The Poker Item

Dec 11 02:26 UTC 2005

OK, there's been enough poker talk so I'll go ahead and kick off a poker
item.  To get things going, I'll talk about the most accessible portion
of poker -- watching poker on TV.

Watching poker on TV is, in a way, less like watching a sporting event
than like watching a reality show; instead of eating bugs, the
contestants are asked to call raises when they might be drawing dead.
Poker is rarely televised live, but instead is typically edited down to
showcase what the editors think makes an interesting or compelling
story.  You get to find out more information than any of the
participants get to have (as opposed to, say, football where you don't
know anything that the players don't know.)  Whether that makes for good
watching is a matter of perspective.

1. Best: FullTiltPoker dot net.  The main reason is because they show
every single hand, even the "boring" hands where everybody folds around
to the big blind.  The commentary is usually at least somewhat
interesting and knowledgable, and the cameras don't get overly fancy in
a way that distracts from the viewing experience.

2. Ultimate Poker Challenge.  I'm giving it good marks because it's in
high-def, which makes the watching more immersive.  Also, they can take
advantage of the size and aspect ratio to show you the hole cards with a
picture-in-picture; this allows you to watch the player's face when he
sees his hand, which adds a great deal to the viewing experience.

3. Poker Royale.  Effectively put together and paced reasonably well;
edited some but not excessively.  They usually like to have an equal
number of male and female players, and since there are so few women to
start with you'll see the same ones again and again.  If you can't get
enough of Kathy Liebert, Jennifer Tilley and Cyndy Violette then this is
likely a good place to look.

4. World Series of Poker.  Its' effectively presented and competently
commentated, but it's so heavily edited that you would think that the
whole tournament only took a couple of hours and every single hand
involved someone with pocket kings going all-in against someone with
pocket aces.  The cameras usually don't linger on the players so it's
hard to really look at somebody and see how he acts when the flop
completely missed him but he's pot-committed.

5. Celebrity Poker Showdown.  The question is really whether you like
watching celebrities, most of whom are not particularly experienced
players.  There's editing but it's not excessive, and the commenation is
a little cutsey but not overly annoying.  Because of the nature of luck,
frequently somebody who does everything wrong never the less ends up
winning, which can be frustrating to watch.

6. Worst: World Poker Tour.  Mike Sexton is shallow and lacks variety in
his presentation, but he looks fantastic by virtue of the fact that he
is sitting next to the worst poker broadcaster ever: Vince Van Patten.
Vince (son of Eight Is Enough star Dick Van Patten) knows the nicknames
of most of the hands, and he'll share them with you long after they
cease being interesting.  If a player is acting weak in order to induce
a bet you'll never get tired of hearing Vince say "he's digging a hole..
he's laying the twigs and branches across it..."

response 2 of 32:

Dec 11 04:10 UTC 2005

I am finding it easier to beat people at non-Texas Hold'em because a lot
of people think Poker is synonymous with Hold'em.

Case in point, my half-brother wanted to play poker. I called the game
as Five Card Draw. He's like, "Whats that?"