Why Didn't Varkonyi Have The Same Effect As Moneymaker?
Everyone knows Chris Moneymaker won the 2003 WSOP Main Event and launched the poker boom of the mid 2000s. Chris showed the world that a regular guy who was not a top pro poker player could defeat the best players and win the Main Event. Moneymaker is a legend. But just one year earlier in the 2002 WSOP Main Event another amateur poker player, Robert Varkonyi, did the same thing as Moneymaker. He defeated the top pros and won the Main Event. And nobody really cared. No poker boom was started and almost nobody remembers him.
So why was the Moneymaker win such a catalyst even though Varkonyi did the same thing the previous year?
15 Replies
Necro-bumping this because I'm so glad that more and more people even now are questioning the brainless and chronologically-challenged "Moneymaker caused the poker boom" narrative. Always tilted the **** out of me because I knew from the get-go that it was false. Demonstrably false. Literally a "wet streets cause rain" argument. It's not just wrong, it's backwards. Moneymaker didn't create the boom, the boom created Moneymaker.
My friends and I started playing in March of 2003, all putting our money on Party and UltimateBet soon after, and it was because of the WPT. Moneymaker didn't even win the ME until two months later, and it didn't air until months after that. By then, WPT was already one of the biggest shows on cable and online poker traffic was skyrocketing.
I've got nothing against Chris, but the meme is really unjust because he got showered with twenty years-plus of credit (and even a place in the Poker Hall of Fame ffs) that actually should have gone to other people. Sure it was dramatic and compelling when he defeated Sammy, but that's because there was a super-talented TV production crew there depicting the event in a dramatic and compelling way. Duh.
Saying that Moneymaker caused the poker boom is like saying that Mark Hamill caused the Star Wars craze.
Eh, his persona and definitely the name made for a good story.
It's more like saying that Hamill caused the Star Wars craze if his real name had been Skywalker.
Eh, his persona and definitely the name made for a good story.
It's more like saying that Hamill caused the Star Wars craze if his real name had been Skywalker.
Yeah he was the personification of the poker boom and became the poster boy. Perfect time, perfect place, perfect name, perfect story. Definitely a symbiotic relationship.
I kinda agree with the perfect storm argument of ESPNs involvement, airing the entire tournament, the production value, commentators (Norm is pretty funny you fools), online poker and satellites, and of course...Moneymaker.
HOWEVER, none of that much mattered at that time without the holecards. All that I mentioned prior, makes the holecards that much more effective (especially the production and airing tournament). But without seeing hands until showdown..if they were shown at all...is worthless. I've watched a couple older broadcasts and it's pretty awful without knowing the cards and I've played professionally and semi professionally for nearly 20 years. Imagine what it's like for the common man flipping through channels?
Is this a troll? I feel it's been covered ad nauseum.
you can't underestimate the moneymaker name. the sheer novelty of it all gave it so much news coverage. yes moneymaker himself was part of the first wave of customers to poker sites doing lots of paid marketing. but the earned media from that outcome dwarfs the initial ad spend that brought moneymaker to the satellite.
Varkonyi was already rich (and on wall street no less - BORING!) Moneymaker satellited in and made it so that 'Anyone' could do the same. Varkonyi was not a 'dream come true' at all like Moneymaker - so everyone now felt like they had a shot at it
Necro-bumping this because I'm so glad that more and more people even now are questioning the brainless and chronologically-challenged "Moneymaker caused the poker boom" narrative. Always tilted the **** out of me because I knew from the get-go that it was false. Demonstrably false. Literally a "wet streets cause rain" argument. It's not just wrong, it's backwards. Moneymaker didn't create the boom, the boom created Moneymaker.
My friends and I started playing in March of 2003, all putting our mo
This is absolutely correct. Our book sales had already exploded before anyone heard of Moneymaker.
In fact, after Greg Raymer won in 2004 we saw another boost in book sales while we saw no boost in sales (after the WPT shows) when Moneymaker won.
It shouldn't be called the "Moneymaker Effect," it was the Henry Orenstein Effect.
On top of everything else, MM run could not have been scripted better; it was 10x better than any gambling movie ever made as far as the gambling scenes go except maybe Hustler & COM.
Chan, Lederer, Ivey and then an utterly perfect final three capped off by the greatest bluff ever. Just amazing luck he got on that first TV table.
I donÂ’t recall much exciting about the 2002 ME once Ivey went out 23rd aside from Shipley spewing the big lead Foxenstyle and Hellmuth getting his head shaved. But if you flip the two fields who knows what Lon & Norm wouldve made out of Varky, Julian Gardner & Ralph Perry.
I do agree he didn’t “help launch” the boom; more like his win threw napalm on a huge fire, but it’s not like he’s spent the past 21 years wearing I STARTED THE BOOM shirts.
There was significant Moneymaker Effect truthing in GrantlandÂ’s ten year anniversary oral history so I donÂ’t quite understand the necrobump.
Not saying anyone here is doing it intentionally or unintentionally but I have noticed it’s become a sort of ‘street cred’ type thing to take shots at the Moneymaker Effect that sometimes stray into shots at him personally. He played at least as well as Ferguson did, or Tamayo & The Laptops.
2001 ME Entrants: 613
2002: 631 (first time hole cards shown)
2003: 839 (WPT)
2004: 2576 (Moneymaker)
This is absolutely correct. Our book sales had already exploded before anyone heard of Moneymaker.
In fact, after Greg Raymer won in 2004 we saw another boost in book sales while we saw no boost in sales (after the WPT shows) when Moneymaker won.
How soon after Greg’s win did the sales increase?
Almost immediately. We sold 60 percent more books in the second half of 2004 than the first half. After Moneymaker won the previous year we saw virtually no change in sales numbers relative to what had happened after the WPT shows had greatly increased our sales.
But in fairness, I've always felt that Moneymaker did prolong the new sales rate that the WPT shows had established, and then Raymer won. Part of the reason, we think, that Greg's win did increase book sales, was that he had been a very active poster on this site before in won the main event.
Almost immediately. We sold 60 percent more books in the second half of 2004 than the first half. After Moneymaker won the previous year we saw virtually no change in sales numbers relative to what had happened after the WPT shows had greatly increased our sales.
But in fairness, I've always felt that Moneymaker did prolong the new sales rate that the WPT shows had established, and then Raymer won. Part of the reason, we think, that Greg's win did increase book sales, was that he had been a very
God forbid Greg win that hand against Kanter as an 82% favorite the following year. Going back to back wouldve sold some books.
MoneymakerÂ’s win definitely ignited an I can do that inferno among the get rich quick/lol study the game crowd. Lotta busted out day traders playing 1/2 and $5 satellites.
It was 99% the presence and growing influence of poker being available online. The "perfect storm" was already brewing, but it exploded after 2003.....
I think the die was cast as soon as the WPT started broadcasting, in 2002. As someone with new online poker brand, I'll say without any doubt the HUGE growth from marketing spends on WPT shows cannot be over stated. My company went and bought every Travel Channel ad spot we could, in whatever markets were available; the ROI from week to week an
What was your business?
