No LA Poker Classic thread?

[cbloom]

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If by donk-tacular you mean +EV, I agree.


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Thanks for the explanation, Alan. They cut out all his other pushes from the broadcast so it looks like the first time he pushed, and it seemed like he had been tight all night before that. If he was pushing 50%, it looks like a good (marginal!) call given the amount of dead money in the pot.

equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 47.9580 % 45.33% 02.63% { K8o }
Hand 2: 52.0420 % 49.41% 02.63% { 22+, A2s+, K2s+, Q2s+, J5s+, A2o+, K2o+, Q2o+, J7o+ }

[Alan Goehring]

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More importantly, Alan how much are you willing to pay for pictures of an semiattractive man multitabling 30-60? Are we talking hundreds? Thousands? Tens of Thousands?

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Do you really expect a serious response? I mean c'mon, you don't even say how many tables.

[La Brujita]

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More importantly, Alan how much are you willing to pay for pictures of an semiattractive man multitabling 30-60? Are we talking hundreds? Thousands? Tens of Thousands?

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Do you really expect a serious response? I mean c'mon, you don't even say how many tables.

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I'll six table with a dirty white tee shirt and ripped shorts. In all seriousness, its great to have you posting on these forums.

[olivert]

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My point was that marketing opportunities are available for SOME players, i.e. the marketable ones. Problems with marketing asian males aside, I've heard Tuan Le doesn't want the responsibility of an endorsement deal.

As for Grinder waiting this long to ink a deal, I don't think it was such a bad move considering the size of the deal he eventually secured, which is significant by real-life standards, not just "Hot-girl-signing-on-to-represent-some-unheard-of-online-pokersite" standards.

And while The Takeover hasn't signed onto anything longterm afaik, I'm pretty sure the opportunity is or will be there for him.

I'm just trying to contradict your doom-and-gloom attitude. Of course, there ought to be a natural thinning-out of the ancillary opportunities you love talking about, but it's not like they are disappearing entirely.


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Shane:

The bar for getting a endorsement deal is certainly higher for the "WPT Class of 2005" than for "WPT Class of 2004".

The deal for the "The Grinder" was long overdue, while I don't believe either Michael Gracz or John Phan have deals done yet.

(I can understand why Tuan Le doesn't want to make personal appearances at various events and functions on behalf of a sponsor, which is the primary responsibility of any endorsement deal.)

One would expect that Nick "The Takeover" Schulman, being a member of the "Class of 2006", would face an even higher hurdle than "The Grinder" in getting a sponsorship deal done.

Schulman doesn't have the attitude or the swagger of "The Grinder" that some sponsors look for.

I shudder to think what would have happened if Josh "SDouble" Schlein had beaten Freddy Deeb heads-up in Aruba in 2005.

Schlein, with his mouth, his swagger, and his attitude, would have been right up the alley of a number of online poker rooms.

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Also, any word on ESPN's schedule for WSOP prelims?

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The last I heard from a source was the approval process for the schedule is being bogged down by various "internal" issues at ESPN.

I do know that PokerStars.com definitely jumped the gun when it posted a list of 9 "televised" events last Friday.

That list of 9 events posted by PokerStars.com was based on a list ESPN Original Entertainment (EOE) and Harrah's submitted to ESPN Programming for approval.

None of those 9 events have beeen approved by ESPN Programming as of this week, though the chance of having 1 out of those 9 events approved is fairly good.

(You don't have to a genius to guess which 1 of the 9 events on the list will probably get TV coverage.)

[John Shiznit]

Oliver,
One thing you miss is that certain guys are not out there actively promoting themselves. I sat with Michael Gracz at one of the tourneys and he's a pretty quiet guy who would probably never mention his wins unless someone brought it up. So yeah he might have one of the best records in tournament poker, but he is not out there trupmeting it. Its like that in every sport the quiet humble guys really dont get many endorsements (tim duncan - knowing oliver he'll trot out a list - im just saying relative to other bball superstars.) alan acheived as much as anyone in the first season of the WPT. he did not get any deals, probably because he is not loud or actively out there promoting himself. so you need to lay off this endorsement stuff. As long as the fields are large there will be a small group of people making a very nice income off of tourney poker regardless of endorsementage.

[olivert]

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Oliver,
One thing you miss is that certain guys are not out there actively promoting themselves. I sat with Michael Gracz at one of the tourneys and he's a pretty quiet guy who would probably never mention his wins unless someone brought it up. So yeah he might have one of the best records in tournament poker, but he is not out there trupmeting it. Its like that in every sport the quiet humble guys really dont get many endorsements (tim duncan - knowing oliver he'll trot out a list - im just saying relative to other bball superstars.) alan acheived as much as anyone in the first season of the WPT. he did not get any deals, probably because he is not loud or actively out there promoting himself. so you need to lay off this endorsement stuff. As long as the fields are large there will be a small group of people making a very nice income off of tourney poker regardless of endorsementage.

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FYI:

Michael Gracz, The Grinder, Daniel Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth, Evelyn Ng, David Williams, Josh Arieh, Antonio Esfandiari, and Jennifer Harman (among others) all share the SAME agent, Brian Balsbaugh, who does business under the name "Poker Royalty".

Having spoken to Brian a couple times in the past 12 months, he can I do agree on this: online poker endorsement deals for players are now taking much longer to get done compared to 2004 and the first half of 2005.

Brian signed The Grinder and Michael Gracz about a year ago during the 2005 WSOP.

The Grinder only recently got his online poker endorsement deal, after the likes of "Blackjack Babe" Erica Schoenberg
and Playboy cover girl Joanna Krupa got their deals.

The Grinder was by far the most marketable tournament poker player from the "Class of 2005", as The Grinder packaged himself in the image of a boxer, complete with swagger, attitude, and a sizable entourage.

Even though The Grinder was a close to being a "total package" as there is, Brian Balsbaugh had to work nearly a year to get an endorsement deal done for The Grinder.

Michael Gracz still doesn't have an endorsement deal yet even though he wants one and Brian Balsbaugh has been trying to get him one in the past 12 months.

Gracz has gotten a couple of TV appearances, first on GSN's Battle of the Ages last July, and soon as a guest commentator on FSN's Poker Dome.

--

I also know from talking to a number of sources that many poker BOOK deals have been recinded within the past 6-9 months, due to a combination of saturation and maturing of the poker book market, and declining interest from the buying public for poker books and other poker-related merchandise (which parallelled the TV ratings erosion for TV poker products.)

WPTE's merchandise and brand licensing revenue in the past 2 quarters are down at least 26% compared to the same quarter 12 months ago.

[John Shiznit]

Having an agenet is not the same as promoting yourself. Take a sport like basketball. Tim Duncan may be the best player in the last 10 yrs (debatable - but thats not important.) However, Kobe Brayant, Allen Iverson, and others have earned more in endorsement money. Basically, because they have alot more controversial or entertatining. A guy like antonio would have done better because his antics are way out there. Yeah, alot of people have a negative view of him but still he has a recognizable personality.

The one thing WPT has working for it is better venues for their tourneys. Borgata in A.C. is now a place people want to go, compaer that to Harrahs, A.C. Foxwoods is the only place to play in the whole N.E. YOu just have to accept that people are not entirely playing for the endorsement. WPT has better venues for their tourneys.

[Dominic]

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I don't know who Joanna Krupa is, or what she has to do with poker, but Grinder recently signed a totally sick longterm endorsement deal with Absolute Poker. You keep talking about the lack of ancillary potential that poker players get to enjoy now, so you must not be aware that people like the Grinder and Takeoever still have a lot of marketablility.

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Joanna Krupa is Titan/Noble Poker's spokemodel...I'm working with her when we shoot the final table of the $100,000,000 on a Norwegian Cruise ship to the Bahamas next month. Yea me!

[img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[Dominic]

"quartile??"

[Lou]

I know the WPT doesn't allow deals, but this call had deal written over it. C'mon, would you call with k8 for a million dollars? But maybe you would for just the 25k buyin and the title!