There aren't a lot of players in the last 20 years since Carlos Mortenson that were serious players. The Moneymaker effect has really turned the tourn that was once considered to be the the poker championship into a lottery.
The WSOP player of the year means more to me than the Main Event because you have to grind many tournaments and you have to know what you're doing to do well in that standing.
That's more of an indicator or someone's skill then one tourn. And that's what the intention of the Main Event was really about.
So unless you're talking to certain players, I mean, it would be like interviewing someone that won the lottery.
And that could be fun. But I don't know, there also seems to be so many of them.
On the other hand, you have the pros that have won it and also gone on to win other tourns and have some success but the problem with them is, you don't know how long they will stick around.
Just look back at the poker boom and reflect on all of those players still playing and grinding, lol not so many.
Then you have the preboom champs that knew what the poker scene was like before Moneymaker then had to deal with the influx of recreational players into their scene and make adjustments to their game.
And those people are hard to find because you're talking about people that have been playing for over 30-40 years as professional/semi professional level, lol.
Think about it, those folks have been grinding more years then most of the Moneymaker crowd have been on the planet, lol.
You should interview one of the older more established WSOP champs because there are still a few that are playing today and finding some success and more importantly, are still playing!
There is McEvoy that won in '83 after the legendary Straus chip and a chair tourn. How he led a petition to get smoking in the poker room banned and is still playing.
Berry Johnston hasn't done much recently but there is a guy that had an incredible streak of cashing in the Main Event for years after winning it and was a tremendous mixed game player and I'm sure had stories of the old days but hasn't cashed in awhile, don't know if he's still showing up to the WSOP.
Johnny Chan is "Johnny Chan" and still grinding and probably one of the least spoken about legendary players today. And came the closest to matching Stu's three titles.
Phil is Phil.
Then you have a few players that really haven't been active in awhile.
Jim Bechtel won it in 1993 and recently won a 2-7 bracelet. There's certain a story there.
Definitely skip Russ, lol.
Harrington is Harrington.
Huck Seed is another guy that people are still very much interested in from the boom and still a great stud variant player. I was watching event 9 a $1500 Seven Card Stud 2023 game and one of the announcers brought up they recently ran into him at a Pizzeria in Vegas recently that was funny. The prop bet tales with that one are "interesting".
Scotty Nguyen is a reminder that you could be on top of the world and then back on the bottom real fast in a hurry. World class player and has done it all. Not as dominant as Stu but very good and had a disastrous downfall. That one would be the warning of the traps and issues of why so many people don't last playing at those levels for so long.
Then there's Carlos with the WPT and WSOP titles.
A lot of these folks above have "stories". They've been around and would probably be more interesting then some of these more recent ME winners.
Again, some of them actually have been professional players as long as or longer than some of the WSOP ME winners starting with Moneymaker have been alive and they're STILL GOING lol and have stories and tales and warnings and a lifetime of knowledge.
Just me but I would rather listen to those folks for real knowledge from personal experience or friends they know that have experienced the ups and downs of playing for a "very long time" and talk about how its not really what people see on TV all the time with the temptations, the variance, the issues, everything you have to overcome lol.
I'd rather listen to that that then yeah "I won the lottery one time, and it was a great run" but thats just me, I'm an oddball, so whatever, lol.
Either way that would require some background info to do an good interview, regardless.
So the answer is if you can find a ME event player with some experience and actually plays for a living:
Can you go into the ups and downs of playing for a living over a long period of time.
Can you discuss why some aspiring players might want to really think about the move from being dependent solely on
gambling for a living and why it might be a good idea to have something else to fall back onto.
Can you share some insights/stories of what you've learned over a lifetime of playing/over your career for the younger group to listen to and learn from.
