[ResidentParanoid]

You seem to have construed the post as an attack on winning players, which it is not.

I probably misread your intent in this way.


Do you think so many people would buy into "poker" if they understood that 90% of players lose, that many of their heroes were broke, that the WPT is less a contest of poker's greatest than a glorified driving competition (to continue the golf metaphor)?

I guess my impression of the "heroes" is that they're a bunch of dumpy, slimy, las vegas acts. So I don't feel deceived. I haven't watched the broadcasts, so maybe I'm missing the deception.

It is true that the golf advertising/broadcasts come out of a longer, more "honorable" tradition. But the golf ads and announcers don't explain that it'll cost $X per year to make any improvements in your game, play on nice courses every week. They don't announce that even when you spend that much, most players won't break 100 for N years.

Even if the poker salesman clean up their act some (which I concede is probably necessary) the problem doesn't really go away.