Are ESPN's live poker broadcasts must-see TV?

If you’re a devoted poker geek or a devoted gambler – and I’m guilty as charged on both counts – then you understand how it was nearly impossible to turn away from ESPN’s live coverage of the World Series of Poker Main Event.

That is, until it put me to sleep. The novelty officially wore off as I stayed awake into the wee hours Wednesday morning hoping to see someone get squashed in the nocturnal fold-a-thon that made a poor substitute for a poker tournament as the field was whittled down to the “November Nine.”

I dozed off before one of the short stacks, a player named John Hewitt who folded 50 straight hands at the start of play, tossed the skeleton of his former chip pile into the middle and got knocked out in 10th place, right around the time the Rio’s tired cocktail waitresses were offering players a dawn-breaking cup of coffee.

This doesn’t mean live poker is a bad idea, but it could use some adjustments. Poker coverage has come a long way in a short period of time. Just a few years ago, the Main Event was played to the end in Las Vegas, and TV viewers didn’t get a glimpse of the action until four or five months later.

People who follow poker already knew who had won, which negated any element of suspense, but the shows still allowed for some intrigue as we saw how the champion reached the promised land.

A few years ago, the “November Nine” concept was developed, sending the final table participants home for four months and giving poker viewers a chance to see a majority of the story and a reason to tune in and witness the ending. Even so, many in the industry figured we would never see live poker because of security concerns.

Now … this. The live broadcast was the pearl among the many gems WSOP officials promised would make their poker event a memorable one. The WSOP went on to set records in participation and payout.

If you haven’t seen it, the live broadcast is on a 30-minute delay, and features longtime play-by-play man Lon McEachern and either Phil Hellmuth and/or Antonio Esfandiari providing color commentary.

As he often does on the felt, Esfandiari gets the best of Hellmuth in the booth. He provides timely and relevant insight, whereas Hellmuth seems more interested in deciding whether each player’s accomplishments merit his name crossing the Poker Brat’s lips.

McEachern comes extremely prepared, and was better at filling the long broadcasts and delays between action than I expected. His pure broadcasting skills are impressive, even though he still makes poker-newbie mistakes such as misreading a player’s hand – saying he flopped a set when it’s a full house – and it’s hard not to cringe when he spouts a monotone-powered cliché such as, “Position poker is power poker, baby!”

The biggest problem is in the security detail. Hole cards are seen only if the hand is carried past the flop, which makes no sense at all. McEachern mentioned Tuesday night that this was a requirement of the Nevada Gaming Control Board in order to get permission to air live poker.

I believe this probably is true, but I also would bet ESPN volunteered this “compromise” to its own benefit. This is because when guys are shoving their stacks in pre-flop and you’re dying to know what they have, the network figures you’ll tune back in for those high-action, one-hour episodes they will air shortly to tell you what happened.

If anything, the hand-showing criteria should be the other way around. Or, better yet, you might as well just show all the cards in every hand. What difference would it make?

Before the flop, there are only a few reasons a player raises or re-raises: He has a good hand, he thinks his hand is better than his opponent’s, or he believes he can get his opponent to fold (position, table image and other factors fit under these umbrellas). The motivation for any such action is relatively straight forward.

However, post-flop play is where the skill element takes hold. Players engage in meta-game warfare as they make decisions on the flop, turn and river. The information that could be gleaned from your opponent throughout a whole hand is priceless compared to a pre-flop revelation.

Think about which would help more; learning from your buddy who is spying the broadcast that your opponent re-raised with you with A-Q pre-flop to get you to fold, or assessing why he fired three more bets with the community cards that came.

The latter is far more valuable, and that’s what ESPN shares, but it bans showing starting hands if it ends pre-flop. This is tantamount to withholding the scorecard of a fight that ends in a knockout – it doesn’t matter.

This backward thinking was no more painful than when watching the final 12 players dwindle down to the November Nine. From covering the game, I learned a long time ago that watching live poker was a snoozefest, but I never realized how much worse it looked on a flat-panel TV.

It almost makes you long for the days of super-edited, misleading, all-action poker shows, with players pushing their chips in the middle on every hand.

Stay tuned — those are coming in a few weeks.

The coverage was great and the action was great......right up until there was 10 players.  I had it on DVR and watched it the next day.  After two hours of 10 handed I just fast forwarded it until the KQ hand. 

I pretty much disagree with this entire writeup.

Disagree in what regard, Giant? You think live poker is great the way it already is, or you don't like it all? I don't mind negative feedback but yours is awfully vague.

The core of my post was pretty much that I found the live poker shows entertaining but they could use improvement.

Writing that you "disagree" with the post is about the most neutral, nonsensical thing you could possibly say.

Good luck to you, though.

i loved the coverage.

everything they did was good. its not that big of a deal if the cards arnt shown unless theres a flop. i mean if the pot gets taken down who cares any way ? move on to the next hand.