There have been several poker TV shows that have came out in the past few years and, so far, I think they’ve all been fairly good.  However, the only catch is that most of them don’t really offer poker fans much besides the chance to see their favorite pros battle each other.  And to me, just watching the game of poker isn’t always the funnest thing in the world to do - even with top players involved.  It’s a lot more fun to actually be doing it.

Well the Venetian Resort Hotel & Casino apparently agrees and has developed a pretty cool concept in the form of a live show that they will be hosting.  It’s going to be called The Real Deal and will be a poker show staged in front of a live audience.  There are no plans so far to film it for television as, instead, people will pay admission to get into the show.

Once inside the show, people will not only get to see a 90 minute poker tournament with some of the top players in the game taking part, but they will also get to actually participate in the tournament themselves.  The way that this will be done is by audience members getting a wireless device which will enable them to be the ninth player at the table of pros.  Everyone will start with 100,000 points and whoever gets the top score out of the audience members near the end of the tournament gets to play against the last remaining pro. 

What I really like about this idea is that it’s something that a lot of people can enjoy.  I could see casual visitors of Las Vegas wanting to take part in this live show and I could also possibly see it becoming one of THE Vegas shows people like to talk about.  Obviously it will take some time before that happens but with top pros being involved, there will definitely be the chance for The Real Deal to be huge. 

Without a doubt, the WSOP is the biggest poker event on the planet.  This year’s WSOP alone saw over 58,000 people participate in the 55 events and over $160 million was dished out in prize money.  And there doesn’t appear to be a successor anytime soon on the horizon….or is there?

The world of online poker had very humble beginnings back in 1998 when the first room in Poker Planet started allowing people to play there for real money.  The Internet poker game increased moderately after that until the much discussed big boom of 2003 after people saw Chris Moneymaker win $2.5 million in the WSOP after making it there through a $39 satellite. 

And online poker has grown to the point it is at now where rooms are running multi-million dollar tournaments and events.  It seems like every month I see another offer from a room that has at least ‘1 million guaranteed’ somewhere in the title.

Then came today where I saw an article ran on the PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker.  A full $30,000,000 is going to be up for grabs and the 17 day event has me wondering to myself, “Just how far is online poker going to go?”

Obviously a $30 million event is not going to upstage the WSOP but it does show how far online poker has come in terms of cash tournaments and also shows that poker rooms can organize huge money events that, 6 years ago, many would have thought were impossible.

I’m sure the online world isn’t at its peak either as I do believe the record of $30 million for an online tourney will be broken.  But it will be interesting to wait and see if any poker rooms will ever rival the WSOP in terms of such a huge event.

As a lot of people may realize, there hasn’t exactly been a rush of solid news in the poker world as of late.  Most of the happenings recently have been on the weirder side of things.  In fact, a lot of the events I’ve been hearing about lately have been very weird.

To start with, I’ve recently seen that David Williams has put up 10K for some guy to prove his claims that he saw Williams get pimp slapped outside of a Los Angeles nightclub.  Williams, who has received quite a bit of notoriety ever since his foot fetish video hit the market, supposedly likes to act tough out in public and berate people right in front of everyone.  In the end, I guess that the guy who said he saw Williams get slapped didn’t want to join in the 10K wager.

Moving on, and getting even more weird, it has been revealed that there may be some major controversy in a Playboy Poker Charity event that was held earlier this year.  In this story, a man by the name of Dr. Kevin Brown (who is in jail for sexually assaulting eight of his patients) was the catalysts behind the Playboy Poker Charity and apparently wasn’t too charitable with the proceeds as he is facing further scrutiny with a pending IRS investigation.

The last thing I saw that peaked my interest was a story about how Congress recently overturned a bill passed in March that declared it illegal to play poker while naked.  Poker pro Dutch Boyd, along with The Naturalist Society, championed the cause to get this bill overturned and were successful in getting it to where people can now play online naked (whatever that accomplishes).

Basically, I’m just glad that these types of stories don’t hit the mainstream as poker has enough trouble as it is.  And although this stuff is entertaining, the game doesn’t need anymore negative attention right now.

For a some online poker players right now, things couldn’t get any better.  It appears that the game of Internet poker has made a full revival from the crushing blow it was dealt after the UIGEA took effect in 2006 and many people are cashing in on the game more than ever before.  But with the game in clear sailing as of right now (barring anymore ugly poker room scandals) it appears that certain individuals need to invent reasons about why poker is in serious danger.

Some are even taking the danger thing a step further and predicting the downfall of online poker as we know it.  One person in particular who is doing this is doctor Ian Fellows who is a researcher at the University of California at San Diego.  Fellows seriously believes that since the poker robot named Polaris 2 defeated online professional players in a heads-up Limit match that it will soon infiltrate the world of online poker and mark the end for the game.

According to Fellows, “It wasn’t until mid-2000, an algorithm was developed, that [bots] could even come close to a competent player. But now online computer poker playing may become a thing of the past.”  Going further, Fellows believes that criminals may start appearing in online games using these supposedly unbeatable computer programs to beat humans and these thoughts are stated in his new book “Fell Omen”.

Now I definitely think that it’s amazing what the people at the University of Alberta were able to do with Polaris 2 in making it good enough to beat a batch of extremely talented heads-up players.  But that’s just the thing: these were heads-up Limit matches, not six-handed, not seven-handed, not full tabled games as was discussed by Polaris 2 programmer Mike Johanson when he stopped by the blog.  Just because the program beat the players at heads-up doesn’t mean it is ready to take the world by storm.

Furthermore, most (if not all) of those who have tried to use poker bots in the past have been caught and have had their money confiscated along with their accounts banned.  Sorry to say it Mr. Fellows but your book and ideas may be a little off-base.

Over the years, the money that’s found in poker has grown dramatically.  Not surprisingly, the people who’ve found themselves participating in the game of poker has risen dramatically as well.  And not just in the US where some of the major poker events are held either.  The game has grown to epic proportions internationally as well since most of Europe is playing poker and many Asians are hopping on board too.

But there may be no country or region that has picked up the game as rapidly and been as successful at it as Russia has been.  And for evidence of this fact, just look at all the tournament success that Russians have experienced lately when they were virtual unknowns in the poker world just a short time ago.

One of this year’s final table participants at the WSOP Main Event in November will be Ivan Demidov who sits in second place right now.  He is many people’s favorite to take home the Main Event prize as he is not only one of the more experienced players there but also is within striking distance of the lead.

Svetlana Gromenkova became one of the few women to win a WSOP bracelet this year when she took first place in the Ladies Championship and is rapidly climbing the ladder to becoming one of the most talented female poker players in the world.

Nikolay Evdakov might have had the most consistent play of all time in a WSOP as he broke the record for most cashes in a year when he placed in the money in 10 different events.  Kiril Gerasimov had plenty of cashes too as he did so 4 times for a total of over $400,000.  Vitaly Lunkin also had a good WSOP as he won a bracelet for the Russians.

It’s pretty clear that Russians are definitely improving their poker play but many people wonder what the reason for this is.  Some believe that it is because so many Russians take up the game of chess and this mathematical game is translating over to the felt. 

It’s the same concept of how many good bridge and backgammon players are easily able to transition themselves to becoming successful poker players too.  But whatever the case is, it seems that the growth of good Russian poker players only looks to grow in the future.