Odds are good that you're on the receiving end of at least one of the multitude of poker sets for sale this holiday season. If so, you're part of the hottest trend not only in casino gaming, but in family and friend game nights.
Popularized by television coverage of tournaments, specialty magazines that glorify players and dissect winning strategies, and Internet sites that let you play for free, poker was this year's Tickle Me Elmo. So says Randy Harris, owner of Bullseye Darts and Billiards in North Syracuse. "It's the hottest gift-giving item this year," he says. "It's crazy. I run out every week."
Holiday demand for all things poker has exceeded expectations and is expected to continue, says Scott Kling, vice president of sales for the United States Playing Card Co., which makes World Poker Tour and Bicycle cards and chip sets. "We're already taking orders for Christmas 2005."
He says Toys "R" Us placed a third order to restock sold-out poker sets, Nordstrom has requested two additional shipments, and Sam's Club is selling out of its exclusive World Poker Tour portable wood-case poker sets with 400 clay chips.
Poker is everywhere, in toy stores, high-end department stores, drug stores and supermarkets, and seemingly everyone is playing it, from teens and 'tweens to college students and young adults, men and women, Kling says.
Poker is hot for three reasons, says Jeff Shulman, co-publisher of Card Player Magazine:
Television coverage lets you see the players bluff, something previously impossible unless you were at the table with them.
With so much money involved, it's become a modern lottery.
People of all ages are discovering that it's a fun game.
"The game that everyone is playing right now is No Limit Texas Hold'em," Shulman says. "At any point, you can lose all of your chips. It's much more dramatic, much more exciting and has a much larger bluff factor. There's nothing more exciting than having successful bluffs."
The game's not always so dramatic. In Syracuse apartments and dorm rooms, students find playing poker is a reason to get together. "It's the social aspect, of getting your friends around the table, laughing, being serious," says Frank Alosa, of Concord, N.H., a junior broadcast journalism major at Syracuse University. He says one night during finals week he got offers to play in three different poker games.
Poker is appealing because "you could be the worst student and the most ungifted athlete in the world and still compete at a high level," he says.
Card Player's Shulman acknowledges: "It's something that's so easy to be pretty good at, but can take a lifetime to master."
Al Krux, of Fayetteville, knows that. He has played poker professionally for 30 years and made three trips to the championship table at the World Series of Poker. This year he finished sixth, winning an $800,000 cut of the $16.12 million purse at Binion's Horseshoe Casino in Las Vegas.
He says poker rooms are filled with young people who have learned the game on the Internet. He doesn't play online "because one of the big points of my game is to be able to sit with my opponent face-to-face at the table."
Winning Texas Hold'em, Krux says, is determined by the value of your starting cards and how well you can read your opponents. Winning over the long run is even trickier. "No one wins all the time. If you limit your losses and manage your money, you can manage your downsides. There's a lot of folks that can't do it. They'll lose the majority of their bankroll. They just can't walk away from the table. That song, 'know when to hold 'em and know when to fold 'em,' is very true."
Calls to the help line at the New York Council on Problem Gambling are up about 30 percent this year, according to executive director Jim Maney, who says the state's new casinos, new lottery games and the rise in poker popularity with teens are to blame. He says the earlier kids are exposed to gambling, the more likely they are to develop a gambling problem.
Most problem gamblers started playing poker or other games before age 14, he says. "It's almost like cigarettes. Do we really want them to start smoking at 14?"
Keith Whyte, executive director of the National Council on Problem Gambling, cautions that gambling is not only a financial risk but a health risk. He says rates of depression and attempted suicide are high among gamblers, and kids who gamble are likely to be involved in other risky behaviors, such as binge drinking and truancy.
"Have that talkwith your kids like you would about drugs and alcohol," says Whyte. Tell them to set a limit and stick to it; not to gamble when they're angry or upset; never to gamble on credit; and learn the warning signs of addiction.
They include: preoccupation with the game; a loss of control; and a tolerance, meaning you need to gamble larger amounts of money to achieve the same level of satisfaction.
"This does parallel substance abuse," he says.
Some parents favor poker. They say it has replaced video games as a popular pastime and has their kids sitting and socializing with others.
Party planner Lisa Webb, of Minoa, says her 8-year-old son, Colton, played poker with his friends at his Monte Carlo-themed birthday party last May. "The kids thought it was soooo cool," she recalls.
Colton "absolutelyloves" poker, plays regularly with his grandfather, Tom Yole, and regularly beats him, she says. The game helps him hone math and logistics skills, Webb says: "It's almost like being a statistician."
If you didn't get a poker set as a holiday gift, and you want to deal into the latest craze, don't despair. Many of those sets that were stacked in stores before the holidays are still stacked there, and your patience may pay off. Odds are good they're marked down now.
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