A year ago, ESPN seemed to be the best thing that ever happened to poker. The nationally televised coverage of the 2003 World Series of Poker transformed the game from a novelty to a national spectacle.

The network had aired poker since 1994, but never like this. An average of over one million households tuned in each night to watch Moneymaker’s miracle run, with over 1.7 million viewers watching his classic showdown with Sammy Farha at the final table.

Suddenly, poker players became celebrities. Doyle Brunson, Howard Lederer and Chris Ferguson became household names. Scotty Nguyen made appearances on late night talk shows. There was even a campaign to make poker an Olympic sport.

And all over the country, thousands of casual players dreamed of becoming the next Chris Moneymaker. As the craze swept the nation, no one seemed to realize that we were witnessing the demise of competitive poker.

A record 2,576 players turned out for this year’s World Series of Poker, undaunted by the $10,000 entry fee. The five million dollar prize was the richest in poker history. The stage was set for the greatest tournament in the history of the game.

Sadly, the 2004 World Series proved to be just the opposite. Rather than an epic clash between the game’s greatest players, the tournament quickly became a playground for starry-eyed online qualifiers.

By the third day of competition, the majority of serious players had been eliminated. A few had managed to avoid the online minefield and a handful, like Gus Hansen, Mike Matusow, “Jesus” Ferguson, Marcel Luske and Dan Harrington, were fortunate enough to escape in the money. Harrington even managed to make the final table for a second consecutive year.

But the vast majority fell victim to the foolish play of the myriad of online qualifiers who had swarmed to the landmark event. The elimination of Men Nguyen exemplified the new era of poker that ESPN had ushered in.

Men was dealt pocket aces, the strongest hand in poker. Like a seasoned pro, the master slow-played his rockets, setting a trap for the overmatched onliner across the table. True to form, the onliner raised with a far inferior hand.

When the flop came, Men moved all-in to ensure that his opponent would not catch a hand to beat his aces. He could have set another trap, but this early in the tournament he didn’t want to risk losing a big pot.

The only play for the online wiz kid was to tip his hat to the master and live to see another hand. Instead, the asinine onliner called with a flush draw. For some reason, the online qualifier thought his draw was a strong enough hand to call an all-in raise from one of poker’s legends.

Of course, the flush hit and the master was eliminated.

The look on Men Nguyen’s face said it all. It was just wrong. Men had played the hand brilliantly, some online schmoe made a moronic call and the master was sent home in the tournament’s early stages.

A similar fate met last year’s runner-up, Sam Farha. Armed with his trademark unlit cigarette and aggressive play, Farha seemed poised to make another run at the World Series bracelet.

However, the veteran ran into another online wizard, who made it perfectly clear that this was his first real tournament. The onliner raised pre-flop and Farha, who never sees a hand he doesn’t like, called.

After the flop, the onliner raised again on a bluff and Farha called with a small pair. The onliner raised again after the turn and again Farha refused to go away. Clearly, the bluff was not working.

Stubbornly refusing to fold his hand, the onliner stuck with his miserable bluff until the river, where he caught a larger pair than Farha’s. The hand crippled Farha and he was soon finished off by another inferior player.

How did Sammy know the onliner was bluffing? The rookie was shaking throughout the entire hand. Despite his extensive online play, the man had never developed a poker face. After all, one cannot see his opponent when playing on the web.

This type of play became the norm in the 2004 World Series. Players who had never experienced a live event and had no concept of reading expressions and finding tells had overrun the game’s most prestigious tournament. With a field full of onliners, the element of skill declined dramatically and the tournament was often decided by luck.

The game’s greatest players are masters of reading their opponents and discovering their intentions based on clues of expression, body language and tendencies. However, even the most cunning poker mind can’t read a player who doesn’t know what he’s doing.

When a large portion of the field continually plays inexplicably poor hands, the superior players no longer have an advantage. Thus, the infusion of young online players in this year’s World Series field dramatically lowered the quality of play at poker’s premier tournament.

Five of the nine players at the final table of the 2004 main event qualified for the tournament online, including the eventual champion, Greg “Fossilman” Raymer. This was Raymer’s first major tournament win.

The online incursion at this year’s World Series can be directly attributed to poker’s largest publicist, ESPN. Drawing on rookie Chris Moneymaker’s unlikely run in 2003, ESPN filled the airwaves with tales of the heroic underdog. The network enticed fledgling online players nationwide, who descended on Binion’s in droves to chase the American dream on poker’s grandest stage.

If the online explosion continues, competitive poker will be caught in a downward spiral as the element of skill continues to become increasingly irrelevant. Meanwhile, ESPN will continue to reap the benefits. The words of the network’s advertisers have proven eerily prophetic: these days, anyone can win.