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Kevin made an interesting post to the comments section of a recent post:
The rise in popularity is great for casinos and for slot online in general, but it's not great for the dealers! Our poker room has more than doubled in players/games/hours played in the last year but our toke rate has nearly been cut in half. To new players: you don't see it on tv or during tournaments (although it's definitely appreciated afterwards!) but you can occasionally toke the dealer.
This was news to me -- I suppose it makes some sense, but I hadn't thought that the rise in poker's popularity would see the toke rate drop to the level of half what it was before.
So please, poker players -- try to educate the newbies at your table on the etiquette of tipping poker dealers. Kevin makes it a good point that it's never shown or mentioned on the TV tournament broadcasts.
sugar's poker tournament
Apparently Sugar's men's club here in Austin has been holding a weekly charity poker tournament for several weeks now. It will be continuing, every Tuesday, until December 23rd, with the finals held December 30th. The grand prize is a trip for two to Vegas; proceeds are going to charity. Play starts at 9pm.
poker player article
There's another interesting article on the popularity of poker and the influence TV has had on expanding the game. This one is noteworthy because it's peppered with some great quotes and sketches of Atlantic City pros.
"Being a poker player is not easy," says Nguyen, one of 20 or so female players in the room, jammed with 500-plus gamblers. "It's a hard way to make an easy living. If you lose control, you can lose bad and lose a lot of money."
celebrity poker showdown
I watched "Celebrity Poker Showdown" last night on Bravo.
The poker play was pretty much what I expected: fairly terrible, punctuated by moments of hilarity as the celebs considered -- and made -- ridiculously bad plays. From a poker standpoint, there's nothing here to really learn. But the show was still pretty entertaining.
Ben Affleck was clearly the experience at the table, but even he made some questionable plays. Don Cheadle and Kevin Pollak offered some decent comic relief. Along with Pollak, the show is commentated by tiltboy Phil Gordon, who is one of my poker idols.
The other strike against the show is that the celebs are not playing with their own money, but for a charity of their choice, which makes the wins and losses a lot less compelling in my eyes.
But as I said, it's fun and funny to watch celebrities playing poker. I'd probably pay $50 on pay-per-view if they had a cast reunion of The Golden Girls in a celebrity poker showdown. And while I don't expect the ratings of Bravo's Celebrity Poker Showdown to come close to the World Poker Tour or World Series of Poker broadcasts, it still is an interesting and encouraging addition to the TV poker lineup. When it comes down it, your average american TV watcher probably cares (and understands) a lot less about quality of play, and celebrities playing poker will get a whole class of viewer who would never watch nobodies playing. So I think it's a great thing for poker.
There was this hilarious take on United Poker Forum:
I can't believe Hollywood caught on to our beloved game and is attempting to kill it with celebs. What's next?
Everyone Bluffs Raymond
Kings and Queens in Queens
Survivor - Binions
Big Blind for the Straight Guy
7th Street Heaven
I read another article somewhere this week that claimed CPS is going to kill TV poker, which is absolutely untrue. Despite the poor play, I'm going to keep watching the show, and millions of Americans who otherwise would have little interest in poker, but may have a lot of interest in, say, Ben Affleck or Martin Sheen, will be tuning in too.
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