Spin Cycle: Poker Hall Of Fame Finalists Highlight Week In Gambling

Welcome to “Spin Cycle,” Casino Reports’ weekly Friday roundup of all things impactful, intriguing, impressive, or idiotic in the gambling industry. Pull up a chair, grab a stack of chips and a glass of your beverage of choice, and take a spin with us through this week’s news cycle …

Hall of a chance

The World Series of Poker revealed on Wednesday the list of this year’s finalists for Poker Hall of Fame consideration — the first group nominated for the honor since the changes to the induction process earlier this month that figure to make the Hall of Fame a little less exclusive. And of the eight nominees, five have turned 40 in the past year and are eligible for the first time, while one of the eight is a 41-year-old holdover on the ballot for just the second time.

The five barely legal (for HOF purposes) first-timers are three-time bracelet winner and long-ago controversial figure for multi-accounting online Justin Bonomo, eight-time bracelet winner and two-time WSOP Player of the Year Shaun Deeb, one-time bracelet winner with more than $65 million in career tournament winnings Isaac Haxton, two-time bracelet winner and high-stakes crusher Jason Koon, and British online icon and two-time bracelet winner Chris Moorman.

They’re joined on the ballot by seven-time bracelet winner and 2024 WSOP Player of the Year Scott Seiver, who didn’t quite get in the door last year in his first year of eligibility, when the rules allowed only for the top vote-getter to gain induction. Seiver and Haxton actually developed their poker skills together some 20 years ago in the famed “Blue Room” game at Brown University.

Then there are two longer-term holdovers: Mike “The Mouth” Matusow, the 58-year-old four-time bracelet winner who has now been nominated for the HOF 12 times, the most of anyone not inducted; and Isai Scheinberg, the septuagenarian co-founder of PokerStars who is appearing on the ballot for the seventh time.

The 33 living members of the Poker Hall of Fame will vote for up to four of the eight finalists, and anyone receiving at least 22 votes will enter the Hall of Fame this summer. If nobody receives 22 or more votes, the highest vote-getter will be the lone 2026 inductee.

Not that you asked, but my prediction: Seiver and Deeb get the call … and Matusow and Scheinberg both fall just a vote or two short.

More news to know …

• It’s been an especially busy news week in the realm of “skill games,” VGTs, VLTs, or whatever you like to call slot machines that are permitted outside casinos in some states. In Pennsylvania, where a couple of weeks ago the state Supreme Court ruled the games illegal, supporters of the machines gathered in state capital Harrisburg on Wednesday to rally in opposition to the ruling and to the games potentially being taxed. On the same day, the Pittsburgh City Council voted to legalize but tax the games. In Chicago this week, with a ban on VGTs lifted, a representative of Bally’s proposed to create airport lounges for the games, making Midway and O’Hare look a lot more like the Vegas airport. And in Missouri, where the games were deemed illegal, the owner of Tuners Bar & Grill has sued state Attorney General Catherine Hanaway over her crackdown on the machines.
• It’s also been a strangely busy news week when it comes to creative poker card protectors. Greg “Fossilman” Raymer, the 2004 WSOP Main Event champ who is known for, among other things, using fossils as card protectors and signing them for whoever busts him from a tournament, got attention for telling PokerNews this week that he has a “douche bag clause” he applies occasionally: “If someone’s just acting like a giant douche,” Raymer said, “no fossil for them.” That little anecdote was nothing, however, compared to the headlines surrounding Andrew Martin, who was told by WSOP staff that he was not allowed to use as a card protector a shiny silver … um … anal pleasure device. Even in Sin City, there are lines and limits, apparently.
• As The Nevada Independent reported Monday, a memorial to honor those killed in the Oct. 1, 2017 mass shooting during the Route 91 Harvest music festival in Las Vegas is closing in on its planned groundbreaking, but is still $7 million shy of its $34 million fundraising goal to begin construction. The goal is to break ground by October and have the memorial completed before the 10th anniversary of the shooting the following October.

• BetMGM announced its latest online poker ambassador Tuesday, as Esther “E-Tay” Taylor is joining a roster that already includes the likes of Darren Elias and Mike Lavin. Taylor has more than $3 million in live tournament winnings to her credit and has made 10 WSOP final tables — though she’s still chasing her first gold bracelet.

House Rules: Insights from around our network

Caesars Extends Three Wabanaki Partnerships In Maine To Include Online Casino

Tribal Community Overwhelmingly Votes Against North Carolina Casino

Citizens: DraftKings Doesn’t Need To Beat Kalshi For Predictions To Add $10 Billion To Market Cap

We Need To Stop Pretending Gambling Is Not Gambling

Walmart Cashier Arrested For Holding Customer’s Winning Lottery Receipt

WSOP Player Smokes, Drinks, Snags Chips — And Gets The Boot

Delaware North Debuts Ember Casino In New Jersey As Part Of National Rebrand

Ante Up … Or Better Yet, Don’t: A Weekend Of Action In Oklahoma

Small stakes and hot takes

This week on the Casino Reports podcast Low Rollers, I welcomed Scott Roeben of the Vital Vegas blog for a conversation spanning the in-the-works Caesars and MGM takeovers, the new Vanderpump Hotel and the under-construction Hard Rock, Las Vegas' likelihood of getting an NBA team, the therapeutic powers of video poker, and proper Sin City tipping etiquette.

I also shared my take on how worried any operators should be about Meta/Facebook entering the prediction market wars, and I monologued about Breaking Bad, Love Island, the three little pigs, and why IP doesn’t do much for me as a slots player.

Full episode:

The Shuffle: Other news and views

Maryland To Match $85 Million Offer To Keep Preakness Rights [ESPN]

Nevada Gaming Regulators To Consider Removing Two Deceased Mobsters From Black Book [CDC Gaming]

Bally's Is Causing Problems For The A's Las Vegas Ballpark Dream [SF Gate]

Judge Rules On Casino Resort’s Right To Develop Tullis Property In East Biloxi [SunHerald]

Inside Gaming: Slot Machines On The Rise [Las Vegas Review-Journal]

The Long Victory Lap For 2025 WSOP Champ Michael Mizrachi [ESPN]

General Manager Departs Less Than 2 Months After Happy Valley Casino’s Opening [StateCollege.com]

‘An Entirely New Experience’: Hollywood Casino Aurora Opens $360 Million Entertainment Complex [Daily Herald]

Future Of Crypto Currency For Las Vegas Casinos Is Still Up In The Air [CDC Gaming]

The Bonus Round

Completing the Spin Cycle with a few of our favorite social media posts of the week: