[ohnonotthat]

I was in Vegas a few months ago and happened to find myself chatting with an older gentleman while waiting in line for the buffet. It turns out he was a [poker] dealer years ago. The conversation turned to tipping and I commented on how I was unable to imagine how the dealers at the smaller rooms were able to make a living. A Mirage/Bellagio dealer can afford to deal 30 minutes of 3-6 and walk away with $4 for his trouble; it all evens out if he gets to push a tourist a few winners at 15-30 at 5+ dollars per. A room where 3-6 is the biggest game will not offer this opportunity.

He broke out in a big smile and said, "you'd be suprised just how often that tourist did well when I dealt".

He proceeded to explain that he was neither capable nor willing of actually choosing who won (well, not willing - I suspect he was indeed quite capable) but that he was always on the look for a good tipper who needed a little assistance.

He used to call them "tourist flops" - a nice euphamism for those 9-6-4/rainbows that often flop big hands or draws for the visitor while missing the local rock's A-K.

He claimed he could produce them at will and a quick demonstration left me to believe that he was, if anything, understating his skills.

Cheating ?

Absolutely !


Non-random ?

Hell yes !




But how would an online site benefit from such a ruse ?

Supplementing the rake seems to be a claim the falls short of plausibility when subjected to scrutiny; not only does this theory fail to account for the fact that once the rake has maxed out there is nothing to be gained from building the pot, it also ignores the negligible (and possibly reversed) effect such behavior would have on the HOURLY drop.

$60 3-6 pots take time to deal out. I don't know whether it takes longer to play one than to play three $20 pots (probably not) but it does take some additional time.

I am not suggesting that the "online poker is rigged" bunch be silenced - perish the thought.

These imbeciles are doing the rest of us a huge favor; the louder they scream the less likely that some rogue site will decide to take the "add to the rake" vehicle out for a test drive - and for this we owe them a debt. (Extra meds and free aluminum foil for all the paranoids . . . put it on my tab).

That said, we need to see that for every "Chicken Little" there are at least three voices of reason. People are signing up to give away their cash at a blistering pace. It would be a shame if the claim that online poker was rigged became accepted as fact by as little as 10% of the population.

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