2025 WSOP!!

We now have an online gaming company running WSOP. I don't see the surprise of them apparently unable to release a schedule in a timely manner for the purpose of satisfying live players. That is, travel arrangements, hotel reservations, vacation requests, etc.

For online players that stuff is unnecessary and basically irrelevant.

And I'm ignoring the cooperation/coordination between them and Caesars necessary to plan and execute a major event.

The schedule announcement is not actually late yet. It won't be late unless February passes and we still don't have news.

Poker tournament schedules don't tend to arrive this far in advance.

For the sake of comparison, Wynn Millions runs from Feb 17-Mar 23 this year and only just announced their schedule a few days ago.

Venetian usually provides detailed schedule info only about a month or two ahead of the start dates for their different series.

It's not 100% reliable, but there's generally a lot of consistency in the WSOP schedule from year to year. If you are targeting a specific event, you can make a reasonable estimate of where it will fall on the schedule this year by examining the past few years. Otherwise you can wait another month for the schedule release, which will still give you a 3-4 month head start. Not ideal, but not egregious compared to the industry standard. It's still earlier than most.

Yes, I understand what you are saying but the WSOP is a different animal than anything Wynn or Venetian offers. On Dec 12th 2017 the FULL schedule was announced for the 2018 WSOP.
I was just hoping that they could get back to that general timeframe of the schedule announcement as I think it benefits them and us.
My motivations for requesting an earlier schedule release is that I'm hoping some GG Poker or WSOP brass read this thread and hear my pain so as to push the schedule through.

You are 100% correct Sir !

Nothing can be compared with WSOP.

There are so many players from around the world come to USA ( Las Vegas) just to get a taste of WSOP.

To be exact last year (2024) WSOP attendance was over 225000 from all around the world.

And I am sure 99% of them has to go through struggles of putting together, travel , hotel booking, managing their business and getting leave from the work etc .
Most players playing at Venetian, MGM, Wynn or any other casinos didn’t made their planning particularly for those events. They were playing because they were in Las Vegas and had a free day from WSOP.

So WSOP ‘s schedule announcement is affecting 10’s of thousands players.

And can’t be compared with any other casino’s events

In a way, you just explained why it would be extra difficult for them to deliver a full schedule far ahead of time.

It's the biggest live series of the year, which also means it's far and away the biggest logistical nightmare. That this is true and they still deliver a full schedule far earlier than the typical series suggests they are doing relatively well to juggle all the moving parts. People who want dates earlier probably underestimate the work involved.

I'd also argue that unless there is a hyper-specific event you want to play (let's say something esoteric like the $1.5k razz), we already have enough data to make relatively well-informed booking decisions. Past years provide a relatively good road map for future years. They've already given us some concrete dates. We know when the WSOP is. We know when the Main Event will run. Most people can pick whatever dates work best for them within the overall window and still find plenty of good tournaments to play. If you are a casual NLHE/PLO hobbyist like the majority of visitors to the WSOP, you'll likely have several suitable events to play in any given random week during the series. Some weeks may be slightly preferable to others, but it's not like you are going to have big windows without access to something appealing. In the event that you book ahead and don't like what's on tap during those dates upon release of the full schedule, most reservations at Caesars and MGM are fully refundable and easily changed.

I can understand being a little frustrated with the slow trickle of information. 4 months ahead is not a very long window in terms of planning major vacations, but most people can book the dates most convenient for themselves and still find plenty of events to play during that window. For those who are hellbent on playing specific events, the 4 month advance notice is still a much bigger window than what you'll get at nearly any other major poker series (WPT, NAPT, EPT, WSOP-C, etc).

Is the 225,000 the total entrants from all events last year? Do you happen to know the unique entrants?

Last night I had a dream that Chainsaw, Scott Seiver and myself made the final table of the $3K Omaha8 and as I was walking to the table to begin play, two hot girls said they were rooting for me.

When is the Monster Stack?

Last night I had a dream that Chainsaw, Scott Seiver and myself made the final table of this year’s 3K Omaha8 and as I was walking to the table to begin play, two hot girls said they were rooting for me.

No Sir . It is impossible to find out unique entrants from what ever published data.

Please don’t consider this as some inside information.

But my wild guess would be Friday June 13th. ( What a day Friday 13th !!)

If it is consistent with the last several series it will be the 2nd weekend in June with day 1A Friday the 13th. My existing room reservation is counting on that.
BTW, I have a theory on why WSOP has kept us waiting on schedule releases the last couple of years. They were too busy flogging preparations for that hinky Paradise series that has no interest for me.

This has been true the last couple of series before GG Poker acquired the brand. I am going to assume that Caesars will still have responsibility for the logistics. Their crews set up the tables and chairs. They still hire the dealers and the people who work the cages and the registration booths. I think GG Poker's only involvement will be with online WSOP tournaments. Amiright?

That could be correct, but IMO there was a reason Caesars sold WSOP. That is getting out of the operation and management of WSOP and moving on.

IRT hiring of dealers, reg, cage, security, etc, I tend to think Caesars handed off whatever they could to GGPoker. Managing staff some of whom report to A while others report to B would be challenging, esp in the cage where a lot of money is handled.

I've been trying to research this topic but I am seeing nothing but the rah rah press releases on how everyone is supposed to be happy with this new arrangement. I am wondering what the reality will be. No info on who does what with regard to the logistics of running this tournament series. GGPoker's online operations and tournaments require no dealers, no cage staff, no tables or chairs, just computers and software. How are they expected to do those things that Caesars has been doing? That's why I assume the GG remains in the background and Caesars keeps running the show.

Maybe GG poker have realized that they are duped !!

Agreed. I brought this up last year when the deal was announced, but nobody seemed to care at the time.

Another thing to consider: assuming Caesars is managing the live events, what compels them to hire competent dealers and other staff? They no longer have skin in the game IRT profits so I don't see a bottom line reason for them to care how efficient the live events are conducted.

One could argue that poorly run events would hit Caesars bottom line eventually, which is probably true. But moving resources to focus on other profit centers may allow Caesars to recover any lost profit.

I disagree with that. Ceasars received as part of the deal following rights:

“As a part of this transaction, Caesars has secured the right from NSUS to continue hosting the WSOP’s flagship live tournament series at its Las Vegas casinos for the next 20 years.”

So NSUS will get some fees ( whatever is the deal mentioned) but profit from running tournament will go to Ceasars including fees, traffic influx to the Ceasars casinos, and $$ spend by visiting players.

Right. I agree Caesars will be contractually paid for their services.

But I have yet to see anything indicating Caesars will get a share of profits. So IMO the structure is such that Caesars can offer minimum quality services to satisfy their end of the contract.

I also agree that Caesars benefits from the foot traffic generated by WSOP. But as I indicated above they may already be developing strategies to make these benefits less relevant.

If "hosting" means Caesars gets a share of profits, then they will have some incentive to provide quality services, commensurate with that share.

Any major business announcement is big on Rah Rah confetti and short on detail. The general consensus is that Caesars retains all operational control of the physical events - bricks and mortar - at locations of their choosing. It is somewhat less clear (at least to me ) for the online operations and how that will proceed in the future other than it will remain on Caesars Digital.

The Ceasrs is very smart company. I think if Ceasars is running the tournament on their own property after paying whatever agreed commitment to use WSOP name , will be entitled to all the profits.

I'm not a financial expert, but I think Caesars has cash flow and debt challenges. That they've shuttered the Flamingo, Caesar's, PH, and Harrah's poker rooms in recent years suggests they are falling out of love with the poker business. Pawning off the WSOP brand is consistent with all of that. It's a way to free up some cash while also continuing their long-term reduction strategy with poker.

From the GG side, you have to think they will flog that WSOP license hard in the online realm while perhaps expanding live WSOP offerings outside of the Vegas market. They've been heavily involved with WSOP Paradise. Whether we perceive that series as a success or not, it's easy to envision other offerings like a South American, Asian, and Australian series. I also think there's a perception that the WSOP's media rights have not been exploited to their full potential, which seems very reasonable considering the sad state of the WSOP broadcast product (paywalled live streams on the very niche PokerGO, low-effort taped edits on CBS Sports).

The WSOP brand can drive engagement to their online platforms, they can get better value out of the media rights, and they can potentially expand live offerings. Those seem like the major incentives from GG's standpoint.

From the customer's perspective, I would not expect the live Las Vegas series to change much materially in 2025 though.

GG is going to have NO tournament or registration software. It will take years to develop that. CET has archaic networks and hardware. It looks like their systems are running on DOS. My guess is CET will remain in charge of all that stuff.

How will you be able to tell the difference?

A few examples:

-more 10 handed tables than previously experienced for same events;
-more observed instances of dealer errors;
-longer wait times to enter and/or rebuy into events;
-changes to existing procedures that result in player inconvenience;
-longer delays in resolving disputes by floor.