http://www.onlinepoker.net/poker-new...r-players/6160

Obviously I find these comments absurd, but what is more concerning (to me) than her obvious lack of respect for other female professionals and her own gender in general is the fact that she appears oblivious to how badly this would make her, and unfortunately by other female players specifically and poker players in general by association, look during a time of relative crisis for the online poker industry.

Edit: The article is over a year old, so the industry wasn't in crisis when she said it. Still.

Fwiw most people suck at poker so what she said is inherently true. White, black, Asians, straight and gay people, men and women, rich and poor. Everyone coming together to suck a big fat one.

True. So she should have said, "Pretty much everyone but a handful of people suck at poker".

I mean, if you substitute any racial group into her statement everyone would have had a field day with it and called her an idiot and a racist.

I think it's pretty much a case of someone young and dumb opening mouth and inserting foot, but it's still a fairly huge open mouth-insert foot moment. Women don't suck at poker any worse than men or whites or Asians or whatever.

Didn't she apologize for this after getting a lot of heat?

Agree with you that it's pretty poor taste to say that and really dumb if she cares about her image (unless she's aiming for Tony G or Phil Hellmuth-like fame), she's 100% right about doyle (for nlhe anyway) and depending on what she meant probably right about females. Trying to be 100% objective and factual about this, I don't want to make any sweeping generalizations or try to say that every male or every female is alike. But generally, first off men are overall better at math/logic. Just look at national test scores, pretty sure males typically do way better on average on their math SATs while females usually do way better on average on the verbal sections. Now let's look in terms of poker players. I think it's pretty hilarious that the article lists those pros. Rousso? As soon as she sat at 3/6 on Stars waitlists would pile up. Trust me it wasn't because they wanted to "play with the pros". Kathy Liebert as someone who's supposed to be the best female? Again lol? I've played with her and I'd snap take a good amount of random females that I've played cash with over her in a heartbeat. Not sure how good the others listed are, but then again you really should be looking at the best not the ones mentioned by the article or else we'd have people arguing that men suck at poker because lol Phil Hellmuth.

So how would you define the statement "women overall suck at poker"? Do you think she's saying 100% of women suck at poker? Unless she has a very high criteria for not sucking, that's obviously not the case and since I think she has a pretty big ego herself pretty sure she doesn't actually think that. But look at overall. Why is it that the ladies events were considered softer? I seem to remember the marketplace giving higher markup for one particular female who entered the ladies than she was getting in the open 1.5k events (which are pretty soft in general). Is this just because the ladies events is more encouraging to first time female players? That could make sense. And then it also comes down to something I can't really prove, but from experience. I actually think that in general the average female I see at the table is less likely to be a fish than the average male. I just think gambling in general is much more prevalent among males maybe I'm way off but it seems to be my experience. But on the other hand I almost never have to worry about them being a solid reg. I almost always aim to sit on their right because I know on AVERAGE (seriously please don't take any of this personally I'm talking in terms of average for this entire post) female is going to be on the nitty side and not really put me in any tough spots.

So while I guess I just made the argument that women are LESS likely to suck than men, I also think they are less likely to actually be good as well. So if her criteria of suck was that they can't win in tough high-stakes games, she's probably right overall. I'm probably going to get flamed pretty hard for this but I'd be pretty shocked if the true list of top 100 poker (nlhe anyway) players right now (not based on results but based on skills so it includes the nameless online players who just crush 25/50nl+ cash online) included a single female.

What gobbo said.. everyone sucks at poker.

Also I think there is a bias because women here are mainly pro players. I think a random woman that plays poker is [just a tiny bit] more likely to be a casual player than a random man that plays poker is. But I don't think women or men have any inherent skill differences. That is, if a woman and a man are both pros and have spent the same X hours, I would expect them to be equal.

To be honest I view poker as kind of a secret club.. unlike chess where there is a clear path towards getting better, in poker its kind of unclear how to get better, and someone who isnt very intelligent and doesnt even work very hard to study can still do very well at poker just from knowing the right people (big, big winners) to explain things to them - compared to someone who is smart and works hard who doesnt have the same resources. That is how eg. a successful lawyer deeply interested in poker can play poker for 10 years and sit in a highstakes private game and be the fish, but some random stoner pro can make lots of money at mtts. I think most moderate winners fail to understand this part about poker, that really they were just very fortunate to stumble upon a better strategy, and so little of their success can be attributed to study and hard work [as compared to other fields like sports, chess, professional gaming]

Annette15 sucks at poker...nuff said

TBH I didn't originally notice this was a year old (). My bad.

I have no idea if she apologized or not - I hope for her own sake she did.

It's still ridiculously dumb, though, to say any specific sub-group "sucks at poker", since this implies that you believe that the sub-group you've named sucks worse than every other subgroup.

I think anyone who plays the game and is honest about their own abilities and the general ability of others knows that there are a lot of really, really bad players out there, and very few excellent players. I doubt gender has much to do with it, however, or race or ethnicity, either. There's nothing inherent in gender or race that would give one group superiority over another, although there are some general attributes that may give one group an advantage in certain situations - for example, since men are generally more aggressive, a table or tournament that rewards aggression will give anyone who is aggressive an edge, and this is likely but not guaranteed to be a male based not only on gender differences but also on the overall population of poker players (which is heavily male).

Really really well said, Alex.

A blog post I wrote about about this when it first came out that got come interesting comments:

Recently, Annette Obrestad said:

“It’s easy money… I’ve always said that girls suck at poker. I say that because they do. Maybe they just aren’t as competitive and don’t try to learn from their mistakes.”

Someone please get this girl an interview coach! What she should have said, and a statement I would whole-heartedly agree with is “Most women suck at poker…but so do most men!” I don’t think that she actually meant that every girl sucks at poker, but that is one reason to be extremely careful what you say.

Stereotypes obviously hurt many people around the world every day, so it is incomprehensible that she would even include herself in the statement, since she doesn’t say “except me”… so she is saying that she sucks at poker too.

Additionally, I find it sad that Annette would be so aloof that she would insult every single female supporter hers (let alone countless males). But if she wants to underestimate women, then I plan to take full advantage if I run into her at the WSOP. I used to think that we had to fight the stereotype that women poker players suck just against men, but I suppose that is a stereotype in it of itself.

The funny things is that since only a small percent of poker players are women, there are almost assuredly more men (in terms of counting them individually) that are weak players than women!

In the same interview, she also delivered a blow to the biggest legend in poker, Doyle Brunson.

“Online players process information so much faster and don’t let their egos get in the way of becoming a better player. No disrespect to Doyle, but I’d rather play him.”

I strongly disagree with the implication that online players have smaller egos than live players. Some of the most arrogant people I know are the guys that chase the monthly table leaderboard on stars—grinding online close to 18 hours a day and then bragging about it like some sort of poker martyr. One of them in particular had a 25k game break-even stretch that certainly points to his ego getting in the way of improving.

It is a good point that our egos can get in the way of becoming a better player though.

The moral of the story here is that precise language is important, especially when the audience of what you’re saying is enormous, like it is for ESPN. There is the remote possibility that Annette did this for the publicity—which her statements have received, in the form of a large 2+2 thread, articles, and twitter responses. (Perhaps the most colorful one came from DougLeePoker, who tweeted “@Annette_15 You really seem like a pompous b****. Could you be more arrogant please?”)

Most likely Annette didn’t realize exactly what she was saying, and how offensive it was. I suggest she take her own advice and try to learn from her mistake.

How many people is this really? Pretty sure like 95%+ think they're better than they are and that their opponents are worse than they are.

But anyway back on point you mentioned aggression but the best poker players are the ones that can adapt regardless of the format. They aren't aggressive for the sake of being aggressive, they are aggressive because they think aggression is the most profitable way to play that hand. So anytime anyone male or female either decides to be aggressive just because they decided they're going to be aggressive or when they decide to play a hand passively simply because "I'm not that aggressive" it's usually going to be a bad decision. the bottom line is every good player is capable of being hyper aggressive in spots that warrant it and capable of being passive either to induce bluffs. I think too many people try to charactarize poker as like actions we are taking, like attacking, defending, whatever. For this reason I don't see why gender would even matter in terms of how aggressive or passive you play.

@Jenny: How would this stereotype actually hurt anyone at all? Or is this a case of your ego getting in the way

Seriously though if I were actually good at poker I'd want people to think I sucked so it's not that bad of a stereotype to have. Also you say stereotypes hurt but stereotypes in general also help people. It's just like poker, we have limited information with which to act on. I personally had an argument with someone saying it wasn't racist in the slightest that if I knew nothing else about 2 people and had to sit next to one on the train I could pick the white one because statistically blacks commit more crimes on average. Similarly if the white was covered in tattoos and was wearing a tank top and the black guy was wearing a suit and had a briefcase I'd probably sit next to him. It's just a stereotype. Whites can certainly be murderers and the heavy majority of blacks are perfectly fine citizens. Meanwhile it's possible in the 2nd case that the black guy's in the mafia and the white guy's just a regular guy who likes tattoos and wearing tank tops. Just because there are some victims of stereotypes does not mean they are a bad thing overall as long as we realize that we're just looking at the average and that not 100% people fit the stereotype.

rule #1 All opinions are valid
rule #2 not all opinions are logical

aggression alone does not make a good poker player.

just because you know a red pro doesn't make you a good player or even give you the ability to be a good player. just like knowing a pro fisherman makes you as good or nearly as good as a pro fisherman. both take years of experience study and development of certain shall we say largely unquantifiable skill sets.

some talent and years of intent study and experience is the best and perhaps only way for the vast majority of people to preform well at either of these endeavors.

because of the random nature of reward in poker and its nebulous scoring system it really hard to know ( nearing impossibility) for a fact who is really good and who is just a really good well funded liar.

IF I have won 4M playing high buy in tournies but If I spent 5M on buy ins travel expences and such still makes me a 1M loser. in fact the old dolt who earns $.50 an hour at 2-4 limit way out performs me money wise.

so when someone says "X" sucks at poker we can be well assured that person is speaking from opinion and as we have seen above ..........

apologize for stating her opinion?

that would be so weak.....

I'm pretty sure this was what I was trying to say, I just wasn't anywhere near as articulate.

The contention that x group sucks or y group sucks will always be correct because the entire population z (poker players) pretty much suck, but stating x sucks instead of z sucks makes you look stupid, IMO.

And I also agree with your statement about aggressiveness and the need to adjust, but surely you'd agree that the current climate seems to suggest that aggression is better than passivity like 80%+ of the time, suggesting that "aggressive men" are better than "passive women".

Note that I'm not saying I agree with this, just that this is what I think a lot of uninformed people might believe based on what type of play and training is generally advocated and praised in the current climate.

"Nit" is often considered an insult, even when nitty or passive play at a table full of aggressive players may in fact be the best and most profitable strategy.

But again, I suck at poker and I'm a nit so what do I know.

I wrote a longer post but then browser crashed basically saying that only reason nit is an insult is that most people first start to win when they are nits (first thing you learn in poker is you play too many hands start folding) and as you get better you learn spots you don't have to be as nitty so the nits are the ones who don't adjust while people considered aggressive are the ones who are aggro in good spots but can also be passive/fold in spots where the most profitable play is to fold. Then there are aggrotards who are far worse than nits and are more likely to be male while nits are more likely to be female imo.

That said profitable males and females shouldn't be influenced by their personality or anything that should be different between males and females at all. Like the decision to fold/raise/call if you are a good player should simply be "which is better, raise, call, or fold", it shouldn't be "am I gonna let him bluff me?" or "am I going to risk this much?". So I'd argue that among very good players the differences between males and females approaching the game are almost all logic, math, and intelligence-based. It's also a question of whether females or males are better at overcoming their personal attachment to the game and realizing that it really isn't a people game it's a logic/math game.