Live Event Every Week - a la PGA Tour?

[SumZero]

I think you missunderstand. The money wouldn't come from the 30 rookies (although they would have to pay for Q school), but it would come from sponsors. So if you are playing a freeroll, do you want just the 100 most established players, or do you want 2000 players, some of whom would be dead money? Since the prize pool doesn't change, I'd take the 100!

Now, I don't think it will work because poker just isn't skillful enough, IMHO. On the PGA tour the top players really are much better than the field. So having the established players only makes sense. In poker, it is less clear to me, that having such a limited field would be legitimate.

The other danger with sponsor added money, that poker tour organizers would have to police very much, would be deal making. If there is money added, you may well see syndicate players who pool winnings and losses, and collusive play between these players would be even more of a problem (when compared to something like the PGA where collusive play doesn't really work).

[Army Eye]

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The pros would want to keep out the newbies because lately the pros haven't been able to counteract the sudden influx of online rooks.

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Yes they have. The pros have still been winning the huge majority of the tourneys.

Of course they want weaker players contributing to the prize pool, making it fatter.

[tylerdurden]

Sure, they want weaker players. But "new players" (i.e. newbies to *live* tournaments) aren't always weak. They don't want a lot of new, skilled, and unknown competition.

Additionally, there comes a point where too many weak players makes a game unattractive, even if your EV increases. Example, let's assume a winner-take-all tournament. Would you rather play in a game with 10 equally-matched players and a 10% chance of winning (EV 1), or a game with 100 players, some not as good but still decent, and a 1.1% chance of winning (EV 1.1). How about a game with 10000 players, quite a few fish, and a 0.02% chance of winning (EV 2)? Even though your EV is double, you expect that you'll go 5000 tries between wins. Could be rough on your bankroll.

[riverflush]

If the current wave of popularity for poker manages to establish "stars" out of the tv players, elevating guys like Ivey, Lederer, Phillips, whoever...to a pseudo-celebrity status, I can see sponsors wanting to put up money to see these guys play every week. Playing for sponsor money - I think we should at least consider that possibility could happen. That will only happen if America elevates these guys above the common poker player (which has happened to some extent now). I'm not sure the average guy watching ESPN last night knew who any of these guys were. We do, but does Joe Sixpack?

Also - how about this: What about "team poker"? If any of you guys out there ever ran cross country in high school, you can understand the format right there. 5-10 guys on the cross country team all competed against each other, yet also were scoring points as a team. Imagine 4 or 5 player teams of poker players in a big tournament who are not only competing for the individual $$$, but possible sponsor money given to the best team score . Sure, you've got all kinds of collusion and cheating possibilities, but that just adds to the show IMO!

Just throwing ideas against the wall...