Need that revenue to flow again
Encore Boston Harbor and MGM Springfield have asked the Massachusetts Gaming Commission for the go-ahead to open up their craps and roulette tables. The Commission will consider the request, scheduled to have a virtual meeting to discuss the matter at 10:00am Thursday.
“We appreciate the Gaming Commission’s consideration of our request as we progress through a phased reopening with the health and safety of our employees and guests at the forefront of any decisions,” said MGM Springfield.
According to MassLive.com, the two casinos specifically asked about craps and roulette, but not poker. The Commission, will, however, also discuss poker during Thursday’s meeting.
The state has one other casino, Plainridge Park, but it is a slots-only facility.
Massachusetts casinos slow to ramp up
After shutting down because of the COVID-19 pandemic in mid-March along with the rest of the casinos in the United States, Massachusetts casinos were among the last to reopen. MGM Springfield reopened July 10; the other two welcomed back customers a few days prior.
Casinos were required to implement a slew of health and safety protocols, including social distancing. The reason craps and roulette tables have been blocked off is because those are larger tables that support more players. Those games draw crowds. They are also games in which players and casino staff are frequently leaning over and reaching across the table. Even with everyone wearing masks, craps and roulette simply don’t lend themselves to social distancing.
MGM Springfield said that it will have plexiglass barriers installed at the craps and roulette tables to enforce social distancing and protect those at the games, just as they do with their other table games.
Poker is a similar situation. Short-handed games could possibly work, but full poker tables are arguably the riskiest gaming tables in the casino. Players are in close quarters, touching chips and cards, and poker is also a game where people tend to play for several hours at a time. All that time sitting in a room near lots of other poker players is something the novel coronavirus would very much approve of.
If I had to guess, I think the Gaming Commission will approve the request to open up craps and roulette tables, provided measures are in place to keep everyone safe. Massachusetts’s COVID-19 have been looking pretty solid lately, with daily new cases above 500 just a handful of times in the past two months.
Poker will stay closed. Plus, poker is not a particularly profitable gaming segment for casinos, so I would be surprised if MGM and Encore pushed for it at all. Additionally, with the casinos only allowing about one-third of its normal customer capacity inside at any given time, it may be hard for them to get enough traffic to even make reopening their poker rooms worth it.