For weeks now I have been answering the question about rematching at Hard Rock in Atlantic City with “Assuming they still allow rematching come March.”
I’d mentioned I’d heard rumblings about no more rematching but it was just rumblings.
Unfortunately, today, just 2 days before the new tier match period was set to begin, they dropped a bomb on us.
The website has been updated with these sad nuggets of text:
For reference via the WayBack Machine, here’s what it USED to say until today:
This hurts me doubly, and I’m sure some of you, as I had a reservation for tomorrow night so I’d be there to rematch on Saturday.
But now, that free stay (and the $80 free play and $40 food comp in my account) are all “activity” (even parking is almost certainly activity if you use your card).
So, I cancelled the room.
This move aligns with the Ocean Casino changing their required inactivity to 24 months. It’s getting harder and harder to find a place that you CAN gamble without ruining potential matching opportunities. For now, the MGM matches (for 3 months) do not require inactivity, so there’s that.
Now, does this ruin the MGR? Is it the nail in the coffin?
I have to say, it largely is in that for years this was an easy to follow process.
I’m not saying you can’t possibly make whatever statuses you have last a bit longer, but Hard Rock Atlantic City’s yearly match was, for many years now, the bridge to keeping everything going.
To all that matched to Ballys in January so that you could match to Hard Rock in March? Sorry….
The name of the game now is taking stock of what statuses you have, when they expire, and what you may be able to match to that could match back to Hard Rock whenever your inactivity period expires. For me that will be April of 2026. I suppose the ideal thing would be to figure out a status you can attain for 2025 that will match to MGM in early February 2026 that would keep you alive long enough to match back at Hard Rock when your 24 months of inactivity is up and then of course match back to Ocean for one last hurrah.
If you have MGM Gold status from Celebrity or Royal Caribbean cruises, you could then wait out your inactivity that way. RC Crown and Anchor Emerald and higher members tier match to MGM Gold as do Celebrity Captain’s Club members with Select or higher status. If you are a cruiser, it may make sense to focus on this. You need 150 Celebrity Club Points for Select. You can rack those up without too much effort in a few cruises. See here for how.
Of course my hope remains that something will loosen up or appear over the course of 2025 that makes something a bit easier, but we just have to wait and see.
In the end, this all just got too popular. And all good things come to an end.
Whether this is an end or a pause remains to be seen….
Thoughts?
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Would this be activity specifically at the hard rock Atlantic City? My last visit (and any activity) to the hard rock Atlantic City was in July of 2023 but I visited and have activity at the Mirage in Vegas before it closed in December of 2023. Would that activity at the Mirage count?
We’ll have to all ask these questions in person. There’s no other way to know.