Casinos push poker tournaments to draw players

ATLANTIC CITY - Just how much the casinos here are wagering on table games for their survival is evident with the start of this month's Borgata Poker Open.

The 15-day tournament, which started its sixth year on Sept. 3, is offering the largest guaranteed cash prize pool in Atlantic City's history and one of the biggest at any U.S. land-based casino: $5 million.

"We're talking serious money," said Bill Blanda, a South Philadelphia native now living in Galveston, Texas, who is no stranger to winning. He's won three major poker tournaments since 2004, pocketing $700,000.

Yesterday, Blanda, 52, was among several hundred players inside the Borgata's entertainment center, which had been turned into a massive poker den.

The $5 million pool of money will be divvied up among the top 10 finishers in the tournament, with the winner taking home $1.4 million. The second-place finisher will get $750,000, and the player in third place will walk away with $387,500.

Just how many are feeling lucky? Day One of the Borgata Open drew 1,192 players from all over the country, more than any other opener in the first five years the casino hosted the event.

While poker and blackjack tournaments are nothing new to Atlantic City's gambling halls, the amount of the prize money this year is.

And there's good reason: Pennsylvania and New York slots parlors have cut into the resort's slots revenue - so much so that such tournaments have grown in prominence, both because of the publicity they generate for the casinos that host them and the number and quality of table-game players they draw in.

Not to mention the fact that Pennsylvania does not offer dealer-staffed table games. The seven operating slots parlors offer only virtual table games, in which an animated dealer appears on a computer screen.

The Atlantic City casinos took in $468.3 million in total gambling revenue from slot machines and table games in August, a mere 0.7 percent increase over the same month a year earlier.

Slots revenue was virtually flat last month among Atlantic City's 11 casinos compared with August 2007, while table games revenue increased 2.3 percent, according to yesterday's figures from the New Jersey Casino Control Commission.

By comparison, the seven Pennsylvania slots parlors took in $156 million last month in gross slots revenue. Much of that used to go to Atlantic City's casinos.

Harrah's Entertainment Inc., which owns four casinos in Atlantic City - Bally's, Showboat, Harrah's Resort and Caesars - also owns the World Series of Poker Tournament, the big one in Las Vegas that is televised on ESPN each year.

A World Series of Poker circuit event will take place at Harrah's Resort here Dec. 5 to 18, and Caesars will hold its circuit event March 4 to 14.

The Harrah's Resort circuit events have had average cash pools of $1.4 million and about 300 participants in recent years. Expect the winning pot and number of players to be bigger this year, said John Arthur, poker manager for the casino, which will feature 123 tables this year, nearly double last year's total of 64, for the circuit event.

"When you run an event like this, it is absolutely an advantage," Arthur said yesterday. "There is a little bit more prestige to it.

"We're hoping they [the tournaments] keep growing, and we're always trying to run them better than before," he said. "The potential for Atlantic City is untapped. We have a big drive-in market. The World Series draws in big numbers."

This is the sixth year that the Borgata has partnered with the World Poker Tour, chief competitor to the World Series of Poker. The Borgata's main event next Thursday to decide the $1.4 million winner will be televised on the Fox Sports Network.

"This is big stuff," said Larry Mullin, president and chief operating officer of the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa. "We want to let everyone know this is the tournament to play in. Our goal is to keep growing it and to attract players from all over the world."

Among the poker stars at the Borgata Open yesterday were Jamie Gold, who won $12 million in the World Series of Poker tournament in Las Vegas in 2006, and last year's Borgata Open winner, Roy Winston, who took home $1.5 million.

John Vazquez, 41, still an unknown in the poker universe, was getting a full back massage yesterday while he played his hand.

"When you're seated for hours and hours on end, any type of release helps," he said as the massage therapist, who charged $20 for every 15 minutes, caressed the back of his neck.

The jewelry-store manager from Brooklyn is still aiming to win his first major poker tournament. He said if he didn't win the Borgata Open, there was always the annual U.S. Poker Championship at the Trump Taj Mahal across town, from Sept. 14 to Oct. 8 this year, which he also has entered.

New Jersey

Gross revenue for each Atlantic City casino and percentage change from August 2007.

Revenue, %

Casino In millions change

A.C. Hilton $23.9 -21.6

Bally's A.C. 56.4 -4.9

Borgata 77.2 +10.3

Caesars 60.5 +4.1

Harrah's Resort 58.6 +19.1

Resorts 22.3 -12.3

Showboat 35.9 +1.3

Tropicana 35.9 -4.5

Trump Marina 19.4 -11.0

Trump Plaza 28.1 +2.4

Trump Taj Mahal 50.2 -0.6

Total $468.3* +0.7

Pennsylvania

Gross slots revenue for each parlor. Change not available because some parlors have been open less than a year.

Revenue,

Slots parlor In millions

PhiladelphiaPark $31.6

Harrah's Chester 28.8

The Meadows 22.0

Mohegan Sun 20.3

Penn National 18.4

Mount Airy 17.9

Presque Isle 17.0

Total $156

*Total does not add up because of rounding

SOURCES: N.J. Casino Control Commission, Pa. Gaming Control Board