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POCKET ACES

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Maryann Guberman has been a writer and editor with many gaming publications, including Sports Form, Card Player, Poker World, Player's Panorama and Systems and Methods. She also has written and edited numerous books on gambling.

Aug 16, 2008

Where's the Passion?

I am an Olympics junkie. I absolutely will not watch any TV program unless all the coverage is off the air. This summer, however, I can find athletes competing in all sorts of sports nearly 24 hours a day and I would probably do just that if a 9-to-5 didn't interfere. I've even missed a couple of ESPN World Series broadcasts in favor of boxing and women's volleyball. I'll do the same with the Winter Olympics which for which I have a slight preference.

What I find compelling about each of these competitions is the intensity and focus of the athletes. They don't just stand ready to compete and beat each and every other athlete in their sport. These people, young (some very young) and old (some older than we generally expect to see at this level) bring with them a complete devotion to their endeavor.

They have what the French refer to as la grande-passion, a term, usually reserved for a love affair, that aptly fits the total immersion, love, dedication, devotion and fervor they devote to becoming better than excellent.

Where does that sort of mindset occur in poker, I wonder?

What currently passes for passion in poker? Would the guy who hoots and howls and spreads his testosterone around the room when he sucks out count as immersion? Would you refer to the dead-pan stare of a first-live-tourney player as dedication? When someone who uses televised tournament players as role models, does that spell fervor?

I know. I'm a dinosaur of sorts in this modern poker age, I and many old-timer journeymen and pros. As such, we expect others to have the same nurturing interest in the game that we (quote) grew up with (end quote).

But that's not necessarily a negative. It won't get me in any of the popular night clubs and it won't make me best friends with the likes of Paris Hilton. The positive impact dinosaurs have is that no matter what happens, they will always be a reference point, a footnote to future poker, an entry in what passes for the print and cyber version of Wikipedia.

Who among the known players has the kind of devotion to poker that Michael Phelps has for swimming, that Nastia Liukin has for tumbling and swinging on bars and rings, and such or the supreme concentration those tiny Chinese athletes (whose names I can't begin to pronounce) present to the world.?

These passionate poker people exist.

Here's one way you know if someone has la grande-passion for poker. Go to their houses and look at the dŽcor. Are there card symbols painted on the mailbox? Does a doorbell chime out the opening bars of Kenny Rogers' famous poker song? Is every wall covered with poker posters and artwork? Do the residents have an entire library with at least two copies of every poker book every published running the length and height of a room? Are the shrubs trimmed in the shape of pips? Does the bottom of the pool have the king or queen of hearts in glass tile at the center?

These are the people who have a passion for poker and I know they exist. I don't know any of the younger crowd that has this kind of devotion but I know a couple of soon-to-be dinosaurs who surround themselves with poker and who exude poker the way a dragon breathes fire.

Most folks will think these people are slightly warped, perhaps close to degenerates, a word we use lovingly, not in its original intent, but I think they are the true lovers of poker, the people whose name and fame, will live on because they have contributed something memorable -- the preservation of their grand passion.