Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Bad Beat Jackpot at Absolute Poker

Miami, FL (PRWeb) June 26, 2007 – Within one day of releasing its new Bad Beat Jackpot game, Absolute Poker doled out nearly $78,000 to five lucky Absolute Poker players after the very first jackpot was hit.

Less than 48 hours later, it was déjà vu for players of the new online poker game as the jackpot bells tolled once again.

“This is proof that Absolute Poker has taken the lead in making online poker more lucrative,” stated David Clainer, senior vice president for Absolute Poker. “When you can lose a hand and walk away with tens of thousands of dollars, it’s pretty amazing.”

The first Bad Beat Jackpot was won early Saturday morning by CGA11 who lost quad tens to NEDKELLY’s straight flush. In traditional Texas Hold’em, CGA11 would have walked away from the table with nothing but a whole lot of anger. However, at a Bad Beat Jackpot table, when a player loses a hand holding four eights (8888) or anything better, they win the largest piece of the Bad Beat Jackpot. In CGA11’s case, that meant nearly $40,000 for his losing hand. All players who were seated at the table where the bad beat occurred also shared in the jackpot.

History repeated itself early Monday morning when MARKM3451 lost four of a kind to WHITETAIL0’s king high straight flush, losing the hand but winning nearly $13,000 by hitting the jackpot.

Absolute Poker is the only online poker site open to U.S. players to feature Bad Beat Jackpot tables. Full details on the latest addition to Absolute Poker’s suite of poker games can be found at www.absolutepoker.com/badbeatpoker/.

Sunday, June 24, 2007

Online Poker Room - Absolute Poker - launches a Bad Beat Jackpot, adding a new spin to their Texas Hold'em poker game.

Miami, June 24 2007.- Absolute Poker today announced the launch of Bad Beat Jackpot - a new spin on Texas Hold'em that lets players walk away with a hefty profit after hitting a 'bad beat' at the online poker tables.

"We're taking away the pain delivered by bad beats by throwing money at their victims," stated David Clainer, senior vice president for Absolute Poker. "Who knew losing big could feel so good?"

In poker, the term 'bad beat' refers to losing a hand that is clearly favored to win. But at the Bad Beat Jackpot tables, losing a seemingly unbeatable hand just got more lucrative.

Now, when seated at a Bad Beat Jackpot table, if a player loses a hand holding four twos (2222) or anything better, they'll win a piece of the Bad Beat Jackpot.

To kick off the new online poker game, Absolute Poker is putting $100,000 into the jackpot. To help it build, $0.50 will be collected from qualifying hands at Bad Beat Jackpot tables. The jackpot will keep growing until someone hits a qualifying bad beat, at which time a large percentage of it will be distributed among the bad beat victim and the players at the online poker table where the bad beat occurred (a small fraction of the jackpot will remain in the pot and another minuscule piece of it will be dedicated to administration costs).

Bad Beat Jackpot tables will be noted with the word "jackpot" written in brackets after the table name and will be categorized in red text. Complete details on Absolute Poker's Bad Beat Jackpot.

Visit Absolute Poker for more information.

Friday, June 22, 2007

Winning By Not Playing

As a joke I started a new strategy in online poker. And to my surprise, it is working. What I do is not play. By not playing I get more chips.

Specifically, I enter single table tournaments then mark the "away next hand" box. I sit there and get blinded out, but otherwise I lose nothing. Well, I gain nothing as well. But surprisingly, I end up winning more chips on average than I pay in buy-ins.

So what makes this happen? At first I jokingly came up with the idea that If I did not play, and play badly so as to lose chips, I would have more chips if I just came to the table late. One way to achieve this online is to start the tourney, then walk away. In fact right now I am (not) playing in a STT while I type this message. The game runs in the background. I saw my hand get dealt AQ, so I quickly hit the "I am back" button and went on to win 4,000 in chips in one hand. Then I left the table again.

There is no way to win first place using this strategy, unless I actually play in the game. But it seems I almost always make it to the money. STT's pay the top three and since I have essentially no time invested in this any win is a good win. On the abandoned game I am playing right now I am the chip leader of five payers based on the one hand I won. With the big blind at $30, my $4,320 in chips will not be blinded out anytime soon.

I have foudn that once it gets to two or thress players, I am in the money and can then go on to actually play and often win if I want. Since I have already made my goal of being in the money I can play very agressive against tight players who think they were there to win. I'm just there to get in the bubble.

So why does this work? A friend suggested that maybe online players are just bad poker players. I don't think so. I think online players are agressive. Too agressive for their own good. So an ultra passive player will tend to beat the average online player. How much more passive can you get than "away from the table"?

Thursday, June 21, 2007

Caesars Galdiator Games

At Caesars Atlantic City, their poker tournaments are called Gladiator Games. They have a points system for the tournaments that will award a free entry in the WSOP Circuit event to be held at Caesars. You earn one point for entering a tournament, then you get another point for every position they pay out in the tournament.

For instance with a 40 person tournament and paying out five people, if you get 1st place you get 6 points. I don't have all of the details, but they schedule a free roll tournament for the top points people, maybe inviting 100 people of which 60 might show up. It might require you have 16 or 17 points to get into the freeroll. Then they "payout" the top finishers with vouchers for entry into the local WSOP Circuit event.

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Northern Virginia's Top Poker Winner Announced

For the NOVA Poker Group's spring 2007 quarter, Robert Costner has emerged as the player to win the most tournaments. This makes Robert one of the best poker players in Northern Virginia and the Washington, D.C. area. Robert has placed first in 40% of all money tournaments he has played for the quarter.

The question is often asked, is poker a game of skill or a game of chance? To repeatedly win two out of five of every multi-table tournaments played, Robert shows that it is skill, not just luck that makes a poker win. The alternative is to suggest that Robert is the luckiest poker player in Northern Virginia.

The NOVA Poker group (NPG) is a group of amateur poker players who host weekly home games. NOVA stands for Northern Virginia. Home poker tournaments without a rake, such as those held by NPG, are 100% legal in Virginia. NPG holds a tournament every Tuesday night and also holds tournaments each weekend, usually on a Friday or Saturday.

Robert Costner is an Arlington, Virginia resident who plays in or runs about 500 Texas Hold'em poker tournaments per year. Robert has won in bar games, home games, internet tournaments, and casino tournaments. He can be found playing at casinos such as Showboat and Harrah's in Atlantic City, as well as various bars and restaurants in the local northern Virginia area.

For more information, contact Jim Slade at (703) 531-1995.