Black Friday Incident Sends Players to the Live Arena

The online poker crackdown has been very unkind to poker players in the United States. It was like they were left hanging, the rug swept out from under their feet so suddenly that they hardly had the time to collect their thoughts. But as the dust settled and the information finally sunk in, people started to realize that online poker as we once knew it really did get axed by the government. Things will never be the same again. It’s almost like poker apocalypse… and just like in a real apocalypse, some online poker players have returned to their “roots”. Live poker is making a huge comeback now that online poker has been weakened – whether that’s a good thing or bad thing, it depends upon you.

The Brunson family – pretty much what we’d call poker nobility if there was such a thing – are basically the only ones who seem to be happy about the whole arrangement, having taunted the online poker players to finally play “real poker”, i.e. live poker. Oh, them and the brick and mortar casinos that are finally seeing a chance to compete now that the online poker sites have been neutered. But the question isn’t whether people are happy or not – though I gather that the general consensus leans towards the latter – it’s where all the players have gone now that there are few options left in the online poker scene. Live poker has been making a huge comeback lately. Places such as the Borgata, Harrah’s Beau Rivage, Foxwoods, and more, have been considered as great hotspots for live poker. Also, there’s no way to quantify it, but it’s safe to say that the ‘Boys’ Night Out’ is becoming pretty common again in the country.

Then again, it wouldn’t be exactly accurate to say that online poker is completely gone. The only sites that the US really punished were Full Tilt, PokerStars, and the CEREUS network. It’s unknown whether or not they’re going to follow through with the punishment of other poker sites as well. Bodog, for example, is still accepting US players, so is DoylesRoom and Carbon Poker. These sites doesn’t have much traffic, though, so they might not be the priority of the US right now. But then again, more and more people are flocking to those sites despite all the risks.

Casino Research