Observations of a poker manager
By Daniel Higginbotham

While talking to some of my staff the other day, we got into a discussion about some of the changes that have taken place in the poker industry. The majority of my employees began their journey into this business after Chris Moneymaker won the World Series of Poker and Texas Hold’em became the main game in poker rooms across the country.

Listening to their views about where the industry is headed reminded me of similar conversations I had with my shift managers and poker room managers as a young dealer in Las Vegas. It was interesting to me to see how the thoughts of my dealers paralleled my thoughts when I was in their shoes.

Back then, Draw poker was all but extinct (except for a brief flicker of life in the form of Triple Draw Lo-Ball in the late ‘90s) and 7-Card Stud was the mainstay of most poker rooms. Texas Hold’em and Omaha were both popular, but most rooms spread two to three Stud games for every flop game they spread. The games were also limit (structured and non-structured) with the small exception of the occasional pot-limit Omaha game. No-limit Hold’em was rarely spread live in casino poker rooms or public cardrooms. Weekly tournaments were offered in Stud, Hold’em, Omaha and Omaha 8; mostly again, these were limit with the occasional no-limit tournament thrown in here and there.

When we walked into a room looking for a game (the majority of us played at least as much as we dealt), we were looking for the game with the most “dead money”; the game with the “live one” in it. What type of game they were playing in was of little importance to us; you had to know how to play all of the games in order to make money playing poker, no matter where the live one might be playing. When I walked into a poker room I didn’t have it in my head that I was a Hold’em player. To me, I was a poker player and if the 7-Card Stud or Omaha 8 game was where the best odds of adding to my bankroll were, then that’s where I would play.

Fast forward to today and I see that to my dealers 7-Card Stud is to them what Draw Lo-Ball was to me. Most of my dealers have never played the game, let alone dealt it. Very few of them have been exposed to Omaha as well. Hi-Lo split games are something that they’ve heard of, but not something that they are familiar with at all. The majority of poker rooms that they go into only spread Hold’em, either limit or no-limit. The vast majority of tournaments are no-limit Hold’em nowadays as well.

Another trend I have noticed is that there seems to be more poker room employees these days that don’t play the game. When I started out, you couldn’t even get an audition if you hadn’t played in the room before! I also believe that dealers that play the game are much more conscientious and professional at the table; they know from painful experience what it feels like to lose a pot due to a dealer making a careless mistake or not paying attention to the action. They also tend to classify themselves as limit or no-limit players, rather than poker players. It doesn’t matter if their game of choice is full of good solid players and the other game is soft with lots of dead money being donated, they play their game and that’s it. This is especially true for no-limit players that wouldn’t think of lowering themselves to play in a limit game, no matter how juicy it may be.

What do I think these observations mean, you may be asking? Well, while sitting around on a slow day chatting with the men that mentored me I remember that we dealers were scared that the popularity of poker was diminishing and that it was going to be tough for us to continue to work in the business. We had a bit of the Chicken Little syndrome going on. These men had seen the death of Draw Poker, the first Texas Hold’em games in poker rooms, the birth of the World Series of Poker and weekly tournaments, etc. They assured us that poker was far from dead; it was just evolving and changing. They were right! At that point in time, poker was going through a change, like everything in life it was evolving. After the movie Rounders and Moneymaker winning the WSOP, poker began a new phase into what was my dealers’ poker generation (for lack of a better term).

I believe that is where we are again, at another point where our game is evolving and adapting to a new generation of players. From what I hear in the poker room and at the tables, people seem to be getting bored. Maybe a little too much vanilla; they want to spice things up a bit. It seems logical to me that game variety is going to become essential to the success of poker rooms. A little mental stimulation to help keep people interested in the game. Of course as a poker room manager I love Hold’em—more hands per hour equals more drop for the house. This view is a little short sighted though, in my opinion. I think that having more options available to the players will, in the long run, maintain more interest and insure the longevity, thus the profitability, of poker.

What does the future hold for poker rooms? I wish I knew for sure, that would make my job a whole lot easier! Pot-limit Omaha seems to be picking up some interest as does Omaha 8 (this is according to what I hear from my players and the people I play with). PLO makes sense to me; it is a game of great strategy and action unrivaled by most any other game. I also can see where Omaha 8 and Stud 8 have a place on the poker horizon. In these games lies an opportunity for solid poker players to increase their expected win. There is a ton of information available to players on how to play Hold’em correctly. They hear the commentators on TV explaining the strategy, plus there are the books, the Internet, etc. I think there is profit for the player in learning the other games and taking advantage of the learning curve that others will go through as they try these games out.

If you would like to learn more about how to make your poker playing more profitable, please visit www.wine countrypoker.com to get information about the upcoming poker seminar featuring poker legends Linda Johnson, Mike Sexton and Jan Fisher in Santa Rosa. Following the seminar transportation will be provided to all participants that wish to take part in a tournament hosted by the River Rock Casino.

Daniel Higginbotham is the Poker Room Manager at the River Rock Casino in Geyserville and can be contacted at daniel.higginbotham@riverrockcasino.com.