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POCKET ACES

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Maryann Guberman has been a writer and editor with many gaming publications, including Sports Form, Card Player, Poker World, Player's Panorama and Systems and Methods. She also has written and edited numerous books on gambling.

March 03, 2007

Is the Poker Press Crashing?

An unpopular rule is never long maintained. Seneca

Earlier this year, someone asked me if I thought poker had reached a saturation point. I didnÕt think so and could find no reason why the question had been posed. From what I could tell, TV was still rife with poker shows, though I have been trading off most TV shows except for National Geographic and Public TV stations of late. Still, I thought the question deserved some investigation.

What a shock. Using GamblerÕs Book Shop as my barometer I noticed only ten new poker titles hit the stores shelves in the last month. One new arrival was actually an old book that had been out of stock for some years, another was an audio version of a previously published Phil Hellmuth work, two of the selections were novels, while a third was a mixture of essays, music and card manipulation (Ricky Jay Plays Poker). IÕm accustomed to seeing way more than this number.

Oh, wait, February consisted of just 28 days. That could explain it. No, I donÕt think so because last February saw 18 new titles. Something is amiss.

Could it be this whole brouhaha over citizens of the United States using their computers to gamble has something to do with the decline in poker verbiage?

This I doubt. People donÕt stop playing poker just because their government tells them itÕs a sin, er, I mean a crime, uh, I mean É.

Maybe the publishing world has run out of poker writers who have anything new to say.

No, that canÕt be. Poker is such a complex game that we should never run out of new things to say about it.

Honestly? I donÕt think thereÕs any relationship between the decline in the number of poker books and the popularity of poker. I think poker is still strong. In fact, a research trip along the Las Vegas Strip this past weekend indicated that people want poker. For this jaunt I decided to take the monorail, which cost me the same as a buy-in to a tournament, and didnÕt save me any time since the southern most stop is behind the MGM Grand. That left a lot of steps to cover just to get to the boulevard and a lot more to get to the furthest casino with a poker room--Mandalay Bay. (Sorry, guys, but this thing just doesnÕt work! Just thought IÕd throw that in.) But, the walk did prove that poker thrives! All the rooms I checked were up to capacity and some of them had waiting lists.

Poker lives but poker publishing wavers. Truth? I think the market has been flooded. While diehard fans will buy every book they can get their hands on, most people, I believe, have been presented with much too much information and they havenÕt had time to digest it all. I believe that factor alone has slowed the sales of poker books and as a result has caused publishers to pull back the call for manuscripts.

I recollect a time when I was more or less forced to read six books a week on such tantalizing subjects as the Victorian novel, the origin of the English language, and the complete works of William Blake for post-graduate, short-termed studies. Recently, however, I find it difficult to plough through more than two books a month Ð and many times I donÕt finish them! ThereÕs just too much.

I donÕt think the current state of affairs (fewer new poker books) is art imitating life. I think itÕs life being lived and poker being experienced. Once a new player sits down to play for real money and gains confidence, his need for reading material abates. Players who are really good and those who racked up a lot of hand time on the Internet, have experience on their side -- something it took the old-timers years to gain. Their need for instructions on how to play ace-king unsuited doesnÕt exist any more.

I also think the call for books will not completely fade away. The current decline will continue but eventually the field will level itself and poker will become like golf. A couple of good magazine will prevail, experts will write an occasional book to bring out the newer and finer points of the game, and fans will continue to be drawn in. Every living, breathing human being wonÕt come to the green felt but there will, now and forever (however long that might be) the player base is set. And, as soon as that unpopular rule gets overturned, adjusted, rewritten, or whatever has to happen to let progress continue, the naysayers of poker will have to find something else to say nay about!