Lee Jones: Looking back at 2024, and ahead to 2025

At some point when you’re young, old people will tell you that time speeds up as you age. This seems absurd on the face of it, and you reject this silly notion and get on with your life.

The next thing you know, you’re the old person telling young people that time speeds up as you age. Which is a roundabout way of asking, ‘Where did 2024 go?’

But here we are, and I’ll recount what I can recall of the year’s blur…

First, a caveat. I’m not in the tournament scene and I don’t follow the tournament scene. I think PokerOrg does an extraordinary job of covering that, and I commend to you Terrance Reid, Matt Hansen, or any of the other fine tournament reporters on our staff. 

Me, I’m a passionate cash game player and inveterate poker industry watcher – I suppose after all the years of working in the business, I can’t shed the habit.

U.S. Online regulation continues by fits and starts

Many people felt that after Black Friday (coming up on its 14th anniversary) we would very quickly resolve to wide state-by-state regulation. Maybe it’s my inner cynicism realism but I didn’t see it happening. This thought was only cemented when I (and a lot of other people at PokerStars) spent a summer trying to persuade California that it should regulate online poker. It was a lot of hotel rooms, informational sessions, and driving miles for naught.

I’ve rarely been so disappointed to be right. As I write this, six states have regulated online poker, and only two (Pennsylvania and Michigan) are in the top ten most populous states. The Big Four: California, Texas, New York, and Florida are nowhere to be seen.

This was made more depressing by the wide and lightning-speed acceptance and regulation of online sports betting. If the poker people thought they were going to ride sports betting coat tails into the law books of 2-3 dozen states, they were sorely mistaken.

2025 outlook: Don’t hold your breath. There may be some progress on liquidity sharing among some states, which is great. But I don’t anticipate a 5x or 10x increase in the number of Americans who have access to regulated online poker in 2025. Or 2026 or 2027, honestly.

The real world comes crashing into the poker room

Toward the end of the year, a major controversy erupted at the WSOP in the Bahamas when Justin Bonomo wore clothing subtly showing his support for the Palestinian people. When I got my start in the poker world 35 years ago, most poker players were largely (sometimes shockingly) unaware of and uninterested in the important real-world issues of the day.

As poker has become more mainstream, the people who play it are more diverse and less mono-focused on the game itself. And, to be blunt, the expansion beyond the “old straight white guy” demographic has created a much broader array of opinions and perspectives. This is desirable and good in almost every respect, but it inevitably brings with it some controversy and conflict. 

I write all this because I think the 2025 outlook is a lot more conflict and controversy. I fear that the political polarization in the U.S. will only deepen in the coming year – it’s absurd to hope that will end at the rail. I’ve already found myself trying to cool (read: “stop”) political discussions at cash game tables this year, and once had to get a table change to avoid an ugly confrontation. 

These sorts of situations are amplified at tournament tables, where the players are effectively trapped with each other until somebody busts out or the table breaks.

My personal opinion is that the WSOP’s handling of the Bonomo incident was ham-handed and tone-deaf. All poker tournament operators and cash game establishments had better get plans and policies in place if they want to keep the games running smoothly while political and cultural tempers run high. 

I note that if – if – we can keep the games civil and pleasant, we will be doing a service to ourselves and the larger community. We can, despite our differences, come together, play a game of cards, and treat each other with respect. It might be a template for how we all behave in the broader world.

Cash games get privater

As I noted at the outset, I haven’t played a serious tournament in years. But I am deeply embedded in the cash game milieu and have a good read of its pulse. The most bothersome trend there is the increasing privatization of higher stakes games. There are many variables causing this, but likely the largest culprit is professionals and, more generally, “winning players.” Too many of them treat the game as their personal ATM, and the weak and losing players as mere pawns. 

In those higher-stakes games, even the weaker and losing players are successful in some aspect of life, else they wouldn’t be able to afford the buy-ins. They know when they’re being treated as marks, and they don’t like it. I know I wouldn’t like it if I were treated like that. 

The way the market has dealt with this problem is that various people have started “private games” within a casino. You don’t get to play in the game unless (a) you’re a losing player, preferably a big loser and/or (b) you’re fun, willing to gamble, and bring a good time for everybody. 

There is a companion ecosystem of non-casino-property “underground” games, operated on the same principles. But with no regulation, shady operators, questionable chip liquidity (i.e. there isn’t enough money to back up the chips on the table), an open field for cheating, etc. Almost exactly a year ago, a massive cheating scandal bubbled out of one such sub-ecosystem in the L.A. area. 

Frighteningly, I suspect I’m beginning to see the effect of underground games siphoning off players in my “lowish mid-stakes” games. Whether my market will see the carefully curated games that are in Las Vegas and L.A. is TBD.

Outlook for 2025: More privatization. Many important voices in the community (e.g. Matt Berkey) have asked the winning players to be better company, give up a whisper of EV here and there to keep all the players happy and the ecosystem healthy. I’m pretty sure he knows it’s a futile attempt. It’s like asking a scorpion not to sting – it’s what they do. When recreational players discover there’s an alternative to sitting with a bunch of “starting hand charts in trench coats” (as Charlie Wilmoth calls them), they’ll take that alternative. Particularly if they can do it in the safety and security of a regulated casino. If they choose to play underground games, well, that’s on them.

I fear we’re going to see more privatization of casino cash games, reaching down into the solidly middle-class of $10 and $20 big blind games. I really hope I’m wrong.

Dark horse: California earthquake

Speaking of things I hope I’m wrong about…

In October, California governor Gavin Newsom signed into law a bill that allows the Tribal casinos one bite at the California DOJ-regulated card rooms’ use of “Third Party Prop Players” (“TPPP”). The byzantine nature of the entire business is far too much to discuss here, but if you follow the link above, you can get all the details from Haley Hintze and me. 

The tribes have until April 1, 2025 to bring a single suit on the matter – I would bet my net worth that they will bring the full weight of some expensive law firms to the matter on or before that date. 

It’s hard to know what the outcome will be, but should the Tribes successfully get the use of TPPPs prohibited, it could have a seismic effect on California poker. DOJ-regulated cardrooms (contrast with Tribal casinos) provide lifeblood revenue to many small municipalities across the state, and those cardrooms (and their host cities) won’t go down without a fight. 

I don’t think we’ll see any impact from this law soon, solely because I expect it to be tied up in the courts for years. Outlook for 2025: expensive litigation, making many lawyers wealthier.

Ready or not, here comes 2025…

^{Featured image courtesy of Petr Sidorov/Unsplash}