Tag: poker

To Tip Or Not To Tip…The Dealer

Nick Momrik36 Comments

Ever played poker in a casino? Do you tip the dealer after a winning hand? Do you do it every time?

For some reason poker etiquette expects you to. I don’t play in a casino very often, but when I do, I’m there to have fun and to make money. As if it’s not hard enough to overcome the rake (casino’s cut of each pot), I’m also expected to overcome dealer tips. Might as well play the slots!

I give a waitress tips because she is taking my order, getting me food, and cleaning up after me. Her job is to serve me in the restaurant. Waitress’s don’t get a decent wage, because tips are the norm. Dealers get paid wages and from the little bit that I’ve heard, it’s pretty decent money. I could be totally wrong on that though. A dealer’s job is to deal the cards and count chips. Something that I (or anyone else at the table) could easily do. Why again do I need to tip this person? No one tips me at work when I fix their computer. I know it’s my job, but it’s hardly a job that anyone at the University can perform.

If we are supposed to tip the dealer, why only on hands that we win? It’s not like the dealer had any influence on our cards. If we are tipping them for “service,” they are providing the same level of service on hands that we win and hands that we lose. The only difference is that we are satisfied with this “service” when we win, but not when we lose.

I’m heading to the casino on Saturday night. I think I might see how much I can win, without tipping the dealer on every pot that I pull in.

Note

For some reason every 5 years or more this post gets shared around to a bunch of angry dealers who fail to read the entire discussion or fail to see by the date that this post was published in 2004! I had to close comments years ago because it gets out of control. Here’s a comment I left in 2009…

For the record, I’ve always tipped when playing poker in a casino unless I forgot to on a hand, which happens to everyone. The only time I’ve ever not given a tip on purpose is if the pot was too small.

Lack Of Posts

Nick Momrik8 Comments

I know I haven’t been posting much lately, but I haven’t felt the creativity or had any big inspirations. I’ve been busy cleaning the house, biking, hanging out with friends, golfing, and of course working. Today I had my oil changed and found out that I need new front tires. This weekend I’m heading up to Rogers City for the long weekend (we have the 5th off). The big plans are to go up to the casino in St. Ignace to play some poker, celebrate Jere’s new job, eat some of Dad’s deep-fried turkey, go biking, and check out the poker table Isaac is building so that I can give him specs on what I want mine like. I’m looking forward to the visit home because it’s been quite some time since my last journey north.

I’d like to have some suggestions on topics to write about. I like doing posts that fall into the Thoughts category, so I’d like your (Yes, all 5 of you!) help. What would you like to read? Maybe my thoughts on space exploration, recycling, fashion… It’s up in the air. Let’s get those creative juices flooding.

UB Deposit Bonus

Aside Nick Momrik3 Comments

Want to play poker online? Try UB! Use my screenname (mtdewvirus) in the referred by field when creating your account and receive a 50% bonus on your first deposit through the Refer-A-Friend program. Much better than the 20% bonus you would normally receive.

Playing Poker With Phil Hellmuth

Nick Momrik4 Comments
Playing Poker With Phil Hellmuth

Yes, that’s me at a .25/.50 cent table (Limit Texas Hold’em) with professional poker player Phil Hellmuth on UltimateBet. It was pretty sweet! I even took his ass on one hand so now I can say I went up against one of the best poker players in the world and beat him. I had aces the hole and he had tens. I raised pre-flop, he re-raised, and I capped it at four bets. There were two other players in the pot so it ended up being over $9 when the cards were turned over, which is pretty good at that limit. An interesting thing that I learned is that Phil has a contract with UB and has to play 40 hours a month, except during May when the WSOP is going on.

Overall it was a losing night of poker because I was paying too much attention to the conversations at the Phil table. Oh well…you win some, you lose some. How many other people can say they’ve played against a World Champion in something?

UB Fish

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I’m trying to play poker more often on UB again, especially after someone used my username during signup and I got $100 in bonus money. There had been a stretch where I hadn’t played for a few weeks and it just didn’t feel right. Over the past few days I’ve gone back to playing the .25/.50 6-seated tables. I seem to do a lot better (as far as winning $) at the 6, rather than the 10-seat tables and have come to a conclusion. It’s because I can make more “moves” at these tables and don’t have to worry about 3 fish calling me to the river with garbage hands, catching their miracle card on the river. As far as online poker goes, it’s also a much better game. The 10-seat tables attract most of the fish if you ask me and it’s hard to play against too many at once.

After winning $5 in about 30-40 minutes last night, I decided to throw around some play chips playing heads-up. I jumped onto the highest no-limit table offered and waited for someone to sit across from me. I proceeded to bankrupt the poor bastard in 4 minutes…took over 225,000 chips from him. I waited for another opponent and ended up taking him for more. Took about 280,000 in 5 minutes! My play chip bankroll now stands at over 1.25 million! :mrgreen: I’ve been playing on UB for over 8 months now and have only rebought play chips once the entire time…the very first day I played. My game has come a long way since that day, but as everything, it’s a work in progress.