Liz L.
11-16-2003, 12:10 PM
I sure wish I could have heard McManus's lecture on poker literature:
Poker Playing Gains In Popularity
By RICK GREEN
Courant Staff Writer
November 15 2003
MASHANTUCKET -- Michael Capener, who's been playing poker flat out since he flew in last week, may be the game's next Michael Jordan.
The odds are, though, that he's just among the millions who can't get enough of an old card game that's as American as jazz and hip as a hot TV show.
Poker is breaking out all over, pulling in throngs of gamblers to casinos, card clubs, Internet sites and kitchen tables, thanks in large part to the Travel Channel's hit show "The World Poker Tour" and a slew of new books, both of the literary and how-to variety. Monday, the WPT will film the World Poker Finals at Foxwoods Resort Casino. Preliminary games began Friday and continue today.
"It's a combination of the things I do pretty well," a weary-looking Capener explained one evening this week, taking a break from the "satellite" games before the World Poker Finals opened.
"It's mathematics. ... [It's] calculating the odds on each hand. It's reading people," said Capener, who described himself as a successful landlord from Phoenix - and a serious poker player for the last four or five months.
This week, scores of others like Capener are prowling the poker tables at Foxwoods. The new poker luminaries and literati are there, too, as the country's largest casino gets a mega-dose of poker testosterone. A seat at the table for the poker finals costs $10,000, and this year's prize pool is expected to exceed $3 million.
"The baby-boom generation can't really get it done on the fields and golf courses and tennis courts the way they used to," said James McManus, whose bestselling and highly readable new book, "Positively Fifth Street," is riding the poker wave. McManus, one of the game's new celebrities, is here for the tournament. On the way, he stopped off at Yale University to lecture on the new poker literature.
"It does have the outlaw cachet that even football doesn't have. Real men played poker. The irony of that is part of the lore," said McManus, who teaches writing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
"Instead of sitting and reading the sports pages and following Derek Jeter's exploits, I follow my own exploits and the people I play against," said McManus. "There's a lot of interest in poker. I don't want to say they have just scratched the surface. But I do think it has some legs to it."
Exact origins are unclear, but modern American poker games evolved on Mississippi River boats and during the Civil War. Today the action stretches from lonely bedrooms, where online gamblers bet on illegal offshore Internet sites, to lavish casinos, where the poker chips, as McManus says in his book, thrum like locusts.
In the Foxwoods poker room, shift manager Mark Rathbun says he's seen "unprecedented growth" in the game. Most of the time - and that would be around the clock - the room's 58 tables are at least two-thirds filled. Wednesday night, every seat was taken, with players only breaking to eat, smoke or drink. One man flossed his teeth during a pause in the action.
"This month we are up 100 percent over what we did last year," said Rathbun, who credits "The World Poker Tour" for ginning-up the game's prominence.
The tour, with a stable of stars ranging from cowboys to geeks, draws millions of viewers weekly, with its soon-to-be-patented system of filming all aspects of the game, including each player's "hole," or unseen, cards.
"There's always been a huge audience to watch poker," said Lyle Berman, the Minnesota casino developer who bankrolled the new television show. "Our estimate today is that one in five people play poker in some fashion. Poker has exploded."
"Poker tournaments are open to everybody. All you need is money," said Berman. "There is enough luck and randomness in poker that a rank amateur can win."
Poker Playing Gains In Popularity
By RICK GREEN
Courant Staff Writer
November 15 2003
MASHANTUCKET -- Michael Capener, who's been playing poker flat out since he flew in last week, may be the game's next Michael Jordan.
The odds are, though, that he's just among the millions who can't get enough of an old card game that's as American as jazz and hip as a hot TV show.
Poker is breaking out all over, pulling in throngs of gamblers to casinos, card clubs, Internet sites and kitchen tables, thanks in large part to the Travel Channel's hit show "The World Poker Tour" and a slew of new books, both of the literary and how-to variety. Monday, the WPT will film the World Poker Finals at Foxwoods Resort Casino. Preliminary games began Friday and continue today.
"It's a combination of the things I do pretty well," a weary-looking Capener explained one evening this week, taking a break from the "satellite" games before the World Poker Finals opened.
"It's mathematics. ... [It's] calculating the odds on each hand. It's reading people," said Capener, who described himself as a successful landlord from Phoenix - and a serious poker player for the last four or five months.
This week, scores of others like Capener are prowling the poker tables at Foxwoods. The new poker luminaries and literati are there, too, as the country's largest casino gets a mega-dose of poker testosterone. A seat at the table for the poker finals costs $10,000, and this year's prize pool is expected to exceed $3 million.
"The baby-boom generation can't really get it done on the fields and golf courses and tennis courts the way they used to," said James McManus, whose bestselling and highly readable new book, "Positively Fifth Street," is riding the poker wave. McManus, one of the game's new celebrities, is here for the tournament. On the way, he stopped off at Yale University to lecture on the new poker literature.
"It does have the outlaw cachet that even football doesn't have. Real men played poker. The irony of that is part of the lore," said McManus, who teaches writing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
"Instead of sitting and reading the sports pages and following Derek Jeter's exploits, I follow my own exploits and the people I play against," said McManus. "There's a lot of interest in poker. I don't want to say they have just scratched the surface. But I do think it has some legs to it."
Exact origins are unclear, but modern American poker games evolved on Mississippi River boats and during the Civil War. Today the action stretches from lonely bedrooms, where online gamblers bet on illegal offshore Internet sites, to lavish casinos, where the poker chips, as McManus says in his book, thrum like locusts.
In the Foxwoods poker room, shift manager Mark Rathbun says he's seen "unprecedented growth" in the game. Most of the time - and that would be around the clock - the room's 58 tables are at least two-thirds filled. Wednesday night, every seat was taken, with players only breaking to eat, smoke or drink. One man flossed his teeth during a pause in the action.
"This month we are up 100 percent over what we did last year," said Rathbun, who credits "The World Poker Tour" for ginning-up the game's prominence.
The tour, with a stable of stars ranging from cowboys to geeks, draws millions of viewers weekly, with its soon-to-be-patented system of filming all aspects of the game, including each player's "hole," or unseen, cards.
"There's always been a huge audience to watch poker," said Lyle Berman, the Minnesota casino developer who bankrolled the new television show. "Our estimate today is that one in five people play poker in some fashion. Poker has exploded."
"Poker tournaments are open to everybody. All you need is money," said Berman. "There is enough luck and randomness in poker that a rank amateur can win."