The reason why poker TV shows lack mainstream appeal
If you go back and watch the original WPTs or the WSOP from 2003 they actually explain the rules of No Limit Hold 'Em.
I always thought the reason poker TV shows didn't do well was that it's a show about a bunch of dudes sitting at a table playing poker.
I dont think we lack personalities, but I do think a previous poster was right about lacking "different play styles", today everything is GTO robotic and by the book.
Are you saying that Wesley and Nik Airball are attempting to emulate GTO on HCL tonight?
You want a good poker show, follow a guy like Mikke Mase or whatever is name is to his trap before the game, show him scoring crack and smoking it with a couple prostitutes. Show a few hands from the game, then follow him to the nightclub afterwards. Show the Asian gangsters with guns to his head when he lost the money they staked him. TV is over anyway, and this won't ever be a game that leads into Murder, She Wrote on Sundays.
The one and only problem with poker right now is that there isn't any coast to coast regulated online site that has been adapted by the masses who is just dump trucking ad dollars on TV/Internet.
Thats it.
Winner winner, chicken dinner! Bold part is only words where I do NOT concur. Replace "right now" with "for around the last 10 - 15 plus years" then you are 100% on the money imho.
The only way to make poker tv mainstream popular is for it to be novel (that’s over), to aggregate big moments from several sessions into one episode, and/or to add non poker entertainment elements.
Poker is boring lol
GGPoker's "Game of Gold" was one of the freshest thing to ever be produced in the last 15 years. I'm also sure they lost money on production as I highly doubt it converted eyeballs into depositors which is why we haven't seen a season 2. Without coast to coast regulated poker or a world wide market there is just no reason to produce something for mainstream TV.
It is very boring and slow. People have even shorter attention span and short, fast content dominates.
The shows that brought poker public attention to set off the boom in early 2000s were edited, showing only the exciting hands and leaving out the blind steals and 3-bet-resteals, the pots taken down by routine flop c-bets, and so on. Watch the old WPT broadcasts or ESPN coverage of the Main Event, and it is exciting.
The reason Game of Gold was so exciting and refreshing was that it, too, was edited down to the exciting stuff.
Unedited livestreams are great for someone like me, but Jane Q. Public is going to switch channels after about a minute.
Poker on TV was never that popular. The reason there was so much of it was because it was so cheap to produce. Filming one tournament would yield several episodes that could fill late night air time on sports networks, plastered with gambling related advertisement. Similar to daytime talk shows: Low cost, high volume, targeted advertisement.
