Editorials by our staff members
The history of tournament poker isn’t a long one. At best it dates back to the 1960s, when the first “Texas Road Gamblers” (the predecessor of the World Series of Poker) convention was held in Reno. Even in 1970, when the late Benny Binion brought the convention to his Horseshoe in Las Vegas and rebranded… Read more »
There’s very little that can harm the game of poker. A bloody U. S. Civil War? Nope, both sides saw their combatants pass time between skirmishes by playing the game. Shuttling it off to seedy casinos and back alley poker rooms? Nope, just adds to the mystery and the charm of the game. Have massive… Read more »
This last weekend, the World Poker Tour was playing in one of its venerable abodes, the Borgata in Atlantic City. The WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open Main Event has become one of the preeminent poker stops on the tournament poker schedule, routinely drawing over 1000 entries in each of the last three years. But instead… Read more »
As I mentioned in a previous article, this is a very slow time for poker news. As such, my mind has been wandering while I have been sitting at my laptop, trying to come up with something to write. I was perusing recent posts and when I stopped on Earl Burton’s article about the WSOP… Read more »
It has taken a long time in coming but, within the next few months (first quarter 2019 at the latest), the state of Pennsylvania will enter into the online gaming arena. Since 2013, there have only been three states that have passed regulations allowing the activity – Delaware, Nevada and New Jersey – and Nevada… Read more »
Everyone comes to poker in their own way. For myself, it was at the knee of my family, playing penny ante games of Seven Card Stud over the kitchen table. Some others, believe it or not, don’t come to the game until they are older. Many in the game today were drawn to poker the… Read more »
In the world of poker, there are several organizations that recognize those that have achieved greatness in the game. There is supposedly the Seniors’ Poker Hall of Fame, which recognizes players over the age of 50 (I say “supposedly” because I can’t seem to find anything online about who is currently enshrined in the group).… Read more »
The 2018 World Series of Poker started last week and, along with players looking for fame, fortune or at least a good time, the Poker Hall of Fame announced the beginning of the process for their 2018 inductions. Voting opened for the public to nominate people for the next two slots in the Hall, with… Read more »
In 2008, the World Series of Poker made the bold move to shift the final table of the WSOP Main Event to November, creating a four-month gap between the time the tenth place finisher was eliminated and the start of the official final table. The “November Nine,” as it was called, lasted nine years until… Read more »
Poker Central’s Super High Roller Bowl will be held at the ARIA in two months. This being just the fourth installment of the event, the SHRB has actually become quite the anticipated tournament. The $300,000 buy-in brings out the best players in the world and they are guaranteed to get exposure because it streams online… Read more »
Earlier this week, the World Poker Tour announced the remainder of its Season XVI schedule. On the roster of events were the usual suspects that have been a part of the WPT for quite some time, tournaments such as the Borgata Winter Poker Open and the L. A. Poker Classic. While those tournaments have been… Read more »
For the past week, the poker world has been watching the tournament room at ARIA in Las Vegas for what was, at the minimum, a unique series of tournaments. The inaugural Poker Masters event was a series of high dollar buy in tournaments that brought together if not the best players in the world, then… Read more »
With the close of the Las Vegas leg of the World Series of Poker last week, the WSOP Player of the Year race became a flashpoint for the poker community. While it has created a great deal of controversy over its scoring, the person who emerged on top after all the events were finished in… Read more »
I know everybody is looking forward to the start of the 2017 World Series of Poker Main Event this weekend and might not really be focused on the present. I know lots of people in the United States are a bit hungover from the Independence Day revelry yesterday or simply exhausted from battling traffic and… Read more »
One of the casualties after Amaya Gaming decided to rebrand the European Poker Tour at the start of 2017 was the notion of poker’s “Triple Crown.” That achievement – winning a Main Event tournament (or a bracelet event) on the EPT, the World Poker Tour and the World Series of Poker – was arguably the… Read more »
When the much-ballyhooed Poker Central was in its starting phase, they made a big deal out of how they were going to be the “first 24/7 poker network on television.” Now just a shell of its former self, Poker Central thinks that the route to take to success will be by a subscription service called… Read more »
If you’ve been away from your television for the past few days, then you’ve missed the latest in uproars in the poker community. On this week’s edition of Poker Night in America from the Choctaw Casino in Durant, OK, the poker world was introduced to arguably the vilest creature that has ever been seated at… Read more »
My fellow online denizens, we are gathered here today for a funeral to celebrate a short but white-hot light that was snuffed out last week. International Online Poker passed away after a long illness otherwise known as “death by 1000 cuts.” While it seems that it was around for much longer than it was, International… Read more »
A couple of weeks ago in the Rivers Casino in Pittsburgh, a rather stunning occurrence took place. Over the span of 120,000 hands and roughly 20 days of play, a computer artificial intelligence (AI) called “Libratus,” developed by the Carnegie Mellon College of Computer Science, defeated a squad of tough poker professionals – Dong Kim,… Read more »
It is early in the 2017 poker calendar, so there have been few things that have grasp the attention of the poker world. There’s discussion as to whether the PokerStars Caribbean…whoops!…the PokerStars Championship Bahamas was a success or not (when you have a premier high roller in Paul Newey dissing the offering, you might have… Read more »
There has been a lot of talk lately about a seemingly minor change PokerStars recently made to its poker client: players are no longer given the option to fold their hand when a check is available. I have avoided the topic for no other reason than I just didn’t feel like writing about it, but… Read more »
Earlier this month, the traditional finale to the calendar year for the World Poker Tour kicked off its action in Las Vegas at the Bellagio. The Five Diamond World Poker Classic had all the trappings of a big time tournament poker – exquisite location, big money and tough competition at every table. What it didn’t… Read more »
While everyone might think it is so, being a “poker journalist” (and there’s a great deal of debate over that title – many just want to say they’re a “blogger,” a “columnist” or an editorial writer) isn’t the easiest way to make a living. The hours can be lengthy, especially for those that cover tournaments… Read more »
The online poker industry has reached a point, a crossroads if you will, and there is a decision to be made. Should the online poker rooms continue to cater to those who occupy many of their tables, grinding out a nominal win rate and build enough specialty points to earn treats from those said rooms?… Read more »
Recently the Poker Hall of Fame announced that Todd Brunson and Carlos Mortensen would be the 2016 inductees into poker’s version of Mount Olympus. Many in the poker community were a bit surprised (and that is putting it mildly in some cases) that Brunson earned enough votes for induction, citing his lack of tournament success… Read more »
