Upgrade at Hooters

(With that title, it's tempting to lead with a photo of before-and-after breast implants. But I shall refrain. Besides, I'm an au naturale kind of guy; I think implants usually detract from rather than enhance beauty.)

The last time I was at Hooters was exactly a year and a day before last night's visit: February 2, 2009, a fact that I did not know when I set out across the street after finishing up at the MGM Grand. I just knew it had been a long time.

The main reason I have avoided returning is that Hooters was one of just a handful of poker rooms that still allow smoking right at the table. (The others, to the best of my knowledge, are Arizona Charlie's--Decatur, Boulder Station, Club Fortune, Palms after 2:00 a.m., and Texas Station.)

I was surprised, therefore, when nobody was smoking when I sat down. As more and more time passed without anybody lighting up, I gradually realized that the policy must have changed. When the floor guy substituted in to give the dealer a break, I asked him about it. He said they changed it nearly a year ago.

Mind you, this is still one of the smokiest rooms you'll find; players need only step away from the table about three feet to light up. But it's amazing what a difference that small distance makes. Yeah, you'll still leave with clothes reeking, but it's not the gag-inducing injection right up your nostrils that it was when the sidestream was 12 inches away.

On that basis, I'm moving Hooters from category 6 up to category 5 in my list of degrees of smokiness in Vegas card rooms.

Also on that basis, there's a good chance I'll be patronizing the place a little more often than I have in the past. It's one of the softest rooms in the city, an easy place to make money if you can stand the smoke and the raunchy behavior of the other players. (Having the entire business themed after female body parts seems to eradicate any inhibition customers might otherwise feel about making sex the continual centerpiece of conversation. I can't recall a single mention of a woman in a few hours last night that wasn't about her body and/or sexual performance. It's true: Men are pigs.)

As an added bonus, Hooters poker room now gives $1/hour in comps that can be used at its restaurants or retail shops, like most every other poker room in the city does. They didn't used to do that (as far as I know). They also have a $100 aces-cracked bonus all day every day (highly unuusal), high-hand jackpots, and a bad-beat jackpot ($1000 shared--not sure of the distribution) for aces-full beaten.

My night among the smokers

Once or twice a year, something hits me (a stroke, maybe, or a brain tumor) and I decide I should put in a session at one or more of the handful of poker rooms in town that still allow smoking at the table. (Wow--strange coincidence. I just noticed that it was exactly one year ago today that I first put up my frequently updated categorization of degrees of smokiness in poker rooms.) Tonight was such a night. I took in Boulder Station and Hooters. Nothing interesting happened at Hooters, but let me tell you about Boulder.


New room

They're advertising a new poker room at Boulder Station. Baloney. It's the same old room, with barely enough change to call it a face lift. They moved the check-in desk from one end to the other, put up new wallpaper, and are gradually replacing the chairs with more comfortable ones. That's it.


Pictures

Despite what has happened to me and other photographers in other Stations properties, I walked around snapping pictures at Boulder unnoticed and unmolested.


Massage

There was a young woman in uniform walking around offering table massages. I had not seen this at Boulder previously, though I've only played there twice before, so maybe it goes on all the time and I was just unaware of it. I've added it to my list of places where you can get a massage while playing.


Oops

On my next-to-last hand of the night, I was dealt J-J, except the second one flipped up and was exposed during the pitch and had to be replaced. I got an offsuit 4 instead. Ick. It's the first time ever, as far as I know, that I have had a big pocket pair broken up and taken away because of a dealer's bad pitch.


My big hand

OK, here's the story I really wanted to get to.

I had started with my customary $100 buy-in, and after a little less than two hours had worked it up to $201. I was two off the button and looked down at K-J offsuit. Not a great hand. Sometimes I'll throw it away, sometimes limp, sometimes raise. As is so often said in poker, it all depends. In this case, there were three or four limpers already, and it's not a hand I want to play in an unraised pot. I hadn't played a hand in a while, and hadn't raised pre-flop in a long time, so I thought that if I raised I could get credit for a bigger hand than I actually held. Furthermore, the cutoff and the button were the two tightest players at the table, so I thought that a raise had a good chance of effectively giving me the button for this hand. I raised to $13. I got four callers, including the button, which was not good.

The flop was Q-T-5 rainbow, giving me an open-ended straight draw to the nuts. The first three players checked. I bet $35 into the approximately $65 pot (a couple of limpers had folded, both blinds had called, and I think the max rake is $4--close enough), basically running a flag up the pole to see if anybody would salute, as the saying goes.

Boy, did they ever! The button reraised all-in for his last $95. The small blind pushed all-in for a little over $400. One guy folded. A middle-position maniac pushed all-in for about $250. Nothing, absolutely nothing like this had happened during the previous two hours! What in the hell was going on?! As the chatter and oooing and ahhing started, people started coming over from nearby tables to see what was developing.

I hated this situation. I probably had the worst hand among the four of us left contesting this pot! I had $153 left at this point. I estimated that I was getting better than 3:1 on a call for the rest of my chips and that I was right around 3:1 to win it. (Eight outs twice is about 33%, but you have to factor in some discount for the possibility of somebody hitting a runner-runner flush, or, more likely here, the board pairing and giving a full house or quads to an opponent currently holding a set.) It was close, but I thought the math favored a call.

I hate this sort of thing. If I'm going to be playing a huge pot, I want it to be on my terms, when I have reason to be confident that I have substantially the best hand. I might semi-bluff all-in on a good draw like this against a single opponent if I could be the aggressor, but calling all-in on a draw? Into three opponents? It's against my religion!

But I was finally persuaded by my estimate of the numbers that it was the right thing to do, so I stacked up my chips and pushed them forward. We now had an actual crowd around the table.

The dealer put out the turn card: deuce of the fourth suit. Didn't help me, but it didn't pair the board, and it killed the possibility of a backdoor flush.

River: a 9! Yes! I spiked my gin card, and now held the absolute nuts. The button mucked without showing. The small blind had 5-5 for a flopped set. The middle-position maniac had A-Q. (I don't know why he didn't raise before the flop. That was uncharacteristic of him.) The dealer pushed me about $654, and gave the rest to the small blind.

Here's the actual math, now that I can take the time to work through it with 20/20 hindsight. First, though, I have to guess at what the button had. I think it must have been 10-10, Q-Q, or Q-10--maybe A-Q or A-A, but I think those are less likely. Given his tight nature and how I had been playing, those are really the only two hands with which he would have called my pre-flop raise and then raised me all-in on the flop. For now I'm going to assume it was Q-10.

The pot was actually offering me $501 that I could win (the $65 pre-flop pot, plus my $35 bet, plus the button's $95, plus $153 from each of the two bigger stacks). That's 3.27:1 on my money if I win. The odds calculator at cardplayer.com assigns us the following rounded probabilities to take the hand: 27% (me), 13% (for the presumed Q-T on the button), 58% (5-5 in the small blind), and 2% (maniac with A-Q). That makes my odds 2.7:1 against winning. So I was basically right that it was pretty close, but mathematically favored the call that I ended up making. [Patting self on back.]

(If we assume instead that the button had flopped a bigger set, it change the odds between him and the small blind, but doesn't change my odds meaningfully. Because he was the short stack, he wasn't eligible for any side pot and therefore wouldn't have to show his hand even if he did have a better flopped set than the small blind's 5s.)

It's nice to be presented with a moderately complex situation, work out the right decision, and have the poker gods reward it. Study your math, boys and girls--it really does come in handy!

I finished that orbit, but didn't have another playable hand (because my jacks got taken away). I packed up my chips and told the table, "Gentlemen, I know when my luck has gotten as good as it's going to get, and that would be now, so I'm leaving before it changes on me." That was my flimsy apology for the hit-and-run. But I just didn't feel like taking a chance on giving it all back, like I did the last time I had a comparable stack. A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do. Sometimes that means take the money and run.


Good dealer

By the way, I need to add kudos for the dealer. He announced verbally each step in figuring out the pot. He showed that I had the button covered, gave his stack to me, then counted my stack and took the same amount from each of the two big stacks, gave those sums to me, then gave the rest of the A-Q's stack to the small blind. He explained clearly at every point what he was doing and why. In multi-way pots, it's easy to make mistakes, but if the dealer says everything out loud along the way, it's makes it far easier for those involved to either be reassured that the outcome is correct or recognize that a mistake is being made and speak up to make it right. I tipped him more than I usually would for being so open and clear. Dealers usually get these things right, but do the work silently, so I have to figure out what they're doing as they go. That's not always easy, because there are several ways one can go about the process. I much prefer this dealer's uncommon explicitness.


One Hooters story

OK, I forgot about the one notable thing that happened at Hooters: I saw somebody flop a royal flush. He had A-K of hearts, and the flop came Q-J-10 of hearts--in that order, even. This is, I think, the third royal flush I've seen made using both hole cards, but the first one that hit on the flop. Given how much I play, that tells you something about how rare a phenomenon it is.


So all in all, my night among the smokers turned out OK. As soon as I burn the clothes I was wearing and finish coughing up a lung or two, I'll be fine.

How smoke-free is "smoke-free"?

Last June I submitted to http://www.allvegaspoker.com/ (a site dedicated to contributors' experiences with Vegas poker rooms) a proposed classification of smokiness of local poker rooms (see http://www.allvegaspoker.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2231&highlight=). Since then, some rooms have closed, some have relocated within the casino, I have played in some that I had not visited back then, and I have more experience with others. As I sat choking in Boulder Station today, it occurred to me that it was time to update the list. I also added the two rooms in Mesquite, Nevada. Finally, I've added links to room-specific reviews that I've written since having this-here blog.

I realize that not every reader will be interested in this information, but I think that posting it here will make it more readily found by search engines than when it's buried in the AVP forums. I can also easily make additions and modifications as needed here, which I can't easily do there.

******************

I personally really dislike cigarette smoke, so one of the most important features for me in selecting which places to spend a lot of time is the probability that I will leave feeling the need to take a shower and change my clothes because of smelling of smoke.

I propose here a tentative classification of Las Vegas poker rooms based on the degree of isolation from smoking areas of the casino. Some of them I've only visited once, and my memory is a little vague, so I could be persuaded to shift some rooms up or down a level. Also, I realize that the borders between these categories are somewhat fuzzy and subjective--but it's the best scheme I could come up with.

The shorthand version is that smoke is generally not an issue that I think about before setting out to play in poker rooms that fall into the first three categories; those in the last three categories require me to decide whether I'm willing to put up with the smoke exposure.

Debate, disagreement, etc., are welcome in the comments section.


1. Room physically separated from smoking areas by walls, doors, and/or corridors; as close to truly smoke-free as you'll find.

Binion's (Note added November 3, 2008: This refers to the new poker room opened 10/30/08, a vast improvement over the old room, which had been in category 3. See http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/11/more-on-binions-new-poker-room.html.)
Caesars Palace
Harrah’s


2. Room open on one end or side to smoking area, but little or no infiltration of smoke is noticeable. (Caveat: in some of these, certain tables may be close to the open area, and if people are smoking right in the doorway, the experience may be irritating temporarily. Overall, though, I think they're easy enough on the lungs that it's just not an issue.)

Cannery
Gold Coast (This is the new poker room, opened early December, 2008, a great improvement on the previous one. See http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/12/new-poker-room-at-gold-coast.html.)
Golden Nugget
Green Valley Ranch
Hard Rock (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/08/hard-rock-may-have-winner-on-its-hands.html)
Monte Carlo (closed as I write this due to recent rooftop fire, but expected to re-open once repairs are finished; no reason to think that the poker room will be altered)
Oasis (Mesquite; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/mesquite-flavored-poker-part-3-oasis.html)
Palace Station (Note added November 3, 2008: Palace Station used to allow smoking in the wee morning hours, but I have just learned that that practice was discontinued a few weeks ago.)
Palms (Room becomes a Category 6, with smoking allowed at the tables, after 2:00 a.m.)
Red Rock
Sam's Town
Suncoast (Note added November 3, 2008: New room recently opened at Suncoast, but smoke rating remains the same. See http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/10/summerlin-poker.html.)
Treasure Island (TI)
Tropicana (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/search/label/tropicana)
Wynn


3. Room open to smoking areas on more than one side, but actual amount of smoke entering is not bothersome, due to distance/buffer zone between smoking and non-smoking areas and/or effective ventilation. I rarely if ever notice smoke during a poker session or on my clothes after leaving.

Bellagio
Circus Circus
M Resort
Mandalay Bay
MGM Grand
Mirage
Rio (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/could-i-have-found-new-poker-home.html)
Santa Fe Station
South Point
Sunset Station (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/08/new-poker-room-at-sunset-station.html)
Venetian (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/08/another-poker-dump.html)


4. Room fully or almost fully open to smoking areas (usually just a roped-off section of the main casino floor, or surrounded by a useless half-wall). Smoke is frequently noticeable while playing. It's usually a minor annoyance rather than a real assault on the senses, but I can expect to smell of smoke when I leave, sometimes lightly, sometimes heavily.

Bally’s
Eastside Cannery (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/08/newest-poker-room-in-town-eastside.html)
Eureka (Mesquite; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/mesquite-flavored-poker-part-1-eureka.html)
Fiesta Henderson (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/lets-have-fiesta.html)
Flamingo
Luxor (new room opened late 2007, old room was much worse; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/02/luxor-improves-to-mediocre.html)
Orleans (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/upgrades-at-orleans.html)
O'Shea's (new poker room in the back; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/poker-harrahs-way.html. The configuration of this room is actually like those of category 2--open on just one end--but it's so small and ineffectively isolated that the experience I had the one time I was there was much more like the others in category 4, so after some debate with myself about how to list it, I moved it here with this explanatory note.)


5. Physically similar layouts to category 4 above, but, additionally, smoking allowed within a few feet of tables and/or such poor ventilation that there is lots of infiltration from smoking areas, even if they are more than a few feet away. I am frequently or constantly bothered by the smoke while playing and will definitely reek of it when I leave. These rooms are only marginally better than those in category 6.

Bill's Gamblin' Hall and Saloon (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/05/newest-poker-room-in-vegas.html)
El Cortez (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/04/armpit-of-las-vegas-poker.html)
Excalibur
Fitzgerald's (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/09/annals-of-perfect-timing.html)
Hooters (Edit, 2/4/08: I originally had this in category 4, which is how it was the only time I played there, but the comments received convinced me to make it a category 6 now. I'll try to stop in there sometime soon and see for myself.) (Edit 2/10/08: Went there tonight and confirmed those reports. See http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/02/hooters-maybe-not-place-for-wise-owls.html.) (Edit 2/4/10: On a visit last night, I learned that the policy changed many months ago, and players must now step away from the table to smoke. Hooters is therefore now listed in category 5. See http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2010/02/upgrade-at-hooters.html.)
Imperial Palace (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/poker-harrahs-way.html)
Jokers Wild (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/08/i-think-im-going-to-throw-up-part-2.html)
O'Shea's (two poker tables in front of casino; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/poker-harrahs-way.html)
Plaza (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/plaza-another-stinky-dump.html)
Planet Hollywood (note that this is the new location of the poker room as of early October, 2008, which is much worse than the old location; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/10/planet-hollywood-doubly-annoys-me.html)
Poker Palace (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/01/poker-palace.html)
Railroad Pass (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/smallest-poker-room-in-nevada.html)
Rampart (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/rampart-poker-room-what-city-hasnt-been.html)
Riviera
Sahara
Stratosphere (new room opened late 2007; much worse than the old room; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/01/stratosphere-upgrades-by-making-things.html)
Tuscany
Silverton (temporary poker area roped off from main casino floor while new room under construction; much worse than previous poker room; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/12/silverton-poker-room.html)


6. Smoking allowed right at the tables; bring your own iron lung along.

Arizona Charlie's-Decatur (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/08/another-poker-dump.html)
Boulder Station
Club Fortune (see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/08/i-think-im-going-to-throw-up-part-2.html)
Palms (after 2:00 a.m.) See http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/07/dont-go-to-palms-poker-room-after-200.html.
Texas Station This is a recent (July, 2009, apparently) change.


The unknowns: There are still a few poker rooms in the valley that I haven't played in yet.

Railroad Pass (listed above because I have been there and can easily tell how it would be, but there was no game going at the time)

Speedway (which apparently hasn't spread a poker game in months; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2008/01/poker-palace.html)

Hacienda (I'm not completely sure they even have a poker room anymore)

Nevada Palace (ditto; see http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2007/08/i-think-im-going-to-throw-up-part-2.html and http://poker.wikia.com/wiki/Nevada_Palace and http://www.vegastexasholdem.net/poker/NevadaPalace.htm). Edit: Nevada Palace is now officially defunct, and has been replaced by the Eastside Cannery.