On the Las Vegas Strip, the right poker room makes you predator, not prey

The burnished mahogany, subdued lighting and soothing earth tones of the Golden Nugget’s newly remodeled poker room might radiate a warm, club-like vibe, but I was ice cold as I recently bought into one of its No Limit Texas Hold ‘Em ring games. While the other players at the table played cautiously against one another, they were relentlessly and collectively aggressive against me. Check-raising me, trapping me, slow-playing me with big pairs, going over the top of my feeble raises and bluffing me right into the ATM machine.

Had I inadvertently plunked down into some sort of conspiracy? Was I the designated sucker of the day? Was the whole world against me?

Yes to all the above. Only after an hour and a half of this galling abuse did it dawn on me that most of the players knew one another. Sure, I had tried to cut an intimidating table image by donning a baseball cap, dark Maui Jim shades and stuffing my ears with an iPod, just like the champs do on TV. Big deal. I was still a one-man all-you-can-eat buffet for my ravenous tablemates.

“You should have known better,” said my friend Max Ruhlmann, a skilled gambler who has made a solid profit at the poker tables for the last decade. “You were playing. Those guys were working — working on you. A chance is exactly what I wanted.

It’s springtime, and that means millions of us regulars are casting a greedy eye on the World Series of Poker. Starting June 1, thousands will compete for six weeks in Vegas for mind-boggling prizes. Last year’s top winner — Malibu producer Jamie Gold, a good but not great player — took home $12 million. There are only two ways to get into the World Series: Buy a seat for the full-freight price of $10,000 or win a seat by clinching a preliminary “satellite” tournament for as little as $100 or less.

And the only way to prepare for one of those tourneys, I figured, was to practice in low-stakes cash games, like the one at the Nugget.

“No, not there!” said Max Ruhlmann, a skilled gambler who has made a solid profit at the poker tables for the last decade. “In a place like that, you’re sure to run right into a pro or two.... Next time, look for a game where people are actually having fun, and you might stand a chance.”

Poker has never been bigger in Vegas than right now. It was almost extinct five years ago, but there are now more than 100 poker rooms in Sin City, and probably two or three new ones added each month. The boom reflects the national poker craze touched off in 2003 by the Travel channel’s World Poker Tour, which popularized the use of the “pocket cam,” the hidden camera that lets the audience see the hole cards of each player. Overnight, one of the most boring activities to watch on TV became high drama. Throw in the no-limit betting rule in Texas Hold ‘Em and you have nothing less than sweet music to Vegas casinos.

“First thing, lose the glasses and the cap,” Ruhlmann counseled. “That’s exactly the sort of player I look for to win against. Y’know, TV wannabes.

“Then find a poker room where there’s a lot of young people drinking a lot and making a lot of noise. I recommend Hooters.”

My cultural aesthetic standards are pretty low when it comes to Vegas. But that low? I was so resistant to the notion of Hooters that I slowly worked my way down the Strip sampling other rooms.

The posh poker palace inside the Venetian has high, recessed ceilings, ornate chandeliers and sand-colored felt on the tables — all of which reeked luxury. I bought in for $100 worth of chips in the no-limit $1 to $2 game and soon found a rich mix of players. Unskilled tourists, some seasoned locals and a few who, without a doubt, were pros. No thanks.

Next, I tried the room at the aging Riviera that was, in reality, just a roped-off space inside the larger casino. A friendly game with lots of player bonuses for good hands, but not much excitement.

By midnight, I had succumbed to temptation, braced myself and strolled into Hooters on the southern end of the Strip, just across from the MGM Grand. Truth is, compared with the sea of kitsch around it, the Vegas Hooters isn’t that bad. OK, I actually liked it.

And Ruhlmann was spot-on about Pete’s Poker Room inside. Tiny, with only three tables and its knotty pine walls, plywood floors and bright yellow table felt, the room seemed more like an adolescent clubhouse. The noise coming from the adjoining sports bar was ear-splitting. Just as Ruhlmann predicted, the younger players at the table, all wearing caps and shades, were more interested in slugging back another round of brewskis and cheering the basketball game on the bar TVs than they were in their hands.

Twice as old as the average player there, I put my shades and cap back on, slowly — very slowly — nursed a Bud and bought in for another $100. Well, move over Johnny Chan! I was immediately on a roll, stacking and racking up the chips, playing my rush and getting reckless: going all-in on marginal hands such as small pocket pairs and A-9. And winning. It’s easy when everyone is a worse player than you.

Well, not everyone. I soon realized that as different players busted out and new ones cycled into the nine seats, there were always two or three who were there for the same reason I was: to feed off the kiddies.

During the dealer’s shuffle, we’d look at one another over our glasses with knowing glances and raised eyebrows. Stealing candy was never easier.

I didn’t quit till the rising sun punctured the desert darkness. In the previous six hours, I had seen a steady parade of sometimes awful players come to the table with a swagger, only to leave in a slump — including the two who had literally passed out, head down on the poker table.

But I had more than quintupled my stake overnight, and if that meant some kid had lost this semester’s tuition, so be it. In the morning light, I was dreaming only of taking out Jamie Gold.