Poker gifts for a pair of jokers...

December 10, 2005 12:46 PM

Gifts for poker players. $25-$50 limit, and 1 week to go. [more details on the flop]

Mrs. I-Love-Cheese and I are taking part in a secret santa gift exchange next weekend. By chance, we were each assigned a different member of the same couple. They are poker enthusiasts. There's a $25 limit on gifts (allowing us to spend $50 for the couple), and the aformentioned 1 week to have the gifts in hand. What should we buy them? Chips? Folding poker table? Stinky cigars?

We're in the DC area, feel free to suggest local stores.

posted by i love cheese to sports, hobbies, & recreation (18 comments total)

Today's Woot might help. (as long as you click it today, saturday)
posted by muddylemon at 12:49 PM on December 10, 2005

Automatic card shuffler with a set of poker-based coasters?
posted by aberrant at 1:08 PM on December 10, 2005

Are poker books out of the question? Dan Harrington's tournament book is supposed to be really good, and part II just came out a few months ago.

Depending on what they already have, plastic playing cards are a really nice gift. Once you try em you'll never go back to cardboard :-) This site seems to have some price decks but it looks like you can get a 2-pack for under $25.
posted by Happydaz at 1:29 PM on December 10, 2005

*high-priced decks.

Posting while playing three tables of poker at the same time is generally bad for the grammar.
posted by Happydaz at 1:30 PM on December 10, 2005

If you can find KEM cards, get them a setup. They'll appreciate them, even if there's


Skip the auto-shuffler, the ones in this price range are a waste. The chips in this price range are pretty sad as well.

I also love cheese. Especially on tacos
posted by I Love Tacos at 2:25 PM on December 10, 2005

If you can find KEM cards, get them a setup. Even if they already have one, they'll appreciate it. (It's almost impossible to have too many cards, and KEM cards are both near-legendary, and out of production)

Skip the auto-shuffler, the ones in this price range are a waste. The chips in this price range are pretty sad as well. The cigars in this range are mediocre, but good enough to stink up a poker game.

I also love cheese. Especially on tacos
posted by I Love Tacos at 2:28 PM on December 10, 2005

James McManus tackles this today in the NY Times (reg/req'd). He's too modest to include his own fine book, Positively Fifth Street.
posted by sixpack at 2:29 PM on December 10, 2005

High-price decks are REALLY convenient and great gifts, worth the price. I play 3-4 times a week and go through a lot of decks, when we had a bendproof one, we were really impressed with not having to change the deck at all.
posted by dflemingdotorg at 2:30 PM on December 10, 2005

Kem cards are not actually out of production. The company was bought by another company and still makes cards. Their customer service has gone to hell, however, and their quality has degraded slightly.

Other plastic card manufacturers include Copag and Gemaco.

Plastic cards are a great gift in your price range, and for that price range, there's pretty much not much else you can get a poker player that will be useful. He/she probably already has chips, and the sets you can get in the $50 range probably are the same or lesser quality as what he/she has unless new to the game.

I would recommend against an automatic card shuffler. They're loud, annoying, not very effective and it will end up not getting used. Same for today's woot.

I would second the recommendations of books - especially Dan Harrington's "Harrington on Hold 'Em" books (volumes 1 and 2).
posted by twiggy at 2:43 PM on December 10, 2005

One more vote for nice plastic cards; probably the best option in your price range. Also, if you get a pretty superior pair of decks (do get a pair of decks), like the new KEM or rough equivalent, the set can fit into whatever setup they've got and it won't be redundant, even if they've already got a bunch.

Poker books are good too, but you might want to assess their particular interest(s) before assuming that "Harrington on Hold 'Em" is the way to go. Although I suppose pretty much everyone is into no limit tournaments these days, so it's not such a risk. I really liked that McManus book, personally.
posted by rkent at 2:58 PM on December 10, 2005

A nice set of poker chips (the clay kind not the plastic) can sometimes be found on ebay for around $50 (they are heavy though so shipping is usually the large part of the equation). I got a really good set for a steal (clay with coin inlay $45 shipped) just like these on ebay recently-not the usual crap in this price range. They are heavy like real vegas chips and the coin inlay makes a nice klinking sound as you rake the pot. You might be cutting it close on your deadline using ebay though unless you can find an auction ending soon with a seller nearby.
posted by HyperBlue at 5:41 PM on December 10, 2005

sixpack's Times article has great suggestions, which I'm eating up. My brother has started playing tournaments, and has all the basic stuff already, but he doesn't have DVD on chip tricks! Cool.

But James McManus' book itself as a gift?-- be careful. I enjoyed his descriptions of the world of the game itself, but I did not enjoy his booklength, sexist, I'm-such-a-suburban-bad-boy navel-gaze, or some of the nasty graphic details of the sex perversions and drug activites of Vegas lowlifes. Some people will really enjoy it, some will find it icky. I fell somewhere in the middle.
posted by Miko at 7:11 PM on December 10, 2005

Automatic card shufflers make you think the mob has actually sat down at your card game and begun shooting. They're that loud. (Especially the cheaper ones, natch.)

Plus, people like shuffling by hand. Especially if they're trying to cheat.

Also, and it may be entirely too cheesy, you can look at customized playing cards, complete with a picture of... whatever. If you know them well, perhaps you can do something humorous or classy.
posted by disillusioned at 10:03 PM on December 10, 2005

The best card shuffler, hands down, is the mechanical variety that operates with a hand crank. Like the person who describes it in this link, I first saw one at my grandparents' house. Inveterate card players, they loved this shuffler because as they got older, their hands were less flexible for hand shuffling. We once got them an electric one and they hated it -- it jammed all the time, and produced bad shuffles.

We couldn't find a hand crank one for ages, but then Restoration Hardware started carrying them. Highly recommended for card buffs -- although I agree that hipster poker players may not prefer to use them.
posted by Miko at 5:56 AM on December 11, 2005

i used to organize conferences in my industry, and i'd always pick up a few of the following for the executives who played poker:

Michael Graves Poker Game

or....

Vegas Classic Poker Set in Wood Case

they're actually pretty nice kits, even for the fifth avenue boys.
posted by eatdonuts at 8:04 AM on December 11, 2005

I was tagging along with a friend who was xmas shopping yesterday - we inadvertantly wandered into a games store and these invisible playing cards caught my eye and I had to buy them (for myself).

The quality is quite good and they look really fantastic.
posted by PurplePorpoise at 11:15 AM on December 11, 2005

Purple Porpoise I've got a set of those too. They are really cool, but my poker buddies and I found them hard to shuffle/deal. Because of this I use them for Solitaire (non-PC variety) instead of for poker.
posted by HyperBlue at 1:30 PM on December 11, 2005

Ah, yes HyperBlue - now that I've had the chance to work them a little, I find them a little difficult to handle.

My friend, though, was working (shuffles, squares, & throws) them like a pro with a normal deck. Not sure if it's a personal thing or a general (ie., I just suck) thing -

- yeah, they're a little too slippery for me. They still look neat, though.
posted by PurplePorpoise at 9:15 PM on December 11, 2005