Geno Lawrenzi

Thorpe Is Back In Style

Your favorite poker room has eliminated poker tournaments and has cut out some of your favorite games. What's to do? Why not play blackjack? Blackjack was once my gambling game...

Shadow Of The Manta Ray

St. Kitts is coming alive, thanks to Mike Sexton and the World Poker Tour. Let's keep it rolling and put the islanders back to work. There is a new poker king in town and his...

Rocket to the Moon

There are as many ways to win money in Las Vegas as there are to win. If you have lived in the city called Glitter Gulch long enough, you have probably tested them...

Bulldogging a Killer

There was a manhunt for an escaped killer near Show Low, AZ. A posse of 50 cowboys and Indians was chasing him. And I was there for the capture. The editor of OFFICIAL...

Romance on the Range

Home, home on the range, where the deer and the antelope play and where cowboys drink and get their friends in trouble. In the 1950s, I was a writer for the tabloids -- weekly...

Things My Brother Won't Do

My brother and I have a lot in common, but there are two things he won't do with me -- play poker or go horseback riding. Let's face it. I am a pretty persuasive salesman,...

The Rest of The Story

Luck is a factor in life and it is everything to a gambler. When luck is with you, few things can go against you. And when good luck turns to bad, there is little you can do...

King Of Hustlers

Pete Rose is what baseball is all about. But because he bet money on his own team, he was banned from being named to baseball's Hall of Fame. That is wrong and should be...

The Last Pony Ride

It was time to leave home. Time to grow up and take my last pony ride on a star-lit night along a river in western Pennsylvania. Sutersville, PA. is a scenic little town of...

Challenger On The Premises

It has happened to me and it will happen to you. You will run into an adversary. Be prepared for the war of your life. Excuse me, you're being accosted. There is another man...

Searching For Good Poker

Poker players are facing road blocks in their quest for a good poker game. They're out there, but sometimes you have to search for them. One of my favorite Willie Nelson songs...

Tips To Win A Poker Tournament

It's relatively easy to win a poker tournament in your home town. Just play aggressive, play smart, watch your chips and stick to the basics. I have spent a relaxing couple of...

Casinos, Illusions And Gambling

If a man tells you black is white and white is black, better believe it. There are illusionists in this world who can create reality out of just about anything. Life is made up...

Audie Was A Giant Killer

He was a World War 2 hero and a gentleman who loved women. And if Audie Murphy caught you disrespecting a girl, you had better watch out. He was dangerous. "It isn't the size...

Jackrabbits And Horses

When you are in cowboy country, the people make their own fun. And one day in Clovis, N.M., a rancher put together a jackrabbit hunt and poker tournament. The call came just...

The Miracle Worker

Woody Allen is a genius when it comes to making movies. He has millions of fans around the world and nearly as many enemies. Here is his story. The day I concluded...

Drinking At The Witch's Brew

When you work as a freelance magazine writer, you can get yourself in all sorts of trouble. I was living in Phoenix, AZ. some years ago, between jobs, when I picked up a copy of...

Famous People I Never Met

Who are some of the people you would have loved to have met in life? As a journalist, I have met many, but my list is still longer than my memories. There is one great perk...

Man With The Golden Arm

Nelson Algren was born to write, to drink and to fight for lost causes. He wrote books about drug addicts and alcoholics and was a member of the Communist Party. Nelson...

Gold Nuggets In Burro Flats

When you're a poker player and adventurer, you meet some interesting people. Al Blackman was one of them. Hope he and Rover are still making their rounds. Just south of Hoover...

Casino Owners Should Upgrade Poker

This is a perfect time for casino owners to upgrade poker and let it grow into the 21st century and beyond. And that means expanding it beyond Texas Holdem. Poker is doing well...

Lovely In Black

My late father did many wonderful things for me. But the greatest gift he ever gave me was introducing me to a beautiful flight attendant named Grace Shaw. The call came at 4...

Watch Out For The Gunslingers

Poker players are getting meaner, more aggressive and more offensive. As poker popularity spreads, the behavior of some of the players getting obscene. It's time to stop...

Star Light, Star Bright

Who would you like to see star in a film about poker? Who would be the director and what would the film plot be about? Poker is a universal game and all of us are gamblers. If...

A Dangerous Poker Player

If you develop a reputation in a casino, let it be a dangerous reputation. You don't want you to be called the calling station. It is dangerous to leave a poker player alone...

A Christmas Jail

It was three days before Christmas. I was 12 and my two younger brothers, Dennis and John, also known as Legs, were 11 and 10. Our parents had left us along while they visited my...

Poker Is Coming Back

(Good news for my poker playing buddies around America and the world. It is slow process but poker is on the road to returning to normal). I know a lot of my poker playing...

The Mango Tree

Dreams die hard. I have this dream about St. Kitts in the Eastern Caribbean. Yes, it will take money to complete, but the results could be spectacular. I have a...

Above The Hurricanes

I just discovered a piece of paradise. It's a tropical island where you can pan for gold, frolic along a white sand beach with bikini-clad beauties, and play poker to your...

Planned Insanity

LouFabig was a former race car driver from Germany who enjoyed laying out carrallies. He talked me into entering one that went from Phoenix to Las Vegas. I was working as a...

On The Road Again

Watch out for new friends. If they have bad habits, they can pass them on and you never know what kind of trouble you can get yourself into. Somebody once said that travel...

Finding The Right Game

Before you sit down at a poker game, do some thinking about what you want to play and your reasons for playing it.?Otherwise, your bankroll could be in for trouble. Are you...

Bull in a China Closet

Sometimes you just have to let the animal out of you. Don't think. Just use your animal instinct and react to the other players. The results may pleasantly surprise you. Don't...

All’s Fair In Love, War and Poker

You see things happen in a poker room that can make you sad. Or if not sad, they at least make you think seriously about the game. I have been away from BestBet Casino...

The Way of the West

(Gamblers sometimes get into trouble because of their wild ways. I have known some pretty wild gamblers in my time and their stories aren't pretty.) Sometimes I wish I had been...

Flight of the Eagle

(In the days of the early West, the Indians and wagon train members didn't just fight. They spent some of their time on the trail doing fun things.) The wagon train was long...

Bring Home the Trophies

Poker tournament promoters need to go back to their old system of giving trophies to the winners, the way they did in the old days. That was proof you won a tournament. It...

Cowboy in Black

here are interviews and there are interviews. This is one that will never leave me and it was the key to Johnny Cash's life and faith as a Christian balladeer. Today I am...

Blood, Gore and Politics

Benny Binion, get off that cloud and show these casino execs how a gambling casino should be operated. And, yes, I amtalking about putting the players' interests first. One...

Are You Ready For Poker?

(Las Vegas is struggling for a complete re-opening. It won't beeasy, but it's going to happen, with the help of all the pokerplayers. Are you ready for it to happen?) This has...

Golden Eggs

(Some lessons from childhood stay with us forever. Like those fairytales that have morals for the ages. Pay attention to them and learn about life.) I don't know about...

Under The Saddle Moon

The greatest poker promoter in the history of the game was Benny Binion. And, my friend, you can take that to the bank. He and Johnny Moss were two wild riding...

Champagne Of The Gods

Things are changing. The more I drink, the more they change. Maybe Willie Nelson was right. Here's one more for the road. A one, a two, a three. The Holy Bible says...

Poker Is On Life Support

What has happened to the world of poker and whenwill it end. This is the question poker players are asking themselves and it's serious. I am in the midst of a cross-country tour...

King of Hearts

Who is really insane among us? People in insane asylums or those who wage war and kill one another? KING OF HEARTS makes you wonder. These days because of the global...

Bennie's Way

If you are an old tier like me, you are probably wondering why the casino owners of the world are going to come back to common sense and bring the world of poker back to...

The Perfect Game

(Finding the perfect poker game is a challenge you should relish accepting. Give it your best effort always.) Poker players are always searching for the perfect...

When Man Discovered Fire

The re-opening of Las Vegas has shifted the power to the people. The question is will they be smart enough to figure out how to use it? How smart are you? While you are...

Don't Talk To A Dummy

I just drove across America, a distance of over 1,500 miles from Pittsburgh, PA. to Clovis, N.M., and I can assure you some changes are being made in the way our nation conducts...

Organs In The Desert

Monument Valley is a vast amphitheater of spectacular spires and red rocks about 200 miles north of Phoenix. John Ford discovered it and made it his church. I don't...

The Fastest Quarter Mile

I first discovered the world of quarter horses when I worked as sports editor of the Tucumcari Daily News in Tucumcari, N.M.  Tucumcari was the home of Elkhorn Drug Store...

Route 66 Blues

(The year was 1960. I was an aspiring journalist and writer living in Phoenix, AZ. And two creative television producers came up with a new TV series called "Route 66.") Two...

THE ABCs OF POKER

Dewey Tomko grew up just a few miles from me before making his mark in the World Series of Poker and opening a casino in Costa Rica. Dewey Tomko was born about 10 miles from...

The Blue Highway

All roads lead to Las Vegas. At least that is the way it seems to me any time I join Willie Nelson in singing "On the Road Again." There are many different ways to arrive at a...

If I Win the WSOP

Everyone has a dream. People dream of having good health, of falling in love and getting married, or of becoming a millionaire by winning the lottery. There are few things in...

A Dangerous Game

Texas Hold'em is probably one of the most dangerous card games in the world to beat. Then why do so many people play it? Your guess is as good as mine. Here is a...

Slots of Luck

W.C. Fields or someone like him -- was it P.T. Barnum -- said a sucker is born every minute. He must have been talking about slot machine addicts. Slot machines turn up in...