Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch- Changes
Monday, October 22, 2007
It seems like there's a whole lotta changes going on in my little world of poker. Some good, some bad. Let's start with the bad.
There's bound to be some cheating in online poker, whether it be a couple of tools sitting in their mama's basement looking over at each others' screens while playing a ring game or a lonely pathetic man-boy opening multiple accounts so he can have 2 entries out of the 1000+ players in a given tournament. But this one is really fucked up.
In case you haven't heard, there has been a lot of questions asked about a possible player seeing hole cards at Absolute Poker. I had re-started playing there after I got rakeback from the site, but having since busted from my measely deposit, it doesn't look like I'll be returning any time soon. Apparently, one of Absolute's employees (current, I believe, and not former), wanted to show his bosses that they were wrong about the possibility of cheating. So, he cheated by setting up an account where he could see all of his opponents' hole cards. This netted him over $300,000, but he was eventually caught after he "cleverly" called down a player with Ten-high to win a tournament. Now he claims that it was all an effort to show his bosses about the security holes. Nice story, guy, but I wouldn't want to be you right now.
Absolute is returning the money to their players, since the cheater never withdrew a cent (thereby supporting his story, but not negating any legal problems he may have). But the real problem was Absolute Poker's original stance: that no cheating could be possible and the records could not be reviewed because Absolute does not retain complete hand histories. Well, they were lying, apparently.
What does this mean for Jordan's Wide World of Poker? It means that I won't be playing at Absolute anytime soon. But that's fine with me. Their software and players sucked anyway (and not in the good way).
Oh, and to make matters worse, the scandal is getting attention from national media.
Congratulations, Absolute, on making online poker look even worse in the public eye!
In other bad news, the Extra Big Bet Club was raided Friday afternoon, causing me to miss out on an evening of poker. I was at the club at about 6:15pm, when I rang the doorbell and noone answered. I tried again, slightly annoyed, until a young Asian walked by me, cupping his mouth and said quietly, "The cops are upstairs." I replied, "Thanks," and immediately began walking away. I didn't look back once. I didn't see any cop cars on the street, but someone else sent me an email independently asking if I heard of a raid. So, that's NiceLook down, EBB down, and Salami changing over to a higher stakes, higher profile format that'll likely attract even more police attention.
I suppose I can rejoice in the fact that the raid happened right before I entered the room, as opposed to after I entered.
In the good news front, it looks like AC will continue to grow. A mere five years ago, AC was a shithole. Now, it's a shithole with some amazing properties. Changes have already occurred, including some awesome extensions to established hotels like the Quarter, a Havana-themed section of the Trop Hotel, or the renovation of the Ocean One Mall, now owned and operated by Caesars under a new name with a vast variety of stores. AC has also developed an impressive outdoor outlet mall. All of these things might seem minor, but they signal AC's change from the boardwalk-based old school slew of casinos to a Vegas-like entertainment, gambling and shopping destination. Borgata, which opened in 2003, was a precursor to this new AC image and now we have at least three new additions coming up.
MGM has announced that they will build a new property in Atlantic City. The $5 billion MGM Grand Atlantic City will develop the new property in the Marina section of town, adjacent to the Borgata. There is no indication about whether a poker room will be included in the 60 acre site, but really, how could there not be a poker room. The new hotel plans to open doors in 2012.
If that isn't enough, Pinnacle Entertainment is building a new casino/hotel in Atlantic City in the old location of the recently-demolished Sands. The new property has a great location, central on the boardwalk. Personally, I prefer Boardwalk properties because of the ease of travel from one to the next. The new complex, set to open in 2011 or 2012 will cost roughly $2 billion. Sands was the first AC property to offer poker, so here's hoping that Pinnacle does the same.
And finally, Revel Entertainment is building a casnio/hotel next to the official casino/hotel of High on Poker, the Showboat. The casino/hotel should be ready for customers by 2011, making it probably the first of the three hotels to open for business. The location isn't bad, at the end of the boardwalk strip. The new casino/hotel is expected to have the most rooms in AC, and the first wedding chapel.
So, things change. I'm glad to see that AC will continue to expand on its rebranding, even though we'll have to wait until 2011 before any new additions. Online poker took a hit thanks to Absolute's failure to be honest inside and outside of the company. The underground poker scene is suffering due to the constant raids by the police. But I'm still here.
Until next time, make mine poker!
posted by Jordan @ 8:00 AM,
3 Comments:
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At 2:35 PM,
Heavy Critters said...
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Feel free to steal the graphic in this post:
http://bloodyp.blogspot.com/2007/10/housekeeping.html -
At 3:15 PM,
said...
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Absolute is returning the money to their players, since the cheater never withdrew a cent (thereby supporting his story, but not negating any legal problems he may have)
Absolute's initial statements admitting wrongdoing, which appeared in mainstream media outlets like MSNBC and Yahoo! News, tried to paint a picture of a disgruntled technical staffer. But in the last three days it's been conclusively determined (and admitted to in more forthcoming statements by AP management) that this is not the case; the cheating was perpetrated by someone in a very senior management position, whom some have even called the head of day-to-day operations. Internal investigations have uncovered additional people that were involved that the community of players investigating the cheating weren't even aware of, but AP isn't releasing their identities and we don't even know if they were AP employees.
The issue of recovering funds is also not as simple as initialy claimed. AP has pledged to pay out everyone affected. But even though the primary cheating account is said to not have withdrawn funds, there is a well-documented pattern of this account dumping chips in enormous amounts. Presumably the recipients are the others turned up by the investigations. But the bottom line is that we don't know yet how large the network of players involved in laundering this money is, and it's hard to say how much of it remains in the AP network and how much has been withdrawn. -
At 8:17 PM,
said...
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"A mere five years ago, AC was a shithole. Now, it's a shithole with some amazing properties." lol
