The Evolution of the Amateur Everything

I recently came upon some old World Series of Poker videos from years past. I saw 1973, 1977, 1978, 1983 and a few others. I highly recommend that EVERYONE watch these videos for a variety of different reasons.The first one I watched, not sure which year it was, was a very grainy video but still color. There were only 13 players that year. The tournament included Puggy Pearson, Doyle, Amarillo Slim, Johnny Moss, and Jack Strauss …among a few others….

Why was it so great? It was old Vegas! There was smoke in the air. There weren’t 8,000 players. At this time, Jack Binion was even table side giving the players insurance odds when they went all-in. That would be unheard of today.

Every one of these players had character and an interesting story.

It just feels like the poker world as we know it today is going to implode. It’s too big. Nothing can withstand that kind of growth without destroying itself. I can almost feel scandal in the air as if it is right around the corner.

Many of you already know my suspicions about online poker. I think it’s rigged to a degree. Ya ya, I know a lot of you think im full of shit but based on all of the things that I’ve seen with my own eyes in addition to my “gut” feel, I’ve come to my own conclusion that I think it is rigged. However, I don’t feel that this keeps me from playing online poker. As a matter of fact, I feel it helps me because I feel like I can make my knowledge work against the poker sites. For now, let’s forget about my suspicions of online poker. I’ll address that with more evidence and food for thought when I actually have time to sit down and right down all of my conclusions (as well as reference reputable sources that have the same suspicions that i have).

Another thing that worries me are rumors of widespread cheating in live poker . I am currently reading In this book, the author devotes an entire chapter interviewing a well-known poker cheat. A few of the points that the cheat brings up:

• Casinos have never busted a poker cheat (because they don’t care if people cheat each other as long as they don’t cheat the casino) . They focus on games like black jack, table games, and slots because those cheats are actually taking money from the casino.
• There are well known poker players that participate in collusion.
• There are well known poker players that pay the buy-in for several players during tournaments so that those players can feed chips to the benefactor throughout the tournament. T.J Cloutier even agrees in the book that this is a factual statement.
• There is collusion and card cheats at every level of poker and at every venue.
• Online poker is rigged (see , im not the only person).. He states that you will notice that players will win when they first open accounts and after a certain amount of time they lose it all plus more back to the online site. The card cheat says he has tested this theory out by creating his own boiler room (several players located in the same network accessing the poker site via different networks so they can collude against the rest of the table).
  He states online poker is also rigged using bots which lose a certain amount of money each hour. Even though you may be beating the bot, you are payin an outrageous amount of rake each hour where after many hours of play you losing a far greater amount than you would at a live venue. The bots basically allow you to play and play back and forth until your table roll is diminished from rake.
• He also states that marked cards have frequently been used in the WSOP. He states that the last Stu Ungar victory was as a result of marked cards and that the blue sunglasses he wore where specifically to see the marked cards.
• He states that Stu Ungar was murdered and did not die as a result of a self induced overdose.

Now, can you believe everything that a self-proclaimed “card cheat” says? Certainly not. However, is it possible that some of the things he says are true? Sure. Again, even T.J Cloutier (someone who has actually met a dinosaur) confirms that at least one of this guy’s stories is true.

I guess the main point I was trying to make, before I got off into the cheating thing (AGAIN)… is that if we don’t do something to slow this thing down the train just might run off the track. When I watched those old videos of the WSOP I thought how great it would be to be a part of this thing back then. Back when there wasn’t a cover over Fremont, when Binion’s was the place to be for a poker player. Back when Binion’s was the Horseshoe. You didn’t have to beat 8000 people to become a legend, you just had to beat the VERY BEST players in the world. There weren’t many, but they were damn good.

What can be done to get back to those days of poker? Probably nothing. The online sites generate so much money that they have taken control of everything. Poker doesn’t belong to poker players anymore, it belongs to PokerStars.com and Partypoker.com.

One suggestion, make the entry fee $100,000. Not even this price will keep out the thousands of amateurs because the online sites will just add extra satellites and people will just have to win an extra tourny or two to qualify. However, it will probably help the cream rise to the top. The best pros would be able to play and not be lost in the crowd of shit that is the world series today.

As far as I’m concerned, the HORSE tourny at this years WSOP was like that of years past. The final table was legendary… filled with the best of the best. It cost $50k to play…. and that did the trick, there weren’t 8000 players.

Just food for thought.