I attended the grand opening/premiere/LV poker mixer for The Real Deal at the Venetian on Tuesday. I’m still processing what I witnessed — but I am pretty sure it was the official jumping of the shark for poker, as some 500 poker fans (including Tim Conway, Robert Wagner, Bob Newhart, multiple poker agents, WSOP officials, and the owner of the Venetian and president of the Sands, who walked out after 25 minutes) witnessed painfully how getting lots of airtime on ESPN, GSN, and Fox Sports comes nowhere close to making you a Vegas entertainer worthy of a $100 ticket twice a night, let alone twice a lifetime.*

*Exceptions: Lacey Jones and Vinnie Favorito were great.

Wicked Chops and RawVegas were there, too. And they took advantage of the red carpet to poll a few well known poker players on who they’re backing in the presidential election:

The breakdown:

Daniel Negreanu — Obama
Scotty Nguyen — McCain
Doyle Brunson — Diplomatic: likes McCain but “Obama is better for poker” (?)
Todd Brunson — McCain
Lacey Jones — Undecided: Worked in previous McCain campaigns, but “on the fence”
Eli Elezra — Filibuster: Obama “right guy for poker … but I’m a businessman also”
Gavin Smith — Obama
Dennis Phillips — Diplomatic Filibuster: House and Senate elections matter more

Early reports from the $15k main event of WPT Festa al Lago (at Bellagio) … Michael Phelps showed up to play … he’s out. And our favorite Donkey Bomber also just got bombed … he got it all-in with Aces only to have his opponent flop quad Queens.

Yikes, when I said “Feel My Pain,” I didn’t mean it so literally.

I’m following the so-so coverage not-so-closely via CardPlayer.com. A lotta pros … looks to be smaller than last year. Big-name pros playing mostly today (Hellmuth, Brunson, Negreanu, G.Smith, et al), probably because they’ve got the big premier of their poker musical (The Real Deal) at the Venetian tomorrow night.

Just got back on the grid and playing electronic catch-up … here are some of the things that are making good browser viewing, but not quite stimulating a full-fledged post:

Jay Busbee (from Bluff) has a good State of the Poker Union address on ESPN.com, where he officially declares the poker boom dead. Also interesting to see ESPN, for the first time I remember in a long-long while, running (non-affiliate) PokerStars ads. [ESPN.com]

Poker Shrink Cranky Olde Coot has a good post wondering why FIDPA still hasn’t made the “new rules” they’ve long ballyhooed public. [PokerBlog.com]

Full Disclosure: FIDPA is one of my MySpace friends. [MySpace.com]

Liberal columnist Michael Kinsley shares a story about John McCain going on some extremely unpresidential tilt at the craps table. (The TJ Cloutier of Politics? Tons of success, a sometimes dangerous love of craps, and never quite able to win the Big One?) [The Daily Beast, via Huffington Post, via Short-Stacked Shamus]

Beyond the Table has a new home online. [Podcast.com]

I think Dr. Pauly’s starting to get a little miffed at me for not working out some production kinks and posting our re-constituted incarnation of Tao of Pokerati, but I think I can make him feel better by simply reading his blog. [Tao of Poker]

With all the talk of what really goes into a world-record endurance poker session, I forgot to send y’all to live-forum coverage of The Poker Den 3 — PartyPoker’s 36-hour high-stakes televised cash game. [MatchroomPoker.com]

Dutch Boyd apparently bought Steve Hall’s Pokerfolio in a semi-hostile takeover. Poor Steve … but he has found a new home for his poker updates/pictures of attractive Asian female dealers. [Pokerfolio.Spruz.com]

Also, the X-10 electronic table — a knock-off of the PokerTek PokerPro popping up in so many places — sharing the same name as a hidden camera used by so many pervy peeping toms before a few lawsuits encouraged them to re-market themselves as a security device. [SlipperyBrick.com]

And long overdue, here’s a great tale of a totally degenerate poker blogger/gambler rescuing his bankroll by poetically chasing/hitting the Station Casinos bad-beat jackpot. [TheTrooper97, via Up for Poker]

There’s more, too, coagulating in my bookmarks and inbox. News stories, forum threads, tourney results … Who knows … maybe I’ll get to them for your reading pleasure, but as is always the case from Head Slacker at this Little-Ole Poker Blog, no promises. It’s good to be back with you all.

LATE ADDITIONS:

Lacey Jones is getting ready for her co-hosting duties of Real Deal, the pokery interactive musical at The Venetian, which kicks off next week. [PokerListings.com via LasVegasAdvisor.com]

She also hosted an interesting event at Cathouse (as simply Lacey J) where women showed up for a seductive-attire contest where the winner got a boob job. [Photobucket.com]

Meanwhile, there was a hardcore SWAT-team poker raid in Fayetteville, NC. A firsthand account as well as some non-poker media coverage here and here. [Triangle Poker Journal]

Some various news stories while wondering what Darus Suharto’s doing right now…

Congrats to John Phan, who took down the WPT Legends of Poker main event at the Bike. That makes 2 WSOP bracelets and 2 WPT final tables since mid-June for the Razor.

The debacle at the $50,000 HORSE event appears to have affected the Scotty Nguyen Poker Challenge at the Cherokee Casino in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The page dedicated to the event appears to have changed a bit in the past week:

August 23rd version from Google’s cache

The same page on August 30.

An interview with Nolan Dalla, WSOP Media Director, on Lou Krieger’s Keep Flopping Aces podcast says to expect new rules regarding player behavior to be instituted in time possibly for the WSOP Circuit events in October.

Strangely enough, the current rules in place were able to disqualify a player who was misbehaving at the final table, even though said player had the chip lead.

The five remaining defendants from an arrest (and SWAT team raid) on a South Carolina home for playing poker back in April 2006 are still trying to get a trial, which may be over a year away.

The Asian Poker Tour drew a field of about 250 for their latest stop, Macau. They had two day 1’s to whittle down the field to 67 remaining. Notable names remaining: JJ Liu, Casey Kastle, and Mel Judah. Play starts again at midnight Eastern time, with updates available on the APT site and Pokernews.

Circle your calendars for Oct. 14, when the Real Deal poker game show (with host Paul Rodriguez) at the Venetian makes its debut. Tickets start at only $75, but audience members will be able to walk away with valuable prizes (imagine how hard it is to walk away with a plasma TV).

More exciting stuff later, maybe…

The poker shark just can’t seem to be jumped. While I don’t expect to see All In: The Musical on broadway any time soon, apparently some people believe that poker players actually go see shows, or at least that they are more likely to if the show is about poker. The Real Deal is gonna be part poker theatre, part poker tourney, part poker game show, with audience members interacting with various pros on stage via wi-fi at The Venetian. Poker thespians will include Doyle Brunson, Daniel Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth, Jr., Antonio Esfandiari, Gavin Smith, Eli Elezra, Jennifer Harman, Phil Laak, Scotty Nguyen, and Todd Brunson — guess they’ve got nothing better to do with High Stakes Poker gone — and surely it is only a matter of time before Hellmuth wins a Tony and/or The Producers will be brought to you by FullTiltPoker.net. No word on whether or not they plan to add hypnosis to the mix (”I will find inner peace and fold these pocket 10s”), but just to let the poker entertainmentpreneurs out there know, poker still has yet to be translated into any of the following:

Poker: the Topless Revue
Poker: the Pool
Poker: the Mechanical Bull Ride
Poker: the Buffet
Poker: the Surgery

Who says there still isn’t room for growth in this industry? Click below to read the full press release, and for more info about a show that will be sure to dazzle us in frightening ways before the end of the year:

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