I decided to partake in the Cabin Fever promotion at Greektown Casino in downtown Detroit. The promotion allows players to collect tickets for hours played in the room and then use them for a drawing on any Tuesday until March 19. The drawings start at 11 a.m. and run until midnight, so I showed up after lunch with 14 tickets from my Wednesday session. Mondays, Wednesdays and Sundays are special days because any hours booked are good for double tickets.
The drawings are for $100 every hour, and you must be present and at a table or on a waiting list to claim the prize. If you’re not there, the prize pool rolls over to the next hour. I sat at noon and missed winning the first drawing. But good news: No one claims the prize. I splashed around the $1-$2 no-limit hold’em game, doing my usual routine of betting too often and folding to raises. I lost a big pot to a set of threes and just like that was down a buy-in.
I didn’t win the next two drawings, either. Then my aces got cracked by an open-ended straight draw, and by 3 p.m. the drawing was worth $400, just enough to get me even. The floor announced, “The drum is now closed.” She dug into the mess of tickets, squinted at the name on the ticket and, once again, it wasn’t me. Oh well, maybe next Tuesday.
— Frank Panama and Gambit Gras are Ante Up’s Michigan Ambassadors. They host the Michigan Poker Monster weekly podcast at mipokermonster.com. You can email them at anteupmichigan@gmail.com.
