Why are poker players so feted?

[Euler]

Betfair just signed up this poker player: -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... hOdONuAVBs

Which begs the question of why successful Poker players are treated like Pop stars, but successful sports traders, who can do just as well and use just as must skill, are given the cold shoulder?!?!

[to75ne]

i think its 2 main reasons. poker is probably a bigger market world wide. every other american film/tv series often seem to have poker games in them. these are usually played by the hero's/anti hero's. its portrayed as a very masculine thing to do. successful, big men, with big cars, blonde birds with big tits hang off their arms, they are wonderful bar room brawlers, shoot guns etc. the game as a very macho image.

trading on the other hand, is not generally widely known, hence a smaller number of participants. no tv series or films show macho men sitting pressing buttons, starring at comp screens for several hours. also those that do know of trading, generally consider us to be parasites/scum bags etc.

bit hard to compete really. perception would seem to be everything.

having watched you video link, he seems very dull, hardly fits the image i describe above. id sooner cut my toe nails then have er drink with him. yawn

[hgodden]

Stuff em. I'd much rather be a sports trader ; poker players can play the game of their lives and still be well down at the end of the day.

Sports traders are the real modern day cowboys No tax, work the days you want, from anywhere in the world. I hate to use the phrase but it's a no brainer

[Groovyelms]

Crist he is a laff a minute, fun loving, fast talking, lip smacking, cool dressing, Dreary Dreary guy, obviously cheap, didn"t he play Lurch in "The Adams familly"

Groovy

[superfrank]

'you feeling a bit unappreciated Euler?!

seriously though the poker players i've seen on tv are largely a bunch of objectionable weirdos, apart from Liv Boeree who is pretty hot...




there are plenty of feted stars in financial trading/investing, e.g. Larry Williams, Buffet, and championships for elite traders...

Williams won the 1987 World Cup Championship of Futures Trading from the Robbins Trading Company, where he turned $10,000 to over $1,100,000 (11,376%) in a 12 month competition with real money. Ten Years later his actress daughter Michelle won the same contest.

[Ferru123]

Another consideration is that there is a widespread misconception that traders, like bankers, created the current finacial mess, lining their own pockets at the expense of the global economy.

Subtleties like the fact that only a small proportion of bankers traded toxic derivatives, and that government overspending contributed to the financial crisis, are often overlooked...

Jeff

[to75ne]

i cant see how anyone can see sports trading in the same light as financial trading jeff.

sports traders usually use their own money, not someone else's (or their own and someone else's money).

sports trading is relatively unknown or little heard of by most people. and as far as i am aware, no sports trader be he/she trading a football match, horse race, snooker match etc as ever brought a financial institution to its knees, or helped to screw up the western worlds economy and heaped misery upon millions of people.

could say the same for poker players, but not financial traders. being a big part of the financial sector rightly or wrongly they have got the image that, that sector as a whole as earnt for itself.

[Ferru123]

Someone with intellectual curiosity might enquire as to the difference between a sports trader and a financial trader. But IMHO, many people will hear the word 'trader', and the mental shutters will come down...

Jeff

i cant see how anyone can see sports trading in the same light as financial trading jeff.

[to75ne]

[quote="Ferru123"]Someone with intellectual curiosity might enquire as to the difference between a sports trader and a financial trader. But IMHO, many people will hear the word 'trader', and the mental shutters will come down...

Jeff
excellent, reckon your bang on with that. as i said earlier perception would seem to be everything.

[74.5]

Subtleties like the fact that only a small proportion of bankers traded toxic derivatives, and that government overspending contributed to the financial crisis, are often overlooked...Jeff

There didn't have to be that many bankers involved in trading toxic derivatives for the world's finances to be brought to its knees, given the content of this article: http://www.propublica.org/article/who-w ... aling-cdos .

Further,most of the investment arms of the world's banks bought and sold the toxic derivatives in an attempt to make a profit.They only hold them now because they weren't able to unload them prior to the crash.

The brown stuff caused by over spending Governments was always going to hit the fan one day.It was only a matter of time.The greedy bankers/traders just made it more acute and brought the problem forward due to the ensuing credit crunch.
74.5