The Merge Gaming Network is continuing its descent into irrelevance, though this latest step down is probably a wise move. Late last week, Merge, one of the few networks still accessible to most poker players in the United States, began barring customers from the states of New Jersey and Delaware from its member rooms.
With no formal, public announcement as to the decision, players began getting locked out of their accounts on Thursday. Typically, when someone is locked out of their poker account, they at least receive some sort of pop-up message to give a brief explanation as to why. This did happen, but the message was likely frightening for most players, saying that the account had been suspended for security reasons. Images of hackers, chip dumping, and drained accounts flashed through the minds of players on Carbon Poker, Aced.com, GR88.com, and more.
But as it turned out, it wasn’t really a security issue at all, but rather a legal one. With newly regulated internet poker in both Delaware and New Jersey, licenses are required to offer games to people within those states’ borders. Neither the Merge Gaming Network nor any of its sites have garnered a license to operate in those states, so they decided to exit, lest they risk prosecution. Merge, like PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker before it, has been operating in the U.S. at its own risk, feeling that as long as online gaming isn’t explicitly illegal in a state, it is fair game.
Merge does not operating everywhere in the U.S., though. Prior to leaving Delaware and New Jersey, Merge had already left Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Missouri, New York, Washington, and Washington, D.C.
While Merge players in the recently affected states may be upset by the development, it is not necessarily a bad thing for them (well, maybe for Delaware players, seeing as intrastate poker traffic there is quite low). Merge was once an up-and-comer in the online poker world, but has fallen to 25th in terms of cash game traffic, according to PokerScout.com. With a seven-day average of 350 players (expect that to fall slightly as the loss of Delaware and New Jersey players are accounted for), it is not all that far ahead of New Jersey’s largest intrastate network, the Party Borgata Network, which has a seven-day average of 260 players. WSOP.com is also a viable option with 220 players.
Merge also closed its doors to Nevada players after that state legalized online poker, but at the time, they didn’t close existing accounts. Delaware and New Jersey players are barred from playing on the Merge Network, period, regardless of whether or not they were already customers.
