features No-Limit Texas Hold'em on each of the other tournament days, the last of which will be Sunday, Mar. 11, 2007.
Riviera Tourneys Best Deal on the Strip
Wide Variations Found in Cost/Payout Ratios in Las Vegas
12/30/06 - Some poker tournaments in Las Vegas only pay back 69% or less of what they bring in, while others, like The Riviera, give back a generous 85%. Located on the North end of the Las Vegas Strip directly across the street from Circus Circus, the Riviera poker room tourney schedule is 3 a day most days, at 10 am and 1 & 8 pm. Buy-ins, with the optional add-on, are $47. They have been drawing 2 - 4 tables full of players. Other good bargains on and off the strip that approach or exceed the 90% return rate are the Venetian, (more expensive), and the Circus Circus regularly scheduled single-table events (but not the 11:30 am daily ones which are a downright rip-off). Many other single table sit'n'go bargains are out there. One interesting small buy-in event that actually pays back 91% or so of what they take in, besides Riviera, and is still affordable for everyone, is Tuscany, just East of the strip on Flamingo Blvd. Mainly a locals casino, the Tuscany Poker Room does give a large percentage of players buy-ins/tourney fees back to the players in the form of prizes, but beware the blind structure, which gets brutal not far into the tournament, favoring lucky players rather than skilled players.