Encore Boston Harbor's $5/$10 Phantom List Hits 16 Deep

Sixteen Names, Zero Tables

Sixteen players are waiting for a $5/$10 no-limit hold'em game at Encore Boston Harbor right now, and the room hasn't opened a single table.

As of the afternoon of May 20, Bravo shows 16 names on the Encore $5/$10 NLH waitlist with exactly zero tables running. That's a phantom list: pure demand with no supply. The median waitlist for that game at Encore sits at 7 players, making the current number more than double the norm, a 2.29x ratio above the room's own baseline.

Sixteen names on the Encore $5/$10 NLH waitlist with exactly zero tables running: pure demand with no supply.

Why This Number Stands Out

Phantom lists are common at $1/$3. They happen at $2/$5. At $5/$10, they're rare. The buy-in floor for most $5/$10 NLH games is $1,000, and the practical stack depth means players are committing real money before cards hit the felt. When 16 people are willing to put their name on a list at that level and wait, the demand signal is loud.

Encore Boston Harbor, located in Everett, MA, is one of the highest-volume poker rooms on the East Coast. A 16-deep phantom at this stake suggests the room's regular $5/$10 crowd showed up in force and the floor hasn't been able to seat the game.

At a 2.29x ratio above the median waitlist, this is not a normal fluctuation. It's the kind of spike that typically resolves one of two ways: the room opens one or two tables and absorbs the list, or frustrated players peel off and drop to $2/$5.

The Bigger Picture

May is historically a month when high-stakes cash demand climbs across the country. Players tune up before heading to Las Vegas for the summer. East Coast rooms like Encore tend to see their biggest $5/$10 and $10/$25 action in the weeks before the WSOP kicks off.

A single snapshot doesn't constitute a trend. But 16 deep at $5/$10 with no table open at a room that normally runs a median waitlist of 7 for this game is a data point worth flagging.

The game will presumably spread. Until then, 16 players in Everett are staring at the Bravo board, waiting.