Poker a Sport?

[astroglide]

asinine

[Senor Choppy]

From dictionary.com:

Sport: [n] Physical activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively.

Game: [n] A competitive activity or sport in which players contend with each other according to a set of rules.

All sports are games, not all games are sports. The key difference is that sports are mostly physical activities, while games can be either physical or mental. Poker is a game, basketball is a sport. Bowling is a sport because the dude says it is. Golf isn't because it's dumb.

I hope this clears everything up.

[ArchAngel71857]

how many leotards do you own? be honest.

<font color="white"> 1 </font> 0 <font color="white"> ,000 </font>

-AA

[TimM]

It's not a sport! by George Carlin.

[Steven_Skunk]

Is magic a sport? I think so. It takes tremendous practice and concentration, and you need to have skill as well.

Is Dungeons and Dragons a sport? I don't know, ask the Bullworther Druids!

Is Model Train building and/or collecting a sport? I think so. I dress up in a uniform (my conductor's outfit) and I am always trying to outdo everyone else with my small scale towns and landscapes. Its very competitive, dude.

Sweet.

[GrannyMae]

<font color="white">10,00</font>0

you sure?
<font color="white">i give. that was very funny. </font>

[MicroBob]

[ QUOTE ]
Sport should require a ball, puck, shuttlecock of some sort. It should also require the ability to defend the other players.....golf not a sport....if you could block the hole, push a guy in his backswing..then yes...but you can't so no.

[/ QUOTE ]


by this line of thinking....many of the Olympic 'Sports' would not be sports at all including track-and-field (i have been a runner before...although i wouldn't really call myself one anymore) as well as pole-vault, track-and-field, decathalon, triathelon, bicycling (try telling Lance Armstrong that he doesn't participate in a sport), gymnastics as well as swimming, diving, skiing, figure-skating, speed-skating.

boxing and wrestling also don't require a ball....but certainly defense is involved quite a bit in these sports.


a lot of people take exception to some of the goofier olympic events like synchronized diving or synch-swimming, etc.
but most people would consider the other events to be sports and they certainly seem to fit the writer's dictionary definition.

these sports require no ball or other device you are trying to 'score' with. there is SOME defense potentially involved in running or cycling when you think in terms of blocking off one of the competitors or 'drafting' behind him.....but this certainly isn't defense in the context you were thinking i would guess.



overall though i considered this article to be pretty amateurish and somewhat idiotic.

his observations on baseball are incredibly stupid.

comparing a couple of major-leaguer's curve-balls and saying that they aren't athletes because you can't tell the difference until you see the results is truly moronic.

to the untrained observer, you could say the same thing about Kobe Bryant draining a bunch of 3's in practice and some NBA also-ran.
same thing for watching Tom Brady throw a football in practice vs. some junior-college QB.


baseball players are routinely going on the disabled-list with a variety of injuries that they sustain from.....playing baseball (although there was an incident a couple years ago of a pitcher going on the DL because he cut himself with a knife....and Sammy Sosa recently threw out his back due to a violent sneeze).

i have met older former ball-players who can't lift their arm up hardly at all because they threw it out a few decades ago.

there are SOME John Kruk's and David Wells' and Tony Gwynn's out there who don't look like true athletes.
but a lot of football linemen just look like huge overweight goons too.

pitchers are routinely throwing the ball 90 mph or harder.
i can't do this and never will be able to do this no matter how hard i try. i also will NEVER be able to hit a baseball 400 feet or dunk a basketball.

some of the feats that these athelets accomplish on a regular basis are pretty darned astonishing.

the writer is just showing once again that many sports-journalists don't know what they are talking about and have very little appreciation for the accomplishments they are covering.

[jwvdcw]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I don't consider bowling, golf, darts, or any other games that a 50 year old man can still be in his prime to be sports either

[/ QUOTE ]

Okay i can understan bowling and darts, but golf not a sport? True, there are a few John Daly's and Craig Stadlers, but most are in peak physically condition. You worked your butt off in college and I respect that. But look at the NBA, Oliver Miller is the biggest fattest slob there is, and he's been playing professional basketball for at least 10 years. No way you're saying that basketball isn't a sport.
Poker, I wouldn't call a sport. But then again it really doesn't matter.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't think you can use physical appearance to determine athletic ability. There are some NFL 350lb linemen with huge guts that look way overweight, and they can run 4.8 40 yard dashes, which is probably faster than 75% of the posters on here. To play in the NBA, you have to be in great shape. If you played a pick up game with Oliver Miller, I guarantee that you would be astounded by how much athleticism he really has.

[jwvdcw]

[ QUOTE ]
Poker is not a sport.
It is not even athletic competition
It IS competition which is &gt; than a "game"

Sport should require a ball, puck, shuttlecock of some sort. It should also require the ability to defend the other players.....golf not a sport....if you could block the hole, push a guy in his backswing..then yes...but you can't so no.

Sport or nto a sport is one of my group of friends favorite "bar arguements" ever. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

great great post...I never thought of the ability to defend but thats totally true, which is why I don't consider 'judged' events to be sports either.

[MicroBob]

you guys probably don't know that there was a very serious movement in the international chess federation to make chess an olympic sport.

since any sport in the olympics has to have drug-testing measures already in place before it is considered, this meant that chess had to do this at its major tournaments.
quite a bit of contraversy in the chess world amongst the top players....most of whom were against the drug-testing and thought thought the movement to make chess an olympic 'sport' was pretty silly and laughable.


i saw a story on The Daily Show that there is a similar situation with bridge.
i think chess finally gave up their ridiculous idea.....but there was a bridge tournament champion who had her medal taken away because she refused to take the drug-test.

pretty funny Daily Show stuff as you can probably imagine.