Comparison with baseball as an argument that poker is a game of skill?

[Self Made]

I haven't been in this forum much recently, so I don't know which arguments for poker as a game of skill have been discussed. I am familiar with some:
- the "my son saved the world" argument [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]: (you can choose to play badly and lose, unlike in, say, slots)
- the Howard Lederer argument (that's what I call it anyway, since I read about it in an interview with him): basically, most hands don't go to showdown at high levels, so what does the random draw of cards have to do with it?

Here's another one, to demonstrates the basic point that there's luck in everything:

Present a scenario to a judge where the better entity only wins 60% or so of the time, and performance can vary by hundreds of percent from session to session. Ask him if that's a game of luck. He'll probably say yes. Tell him he just called baseball a game of luck, and performance pay for professional baseball players must be illegal gambling.

[KurtSF]

While the comparison is actually good (I think there is a similar amount of luck in poker and baseball), it is also pointless. Gamblers /= athletes, no matter what kind of "luck" is involved.

[KurtSF]

Then again, baseball players /= athletes either, but you know what I mean.

[mtgordon]

As a side not Lederer's argument isn't very good either. If a guy flops quads he's obviously not folding. Just because we don't know what cards a person had because it didn't reach showdown doesn't mean the cards didn't have any affect on the outcome.

I would much rather compare it to sports.

[Skallagrim]

"If a guy flops quads he's obviously not folding."

While this is true in all but truly sci-fiction scenarios, I thought poker was made up of more than one player? Doesnt some one else have to make decisions for there to be play?

If the guy goes all in with quads and everyone folds to him, what won his hand, his quads, his bet or everyone else's decision to fold? And since he could have got the same result with the same bet with 2-7os, how can the cards be the determining factor in that outcome?

What if some guy calls with a staight flush draw? What if he hits it?

What you call the Lederer argument (which I call my argument since I posted it way before Howard mentioned it to the press) is still the best argument going.

A players reaction to their cards is not the same thing as the cards playing themselves. If it were, we wouldnt need any strategy (or this site) beyond a simple flow chart, would we?

Skallagrim

PS - the baseball analogy is actually a very good one in terms of statistics and also how each opponents level of skill is important to quantifying how much skill determines the outcome of a game or tournament.

[Chump Change]

A comparison I thought of recently (2 actually, 1 being backgammon but i'm sure that's already been discussed) is to scrabble.
There is a random distribution of tiles but from then on the skill takes over. A good player will make use of bad tiles and beat an unskilled player and when two elite players (or two of the same relative skill) play the outcome will usually be decided by tile distribution (variance). Still, a reasonably skilled player can beat an elite player on any given day, but the more skilled you become the less luck you realize there is and most amateurs think the game is, while not predominately, a bunch of luck. There are even terms for running good and bad.
I don't think this notion will blow anybody away but it's still interesting how one is viewed as wholesome and there are money tournaments and matches for money all over, while the other is under government heat.

[ike]

[ QUOTE ]
"If a guy flops quads he's obviously not folding."

While this is true in all but truly sci-fiction scenarios, I thought poker was made up of more than one player? Doesnt some one else have to make decisions for there to be play?

If the guy goes all in with quads and everyone folds to him, what won his hand, his quads, his bet or everyone else's decision to fold? And since he could have got the same result with the same bet with 2-7os, how can the cards be the determining factor in that outcome?

What if some guy calls with a staight flush draw? What if he hits it?

What you call the Lederer argument (which I call my argument since I posted it way before Howard mentioned it to the press) is still the best argument going.

A players reaction to their cards is not the same thing as the cards playing themselves. If it were, we wouldnt need any strategy (or this site) beyond a simple flow chart, would we?

Skallagrim

PS - the baseball analogy is actually a very good one in terms of statistics and also how each opponents level of skill is important to quantifying how much skill determines the outcome of a game or tournament.

[/ QUOTE ]

Your argument or Lederer's or whoever you want to attribute it to, sucks. The fact that most hands don't go to showdown doesn't prove anything. Imagine a heads up poker game with a 2 card deck, one ace, one king, whoever gets dealt the ace wins. Add in some betting so it never ever goes to showdown.

I hate these arguments. Theres obviously some luck and some skill in poker. "Mostly skill" isn't sufficiently specific to make a convincing argument. If the fact that the best players tend to win isn't proof that poker is mostly skill, none of these silly arguments about losing on purpose or hands not going to showdown do any good.

[dlk9s]

[ QUOTE ]
(I think there is a similar amount of luck in poker and baseball)

[/ QUOTE ]

No, there isn't.

[Skallagrim]

Ike, you just dont get it do you?

I didnt create the argument, Courts and legislatures created the argument: if poker is mostly chance, its illegal gambling except at a licensed casino (or in very few states, a home non-raked game). If its illegal gambling, its covered by the UIGEA and I will ask you again whether this argument matters after all the funding for online poker dries up.

But the real problem you have is an inability to see the distinction between a decision BASED on cards and a decision DETERMINED by cards. I dont know you at all, but I will tell you if you play poker where your decisions are determined by cards, you are an entry level player and easily beatable by more skilled players who will take advantage of your predictability.

A serious student of poker knows that (his) cards are only one factor in any decision.

Every other aspect of poker is NOT CHANCE, whatever you want to call it.

If you dont like my argument, come up with your own.

Otherwise, if you are playing a game you believe is mostly chance, well why study it? You either get the cards or you dont right....There is nothing I like more than seeing someone who believes that statement sit at my table.

Skallagrim

[Mendacious]

Skallagrim, respectfully, though I undertand the luck/skill argument is a Court or Legislative creation, I think most of what I see on this totally misses the real purpose of the distintion. OK, fine, Poker = Scrabble, or Poker = Baseball, whatever. That doesn't help us. It is not like a plethora of States make it legal to wager on the outcomes of scrabble and baseball-- such that if they are in, we are in. You can play Baseball, Scrabble & Poker all day long, you just can't wager on them in most states.

In my view, the intention of most States is to make WAGERING illegal-- with a few limited and licensed expections such as lottery, horse racing dog racing, Indian Casinos, etc. However, there are too many "legitimate" activities that share similarities with "wagering" such that a backdoor exists in the law to differentiate these things from traditional gambling. By this I mean- trading, bonuses, contests, etc.

IMHO it is misfocusing our efforts to try to "backdoor" poker through a luck/skill exception that clearly was not intended to apply to a wagering game like poker. Rather, we should spend our efforts getting legislatures to explicitly approve a licensed and regulated version of our game. Legalizition of poker wagering needs to be accomplished through grassroots support, lobbying, and not lawyering.

-- and this is coming from a cardplaying lawyer himself.