I'm currently on a biz trip to sunny Canada this week. Sound great, right? Wrong. I'm stuck in a hotel room at the Vancouver airport, and won't even get a chance to go into town for a couple of hours. So I'm stuck in my room, and, unfortunately, I only get five channels of TV. I'm not a big TV watcher, but in this kind of situation, I need something to help wile away the late night hours. Fortunately, Poker seems to be big up here in the great white north, and the game permeates the few channels of TV. In fact, I'm currently watching a reality show where Phil Helmuth and Annie Duke are hosts. I think the title is something like "The Ultimate Bet Poker Show" or something similar. The premise is a group of players sit down at a poker table and play a single-table tournament. Meanwhile, Phil and Annie sit in another room and criticize/comment/rag on the play of the contestants. Each week, Annie and Phil vote one or two players off the game, with the goal (evidently) being that at the end of the season, they've picked the best player to sponsor at a big live tournament somewhere.
The show is kinda silly, but I'm a sucker for pretty much any poker on the tube, and the show is kinda entertaining. Annie Duke is actually a pretty good analyst, offering some decent commentary on odds, probability of winning, and the importance of aggression. I learned a few things, including why A-small is so weak in the blinds when facing a button steal attempt. Sure, I knew it was weak, but not completely why. Annie made a nice little explanatory speech that laid out the reason it tends to be so far behind against the range the opp is hold. Pretty cool.
Now, Phil, on the other hand..... well, the man simply has to be the world's biggest poker schmuck. He's inconsistent in his advice to the players and offers inane commentary to anyone bothering to listen. Worse, he is so friggin' impressed with himself that he seems incapable of actually hearing what Annie Duke (or any of the other people on the show) is saying. He's right, she's wrong, period. He also frequently throws in little comments about what a great player he is, how many bracelets he has won, etc. Like I said: schmuck.
Now, before you say anything, I understand having a character you "love to hate" often makes for good TV. Think JR Ewing, Simon Cowell, John MacEnroe, or even Mr. Burns from the Simpsons. Villainry makes for conflict, which is at the heart of a compelling story or contest.
The problem with Phil H. is he's just too over the top full of himself to be compelling. He's also not, in my humble opinion, that great of a poker player. Sure, he's won 11 bracelets, but when you watch him play on TV (whether its on High Stakes Poker, NBC's Heads-Up competition, or just snippets from past WSOP events), the man occasionally makes some pretty dodgy plays. And then there's his whole poor sportsmanship gig, calling other players names and throwing his intolerable tantrums. And this ultimately is the problem with not being able to "love to hate" the guy. JR, Simon, Mac, and, yes, even Mr. Burns, were brilliant in their own fields, therefore even if you hated them, you still got something back from watching them. Phil, on the other hand, is brilliant only in his own mind. You don't love to hate him, you simply hate him.
Oh well... enough ranting for now. Back to my five pitiful chanels of hotel TV. Maybe there's a Phil Helmuth tantrum I can watch.
All-in for now...
-Bug
There may be, but he shows up on the tube more often then any others I can think of.
ReplyDeleteAs for looking for his blowups, he seems to have turned over a new leaf for awhile now and become Mr. Nice guy.
I was watching WSOP Binon cup on ESPN tonight that started (before tonight) with 20 bracelet winners, and last ten were here with Phil as the low stack (something like 1125 chips, mzx chip count was something like 20,000+). He went out 1st hand on TV and smiled graciously i spite of a jab or two from one of the other players. He was also a gracious winner and loser on NBC's Head's Up earlier this year.
I do agree though, he doesn't give much advice, like in the local paper's column on Thursdays and they tend to mainly focus on him. A couple have been somewhat entertaining but I can't say I've really learned anything from them yet.
Do you know if we might be able to pick up that program down here in the states on cable?