See, I disagree with this as well. I’ve seen Hellmuth been gracious in defeat (on TV) on numerous occasions. There are far, far worse losers out there. Hellmuth gets a bad rap.
Hellmuth’s problem is that he can’t bring himself to believe that making the right decision can ever result in a bad outcome for him. Or, conversely, that another player’s making a bad decision can result in a good outcome for the player. Which I can identify with as I have some difficulty dealing with “bad beats” but then I’m not a world-class professional player who really ought to know better.
Not sure what you mean here… I think Gabe might be my favorite commentator… He’s a real poker player. IMHO he’s a world class one, at that.
In his own words, he’s gets too aggressive in big touneys.
I’m not sure that’s really a fault.
Here, I agree, once more.
Hellmuth will never, ever let anybody forget his bracelet count.
Notice I didn’t say “record”.
Because it’s not really a record, IMHO.
It’s a count, brought upon by playing every single WSOP NLHE tourney, since he started.
Doyle quit tourneys for like ten years, right?
Really? I’m not disagreeing, per se, but an example would be nice.
I think it’s usualy more like:
“I’m Phil FUCKING Hellmuth! I’m the best NLHE tourney player in the WHOLE GODDAMN WORLD!!”
(turns to his wife) “Did you see what he called me with, honey? I raised with AQ and he called with pocket fucking tens!”
Meh.
Now I’d like an example of him doing anything remotely close to that, particularly in recent years. 
And as a counter-example, I’ll offer his bust-out at the PPT event aired a couple of weeks ago (it was either second-quarter Commerce or first-quarter Bellaggio). He got beat on the river, IIRC, and was nothing but gracious as he walked away.
I’m not questioning his skill or knowledge. What I’m saying is that while I’m watching HSP and one of the players at the table is telling a story, I’d rather hear the story from the player than Kaplan doing a funny funny joke. Part of the appeal of HSP is that it’s a window into an aspect of play that we don’t get to see on any other show, people who for the most part are friends playing with each other, shooting the shit, having fun, as opposed to seeing one star player sitting at a table full of people he doesn’t know in a tournament setting. Watching and hearing that interaction is way more interesting to me than Kaplan doing a bit that, if he feels he must do, could be done at a time when the players themselves aren’t being more interesting.
IIRC at this year’s main event Phil mixed it up with someone a couple of times for making what Hellmuth considered bad plays. And of course there was last year’s infamous “you can’t even spell poker.” I’m pretty sure Hellmuth was ahead both times, as opposed to playing tens against two overs.
Right F’ing on, man.
Do you, by any chance, follow Daniel Negreanu’s blog?
He agrees with us regarding commentary:
(bolding mine)
If anybody is unfamiliar with Shana Hiatt’s lawsuit against the WPT, just google it.
Suffice it to say, they wanted to stifle her poker commentary, and so far, she appears to be winning.
She’s also entertaining, hot, and has very nice titties.
Norman Chad is a gi-normous douchebag.
I like Norman Chad. His jokes arent always funny, but I like his attitude towards beinga color commentator for… poker.
I just wish Lon and all the other play-by-play types would talk less. There isn’t all that much going on with Hold 'Em.
I think I agree with the first statement, but I definitely disagree with the second.
As long as this thread has been revived and somewhat on-topic, can I just express my disgust with the shitty coverage of this year’s WSOP on ESPN? I think so far they’ve had exactly one hour of coverage on a game other than hold 'em, a PL Omaha final table. I was so excited about the HORSE tournament this year, thinking that they’d have some cool coverage of some of the other games, but no. Final table only, which was all NL hold 'em. Yes, I get that most of the people who’ve gotten into poker over the last few years have gotten into it because of watching NL hold 'em on the WPT, but come on, ESPN, a little variety would be nice.
I have WSOP as a series recording, and final tables from other tournaments have been popping up. I was disappointed with the HORSE final table, too, but they’re easing into non-no-limit-hold-em and it will eventually depend on ratings.
Gadarene, yeah there’s lots of strategy and such, but as far as play-by-play goes, stating the cards and what hands and draws people have is about it. It’s not like Omaha High-Low.
I disagree with this too. There’s all kinds of interesting things that an intelligent commentator can say about the action in a given hand.
Then watch other shows.
Norm and Lon have a “scthick”.
…and it works for most of us.
We already know the game, and can therefore appreciate the humor.
I wasn’t disagreeing with you, Eleusis. I was contesting garygnu’s assertion that there’s no real need for poker commentary in the first place.
Ok, what other tv shows cover the WSOP?
Right on, Gadarene. I’m sorry.
Well, seeing that ESPN has the exclusive contract, you could always go to cardplayer.com for dry coverage.
I’m not saying I don’t think poker commentary is nesessary. I like commentary, WSOP’s especially, but I would like to hear about 30% fewer words from Lon McEachern. Let us maybe read the players ourselves. (And don’t get so excited on a blank card coming on the river.)
Poker commentary is extremely basic. Because of the way the editing is done, the choice of how to do the commentary, the level of understanding of the audience, the level of understanding of the hosts, and because of the nature of what poker coverage tends to cover (more on that later).
The commentary, in any of the shows, rarely examines any hands or thought processes in depth at all - it’s all very shallow, very common sense stuff that doesn’t touch on the really interesting parts of the decisions.
It’s as if you had a football color analysis who said “They’re going to pass now, because it’s 3rd and 13, and a running play has little chance of getting the first down.” True, and simple. But it doesn’t touch on any of the really interesting stuff - how the routes were designed to exploit the tendencies of the defense, how the blocking scheme was altered to take into account the defensive players and formation, what reads the players have to make in order to figure out what to do, how players are adjusting on the fly based on the reaction of the defense, etc.
Another factor is that poker coverage focuses on the least interesting form of poker there is - shallow stack late-stage tournament poker. It makes for good TV, because Mike Sexton can say “He just bet a million dollars Vince!” (which is nonsense - tournament chips don’t correspond to actual money, but ‘million chips’ sounds less impressive, right? I could run a tournament at my house with a $1 buyin, label black chips 1 billion dollars, and then say “He’s raising him 50 billion dollars Vince! WOW!”) and because most people who watch poker don’t want to see interesting, complex poker - they want to see large amounts of chips, with lots of money on the line, play an extremely simple form of poker where the drama comes from slowly watching the cards be dealt rather than the mental battle that tends to go on in more complex forms. Because of the structure, the average WPT final table is much closer to checkers in strategic depth than the chess of your run of the mill cash game.
I lived and breathed poker for years, but to be honest, I can’t muster up the interest to watch that garbage. Except for the money involved, it’s kiddie poker - and the way they edit it makes it even less interesting. The exception to this is High Stakes Poker, which is massively, massively better than anything else. And while I think Gabe Kaplan has a fairly advanced understanding of the game, the format still isn’t conducive to in-depth commentary. He gives explanations for behaviors sometimes that make me wince - but it’s not because he’s incapable of understanding the deeper aspects of the game, but because he has to simplify and leave things out for his audience.
Another thing is the time factor - on poker forums, I’ve had discussions with people about particular hands that could easily last dozens of pages discussing dozens of different aspects of the decision - but you’d never see that on TV, both because of time constraints, and because your audience mostly doesn’t understand the advanced meta-game concepts and stuff like bayesian probability breakdowns.
It bothers me a bit too, because the impression people tend to have of poker is it’s all just a “OMG I HAVE A PAIR AND 6 BB I’M ALL IN!!” simple game - when the reality is that it’s so much more interesting and complex. But they do their best to play up the former, and play down the latter.
“I lived and breathed poker for years, but to be honest, I can’t muster up the interest to watch that garbage. Except for the money involved, it’s kiddie poker - and the way they edit it makes it even less interesting. The exception to this is High Stakes Poker, which is massively, massively better than anything else. And while I think Gabe Kaplan has a fairly advanced understanding of the game, the format still isn’t conducive to in-depth commentary. He gives explanations for behaviors sometimes that make me wince - but it’s not because he’s incapable of understanding the deeper aspects of the game, but because he has to simplify and leave things out for his audience.”
I know you, man.
Just spent last weekend in Vegas, and won, big.
But my $100/hr avg is not realistic for 1/3NL.
Else I’d move there tomorrow.
I still like Norm and Lon the best, because they make me laugh.
UGH!
NO!
I like Gabe the best. :smack:
Actually, Gabe should be sitting at the table, if you ask me.