pokers golden age

[silverking]

Here's a cross post from a post i put on RGP....it's a bit of a ramble, but I meant it to read like that!.....I love poker history.

The post:
OK.....what to do about poker. In the grand old days, the days of Doyle
and his suitcase full of cash as Ulvis Alberts takes his pic out in
front of the Shoe......the days of Stuey putting guys on all in's hand
after hand after hand........Crandall Addington, Puggy, Bobby when he
played poker instead of wearing suits.........you know what I mean, Al
Alverez wrote about it in "Biggest Game"

Where's that poker now??

It's all kids who watch to much TV playing at Mandalay Bay, trying to
look like they know what they're doing........guys in sunglasses sucking
out with a 9-2 offsuit on a guy with a pair of Kings.

No wonder dreamers look at Doyle with such respect, TJ too, .....the
guys who really DID drive all over Texas with a distinct possibility of
getting a shot gun pushed up their ass (if they were lucky...knife to
the throat if they weren't)...the Texas Road Gambler.......say it a few
times....."Texas Road Gambler"..........

I play on the internet.....often with idiots.....often losing to the 9-2
offsuit.......but then........late at night, with my computer turned
off, I get out my copy of A.Alverez's "Bets, Bluffs, and Bad
Beats".....I get a scotch.....three fingers.......and start to page
through the book......it's glorious, the pictures, the stories, ivory
chips, riverboats, Doyle and Stuey in black and white.

I just made it to Vegas as a guy in his early twenties in 1986....before
it turned into what it is today (which is OK I guess...i go there).....I
was with a buddy and his cousin, we were coming from the World Drag Boat
Championships in Phoneix, and we stopped in Vegas to look around. They
bagged out early that first night in town, and I started to walk up the
strip.....not many people around in those days at the motels between
downtown and the strip....it took me about 40 minutes and then....there
it was.....the strip......Now I don't know what was up in 1986, or that
night in particular, but there was hardly anybody around. As I walked up
the strip, unlike today, it was truly the strip of my dreams.....those
dreams, for a kid from Canada were largely comprised of Merv Griffin at
Caesars, and Johnny Carson from the Desert Inn once or twice a
year.....once actually....it think....yeah just once a year.
I remember....actually remember.....seeing Stuey on Merv after he won
the Worlds.........just a kid....."the poker kid"....

As I walked up the strip I saw something that to this very day sticks in
my head........Caesars Palace was so green...or was it
turquoise??.....it was so totally out of my league (i was, after all in
a motel halfway to downtown)....It was just like Merv said it would
be.....unreal......I still see that turquoise color in my head......and
when I'm in Vegas today, I try to find that tiny little piece of the old
Palace that's still there......"see it......that small piece
there"......but that old Palace, the one from 1986....man...that was the
dream palace......the Palace of pokers golden age.

On my way up the strip I stopped in Vegas World.....the lobby was cheap
spaceship by design....and as I stood looking, a huge crowd of guys in
suits came towards me....dangerous guys......it was obvious I should
move to the side, and perhaps even avert my glance.........today, in my
dreams.....I still think that was Tony the Ant walking by.......man,
that was close.

Of course now it's all different......the poker I'm dreaming about is so
far in the past that it's all just in pictures now, Ulvis Alberts black
and white pictures........thank god for those pictures.

Today:

No wonder the entire room stood and delivered an ovation when Doyle left
the WSOP this year..........I'm quite glad I'm not alone in my poker
dreams......you know.......those dreams........"why, I had a dream just
like that the other day..........Doyle was at one end of the table, and
Stuey was at the other.....man it was hot in the Shoe.....then the
dealer burned the first card..........................."