Buenos Aires Poker

Upon arriving to BA (Buenos Aires) after my 5 day Uruguay sojourn, I was impressed with the energy and size of this city of 11 Million people. Much different than Montevideo, Uruguay.

I called up a couple of my poker contacts I made in Punta del Este,Uruguay who were from BA and at the tournament over there. Sure enough, that night they were going to have a poker game from 9PM on. While I am trusting second hand info from these guys, it seems that casinos in Buenos Aires either don't have poker, or have a strange form of running the games. Apparently all players at the table have to ante up BEFORE seeing their first two cards in Holdem. Sounds very strange to me and would obviously be at a disadvantage to play in a "blind betting" situation. So...instead the knowledgeable players play in various private club games throughout the city. It reminds me of Florida home games I used to play in when I lived there since at that time there was no public poker in the Indian casinos of Florida (that has changed significantly in recent years).

So...with private information address in hand, I set out for my first BA poker adventure. The address ended up not being very far from my hotel. It was a little disconcerting when I arrived by taxi because I didn't see a number for the address over a door where it was supposed to be, and there are no signs signifying these "poker clubs". Fortunately I had invested in a local cellphone chip and was able to call my contact back who came out to the door to find me and bring me in. It is pretty secure with a heavy locked door and doorman...which is probably what you need for protecting a "home game" setup.

Coming up the stairs it was like I was in some small office complex or similar to small language schools I have seen in Latin America. As it turns out, this 4-5 office mini complex was all for the poker club...and they had a chess room as well. I met "Pato" who manages the club and is a world class chess player who has even traveled to my town of Chicago to play in chess tournaments. I was ushered in to the poker room which was already full and in action. All guys with a mix of ages though half of the players were around my age or older I would say (50s).

You have to have a bankroll to play in this club, because the smallest buyin is 3000 pesos (currently around $800 US). I was able to watch for about 40 minutes before getting a chance to play. It is a very different concept than what I have ever seen before. They play in two hour rounds. Everyone starts the round with 3000 chips (pesos). No one posts money up front as everyone's credit is apparently good until proven otherwise. The blinds are 25-50 pesos (around $8-16 current exchange) which is a healthy blind setup. The action was quite good and there seemed to be a decent balance between tight and loose players. Most of them sure didn't seem too concerned about the stakes or look at the chips as money.

After the current round finished at the 2 hour mark, Pato comes in and they tally up chip status. Those who lose have to pay up the balance of what they don't have in chipcount. Winners get paid cash for their profits over their 3000 buyin. I had only brought enough cash for two buyins at this level...which is short of what you should have for this game. I usually don't want to play if I don't have 3-4 times the minimum buyin available...and in most games I limit my downside losses to 3 buyins, as bankroll management is the key to winning poker players. But in this case I felt the play was soft and I would get my feet wet with my new Argentine poker friends with what I had in my pocket.

Oh...the rake. As you sit down with your 3000 chips, the house immediately takes 300 (10%) from your stack. At first I thought this was quite a high rake...but as I quickly calculated in my head what the Panama poker rooms take as a rake PER POT (5% up to $50!), I figured this rake is actually a bit less than the money that would disappear in the game in Panama. It also moved the game faster and better not having to deal with a pot rake on each hand. I'll have to look at this closer when I have time to compare it with other methods of raking games that I have observed.

I played pretty tight for the first 45 minutes until I could get a good read of all these new poker friends at the table. The game was loose enough that I figured I had better play pretty tight as bluffs were called regularly for big money. There didn't seem to be much "scared" money at the table...and the typical raise was 10 TIMES the blind. That means that to call a raise usually cost you $100-200 dollars! That tightens my game up in a hurry.

I won the first hand that I played and a small pot with AQ that I raised with one caller and flopped the Q...the other player folded to my 3 times blind bet. Then the next two hands I played I lost. One on the flop where my AK raised with 4 CALLERS and no AK on the flop. I got bet out of the pot by a player who had flopped two pair...something like 8-3 offsuit. You learn alot about a player when they call a raised pot before the flop with 8-3 off. You don't mind having 1-2 players at the table playing that way. The next hand I played I had JJ in the small blind. There was only one other American in the game who I had met briefly before starting the two hour round. He had played the round before and then introduced himself before I started playing. He was sitting to my immediate right (you draw cards before the game for seat position) on the button and raised what in this game seemed a "moderate" raise, 3 times the blind. I just called, putting him in AK or KQ, or a medium pair. There had been 4 callers preflop so I didn't think he was bluffing necessarily, but since I was new to all these people, I still didnt have a solid read on him as a player (sometimes I will be more aggressive with JJ when I know the other players better). The flop came 3 small rainbow cards. Since I didn't want the raiser drawing to an AK or something like that, I bet my jacks pretty heavy...don't really remember exactly...but I think like $100 worth of chips. The middle guy folded behind me but my American new friend went ALL IN behind me! I'm figuring he doesn't know my play yet either, so why would he put us both all in with this flop? It took me a couple minutes of thinking and trying to read him. I even asked him "do you have aces or kings somehow?". He didn't flinch. I didn't think he would have any of the low cards on the board, but then maybe he had a suited Ace with one of those low cards? I looked at the pot which was now 450...and with the all in I was going to be looking at winning over $1200 if I called and won the hand. I decided it was worth the chance and called...only to have him turn over the AA! UGH!. OF course the turn and the river didn't improve me and I had just had an expensive lesson from my fellow American player. He's pretty tight and hard to read.

I requested another set of "fichas" (chips) and now I was all in with what I brought to play with cashwise. I felt the game was good enough that I could win back my first buy and hopefully profit still. Without going into further hand details, lets just say I locked in and grooved with the table for the next 80 minutes and by the end of our 2 hour session I won back the 800 of the first buyin plus around $230 profit. To be quite honest, I was relieved to do so and even though they were going to play a couple more rounds through the night, I figured since it was 1AM already and I had traveled all day to get there...I would take my profit and call it a night. I like writing profits in my book...even if it is a small one. And when you come back over $1000 in an hour of live cash game action, it feels like a BIG win.

Now, when play was done everyone once again cashes out...losers paying, winners receiving. I felt really good to take away $230 without ever having to reach in my pocket for my bankroll. After settling up, they all signed in again for another 2 hour session while I waited for a taxi to take me back to my hotel.

While it is a strange system of playing from what I am used to, I came away feeling like I could make some regular money out of this game if I lived in Argentina. It was much friendlier than the regular cash games at the Veneto in Panama City. The players are probably more aggressive and a little better quality overall than the Panama competition, but everyone seemed relatively "nice" playing the game. You don't get many "niceties" at the Veneto in Panama. And the more I think about it, the more I like that you "reset" the game every 2 hours. That way no one can have a lucky streak and just run over the game all night long. And it also protects from the "hit and run" kind of play you see in some public poker rooms in the world where some strange player comes in...wins a couple pots on luck in an hour and then runs with the money. I definitely felt these players were all going to be here for the full two hours...and a couple of them were down 2-3 buys/rebuys. So...I think I will be back there next week after my current side trip over to Mar del Plata for the finale of the LAPT tournament tour this year. I should get a blog report on here the next day or two from Mar del Plata.

Get lucky everyone...just not against me!:)

On the poker trail in Uruguay

Well, I just spent 5 interesting days/nights in Uruguay. Poker was dead in Montevideo the capital city, but alive and well on Easter weekend in Punta del Este which is one of the most popular beach resorts in South America.

First, Montevideo. Very nice, laid back city. Surrounded by a beach on the "Rambla", lots of old and new buildings everywhere but very few skyscraper types. Lots of cafes and bars dotting the whole city and overall clean, tree lined streets in safe neighborhoods. Hardly see any police anywhere over 5 days...that says alot for the relative safety of the country...much SAFER than the USA in general I would say.

The only poker that I could discover being played publicly in Montevideo is at the casino at the Radisson Hotel on Plaza Independencia...in the "old city". This is an interesting part of town and definitely worth seeing. According to sources at the casino, they have poker most days from 2-10PM. Some players I met in Punta del Este said that it is an inconsistent, weak game. They said they would rather play online. I stopped two different evenings and they never had a game going. Bummer, because this city has many nice features for things to do when poker players aren't playing.

I took a one day excursion to Punta del Este on Saturday where I had read there was a major tournament. I was bummed that all my emails to the Conrad hotel and casino which was hosting the event were never answered and they never posted details online about the tournament. When I got there Saturday, it turned out they were late into the second day of a 3 day structure. Kind of their own little "world series of Poker" I guess...but a baffling structure to me. They must have spent too much time in Panama during one of Panama's terrible high stakes tournament promotions. This tournament was apparently $1000 buyin with two rebuys. There were two flights over two days and then the top however many from each flight would play for all the marbles the 3rd day. The blinds went up every 15 minutes and it was NOT deep stack. This type of format is perfect for building big pots on rebuys and rewarding bad players who have all the money in the world. Skill is a much lesser asset in this format. Money/buyins is king. Not my kind of tournament, so glad I missed it. Still, I dont understand all these Latin poker promoters putting out web content and then not answering emails. Stupid in my book.

Fortunately though, I was rewarded with a lively poker room up in the main Conrad Casino (tournament was in the ballroom) and three tables had plenty of chips clacking about. They room features 3-6, 5-10 and sometimes 10-20 NL Holdem. All three tables playing when I arrived were 3-6...and there were a bunch of huge stacks in these games. Minimum buyin was $200 I believe, and it appeared many were buying in for 500+ at a time making for the big stacks in play. I only have to wait 10 minutes for a seat to open up and I found myself seated at a full table with a wonderful mixture of players. We had young and old, Spanish speakers, Portugese and English...and all languages were allowed during play. At my table to my immediate right was a young executive banker from Rio, Brazil who spoke perfect English. Another young player at the other end of the table from me was from Spain. The rest seemed to be a mix of Uruguayan and Argentinean players of all ages. The average flop saw 5-6 callers and made for plenty of action. I was never down in this game and after 2.5 hrs I decided to pull out with a $500 cash. Not bad for my first session in the deep south of South America.

Now its on to Argentina on Monday and checking out the LAPT tournament in Mar del Plata. I also met some Argentinean players at the Punta del Este tournament who invited me to their cash game in Buenos Aires...so I am licking my chops already and looking forward to making lots of new poker friends in Argentina. Hopefully I can win a satellite for the $5000 buyin at the LAPT. If not, I will probably just try to take down some major live cash games and I think they will have smaller "second chance" tournaments as well.

Ah...how I love poker adventures..

Status of Latin American Poker

I have lived and played poker in Latin America for over 8 years now. I guess that makes me one of the "older" players in the market...especially since many of the players I see here were still in 3rd grade when I started playing here. It is exciting to see the fast growth of poker in these countries...especially since I believe the game teaches young and old alike a lot of life lessons that extend to most other aspects of living. It also offers a more productive activity with a profitable upside than standing on street corners smoking cigarettes or pushing drugs. I suppose to some people, poker itself is a "drug"...a form of high or addiction that can drive one to levels of at least temporary insanity. As for me, I like to see a little "insanity" at my table...it can be highly profitable...as long as security is somewhere nearby.

Our recent journeys have taken us to Panama, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Aruba, Colombia, and starting next week...Uruguay and Argentina. It has been fun and interesting to meet the promoters and players of poker from various Central and South American countries at these events and poker rooms. It also has been interesting to note the variety of promotions going on in the regional poker magazines such as Poker Hispano
(http://pokerhispano.com ) and Bluff Espanol (http://bluff.la ) and the various promoters in this region such as WPS ( www.worldpokershowdown.com ) and Latin American Poker (http://www.lapt.com/ ) who are primarily backed by Poker Stars
( www.pokerstars.net ). These are good signs that poker is growing in this region and a few people are trying to bring quality events and purses to poker rooms and casinos throughout the Americas.

As in any new and growing industry, there are always risks and growing pains associated with the growth of poker in this region. Up until recently, poker in these countries was primarily for the upper class, moneyed players…many of whom were first exposed to poker in the USA, online, or in the upper echelons of their various gaming rooms primarily geared to high roller bankrolls. Most of the live action throughout this region has been primarily no limit Holdem with minimally $100-200 buyins and 5-5 to 5-10 blind action. You arguably need a bankroll of $5,000 or more to start playing at these levels and the majority of even your regular casino players in these countries might be hard pressed to have that much cash in their account or pockets to play with. In addition, a novice or learning player will go broke in a hurry playing at these levels. So, the live games are primarily targeted to high rollers while the average young, non moneyed player who wants to learn the game is relegated to low buyin tournaments which seem to be flourishing on the other end of this spectrum. It is our opinion that for poker to reach the masses in these markets, the casinos and promoters needs to start offering lower limit and lower buyin CASH games for the non-wealthy gamers and also do more to educate and create educated and winning players who will add to the houses’ hourly rake rates without going broke. So many rooms we know of seem focused on BIG cash games and then SMALL rebuy tournaments. To us there seems quite the disparity and lack of attention to the middle class and building a consistent and variety of local action.

It is quite noticeable to those of us with international player experience that there is a real lack of knowledge and experience with poker management in these countries. Many of these rooms are run by managers who have no experience or true knowledge of poker. They don’t know how to make correct and consistent rulings at the table, they don’t know how to train dealers and support staff, and they don’t know how to get the most profit out of a poker room or deal with the players accordingly. Hopefully over time, we will be able to positively impact the market with advice and strategy to casinos and poker rooms that will increase their productivity while providing safe places to play our game.

That brings us to another observation down here. The rules and enforcement are all over the place depending on which country and which casino or poker room you play in. There is very little standardization in Latin America outside of the larger tournament events which have to at least make an effort to fall under WPT or other international rules of poker. In some markets such as Panama, the action is good, but the foreign player has to be very careful which game they play in. “Panama Poker” can be profitable, but it also can be hazardous with the large amount of collusion and team playing that goes on. The main room with 90% of the live poker action in Panama is at the Veneto Casino. They regularly get 2 games going 7 nights per week. Many of the players there have big money behind them…and unfortunately the management has not seen fit to enforce international rules or standards of play. Only if the players themselves speak up at the table will there be any kind of controls from the dealers or the house on standard rules such as “show one show all” or premature splitting of pots between two buddies or outright couples at the table. This is like an insiders’ “home game” where only local rules apply. If you cannot flow with that, you are best not to get in that game.

We also need more standardization of poker tournaments, both in Panama and elsewhere in the region. The rake out of tournament purses has been anywhere from 10-20% depending on where you play. There is very little accountability or transparency to the players in these venues which are often times run by novices in the sport…and it seems players are so focused on the action that they are not “counting” the pots or the purse. This is another area that we hope some regional body, whether it be the Latin American Poker Tour or some other association of players that forms, will eventually impact the verity and consistency of poker in this region. It is hard to promote and help develop players and events in this region because we will not knowingly work with those unwilling to be transparent or abide by international standards of the game of Poker.

Even with all the cautions mentioned above, we are high on the opportunities that exist for our favorite sport in the Latin American region. Just seeing the growing international traffic from Europe and North America in the tourneys and poker rooms down here show the potential that is still just trickling into these markets. We hope that the media and poker magazines continue to spread good and balanced information throughout the Latin American region, and we hope the casinos and poker rooms continue to “improve” their game in providing dynamic and safe environments wherein we can practice our game and focus on just the competition.