From the mailbag: Florida

Calder [Casino & Race Course] opened with server-based reels up to $100 and 45-line $1 denoms … all of those are all gone too. And they’re owned by Churchill Downs. The Miami Gardens area, famous for both Calder Casino and Tootsie’s Cabaret — a strip club the size of a WalMart supercenter, but otherwise in a sketchy part of town — will never be confused with upscale Sunny Isles Beach or Jupiter Island.

Gulfstream Park has always been sort of a grind joint, but they actually have good games and good bounceback-up to $225/week. I can see why Harrah’s would want them — unlike most of [Gary] Loveman‘s ideas, this one is logical. Isle (Pompano Park) has a nice product, but I think gave up trying to get the Coconut Creek Casino crowd. The Seminoles answered Isle’s challenge with a huge remodeling and expansion. It’s still a very douchey place to play, but they may have the best location in the state, being close to Boca Raton and not too far a drive from Palm Beach. If you live in Boca and prefer to play Isle than CC, you’re adding 15 minutes to the drive each way. Magic City (Flagler) is basically a small denom grind house.

I wouldn’t ever discount Wynn‘s or Genting‘s marketing abilities, but I think a destination casino in a city which is all locals[-oriented] midline or budget casinos is going to be a tough sell. Especially when the clientele at a few of them (Seminole “Classic,” specifically) look like a long waiting line at the Probation Department.

Editor’s note: Before his company threw in the towel in Florida, Las Vegas Sands Vice President Andy Abboud penned a ringing rebuttal to a group of state officials — mainly Attorney General Pam Bondi (right)– who had come out against casino expansion. Abboud does a splendid job of exposing the hypocrisies of the opposition, as well as pointing out how termite-ridden the current gaming ‘framework’ in Florida really is.

The Caesars Entertainment IPO having been a hit on opening day (if you define “hit” as shareholders managing to “get out with smaller losses than they might have seen“), the water has been chummed for a much bigger stock dump, probably sooner than expected. Stock analysts interviewed by The Associated Press even float the idea that Apollo Management and Texas Pacific Group might flush their entire stock position into the market. With all due respect, I doubt it, especially given the downward pressure on prices that will occur if and when John Paulson and suckers investors like the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (whose trustees deserve to be sacked, if not shot) unload their 23 million-plus shares. And, after all that opening-day flurry, Caesars netted a puny $13 million “for general purposes.” Don’t spend it all in one place, guys.