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Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle

July 22, 2005

Headline: Say hello to our new poker face

Body:
Chances are you won't be teeing it up any time soon at the Masters with Tiger Woods. For that matter, the odds dictate you're not likely to find yourself at the World Series of Poker across the table from Daniel Negreanu, whose weekly column on poker debuts today.

But Negreanu thinks that if you follow his weekly tips, you can become the best player on your block, which is the first step on the way toward Las Vegas.

"Poker doesn't discriminate," he said. "There's no prerequisite in the sport other than learning to play. It's hard to become a top player, but it's easy to be a winning player. It's as simple as studying it as you would study math or any other subject. You can become good at it."

Negreanu, 30, a native of Toronto who gravitated to poker from pool and sports betting, has won 36 tournament titles and was the 2004 World Series of Poker player of the year and Card Player magazine's player of the year.

His weekly column, which appears in 18 newspapers in the United States and Canada, including the Seattle Times and the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, will focus on tips and strategy for the basic player.

"This is for the everyday player," he said. "We'll have tips that can help you win games, like the top five reasons that players do certain things. A lot of it is following the book and making fewer mistakes than the other guys. We'll work week by week on eliminating common errors."

He'll also focus on one of the game's most difficult lessons: the fact that luck has everything to do with poker.

"Most people find the luck or the variance factor is more important than they thought," he said. "Just because you're a good player doesn't mean you're always going to win. The toughest part of the game is dealing with bad luck."

By DAVID BARRON
david.barron@chron.com

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