The death of a regular (1 Viewer)

[Taghkanic]

I guess it’s inevitable if you host long enough: Eventually, some of your regulars die.

Today, one of my favorite poker buddies—seemingly healthy, who led a vigorous and active lifestyle—passed away from a heart attack at age 64, thankfully in his sleep. None of us saw it coming. It’s a major blow for his family, the community, and our small group of guys who have played together for 10-12 years, sometimes as often as weekly.

This particular reg also was the host of our game for about five years, prior to my taking it over.

A question I’d like to put out to the PCF community of hosts: When this happens, do you do anything special at your next game? Or host a special tourney or other event in their honor? Or just propose a toast, then shuffle up and deal? There will of course be other services and a memorial for his wider circle of friends, but I’d like to also do something for/with our group.

 

[Windwalker]

I guess it’s inevitable if you host long enough: Eventually, some of your regulars die.

Today, one of my favorite poker buddies—seemingly healthy, who led a vigorous and active lifestyle—passed away from a heart attack at age 64, thankfully in his sleep. None of us saw it coming. It’s a major blow for his family, the community, and our small group of guys who have played together for 10-12 years, sometimes as often as weekly.

This particular reg also was the host of our game for about five years, prior to my taking it over.

A question I’d like to put out to the PCF community of hosts: When this happens, do you do anything special at your next game? Or host a special tourney or other event in their honor? Or just propose a toast, then shuffle up and deal? There will of course be other services and a memorial for his wider circle of friends, but I’d like to also do something for/with our group.

When that happened with one of our regulars (he died in a motorcycle crash), we put his face and his favorite phrase before going all in (“fuck it, let’s gamble”) on a dealer button, and we still use that now.

 

[Chippy McChiperson]

Maybe host a special memorial tourney, and half the buyin goes to the charity of his estate’s choice, and winner gets a trophy or a plaque. If it’s well received could make it an annual event.

 

[Taghkanic]

Among other things, he was a bourbon distiller, so I was thinking of a tourney with some of his bottles added to the prizes. (Not sure if his son will carry on the business, so these may become hard to come by.) A charitable angle would be good too.

https://www.grazinburger.com/the-unburdened-distillery

 

[gopherblue]

Damn. I really liked him and had a nice conversation with him at the last game.

 

[MrCatPants]

So sorry for your loss. I've lost two this year from my game, including one who started feeling ill at the game, left early, and never made it home. There's a thread with some ideas from my similar question here: https://www.pokerchipforum.com/threads/memorializing-a-player-who-has-passed-on.87031/

I let the broader group know in each case by email (how I do invites) with services information and then we did a toast at the next game with my early arrivers. Going to deal two extra hands in the league championship and fold them.

One thing I didn't realize but now do - usually everyone is closer with the host than they are with each other. We only had two folks from the game show up at each service. Just something to be cognizant of.

 

[allforcharity]

Horrible news. At least it was quick and painless

 

[DMack]

We had a couple pass this year. One unexpectedly and the other battled for a long time. We dealt them a hand to start the game off.

 

[bergs]

Pretty sure if I dirtnapped my East Coast crew would expect my estate to rebuy at the next game at least 3 times. To their credit, they’d deal me in and let me draw max on flop.

 

[DoubleEagle]

Sorry for your loss.

 

[DoubleEagle]

A question I’d like to put out to the PCF community of hosts: When this happens, do you do anything special at your next game? Or host a special tourney or other event in their honor?

It sucks, but we have had this happen several times as our group is getting older. Here is what we did four years ago. Unfortunately, we have had it happen two more times since then.

 

[merkong]

Years ago we bought a guy in once at our next session after he passed and let him get blinded off.

When he was all in at the end of his stack he won the hand.

Damn you Merle.

 

[BPTDirector]

Had two losses in two years sometime back. The first meet every league year after that was a memorial where we had a moment of silence for each by name.

 

[TexRex]

I had a key player die (Mike) in 2014. We did a memorial tournament for him for 8 years that had special features. Prior to his death, he helped me design something he wanted.

I had another key player (Kevin) die in 2020. I didn't get a chance to discuss such a tournament for him, but I worked with his daughter to come up with something special. I'm taking a sabbatical from hosting right now, but I will combine the 2 when I start up again. It will have special features from both.

Here are some special things I did.

• Have a Final Table with one fewer player, saving a seat for Mike. Originally, our final table was 10, but only 9 for that game. However, I eventually went to only 9 at each table, and just did the chip bonus for those who made it.
• Mike's "chips" would be divided among those who made that final table as a bonus for making it. It was about 10 BB for each player.
• Kevin liked re-buy tournaments, so we did a special re-buy tournament. Most of ours are freezeout tournaments.
• Kevin wore Hawaiian shirts. Players who wore a Hawaiian shirt received bonus chips at the start that was about 20% of the total chip stack. Mike always wore a fedora or a Panama Jack hat. When I restart, players will be able to get a bonus for wearing any of those items, though wearing a "Mike" hat wasn't a feature before.
• Right after Mike died, we let players pay extra for extra chips. All of that money went to a charity Mike supported. Almost every player contributed to get the extra chips.

I honored Mike by naming the award for our Main Event winner after him. He won the first MPOY award, and died during our second year of the awards, which started in 2013. The image on the paper award for the MPOY has an image of 2 men -- one in each type of hat.

I had other players pass away over the little over 11 years. However, I only honored those two who were regulars and both made some significant contribution to our game. I have a little write-up on each of those we honored telling what they did for our group. Both were among our better players, though their track record wasn't their main contribution.

I like the idea of one memorial tournament a year. Our last 8 years started with Mike's memorial game. I perhaps will name players I know of who came and have died next time, and do special things related to those who contributed significantly to the group.