THE SINGLE GREATEST CONTEST OF ALL-TIME!!! FREE STUFF TO BE WON!!!

[The 6th Wilbury]

Originally Posted by BJ Nemeth

He didn't guess those top 20; that's a list of the top 20 that Harrah's released about two months ago. As it turned out, the list hadn't changed in those two months.

Haha yeah, those weren't my guesses, it was my attempt at explaining why votes were flowing where they were once I saw the initial list of leaders.

Let me throw a weird thought out there... given the way the voting has gone, if Phil Gordon was a bracelet-winner, would he have gotten enough votes to rank in the top 20?

As you clean up the beverage that just shot out your nostrils, consider the following:

1. In the early years of the post-Moneymaker poker boom, he seemed to show up on all sorts of televised poker shows. He won an event in the World Poker Tour heydays (Bay 101), and had a smattering of appearances on the WSOP coverage in the years since. More recently, he has played on several weeks of Poker After Dark and on several of the NBC Heads-Up tournaments.

2. Thanks to his work hosting a poker show (Celebrity Poker Showdown), which aired on a venue far outside the poker norm (Bravo network), he became reasonably well-known as a "poker teacher to the stars" figure.

3. He did cameos, albeit CPS related, on major mainstream shows like Joey and Saturday Night Live. He has a few movie credits, including The Grand.

4. He is a member of Team Full Tilt. Not a Full Tilt Pro or a Friend Of, but one of the signature players who show up on all the TV ads. In some ways, this probably should go first on the list.

5. He has written several successful poker books, including the Little Green/Little Blue series, while producing an instructional DVD. And he hosts the Poker Edge on ESPN.

6. He was often included when naming the various Phils of poker, along with Hellmuth, Ivey and Laak. (This took place in the pre-Galfond days.) I believe ESPN even showed a fan collecting autographs of the four Phils during the early WSOP coverage.

7. His work with the Prevent Cancer Foundation, the Bad Beat on Cancer and 1% initiative supplies him with good-guy image.

Remember, I'm not asking if Gordon deserves to be in the top 20, assuming he had a bracelet. We all know the answer to that. I'm curious to know if he would make the top 20. Everyone seems to contend that the voting generally went to the bracelet winners who were the most famous around 2005. Looking at actual voting, it's hard to argue with that.

Well, to the casual fans who watched poker on TV but didn't visit forums or subscribe to poker magazines or follow daily chip counts on PokerWire/CardPlayer/PokerNews, et al, Phil Gordon was easily among the 20 most famous poker figures five years ago. I should know -- I was one of those fans.

Craaaaazy.

[Spartan]

Originally Posted by The 6th Wilbury

As you clean up the vomit that just shot out your nostrils, consider the following:

FYP.

Actually, if he won a bracelet I'd have much more respect for him. Its not that he's a bad player necessarily, but being "poker author" Phil Gordon only gets you so far in the poker world. However, if he did have a bracelet he would definitely be in the running. The top 20 seems like a laundry list of the people that get featured on ESPN year after year. I suppose if this is a made-for-TV freeroll it is the best way to get people to watch it.

[The 6th Wilbury]

Originally Posted by Spartan

Actually, if he won a bracelet I'd have much more respect for him. Its not that he's a bad player necessarily, but being "poker author" Phil Gordon only gets you so far in the poker world.

Besides a few dorky moments (his "you're such an idiot" moment with E-Dog) and a couple other less-than-graceful ones (you'd think he got one-outed the way he reacted to his hand against Laak in the NBC HU), I feel like this is where the biggest anti-PG backlash lies: the man has gotten a TREMENDOUS amount of poker fame relative to his results. I agree wholeheartedly: he is a good player sure, but certainly not one who warrants the Q-Score he has achieved compared to many much more successful peers.

This is precisely my point. The voting seems to have rewarded Q-Rating much more than it has rewarded P-Rating (you know, P for Poker). Because of this, I truly believe Phil Gordon would be playing in this tournament if he were a bracelet-winner.

So in some ways, this list could be worse.

[BJ Nemeth]

Originally Posted by The 6th Wilbury

Let me throw a weird thought out there... given the way the voting has gone, if Phil Gordon was a bracelet-winner, would he have gotten enough votes to rank in the top 20?

Phil Gordon is an extremely nice guy, but I don't think he would get the votes unless his bracelet victory attracted a lot of additional TV coverage. For instance, while he's a founding member of Team Full Tilt, can you remember any TV commercials that featured him as a central player?

The players who I think are a bracelet away from locking up TOC votes:

1. Gavin Smith
2. Gus Hansen
3. Tom Dwan

I'm not sure about Patrik Antonius. He has a huge fan base among hard-core fans, but I'm not sure if the more casual fans really know much about him. The guys I've listed above receive a lot of TV time, are memorable "characters," and the last two have received a lot of praise as being fantastic players. (Gavin hasn't been praised as highly on TV as the other two, but casual fans absolutely love him.)

[The 6th Wilbury]

Originally Posted by BJ Nemeth

Phil Gordon is an extremely nice guy, but I don't think he would get the votes unless his bracelet victory attracted a lot of additional TV coverage. For instance, while he's a founding member of Team Full Tilt, can you remember any TV commercials that featured him as a central player?

The players who I think are a bracelet away from locking up TOC votes:

1. Gavin Smith
2. Gus Hansen
3. Tom Dwan

I'm not sure about Patrik Antonius. He has a huge fan base among hard-core fans, but I'm not sure if the more casual fans really know much about him. The guys I've listed above receive a lot of TV time, are memorable "characters," and the last two have received a lot of praise as being fantastic players. (Gavin hasn't been praised as highly on TV as the other two, but casual fans absolutely love him.)

Besides the current Rush Poker ads, the only Tilt spot that featured Phil Gordon (besides the final group shot) was a rarely seen one in which the players gave out little-known facts about themselves. Gordon referenced his height.

As for those three players, I'd go so far as to say Gus Hansen would be among the top five vote-getters -- again, assuming the masses are collectively doing so for the reasons we think they are.

[Gary Wise]

Did anyone figure out who won this thing?