Letters to The Mob

A possible solution to the tournament controversy? ( By Keith 'The Camel' Hawkins) 1/4/02

There was a huge furore at the Vic recently about a deal which excluded one of the finalists. I do not propose to comment on this situation directly, as I had a small financial interest in one of the players, and my view maybe seen as biased.

In general terms, though, a deal should always include every remaining player. Or the tournament director should be allowed to veto it. But, if a deal is made, no-one should be allowed to renege on it, or complain about it later on.

Tournament directors must be allowed to "sit in" on deal discussions, and stop deals being made if they are against the "good of poker".

I have witnessed a couple of ridiculous situations, where the good of poker was clearly compromised.

When I was a fledgling Camel (camelette perhaps?) I regularly played in a card room at Reading, now sadly closed. One summer in an effort to drum up support they ran a poker league, with a prize to the winner of £1000 if I remember correctly. You got 1 point for playing, 3 points for making a final and 5 for winning. By the final tournament of the league, the league rested between two players. One busted out early, but as he lead by 3 points, the other guy needed to win to take the grand. He made the final with low chips, but doubled up early, and played very cautiously. When it got down to four handed the other 3 players were his friends. They did a deal and then contrived to lose pots to this "player" so he won the tournament and hence took the grand.

The other occasion was in a "major" tournament in the Midlands. They were playing for a significant amount of money 3 handed. For some reason, the casino had decide that the tournament should finish at a set time… 9pm I think…. And if it hadn't finished naturally at that time, the prizes would be awarded per chip count at that time. The chip leader now decided, prompted by his father it must be said, to take the maximum time allowed (2 minutes) over every decision in order to waste time and reach the chip count.

Both these situations were so unfair, so ridiculous that the rules should allow the tournament organiser stopping events like these occurring.

But, in an individual tournament, how can we stop deals, which might affect the chances of one player winning? Well, perhaps the only way is to flatten out the payout structure. In a major tournament the difference between the top prizes is so great, that deals which compromise the integrity of the event will nearly always take place.

A possible structure?

1st 22% 5th 10% 9th 3%
2nd 18% 6th 8% 10th 2%
3rd 15% 7th 6%
4th 12% 8th 4%

I appreciate that many people want to make a big score from a poker tournament, but if we are to attract corporate sponsorship, we must be seen as totally clear from any controversy and suspicion of the dodgy dealing which can only damage what we all want, for poker to be appreciated as the skilful pastime it is.