Online Poker in the U.S. (Yes, it still exists)

I feel like the current existence of online poker in the U.S. is treated like a dirty little secret. It’s as if we’re scared that, should enough people learn about it, it will inevitably get shut down. Perhaps that’s true, or perhaps the government has just done a great job of scaring us into thinking that it’s true. Naturally, the Big Three sites got all of the media attention when they were shut down by the Department of Justice (DOJ) last year, but there are still several smaller sites operating under the radar, and for now they seem to be going strong.

Let’s start with the obvious question: Are these smaller sites legal? According to Nelson Rose and Preston Oade, who are both poker players and prominent lawyers, the simple answer is, “yes.” Unless you live in a state such as Washington or Kentucky where online poker is specifically prohibited, it is not illegal to play poker online. Most people forget that the charges brought up against the Big Three had to do with bank fraud, not the game of poker. They are charged with using bogus company names when making transactions, which violates federal law. As long as a poker site is using its true identity when accepting deposits and processing withdrawals, there is no fraud, and the transactions are legal. On the other hand, online sports betting is explicitly illegal under the Wire Act of 1961, so you’d be better off avoiding poker sites that also offer sports betting. Poker-only websites are clearly safer and in far less danger of being shut down.

Still, most players are understandably wary. A few months ago, Card Player announced on Facebook that it was offering a deposit bonus for first-time users of Carbon Poker, which accepts U.S. customers. Instead of the positive responses that usually come from freebies like deposit bonuses, just about every comment was negative. People were questioning how the site could accept U.S. customers, and most believed that the site would get shut down eventually, so they had no desire to deposit any money, bonus or no bonus.

At first, I felt the same way. I had been playing on Doyle’s Room for a while, and they were one of the sites that stayed open through Black Friday. But one day they decided to change their name to America’s Cardroom, and that was the day I withdrew every penny. With a name like that, it almost felt like they were daring the DOJ to shut them down. Whether it was rational or not, I decided not to take a chance playing in a cardroom that was essentially flaunting their questionable legality with their very name.

Now some time has passed, and looking back, I almost certainly overreacted. The current risk of playing online is probably lower than we all think it is. Still, it’s unrealistic to think that we’re all suddenly going to let our guard down completely. For starters, a lot of people used to keep insanely large bankrolls online, figuring it was similar to keeping money in a bank account. As anyone who had serious money on Full Tilt can tell you, that clearly wasn’t the case. I don’t know anyone in the U.S. who currently has six figures in an online poker account, and I’m guessing very few players even have a five-figure account anymore. Most people just aren’t willing to take the risk of having that kind of money frozen, and I can’t say I blame them.

But let’s think about the various resulting effects of that. With everyone keeping smaller online bankrolls, high-stakes games on these smaller sites are extremely rare. Therefore, you won’t find many top-level pros, since they have either moved out of the U.S. to continue playing for high stakes on PokerStars, or else they are playing live. Even medium-limit games are sporadic, with a few sharks waiting for an occasional fish who may never show up. So the vast majority of tables are what most of us would consider small stakes.

Of course, even in smaller games you used to face a lot of really tough grinders who would play up to twenty tables at once, looking to make a small profit at each one and making it nearly impossible to find a soft game. The thing is, smaller sites often don’t have twenty games going at a given limit. Maybe at certain peak hours you’ll get that kind of traffic, but otherwise you probably won’t have twenty $1-$2 no-limit hold’em games going, for example. Furthermore, it takes a pretty decent bankroll to multitable in that fashion, and as we established before, not a lot of players are keeping that kind of cash in online poker accounts anymore. So not only are the high-limit pros playing elsewhere, you also have fewer players of the low-limit variety.

The results should be clear. For part-time and recreational players, online games in U.S.-friendly cardrooms are easier than they were before Black Friday. I know many people who predicted that the opposite would be true. They figured that only the most serious players would take the risk of continuing to play online, but the reality is that the most serious players don’t have the incentive to spend their time on smaller U.S.-friendly cardrooms. Their attention is elsewhere.

With a full-time job, I’m now in the category of part-time/recreational player, and I can speak from personal experience that the lower-limit games on Carbon Poker, for example, are much softer than their PokerStars counterparts were a year ago. Sure, you see a bunch of the same faces sometimes, but instead of them taking up every seat, maybe they’re in half the seats, while the other half are often players you’ve never seen before, which is always a good sign.

Meanwhile, I keep a bankroll about one-tenth of the size I used to keep on PokerStars. I certainly wouldn’t be happy if that money were to be frozen suddenly, but it wouldn’t ruin my life either. Basically, it’s a calculated risk, and one that I decided was worth taking. I spent seven months away from online poker, only to realize how much I missed it. I like being able to play a few hours here and there, more for the enjoyment of it than anything else. And since I can make a little extra cash, so much the better.

For any of you who are on the fence about whether to give online poker another try, the decision is, of course, entirely yours. If you feel that it’s not worth the risk, that is completely understandable. On the other hand, top legal minds clearly believe that it’s lawful, and bright poker minds can tell you that the games are softer than you might expect. This might be the right time to give it another shot. After all, who knows how long we’ll have to wait for online poker to “officially” make a comeback in the U.S.?
As far as these smaller sites are concerned, it never went away. ♠

Matt Lessinger is the author of The Book of Bluffs: How to Bluff and Win at Poker, available everywhere. You can find Matt’s other articles at www.cardplayer.com.