WPT at Wynn

Borgata frequently does stuff like sun-thurs for multiflight and they do fine. Got incredible numbers pre covid and now post covid doing great still. Wynn won't have any issues, people will take a second poker vacation of the year for this.

There's been some interviews that Adam Pliska and Ryan Beauregard had done why they did with the schedule, freeroll, no gtd on places like pokernews podcast, onlyfriends podcast and others.

I’m sure they will do”fine”. But “fine” could be a 40% drop in entries from last year. I’d be curious to hear Ryan’s explanation. Do you have access to a link?

As for the vacation idea, that remains to be seen. But I don’t see it. I’ve spent a fair bit of time in Vegas in December. Outside of things like the Rodeo and an occasional convention, it’s a dead time of year. This is why Wynn is even able to hold a major series in this timeframe. Less demand for the space.

That being said, there’s no reason I can see why they couldn’t have held the Prime championship the weekend of the 7th. Just very odd.

But maybe I’ll be proven wrong. We’ll see.

You don't think an $1100 with a 5M guarantee appeals to recs? I'm a rec, and I'm playing it.

I’m prepared to believe they will have less space this year. I’m just wondering if that is the case on the weekend of the 8th. If they won’t be using the ballroom at all that weekend, then ok, the Wynn, or whoever took the space, put the kibash on it.

Still, they are using a weekend for this gimmick freeroll event. I have to imagine they will have the ballroom for that. And so, they are hurting the Prime Championship in order to run what is essentially a promotion for their paid website. That would be disappointing, not to mention what it might portend for the WSOP now that it’s being driven by an online poker site.

I’m all for technological innovation. But live poker doesn’t need to become a vessel for companies to encourage people to blow all their money online.

Mid-week tournaments don’t appeal to recs, by definition. That doesn’t mean there will be no recs. There will just be fewer, and I think potentially far fewer than there would be otherwise. This will still be a massive prizepool. Just not nearly as big as last year or as big as it could have been IMO.

I don't think you can speak for all recs. Recs are not a monolith. They have different levels of flexibility and income.

I wouldn't assume that what's right for me is what's right for everyone. Different strokes.

Personally, if I know I want to engage with a series, I can make weekdays work. There's even usually a latent perk of lower room rates Sun-Thu.

And while I don't claim to speak for everyone, the type of people willing to drop several thousand $$$ on poker tournaments can probably free up a few days here and there when needed. I don't think the majority of the audience for these big Wynn series is going to be locked into a tight Fri-Sun timeframe. FWIW, last year's Prime bled into Monday for anyone who made day 2. Day 3 was on a Tuesday. If someone was playing that event with the intention of running deep, they had to be prepared to miss some weekdays.

I’m a rec and I am making the series for the prime event. It’s usually a big guarantee/prize pool for the buy-in and a favorable structure. I generally go to Vegas twice a year during WSOP and wpt. And I agree with the above…for a pure recreational/low volume player, I have zero issues taking a few days off work and enjoying a week in Vegas.

I am also personally excited for wpt gold. I mostly play online on Sundays and bigger prize pools with lower buy-ins is super appealing to a lot of recreational players. As long as their security is better than ACR and their software/app is better than global poker, it will be a huge success. I do hope I get into the free roll, too.

I think many recreational players are more ok with taking time off if they know they are in the money. That will not remotely be the case this year.

Anyhow, I’m not speaking for anybody. Nor am I saying what is right. I’m saying that rec players, by definition, don’t play poker for a living. That means they do something else for a living. And that means they do not have the opportunity to play mid weak as readily as a professional poker player. This is why the WSOP holds a featured event every WEEKEND.

This is all self-evident. The WPT Prime Championship event will get fewer participants than it would if it were held over a weekend. The only question is why did they make decision. We will have to wait and see what the logistics are that weekend of the 8th. If the ballroom is being used for something else, then that would explain it. But if it’s not, this will remain a curious decision no matter what effect it does or does not have on any single individual’s plans.

For my part, I plan to be there. But will only have one bullet to fire (Sunday) as opposed to a possible 3 if it were Fri-Sun.

I know I’m not all recs, but if a major event has starting days of Sunday/Monday or Sun/Mon/Tues, I don’t bother considering it. Having to take an extra day or two at the end if a deep run happens is massively better than having to take days off to play day 1s. I ceased going to Borgata mains for this exact reason-there are too many other series with schedules friendly to a working man’s schedule.

It looks like the Amazon ReInvent convention is being held in Vegas Dec 2-6 and the Wynn is one of the venues. It's usually a week after Thanksgiving and this year the holiday is late. I think this explains the scheduling. I still wish they had used the weekend of the 13th-15th for the WPT Prime instead of the freeroll. But who knows, maybe they won't even have access to the ballroom at all this year.