Dealer Rant (NYC club)

[Cornell Fiji]

I am home from school for winter break so I decided to go check out one of those NYC poker clubs with two of my friends. The club is the one on 61st (do any posters play there? I am 95% sure that if so you weren't at my tables this week because the competition was atrocious.) And the dealers were absolutely terrible.

3 things/incidents that really annoyed me:

1- Kid dealer, no older than 23. He was only passively paying attention to the game, never charged people who missed blinds (fine, I dont have a big problem with this, nor was I going to say anything.) The most frustrating thing that he did however was when the hand got to the river and there was a big bet that someone was thinking about calling, he would shuffle the deck... FACE UP!!! He would expose nearly 1/2 the deck while there were big calls to be made, it was brutal.

2- "Nice Hand" -- I always tip, expecially in a place like this one where there is no regulation, tons of regular players, everyone knows one another, and dealers who are off play at the tables when they are off. I fully accept the fact that the game is not being played on the up and up and I don't want to make any enemies of the dealers. I am playing No Limit though and some of the pots are ended on the flop and I win $15 in a 5-5 game. When this happens I dont toke the dealer but the dealer always hits the table and says "Nice Hand" begging for a tip. Sometimes I have conceeded and tipped them, most of the time I dont, always I am annoyed.

3 - This was the incident that annoyed me more than any others. Playing at the 1/2 NL game I flop a flush on an A [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]7 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]2 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] board get someone all in and when they see my hand they muck. Instead of the dealer pushing me the pot however he gave the cards back to the player and asked if he had a chance of making a runner-runner boat to beat me. The player said yes and flipped up A [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]K [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]. The boat didn't come but I made a comment to the dealer (in an extremely nice tone because I don't want to make any enemies) that if a player mucks his hand against me I would appreciate it if he didn't turn it over. At this point the dealer got angry and told me not to tell him what to do and that he will always 'protect the player at all costs' and that 'at this table we play by my rules, if you don't like it then leave.' I thought about leaving, but then looked at the big stacks in front of me and actually apologized to the dealer for telling him how he should do his job (he would later acknowledge that 'there is some basis for what I said but he always wants to 'protect the player' and therefore this is how things will be done at his table. I didnt protest.)



Are bad dealers and sketchy situations inherent in these underground clubs? Is this something that I will have to accept if I want to play in these games? Are there any clubs that actually have good dealers and bad players (I would rather play at a place with bad players and bad dealers than a place with good players and good dealers)

Just needed to get these experiences off my chest, wondering if anyone else has seen this or if anyone else plays on 61st.

-Steve