By David Sessions
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
Over the past few years, poker left the garage and invaded the living room, finding a niche on television nearly every night.
The game's increased popularity as a spectator sport has boosted sales of tables, chip sets and card decks for home use, but the fad is still new enough that no estimates exist on exactly how many millions of dollars are spent on poker items.
It's easy, though, to quantify Americans' desire to watch the game on TV. All you have to do is count the networks carrying poker programming.
There's ESPN, trying to become the Worldwide Leader in Poker with the World Series of Poker, a new Web site called "ESPN Poker Club," and the poker-themed series Tilt, starring Michael Madsen.
The network first aired the World Series of Poker in 1994, and ratings have steadily increased, peaking with a 2.8 rating (which translates to 2.5 million households) for the 2004 final in September. Tilt's season finale airs at 8 p.m. Sunday.
Fox Sports Net has also embraced the poker phenomenon, beginning with a Thanksgiving 2000 broadcast from Great Britain. The network was the first to broadcast poker live, beginning with the American Poker Championship in July -- watched by 575,000 households nationally. FSN's Poker Superstars Invitational Tournament returns for its second season Sunday at 7 p.m.
NBC, the Travel Channel and Bravo have all joined the game, as well. Bravo's Celebrity Poker Showdown takes a different approach, eschewing the sunglasses-and-cigar crowd for the champagne-and-caviar set.
But without the work of an 81-year-old poker player named Henry Orenstein, watching the game on television might not be so easy.
Orenstein, inventor of the wildly popular "Transformers" toys, won the World Series of Poker's seven-card stud tournament in 1996. When he found poker telecasts too boring to suffer through, Orenstein dreamed up the idea for an under-the-table camera -- one of his more than 100 patents -- which allows viewers to see the players' hole cards.
Orenstein now heads production of FSN's Poker Superstars Invitational Tournament, an all-star event he created.
"I really thought it was going to be very big," Orenstein said of televised poker, "because I know poker is a very big game. It was a sleeping giant."
Televised poker also owes much of its popularity to its instructional value, as millions of amateur players try to take what they learn from the pros and use it in their garage games.
"Every hand is a poker lesson," said George Greenberg, FSN executive vice president of programming and production. "When you watch our poker, they do everything for a reason. All the card players in the world think they're great card players. ... Not everybody can be a ski racer, but everybody can play cards."
Keeping poker telecasts fresh is the next challenge, Greenberg said
"Poker will continue to be popular for as long as we in television can cover the game and make it interesting," Greenberg said. "As long as poker's getting a rating, we intend to show it."
Must-see TV
• NCAA Tournament selection shows: The women's special airs at 4 p.m. Sunday on ESPN, and the men's show is at 5 p.m. on KTVT/Channel 11. Get your brackets ready.
• Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel, 8 p.m. Monday, HBO: Of particular interest to parents of budding baseball stars: a report by Armen Keteyian on the alarming rise in "Tommy John" surgery and elbow-ligament damage among high school and college players.
David Sessions' Sports Media Column Appears Every Friday.
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