im sick of the 'sad life stories' during wsop telecasts

[jae686]

removed due to edit of previous post.

[DragonZ]

me? what about you?

[pokerraja]

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This was the kind of feature they should've stuck into the Sunday night SportsCenter with Chris Connelly.

Edit: I've got no problem with the special interest features during the WSOP. However, the Sunday Sportscenter has done plenty of these type of features, why wasn't this one of them?

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my biggest problem with this type of feature is that it does not belong on a poker show. Poker is about gambling, vegas, drinking, balling out, Milwaukees Best etc... Stories about people about to die or miracle survivors does not belong. I seriously had a major buzz kill seeing that poor kids burnt face, jesus. Im still on tilt.

[Kerth]

I hate that [censored] too. I hope they would just have confidence in poker being entertaining by itself without gimmicks.

[amplify]

That is the exact thing I thought when the story began, but as soon as they showed the kid, my heart went out to him and I was really glad that they showed it. And I'm a jaded, effed up individual. I only wish I had the courage that kid displayed to move forward. Half the time, I'm to lazy to even do anything, much less battle some horrific stuff like that. Respect, kid, respect.

[cbloom]

I think they should show about one of these per *series* not like 5 per episode. Also would be nice if they only did background stories on people who wound up making it deep. I don't really care to hear the sob story of a shmuck who's just dead money and busts out in a few hands, that's just pathetic that all this person could do with their sad life is waste $10k for a few miserable hours of being pushed around at a poker table.

[MikeRice]

2003 was the WSOP glory days every table stacked with pros and semi pros. At least double maybe even triple the hands shown per episode, no war amp champs, accident survivors, stinky englishmen or other sob stories to waste our time.

[UATrewqaz]

I also grow tired of them.

I like the rest of you can't figure out why they think the audiance wnats this. I guess they figure people will grow tired of "pure" poker for the entire broadcast, but heck isn't that why people are tuning in, it is a poker tournament.... I can tolerate a few fluff pieces on the bigger names (for example the "impressions" skit was funny and poker related)

However they put some random sob story in every broadcast (no disrespect to anybody). The story about the man dying of brain cancer was very, very sad and bummed me out, and the story about the burn victim child was also pretty blindsiding... I can see how it could be very upsetting to the squimish or sensitive types.

I guess they try to put a feel good spin on it, but jeez. The target tv audiance of poker is young to middle aged males (mostly) and I don't know why ESPN does this.

[legend42]

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I guess they try to put a feel good spin on it, but jeez. The target tv audiance of poker is young to middle aged males (mostly) and I don't know why ESPN does this.

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Because those males are going to watch the show anyway. They are the built-in audience that the production doesn't need to do that much "extra" to cater to. Those features are designed to appeal to the rest of the potential viewership, who aren't automatically going to tune in every week.

And like it or not, most of the people who did watch, when they're discussing the show at work tomorrow, aren't going to be analyzing the poker play; they're going to be talking about the burn victim. If there is one thing that TV producers know to be true, it's that people like a story.

[surfinillini]

the WSOP broadcasts have turned to dog[censored] and it's another TV show I just cannot watch anymore...

looks like the only show I can stomach recently is Laguna Beach