Rivers Casino Pittsburgh Pa Poker Room

• Rivers Casino Pittsburgh Pa Poker Room Reopen
• Rivers Casino Pittsburgh Pa Poker Room Schedule
• Rivers Casino Pittsburgh Pa Poker Room Rules

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Poker rooms slowly started to reopen at casinos in Pennsylvania nearly seven months after the casinos and subsequently poker games were shut down in March as a result of coronavirus.

Due to the social nature of the game, poker rooms were not permitted to welcome back players when casinos started reopening in June.

Five poker rooms reopened as of mid-November with Parx, the state’s largest, set to return in December. The city of Philadelphia added restrictions included another shutdown of Rivers Casino Philadelphia until at least Jan 1, taking away another option for live poker.

One poker room continues to remain conspicuously quiet – Wind Creek Casino.

Wins and losses for Wind Creek

Wind Creek is one of the larger poker rooms in Pennsylvania rooms with 26 tables. Located in Bethlehem, PA, it’s in a prime spot to attract visitors from New York City and northern New Jersey.

A representative from Wind Creek told PlayPennsylvania they had no update on when the poker room would open. On Nov. 18, Wind Creek opened the Betfred sportsbook. The sportsbook is the first for Wind Creek in the United States and the third US retail location for Betfred Sports.

Wind Creek claimed a number of honors from Casino Player Magazine in October including being named best:

• Overall Gaming Resort
• Table Games
• Poker Room

However, it hasn’t been all good news at Wind Creek Casino. Wind Creek announced layoffs on Sept. 24 that affected about 20% of its workforce. Total revenue in October was $33.1 million, a 16.41% decrease from October 2019.

Wind Creek provided the following statement to LehighValleyLive regarding recent layoffs:

“With recent business volumes significantly lower than we had hoped, we were forced to make this incredibly difficult decision. The hospitality and gaming industries have been crippled by the COVID-19 pandemic. We believe that our reduction in workforce will in the long term positively affect our future success.”

In addition, Wind Creek also announced the permanent closure of Emeril’s Fish House.

A Wind Creek employee provided an update on some of the happenings at Wind Creek including the poker room. The person agreed to share their insight based on the condition of anonymity.

“When Wind Creek shut down in mid-March, they could’ve easily had a mass layoff but they didn’t. They continued to pay all employees until May 31, 2020. Even those that work on tips got an average hourly wage and they continued to pay for benefits. Most casinos around the country just straight up laid off hundreds of dealers back in the spring.”

On June 1, the poker room employees were furloughed. They stopped getting paid but the full-time workers could keep their health benefits as long as bi-weekly premiums were paid. On Sept. 30, all poker room employees were laid off/terminated and the poker room was made into a high-limit slots parlor.

“We were told it was being turned into a high-limit slots parlor for the time being. Obviously a casino makes way more money on slot machines than a poker room, so I believe they’re focusing on that right now.”

The employee said it is their belief along with other employees that the poker room is not closed permanently and will eventually reopen.

“The plan is to reopen the poker room in the future. But who knows what the future entails considering what is looking like another round of closures. Wind Creek does see the value in the poker room but I think right now they’re trying to recover from the major financial hit they took during the 3.5 months we were closed up. The client base of the poker room really enjoyed playing at Wind Creek. I know some of them think it’s closed permanently but that isn’t likely the case.”

Rivers Casino Pittsburgh Pa Poker Room Reopen

Poker pales in revenue comparison

In fiscal year 2019/2020, poker accounted for $37 million in total revenue across the state’s ten poker rooms. That number pales in comparison to the $607 million in total revenue by all other table games.

Casinos, trying to recover from an unprecedented financial hit as a result of COVID closures and operating at reduced capacity, are likely allocating resources to games that generate more revenue.

In late August, PlayPennsylvaniaexclusively reported that Harrah’s Philadelphia would not reopen their WSOP poker room.

Meanwhile, PokerStars PA remains the only online poker option in the state – for now.

Pennsylvania poker revenue by casino

Rivers Casino Pittsburgh Pa Poker Room Schedule

As you can see from the table below, live poker is not the biggest revenue earner for PA casinos (though it can help drive other verticals).

2019/2020 Fiscal Year Poker Revenue in PA (figures from the PGCB):

Rivers Casino Pittsburgh Pa Poker Room Rules

I've been to the Rivers poker room a number of times since moving to Pittsburgh earlier this year. This is a very solid poker room with lots of offerings for both the tournament and cash player.

Overalls the room is run very well. On the cash side, the dominant game is 1/3 NL with the occasional 2/5 and PLO games. They also have 4/8 limit occasionally along with some higher limit games during special events. They also run a number of hourly hot seat and splash pot giveaways that encourage players to stick around. I have rarely had to wait for a table here. The management has done a nice job with their dealer scheduling and if the waiting list grows, there is almost always another dealer available to open a new table.

On the tournament side, they run about 2 tournaments a day and the structures are quite good. They also run special tournament events every other month. Even their standard tournament offerings have good chip stack and blind structures.

As far as the competition goes, the players run the usual mix from pretty good to pretty horrible, from nit to maniac. As far as personalities go, almost everyone I've played has been pleasant to share a table with (even if they're a bad player).

When I first started going there, I found the dealers to be spotty and prone to mistakes. Over the last few months, however, the dealers have improved to the point where I think they're among the best I've seen. They're friendly, knowledgable, and know how to control a table. Kudos to both the dealers and the management for making the effort to get better. Most rooms don't do that.

Food is ok and nothing special, although the rivers buffet is supposed to be excellent. Comps are also only ok, but that is out of the poker rooms control. Another reviewer mentioned the room being dirty. I have not seen that. Perhaps he caught them on a bad night or the problem has been fixed.

If you're in Pittsburgh or if you haven't been here in a while, check this place out. They have good cash offerings, excellent tournaments, and good promotions around both.