Poker Rooms in Oklahoma?

[mothra]

I know of one, the Cherokee casino east of Tulsa.
Are there any others?

[ZBTHorton]

Winstar...exit 1...off I35...

[Jimmy The Fish]

There are at least two in the northwestern corner of the state. Quapaw Casino (Miami) and Grand Lake Casino (Grove) both have poker rooms, and I've heard that Buffalo Run (Miami) has now opened one also.

Quapaw and Grand Lake both cut corners to get their poker rooms up -- they ripped out their OTBs and put poker tables in. Consequently, both "rooms" have an abundance of TVs.

Both rooms usually have 3-6 and NL (2-5?). Quapaw rakes up to $4 (plus another buck for the BB), while Grand Lake rakes up to $3 (plus one for BB).

Grand Lake is a longer drive for me, but the lower rake and the better ventilation make it a nicer experience. (Quapaw allows smoking at the table, while Grand Lake has a bar along one wall where nic-sticks are allowed.)

[InkyWretch]

There's a room west of Fayetteville, Arkansas, just across the border in West Siloam Springs. It might be closer for you than Grand Lake.

Cherokee Casinos just outside Tulsa and across the state line from Fort Smith, Ark., are up and running. Both are filled with loose, loose players. If two players fold pre-flop, it's a shock. And that's in just about any game in the room. The Tulsa location is much, much nicer than the Fort Smith spot.

Choctaw Casinos are working on converting old bingo parlors to card rooms. They should be very nice once the work is complete but it might be Sept. before they open.

[Black Aces 518]

Thunderbird east of Norman and Lucky Star in El Reno are up and running. Decent tables, good chips, donky players, high rakes.

[four eight suited]

Im from Dallas and have been hitting up Winstar @ I-35 exit 1. They spread 2/5NL and 4/8,5/10 and a few 10/20 games of limit too. They just turned the plasma screen tvs on yesterday along with the autoshufflers. Also they managed to fix the ridiculously cold AC in there so its a little more comfortable (although I would still bring a jacket). The main problem is the rake. Its a 10% $5max with a $1 drop for state education from the small blind.

[Jimmy The Fish]

[ QUOTE ]
There's a room west of Fayetteville, Arkansas, just across the border in West Siloam Springs. It might be closer for you than Grand Lake.


[/ QUOTE ]

I'm driving down I-44 from Springfield. West Siloam is exactly 6 minutes closer to me than Tulsa, according to Mapquest. They're both in the 3-hour vicinity, which puts them in the same length-of-trip category as Kansas City and St. Louis.

The Miami/Grove rooms are the closest to me, by far.

[Jimmy The Fish]

I confirmed the rumor this weekend: Buffalo Run does indeed have its poker room open. I have a new favorite B&M room.

It's a small room -- 7 tables -- wedged in adjacent to the OTB in the northeast corner of the building. Being adjacent to the OTB, it's the closest thing I've yet found to my personal idea of gambling nirvana (which would be a poker room with OTB bet-runners and TV screens on every wall). Hit a quickie 3-1 payoff at Churchill Downs while waiting for a new table to open up Sunday afternoon.

Being wedged into a corner, the room doesn't have the half-height open walls that most poker rooms do. This greatly limits the amount of smoke that drifts into the room from outside. Smokers can step outside the main entrance, or through a glass door into the OTB, to satisfy their habit; but the room itself is more smoke-free than any room I've ever been in.

The room hasn't had time yet to build a steady clientele; I didn't see more than four of the tables in use. New tables with automatic shufflers are very nice; the chairs need improvement, though. I thought seriously about stealing one from the OTB and bringing it over.

Games are what you'd expect: 3-6 HE standard, signup lists for 6-12 and 10-20 (although neither of these games opened on Sunday), and 1-2 NLHE. The house rakes 10% up to $3, plus a jackpot buck.

Dealers were friendly, if not exceptionally speedy. I didn't see any technical errors; the only point of confusion came when two different dealers gave conflicting answers over the question of whether there's a house rule prohibiting rabbit-hunting.

Give this place a couple months to get a regular crowd built up, and it'll be solid. My excursions to Grand Lake were much more profitable, but the cleaner atmosphere and adjacent OTB at Buffalo Run give it plenty of outs...

[malo]

Thanks for all the info guys. Live in SW MO and have been looking for anything at all about what is happening in NE OK. Thanks to Jimmy for answering some questions (and Jimmy..I PM'ed you.)

Hoping someone will start an Oklahoma poker room directory. Lacking computer literacy, it won't be me /images/graemlins/wink.gif, but if anyone stumbles across such a thing, can you post and share?

I know a lot of folks on the boards live on either coasts and aren't too interested in OK (to say the least). But there are a few of us "fly over country" residents around the forum for whom OK poker is good news indeed.

[pragan4]

Jimmy, this is awesome--I'll probably be heading down to Miami this weekend some time (I'm in Springfield also).

I went to the Cherokee in Tulsa this weekend and it was really nice--I played the 1-2 NLHE game all night. I was sort of surprised that they didn't comp anything for poker players (when I asked for a drink and she told me it would be $4.50 and I was a little startled). The game was pretty relaxed and the poker room is right at the front of the casino in the middle of the slots, so it was a little loud occasionally.

I don't have any experience at other OK poker rooms to compare, but the people there seemed to think it was pretty much the nicest. The room has 30 tables and almost all of them were going when I got there at midnight on Saturday, but by about 4 it was down to 10 mostly limit with a couple NL 2-5 and my 1-2 table.

The 1-2 table is max/min buy-in of $100, but the 2-5 game is min $200 with no max. Someone said something about the casino beginning to comp poker players on the 1st, so someone will have to see if that's true.

[Jimmy The Fish]

I'm glad you guys got some worthwhile info out of the post. I'm moving to northern Indiana in a week, and almost certainly won't get the chance to take any more Okie money with me; but that just leaves more fish for the rest of you. /images/graemlins/cool.gif

[Jimmy The Fish]

Oh! One other thing I wanted to mention about Buffalo Run -- I found a pair of Double Bonus VP machines with a 10-7 paytable. Good times, good times... /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[TheCroShow]

sweet deal, i'm moving to oklahoma city in a week or so. reassuring to hear poker rooms are kickin around.

[Chimp]

[ QUOTE ]
I went to the Cherokee in Tulsa this weekend and it was really nice--I played the 1-2 NLHE game all night.

I don't have any experience at other OK poker rooms to compare, but the people there seemed to think it was pretty much the nicest. The room has 30 tables and almost all of them were going when I got there at midnight on Saturday, but by about 4 it was down to 10 mostly limit with a couple NL 2-5 and my 1-2 table.

The 1-2 table is max/min buy-in of $100, but the 2-5 game is min $200 with no max. Someone said something about the casino beginning to comp poker players on the 1st, so someone will have to see if that's true.

[/ QUOTE ]

Cool - thanks. Anyone have a report about the West Siloam Springs Cherokee's room? I'll be there next week while I'm out schmoozin Wal-Mart. How many tables, what games, types of players, etc?