Casino Morongo, Commerce, Hawaiian Gardens, and The Bike all announce partnership with Pokerstars to provide CA online poker

[Dan Druff]

Nothing has been legalized in CA yet, but if these companies have their way, Pokerstars will be running the sites for Morongo, Commerce, Hawaiian Gardens, and The Bike.

It is not clear if they would share player pools or simply have competing sites.

Press release: http://www.psimg.com/pdf/press/ratio...california.pdf

The Morongo Band of Mission Indians, California’s (and the world’s) three largest card clubs – the Commerce Club, the Hawaiian Gardens Casino and the Bicycle Casino – and The Rational Group, which owns and operates PokerStars, announced today that once California enacts legislation authorizing intrastate online poker, PokerStars will serve as the subcontractor providing the online poker platform and related services for a real-money online poker website to be licensed, owned and operated by an entity owned by the Tribe and the card clubs. This will give Californians access to the world’s largest and most popular online poker brand in a safe and locally-regulated environment. The organizations will work together to advocate for legislation that extends California’s tough, long-established gaming regulations to include intrastate online poker and thus ensure stringent consumer protection, consumer choice and maximum revenue for the state.

[Dan Druff]

The biggest obstacle to this actually taking place is a competing bill that has a "bad actor" clause, barring Pokerstars from pahticipating in the legalized California poker market.

[BeerAndPoker]

They got the California Poker hearing streaming here:

http://calchannel.granicus.com/Media...4&event_id=856

[NorCal Sports]

The biggest obstacle to this actually taking place is a competing bill that has a "bad actor" clause, barring Pokerstars from pahticipating in the legalized California poker market.

They got the California Poker hearing streaming here:

http://calchannel.granicus.com/Media...4&event_id=856

What's funny about that hearing is that multiple times they we talking about PokerStars - but never referred to them by name ... but it's clearly something everyone was aware of. During one point in the proceedings, a guy representing the card rooms said he's heard from players around the country that basically if given the choice - they'd play on PokerStars.

I agree it is one of the few things they aren't agreeing on at the moment. While I think it would be cool to have PokerStars as an option if this bill passes - I agreed with another presenters point that a rival casino/tribe/cardroom isn't going to invest the ~20 million just to get your room launched if they have to compete with PokerStars.

We'll see what happens, but after watching I feel a little more optimistic we might get something done by the end of the year.

[Bootsy Collins]

I am dying to open up my Hawaiian Gardens online site. I am going to invest in a large tent so that I can get a more authentic experience.

[jacosta24]

Not really feeling the whole pokerstars entering first there kind of shady they should wait a and pay the price for running an illegal cardroom but if they combine player pools with those three rooms it sounds very intriguing.