Let's bring an end to moronic behavior on TV Poker!

[Vee Quiva]

Three cheers to Norman Chad for calling out Mattias Anderson and Josh Arieh for their boorish behavior throughout the World Series of Poker. He also chastised Mike Matusow for his inappropriate comments.

If we can just get Mike Sexton and Vince Van Patten to start criticizing idiots like Phil Laak and Antonio Esfandiari(sp)instead of cheering them on, it might be a little more tolerable to watch.

[TakeMeToTheRiver]

[ QUOTE ]
Three cheers to Norman Chad for calling out Mattias Anderson and Josh Arieh for their boorish behavior throughout the World Series of Poker. He also chastised Mike Matusow for his inappropriate comments.

If we can just get Mike Sexton and Vince Van Patten to start criticizing idiots like Phil Laak and Antonio Esfandiari(sp)instead of cheering them on, it might be a little more tolerable to watch.

[/ QUOTE ]

But it still makes good TV. The TV producers can curtail it by not showing it -- but ESPN and WPT are not going to do that. ESPN gets the best of both worlds by showing it (over and over and over again) and then criticizing it.

I don't believe this behavior would truly change unless the tournament rules changed and followed the NFL's lead and start penalizing excessive celebration and poor sportsmanship. Then next year we can hear Matt Savage say: "Excessive Celebration, Mattias Anderson, 10-minute penalty, first down!"

[Vee Quiva]

Actually instead of a ten minute penalty, I would have preferred to see Greg Raymer snap and bodyslam Anderson through the table. I think that would have put an end to it right quick.

[Toro]

Let's face it. We all love to hate it. If it didn't exist, we would be bored to tears. I know, I know. Except for the purests out there who would enjoy the Poker for the poker and without the pyrotechnics.

[slickpoppa]

Yeah, I admit I love to hate. Seeing Matusow act like an ass and then cry when he lost was the best moment of the WSOP in my opinion. There really just weren't that many interesting hands this year, at least that ESPN showed.
The bad personalities are an essential part of poker. If I wanted to see pure strategy without any trash talk I could watch a chess match. I'd get pretty bored watching tables of 5 greg raymers and 5 dan harringtons, no matter how well they played.

[flair1239]

The problem that I see is that they try to show too much drama.

The all-in hands are important, but they show them with no context.

In my opinion they should build up more to the all-in hands by showing some preceeding action. The reason that the Raymer vs. Matusow thing was so interesting is because they took the time to develope the story line, by showing some relatively routine background hands. The same with Brunson v. Fischman hey showed some hands. In my opinion these two confrontations made for the best TV of the main event.

[B Dids]

They just didn't show a lot of the interesting hands. From what I remember of the web coverage of the final table, there were a lot of good hands (esp between Greg and JA) that didn't get show. ESPN seemed far more focuses on the interpersonal stuff than the actual game play.

[jwvdcw]

[ QUOTE ]
Let's face it. We all love to hate it. If it didn't exist, we would be bored to tears. I know, I know. Except for the purests out there who would enjoy the Poker for the poker and without the pyrotechnics.

[/ QUOTE ]


exactly....all of you out there whining so much about Arieh and Fischman and so on and so on, go watch some old poker tapes when everyone was quiet and gentlemanly- you'll see how boring that was.

[cowpie]

[ QUOTE ]
exactly....all of you out there whining so much about Arieh and Fischman and so on and so on, go watch some old poker tapes when everyone was quiet and gentlemanly- you'll see how boring that was.

[/ QUOTE ]

Amen brother. Pre-Internet poker, only Hellmuth cried like a baby when he lost. Now when the kids have taken over the poker world, we hear more complaints such as "Hey you check raised me with 22 on the flop and turned trips? WTF, I'm gonna tell momma!!! I had pocket aces damnit. It's the nuts!!!". It's much more fun now.

[slickpoppa]

I don't know about pre-internet poker games being boring. From what I hear it sounds like games were more intersting in the old days when guys would play drunk and have to worry about getting shot after winning.

[mullaney]

[ QUOTE ]
They just didn't show a lot of the interesting hands. From what I remember of the web coverage of the final table, there were a lot of good hands (esp between Greg and JA) that didn't get show. ESPN seemed far more focuses on the interpersonal stuff than the actual game play.

[/ QUOTE ]
Are there transcripts of the final table anywhere?

[ChasingTitles]

I think you have to put Mike Matusow in a different catagory. There is a big difference in my opinion between Mattias being overly excited about a hand and Mike Matusow verbally abusing an opponent. I always had tolerance for Matusow from what I saw on TV, I figured he just had problems but after I saw his comments to Greg Raymor I lost every bit of respect I ever had for Matusow. I also gained a ton of respect for Greg because if that were me, I think I would have jumped over the table.

Also Phil Laak was doing push ups and acting crazy at basicly a freeroll in both the Invitational tournament and the Bad Boys of Poker tournament. From the other more serious tournaments Phil has kept himself in check.

I do agree however that there is a serious lack of sportsmanship going on. And unfortunatly I think its only going to get worse.

[Neil Stevens]

[ QUOTE ]
Let's face it. We all love to hate it. If it didn't exist, we would be bored to tears. I know, I know. Except for the purests out there who would enjoy the Poker for the poker and without the pyrotechnics.

[/ QUOTE ]
I'd rather watch Howard Lederer stare than watch some guy screaming like an idiot. But sure, I'm in the small minority.

[oil doe]

OK. I realize this is shameless self-promotion. But the following is a link to an article I wrote that got picked up by Canadian Poker Player and pokerpages about the bad behavior:

http://www.pokerpages.com/articles/archives/calistri02.htm

[Jimbo]

Great article, thanks for the link.

Jimbo

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

I disagree completely. Having "bad guys" to cheer against builds ratings.

[Freudian]

Believe me, Norman Chad loved that they acted this way. That way he got to say a few one-liners and it made for good television.