Greg Raymer Champion

BY: Ashley Adams
Contact at: (Asha34@aol.com)
Author of Winning 7-Card Stud

Greg Raymer is the World's Champion of Poker. He has done the difficult, winning the final event of the World Series of Poker. There are so many superlatives that describe his feat. By winning five million dollars ($5,000,000.000) he is the winner of the largest prize in a poker tournament; the winner of the most money in WSOP history; and the winner of the largest first place prize in any competitive sporting event. By beating 2,575 opponents he wins the largest poker tournament ever held in a real (versus virtual) casino. He is, quite simply, the man. Lancy Howard would be proud (read The Cincinnati Kid if you don't know that reference).

Even so, there is some obnoxious and silly sniping along the fringes of the win. I've recently read many posts complaining about the lack of "name pros" at the final table. Somehow, these posters have come to the conclusion that since no one they have ever heard of (and they haven't even heard of final table contestant and former WSOP Main Event winner Dan Harrington) won the largest event in poker history, the victory must be more the product of luck than ever before.

Some poker "purists" opine that with the mammoth field, luck clearly outweighed skill. Some famous players criticize many contestants in this large field for not having the skill to fold to a bluff, making the aggressive tactics of the world's best players less meaningful. "How can you outplay someone who doesn't recognize the great hand that the bluffer was representing" seems to be his or her mantra.

To all of these critics I say "HOGWASH". They are wrong on so many levels that I have to laugh at their inanity. This victory by Greg Raymer is the greatest poker no limit tournament victory in the history of the sport. Consider the following.

If a player is too bad to be bluffed out of a pot then how skillful is it to attempt a bluff against that player? Don't whine just because the tactics that work against your regular crew of tight players doesn't work against a loose tournament newbie. If these well known professionals are such experts then why were they bluffing a guy who was going to call? What kind of a read was that?

The ability to bluff is not necessarily any more important a skill than the ability to adjust ones play to fit the situation. It sure seems in hindsight that the experienced player -- at least the player with experience playing against a lot of unknowns of limited experience -- would know enough not to attempt bluffs and other fancy moves against the typical loose, inexperience big field player. Toward that end, maybe the guys who have the most experience playing in large on line tournaments against loose, inexperience players have a decided advantage over those big money players who generally are up against players whom they know and play regularly against in brick and mortar casinos. Adjusting to game conditions is a valuable skill indeed.

But let's say that the top pro really is significantly better than the field. How much better is he? And how does this advantage translate into his chances for winning an event with such a large field? How incongruous were the results from what we'd expect the results to be?

Is the top pro fifty percent better than the average player in the WSOP? That's a whole lot better -- certainly much better than I've ever been in a ring game (and I'm pretty good). To be fifteen percent better is to beat the rake at the $20/40 game I'm usually in. And there are darn few players who beat the rake -- maybe 10% of us at most. To be fifty percent better would be to win three big bets an hour or so -- maybe four or five big bets an hour. I honestly don't know anyone making that good a living playing poker anywhere in the world.

But let's really bend over backwards to give full credit to the best pros in the business. Let's credit these top-level pros playing in the WSOP's final event with being even better than the best. Let's say they're one hundred percent better than average -- no, make that three hundred percent better -- four times better than average. If the average player has a ten percent chance of winning a one-table tournament then let's give these players a forty percent chance. That's an absurdly huge advantage. But then I want to make an absurdly huge point.

Now let's apply that to the WSOP. There were 2576 players. The average player would have been a 2576:1 long shot to win the event. What shot would the best pros in the world have? Even if we give them the benefit of being three hundred percent better than average, they'd still be a 644:1 long shot. Them's long odds folks.

But let's not look at just the chances of one particular pro winning the event. Let's look at the whole field of "name pros". How many pro players do you know by name? Can you name 30? 40? 50? OK, maybe you read a lot of poker magazines and have a good memory and can recognize 60 of them as the top pros. Good for you! Then the odds of one of them winning is about 10:1 against! So why be so surprised that the winner wasn't one of the people you thought was the most skillful.

As it happens, the universe of excellent no limit hold em players is probably much broader than most observers think it is, and much broader than it ever was. Consider this. Up until fifteen years ago or so, you had to have very deep pockets and be one of a select few touring professional players to get much experience at all playing no limit hold em. Up until a decade ago, if you wanted to play in no limit tournaments on a regular basis you really only had a few more options than that. You either had to live in Southern California or Las Vegas where these tournaments went off with regular frequency or you had to have the freedom and bankroll to travel around the world to play in tournaments as they happened. In the mid-90s these options expanded to living in Eastern Connecticut or Atlantic City and playing each week or so in small no limit tourneys. But that was pretty much it on a regular basis.

But then, starting in the late 90s and expanding exponentially each year until the present, on line poker really took off. Today, thousands of no limit tournaments a year can be played from the convenience of your home -- a few every day if you so desire. And while it isn't the same thing as playing in a live tournament, it's certainly close enough for hundreds of thousands of players to develop serious no limit tournament chops.

All of this points to the enormity of the recent victory by Greg Raymer. He not only won the world's most prestigious poker event (going away, by the way, for those of you who didn't follow the action live. Make sure to watch the overwhelming play of the final day when the event comes to video). He not only beat the largest field ever assembled in a live tournament. He beat the largest field of players with no limit hold em experience.

Some attempt to downgrade the proficiency of the competitors in this year's final event by pointing to the number of players who won their seat in a satellite or qualifying tournament of one sort or another. But this seems to be inverted logic. Which is the more skillful means to a seat at the Big Dance, buying your way in for $10,000 or earning your way in by beating other players? Seems obvious to me that those who won their seats by beating hundreds or even thousands of other players had the more difficult route.

All in all then, Greg Raymer's victory demonstrates that he is, right now, the best no limit tournament poker player in the world. Besides that, by the way, he is an amusing, intelligent, and affable player from my home casino of Foxwoods Resort Casino in Connecticut. He is a credit to the game.

Congratulations Mr. Raymer. Long may you reign!

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