3799 Las Vegas Boulevard South Las Vegas, Nevada 89109

Poker Room: (702) 891-7434

Official MGM Grand Poker Room Website

23 Tables

Trip Report - May 2006:

Believe it or not, this was my very first time playing poker the MGM. It’s not the first time I’ve gone to the MGM with the intent to play poker. I’ve gone several times planning to play, but I never played.

Why?

First. Parking is a nightmare. No, not so much a nightmare as terror-filled waking hallucination. The parking equivalent of a bad acid trip. Sometimes I gave up and went to Luxor or Mandalay. And once you park, get out those hiking boots, because the Poker Room is on the complete opposite side of the worlds largest hotel. Half the “fun” is finding the room, as about halfway there, you begin to realize what the people on that TV show “Lost” must feel like. Only they have a better chance of getting off the Island than you do finding the Poker Room from the parking garage on the first try.

Second. Because spoiled locals like myself don’t do long ‘waiting lists’. Poker is poker, and I would rather get great cards at Boulder Station than terrible cards at the Bellagio. Three of a kind beats two pair in every, single, Poker Room on earth. Good cards pay the same no matter what room you play, and when you live in Vegas you have your pick of rooms … and you generally call ahead to the room manager and make sure you are going to get into a game when you arrive. We don’t have time to stand around. We have money to lose before rush hour starts.

So, I hate waiting lists. And unless you are extremely lucky, you are going to be on one at the MGM. Is this because the MGM poker room is crowded? Not necessarily. I waited for 50 minutes on this day, and this is what a part of the poker room looked like:

Notice the guy tilted back sleeping at a table? Well, according to the electronic waiting list, there were more than enough people to fill all of those tables with players … but you might as well sleep if you can’t play.

MGM runs the room a bit like a supermarket. You always have to stand in line. If the room is not busy, then they cut way back on dealers. If the room is busy, then you are going to wait like you would at any other busy room.. Going at off-peak times is futile, because that just means they will have 2 dealers instead of 20. You are going to wait … no matter what.

Now, the list management system is great. There are nice, large monitors behind the podium so you can always confirm that your name has, indeed, not moved from the same spot it was before you went and ate at the buffet. It sure beats having to ask a list person, but can also be a bit depressing as your railbird status sits there and stares at you in a really spectacular way. At least you are on a really, really cool looking waiting list.

I put my name on the list for every game, just to finally play the room. Nearly an hour later, they announced that they were seating 4/8 limit. I guess they sobered a dealer up, gave him the standard sobriety test, and determined that he could deal. According to the guy speaking over the microphone, “Only 4/8 limit is open at this time, and you will have a long wait for any other game”. Sounds like a hint to me. Only one extra sober dealer.

Basically, I play 4/8 or I go home. So …. 4/8 it is.

I sit down, and the first thing I notice is the racetrack. OH NO! … the dreaded racetrack. Okay, some people love them, but I despise the things with a purple passion. Goodness help you if your cards hit the racetrack and you have closely cut fingernails like I do, because you aren’t going to pick them up without accidentally flipping a card over. You need to try to do that “finger sticky sweat” maneuver to pick the cards up, because you can’t pick them up directly without long fingernails. Moral: Keep the cards on the felt. Why do some people like racetracks? I don’t know. I think it’s a form of sadomasochism, but that’s between those folks and their psychiatrists. I hate the tables.

The dealer was actually very competent and friendly. He swiped my players card, noted my seat, and made some pleasant small talk. Very professional and friendly guy. And the people who replaced him were similarly pleasant and friendly. No errors, misdeals, or confusion. Very well run games. The dealers are of definite high-end Vegas quality.

The competition? I hated it.. I played tightly, and raised pre-flop only with A-K suited, A-Q suited, and a pair of tens (the best hands I had that session). My raises were always called by a minimum of 6 players, and my hands were cracked every time. My AK was cracked by someone who made two pair on 7-2o calling my pre-flop raise. This is why I hate playing limit poker in tourist casino’s. They’ll gamble on any hand if it will only cost them $8-$24 per round of betting. And why not? They brought $1000 to play poker with, and dammit, they only come to Vegas twice a year and they are NOT going to spend the trip being patient and waiting for a hand. It’s much more exciting to play garbage and catch the turn and river than to sit back and waste precious trip hours playing cards with any modicum of rhyme or reason. Put your money in, pray you catch your cards, and if you bust, there’s always another C-note in your wallet to re-buy with.

Some of the tourists were Phil-Ivey wannabe’s with goofy gimmicks and actually looked like they were pondering whether to call, raise, or fold (which in 4/8 should take about .05 seconds to figure out). At least that was my experience.

I would call the game “loose”, but that is really an understatement. I was basically playing Bingo in a Poker Room.

Dealer: “And the next ping-pong ball out of the drum is ……… 7 of hearts.”

Player: “BINGO!!!!!! Two pair.”

Dealer: “Well come on up, show us your card, and claim your prize!”

But I digress.

I was here to play the room, not necessarily play actual poker at tourist 4/8.

The waitresses were very nice, and they were very quick with beverages. They were youngish, had short skirts with some butt-cheek-peekage, and supplied sufficient eye candy for those who care about such things.

The seats were comfortable. This is a very MODERN room. In fact, if I was going to use one word to describe it, it would be “Modern”. There is nothing old-schoolish about this room. It’ s not like Binions, it’s not like the Bellagio. It is a bit unique. It is kind of a nice, high-tech, super-touristy kind of room. The tables are spaced more than far enough apart, there is no cramping, and most of the people seemed to be tourists staying in the hotel and enjoying a good game of cards while listening to the hipster music. The room is next to a club that plays club-type music (what else?), but this actually makes the room more fun as it gives you something exciting to listen to as you wait for the next hand. It is entertaining. Seriously, the room is VERY nice, but the parking situation and seemingly endless wait for the game of my choice is just more than I will usually put up with. If I was actually staying at the hotel, I am sure it would be a complete blast to play here. With the looseness of what appear to be “money tourists” who can afford to lose, I can imagine some decent money being made. I can also imagine a lot of bad beats.

I played for one hour, then left.

Is that enough to REALLY give an accurate review of the room? No. Of course not. But it is what it is … a trip report that simply gives you my impressions of a particular game in a particular room on a particular day. I have heard other people give it much higher marks, and this may well be true. Some people have better luck with waiting lists, competition, etc, at different casinos. Some people hate the rooms I love, and some people love the rooms I hate. Such is life.

This is a very nice, very clean, very MODERN room, with extraordinarily loose games on limit. You are going to need at least as much luck as you have skill because AA in the pocket only holds up if the 6 guys who call you don’t make something out of their J-5’s or worse. I would like to go back and play some No-Limit sometime, but I don’t know if I’m willing to wait again. Oh, who am I kidding, I’ll try again at some point.

Update November 2006:

Since shedding the car and moving next to The Strip, I have played the MGM many times since the initial review. No Limit only. I’ve always had to wait a bit, but my experiences with the play has been much, much better. The players have been consistently loose in 1/2NL and a tight player could make a decent grind here. I’ve grown much more fond of it in the past few months.