Hard Rock Casino Tampa Poker Room Review
(December 14, 2016) – Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Tampa will unveil its new state of the art poker room on Thursday, January 12, at 11:30 a.m., further staking its claim as a premier poker destination. Seminole Hard Rock Tampa’s 46-table, non-smoking poker room will feature Wi-Fi throughout and will have the sports fan in. All reviews nice casino fresh harvest the hard rock cafe council oak poker room steakhouse memorabilia excitement Richard A wrote a review Nov. 2020 66 contributions 10 helpful votes. Now $169 (Was $̶2̶1̶6̶) on Tripadvisor: Seminole Hard Rock Hotel Tampa, Tampa. See 1,652 traveler reviews, 334 candid photos, and great deals for Seminole Hard Rock Hotel Tampa, ranked #48 of 177 hotels in Tampa and rated 4 of 5 at Tripadvisor.
The Hard Rock Casino in Tampa, run by the Seminole tribe of Florida, is a large, great room. They have 50 tables, spread $1/2 and $2/5 no limit hold'em with a $100 capped buy-in. They spread $2/4 limit hold'em and $1-5 limit stud. There are regular tournaments as well.
- A schedule of Seminole Hard Rock Casino Tampa poker tournaments, including time, buy-in, blind structure, and more. You also can find Seminole Hard Rock Casino Tampa phone number, address,.
- Experience Poker in an electrifying atmosphere in our luxurious Poker Room. Always smoke free, our poker room features 46 tables with Wi-Fi throughout and dedicated parking in Draper Place Garage for easy access. If you're a sports fan, then we've got you covered! The room offers a Sports Bar and 42 television screens throughout so you won't miss any highlights of your favorite games.
This is the action room in the Tampa area. There are many younger players, most with either iPods, sunglasses, or baseball caps, just as they see on television. I have no idea if any of them have any serious game. The few who were at my table when I played on a Wednesday morning were professional poker wannabees who, after they lost a hand, loved to talk about how other players played their hands wrong. I enjoyed having them at my table and would love to play with them again. They were good for the game.
There's a nice food court right near the poker room. The prices are very reasonable, I thought, with a veggie burger at one of the places for $3.95, a veggie lo mein for $4.50 and house fried rice for $5.50 at the Asian place — or a huge scoop of Ben & Jerry's ice cream or a Cuban Chicken Noodle Soup for only a few bucks each. They also had a place that sold beef empanadas for $3. Did you ever see the musical Sweeney Todd? Remember the show-stopping scene 'Worst Meat Pies in London'? Leave it to say, stay away from the empanadas.
The poker room itself is non-smoking, but is open to the rest of the casino. This allows for some annoying smoke to waft in near the edges of the poker room. Someone less bothered by cigarette smoke than I probably would not be bothered by it, but I was.
There is a very high ceiling with excellent lighting on the tables, very comfortable, well cushioned chairs, but without wheels – making repositioning a little more of a chore on the nicely carpeted floor. The room is not as clean as some, but cleaner than most. It is well run – with tournaments going off on time, empty seats being quickly noticed and called for, and signing up for games simple.
The room takes the standard-for-Florida 10-percent, $5-maximum rake and a $1 jackpot drop. The jackpot goes for a bad beat jackpot and a high hand bonus. When I was there, the bad beat was colossal – at $125,000. You needed to have your quads beaten. A royal flush in spades paid the holder $500. Other royals paid $100.
I heard an interesting story that I verified with a few other players. Apparently, for three days back in July of 2007, the poker room spread a $25/50 blind no-limit game with no cap. Players were seen sitting at the table with tens of thousands of dollars each! The poker room was taking quick advantage of the fact that as a Seminole casino they were not officially regulated by state law. By the third day of this enormous game, that had run continuously, people in suits (who were misidentified as state inspectors but who were really tribal officials) came in and shut the game down – as it went against the spirit of the state law that limited buy-ins and limits inside state-regulated casinos in racetracks and jai alai frontons. This high-stakes game apparently risked damaging the trusting relationship between the Seminole tribe and the state regulators. I guess the Seminoles didn't want to kill the golden goose of casinos they have established in Florida. Even so, for three days last year at least, the place had the biggest action outside of Las Vegas and Southern California. Folks I met were dreaming of a day when these games could once again flourish. And, for what it's worth, in my opinion there's no good reason that they shouldn't be allowed.
I liked the action and the excitement of this room. If I were in Tampa on a regular basis this is the place that I'd play in cash games. But for tournaments I'd probably play at Lucky's – a place with no-juice tournaments at a nearby dog track that I'll review in a subsequent article.
Hard Rock Casino Tampa
Hard Rock Casino Tampa Fl
5223 North Orient Road
Tampa, Florida
Hard Rock Tampa Poker Room
866-502-PLAY
Seminole Hard Rock Poker Room
Tags
Live casino poker
I live 30 min away from the HR. I normally go to a closer poker room but I decided to visit the HR poker room this past weekend. I was there for probably 45 min, the lighting in the poker room was so bad that you can't even see the cards denominations when you look at them. The dealers were friendly and the service was pretty good. I played 1/2 and 2/5 the games were pretty good except the usual donkey throwing money all the time and straddling every hand he played on the 1/2 table. The overall rating is so low because of the lighting in the room, they fix that the Hard Rock becomes probably the best poker room in the Tampa Bay area.