HARD ROCK TAMPA

[TEKEE]

i plan on traveling to Tampa sometime in the near future to play in the cash games here(maybe a cheap tourney also) i think $100 max is all that is offered.will i have to wait long for a seat? i live in SC & this seems to be the closest casino to me thanks for your replies in advance.

[EvanW76]

First, go to Biloxi/Tunica instead. You will have a wider variety of games, and you can also hit the pit if you feel like it.

For Tampa, I haven't been since the limits changed on 7/1, but from what I have heard, the waits are pretty disgusting. I believe they have $1/2 and $2/5 NL, which are both $100 max. They also have $1/2 and $2/4 LHE, IIRC.

Hit the Beau if you go to Biloxi. Spend a couple of hours at the tables, eat at the buffet for free, and make some extra cash.

EW76

[Fishhead24]

The waits are not long at all in Tampa......except perhaps the weekends at the HARD ROCK........but still not long.

[EvanW76]

[ QUOTE ]
The waits are not long at all in Tampa......except perhaps the weekends at the HARD ROCK........but still not long.

[/ QUOTE ]

Totally didn't realize he was asking about other places in Tampa. Had Hard Rock in my head from a previous thread. Anyway, as Fishhead said, most places are no problem to get into, save for the weekends @ HR.

EW76

[mxp2004]

I was just at the Hard Rock in Tampa on this past Saturday night. I was visiting a friend who lives in Tampa, and we arrived at the Hard Rock to play poker around 8 p.m. We both signed up a 1/2 NL seat, and we both were seated in a little less than a half hour. The Hard Rock had a number of NL tables going, and I'd say that we were around 12 or 13 on the list when we put our names in. Thus, if last Saturday was typical, the waiting times are not bad at all.

For the 1/2 NL game, the max buy-in was $100. I know that the room had a 2/5 NL game also, but I didn't ask what the max buy-in was for the game.

The 1/2 game played differently than the ones that I am used to in AC and Vegas. For one thing, opening raises were a lot smaller. While a typical opening raise in AC and Vegas are usually in the $12-$15 range for the most part, the opening raise at the Hard Rock was generally $6 to $8.

The post flop action was also similarly scaled back. For example, if 6 people saw a flop for $2, a post-flop open was often in the $6 range. Again, in AC or Vegas, the post-flop action tends to be much more aggressive, with $10 to $20 pots requiring bets of at least 75% of the pot to be taken seriously.

Finally, I thought that the competition was pretty soft. If you could double-up -- and thereby build a stack to work with and make some -- I think that you could run the table over by being aggressive with you chips when acting in position.

I guess I have to caution to take my comments about the competition and style-of-play with a little skepticism. As noted, I was just visiting Tampa, and so this was my first and only trip to this cardroom. As a result, my observations might just reflect what my table was like, rather than how you can expect players there to behave generally.