No Walk In The Parx

What will eventually be the largest poker room in PA, or so I am told, opened this week on a soft system, with only a portion of the area set aside operational. It's also disturbingly close -- less than 30 minutes -- from my house. So my top home player and fellow degenerate and I took a drive over tonight. Here's the lowdown for the folks in my area, as well as those of you who just enjoy the poker diaries...

Parx is the converted Philadelphia Park, an old-time horse racing area (home of Smarty Jones, for those who care, and if you do, you are definitely reading the wrong blog) that's outside of Northeast Philly. I know the area from my teens and 20s, as the Shooter Mom used to work at the track and later at a local Italian place, and when I wanted the car for the night, I would drop her off and drive out. It's a place where whites fled to after the city got crunchy, and which has since gone downhill as outlet malls and sprawl combined to drop things back. The story of Philadelphia for the past 200 years has been the people with money moving north and east; Parx is merely going to accelerate the downturn of this particular area. Such is the way of casinos.

The locals also know the place to be the home of some scandal, as a half dozen or more people have left their kids in cars in the outside parking lot while they went and got their gamble on. Charming, no? But as I said before, it's close and it's poker, so...

The main casino is fairly nice, as these things go; much more of a true Vegas feel than the squalid AC joints, and while it smells a little more high roller than you'd like, part of that was probably the clear problem of being there on a packed Saturday night. After walking the place for 10 minutes and discovering that the poker room was in an entirely different building, we headed out.

Our plan was to head over late in the evening, knowing that the place was going to be a madhouse, and hoping to avoid the big wait by going off prime time. No such luck. We walked into an upscale orange area with the feel, honestly, of a gay bar -- lots of dudes, dispirited, not a lot of foot traffic, all looking fairly furtive -- we headed up the escalators of a multi-story barn that used to be all about the racetrack to find ourselves on the outside of 80 (!) players waiting for a 1/2 no limit game. And since the main casino is a quarter mile away with a cold walk outside for your trouble, feeding some slots or trying anything else to pass the time had even less appeal than usual.

The trouble is that no more than 30% of the tables can be for poker by bizarre state law, so despite the fact that the place has tons of room and no shortage of players, you still have to wait for a space. It's asinine. So is the lack of tournaments, the lack of food or beverage service for anything but rudimentary bar food, the lack of slots or any casino action in the same building while you wait... sheesh.

To keep the wait down, my guy and I took spots in the $4/$8 limit game, and got into that after only 90+ minutes of thumb twiddling. As is the usual in limit games, that was a peculiar bastardization of poker where hands go to the river for any kind of draw; we were there for 20 minutes, or long enough for me to take down a $50 pot for a pair of tens on a crap board, and for my friend to get paid as well as I was claiming our spots in the $1/$2 game. I get seated next to a big stack that's shoving away on things, so I commence to patience... and watch as he calls down aces, all-in, pre-flop, with 6-7 off suit and hits two pair for the win. Good grief. Well, it's not like there isn't money to be made, I guess, or that the general thought that fish come to new rooms isn't a true one.

I'm a little card dead to start, and I make good folds when I'm not -- stuff like Ace-5 against raises where the cards showed my lack of kicker would have cost dearly. Only one hand that I fold (8-3 off in the small, fearing a re-raise from the maniac and not wanting to lose my good Super Tight image for later), hits, and even that hand doesn't bother me that much, seeing how the pot never achieves critical mass. Finally, I catch a hand -- 8-9 diamonds -- and call the maniac's usual raise to see a flop. I catch middle pair with an Ace-8-3 flop, the 8 and the 3 being spades, with the flush draw not showing up for me, but spades. I bet the middle pair on a semi-bluff for the pot, and get called by the maniac. The rest of the table folds.

The turn fills the flush draw with something low. I raise $10 over the past bet, continuing to tell the story that I hit the flush and am now looking to prime the pump. Instant call from the maniac. Crap. The river gives me a 9 for two pair, with the flush story still live. I up the raise for another ten for another instant call, and take down a very nice pot against Maniac's Ace and nothing else. River luck, and it's as if I've farted in the guy's face. He's violently throwing money into the pot on the next hand, and I call with Ace-Deuce diamonds; the flop misses me and I let it go. Mr. Petulance continues to overbet pots for the next five hands on his seeming rage, and I don't have cards to call it down. Oh well. Patience. Patience.

I get a pair of kings in the big blind, and no callers except the maniac. Looking at less than $5 in the pot and knowing that he'll call anything, I pop it $15 and get the call I'm looking for. The flop is a bit of a disaster -- 3 rainbow connectors, middle cards -- especially since we've seen this guy play any two. I continue the bet for $40, and can't say I'm surprised by the call. The turn adds to the straight draw, and the river completes it. The maniac shoves for $85, and faced with the prospect of risking half my stack for a chop, I let it go. Probably a mistake, but I've just seen my top two pre-flop hand get completely counterfeited by the board; it's not a good moment for me. And I'm starting to develop that magic moment of hating a fellow player, and when that happens, bad things befall my chip stack.

An hour and much tap-dancing around the board, I've got 85% of what I buy in for, and my last pair of the night in the big blind. Appearing to not even look at the cards, the maniac pops it to $17, and gets two callers. Knowing this guy will bet anything, and that my tight image will see a big raise push the others off the board, I pop it to $65, and get heads up with the maniac. The flop is three middling cards, all of them diamonds. I don't have one, but I don't see him having one, either. I shove it all in.

I know I'm ahead in the hand. He turns over ace-rag... and the ace is a diamond. So of course the turn fills his flush, and to add insult to injury on the drawing dead river, a 7 for trips. And just like that, boom, gone.

It's a nice room. The cards are good, the chips are new and not filthy, the seats are comfortable, there's lots of room to move -- unlike, say, Chester -- and the location can't be beat. I'm sure I'll be back. And hopefully, next to someone who isn't a lucky maniac who doesn't pay attention when the tight player shoves. I'd really like to not come home from this place fuming for a couple of hours every time out, really...