The National Deaf Poker Tour began play today at The Taj Mahal with two more events this evening and three tomorrow.

Vanessa Rousso

The tour was founded in 2006.  The mission was to find the best deaf poker players and match them against each other in hopes that someone will represent the NDPT on the big stage at WSOP, WPT, USPC or other major poker tournaments.

For information on the tour go here and for the schedule go here.

As for the bad beat jackpots, The Borgata still has the largest in the city at $355,222 going into today’s play, making back most of the small bad beat hit it had last week. The small bad beat jackpot remains topped out at $50K.

The Tropicana’s bad beat jackpot is at a pretty hefty $285,727 as of today and The Caesars Combined Bad Beat jackpot, which had a hit last Sunday, is at $118,695.

The Taj Mahal’s bad beat jackpot is back up to $115,595.

Wednesday (Nov. 20), of course, is the start of the Borgata Fall Open with a $200,000 guaranteed $400 + $50 No Limit tournament. Get the schedule here.

And of course, the “November Nine” start playing out the WSOP in some out-of-the-way Nevada cow town on Sunday. Here’s some info on how to watch, but live play is better grinders and it’s sure to be on in the poker rooms.

A few days behind on this one, but The Caesars Combined Bad Beat Jackpot has hit yet again, keeping up a trend of hits that’s starting to border on ridiculous.

The jackpot hit Sunday, Oct. 30, at 9:43am for $178,842 at Caesars. That means the combined jackpot has hit eight times since early August and hit three times in October alone.

As usual, we have only cryptic info from Caesars, apparently home to the most paranoid poker players on the planet, as to what went down.

Here’s their report.

“The player (once again unidentified) who thought he had the winning hand laid out his straight flush, only to experience a bad beat when the other player (also unidentified) flashed a higher high straight flush and the win.

The losing hand earned $55,442 while the player who had the winning hand added $37,557 to his wallet.”

By the way, not giving your name in press releases won’t fool the I.R.S. or anything.

Just saying.

In addition to the 25 Caesars poker room players, 23 fellow poker players at Harrah’s Resort, Bally’s and Showboat each received a payout of $1,789 as part of the pooled jackpot. Obviously, an early Sunday morning hit led to fewer players to split with.

The jackpot is now at about $111,000, and being Wednesday, the minimum should have dropped down to four jacks.

Of course, the high minimum doesn’t seem to matter. The jackpot has been hitting every two to three weeks regardless.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

OK, minor correction. Actor and comedian Brad Garrett played the Borgata’s Music Box last Friday, and while in town he decided to take in some poker action before the show.

So that clears that up.

Anyway, Garrett, who has been a comedic highlight during the  coverage of several World Series of Poker main events he’s played over the last few years, brought his usual charisma to the Borgata Poker Room and the casino snapped some pics.

All we know about the visit is that he drew a crowd after going all in and winning on his first hand. And if he did it on the unsuited 10, 3 he’s showing in the pic below, he’s a lucky bastard.

Not sure exactly what Hold’em game he was playing, but he also ate at SeaBlue, if that helps.

Anyway, here are a couple of shots.

Here’s the schedule for the satellite and secondary tournaments for the Borgata Fall Open, Nov. 9-23.

Satellites for the $1 Million guaranteed prize pool, $2,500 + $200 buy-in, Fall Open Championship (Nov. 20-23) start Nov. 17.

Also, eight bounty tournaments are scheduled along with three on the main event schedule.

You can get that schedule here.

It’s another normal weekend in Atlantic City for tournament action, which is probably just fine with the folks at The Tropicana, who are seeing their bad beat jackpot head into uncharted waters.

Well, for them anyway.

Michelle Orpe

The Trop bad beat is at $399,000, just about ready to break the $400K mark. We don’t know officially, but that seems to be a new record for the casino.

The jackpot picked up about $20,000 since last Friday. Remember, the Trop’s 40-table room also holds tournaments, so that’s not bad for the action they usually see.

Still, it may not quite be bad beat mania yet, but it’s getting there.

The Harrah’s combined bad beat jackpot is next in the city at $341,475, followed by the Borgata, which saw a small bad beat hit early in the week leaving the total bad beat jackpot is at $281,429.

And the Taj Mahal seems to have had another hit this week, probably for about $140K,  and is down to $28,183.

They’re predicting another hot weekend on the beaches grinders. It’s a good time to hit the sand and the tables.

According to Golden Nugget officials, Atlantic City should have a new poker room in play by the fall. And judging from the action at the brand’s Vegas casino, it should make a play to challenge the city’s big boys, the Borgata and the Taj Mahal.

As you’ve probably heard, Landry’s Inc., the Houston-based company that runs the Nugget brand, took over control of the former Trump Marina on Tuesday. The company plans to do ongoing renovations to the property through December.

And according to Amy Chasey, vice-president of marketing for the Nugget, a new about 35-table  poker room (there was no poker room at Trump Marina) will be a major component.

“Poker is a very important part of the Golden Nugget brand,” she says. “We’ve been involved with Poker After Dark on NBC and High Stakes Poker on the Game Show Network. So we really feel poker is synonymous with the Golden Nugget.

“We expect to have the room open by the fall,” she says. “And we are planning to have a special high-stakes, cash-game room. That’s a need we see here in the city that we want to fill. A lot of high stakes players appreciate their own space.”

(more…)

When the government moved against online poker last month, we figured Atlantic City’s poker rooms would reap a benefit.

But the numbers just don’t show it. Instead, April was kind of a down month for the city’s rooms, except of course, at The Borgata.

For a breakdown, check out our weekly Poker Lowdown column.

We’ve speculated that the demise of online poker would provide a bump at live poker rooms as players come out of their dank and dusty bedrooms to play against actual live people.

Well, Cardplayer.com decided to look for early signs and made some calls to poker rooms around the country.

That included this check-in with Harrah’s Resort poker manager John Arthur.

“Perhaps hit the hardest by the recession, Atlantic City card rooms are hoping to see a nice spike in room traffic following the DOJ’s indictments. At Harrah’s, the 40-table poker room has experienced a small bump, but Director of Poker John Arthur has noticed more online players comparing each room’s player loyalty programs.

“’I’ve seen a number of players stop by and ask about our various promotions,” said Arthur. “These guys are used to being rewarded for their online play and now they are looking for whatever edge they can find in the live setting. Whatever they decide, we are more than ready for their business.’”

Cardplayer called rooms in California, Las Vegas and several other parts of the country. Nearly all the poker managers reported a slight increase in players, some saying as much as a 20 percent bump. Read the story here.

One week out from Black Friday, it looks like poker is going live around the country.

Players head to the Taj

Another day, another $11K added to the Taj Mahal bad beat jackpot, which now stands at $614,021 going into today. That’s a pretty amazing jump for a Monday and it’s pretty clear that until this thing hits, the Taj Mahal will be the center of Atlantic City’s poker action.

Of course, for the city’s other six rooms, that’s not good news. But this jackpot can only generate good buzz for the city as a whole.

And as we’ve said many times, the Taj is doing this with a standard jackpot format that sets quad deuces as the minimum hand for the bad beat. More than $307,000 is waiting for the player who wins it. Also 25 percent goes to the winner of the bad beat hand with the remaining 25 percent going to the rest of the players at the table.

Well, we’re back and returning to some bad news for those hoping that New Jersey would be the first state in the country to regulate and allow online gaming, including online poker. The New York Post Friday, citing an unnamed source, reported that Gov. Chris Christie is expected to veto the online gaming bill.

Christie

Christie had been thought to be leaning towards the bill, or at least allowing it to pass by not taking action. But The Post reports the Governor has been intensely lobbied on the issue.

According to The Post’s source: “Christie is being pushed in both directions,” a source close to the situation said. “My gut tells me he is not going to sign.”

You can read the report here.

Update: According to published reports, and due to some state house technicalities, Christie has until March 3 to act on the bill, not Feb. 24 as reported by The Post. That gives lobbyists and extra week to make their case.

If The Post is right about the veto, New Jersey will go from potentially being a leader in online gaming to, well, nothing.

The Post also reports that despite the bill being passed by an overwhelming majority in both houses of the state Legislature, the bill’s sponsor, State Sen Raymond Lesniak, will not try to override a veto.

Caesars Entertainment, which owns four A.C. properties, is seen as the main opposition to the bill, lobbying vigorously against it,  as they feel it will interfere with the passing of federal legislation to allow online gaming, The Post reports. Federal legislation, by the way, that, if passed, would allow Caesars to base their online operations in Las Vegas.

But hey, thanks for thinking of us guys.