Hey everybody!

BTown Poker is having a GREAT Season 09!  More and more of you are coming out just about every night to play the best in FREE POKER!  A lot of you are bringing new players into the fold!  All of you are chasing the points to get qualified for the TOC!

You all ROCK!

In order to make this the smoothest tournament experience for everyone, there is something that we need to discuss and figure out how to fix:

Too many times, as the betting is going around the table, a player is being missed because their cards are behind the chip tray or are covered by their hands.  Being missed in a round does not allow that player to have the option to check, bet, or raise, thus changing their odds of winning the hand.

I know that some of you are thinking, “Well…that’s THEIR fault because the player is not paying attention!”

Technically, you are right.

Then again…technically, you are wrong, too.

Let me tell you what happened to me in Vegas…

In the tournament I played in, one player had his cards hidden under his hands and was passed over in the pre-flop call/bet process.  Since the dealer could not see that he had cards and there was no raise, he was allowed to call the blinds before the flop was put on the table.  Then the dealer requested that he keep his cards in front of his chip stack.

A few hands later, in fourth position, I was holding Jacks with a Jack on the flop.  The dealer then pre-burned for the turn.  Check, check, check…and the dealer put the turn card on the table!

She had passed me!

I had my cards visible on the table and in front of my chip stack, I was thinking about how much I wanted to raise to get some callers, and SHE PASSED ME!   I mentioned something about it, the dealer picked up the turn card and allowed me to bet and get one caller.  The ten on the turn and the two on the river let my trips hold up against an Ace-Jack.  Woooo hoooo, yea me!

All that brings me to this:

Because we use two decks, it allows for the action of the table to move along at a faster pace that with a dedicated dealer who is dealing from a single deck.  That means that our dealers MUST pay attention to everyone who has cards in the hand and may NOT pre-burn.  It also means that every player MUST keep their cards in front of their chip trays and visible on the table so they will not be passed in the betting rounds.

If we can all do this together, every table, every hand will be smooth, quick, and a winning hand for you!

Kinda like my Jacks!

Happy New Year!

Yeah…a new year.  2012.  Woo Hoo.  Meh.

JUST KIDDING!  It’s going to be a GREAT year for us!  B-Town Poker is going to have its’ most successful year EVER because of YOU!

This year will be about making beneficial changes for you, our poker players.  You have made interesting comments about game-play that Jay and I discussed and we take every comment seriously.  One e-mail came over the inter-webs recently that made us stop in our tracks and think hard.

So hard, that it made my head hurt.

So hard, that I actually discussed it with my friend WHILE ON VACATION! After a while, she told me to, “shut the hell up!”

The e-mail I am talking about discusses the act of “chopping” points between the final two players in any tournament. First place points get 1200 base points and 250 bonus, while second gets 800 and 200.  When a chop occurs, each player receives 1000 and 225.  The e-mailer thinks that this is unfair in the interest of overall points.

I happen to agree and let me tell you why;

Let’s say that you and I chop. If I had won outright (1200), I could be ranked 16th instead of sitting at 19th, while you (800) would be 5th instead of 3rd.  That’s a big difference when you think about the fact that last season 1st through 3rd place were only separated by a few points and it came down to the last tournament. Maybe some of the others knocking on the door didn’t get the same splitting opportunities, holding them at a disadvantage to advance.

As for chopping the money, the incentive for a player who doesn’t have many points and doesn’t care about points is totally gone once the money is decided. That means the action is corrupted and the players decision making will be totally reckless and fully loose.  That’s not fair to the other player who wants those points.  That $50 is not only a prize but also insurance that the action is normal.

Winning a tournament is a difficult task and should be rewarded accordingly.  Winning tournaments should give a player a major advantage to winning the overall season point leader, and chopping the key part of the tournament cuts the legs out from the leagues’ built in philosophy.

So here’s what we are going to do for Season 09; No more chopping of points or prize money, UNLESS the time limit of the tournament is going to exceed 4 hours.  If this occurs, both players’ chips will be counted by the tournament director and then first and second place will be determined with the $50 prize going to the winner.

With this rule in place, we will be able to keep the competition pure and the integrity on the game intact.

Good luck and happy hunting, everyone!

** UPDATED RULE can be seen here and scoll down to Rule J **