As previously mentioned, Texas is scheduled to join one of the big multi-state lotteries, in hopes of luring more Texans into plonking down cash for that worst of all longshot bets, lottery tickets.

There's an awesome quote from Weston Ware (referring to multi-state lotteries vs. slot machines, etc.):

"Compared to what was being talked about, Powerball or Mega Millions is more like the flu than it is like pneumonia," said Ware, legislative consultant for Texans Against Gambling. "But I think the people are finally waking up to the fact that the lottery is a bad bet. That's why you're seeing these ticket sales keep going down."

Link

How bad a bet is the lottery? It's not always clear. Here are some basic facts on your odds of winning the jackpot (all balls) in each of these games:

Texas Lotto: 1 in 48 million (used to be 1 in 25 million)
Powerball: 1 in 120 million
Mega Millions: 1 in 135 million

As to the actual Expected Value of a lottery ticket in these games, it tends to fluctuate based on jackpot amounts, but generally, lottery E.V. is somewhere around $0.40-$0.70 per dollar spent.

Although I strongly recommend against buying lottery tickets because of the terrible E.V., a lot of people do it because the marginal utility of one dollar is arguably small, especially compared to the marginal utility of winning retirement cash. The problem is that most lotto players don't just play one dollar, once; everyone knows people who may have started buying one or two tickets every now and then, who now buy their weekly ticket - or tickets - religiously. It starts to add up, which when dealing with such negative E.V. bets is something you really should avoid :)

I've heard of some state lotteries approaching positive (pre-tax) E.V. when their jackpots get very high, but never a situation where a lottery has positive E.V. There is a pretty good discussion of lottery E.V. in this paper by a Princeton professor.

The season finale of Lucky is on this week, Tuesday 10 Eastern on FX. Preview

The show has grown on me over the season; I can't say I'm a mad fan but it's definitely gotten a lot better. The poker scenes are fairly unrealistic, but it adequately fills its role as the only gambling sitcom/drama on TV.

The Dutch government took 80 international gambling websites to court, charging that they were not licensed to operate in Holland and therefore needed to block Dutch citizens from their sites or risk huge fines.

Some 62 betting agencies based all over the world caved in to the request. They agreed to block Dutch residents from gaining access to their websites.

Those that did not comply face fines of Euro10,000 (AUD$17,400) a day. Getting these guys to pay may be difficult but it was a victory because 62 raiders have logged out.

Link

I say good show to the Dutch government. The Dutch do allow online gambling operators in their own country; enforcing this ban on international operators allows them to effectively regulate, manage and tax their own industry.

While I'm in support of free trade, I also think a model like the Dutch one could provide a framework for legalizing and regulating online gambling in the US.

It's preferable to billions of dollars being sent offshore every year illegally, and it's preferable to US citizens not being allowed to gamble because their credit card companies won't fulfill the transactions.

It also requires highly prominent US legislators to back a plan to legalize the demon that is online gambling. Which seems highly unlikely to happen in the next few years, unless Wacko Traficant gets released from prison and elected to Congress.

Of all my claims to fame in my local poker game, the time I caught a cheater is probably my most well-known.

I hate cheating in any game, but especially in games involving money. It is a thoroughly indefensible, despicable activity.

In this case, it was my regular $1-$2 pot limit game a few years ago in town. There was a player in the game who is a cheater.

One week, at around 4am, he was dealing. At the end of the hand, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him pick up two cards from his lap and throw them back with the rest of the cards as he shuffled. I was shocked, so shocked that I wasn't 100% sure I had seen what I thought I had seen. I didn't say anything.

I kept a more observant eye on him for the rest of the night. I didn't see him deal any more cards into his lap, but one hand I was sure I saw him peek at the top cards of the deck when he was dealing, before the flop was dealt. But as soon as I looked over, he moved his hand, and again I wasn't 100% sure of what I had seen.

The game was over shortly after that, and I hadn't caught him but was pretty certain he was cheating. I remained around after the game and told the host what I had seen. We agreed that we wouldn't bar him, since I wasn't totally sure and had no proof, but would keep a closer eye on him.

The next week, he came again and I was keeping hawk eyes on him. I didn't see any cheating until late in the night. I first noticed it around 3am when he was dealing five-card stud hi-lo. I saw him deal himself a card from the bottom of the deck that made his heart flush, and won him about $25.

I knew for sure now he was cheating, but this is not an accusation one makes lightly, and hopefully not without proof. I wanted to catch him with cards in his lap, evidence that would be irrefutable.

A couple times, I saw him peek at the top cards of the deck again. It seemed amazing to me that nobody else had noticed this, but it was 4am or so by this point and he was good at doing it when the action was on the other side of the table and attention was diverted from himself. I still didn't speak up, though; I really wanted a lock on him before I said anything.

Sure enough, a few hands later he was dealing again and I noticed him deal a card into his lap. Then as soon as the hand started, he peeked at the top cards of the deck as well!

I jumped out of my chair, and yelled "what the heck are you doing?!"

He moved his hand, and said "what are you talking about?", feigning surprise.

I said "you were just looking at the top cards of the deck!!"

Everyone looked surprised, including the cheater; he protested his innocence, and a few of the people at the table even said that they hadn't seen him do anything. Luckily, I had the smoking gun.

"Well, even if you weren't looking at the cards -- which you were -- you have two cards in your lap that you dealt yourself!"

"What are you talking about?" the cheat said, while he threw the two cards on the ground!

"You just threw the cards out of your lap, and onto the floor!"

The cheater looked down, surprised. "Oh -- these cards? They must have fallen out when I dealt! It was an accident!"

What nerve! At this point, I was extremely angry. People who know me know that I very rarely get angry.

"You're CHEATING. I saw you do it last week and now you're doing it again. Everyone knows it."

The host stepped in, and asked what we should do. The cheater maintained his innocence, pretending to be really upset about the allegations, and said he was going to leave the game. The host said that was a good idea.

After he left, everyone agreed that he had, in fact, been cheating. We decided that we would bar him from the game, no matter what he said.

I was pensive. I had found him with cards in his lap, but he still maintained his innocence and could craft a story to possibly cause a big blowup in our poker group, at least among the players who weren't there. At this point in the night, there were about six of us remaining and our group had 20-30 people who played in the game. I didn't want to see controversy; I just wanted the guy to stop playing with us and never come back. We ended the game there, exhausted and anxious about what he would do next.

I went home and sure enough, there was an e-mail from the cheater in my inbox. It was sent to the whole poker list, which had about 200 people from our company on it. I opened it, expecting accusations towards me and an elaborate cover story.

Instead, I was shocked to read these two opening sentences: "Tonight at the poker game, somebody accused me of cheating. He was right." followed by an admission of guilt. He made no excuses, but he did try to justify his cheating somewhat by pointing out that even though he was cheating, he had not made money from his cheating.

This is amazing but true -- he may have been a cheater, but he was a horrible cheater and an equally horrible poker player. Even when he was cheating he wasn't doing it smart enough to actually make real money. It is sort of poetic justice, although it didn't make his transgression any better. He volunteered to stop playing, and I never heard from him again. I saw him at work a few times and didn't say anything to him.

So that was my story of catching a cheater. It's the only time I've seen a cheater in a poker game, and I hope it's my last. It gave me one hell of a poker story though.

Have you ever caught a cheater in a poker game? I'd like to hear from you if you have.

Max Drayman has written a nice article, pointing out some good gambling-related sites that I hadn't seen before, including PokerTop10.com which is a pretty good site. Article

There's an interesting little set of updates from last week's Global Interactive Gaming Summit in Montreal. It's basically a gathering of online gambling peddlers, but there were some interesting tidbits like NETeller (an online paypal-like service that is used heavily by online gamblers) has recently increased their weekly deposit limits (I'm guessing this is related to the recent moves by US credit card companies to stop payments to online casinos), and also Mah Jongg for money online is coming soon.

I wonder if they'll play with the rules for the hand called "Unique Wonders" or something like that. It's the hardest hand to get in Mah Jongg (think royal flush in 5-card draw, only significantly harder). In the rules I used to play by, if anybody got this hand they instantly won the entire pot, as well as everything that every player had in their wallets! Talk about an aiya and a half.

Link

A couple poker movies showed at the CineVegas film festival last week. Shade is an interesting-sounding film, directed by a real-life card mechanic, and starring Sylvester Stallone as a poker hustler/cheat.

Shade is set in the world of poker hustlers working the clubs and martini bars of Los Angeles. The tale unfolds as a group of hustlers encounter "The Dean" and pull off a successful sting that results in their pursuit by a vengeful gangster.

It premiered last week at the festival, and got a fairly good reception. But Sly ain't exactly big-box-office material anymore; it sounds like it'll be coming soon to a video store near you, but I can't tell you when.

Stuey is the long-awaited (by me) biopic of Stu Ungar, without a doubt the greatest no-limit hold'em player of all time. It's also gotten very decent writeups, although they frequently mention the depressing side of the film, so it may concentrate more on Ungar's personal struggles than his amazing poker accomplishments.

One of my favorite Card Player articles was Mike Sexton's 2-part tribute to Stu Ungar. I can still remember reading Part 1 in the Bellagio poker room and being called for my seat in the 8-16 game, but being too engrossed to get up and take it. Part 1 Part 2

Update: wsop.dk has a great page of links to tributes to Stu Ungar. Also, the home page for Stuey is here; plenty of reviews and press, no details on distribution yet.

Antigua and Barbuda is taking on the US in the World Trade Organization, claiming that the US ban on online gambling violates WTO rules on services.

Washington says US law prohibits cross-border gambling "because of the social, psychological dangers and law enforcement problems that they create" and the "financial and social risks posed by such activities to its citizens, particularly but not exclusively children".

Link

Good luck to them. I can't imagine any scenario in which the US would lift any prohibition on cross-border gambling based on the objections of Antigua and Barbuda. This is a country where it's illegal to make most bets with your friends, let alone companies in other countries. And that's unlikely to change anytime soon.

Obviously, I'm in favor of living in an environment where gambling is not prohibited, but reasonable safeguards are in place so that kids under the age of 18 aren't becoming compulsive gamblers. As for me, I don't need the government to protect me from perceived "undesirable activities" - gambling or otherwise - that are consensual activities between two adult parties.

Did you manage to catch the WPT final on the Travel Channel today? I did, even if it was late night on Tivo after coming home from work.

I could watch poker if my hair was on fire, but this episode was a little anti-climactic. The play down to the final two players was really pedestrian compared to most TV poker I've watched. All of the earlier episodes of the WPT I've seen were better in terms of multi-way action.

When it got down to two, Alan Goehring and Kirill Gerasimov, Kirill switched up the heat and Alan became, in my opinion, overly tight, leading to Kirill snatching up a 2-1 chip advantage when Alan had been the chip leader all tournament.

One of my favorite hands was when Alan super-slow-played pocket Kings against Kirill's A4. The board went 77J-7-7, giving Kirill the win and Alan a serious lesson in the dangers of overly slow play.

Most questionable hand, in my opinion: Alan has K7o. Limps in for $25k. Kirill has 76o, calls. Flop comes AT8, two spades, giving Kirill an inside straight draw. Kirill checks. Alan bets $50k. Kirill smooth-calls. Turn is another 8. Kirill bets $150k. Alan calls. River is a 4s, making 3 spades on the board. Kirill moves all in and Alan folds. I just really don't understand Alan's call on the turn, after betting out on the flop. I'd expect to see a fold, or a big raise. Kirill had not been checking much, so Alan had to expect a big bet on the end. If he's looking for a K, he's getting terrible odds. If he really thinks Kirill is on a spade draw, he should either fold or move in on the turn. I can't think of any way to justify his call on the turn. I also think his bet on the flop is a little too small for what he's playing.

But these guys are clearly not great heads-up players. Kirill, while clearly a solid player, only learned the game less than two years ago! Playing heads-up, they continuously had terrible reads on each other and each made several plays that even in the krazy world of heads-up play seemed pretty dodgy. The final hand was interesting odds-wise, but not play-wise: Alan's two small pair vs Kirill's top pair (8's), they get it all in, next card makes Kirill's inside straight but the river brings Alan one of the 3 outs he had to win it with a full house.

But I'll reserve any further criticism for after I win my first major :)

What about PartyPoker.com's (and UltimateBet's) television commercials, which they've been pounding over the WPT season? Am I the only person astounded by the fact that these are playing on US TV? They are soliciting for what is an unequivocally illegal activity in 90% of the markets they are advertising to. I can't think of any commercial I've ever seen for something that is so clearly illegal.

It is a good sign for poker; it shows that there is enough acceptance of it that the ads haven't caused widespread objections. Imagine the reaction an ad for "prescription-free" mail-order prescription drugs from Mexico would trigger, for example.

Nonetheless, I'd say that the Travel Channel, PartyPoker.com and Mike Sexton are opening themselves up to a civil damages suit where some kid loses his mom's life savings on the poker site, and sues the bunch of them, saying the ads made an unregulated, risky, illegal activity look like a legitimate way to make millions.

If you are considering playing online poker, I strongly recommend you do some research about the various rooms and experiences that others have had before deciding where to play. PartyPoker.com, for example, recently had some pretty atrocious customer service experiences, including mailing out checks and then e-mailing their customers to please not cash them for a few days due to "a minor delay on a bank transfer to the account in which we have issued your check"! The criticism got so hot on the newsgroup rec.gambling.poker that Mike Sexton -- host of the World Poker Tour, and an employee of PartyPoker.com -- sent a personal message to the group (here).

So if you do want to play online, as with most things in life, do some research before you jump in. Know the risks. Personally, I've played online poker in the past but decided it wasn't for me. Collusion between players is way too easy, you have very limited abilities to read players (which I consider one of my strengths), and it just wasn't nearly as fun as playing live is for me. But some people really get into it, and some people are undoubtedly making real money at it. Oh, also it's probably illegal if you live in the US, but you already knew that :)

9pm ET/8pm Central, on the Travel Channel. Watch it! Link

A recent AP article raises questions about the legality of Chris Moneymaker winning the World Series of Poker based on the fact that he gambled online to gain his entry - while living in Tennessee, where gambling is illegal.

In Moneymaker's case, it's unclear whether his $2.5 million win will be reviewed. Nevada officials said there does not appear to be any violations of state law since Moneymaker, 27, of Spring Hill, Tenn., paid the $10,000 buy-in and won the annual tournament at Binion's Horseshoe Hotel & Casino legitimately.

My take is that his means of entry into the competition (playing in an online tournament) was illegal, but that shouldn't affect the legality of his win at the WSOP. He should be prosecuted - probably fined a small amount in line with what Tennessee law says about gambling (I'd guess a class C misdemeanor or similar). Link

"Player in seat three, please stop praying, it's your action."

Of all the many mysteries about God, one of the very few things we know with certainty is that God is not sitting at your elbow at the craps table shouting, "Come on 7! Baby needs a new pair of shoes!"

In case you were wondering. Link

There's an interesting article from the NYT about road warriors' TV-watching habits. The end of the article contains this quote:

"I found myself in England one night watching people playing poker for over an hour," he said. "Really, there was nothing else on."

Link

While this may reflect this individual's attitude, I've been extremely surprised by the number of my non-poker playing friends and acquaintances who tell me they love the WPT coverage. Honestly. People who don't even know the difference between a flush and a straight are getting into it. I'm shocked, but apparently the show really is compelling to people who otherwise aren't very interested in poker. Which is great news!

There's a good article from the St. Louis Times from a few weeks back which talks about the WPT, "Lucky", and the growing acceptance of poker into the mainstream. Link

I couldn't find any actual numbers on the Nielsen ratings of the WPT, if anybody has seen these please let me know.

Only 1% of the clients of Cantor Index, a 30-year-old UK company that makes a market in "spread bets" - short-term contracts on whether stock indices, individual stocks, bonds, etc. will rise or fall - are women, but apparently they are doing quite well at it.

Jenny King, 35, from Thorpe Bay, Southend, Essex, started spread betting after being made redundant last June from the Royal Bank of Scotland where she was head of fixed income operations. She now combines day trading - where trades are not left to run into the next day - on various world indices with looking after her three children, Hannah, 6, Reece, 4, and sixmonthold Luke.

The article points out something I didn't know -- betting profits in the U.K. are tax-free! I know where I'll be relocating when I become a professional poker player.

Link

In Austin, there is a taxi company called Roy's. It is the most consistently bad cab company I have ever used. I often run across the street to avoid a Roy's cab and find an American Yellow Checker cab instead. Whenever I mention this to anyone, they usually ask why I think Roy's is so bad.

This anecdote from a friend of mine, who happened to get into a Roy's cab on Friday night, sums it up.

Roy's Driver: Yeah, I worked at American Yellow Checker for four years. I just moved over to Roy's.

Friend: Why did you switch?

Roy's Driver: I fell asleep at the wheel and crashed into a tree.

Case closed.

"You done took all the rich people and made 'em poor, and now you want to take their nickels as well as their quarters." -Louisiana State Rep. Juba Diez, D-Gonzales, referring to a bill that would allow gamblers to play nickels in video poker machines. Link

What do you do if you operate a business which straddles two states, one state where it's illegal to operate video poker machines but it's ok to pay out large jackpots from other video gambling, and another state where video poker is OK but you can't pay out more than $10? Have your customers play video poker on one side, and collect their winnings on the other, of course.

Except it didn't work. Pedroland, a company that runs an arcade on the NC/SC border, was trying to do just that and got caught with a $400,000 fine - equal to about 2 months earnings. They're still operating though. link

This method of thwarting the law sounds hokey, but it's actually similar to how Japanese pachinko parlors operate without getting busted. Gambling on pachinko is illegal in Japan; parlors will sell you a large bucket of pachinko balls, and you can redeem the balls for cheap little teddy bears. Around the corner from every Pachinko parlor is a store that buys those little teddy bears for significant amounts of money.

A paper from the University of Alberta on PsOpti, the games research group's poker playing robot, won the distinguished paper award from the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence. The article is really light on details, and I couldn't find much info on PsOpti around the web.

"A lot of the original research in games involved games with perfect information. Like in chess, you always know where the pieces are, there's nothing hidden," Schaeffer says.
"Games with imperfect information, like poker, are actually much more important in the real world than games of perfect information."

Link

What is it with Canadians and pokerbots? I've long known about the University of Alberta's poker playing robot named "Poki", which is pretty interesting and has a good amount of information on the web. Poki recently had a heads-up contest to help gather data to refine its strategies. It is not clear to me whether or not Poki is PsOpti's precursor or not.

The Borgata, the new Boyd/MGM Mirage casino in Atlantic City, is set to open doors July 3. The casino has promised to shake up the image of Atlantic City by providing a "fun, upscale, energetic, international and sensual" environment.

Certainly doesn't sound like any of the casinos presently in Atlantic City, that's for sure! Whether they come through on their promise remains to be seen, but two things are for sure: a ton of money was spent on this place, and MGM Mirage knows how to run a good casino.

The $1 billion casino, under construction for nearly three years, will be the first new one in Atlantic City in 13 years, since Trump Taj Mahal began taking bets in 1990.

Link

When I read the quote above, I thought there had to be a mistake. I distinctly recall being in the Trump World's Fair Casino the day it opened, and I remember that being sometime around mid-1996, well after the Taj had opened.

In actuality, the World's Fair actually had been around (under different names) for almost 20 years by that point. There is a good article on the history of the Trump World's Fair Casino (aka Playboy Casino, aka Atlantis Casino, aka Trump Regency) here.

In any case, it would be good to see a little more of an upscale festive destination in A.C. The place is just so darn depressing.

NYPD brought down a massive illegal numbers racket which was raking in $30m a year.

That money and numbers-tabulation site was at 3800 Independence Ave. in the Riverdale section of The Bronx, where Perez stashed more than $50,000 and more gambling records.

"Some of the managers of this operation have done well enough to send their children to Ivy League schools," said Brooklyn Executive Assistant DA Christopher Blank.

Numbers racket??! What are we living in, a 1920's gangster movie? I suppose the odds in a numbers racket can't be too much worse than the lottery, which makes tons more than thirty mil a year. Link

Decent article on the World Poker Tour, with quotes from producer Steve Lipscomb:

"It's the only sport in the universe where you can show up and participate because you want to. At every World Poker Tour event, there are players such as Phil Helmuth, Amarillo Slim, Gus Hanson, Annie Duke. All those guys are there, but you can show up and play against them," he said. "It's like sitting next to the Tiger Woods or Michael Jordan of poker, and on any day you can win."

Link

Slate Magazine's Jonathan Chait believes that Washington coach Rick Neuheisel should not have been fired for betting on an NCAA pool -- but only because he should have been fired for incompetence.

The real crime, though, is not that Neuheisel was fired. It's that he was fired in such a way as to preserve his reputation. Here is a man so richly deserving of a pink slip that his dismissal on such minor grounds leaves a sour taste. It's sort of like nabbing Al Capone for tax evasion. They got the right guy for the wrong reason.

Link

Did you miss me? Heck, I was having such a good time out there I was beginning to miss me! And despite being in a remote island paradise, I still managed to do a bunch of work and win a couple bets from friends.

Hawaii is a really beautiful place, and although it has no legalized gambling it does have an apparently robust underground cock fighting industry. One of the tour drivers was talking about cock fights and I was going to try to get him to take me to one, but somehow between the flowing tropical fruit drinks, bikini-clad women, seedy asian karaoke bars and sandy clearwater beaches I got a little sidetracked.

I'm somewhat hazy on what constitutes animal cruelty, but I am pretty sure that raising animals from babies to become vicious trained pit fighters for the purpose of enriching oneself and friends at the expense of a few animal lives is endorsed by the SPCA. Certainly I've always wanted to at least witness a cock fight in real life, if not give a $20 bill to an overweight man in a wifebeater named Sanchez and say "give me a twensky on Peckin' Mahoney."

I came across this gem from the Honolulu Star-Bulletin from several years ago: as part of the "Kids Voting" project, K-12 kids were asked to comment on a number of political issues, including the legality of cock fights! Some of the answers are surprisingly elegant, such as this contribution from 11th grader Jordan Higa (supporter of the pro-cock-fighting movement):

I do not believe an individual's mere presence at a cock fight is illegal. This stand is due to the way I view cock fights -- as a cultural tradition.

I strongly believe Hawaii should promote, rather than discourage cultural identity. My proposal is to legalize cock fighting and commercialize it to the level of professional wrestling and boxing.

The state would profit economically and culturally from this, and the sport would be more easily regulated.

Link

I'd also like to extend a special casino thanks to The Pyrate for taking over the helm and keeping this place from gathering too much dust last week. I had a number of comments from readers that his post was very enjoyable and left them wanting more from Ye Olde Swashbuckler. Look for more from him in the future.

You know, from time to time, a man wonders about some pretty random things. Is the moon made of cheese? How long can I stand on one leg for? Is Wolf Blitzer's real first name Wolfgang? Amongst other things...

Recently, I was wondering how the pyrates of old gambled away their booty. So I pointed, and clicked, and did a search for webpages containing the words "pyrate" and "gambling." Needless to say, my search was bootyless (story of my life really), but there was one very interesting hit. Here is the result:

... viagra prescription,viagra prescription,online casino, sportsbook, gambling, porn, live ... piratelynx, uncle, pirate_lynx, fakes, xxwizardxx, porno, pyrate, xxx, 0 ...

I expected this kind of thing, searching for what I did (this particular page was trying to get me to buy generic Viagra - what a great and original business idea), but one thing strikes me as odd. UNCLE.

Why amongst porn, gambling, xxx, and generic Viagra, does the word uncle appear? Is this to lure in all those websurfers who are trying to buy some Viagra to break Uncle Chester's porn addiction? I do not understand. Perhaps I am just way out of it, but the word uncle has no business being in this list. Bizarro...

I'm off to the sandy shores of Hawaii for ten days. In the meantime, please enjoy the lyrical stylings of Love and Casino War's first guest blogger, Jonno aka The Pyrate. He has graciously agreed to hold down the casino in my absence. Look forward to some swashbucklin' good times, just as I look forward to throwing down coconut cocktails served by bikini-clad islanders in one of the only two states in our union with no forms of legal gambling whatsoever.

In honor of the opening of the new Tulalip casino, this Washington paper has an article designed to "educate" gamblers before they go into the casino, but the advice is at best unhelpful. It begins with Keno, which is always a warning sign; describes roulette as a game where "the winning odds are low" and blackjack as a game where "the odds of winning are better". It says that with video slot machines "the odds of winning are low" but fails to mention video poker, which often has better odds than many table games. On craps, "more money can be won on the bets with the worst odds" and there's even a quote from a dealer saying "You never want to say 'seven' -- you'll jinx the whole table". Argh. Link

If you want to be informed before you go to a casino, I think there's only one place to go -- The Wizard of Odds. The information is very thorough and you will understand any game - and more importantly, the house edge - by the time you're through.

Rick Neuheisel, coach of the Washington Huskies, apparently participated in a college "auction" pool, which could get him fired. He claims it was just some old neighborhood buddies and "pretty harmless". I'd say that argument would hold weight if it was a $10 pool, but $5k??

Two NCAA investigators and one from the Pac-10 Conference questioned Neuheisel on Wednesday after receiving a tip that he put up $5,000 and won about $20,000 by picking Maryland in an auction-format pool on the men's basketball tournament in 2002, the newspaper reported.

He can pretty much kiss his job goodbye. Link

Court TV is airing the entire trial of Adrian McPherson, the FSU quarterback accused of betting on all of his team's games, today through Friday. Link

There's a pretty good profile on professional poker player Annie Duke at cbsnews.com. Relatively free of overused poker cliches and puns.

On her best day, Annie took home $300,000. On her worst, she lost $110,000. But all told, she makes a very nice living for the family.

Link

The New York Times has a somewhat depressing 4-page article on the current state of Dennis Rodman. Link

After an earlier disappointing encounter with NewsMonster, I recently started using a newsreader that I'm surprisingly happy with, Syndirella. Although it hasn't had a new version released for several months, it meets most of my needs and makes my news/blog reading much more efficient. I strongly suggest trying it if you're a Windows user.

One of the changes I've made to L&CW as a result is that I didn't realize my news feed only contained excerpts of my entries. So I've changed it to give RSS readers the full meaty goodness of each entry. Enjoy.

Positive EV jackpots... it's enough to bring a tear to a wise gambler's eye.

Evadne Gayle won a �290,684.52 jackpot after being dealt a royal flush at Birmingham's Grosvenor Casino.

The 50-year-old came up trumps on the Super Stud Poker game, which links all the other Grosvenor Casinos across the UK to generate an ever-increasing jackpot.

Link to the story.

Super Stud Poker is a simple game not generally played in US casinos, although it's nearly identical to Caribbean Stud, just with slightly different payouts. (Steve Brecher's excellent analysis of Caribbean Stud is here, Wizard of Odds' is here.)

In Super Stud a player is dealt 5 cards, and like Caribbean Stud is paid out if they beat the house (when the house has a minimum qualifying hand), and there is a �1 optional "jackpot" bet which pays off fixed amounts, and a progressive jackpot.

Here's my quick analysis of the jackpot bet that Gayle won on, based on this jackpot (the biggest the Grosvenor jackpot has ever gotten to):

Hand	Pays	Payout	Actual odds	E.V.
Royal Flush	100%	�290,684.52	1/649740	�0.447
Straight Flush	10%	�29,068.45	1/72193.33	�0.403
4 of a kind	�100	�100	1/4165	�0.024
Full House	�75	�75	1/694.16	�0.108
Flush	�50	�50	1/508.8	�0.098
			SUM	�1.080

So, based on a �290k jackpot, this game's bonus bet had a +8% expectation. That is quite good, although like most jackpot games most of that E.V. comes from getting a straight or royal flush. The break even point is reached when the jackpot exceeds �263,204.78. It's basically the same for most Caribbean Stud games in the US, although some casinos in the US have Caribbean Stud jackpots that reach break even at $110,542.

Due to lack of house support, the vote on the Internet Gambling Prohibition bill a.k.a. H.R. 2143 got canceled today.

House leaders pulled the bill from consideration after two Republican committee chairmen and several prominent Democrats said they would vote against it for a variety of reasons.

Link

The other bill alluded to in the article is the broader Unlawful Internet Gambling Funding Prohibition Act a.k.a. H.R. 21. Both attempt to prevent internet gambling by making it an offense for financial institutions to provide funds to gambling operations on behalf of players.

Alan Bostick writes "As I Please", which often covers poker and related subjects. I know him from somewhere a long time ago, I think either from his posts to rec.gambling.poker or perhaps playing in WRGPT. He also likes Greg Costikyan, who's one of my favorite regular reads. Link

Another plug for Mitch Hedberg, who's coming to Austin's Capitol City Comedy Club June 19-22. Link

He has some hilarious quotes, including these:

I bought a doughnut and they gave me a receipt for the doughtnut...I don't need a receipt for the doughnut - I give you money and you give me the doughnut, end of transaction. We don't need to bring ink and paper into this. I can't imagine a scenario that I would have to prove that I bought a doughnut. To some skeptical friend, Don't even act like I didn't buy a doughnut, I've got the documentation right here...

My lucky number is four billion. That doesn't come in real handy when you're gambling. "Come on, four billion! Fuck. Seven. Not even close. I need more dice."

I love blackjack. But I'm not addicted to gambling. I'm addicted to sitting in a semi-circle.

Link

Update: Hedberg was HILARIOUS. It's a close call between him and Jake Johannsen for the best standup I've seen. One of my friends who was with me said after the first three minutes of Hedberg's act he felt like he was going to vomit, he was laughing so hard. It was a great show, and if you ever have the opportunity to see him, take it!

A legal loophole has resulted in businesses in Prague running over 6,000 slot machines in the city virtually regulation-free. The deputy mayor is trying to introduce some regulation. The article does not mention what the average payout level of these rampant slots are, but I'm guessing it's low.

A 1990 law on lotteries and other games already exists that enables Prague city council to take measures governing the location and number of hernas. The problem is that so far the city has not taken advantage of this general provision by proposing specific rules. The only clear conditions that currently exist are that slot machines should not be placed near institutions like schools, churches and hospitals.

It's clear that the Prague government let this get way out of hand and has no idea of the right way to go about controlling it. Business idea: become the worldwide expert in helping local governments set up fair gambling regulatory bodies and practices. Link

I found the Button Maker and had a little fun with it. Add your poker-playing inclinations to your web page.

Limits

Games

Hong Kong is proposing legalizing soccer betting. Apparently there is a huge underground bookie network there and the government hopes to cash in by legalizing / taxing the action. Sounds like there is a lot of opposition though.

The government has said its gambling proposal would raise an estimated 1.5 billion Hong Kong dollars (US$192.3 million) a year in extra tax revenue, some of which would be donated to a fund to raise public awareness about gambling addiction.

But opponents warned in a legislative hearing Wednesday that the measure would attract youngsters to gambling on soccer - a popular sport among Hong Kong students.

Link

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