New TDA Rule

There has been a lot of talk recently about the new TDA rule about when a player must be seated in order to play in a hand at a poker table. Here is the rule.

29: At Your Seat
 A player must be at his seat when the first card is dealt on the initial deal or he will have a dead hand. A player not then at his seat is dealt in, he may not look at his cards, and the hand is immediately killed after the initial deal. His blinds and antes are posted and if dealt the bring-in card in a stud-type game he will post the bring-in*. A player must be at his seat to call time. "At your seat" means within reach of your chair. This rule is not intended to condone players being out of their seats while involved in a hand.


There has been much debate about this issue in the poker industry and it has been mostly negative. The 1st thing I would remind everyone is that the TDA rules are meant as a guide and any tournament director has the right to use whatever rules he chooses as long as it is clear to all their intentions. If you are running a tournament and don't like this new rule then just announce what you are going to use as your time frame to kill a hand if a player is not in his seat.

I personally like a couple of things about this rule for Bar Poker. It sets a clear time that you must be in your seat. How many times at a bar game has the dealer waited to deal the last card because they are waiting for a player to get to table. Happens all the time and in the long run of a tournament, that blinds go up fast, a few minutes can make a difference of several hands of play. The other thing that I like is that the player may not look at their cards. A player that looks at mucked cards almost always gives away if their hand was strong or weak by their reaction.

There were many changes and additions to the TDA rules, so you would like to see them all here is a link to their website.

http://www.pokertda.com/poker-tda-rules/

I am just happy that someone is trying to get a set of poker rules to try and keep the game uniform. I don't like that it is getting more specific about rules and it's getting harder to know all the exact rules, but at least it's not pages and pages long like the current WSOP rules.
Thanks TDA and keep up the great work for the game we love!

Card Dead

At a recent bar game late into the second hour a regular player began talking about how their cards had been bad all night. At this point in the night I had a fairly big stack and I had been pretty much card dead all night at least according to that players standards. So, why did I have a good size stack and that player was on life support? The answer is simple. Play the player not the cards. Any good player is able to take the nights when the cards are not running so good and turn it into at least a chance to cash, make the points or even win. It is one of the small negatives to league style bar poker that start with stacks around 10,000 in chips. A player that is getting less then ideal starting hands is able to fold his way to at least close to making the points and many times can make it depending on the other players. When I arrive at a new table, whether it is at the start of a tournament or just changing tables, I look around the table and see who I know and who I don't. Are their players that I can outplay or are they players that I can't make fold. What kind of starting hands do these players value. To some J-10 is just as good as A-K or a pocket pair. I am going to call a per flop raise with less of a hand to this player because I know what they could possibly be raising with and I also know with a flop that couldn't possibly have hit them that a bet or a reraise will probably make them fold. Then you have the player that thinks he is card dead. I am going to raise his big blind almost every time and he is going to fold most of the time. When he doesn't I am going to make a continuation bet and then if he doesn't fold I will watch my step he may have a hand. All of this can be done with any two cards in your hand. So, if someone tells me they are card dead and folding their way on I say good for me. I will be more then happy to take your chips. Poker is not always about the cards, it's about how you play what you got!

State Champions

First thing is disclaimer. This is not blog knocking the accomplishments of any Free Poker network player. I am happy for anyone that qualifies for any of their tournaments and I wish them the best of luck in their events and will be there following them if they post.

Recently, the FPN held their state tournaments including MN. When they get down to the number of players that they advance to nationals they proclaim them State Champions and give them a trophy. At the current MN event there were 254 players that were eligible to play. Now I am assuming that not all players were able to attend. They were giving away 20 National Tournament entries. These 20 are the new State Champions. That is approximately 10 percent of the field which is very close to the payout schedule of most tournaments. So, if you are using the FPN thought process at last years WSOP Main Event they had 666 Main Event champions. The last HPT event had 27 champions. Austin Monson is a MSPT champion and I am a champion of many poker events. The funny thing is I have never won an event, but I have cashed or "qualified" in many poker tournaments. So, why not call it what it is. You are only a State Champion if you are the last man, women or team standing. This concept makes the Vikings Super Bowl champs or the Wild Stanley Cup champs. The top 20 are National Qualifiers. then play down to an actual State Champion. I know that the FPN has done it before as Kari Davis from Willmar was a true State Champion a few events ago. I know that the whole discussion is kind of trivial but it bugs me to call someone a champion when they really are not.

Easter Casino Trip

Once again it's been a while. It seems my poker playing days are getting farther and farther apart. Last weekend for Easter I went to Milacs to use my free room and buffet coupons from the CMPPA charity event. I remember why I don't go there very often. I really like the people that run the poker room  and most of the dealers, but it's just difficult to go there and play. Here an insight to my weekend. I arrive at Casino a little later then I had planned and My Daughter and Son in-law had already checked in. Happened to meet Kenny in parking lot so we walked in together. Went to get on elevator and guard stopped and asked for our room key. Kenny took his out and shows him and then he asked for mine and my wife's. I said that we had just gotten there and that Kenny had checked us in and had our room keys up in the room. He wasn't going to let us in. Here we are with suitcase in hand and he wouldn't let us up to our room. Finally he says I will let it go this time and off to room we go. I play the $30 buy-in tournament in the afternoon. 8 full tables. I get to my seat and look at my table and realize I am the youngest player at the table, Great! I win a couple of early hands and things are looking ok, but blinds are 15 minutes and it painfully obvious that this going to an all in fest quickly. I survive to 1st break and through rebuy period and have about 5000 in chips. Not very good but at least I didn't rebuy. Early in next blind level I raise in mid position with KQ. I get several callers. Flop is KKJ. I bet about a little more then half my stack expecting everyone to fold. I get reraised by an all in for about half of what I have left. I call and he turns over KJ. A few hands later I am button with one caller ahead of me, so I push in with 88 and get reraised by big blind with AA. So ends my tournament. Later I sat down at a 3-6 kill table and it was pure hell as always at Milacs. No one ever folds. After an hour and $35 down I surrender and go to blackjack tables. I did make a little back later on a slot but not the best gambling weekend. But, it's not over yet. Milacs is a dry casino so if you want a beer you have to sneak it in. Funny, that they have a fridge in each room! We had a few beers in the room and watch NCAA games and played some cribbage, probably the highlight of the weekend. Everyone else gambles late but I decide to go to bed early, so I'm up early and everyone else is sleeping. I decide to go to pool and hit the hot tub. Get me suit on, grab a soda and head to pool only to get stopped by another guard because I can't have a drink in the pool area. I look at him and say "you really going to make me go back to room to get rid of soda". Yes, he made me go back to room. I'm a little irritated by now. Go back to room and go back to pool only to find out heater was turned off in hot tub and it's going to take 3 hours to heat up. Back to room! Later we check out and go to buffet. We have 3 free ones, so it's only going to cost us $18. Not bad for 4 people. I seriously wanted to ask for my money back. Food was poor. We talked to manager because we had taken some peal and eat shrimp and you could smell that it was bad. He didn't say much and they never even removed the bad seafood. It will defiantly be my last visit to Milacs. Hinkley is much better and only a 10 minute farther drive. My only question is why can't MN have a nice Casino? I have been to many casinos in many states and ours are some of the worse run ones and what happened to customer service and MN nice. I that also doesn't apply to the local Indian tribes. It's time for state run competition!

Bad Beat on Cancer Charity Event

Last months CMPPA Bad Beat on Cancer was another successful event for the CMPPA to kick off it's 2013 year. Once again the local bar poker community surprised me by having 52 players show up for the event and donate over $1100 to the American Cancer Society. Thank you to all that donated items for silent auction and or your time to make the event successful. It was a fun day raising money and remembering James Wang. It was nice to see Donita and have her and Ann speak about Jim and his love of bar poker and it's players. There were many great auction items with me taking home a package from Grand Casino Milacs and a pair of Timberwolves tickets. Got to see many people that I had not seen for many months and had a very fun poker table to start tournament. Now this is not your normal CMPPA event as extra chips were given to anyone that donated to American Cancer Society so most players started with 25,000 in chips. As most of you know that when you give bar players extra chips play tends to start fast and pots build fast. One of the players on my table almost doubled up on the first hand. I played a little less aggressive then I have been playing and ended the 1st break about 5000 down in chips. 4 of the first 5 players knocked out of tournament came off of my table so it created several big stacks early. As the blinds increased I picked up the aggression a little and was able to build a nice stack on my table with many big stacks. When we reached 20 players my table was broken down and the move was not kind to me. I went card dead for a long stretch but was able to limp my way to final table with a very small stack. On the final table my card dead hands continued until I was forced to push all in with a small pocket pair and managed a double up. This seemed to get me started and I soon moved up to a mid size stack. One of the players on the table had been drinking a lot and all of the sudden got very aggressive and even announced that he was getting tired of playing. He had moved all in two hands in a row and appeared to be giving up all his chips. The next hand he moves all in again and everyone folds to me. I am big blind and have A-3 off. It is most of my chips to call, but not all. I think for quite a while as I am sure that I am ahead of him and he is just continuing his pushing all in, so I make the call. He turns over pocket jacks. Wow, was i wrong! It doesn't look good for me. The flop comes out 3 suits that I have the ace of and the river brings another and I 4 flush him and take him out of the event. So much for my great poker instincts, well at least I got lucky and won the hand. It was the turning point for me. I went on to win the event by taking out the last 2 players on the same hand with 2-3 off by rivering a deuce. I finally won my first CMPPA event! It's was about time. Now it's too bad that I can't play in the event next month. Thanks again to all that came and played and donated. It was a day to remember.

River Rat Poker League

I went and played at the Ultimate tonight and of course the talk was about the disbanding of the River Rat Poker League. Now I have never played in any of the events but I am not surprised to see this happen. It had grown too big and too much advertising was being done about it to include Facebook and a website. Most of the talk was about why it happened and what could be done about it. Here is the MN Law about a social bet from the MN Dept of Gambling website trying to explain it.

Private, Social Bets

It is sometimes difficult to distinguish the difference between a "private, social bet" and illegal gambling. The best way to make the distinction is to look at the intention of the law.

Minnesota law makes any "bet" illegal. A "bet" is defined as "a bargain whereby the parties mutually agree to a gain or loss by one to the other of specified money, property or benefit dependent upon chance, although the chance is accompanied by some element of skill." According to this definition, any card game where the participants pay to play, and have a chance to win money, would constitute a "bet" and, therefore, be illegal gambling.

However, the criminal gambling statute creates an exception for "a private, social bet." The important thing to remember about a private social bet is that it cannot be part of "organized, commercialized or systematic gambling." The owner of the location of the social bet cannot derive any profit from the bet, organize regular occasions for such bets, or advertise their occurrence. Potentially, any gambling that occurs in a business establishment could constitute illegal gambling because the owner of the establishment derives the indirect benefit of increased patronage.

It appears that the law was intended to exclude from prosecution such events as penny-ante card games among friends in one's home, small spontaneous wagers between friends, and other spur-of-the-moment private transactions. Once those wagers occur on a regular basis at a business establishment, it is difficult to characterize them as "social bets," and the location of the event runs a substantial risk of violating the law.

 

 

 

So what actually are the options for the group. The first obvious one is to move all the games to a casino. I am certain that any number of poker rooms would be interested in hosting their events. The next option would be to continue playing but move events around and remove all the social media outlets, but they could risk a raid if the state decided it was worth their effort. I doubt the state would waste much time and on money on their group, but then again looked what happened at Granite Bowl. There is also the membership option such as the CMPPA. Create a legitimate business and take in membership and host events. The big problem is keeping to the states $200 max payout which doesn't seem to fit their structure.

 

I wish them the best of luck on whatever they decide.

2013 CMPPA

It's 2013! The beginning of a new year and a new CMPPA year. Our 1st event is the yearly kickoff Charity event in honor of one of our 1st CMPPA members. James Wang passed away during our 1st year of existence and so to honor him we now run the The James Wang Memorial Bad Beat on Cancer Hold-em Tournament.

 This years event will be Sunday January 20th in the poker room at the Ultimate Sports Bar in Waite Park. Tom has agreed to host our events in 2013. The CMPPA was dealt a big blow with the closing of it's 1st host McCann's, so hopefully we have found a new home for years to come. The charity event is a free holdem tournament with a silent auction. They will be opportunities to donate to the American Cancer Society and receive extra starting chips. All money raised will be donated to the local chapter. I hope that many of you will be able to attend and donate items to the silent auction. To date we have raised over $3000.

The 2013 CMPPA schedule looks to filled with all the usual fun events including the popular Team and Heads up events. The schedule will be posted on our website soon. We will be running 9 events total this to include 4 St Cloud Series of Poker Events. Your $50 membership fee gets you into all 9 tournaments and includes some special extras at non member events.

It once again looks to be a heated battle for the Player of the Year honors as last years winner Matt Decker looks for a repeat, but I am sure that we will all be gunning for him and the 2013 title.