Here we go again with another installment of strange things I’ve witnessed poker players do.

Jackpots. Typically it is awarded when you make a big hand like Aces Full and get beat by Four Of A Kind or better. Most all casinos have them but the qualifying hands may be different.

In the old days of poker in California (poker has been legal in California for at least 100 years if not more), they didn’t have jackpots. Players had to create their own. The table would agree on what hand had to be beat and then they would take $1 from every pot and drop it into a cup. If you lost with the qualifying hand you won all the chips in the cup.

Then along came larger card clubs and poker dealers. The poker dealer then took the $1 and gave it to the casino who paid it out when the jackpot was hit.

Now lets do some math. If a typical dealer deals 27 hands per hour (some dealers are faster) that comes out to $27 per hour the casino takes out of the pots. Now, most Hold ‘em games are played nine handed. So if skill and luck are all equal, basically each player is paying $3 per hour to have a jackpot at their table (and if you play 12 hours a week you are paying $1,872 per year for your jackpot).

Then back in 2005 or so, the Department of Justice ruled it was illegal for the casino to take money from the players to pay for a jackpot. No longer did $27 an hour disappear into the casinos pockets.

Since jackpots were so poular amongst players the casino decided to keep jackpots eventhough they couldn’t charge the players for it. The catch was, they made the jackpots a little harder to hit. Instead of Aces Full losing to Four Of A Kind, it had to be Four Of A Kind Lose to a better Four Of A Kind or higher hand.

That’s when poker players went strange. The majority of players decided to complain to management or to not play at all. They didn’t want a free jackpot. They wanted the casino to rip them off and start charging them again. They wanted to lose an extra $3 per hour on the longshot they might lose, not with Four Of A Kind, but with Aces Full.

So the casinos talked the DOJ into letting them rip of the players again by taking the $1 jackpot drop every hand.

So I ask you, what is better… a jackpot you pay $0 per year for, or one you pay $1,872 per year for (based on 12 hours per week playing)?

• Poker Players Are Strange