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$50 million deal Caesars Entertainment and VICI Properties announced on Wednesday that they have agreed to sell Harrah’s Reno Hotel and Casino an unnamed affiliate of CAI Investments. The sale price is $50 million, with 75 percent going to VICI Properties and 25 percent going to Caesars. Once the transaction is complete, Harrah’s Reno will… Read more »
Two more iconic properties sold MGM Resorts International announced on Tuesday that it has agreed to sell both the MGM Grand Las Vegas casino and the Mandalay Bay. The total value of the deal is approximately $4.6 billion. The sale of MGM Grand is the most heavily-covered part of the deal in MGM’s press release.… Read more »
In a surprising move that has become all too rare in recent years, the Sahara Las Vegas casino announced that it will re-open its poker room. The proclamation came last week via Twitter, a couple days after New Year’s. Tiny, but welcome As can be seen in the tweet, the new Sahara poker room will… Read more »
Card room can’t handle rush on cashier California Attorney General Xavier Becerra issued an emergency shutdown order of the Magnolia House Casino for not having enough money to cover cash outs. Located in Rancho Cordova, just outside Sacramento, the Magnolia House has kept its restaurant open in the meantime. In a press release on Monday,… Read more »
Happy New Year, everybody! If you’re like me, you don’t make New Year’s resolutions. Instead, you enroll at Orangetheory Fitness and then “don’t have time” or “forget” or “aren’t feeling well enough” to go by January 17th. And I am sure glad I didn’t make any resolutions, as one of them would have been, “Write… Read more »
As the decade comes to an end, on era in New Hampshire has just been born. On Monday, legal sports betting went live in the Granite State. Governor Chris Sununu was the first to place a wager, using the DraftKings mobile app. Naturally, considering his constituency, he bet $82 on the New England Patriots to… Read more »
I am a terrible sports bettor. I’ve probably mentioned that before. Fortunately, I live in a state in which there is no sports betting available and I haven’t felt the desire to jump through the hoops required to bet with an offshore book. Thus, I can safely say that I did not contribute to the… Read more »
In the Final Fight and Street Fighter II video games, there is a bonus stage during which you beat up a car. I would imagine this would be great fun in real life, even more so if you inexplicably turned into a panther afterward like at the end of Michael Jackson’s “Black or White” video.… Read more »
Three more poker pros have taken up Phil Galfond on his ultra-high stakes heads-up challenge. Prepared to win or lose a lot of money are “Venividi1993,” whose real name is unknown (to us, at least), Dan “Jungleman” Cates, and Brandon Adams. Though two challengers were previously announced, the three named above only brings the total… Read more »
Former poker pro and founder of the online poker site RunItOnce.eu (RIO), Phil Galfond, has confirmed two opponents for his heads-up challenge. The first is Bill Perkins, while the second is poker pro and coach, Fernando “JNandez87” Habegger. Galfond issued the challenge via the RIO blog last month. He split it into two variations. The… Read more »
Simple scheme didn’t last long 32-year old ex-casino dealer Ming Zhang was sentenced to 18 months in prison last week for leading a cheating scheme that bilked Maryland’s MGM National Harbor out of more than $1 million. He was also hit with three months supervised release after he completes his prison term. Zhang was a… Read more »
Back to its roots The Dusk Till Dawn poker club is one of the UK’s premier poker venues and soon, it will be a poker-only venue. Last week, Dusk Till Dawn owner Rob Yong announced via Twitter that he is removing all casino games and making the club 100 percent poker. In his tweet, Yong… Read more »
The National Football League announced on Friday that Arizona Cardinals cornerback Josh Shaw has been suspended indefinitely for betting on NFL games. The suspension will go through at least next season. On Monday, ESPN reported that not only had Shaw bet on NFL games, but he actually bet on his own team’s games, as well.… Read more »
MGM wants to get lighter MGM continues to look to shed properties, as Bloomberg is reporting that MGM Resorts International and MGM Growth Properties LLC, a real estate investment trust spinoff, are looking for an investor to buy the MGM Grand and Mandalay Bay. Bloomberg’s sources provided little detail and MGM Growth Properties did not… Read more »
The legal, regulated sports betting industry in New Jersey has been great for Atlantic City casinos and the state, but Atlantic City Mayor Marty Small, Sr. is not satisfied. His city does not receive direct tax dollars from sports betting and he wants that to change. The Press of Atlantic City reported on Tuesday that… Read more »
You know the joke about “Florida Man?” Well, if there was ever a Florida Man, 21-year-old Michael Psilakis is that person, because he is perhaps the dumbest shit ever to (allegedly) commit a murder. Psilakis was arrested on November 2nd by Pasco County Sheriff’s deputies and charged with first-degree murder for allegedly killing a man… Read more »
Poker Hall of Famer Bobby Baldwin was named Chief Executive Officer of Drew Las Vegas, a new casino that is currently under construction on the Las Vegas Strip. At the same time, he was also named Vice Chairman of Witkoff, the real estate firm that is developing the property. A long history for a casino… Read more »
When I was sixteen-years old, shortly after I got my driver’s license, I had a bizarre minor accident. I was pulling into a parking space at a strip mall to get my haircut when suddenly, my car sped up, jumped the curb, and hit the shopping center’s façade. To this day, I don’t know what… Read more »
Despite making a living in the gambling industry for nearly a decade and a half, I am not much of a gambler. I covered the World Series of Poker in person for a couple years and rarely actually played poker. I played some video poker on occasion when I took a break and would go… Read more »
The Major League Baseball World Series starts tonight, with the Houston Astros as the favorites against the Washington Nationals. On Sunday, the line for the Series at the Caesars sportsbook opened with Houston at -235 to win it all, making the Astros the biggest favorite at the outset of the World Series since the Boston… Read more »
MGM Resorts International announced on Tuesday that it has sold two of its Las Vegas Strip casinos: Circus Circus and Bellagio. The combined sales price of the two properties is $5.075 billion. Circus Circus The agreement to sell Circus Circus, one of the mainstays of the north end of the Strip, was rumored to have… Read more »
Interneting is a skill. When trying to find specific information or a helpful resource, you have to know how to phrase your query text. No matter how great we are at the Google box, though, once in a while we get an odd search result. That said, I don’t think I have ever ended up… Read more »
Two Caesars casinos in Iowa have run afoul of state regulators. Last week, the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission handed out fines to both Harrah’s Council Bluffs and Horseshoe Council Bluffs for failing to stop two people who were underage from gambling. The casinos were assessed fines totaling $50,000. Almost old enough, but not quite… Read more »
It can be fun to own a part of history. I, for instance, own a couple seats from Milwaukee County Stadium, the former home of the Milwaukee Brewers. Now, not much history was made in that stadium, but I spent many a day in my childhood there, so they mean something to me. My wife… Read more »
When I was in middle school, my family went on a random road trip to South Dakota. Not exactly the kind of trip that makes a kid scream, “VACATION!” but it was actually pretty cool. Mount Rushmore, the Badlands, Wall Drug, a quick jaunt to Devil’s Tower in Wyoming, and Deadwood. Deadwood was an old,… Read more »
