Is the boom over or just a down turn

Percula · #1 10-13-2007, 05:52 PM

So I have been play at Casino AZ lately on Friday nights. I have been playing irregularly at CAZ for years. In the past couple of years you would never see a Friday night with an open table, long wait lists for most games.

But the last couple of weekends, this has not been the case. Several open tables, no long lists.

I am not sure if that is a result of the poker boom cooling off or the housing market crash. It should be noted that a fair amount of the money in the poker economy at CAZ is the result of developers.

Anyone else see this in their rooms?

MicroBob · #2 10-13-2007, 06:20 PM

football season?
Diamondbacks fever?
tourney going on in LA?
promotion at a competing casino?
other reasons?

overall I feel like such things tend to go in waves.
If there were several people who had to sit around for a long time and wait for their name to come up on the list then their experience isn't going to be as enjoyable and they will be less likely to come running back the following week.
When things get over-crowded like that I think some people tend to only have so much patience for it so it will tend to balance out and be kind of self-balancing.

In other words, if they had more room and more tables there so that nobody had to wait perhaps the demand would have remained high.

Don O · #3 10-13-2007, 10:05 PM

For the last month I have been traveling to play.
Las Vegas to Tunica to Foxwoods and places in between, I do not see much if any down turn in poker.
Only problem most are seeing is poker room saturation which spreads games around more.
I am back in Las Vegas now doing an upgrade on motor homes then back on the road I go.
Don O---

pig4bill · #4 10-14-2007, 01:03 AM

Boom is over. I saw something tonight I thought I'd never see - an empty table at 8 pm on a Saturday evening at Bay 101.

Rottersod · #5 10-14-2007, 03:55 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Boom is over. I saw something tonight I thought I'd never see - an empty table at 8 pm on a Saturday evening at Bay 101.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree. Ever since they raised the drop at most of the LA rooms the number of players have dropped and sometimes it's been significant. Hustler on a Saturday afternoon had only 2 tables of 1/2 NL going. A few months before it would have been 6.

Jerry D · #6 10-14-2007, 04:07 AM

The poker rooms aren't empty - but the Poker Boom is really, really over. Most of the boom came from the internet and people who wanted to have a little fun and play some poker on their computer, then those people later decided to try it out in a live casino. But now Bill Frist and the Republicans have put the hammer down, killed neteller, made the majority of the sites leave the US, and you have to jump through so many time consuming hoops to even TRY to get money online even if you want to try to after you hear on the news that Online poker is Illegal, and that the FBI is warning people not to play poker online.

Oh yeah the boom is way over.

Howard Beale · #7 10-14-2007, 04:15 AM

I've been pointing out that as far as I can see business at CAZ has been down for a couple of years. Firstly, I remember when they went from a total $4 to a $5 drop years back and I told ppl that I thought that was a bad move. Then they got blackjack and I think that is what has affected the poker room more than anything else. It's drawn some players away from poker and broken many, many others who are now staying away from the casino altogether. You mention empty tables on a Friday night? How about empty tables on football promotion Sundays? (one of the best promotions I've ever seen anywhere). Only a couple of years ago if you didn't have a seat a couple of hours before game time you might as well not go play until the games were over. Now there are empty tables. Too bad. You'd think that the casinos would want to be more like leaches and let the victim live but apparently they'd rather be vampires.

youtalkfunny · #8 10-14-2007, 06:35 AM

I gotta think the housing crunch and the gas prices are playing a substantial role.

EDIT: As soon as I typed that, I left this thread, and went to the next thread to catch my eye. It turned out to be a post about a mind-boggling floor decision that needlessly cost a player a big chunk of his stack.

Every night, I sit down and open a dozen threads, each detailing floor calls that range from moronic to deranged.

All these rooms, run by all these incompetents, CANNOT BE GOOD FOR BUSINESS. I wonder how many people quit coming because they can't stand this part of it?

I know that I have worked as a dealer in rooms that have made me think, "Boy, I'll never play in this room! You'd have to be nuts to trust this staff to correctly settle any disputes."

RydenStoompala · #9 10-14-2007, 10:49 AM

Ebb and flow. The bull market in all things poker is temporarily consolidating. Whether this is a correction or a new down trend depends on the operators and how well they run the games, develop new players, keep the rooms in good condition and, most importantly, keep the corporate nerds from running a spreadsheet that says the poker room should be charging twice the rake.

I miss the mob.

jjshabado · #10 10-14-2007, 11:21 AM

Its also relative. If you think about the state of Poker now vs. 10 years ago you'll see a big difference. The 'boom' may be over but its caused a big growth in poker thats not going anywhere anytime soon.

The main event was a good example. I heard people talk about how the crowds were down and how the boom was over, but it was still a HUGE number of people.