For the first time since going to the World Series of Poker (WSOP) in 2005, and despite the absence of any real success at the 2008 WSOP, I started to look forward to the 2009 event as soon as the last one ended. Usually, I'm more inclined to take things one month at a time, but this time I felt like the WSOP experience had set itself apart from the rest of the tournament circuit.
When the organizers announced the
schedule last week, the wind in my sails deflated a bit. This year's schedule seems more disjointed than in recent years and incongruous with positive trends in WSOP scheduling. Basically, they fixed a few things that weren't broken, didn't add much, and alienated a lot of players by eliminating five rebuy tournaments.
I know that there are still plenty of events for everyone, and I'll show up and play a bunch of them, but I gotta complain about a few aspects of the new schedule:
- Opening Weekend: Leaving aside for a moment any analysis about the $40K event that is the first open event of the WSOP 2009, the first big field NL event is a $1,000 buyin, a downgrade from its usual $1,500.
First of all, it has been a sort of unwritten rule that the lowest WSOP buyin should be $1,500. Secondly, the first $1,500 event NL consistently drew an enormous crowd, and I don't see any reason to tamper with that success. This year's format will most likely create more of an organizational nightmare, too. I also liked the traditional back-to-back scheduling of $1500 NL with a $1500 PLHE, but the next events after event #4 are PLO and Stud.
- No new games like Badugi. Last year's 8-game format was a success, they should have tried for a 12-game version, or something. This is a minor issue for me, but it would have been nice to see more forms of poker incorporated, as has been the case in the past few years.
- The decision to remove rebuys is inexplicable and very frustrating. The WSOP is supposed to be a showcase for
all forms of tournament poker, and rebuys are one of the most popular, fun, and skillful types of tournament poker around. I heard of arguments that were given for the termination of rebuys, the first being a concern for collusion during the rebuy period (which had been addressed adequately last year by Jack Effel, I thought), and the second, far more ridiculous assessment advanced by
Daniel Negreanu, a member of the WSOP's Player's Advisory Committee:
"Frankly, rebuy events should have never been a part of a World Championship series event, and what is happening this year is simply fixing that mistake."
I don't know where Daniel gets this idea from, or why he uses the lamest rhetorical adverb, "frankly," whenever possible. Well, gee Daniel, thanks for being so candid! Let's hear your reasons to back this up:
"With a player of the year award on the line, every player that enters an event should have an equal chance at acquiring points and winning a bracelet. Rebuys skew these types of events significantly in the top pros favor. Players like myself, who aren't concerned with the amount it costs, will simply cash a higher percentage of the time by using an aggressive rebuy strategy."
This rationale is both inaccurate (rebuys do not enable "significant" skewing) and absurd (Daniel is actually unique in his history with rebuys for using his lack of "concern with the amount it costs" as a sort of publicity stunt and legend-building opportunity) for a few reasons:
The WSOP Player of the Year (POY) award is almost meaningless in the scope of the entire series--it awards the player who ran well and produced results across several events, and the state of being well-bankrolled, or ability to be "aggressive," for 5 rebuy periods (out of 50+ events) has an effect that is less than negligible on the POY race.
Furthermore, very few non-name-brand players pay any attention to this POY race--it's more like a novelty. Of course, if events like the $40K NL and $50K HORSE events count towards the POY results, his argument is worse than disingenuous. In any event, Daniel's fixation with POY-type accolades does not represent the average poker player's priorities.
Yes, rebuys are great for professional players for reasons I don't feel like enumerating, but it has nothing to do with bankroll considerations, as almost everyone realizes that mindless gambling in the rebuy period has a negative expected value.
The thing is, rebuys are also a great opportunity for amateurs and shot-takers, who enjoy a unique sort of overlay. Although those players are not employing the same optimal rebuy-period strategy that pros do, they get to play what is essentially a $3,000 tournament for $1,000. And sometimes they win.
Michael Chu snapped off the rebuy in 2007 on "one bullet."
"As for the PLO and 2-7 event, due to the nature of those games, players will be able to simulate rebuys with lamers. You can put your whole bankroll on the table all at once, or you can protect yourself by holding on to your lamers until you feel like you want to put the rest of your chips in play."
This is actually a pretty insulting explanation. Part of the risk, the vague sense of danger in a rebuy tournament, comes from having to manage your decisions in relation to your actual cash bankroll for the event. A fixed buyin with lamers that can be used at any time doesn't even come close to mimicking an actual rebuy event. Not to mention, with the PLO/2-7, they are substituting events where players spent an average of $20k+ with a flat $10,000 event and massacring the long-standing traditional symbolism that the $5K 2-7 w/Rebuys event embodied as the "pro's bracelet."
To me, the only legitimate reason to eliminate the rebuy events is to protect players' bankrolls, which might be a prudent consideration by a casino in an uncertain economy. But in the meantime, empty statements from Negreanu like, "It's the right thing to do for poker, and I am genuinely able to separate what is best for me, and what is best for poker, and choose poker" do not amount to a solid explanation.
To be continued (maybe)....
