Shakopee, Minnesota, Has a $40/$80 Mixed-Game Problem

At midnight Central time on May 24, six players were on the list for $40/$80 MIX-8 at Canterbury Park in Shakopee, Minnesota, with zero tables open.

Another six names sat on the $20/$40 MIX-8 waitlist. Also zero tables open.

Twelve players waiting for mixed games north of $20/$40 in suburban Minneapolis. Not at the Bellagio. Not at the Aria. Not during the WSOP. In Shakopee, population 44,000, on a late-May night.

Twelve players waiting for mixed games north of $20/$40 in suburban Minneapolis, not at the Bellagio, not during the WSOP.

The Midwest Has a Mixed-Game Scene. You Just Don't Know About It.

Both waitlists registered a ratio of 6x their median, meaning the demand that night was six times the normal level. That's not a blip. That's a room full of mixed-game players who showed up expecting action at stakes that would thin the herd in most poker rooms in America.

Think about what $40/$80 MIX-8 actually means. Eight-game rotation. Stud, stud hi-lo, razz, Omaha hi-lo, 2-7 triple draw, limit hold'em, NL hold'em, PLO. You need to be competent in all eight or you're lighting money on fire. This isn't a "let's try stud" table. These are specialists.

And Canterbury has enough of them to fill two waitlists at once.

The Counter-Take

Sure, you can argue a single snapshot doesn't prove a scene exists. Maybe it was a home-game crew that migrated for the night. But the median waitlist for both of these games is 1, not 0. That means Canterbury spreads these stakes regularly enough to have a baseline. A room doesn't put $40/$80 MIX-8 on the Bravo board as a novelty.

The real story is simpler than people want it to be. Poker players in Minnesota have money, they have time, and they have a taste for mixed games that would surprise anyone who thinks high-stakes mix lives exclusively in Las Vegas. The Canterbury waitlist isn't an anomaly. It's a signal that the map of serious American poker is wider than the Strip.

Somebody should open those tables.