Poker's latest draw: Teen-age gamblers

Thanks to TV, the game has become a craze for young set, who play it everywhere, anytime Monday, January 03, 2005 By MELISSA ANELLI STATEN ISLAND ADVANCE

Pick a teen, any teen, and ask if he or she plays cards. The surest bet in town is that the answer will be yes.
The game is usually Texas Hold 'Em -- a poker variant enjoying an upsurge in popularity thanks to its starring role on ESPN's "World Series of Poker" and Bravo's "Celebrity Poker Showdown," which pits Hollywood personalities against each other -- and it has been all the buzz since the summer.
Since the craze took hold, the average age of a poker face has been dropping. Some of its most fervent followers can't even work up a five o'clock shadow. Yet they sit around tables -- from professional mahogany ones to lunchroom benches -- shifting chips and becoming schooled in the art of the bluff.
In an informal survey, the Advance found that only one out of 30 high school students didn't count the game among their favorite extra-curricular activities. And it doesn't stop there; a sixth grader from Paulo Intermediate School, Huguenot, said he plays with his friends between classes and before homeroom.
"All my friends play," said Mike Slisz, a senior at Tottenville High School. Slisz tried to think of one person he knew that didn't, and failed.
Only "the corns, the nerds," don't play, said Larry Favorito, 16, of Curtis High School. Favorito plays poker every day at lunch, usually hiding the money under the table when he sees a teacher approach. And despite the blatant violation of the Department of Education's discipline code, there are so many lunch time games that the cafeteria sometimes resembles a furtive casino. Favorito also said that twice teachers have "thrown down" money.
Curtis High School and the Department of Education did not respond to requests for comment on the fad.
But the real games are found in rec rooms and basements all over Staten Island; $5 or $10 buys a stack of chips, which have no real value throughout the game except to mark who's playing. Whoever ends up with all the chips gets everyone's cash; one group of high schoolers said the winner of their monthly 40-person tournament regularly takes home $400.
SOCIAL HABIT
Brothers Erik and John Rossetti and their friends meet almost every night in the basement of their Sunnyside home. On a recent night, two tournament tables, 11 players total, populated the sports memorabilia-covered room. A DVD of "Rounders" -- a poker movie starring Matt Damon -- played in the background, but no one was paying it any mind.
Erik played around the covered pool table, waiting with practiced patience as the others upped their antes and set their bets. He looked almost bored. But by the time his turn came around, he could tell what cards each of his opponents had by how much they had bet, and knew exactly how much of his dough he should risk. He always does. He once folded a stellar "pocket aces" hand on the correct hunch that another player had assembled a hand of four kings.
He's made $1,500 off these games in the past six months. He's 16 years old.
Those who play call the habit healthy, social -- and equate it to playing basketball, or seeing a movie, with perks.
"If you're not playing for money, it's not as fun," said Jon, 17, a student at Susan Wagner High School who didn't want his last name used. "You play for like five dollars a game, not going overboard or borrowing, because that's when you start getting in a lot of trouble."
Erik and his buddies -- neighborhood friends who range from 14 to 22 years old -- play almost every night, and have for the past six months.
At 3 p.m. the phone calls start, and by 6 p.m. there's at least seven of them sitting around Rossetti's basement pool table. They each pay $10 to get $800 worth of chips; whoever has the most chips at the end wins the pot. They play as many as three games a night.
Erik has become a pro and seems to love the game; he plays with fake money on the Internet in his spare time, and between rounds uses a spare deck to play a quick, moneyless hand of Omaha, another poker variant.
Those of them who are 20 years old or older go to Atlantic City at least once a month (the underage ones have yet to be caught), and at least half of them are saving their winnings so that when they're old enough, they can go to Las Vegas. Steven hopes to one day play in the World Series of Poker there.
CAUSE TO WORRY
But parents, teachers and addiction experts say there's cause to worry.
The average age of those who do have those concerns is dropping, says Beth Schwartz, supervisor of the treatment program at St. Vincent's Hospital's Gambler's Treatment Center in West Brighton.
"We're seeing more and more youngsters," she said, noting about 15 percent of the center's clients are youths, a number that spiked this year. "Statistics have shown that the younger they gamble, the more of a problem they might have later on."
And it's not just chips that sold like hotcakes this holiday season; gambling sets are being targeted to the pre-poker set as well. This holiday season, in any of Staten Island's card and novelty stores, were brightly advertised $7.99 Barbie "Bunko" sets, a kid-flavored version of the old card game. Packaged in a hard pocketbook-like case and containing pink dice and cards with images of high heels and sunglasses on their black-and-pink backs, the set is like a gaming fashion accessory for 9-year-old girls.
"My 10-year-old son requested Texas Hold 'Em for Christmas," said George Anthony, a conflict resolution specialist and history/sociology teacher at Susan Wagner. "I don't know if I want him playing, but at the same time it's become a social game as much as it's a card game. I'm hoping it's just a fad."
The teacher asked his sociology class last month whether they thought Texas Hold 'Em would lead kids at the high school age to move to other forms of gambling.
Eight voices instantly shouted, in unison, "It already has."
Some of their friends play nonstop throughout the day, they said.
"They gamble past money, they start putting other things up," said Elad, 16, who "got out of that" once his friends started waging each other's designer clothing.
"We really have done a job of desensitizing the public, and in particular parents, about gambling and the risks," said Dr. Richard Pearlman, who works with patients at the Gambler's Treatment Center. "We've done a good job of alerting the public to the dangers of drug addiction, of cigarette and tobacco smoking, but (not) pathological gambling."
That insidious type of gambling affects three percent of adults and as much as six percent of youngsters, Pearlman says, and has effects similar to drug addiction, "although not as popular or advertised."
Among those effects are depression, poor concentration, poor performance in work or school and mood dysfunction.
Pearlman says that nationwide studies suggest 80 percent of students have gambled at one point or another by the time they enter high school, what he calls "an incredible number."
Melissa Anelli is a news reporter for the Advance. She may be reached at anelli@siadvance.com.