We were in Las Vegas last week and stopped by our favorite blogger Matt Stout's house to marked card tricks check out his new digs.

He recently bought Paul Wasicka's house in Spanish Trail and after seeing it we have to say, we're a little big jealous. Check out the video and tell us what you think of the crib in the comments below.

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If you follow high-stakes online poker you’re no doubt familiar with Viktor "Isildur1” Blom, Patrik Antonius and Phil Ivey.

You may even know that Ivey’s new account on Full Tilt is "Polarizing” or that Antonius has returned to his old "FinddaGrind" alias.

Over the last couple years cheat poker, however, the next wave of online poker players has encroached upon the high-stakes scene.

It can be hard for even the most devoted online poker fan to keep track of the new handles so here’s a quick guide to the latest movers and shakers from the last year.

Some of these players are still unidentified so feel free to share your thoughts about who the accounts belong to in the comments below.

All profit numbers are from highstakesdb.com:

Ragen70

Real Name: Niklas Heinecker

Online profit this year: $3.8 million

Biggest live tournament score: $4.4 million

Nationality: German

Current residence: Hamburg, Germany

Bio: What a year for Niklas Heinecker. Not only is he one of the biggest online winners but he also took down this year’s inaugural GuangDong Asia Millions for $4.4 million.

Heinecker has actually been around poker for years but 2013 has really proved to be his breakout trick cards.

He travels the international circuit with fellow Germans Igor Kurganov, Tobias Reinkemeier, Fabian Quoss and Phillip Gruissem.

Cottonseed1

Real Name: Kyle Hendon

Online profit this year: $3.1 million mid-2013 (opted out of tracking)

Biggest tournament score: n/a

Nationality: American

Current residence: Mexico

Bio: Despite having played since the mid-2000s, Kyle "Cottonseed1” Hendon has always been well under the radar.

2013 may be the year that all changes for Hendon as he’s absolutely crushing the high-stakes games with $3.1 million in profit on Full Tilt Poker.

Hendon has been particularly dangerous in the big $2k/$4k FLO8 games that have been running.

Interestingly Hendon is one of the few players who has opted out of having his long-term results displayed so his exact profit is unknown.

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How to Host the Perfect Poker Home Game is a 13-part series on how to run the superlative poker night for all your friends and coworkers.

We’ll cover everything from what game of poker is easiest to play, what hand beats what and even what drinks and food to serve. Follow this guide and people will be reserving their seat at poker lenses your table weeks in advance.

For our seventh article we’re going to take a look who you actually want to invite to your game and what you can expect from each demographic.

These are a few of the basic groups that you can choose, or choose not, to invite to your home game.

Best Buds

This is your bread and butter. You want to invite your closest friends because you know they are trustworthy and good people to be around.

You can call them up on short notice and fill out your game if you need.

Pros

• It’s way better bluffing someone you’ve known for years
• Even if they dominate you at the table you may get a free drink out of it later
• Ability to taunt your friends for years to come

Cons

• They’re probably going to borrow money
• They may not leave
• They’re pretty damn offensive

  Co-Workers

  Co-workers are a great source for fodder at the poker table because you know they make money!

  Putting the word out in an office is a good way to build your game quickly.

  Pros

  • You know where your opponents work so collecting is easy
  • Poker can be a bonding experience
  • You’ll all be equally tired at work the next day

  Cons

  • Bluffing your superior out of a $100 pot could make things interesting the next day
  • Things get awkward when crazy Phil from accounting suggests everyone put their next paycheck on the line
  • Bill Lumbergh keeps reminding you about your TPS reports

  Members of the Opposite Sex

  This is a tricky one. If it’s an all-guys game it sounds great to get a couple good looking women in on the game. The thing is it can change the dynamic considerably.

  Remember you’re not going to look very attractive to a member of the opposite sex if you bluff them out of a $100 pot and dive onto the table to perform a chip backstroke.

  Conversely ladies’ poker nights work very well and sometimes women feel more comfortable just playing with other females. Proceed with caution.

  Pros

  • Game tends to be more civil
  • Your home game could conceivably double in size
  • The game is usually more relaxed and fun

  Cons

  • Game tends to be more civil luminous contact lenses
    
  • Sleeping on the couch for check-raising your wife/significant other sucks
  • If you’re a guy, losing a massive pot to a girl who had "double kings” might hurt your ego
  • In the poker game of life, women are the rake

  • Professional Poker Players

    Poker pros are a long shot, of course, and will arguably destroy the game for everyone else.

    On the plus side you have a shot at getting your game televised!

    Pros

    • Good story to tell all your friends

    Cons

    • You will lose all your money
    • Several pros keep nagging you for a buffet comp
    • Phil Hellmuth keeps referring to you as an "idiot from Northern Europe”
    • They’ll convince you to "play with the pros” then simply take all the money on the table and wait for the DOJ to come for it
    
    

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The rumor mills are already grinding away after Doyle Brunson met with Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps recently.

Phelps was in Las Vegas with some of his friends over the weekend. He ended up having dinner Saturday night with Doyle Brunson, and several other pro poker players, which started buzz that perhaps Phelps would be joining the Doyles Room online marked cards poker site.

Brunson blogged about the meeting on Sunday, but made no mention of any business talk.

"What a nice kid! He had a bunch of his friends from home with him and they were the guests of the Palms Hotel and Casino," Brunson wrote. "I got a call that he was an avid poker fan and wanted to meet me, Todd, and Hoyt Corkins.Jennifer Harman

Doyle Brunsonmet with Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps recently.

Phelps was in Las Vegas with some of his friends over the weekend. He ended up having dinner Saturday night withDoyle Brunson, and several other pro poker players, which started buzz that perhaps Phelps would be joining theDoyles Roomonline poker site.

Brunson blogged about the meeting on Sunday, but made no mention of any business talk.

"What a nice kid! He had a bunch of his friends from home with him and they were the guests of the Palms Hotel and Casino," Brunson wrote. "I got a call that he was an avid poker fan and wanted to meet me, Todd, andHoyt Corkins.Jennifer Harman and her husband Marco were also there."

Brunson brought along some copies of Super/System 1 and 2 for Phelps and his friends, and he spent some time answering all kinds of infrared marked cards poker questions from the group.

"Michael said all he wanted to do in life was to eat, swim and play poker," Brunson wrote.That's no surprise after Phelps' performance at the Beijing Olympics this summer. After taking gold in all eight of the swimming events he competed in, news came out about the amount of calories Phelps must consume each day to keep up with his activity level and about his love of poker.

He became a regular at a Windsor casino just across the border in Canada from where he was training in Michigan, plus he's a regular player online too.

It's not a huge stretch of the imagination to put Phelps, who has solidified his place as an Olympic legend, at the virtual tables on the site owned by one of poker's biggest legends.

Phelps is also being courted by other poker industry entities. He was invited to play in the Asian Poker Tour event in Macau recently, and Betfair Pokerhas also extended an invite to buy him into the 2008World Series of Poker Europe Main Event.

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The main event of the PokerStars.com European Poker Tour may have been in the spotlight during the stop in Prague, but one of the side events turned out to be the highlight for a couple of RedKings Poker pros.

Ramzi Jelassi and Jonas Molander, both recently signed as pros at RedKings Poker, made the final table of the €2,000 side event. The two Swedish pros were both in contention, but it was Jelassi who picked up the win.

Both players were still in it when it was down to five, but Jelassi pulled ahead of the pack after infrared contact lenses taking down a decisive pot.

Jelassi reraised all-in with pocket fives, and the chip leader, who'd been stealing pots all night, called him with pocket kings. The board came A-7-2 with all spades.

Jelassi had the five of spades but was still trailing. The turn brought the king of spades to fill in Jelassi's flush, and when the river brought an eight, Jelassi had the hand and the chip lead.

[[PokerRoom:Logo:red-kings-poker:left]]

Molander ended up out in fourth place, and it came down to Jelassi versus a Norwegian opponent in heads-up play.

On the final hand, Jelassi called a bluff with A-T on a nine-high board, and his opponent had jack-high. Jelassi picks up €129,000 for the win marked cards, which is his biggest live cash so far.

"It feels really good to nail a victory after many good finishes but no first place for a long time," Jelassi said. "It was really fun to have Jonas on the final table as well and also show our new sponsor, RedKings, that we can play the game."Jelassi has several cashes in events across Europe going back to 2005. The only other wins on his resume are a €1,000 No-Limit Hold'em World Heads-Up Poker Championships in Barcelona in 2006 and a €200 Super Satellite to the main event of the 2007 Paddy Power Irish Open in Dublin.

Molander also has several cashes in European events dating back to 2005. He has a win in a Bellagio Cup III event in 2007 and a win in the Helsinki Freezeout main event in 2005.

"We are of course very happy to have both guys on this final table and hopefully this is just the beginning for our two Swedish 'Kings,'" says RedKings Live Events Manager Jerry Land.

If you'd like to check out where Jelassi and Molander play online and perhaps join them at the virtual felt, head to RedKings Poker.

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Former Irish Open winner Marty Smyth has agreed to donate all his winnings in the 2010 WSOP Tournament of Champions to charity if he qualifies.

Twenty of the 27 spots at the 2010 event are voted in by the fans and Smyth hopes to get enough votes to be one of them.

Smyth specifically pledged marked cards everything he makes in the $1 million freeroll to the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children and Our Lady's Children's Hospital, Dublin.

His sponsor, BoylePoker.com, is behind the move and launched an online campaign yesterday called, "Vote for Marty", which supports his bid for entry.

"Not only has Marty won a WSOP world championship event, he's won the World Open, Irish Open and Poker Million," said Paul Spillane, head of poker at BoylePoker.com.

"Surely that's the pedigree of a true champ and his generous gesture of donating any prize money he might win to children's charities in Ireland, should see the whole country swing behind him. It's a no-lose situation for the children's hospitals so get voting now people!"

The winner of the 2010 WSOP Tournament of Champions will receive $500,000, the runner-up gets $250,000, third place earns $100,000 and the fourth through ninth place finishers will earn $25,000 each.

At the time this article was published the "Vote for Marty" Facebook page had over 600 members.

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