Avi Benyakar
Texas Hold’em poker is today’s most popular poker game; it might be the most popular card game in the world. Below Peter Chaili gives us account of his personal experience of the game and its McDaniel debut on April 7. Here, though, is its history.
The name “Texas Hold’em”: while there is no clear evidence of the origin of the name of Texas Hold’em, it’s pretty sure that the game originated in Texas. Legend has it that the game first was played in Robstown, Texas, in the early twentieth century, and came to Dallas, Texas in 1928.
The unique rules of the game: another legend has it that the original poker game Texas Hold’em was developed because a single deck of cards was not enough for large group of farmers who wanted to play at the same time, since the cards ran out before all players received their cards.
Growth in popularity of Texas Hold’em around the globe: Texas Hold’em game was introduced to Las Vegas by gamblers from Texas, including the legendary poker player Amarillo Slim. At a later stage the game was immensely popular when it became the main event at poker tournaments.
In 1972 only eight poker players took part in a series of poker tournaments worldwide, thirty years later the number of players who took part in the tournament grew to eight hundred. That number is growing rapidly every year and currently there are thousands. (Last year there were more than 9,000 players.)
Over the years, poker has become a part of leisure culture. Its popularity grew thanks to live television broadcasts of poker, books and films that dealt with it, and of course playing live on the Internet, which has made it accessible to more and more poker players from around the world.
Today technology enables players all around the globe to enter tournaments and make their mark. It does not matter if you sit in a luxurious casino in Las Vegas or Europe, or use the Internet to play poker. Anyone anywhere has the opportunity to perpetuate his name and win the glory of world large sums of money of the Champions game – Texas Hold’em Poker.
