Jena Delk’s Blog

Club 52 - poker room in Melbourne Greyhound Park in Melbourne, FL.

Last night I played poker for four hours while Michael played golf. It was my first time out to play poker in Florida since the buy in limits were raised from a max buy in of $100.I went to Club 52 because of its proximity to Baytree, where Michael was golfing.  Club 52 is never my first choice for play in Florida, but it is my closest room, so it is sometimes selected out of convenience.

Club 52 fell out of favor for me in 2008.  The tournament director and/or management made a decision which would cause me not to return for more than a year.  Club 52 had advertised for several months that it would be holding a tournament which was guaranteeing a $10k entry into the 2008 WSOP Main Event.  I don’t recall the exact buy in amount for this tournament, but it was in the neighborhood of $150-200.  The day of the event came and the players were all seated and cards were put in the air.  The players were getting excited because there were not enough players to cover the guarantee amount, which meant Club 52 would have to kick in some of its own money to award the prize.

My table was on its second hand when the announcement was made that the tournament will be a re-buy  (Misnomer- actually it would be a re-entry) tournament. If you were knocked out, a player could return to the cage and purchase another entry to the event, thus paying the juice again.   Several players began to strongly object for various reason.  A lady at my table had traveled three hours to play this event with her husband and did not want to return home without playing.  Another gentleman did not play re buy events because those “wild young people” have no regard for money.  A multitude of people protested they did not bring extra cash with them or simply could not afford another buy in, thus putting them at a strong disadvantage to those with money in their pockets.  And a good many others do not like to play this type of event.

I complained and tried to convince the management to reverse their decision in the best interest of all the players.  My efforts were in vain.  In the end, I was refunded my entry fee as were a few others.