The Arena Poker Room — Attraction in Scottsdale

My hubby and I stopped by to play some poker while between family members homes for the Christmas holidays.

We were sat at the same poker table by a side entrance (I mistook it for an employee entrance at first glance).

My purse sat on a table between us. A “gentleman” came, hooked his toe on the table and slowly moved the table back...picked up my purse and BAM out the perfect.y situated side door he went.

I noticed almost immediately..I know I know..my fault for not hooking the purse up.

Here’s the negative.

Due to what was INSIDE of the purse we opted to contact the sheriffs department to file a report.

While still being treated appropriately, we knew the casino staff was not happy with this decision. Little did we know it would affect the outcome of the story.

Funny thing, an officer went to that same casino...where they had ALL OF MY INFORMATION to find my info after finding my purse (it was found a week later not far from the casino in a dirt ditch). The casino had “no reports” of my stolen purse. You see, they were upset that I had contacted the sheriffs department so they discarded my information which in turn made it VERY difficult for the sheriffs department to find me.

The officer noted a Gold Star Mother ID card and made it his mission to find me.

No thanks to the security team at Talking Stick.... my purse was returned minus the cash inside. As a woman poker player, I will NEVER feel comfortable going to this poker room UNLESS I clip my purse to my side. I mean, how many purses are found inside of a poker room? I’ll answer for you....not many. Nice snag Mr criminal, too bad you missed the value of the purse (over $2500) the iPad($600) was still charged (in fact I’m writing the review on it now) the $5000(yes thousand) dollars worth of medication YOU MISSED OUT ON oh and I got my Gold Star Mother card back.... if you wanted the money I would’ve gladly handed it to you......women DONT SIT IN THE FRONT OF THIS ROOM ...AND WATCH...

Players beware.

I played at a 2/3 Holdem $300 limit table for about 4 hours and among the players was a gentleman in his 60s who reminded us often that he's won several championships and won the Arizona Championship some 20 years ago and, as the heir of a wealthy family fortune, was independently wealthy and did not have to work. It was also clear from all the dealers that came to the table that is he was well-known for being a regular, someone whose play created large pots and was a generous tipper.

Then came a hand with four people in it and the pot grew large. On the river the same gentleman pushed $200 on the river, one player folded, one player called, and then the player just to my left announced: "Call". Then just as he revealed and tabled his hand face-up, he said: "I have a straight - if you have a boat you win." and indeed, he showed the low and high end of a straight. The dealer took his face-up cards, hesitated for a moment in a gesture that I interpreted to be showing the cards for all the see and then put them in the muck because the action was over and immediately proceeded to count out the chip of the other players.

All was good up to now until the dealer began pushing chips in of the direction of our champion player who had one of the losing hands. The winner became alarmed and exclaimed: "HEY! Why are you pushing the chips to HIM?" The dealer said she thought he had folded. I immediately said: "No, he clearly called."

The losing player, our infamous champion, who was wrongly receiving the...

I have played here 2x since it opened and havent been overly impressed. The podium staff were nice, and I noticed both times this place wasn't that busy. They spread a variety of mid to higher level games, but the old room had a lot more action from my previous visits. Their current high hand promotions are about what Lonne Butte poker offers, but requires $30 in the pot with both cars playing. Butte is only $20, but Arena is every 20 minutes the last time I played, so good trade I guess. The poker dealers didn't seem overly enthused to be there both times I played, but they kept things at the table moving pretty quickly. Good job!

I won't go out of my way to come back, but very interested to see their poker tournament schedule, and see if it matches the good number of events, and turnouts, they had at the old Arena location. Only other downside, it is a far walk from the covered parking, located on the south end of the property.

Staff could use some customer service skills to make this place more welcoming to all players, not just the regulars.

For all the hype and long awaited reopening of this poker, did not live up to the hype. On a scale from 1-10, it...