But its the EPL's rule he is breaking not the Palms'. Its the EPL who doesn't want certain criminals in their league, I don't think Palms cares.

I think it is clear that Mike (and others) do not "support" Annie Duke's idea of the EPL as a new sports league that is loosely based on the Professional Golfers Association. The core idea of the EPL is to obtain mainstream investors/sponsors such as Coke.

This goal is the sole reason that the EPL has an Ethics Committee, sent out warning letters, etc.

Compared with men of similar age and educational attainment, women tend to be less analytical, more emotional, and less comfortable in confrontational situations. These comparative qualities tend to handicap women vs men in the pokers. Obv, a few women consistently compete and outperform vs men. However, on average, women are underrepresented and underperform in tournament poker, and (i suspect) in the cash games.

There are plenty of psychological studies that support these comparative gender differences, and I doubt you will disagree if you've spent much time among men and women.

Don't bother calling me "sexist" if you disagree.

This post makes me really sad, because it sounds so defeatist. If girls and women are constantly told this, then it's no wonder they don't go into the STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) fields.

And there are many studies that find, that yes, although what you say is true, it is a cultural trait, not genetic. Women have as much analytical ability as men when they are born. This is not like saying men are can carry more weight on average than women, this pertains to mental capabilities of which there is no proof that men possess more than women (or vice versa - eg men can't grasp emotion as well, which is why they don't study psychology).
There is no "analytics" gene, in the last 20 years, women have caught up with many fields in math at such a fast rate that it can't be genetic in nature. If it can be done in STEM, it can be done in poker, people.

can you accept that men are physically stronger than women?

Yes, and because it is tremendously elitist to say we don't want 'certain' criminals in our league, but those criminals/ethically questionable players who have lots of poker friends and are part of the 'in crowd' are fine, to me it defeats the purpose of having the committee in the first place.

One of things that makes Poker great is that anyone can play against anyone. Until now, the game didn't discriminate. Any league that gets to decide not only the criteria of whose results are worthy enough to participate, but also who they feel is personally worthy to participate is too elitist for me. In fact, EPL may as well stand for 'Elitist Poker League'. The biggest LOL is that there are several players that the EPL has welcomed into their league with open arms who I wouldn't want in my house for a home game.

Yes

I went to the gym with my friend and didn't have time to get home(my phone was dead) before the interview, so I just did the interview on his phone in the basement. I don't have any PR people, and if there was a sound going on its possible maybe his parents tried making a phone call on their other phone or something like that. What minute does that occur at? I could listen and try figuring out if it was added after or not

Genuine question because I'm fairly ignorant in the subject of the physiological effects of hormones. Do different levels of testosterone and estrogen have psychological/behavioral effects on people?

Don't be so emotional. Plenty of individuals overcome genetic, hormonal, physical and/or cultural obstacles to become overachievers in their chosen fields. Conversely, many individuals manage to dramatically underperform in life, notwithstanding massive physical and cultural advantages.

But the simple fact is that gender differences appear in humans starting from birth, long before environment or cultural factors could account for anything. Humans have many obvious gender-based genetic traits and there is no reason to believe that emotional, psychological and/or analytical differences between men and women cannot be influenced by genetic predispositions.

Mike,

It was a call coming through to our studio and the accompanying beep that people heard, not yours.

Also, thanks again for coming on and spending so much time with us!

Nearly all hobbies have a professional league which bar people from entry based skill/results. If you're good enough you get to compete against elite fields for more money, if not you can play your friends in the local park or Sunday league. Professional leagues also ban people pretty much solely on the criteria of whether they damage the reputation of the league. The EPL doesn't stop me going to the WSOP and playing the elite, the lack of money does. If you followed your argument for other hobbies/pastimes there would be no NHL, NFL, NBA, Premier League, Champion League, Olympics because you wouldn't be allowed to bar people from entering because they weren't good enough. The EPL isn't replacing anything its just adding to it. Don't get me wrong I wish someone else came up with the idea but in this case I think I just have to take my hat off to AD and say good idea, please make sure you run it properly. So far this hasn't really happened but its still only had two events.

I'm 99% certain it was just a call alert coming in to either our phone or Timex phone, likey ours.

Continuing to compare poker to other professional sports leagues is ridiculous. Sports leagues do not consist of people putting up their own money to compete. They are athletes who have signed a contract and play in those leagues as theirs jobs. People need to quit comparing a poker league to real sports. In poker, Bunner can compete with Phil Ivey. In golf, Bunner cannot compete with Phil Mickelson. Regular joes can't beat pros in any of the other sports you mentioned. Regular joes can beat any EPL member on any given day. That's what has always set poker apart from other activities.

You know what makes you good enough to play in the EPL? The ability to go the cage with 20K in your hand. It's only the EPL deciding otherwise. Do you honestly believe that Phil Galfond, Victor Blom or Shaun Deeb aren't good enough to play in the league? The fact the EPL defines those three players as amateurs is hilarious.

Justin Rose in the 1998 British Open finished T4, as an amateur, with Davis Love III finishing 8th, who had won the PGA championship the year before so don't say Bunner can't compete with Phil Mickelson. A regular Joe cannot beat Ivey in the long run. I think there are good arguments for the EPL expanding its qualification criteria.

People like watching the elite playing the elite its why I always watch the Champions League final. I prefer watching episodes of PAD when its Ivey vs Durrrr vs DN vs PA, I didn't like watching HSP this season because it had lots of amateurs playing. If i wanted to watch amateurs play poker I'd sit in my local casino. The EPL is made for TV.

Edit: I don't thinks its terrible that there is one series of tournaments that is elitist. There are so many tours these days the surely one made for TV tour isn't that bad.

Rose burst to prominence at The Open Championship in 1998. He turned professional the following week

Valid point I take it back. I still think the rest of post is true

Timex...i didn't really think my question through about the beeping, i should have explained more but was in a rush. I was really thinking even if that was someone beeping in you answered the question smoothly and like the entire interview it was a great listen. thanks for coming on the show and good luck crunching numbers back at university!

Re the epic poker league, I don't think the issue is that hard. If they want certain restrictions on who plays them apply that to qualifiers/satellites as well. Then the guy doesn't get to the pro am and no issue arises. You either do it properly and cover all events or get 12 pages of thread about it at 2+2. i don't mind the concept at all, just in this case it's been poor implementation.

What if all major poker tournaments moved to this model?

Before you say it won't happen, it's a hypothetical question when talking about the validity of the model.

If all major poker tournaments had qualification requirements based on previous results it would be terrible. Terrible for everyone professionals and amateurs.

Edit: Do you think it could happen?

Yes. After that, it gets complicated. Alot of secondary sex chracteristics are actually based on what range of levels of various hormones a being has in it's body. Women have to have a certain set of levels of certain hormones to function as a woman, as do men. Progesterone, estrogen, testosterone, prolactin prostaglandins, etc are primarily involved. Science has studied across various fields how the range of levels betweeen these hormone can inhibit certain behaviours or amplify certain behaviours. EG, aggression, and libido.

Here we can make our poker comparison. Mind you this is VERY simplistic over view, but hey I'm not paid to be a prof on reproductive physiology. Higher testosterone levels will lead to higher risk activity, men as a population have higher testoerone levels, men will take more risk. Women have lower testerone level as a population, women will be more risk adverse. If poker is viewed as a risky behaviour the normal population of men are more likely to play poker, and women visa versa. Caveat, there will exist men and women that can function with hormone levels outside of normal, and it seems that women with higher levels of testerone will take more risks, and men with lower be risk adverse. And this is only risk based on a hormonal level, it may be affected by other factors, however the effect can be predictied by testosterone levels.

Now how this is all affected by enviroment and genetics gets even more complicated, and I won't go there. I just don't have the time or capibility in one post, and 2 PBR's after work. Hell, my repro class was 2 semesters...

Having seen so many men go on monkey tilt for so little reason, I'm not so sure about that.

well for 1 week out of the month women are on life tilt

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