LV Hilton closing poker room 10/17

[malo]

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At Harrah's the dealers claim how busy the poker room is depends incredibly on who the floor is. Most of the Harrah's floor people get on the casino-wide PA and announce the games at least every 15 minutes. Some do this about every 2 hours. The dealers swear this makes a huge difference, and nights with vocal floors they'll have 6 tables going while nights with a mute floor they'll have 3.

This is the set of walk-by tourist traffic you will lose through consolidation. If there's no 12-table room in Harrah's, folks walking from the monorail station toward the strip can't be diverted to the poker room. Losing those players is surely not good for Vegas poker. And I think those are the players that represent the largest fraction of the non-freeroll-chasing Hilton players. They'll just be lost to the winds and we won't be seeing them seated in Wynn's room.

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Bav, wouldn't think the Harrah's room would be a likely candidate for closure. Look's like a pretty nice room, seems to do an OK business.

My picks for Harrah's closures on the east side would be O'Sheas (does that really count as a room?) and maybe Paris, since they moved their room to such an out-of-the-way location.

[bav]

Yeah... I wasn't intending to suggest that Harrah's would close the Harrah's room. Just pointing out that the closure of a couple of these small, low-traffic, out-of-the-way rooms like Harrah's isn't going to suddenly boost the traffic to the remaining rooms a bunch. Lots of their patrons are opportunistic walk-by's that simply won't play if they don't happen to walk past a poker room.

I definitely agree with O'Shea's and Paris being first on the chopping block. Nobody will even know O'Shea's closed, and Paris already shot themselves in the foot when they moved the room--they may as well have closed it. Which also means closing them won't be good for Vegas poker, nor will keeping 'em open be good for it... they are both mighty unimportant in the grand scheme.

[Photoc]

Bav, I can see Trop, Riviera, and Gold Coast all going by the way of the Hilton next year as well.

[bav]

Yep. Those are also all barely noticed rooms. The thing about O'Shea's and Paris is they are part of the Harrah's empire and are located such that closing them will unlikely drive customers away at all. Paris guests will walk to Bally's to play poker, not Planet Hollywood, and probably not Bellagio. O'Shea's players... well... who cares.

Tropicana and Riviera are independent. If they close the poker room, the companies have NO poker presence in Vegas, and any tiny fraction of guests who actually want to stay in a place with a poker room will be lost. So they may (or may not) be a bit more stubborn about keeping 'em open.

[Photoc]

I've played many tournaments (won only a few) at PH and I have heard quite a few times that people walk to Paris and see there is nothing going on period and tournaments are cancelled so they come over to PH to check it out and are quite impressed. But you're right about the 2/4 players probably not going to Bellagio.

O'sheas has players?

[*TT*]

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Tropicana and Riviera are independent. If they close the poker room, the companies have NO poker presence in Vegas, and any tiny fraction of guests who actually want to stay in a place with a poker room will be lost. So they may (or may not) be a bit more stubborn about keeping 'em open.

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I agree, there are fewer reasons to close their rooms - except of course if they are unprofitable.

[govman6767]

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Yeah... I wasn't intending to suggest that Harrah's would close the Harrah's room. Just pointing out that the closure of a couple of these small, low-traffic, out-of-the-way rooms like Harrah's isn't going to suddenly boost the traffic to the remaining rooms a bunch. Lots of their patrons are opportunistic walk-by's that simply won't play if they don't happen to walk past a poker room.

I definitely agree with O'Shea's and Paris being first on the chopping block. Nobody will even know O'Shea's closed, and Paris already shot themselves in the foot when they moved the room--they may as well have closed it. Which also means closing them won't be good for Vegas poker, nor will keeping 'em open be good for it... they are both mighty unimportant in the grand scheme.

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Osheas does not need a poker room since it has beer pong tables [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[bav]

Closing Hilton and Riviera and maybe Tropicana won't really help the Vegas poker scene at all. Just not enough there. To actually make a discernable difference in the other rooms you'll have to close a lot of the small rooms.

My list was based on room size, location on the strip, perceived quality of the room (that's why Mandalay is in there to be axed), nitch market fullfillment (that's why Sahara is to be saved), and a bit of my personal preference.

I included PH on my list to shutdown 'cause it's not very large, parking sucks, and it's just a bit of an odd duck sitting in amongst Bally's/Bellagio/MGM in my list. (Oh yeah, I forgot to include Monte Carlo in the list to shutdown).

I actually really enjoy playing in the small rooms. They have atmosphere and each seems a little unique in its own way. The staff and the regulars make each room special (sometimes bad special, sometimes good special). So yeah, I'd miss some of these rooms if they closed. But I'm thinking about what goes on in all of these rooms when someone says "can we start an interest list for X" where X is 4/8, or 6/12, or NL2/5, or stud or Omaha or a mix game. You get 3 to 5 names on the list and that's where it ends. Cut the number of room to 40% of current so instead of 25 rooms of 3 to 6 tables going you've got 10 rooms of 7 to 12 and repeat the exercise and just maybe they can get a critical mass. On the other hand, I think closing the small rooms will significantly increase the grinder:tourist ratio since they'd just plain lose a lot of the walk-by tourist traffic, which is not a good thing.

But this was just my selfish list. If I had my druthers I'd also ban 2/4, 3/6, and NL1/2. Make people play for "real money" if they want to sit down.

[KurtSF]

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But this was just my selfish list. If I had my druthers I'd also ban 2/4, 3/6, and NL1/2. Make people play for "real money" if they want to sit down.

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IMO this should't be a "ban". But its always struck me as strange that some rooms don't differentiate themselves by being a "real money" room. IIRC only the B doesn't spread these games. I think other high end rooms (like the V?) could benefit by making themselves appear more exclusive and upscale.

[VORP]

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But this was just my selfish list. If I had my druthers I'd also ban 2/4, 3/6, and NL1/2. Make people play for "real money" if they want to sit down.

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IMO this should't be a "ban". But its always struck me as strange that some rooms don't differentiate themselves by being a "real money" room. IIRC only the B doesn't spread these games. I think other high end rooms (like the V?) could benefit by making themselves appear more exclusive and upscale.

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Venetian tried only spreading 2/5+ NL when they opened but they just didn't have the business to support it. But, well, they're tried a lot of things they didn't have the business to support.

Wynn is pretty close to B, they start at 4/8 and 1/3NL.