Poker in PA: Players Flock To Pittsburgh

“Interest in poker is definitely heightened”

Poker in PA: Players Flock To Pittsburgh
RJ Schmidt, Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs License

Vegas. Atlantic City. Los Angeles. All hotbeds of poker. Now…Pittsburgh?

Local PA affiliate KPXI reports that, finally, Pittsburgh is getting some name recognition in the poker game. Big stakes. Televised tournaments. Star players. Pittsburgh has it all…well, had it all when Poker Night In America came to town to start filming.

“Poker in Pittsburgh is actually pretty big,” says Jack Schanbacher, 31, of Reserve, who went up against 2004 WSOP Main Event champion Greg Raymer, 2009 Main Event champion Joe Cada and four other big names during the “Poker Night” filming at Rivers Casino. “There are some high-stakes games that go on in Pittsburgh that you don’t find across the country. There are some wealthy guys that enjoy playing poker. We get some very big games.”

In fact, it was PNIA’s Nolan Dalla that saw the potential in the city as a up and coming hotbed of poker activity.

“(It’s) a fresh, new market where poker is popular and seems to be growing,” says Dalla, who has been media director for the World Series of Poker since 2002 and was PokerStars’ communications director for three years. “We find that players are much more excited and open to what we are trying to do in poker locations that are relatively new and fresh.”

The players were excited to take a shot at some of the big name pros as well as the locals who reportedly sometimes play games as big as $25/$50. Poker Night In America was shot at the Rivers Casino, the 4th largest casino in PA, with a 30 table room that sees its fair share of higher stakes action players.

Interested in reading more about how the Pittsburgh poker scene? Check out the full article.

21+ in OH. Please play responsibly. For help, call the Ohio Problem Gambling Helpline at 1-800-589-9966 or 1-800-GAMBLER.
published 10 years, 2 months ago • by • permalink

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