Why can't poker be as big as tennis or golf? where players get sponsorship's to play tournaments? and young kids can play at the age of 12 to get good at various poker games?

just like how bridge is played. they have clubs in almost every town. poker is all gambling.

Only losing players are gambling


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no dreezy562, poker is gambling. No less an authority than David Sklansky says it is gambling. You have heard of him, yes?

Sure have I think I've read a book of his. So do you think poker and roulette are essentially the same, a gamble?


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They are it's just in one the odds are against you while in the other you can turn the odds in your favour. If your strategy is better than your opponents in poker it is no different to the casino strategy being better than yours in roulette.

At the beginning of this (however) small argument, I would have sided with the "it's not really gambling" argument.

But how you put it just makes more sense

Poker is gambling.

If you're saying it is not then it is because you equate gambling to losing and think therefor poker can't be gambling. It has nothing to do with being able to win at the game that makes it gambling, poker is just as much gambling as blackjack.

This is only true at a table where most if not all of the other people at the table are worse than you are at turning the odds in *their* favor. Also, the degree by which you have to be better than everyone else at the table to turn a profit depends on the rake.

And, as I'm sure you intended, even when the odds are in your favor it's still gambling. If you make a bet that gives you a 55% chance of doubling up it's a good bet but there's still a 45% chance you'll lose.

You could make a very strong argument, though, that all competitive activites (with the exception of a very few purely controlled games like Chess) have a significant degree of variance, which would make them functionally equivalent to Poker.

Take golf. No one would argue that it is gambling, but the amount of variance that affects your outcomes is very high. The best players learn how to recognize situations (same as poker), and take a strategy that minimizes risk and maximizes upside (same as poker).

And your premise is flawed. Kids can play poker, I taught my niece to play poker when she was 7. She can't play it for money until a certain age, but neither can individuals go pro (in most sports) until a certain age.

Because it's not quite as good as a spectator sport.
They already do. There are loads of sponsored players, albeit they are mostly sponsored by poker sites, rather than mainstream companies.
Legal reasons.

What defines something as gambling or not? If it is defined by whether or not one risks money, then any tournament with an entry fee is gambling, including chess. If it is defined by whether or not results are influenced by skill, then poker is not gambling.

It doesn't make sense that a poker cash game is considered gambling, as is a poker tournament, but a golf or chess tournament is not. In a chess tournament you are risking money hoping to achieve an uncertain result, just like poker. Your skill level influences the result, just like poker.

Are freerolls gambling? I would say not.

The definition is a couple of posts above yours.

You can be a perfect poker player and still need luck to win your all-in with AA vs 72. If you you are a perfect golf player, you hit a hole in one with every shot and therefore can't lose any game.

Your strat better than mine? Sounds like a skill game to me.


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It is different. The casino is an establishment it doesn't employ strategy it simply runs the numbers and collects. Poker is a game not played against the casino but play against another person that has their own money. Big difference


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There is variance in golf same as poker. You need skill to put yourself in a position to win. Wind gust on the green? Oops there goes the hole in one. Fish sucks out on you? Oops there goes the pot.


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Skill and gambling are not mutually exclusive.

poker is gambooling? ****... i thought when i get it in with the nuts on the turn i just win the hand every time... no river required...

What do you think running the numbers is? Why doesn't a casino offer 3 to 1 on a blackjack for example? Blackjack just like poker is a zero sum game the difference being the casino tells you the strategy for their side up front. It just so happens (without counting) that you can't beat their strategy.

Just because you are playing against someone with their own money doesn't remove the gambling aspect. What if the other player is backed by the casino, does it now become gambling? What if you bet on a coin toss with your friend wagering his own money, is that not gambling?

In poker when you break it right down you are wagering that you will have the best hand at showdown - in principle exactly the same as blackjack where you wager that your hand will be better than the dealers. The strategy is a lot more complex than blackjack but it is still a wager. As mentioned above gambling and a game of skill are not mutually exclusive.

gam·ble
/ˈɡambəl/

verb-

1.
play games of chance for money; bet.

2.
take risky action in the hope of a desired result.

noun-

1.
an act of gambling; an enterprise undertaken or attempted with a risk of loss and a chance of profit or success.

Seems pretty clear to me..

Poker is a skill game. Poker is gambling.

Wagering money makes poker gambling. If you play golf with a friend for $100 a hole, you are gambling.

This could apply to nearly everything that makes money. When a farmer invests money to plant a field he is now gambling. If I open a restaurant I am now gambling. Anyone who has invested money in a stock is gambling.

We arbitrarily affix the term gambling to acts that society deems as frivolous and without worth.

This is just semantics, yes the conventional use of the word 'gambling' might be expanded and applied to any investment or job since the element of risk can never be eliminated from any human endeavour.

However, the more definition of the word 'gambling' is as follows and applies to poker:

1.
play games of chance for money; bet.

Yes and unfortunately people don't call it gambling because that is exactly what someone is doing when they start a business with a small chance of succeeding.

Except that when someone opens a restaurant and fails they were "exploring options" and when you go broke playing (winning) poker you were "a degenerate gambler".

Don't worry too much about how people call it because it makes no difference. The way you approach something shouldn't change based on what people think of it whatever it may be. In poker you have bankroll management and that is how you combat variance. In a way you can play a game of chance with more certainty than opening a restaurant but people think of that being "an entrepreneur". It's totally ******ed and that's exactly why what (the generally stupid) population thinks cannot be taken seriously.

because Phil Hellmuth bouncing around in a white mini skirt and groaning as he goes allin is never going to compete with Tennis.

/thread