TEXAS HOLDEM ONLINE POKER

So many players showed up for the 35th World Series of Poker in Las Vegas that Binion's, which has staged the event since 1970, had only half the field compete last Saturday and made the other half wait until Sunday. The surviving contestants combined when the tournament resumed the next day. The winner will be decided today.

The attendance of 2,756 gamblers -- three times last year's number -- competing for a $5 million prize underlines poker's surging popularity at U.S. casinos. From Harrah's New Orleans to MGM Mirage's Bellagio in Las Vegas, better known for slot machines and blackjack, poker players are waiting hours for tables.

``It's changed the entire gaming industry,'' said Steve Lipscomb, 42, creator of the ``World Poker Tour'' program on Discovery Communications Inc.'s Travel Channel. ``Everyone had shut down or was in the process of shutting down their poker rooms. Now they're rushing to open them.''

The game's lure has been enhanced by televised poker on the Travel Channel and Disney Co.'s ESPN network, which allows viewers to see everyone's cards, and by the rise of online poker rooms.

Another big draw is the emergence of no-limit Texas Hold'em, a game that appeals to both the pros and TV viewers. It allows players with weak cards to bluff opponents and win hands by offering to bet all their chips. The Texas Hold'em showdowns helped attract the record number of gamblers to the World Series, ranging from Swedish Internet players to aging Texans in cowboy hats to Hollywood stars such as Tobey Maguire of ``Seabiscuit'' fame.

Big Spenders

The poker business isn't about to rival the slot machines that bring in an estimated 60 percent of the gaming revenue at casinos, according to Mark Greenberg, chief investment officer at Invesco Leisure Fund in Denver. And many conventioneers seldom stray from the $5 blackjack tables.

Yet revenue from poker has tripled at some casinos, thanks partly to ESPN, which broadcasts the World Series of Poker, and the World Poker Tour show, said Barry Shulman, publisher of Card Player magazine, a trade publication in Las Vegas.

While the gamblers paid as much as $10,000 to enter the championship, Harrah's Entertainment Inc. has the biggest stake. Harrah's bought the World Series of Poker in March, as part of a $39.7 million transaction, from heirs of Benny Binion, the cowboy turned casino operator who began the event at his Horseshoe Hotel 34 years ago with six players.

More Elbow Room

The gamblers will have more room next year when the event moves across town to Harrah's 2,500-room Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino for all but the last two days of the tournament. Then it moves back downtown to Binion's old-style Vegas tournament room, dubbed ``Benny's Bullpen'' after the founder, who died of heart failure at the age of 85 on Christmas Day in 1989.

Las Vegas-based Harrah's, the second-largest U.S. gaming company after Caesars Entertainment Inc. based on revenue, declined to comment on why it purchased the World Series, citing an exclusive-interview arrangement with Forbes magazine.

The Borgata, a joint venture of MGM Mirage and Boyd Gaming Corp., will expand from 34 to 100 poker tables. Monthly poker revenue averages $1 million, up from $700,000 last year, said Jim Rigot, vice president of casino operations at the resort in Atlantic City, New Jersey.

The six Atlantic City casinos with poker, led by the Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort, reap a total of $50 million a year, Rigot said.

In Las Vegas, the Golden Nugget revived its poker room after 15 years. At the Bellagio, revenue from poker is up 35 percent from last year and the poker room will expand from 30 to 38 tables by December, said Doug Dalton, 55, director of poker operations.

Surprise to Industry

Shares of Minneapolis-based Lakes Entertainment Inc., a casino developer that owns 80 percent of the World Poker Tour, have more than quadrupled in value since the TV program's debut in March 2003. With an average of 1.3 million households viewing each week, the World Poker Tour is the Travel Channel's most watched show.

Poker's growing fan base has surprised industry analysts and investors such as Invesco's Greenberg. The game historically hasn't generated much money for casinos, even though 80 million Americans have played it at one time or another, estimates Shulman.

Unlike in blackjack, a casino has no stake in the outcome of each poker hand; it just provides dealers and tables and collects a fee from the winner of each hand, typically as low as 2 percent.

Still, the World Series of Poker, which included 32 smaller tournaments that began a month ago, attracted more than 13,000 entrants. With $41 million in prize money, it's the world's richest sporting event, organizers say.

Poker as `Good PR'

Further evidence of poker's new stature are the big-name advertisers: The main table featured on TV shots includes an ad for Levitra, a male impotence drug sold by GlaxoSmithKline Plc. Another sponsor is Miller High Life beer, brewed by SAB Miller Plc.

``Poker itself doesn't make that much money, but it can bring people into casinos where they'll spend money on other games and stay out of other casinos,'' said Larry Klatzkin, a gaming industry analyst at Jefferies & Co. in New York.

For Harrah's, poker was just a small part of its $4.3 billion revenue last year, Greenberg said. ``It can be a good business for them, and it is certainly good PR,'' he said. Invesco owns 1.4 million shares of Harrah's.

It can be good business for cable-TV channels, too.

In addition to ESPN and the Travel Channel, General Electric Co.'s Bravo and News Corp.'s Fox Sports Net offer poker programs.

``Every good TV show is all about human drama -- like when you're watching someone make a $1 million decision,'' said Lipscomb, who lives in Los Angeles.

`A Ratings Monster'

Starting June 8, ESPN plans to televise 22 one-hour episodes from this year's World Series, up from seven hours in 2003, said spokeswoman Keri Potts. Last year's final episode attracted almost 1.9 million households, more than twice the 800,000 who watched the first episode.

``All of a sudden, it became a ratings monster,'' Potts said.

On Thanksgiving Day, Fox Sports Net aired ``Showdown at the Sands,'' a $1 million tournament hosted by billionaire investor Carl Icahn at the Sands Casino Hotel in Atlantic City. The final hour attracted 580,000 households.

This year's record field was also generated by online poker rooms, such as PartyPoker.com and PokerStars.com, which allow amateurs to hone their games while staying at home.

More than 900 players in the championships won their spots through online tournaments. An additional 500 won satellite tournaments that cost as little as $225 to enter.

`Triple-A Team'

Online poker rooms are helping prepare the next generation of casino poker players, said Dan Goldman, vice president of marketing for Costa Rica-based PokerStars.com.

``Casinos used to view us as evil, but now they see us as their Triple-A team,'' he said.

PokerStars sent last year's winner, Chris Moneymaker, to the tournament. Moneymaker, 28, an accountant from Tennessee, earned his seat in the finals after paying only $40 to enter an online contest. He was eliminated from the latest competition on Sunday.

Two-thirds of the series' players were competing in their first World Series; 95 percent were men.

On Monday, spectators jostled to watch actress Laura Prepon, who stars on Fox's ``That '70s Show.'' Prepon, 24, competing in her first major tournament, outlasted 80 percent of the field, including some former champions and actors Maguire and James Woods. With $21,000 in chips after the first day, Prepon rescheduled a movie audition so she could keep playing.

Down to her last $5,000, she decided to go ``all in'' with a pair of fours in her hand, only to lose to a pair of nines.

As players were eliminated, some lingered to commiserate. On Tuesday, Frank Brabec, a 48-year-old real estate broker from suburban Chicago, lost a $610,000 pot when a young Swede hit a flush on the final card to beat his two pairs.

``I got my money in with the best of it and I lost,'' said Brabec, wearing a red shirt depicting dogs playing poker. ``If there was no luck in poker, no one would play.''