A "freeroll" is a poker tournament that doesn't charge an entry fee, but pays out cash or prizes to the winners. They cost nothing to play, so there's no risk, which is what the term freeroll means in gambling.
Freeroll tournaments are a popular way to promote casino poker rooms these days. Players qualify to participate in freeroll tournaments by logging a certain number of hours in cash games, and the prizes, depending on how hard the casino is promoting, have gotten very big. For example, Station Casinos has held a $500,000 freeroll for which you had to play 75 hours in three months; the first prize was $75,000. The Wynn recently sponsored a $100,000 freeroll tournament where you had to play 30 hours in a month.
Some casinos, epecially the locals casinos, offer smaller tournaments, but on a regular basis. One poker room manager told us, "At some locals casinos, the actual tournament is rarely played. Qualifying players, all of them locals who know each other, simply cut up the prize money, which can get as high as $100 apiece. If you have to play 20 hours to qualify, that works out to five dollars an hour -- a great comp for poker players, who are definitely the low men on the casino-comp totem pole."
