Daniel Negreanu says the high roller circuit are damaging poker by not being exciting enough on screen. The Canadian tournament star isn’t impressed by the modern serious nature of the game and thinks it is seriously harming the game.
Daniel Negreanu Needs to Look at Himself
Daniel Negreanu isn’t shy to speak his mind. The one time leader of the live tournament winners list frequently shares controversial opinions.
This time though he might want to be taking a good look at himself.
In a recent interview he took aim at the current crop of stars and accused them of boring the fans.
“Frankly, I think the high roller circuit are damaging poker more than you could imagine.”
“I think they are doing more damage by taking the personality out of the game to be prim and proper.”
This is a bit rich given the two recent embarrassments he suffered.
After having a childish meltdown due to lagging software people were seeing a new Negreanu. He then proceeded to go completely over the top at a viewer on a live stream leading to a ban from Twitch poker.
Not his finest moments.
Is High Stakes Boring?
High stakes poker has evolved a lot over the last 15 years. A new breed of professional takes the game extremely seriously.
Negreanu thinks this is the wrong approach.
“Poker wasn’t designed to be that way. Poker is an antagonistic game, it’s a stick the needle in game where you say ‘I got you sucker, let’s go’. That’s what it’s all about.”
“Nobody wants to watch a bunch of polite people shake each other’s hands and say well done. Nobody wants to watch that. It’s not the way to promote the game at all.”
He also thinks that the serious nature of playing for millions of dollars should be accompanied aggressive needling.
What he doesn’t understand is that the landscape is different from his era. Back in the day the scene was all about regs who knew each other from games in the US. This is no longer the case.
The high stakes world is now full of youngsters who learned their craft online in a solitary environment. Although many have got to know each other it’s just not the same. It’s now a serious business.
Negreanu Takes on Doug Polk
One bonus from all Negreanu’s shouting of late is that Doug Polk managed to goad him into accepting a challenge.
The pair are set to duel it out playing $200/$400 heads up NL texas hold’em.
The match will be streamed live for all the fans which won’t please Negreanu as he clearly isn’t a fan.
In the interview he also spoke out about the switch from shows such as High Stakes Poker to live stream formats.
“A lot of the trend has been towards the live stream, which is great for die hard fans and the intricacies that they want to see every hand,”
“But as a packaged show for the mainstream; I’m not going to sit there for six hours and hope that something happens. I’m just not going to do it.”
“So what they need is more shows like High Stakes Poker.”
We can’t wait to see Negreanu and Polk square up. Both players will be seriously worried about the humiliation of losing. Especially Polk who is a huge favourite in the format.
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