Feedback!

Recently (last blog) I put my email out there in hopes to get some feedback on my blogs. I want to start by thanking everyone that took the time to write to me (regardless of subject matter). I love interaction and hearing ya'lls thoughts. I am going to make a conscious effort to cover the requests everyone put in as well as continue with the norm in future blogs. I think I got some 20 responses in the last few days none of which were anything below constructive criticism. I only got ONE request for money which I want to say to all who are thinking to send that Im sorry but I can't grant them. If I granted every one I''d be broke in a week. That being said,there are a few things that I'd like to address here just to set the record straight!

First and foremost to everyone that wrote about Lolo's SEVENTH place finish. Thanks. Its good to know that I have 10 new friends who never make mistakes. Only joking. If these are the "worst" types of comments I get I'll consider i'd be ecstatic. I don't know how I was so misinformed about her placement (and thus her post run speech). TBH I think I was a bit buzzed while watching and got it confused with another race and problems ensued from there. My point remains the same however in that she still presented a classy appearance despite "failure." Furthermore it shows that there is variance in the sport (my original point) that I found interesting. If you care to check back I changed literally 10 words to make the blog correct and I don't feel it takes away from the point at all. I'd also like to note here that someone pointed out how I mentioned Lolo wins 100's of races per season. I skimmed the blog quickly and couldn't find that part (not to say its not there Im just too lazy to reread it in detail) so I'd like to mention that I think I was referring to "races" as practices or perhaps I was exaggerating. I don't know though since I didn't reread it. But just a thought in case anyone else picked that up. There is the third (and most likely) option in that Im just retarded. In any case, thanks a lot for looking out as Im sure I'll make a bunch of retarded comments between now and the time cardplayer gives me the boot. The only difference now is that I won't lose sleep over it because I just employed 10 new editors working for me :)

I got many requests to talk about poker. Ughhhhhh. Several were on the same subject; namely that of the direction of poker in the next few years. I found this rather interesting (perhaps anything that doesn't feature the discussion of a specific hand isn't as boring) and would like to briefly touch on a few points. I recently had a discussion with Tom "Durrrr" Dwan the other day in which I was complaining about how poker has been getting harder and its dying blah blah blah. He quickly shut me up and explained the following. I am paraphrasing here but I'll put it in quotes because well Idk why but thats just what Im going to do.

"There is more money now in poker than there ever was before. There are more people playing, bigger tournaments (WCOOP online for instance is 5 times bigger than last year if you compare the main events, ftops just added a 25k PLO and 25k HU event, stars doubled their guarantees, etc), and sicker cash games than ever before. You just have to be smarter."

We had a pretty extensive conversation but this was the gist of it. I feel like this really hit home for me. In the past (2006 - 2007) you could sit HU at virtually any stakes and be 90% certain that if you weren't familiar with the person that sat down with you, that they were a fish. I mistakingly didn't alter this philosophy in the past year and it has hurt me. Players have gotten better but that's being confused with poker dying. Sure if the games "dry up" (like 5 card stud) then there won't be money involved but I feel there's simply too many people playing (and bad ones at that) for that to happen in the near future. Furthermore, if you've had the opportunity to go to Europe or Australia where the average person in a 10k event can't spell poker I feel you would rest assured. I would like to note that PLO has definitely taken a surge in the past year and I feel it will continue to do so in the new future. I also think the newest trend is going to be the mixed games (which several of you mentioned) and I really want to get into that as my next project (after I win a big live tournament). I don't to dismiss this as the end of this subject as I think its eminent but I wanted to touch on it because of the volume of requests I had about it. I hope this helps and if I continue to get more requests perhaps I'll dedicate an entire blog to it that I have a really good idea for (in the event that I do). Keep them coming and I'll get on it :)

Thats all for now! Thanks again for all the comments and please keep them coming (alectorelli@gmail.com). I would like to note that I generally only check emails Monday and Thursday mornings so if I don't get back to you immediately; don't fret. I will do my best to respond during that next period where I check them. Thanks for reading and I'm going to make a point to update these more frequently especially with the topic requests I have more to cover.
Cheers

~ Trah ~