Posted by Dr Fro 3:37 PM

Pauly tells us that

Those happy sunny summer days of poker are over for now as the winter of discontent approaches. And eventually the bitter winter freeze ends in a thaw and those warm halcyon days quickly return. But not for a while.

As always, he has a good write up on the state of affairs in poker and his life.

Iggy takes the political angle.

And our own John Greene tells us his prediction that NL holdem will slowly die down. I disagree with Mr. Greene. I agree that we may have seen a peak, an inflection point in the exponential rise of poker (including NL) popularity, but I believe it will continue to be quite popular. For starters, the gay law that was just passed will increase the amount of B&M play. People in Dallas are a little more likely to drive 1 hour to Winstar than they were a few weeks ago. I personally think that the law will hurt Vegas a bit in the very long run as the online gambling is a great recruiting ground to turn normal people into degenerate gamblers, that is, degenerate gamblers that like to go on vacations to places like Las Vegas. I also agree with the point that there will be a shift to limit games over the next decade for the same reason that there was a shift (in this country only) many moons ago. But there was a paradigm shift in the way casinos viewed poker, and that won't change. There used to be no catering to the (oxymoron alert) low-roller-no-limit player. Casinos figured out that this was a very important demographic. Unlike the professionals who hardly tipped, never rented a room and begged for comps, the guys showing up now would pay for rooms, buy dinner at the steak house, but jewelry for their girlfriend at the gift shop, get wasted and blow a few hundred at the BJ table on his way out the door. Basically, NL Holdem Guy was the casinos ultimate customer. I think that as long as casinos like having customers that willingly hand over money, they will continue to spread NL Holdem. And, to misquote Field of Dreams, if you spread it, they will come.

And if anybody is wondering why I am so giddy today, it might have something to do with winning the office pool this week (the Washington State pick was golden), winning on the Cardinals last night, and holding a Cardinals to win it all ticket from Caesar's.

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