The World of Professional Poker Part 2

The 2000 WSOP winner Chris “Jesus” Ferguson renowned as one of the best players in the world once went 18 months without seriously cashing. If players as good as that can experience runs like that then what price the lesser players. It is why behind the scenes, players are constantly swapping pieces of each other in tournaments and doing deals that the public never get to see. Then we have the mystery financial backers that are behind a lot of professional players, these are the guys that make the money without even playing poker as long as they tag on to a good enough player.

In short, the named players do not need money because they know that they can get it from somewhere or someone. If a player had to finance themselves these days to play on the circuit, there would be hardly any big name players. The top players know how demanding tournament poker can be and is why they frown on the publicity thrown on certain players all because they have won a tournament or two. They know that the reverse can easily happen and especially in some of these tournaments with speeded up structures where literally anyone can win if they are aggressive enough and have enough gamble to try and amass a big stack.

But the way that poker is promoted and marketed, it advertises BIG tournaments with BIG prize money to lure players into the game in the same way that the National Lottery attracts people to buy lottery tickets by making the jackpot well into seven figures. They know that if they spread the prize money more evenly that many people would lose interest once they knew that even if they did win that the amount would not be a life changing sum of money. But players perceive that they are in with a shot of winning these tournaments but for the vast majority of them, this is an illusion.

You will no doubt have heard of the term “dead money”. It is a term used by the pro’s to indicate the players in the tournaments that have no chance…it is just a polite way of saying it. But if you asked one hundred players if they viewed themselves as the “dead money”, how many would say yes? But when one of them gets lucky by winning one of them by overcoming astronomical odds then they are touted as the next poker superstar. Look out for part 3 of this series coming soon.

Play poker with The Dean at www.pokerstars.co.uk/poker/getting-started/free-poker/