Why exactly is poker considered a sport by some people? Some people actually believe this. If Poker players are athletes than Phil Hellmuth, Dan Harrington, Phil Ivey and other people who I am embarrassed to name make John Daly, Mo Vaughn and David Wells look like Michael Johnson, Carl Lewis and Jim Thorpe...or Usain Bolt if we want to stay with Modern Olympic Athletes. Jim Thorpe won gold medals in the 1912 pentathlon and decathlon.
Speaking of Olympic athletes, remember Maurice Greene?
Poker is not a sport. It is a card game. (If it ever makes the Olympics it means that the Olympics have re-instated baseball and softball. They also would have added tennis, golf, auto racing, cheese wheel racing and purchased the rights to the redneck games. [The redneck games portion would proudly be aired on CMT]) I still haven't quite figured out why people would tune in to watch poker. Certainly there are more entertaining things on television. To me watching poker is not quite as stimulating as watching the man on PBS teaching us how to paint.
People tune in to watch to see what the "River Card" is. I'm continually amazed by just how many poker tournaments are now on television. So many TV networks put poker on for no reason. They think people want to watch U list celebrities (U for unknown) play poker. By U-List I mean a cameraman for The Office, a 1982 Sportscenter anchor, twin millionaire bimbos from a billionaire father, someone from the Jersey shore, someone from the Hills, a 1962 Mets reliever and Kathy Griffin. You really have a sad life if you are captivated on the every move of these non professional poker players.
Why was poker the card game chosen to be put on television?
Why isn't 99 on television? It's action packed. You continually count the value of cards until you get to 99. The first person to push the pile of cards over 99 loses. It also could be used to teach math skills to young children. It would actually be an educational card game. The commentary could be just as good as what it is for Poker.
"Can you believe they are playing 99 and didn't know that twenty-three plus nine equals thirty-two? We are going to have to put an error in our scorebook!"
"Oh wow he brought out the 4 and it skips backwards, but then she brought out the four and it reverses back to him. Oh what a bad break for him!"
"They forgot to pick up there card and will be playing a card down. What a mental mistake! How can you do that on this big of a stage? It's so sad seeing someone choke. They are clearly going to have to work on this in the off-season"
"Down to our last two contestants. We are at 97, can they come up with a card necessary to avoid getting to 100. They can't! They can't! We have a new 99 World Champion!"
If Poker is televised, why not televise war? That is fast paced and can go on forever. I found a great sponsor for War too. "War, brought to you by Monopoly, the only other game with no ending in sight!"
Why not televise bridge? I play bridge. That is hard to believe since I feel like Bridge is not a game played by people in my demographic. Bridge is a game in which no talking is supposed to occur during the game. (Obviously with me playing that rule is completely overlooked) The commentators for Bridge would sound like golf announcers with tape over their mouths. That is how quiet you are supposed to be while playing bridge. The bidding and Bridge would be interesting, because you are allowed to talk then. Maybe for ratings purposes Bridge would be changed to allow for some chatter. At least Bridge requires more thought than Poker. You have to bid, and not overbid. You have to see if you can draw trump fast enough. You wonder if suits in other hands are split evenly so you don't have to use all your trump cards to get them out of everyone else's hand.
Seriously though, can we please stop televising poker? If not can we please televise these other card games. If we are stuck with cards on television than I will need some card playing variety on television.
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