Announcing ThreeRiversPoker.com

Over the last three years, I've written the occasional post about poker at my personal blog. I've been calling, raising and folding since I was a kid. We used to sit around my grandparents' kitchen table playing seven-card stud with this frayed box of plastic chips they must have bought before I was born.

I started playing for real money in high school, after seeing the Mel Gibson version of Maverick in theaters. (Most people will tell you it was Rounders that got them either into cards or back into cards. For me, it was Maverick ... although that's just between us, okay?) In those days, it was dealer's choice, anything goes. We played poker variants like queen and what follows, king little, baseball, criss-cross -- absolutely ridiculous stuff. Still, by that time, I was winning more than I was losing.

We continued playing on through college, though all those wild-card games eventually faded away. We started playing hold'em with some regularity. Then the poker boom hit: the World Series on ESPN, the WPT, Chris Moneymaker. It was nice that I already knew how to play and had a semi-regular game. But now more people wanted in it. Fine by me.

There were poker trips to Vegas and Atlantic City in my late 20s and early 30s, and then last fall -- finally! -- table games went live not far from where I call home. In West Virginia, poker rooms opened at Wheeling Island and Mountaineer, two racetrack/casinos less than an hour's drive from my home in the Pittsburgh suburbs. I don't play nearly as much as some do; about every three weeks or so I'll head over for a full day's worth of poker. But, boy, it's nice to have some $1-$2 no-limit available any time I want the action.

And I must not be the only one who thinks so. The Wheeling Island poker room is packed by early afternoon almost every day. The waiting lists at night regularly stretch 30-people deep. Because of all the interest in local poker, and because I was already writing a bit on the subject, I decided to start a poker blog. So allow me to officially announce ThreeRiversPoker.com -- a poker blog for players from Pittsburgh and the entire tri-state area.

This blog won't be as comprehensive, or updated nearly as much, as my other big online endeavor -- FantasyHurler.com. But from now on, I will post my poker musings here at Three Rivers Poker instead of at my personal site. I'll also be posting Wheeling Island and Mountaineer news, rumors, schedules, etc., as well as information about legislation that could legalize table games in Pennsylvania. The goal is to make this the Net's best online resource for poker players in the Pittsburgh area. If that includes you, be sure to bookmark us. And, hey, maybe I'll bump into you at the tables one day.