10-14 years ago, we had guys like Dwan, Galfond, Haxton, nanonoko, isildur, jungleman etc. depositing $50-$100, starting at the micros, rising all the way up to mid-high stakes. These guys were naturally talented, intelligent, gifted, with a strong work ethic and got to the top of their field through a mixture of all these things.

This just doesn't seem to happen anymore. Yes, we have regulation which has affected a lot of countries. But most of Europe, Canada, Asia and South America are still part of the global player pool - that's a lot of countries, and just by the law of probabilities, you'd expect there to be at least some gifted young people who pick up poker and rise up the stakes quickly.

Besides, countries like USA, Italy, Spain, France can still play poker. So there's nothing stopping an intelligent person depositing and grinding up the stakes.

Yes, poker is a lot tougher now. But so is every competitive field, yet new talent rises to the top every year in sport, music etc. to replace the old talent. Not true for poker. The players at high stakes are the same faces who climbed up the stakes years ago. There are no young prodigies who have recently risen to the top - this is rather worrying.

Yes, poker does not get the mainstream media attention it once did. But many competitive fields don't. This shouldn't stop a young, intelligent, motivated person discovering poker and grinding up the stakes.


Why don't we see this happening anymore?

Not as profitable anymore. Also you answered your own question, all the above reasons you stated.

Tragedy of the Commons,

plus folks have been fishing with dynamite, killing off the youngsters before they mature into the sort of icon you describe.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/james...b_8445576.html

"Fisheries associated with various commons have long suffered from overfishing or environmental stressors. A century ago sturgeon was so abundant that fishermen complained about the fish slashing their nets; they tossed them out as by-catch. Later, the fish were harvested in vast quantities for their flesh and roe. Today, sturgeon are largely endangered, victim to both overfishing and the damming of rivers that reduces their spawning success. Atlantic cod have followed a similar fate, infamously overexploited in Newfoundland and then more recently, in the Bay of Maine. In the latter instance, both heavy fishing pressure and rapid climate warming have been implicated in the demise of the fishery. Antarctic toothfish have largely disappeared from regions of the Ross Sea, coincident with the onset of a recent fishery. Here, similar to the Patagonia toothfish, whose fate was largely sealed when renamed the more delectable “Chilean Seabass,” slow growth and a long life span with late reproduction spelled trouble. Bluefin tuna have become so precious a commodity (in 2013 a single fish sold for 1.76 million dollars) that overexploitation is almost certain to doom the fishery. "

Couple of points:

1. In any competitive field, the majority lose or make very little money. There's huge numbers of wannabe musicians who are just scraping by, most sports players do not make it to the top where the big money is, most artists are poor and make a pittance for their artwork. But this doesn't stop people chasing these dreams, because a small percentage do rise to the top and make huge money. In poker, this isn't happening. No one is rising to the top. We haven't seen new cash game talent for years - this is strange and perplexing to say the least.

2. I gave counter-arguments to those reasons. Eg. regulation and media coverage affects things somewhat, but not as much as people think. A highly motivated and talented individual will always find a way to achieve their dreams. A little bit of regulation is not going to hurt them, particularly if they are from any country which still has full access to online poker (i.e. Asia, South America, Africa, Canada, most of Europe).

limitless and llinus both only became relevant in last couple of years after rising through stakes very fast , limitless is arguably in top 5-10 NL players and LLinus is arguably tied with OTB red baron so im not sure what your point is OP.

Just takes more work to move up the stakes now so less people are able to do it.

Also sites overall offer less rakeback / deposit bonuses / higher rake which all combine to making less money,
back in the day people could hop around sites playing break even or slightly losing poker and be printing a ton of money off deposit bonuses

Maybe playing, and risking, the highest possible stakes was never that great an idea.

That is interesting that you use the over-fishing analogy to demonstrate what has happened to poker. But surely very gifted and hard-working players do not need fish? They can just beat the regs who are worse than them.

I don't have a "point". It was a question of why we don't see gifted young talent rising to the top in poker, yet we see it happening in all other competitive fields. What is so different about poker that means no one is rising to the top anymore?

With correct bankroll management, I don't see a problem.

people already answered you lol, someone gives you a reason why + examples on why you are partially wrong and you just repeat the question

Because the fad is over.

because there are no more poker stars to look up to.

This obv.

15 years ago, really smart people saw a very real chance to make a boatload of money. Now nobody who can make some serious money in the ‘real’ world would want to become a pro poker player over going to college or getting a well paid job.

How would you define the difference between fish and regs who consistently lose money?

why would you compare poker players to athletes and musicians?top athletes and musicians make a ton of money bc people pay to see them perform.
this isn't the case in poker.

a decade ago online poker was filled w terrible players. you could print money just by playing tight. that isn't the case today.
with much harder games,it's a lot harder to move up stakes.

this isn't rocket science.
if the guys you mentioned were starting out in 2018 they would have much different results than they did in 2005.

Umm
It's pretty obvious now?
All the people OP mentioned had first mover advantage into poker
back then the Internet was your young kids so you had no established pros.

These days you have to tear through the ranks of older pros grinding for years, more and more at every level.

Many people are still doing that fyi as nosebleeds have shown with the hungry up and comers, it's just not everyone like back in the day

I won't debate whether "the regs who are worse than them" are fish to those who would feed on them from higher in the food chain. Just ask yourself who those regs feed on

The analogy is limited however any event, because smaller prey fish never mature into sharks. A better analogy may be that baby sharks either starve or get eaten along with smaller prey fish, because of the lack of food resources for already big sharks. With abundant prey fish, baby sharks can avoid getting eaten, feed themselves and mature.

Simple answer , even in the heyday of the "Boom" only a very small number of folks involved in poker online/live were actually really making that much and most never kept it either. Now that so much has changed from 2003 -2008 (already discussed) it is really very clear that many fewer folks will ever have a chance to develope much success. Some still will , certainly, but not many. The "good ole Days" were not that good , but today it is nearly impossible for beginners to rise to the prominence of "back in the day"!

Cuz most of the high stakes pros who have the bankroll to lose to up and coming players just trade crypto now. Which, is ironic cuz now they can afford to lose the money given their alternative income away from the tables. I can't really blame them.

So, no big runs like the old days. The upswings experienced by players nowadays are being reinvested in other areas away from poker. As opposed to being taken back to the tables.

I kinda wonder if Pokerstars refuses to use crypto cuz of this...They know players will be even more motivated to bink and run with their money given the option to profit elsewhere for less work.

Why grind when you can mine?

Back then it was super easy to multi-account, use software that is now banned, collude, etc.

Plus I also think there's been somewhat of a realization that becoming an online pro cash game grinder isn't as glamorous or fulfilling as once thought, and in fact can be a lonely, miserable existence.

I think the biggest reason is that beating the micros in order to get to a stake to sustain your costs of living in a 1st world country is so, so, so, so much tougher now that it was before. Those stakes used to be exclusively filled with recs, while now you have to fight tons of bots and at NL25 & 50 you are already facing fulltime pros from eastern europe.

Rake and fewer sites/players make it almost impossible to grind your way up.

well basically black friday happened and then its been downhill ever since

But someone in their late teens or early 20's doesn't need to sustain their costs of living. They are either at college/university, or living at home with parents with no rent or bills to pay. So it's the prime age for an intelligent and hard working person to play in their spare time and climb the stakes.

It's the prime age for an intelligent and hard working person to focus on school and distribute extra time into quality of life and doing stuff that looks good on the CV to enable them to get a good job right out of college.

Back in the day, prioritizing poker over school was a smart long term decision for a lot of people, today the only reasonable advice is to focus on school.

Why are you so hung up on that? Poker is still a pretty cool and fun hobby, but what non-degen in in their right mind would risk making very good money in a well respected job over the slim chance of becoming a professional gambler?