What a fucking mess the once-revered HPT (Heartland Poker Tour) has become.

The Westgate Las Vegas is the former Las Vegas Hilton. In the 1980s, when I used to stay there, it was a pretty big deal, and was the biggest hotel in the world.

It has since become a has-been, mostly due to its inconvenient off-strip location, as well as its age and uninteresting theme.

The HPT has a stop there right now. The Main Event began on April 6, had a $500k guarantee, and the buyin was $1650. This is the first time the HPT has been in Vegas since 2014.

First, there was a small controversy over the $1650 buyin. Allen Kessler noticed that the rake was $210, which is the highest rake ever charged on a $1500-type event in history (aside from another HPT event in Chicago, apparently, which charged $230)!



But the best was yet to come...

Recall the $500k guarantee for the event.

First off, it's a fake guarantee. The guarantee only takes place if they get 300 or more entries, which means there's no overlay unless there's 300, 301, or 302 players, because the break-even mark for a $1650 event with a $500k is 303 players. (That is, 303 * 1650 is just about exactly $500,000).

But let's say there's 300 players exactly, thus triggering the guarantee.

While it's true that $495,000 in buyins will have been paid, and the Westgate will only be out $5000 to complete the guarantee, they will also be out all of their operational expenses, because the $210 entry fee from each buyin will end up going to the players.

And that's apparently what happened at the Westgate. The dinner break came on Day 1B (April 7), which was the last opportunity to buy in for the event. It seemed they would end up somewhere around 300, which was a nightmare for a small room like the Westgate. Why? Because 300 players paying $210 in fees adds up to $63,000. And the Westgate was going to be out that $63,000 in fees (plus the $5000 they would owe the guarantee), due to barely triggering the guarantee.

That's when they decided to try something unorthodox, and very unethical:




In reality, they were offering a $1650 buyin event (with a full stack) for the low, low price of $825! 50% off!

They sent popular vlogger TheTrooper97 out to announce this on Twitter.

They also made an announcement in the Westgate sportsbook that they were discounting the buyin by 50%.

Here's Ben Yu's account of what happened:





One player decided to do some on-the-spot investigative reporting.

That stuff will be in the next post...