In many ways I really admire and have a lot of respect for the Venetian poker room's management. They run great deep-stack tournaments and have run reduced-rake specials and other great promos to try to spur the activity in that room. The Venetian dedicated an enormous amount of prime real estate (floor space) to the room and it's clear that Venetian execs, perhaps even Sheldon Adelson himself, consider poker to be a priority in their room.

The Venetian has a good selection of $1-$2 and $2-$5 NL. There is a $1,000 cap on the $2-$5 game. I'd like no max but $1,000 is good enough for me. They're starting to get $5-$10 NL regularly which I'm glad to see.

The Venetian room is spacious and the chairs are very comfortable. My favorite thing about the Venetian is their food menu. You can't really go wrong ordering from their food menu. My personal favorite is the smoked salmon and bagel dish. They give you $1 an hour in comps on 2-5 and lower and $1.50 an hour on games higher than that which is a good comp rate.

The Venetian also has great drink service complete with complimentary Red Bull, Fiji water, fancy coffee drinks like mochas and cappuccinos, and call brand liquor.

The rake is $1 on $10, $20, $50, and $90 and there is no jackpot drop. This is reasonable rake. It's hard for me to compare it to the places with $10, $30, $50, $70 but it's likely just a smidge higher.

The room is fairly quiet although the $2-$5 games near the rail are close to some loud slot machines. If someone is playing them, it can be annoying. Interestingly, just sitting at the far end of the table from the machines alleviates some of the noise. Sitting in the seats nearest the slots, even at the same table, is noticeably louder.

Full cell phone usage is allowed when playing as long as you aren't slowing down the game. As you know by now, this is important to me.

The skill level of the competition is low here (this is good). You really have two types of players at the 2-5 game at Venetian: bad players who are tight and bad players who are loose. (There are a few pros that'll stop by here and play. They tend to gravitate to the 5-10 and 10-20 games though.)

The tight bad players can be run off hands easily but don't dig into their stacks very much. The loose bad ones can be very profitable.

Sometimes the loose ones can play so unconventionally (i.e. badly) that it can be hard to win against them until you adjust your play to nutcase play. They bluff when it makes absolutely no sense to bluff or for an amount that seems ridiculous for a bluff. Also, they'll frequently check the nuts, even from flop to river because they're more interested in getting a check-raise then actually getting value for their hand. These weird plays (or non-plays) can really throw off someone who's used to an A-B-C approach to the game.

They play 10-handed at the Venetian. They have shuffle machines on the tables. Overall rating 4 stars (I would say 3.75 stars but give it a 4 based on their management's commitment to poker).

Pros: great food and drink service, low skilled competition, comfortable chairs, cell phone usage permitted, good number of available games

Cons: Parking/ Access can be a challenge, at times can be noisy

Venetian Poker Room

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