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There are two types of rules; the official written rules that govern the game, and the "unwritten rules". This is pretty much true for any activity.

The unwritten or "gentlemans's rule" regarding the clock is that you give your opponent ample time to make a decision. It is considered rude to call a clock on your opponent unless they are taking undue time or abusing the privilage.

It is unreasonable to blame the rest of the table for not constantly calling the clock on her; they were just trying to be polite. It wasn't until she was perceived to be milking the time that they started calling it on her.

For instance, when she asks for a count of Raymer's chips you hear an immediate call for the clock. This is really unusual, and was prompted by two things;

the fact that she took such an incredible time to lay down the KJ hand. Not only did she take way too much time, but started wandering around the room. Then she had the audacity to ask if she could at least see the hand! Again, this was considered odd and rude behavior; to make everyone wait and wait and then not call, but want to see the cards anyway.

The other thing is that she asked how much Greg was betting, he looked her in the eye and stated very clearly the amount. Turning to the dealer and asking for a count was tantamount to calling Raymer a liar. He is a very straightforward profesional and knew exactly how much he was putting in and was quite clear in declaring the amount. Again, she is technically within the written rules here, but making a very rude move.

It is in response to this that what would normally be considered a rude immediate call for the clock was taken; I don't know who it was that called it, but it is clear that they were fed up with her behavior enough at that point.

I already know what's coming; she wasn't experienced enough to know better, she had very limited tournament experience.
I think that for the first few days of the WSOP, folks were willing to buy that arguement and cut her some slack.

However, after several days of being in that environment and observing how other folks were using their time to make decisions, it should have been clear to her that she was taking longer to make decisions and using up time more often than other players. This put players at her table at a disadvantage since they were getting fewer hands per hour.

To get back to the OPs question, I think that this is why folks were so steamed at her. It is one thing to come into an unknown environment and not know at once how "things are done." However, by day 5 it is expected that some of the "unwritten rules" of behavior would have seeped in. At that point violating some of them appears to be intentional rudeness rather than rookie inexperience.

From what I saw at the WSOP, blogs and articles I read, and conversations with other players, I have to agree that ESPN actually was showing an accurate representation of her play and behavior, and in fact may have made her look better since it is such a small dose of her.

Shauna

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Guys,

If I could just chime in here. Let me just say that I have responded to some of the criticim of my play in various threads on twoplustwo (please see, e.g. here, here, here and here ). On another messageboard, I have also written a lengthy post responding to accusations from the above poster of being intentionally rude to Greg Raymer (by asking for a chip count) and other players, and of angle shooting by taking time in making decisions.

In sum, I have said that the criticism w/r/t the time I took in making decisions is valid, I've said that I'm sure more experienced players would have made different decisions w/r/t to certain hands and that given what I know today, I would have made a different decision as well, if I could back in time. I have defended the right of every other person to analyze and criticize my play, if that is what they wish to spend their time on.

The only place I draw the line is where posters are attacking me personally, intimating they would physically assault me or accusing me of angleshooting (and this is the only exception I take to what Aamazon has written, specifically (hopefully Aamazon you will have an opportunity to see my response to your posts on the other messageboard you and I frequent) and some of the over-the-top posters in twoplustwo's WPT forum, generally. I don't think anyone should have to put up with such behavior from another person either in the anonymity of a internet forum or in their day-to-day "live" interations with other people.

W/r/t why the hostility, I've already said in another thread that I like to think this all about poker. I don't think there is much in it for anybody to speculate whether race or gender are motivating factors for other people's behavior or thoughts in this regard, because in the end we do not know the minds of people with whom we are not intimately familiar or otherwise know very well. I'll say once again that people are free to analyze or criticize my (or any other players') play if they so choose. But if I could also say, once more:

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Lastly, I've said before that I can take the criticism, and some of the ribbing that's gone on here. (Some of it; a lot of it has been overthetop and unnecessary). But I'm just wondering if everyone hasn't had enough of this discussion? I don't think people are really that interested in discussing me or my play. I've (anonymously) followed these boards for some time and there's a lot more timely and interesting topics to address here. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]


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Best,
Tiffany