The clattering of shuffled chips. The rifling of a deck of cards. The occasional uproar after a brutal river suckout. These are the sounds that poker players have become accustomed to during the long, sometimes grueling hours of live tournament poker.
But at the Commerce Casino on Saturday, those noises were drowned out by conversations, laughter, and yes, still the occasional roars of shock or disgust for those brutal two-outers. This was all due to the Social Experiment, a unique tournament played out at the California State Poker Championship.
The tournament, which banned all use of electronic devices, sunglasses, headphones and hoods at the table, was run by Tournament Director Matt Savage and Tournament Coordinator Justin Hammer at the Commerce Casino in Southern California.