Everything is anathema

Great post, I definitely agree especially about the coaching part. I kinda feel like that's why Grindcore's videos had a huge fan following (obv they were good videos too).

Personally I'm most definitely in the "idiot" category :P But yeah having spent like 5hours+ a day for the last few months studying my ass off I can say for sure that actually getting to the nosebleeds these days is like so fucking difficult and people probably aren't going to be putting in the effort to make that goal anything but terrible. I think being realistic about that stuff is definitely a good thing as a coach even though it's not the most glamorous thing and maybe not even what your students initially want.

Awesome post T, and I can def be counted as one of the guys who "just" does what the instructor says, without being totally sure of why im doing it.
Thats why I stopped watching the Ying and Yang series :)
In alot of the examples you bring up, you had a certain dynamic going, wich I obv didn't, and I started leveling a shit ton, min clicking it back left and right :D

" If it's been 2 years+ and you're still playing 1/2 NHLE, it's not going to happen."

Hmm. Okay.

i thought i remember hearing about a few people who have played ss/ms for a number of years and then shot up? even if i am just imagining that i disagree with that point.

leatherass makes vids for bluefirepoker. He joined and pretty much immediately Phil Galfond left. Make of that what you will.

I agree with everything you've said though- Most people are completely unrealistic about what's possible and how much work it will take, and what else (eg rungood, beneficial personal circumstances etc) is going to be required to fulfill their goals. For example I was reading one of those "challenge" threads on 2+2 where this guy said "I'm going to learn 2-7 triple draw and crush oogee". Oogee being one of the main TD regs who is always sitting at the nosebleed tables waiting for action. This guy starts off playing part time after work at the nanostakes and keeps posting... and keeps posting... and a few months later he's still at the same stake and still posting... and then someone says "What do you do to work on your game?" and he says "I don't really work on my game I just play". So he wants to beat the games build up a huge roll and beat one of the most well-known regs while not working on his game. Needless to say a short while after that his challenge ends with him going busto before he even gets to .50/1 TD.

The thread in question is at http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/174/poker-goals-challenges/10-20-triple-draw-playing-oogee-hu-791005/

This post is just silly really. Your examples don't even ring true, Leatherass has made vids for a bunch of different sites. Mike McDermott was a nit too and just had a dream of winning the main event some day. And, the comment about 2 years being some kind of magical cut off for your ability to progress as a player is plain stupid. If you treat poker as a sport then it's common in sport to not reach an elite level until you've put in at least 10,000 hours of practice and play.

I wasn't trying to imply that Rusty has never made videos and should. The point is that people won't watch them for a variety of reasons, some valid, most not. I don't know many nits with BRM like Mike, but we are of course each entitled to our opinions. You've called my post silly and plain stupid and then go on to compare poker to a sport. Oops.

I think you've missed the point of the film. And, if you think comparing poker to a sport is stupid, then I don't know what to say really. Sure it's a game, maybe not a sport. But if you can't find it in your mind to compare games to sports then maybe you shouldn't be writing blogs.

The point of the film and whether I missed it or not is irrelevant to using those character types to highlight an existing phenomenon. As for poker/sport, it's a comparison that's come up so often that it's been thoroughly debunked. It had to be, because whenever one of the 2+2 coaching scam threads appears someone goes down the "Tiger Woods has a coach!" road and that needed to stop happening, obviously. I don't think I will stop writing because someone disagrees with me about something, but I do appreciate feedback both positive and negative - thanks for reading.

Poker is just so fundamentally different to just about every sport I can think of that this comparison is silly. I also tend to agree with the 200nl grinding thing for the most part, maybe not the timeframe but more just that if people don't work on their game for long periods of time it's a great indication that they are very unlikely to make it to the top.

I definitely went too far when I said it was stupid in my comment, I didn't mean for it to sound so rude. Also my film comment is I agree irrelevant. But, I don't understand how people can say games and sports are incomparable. I'm not saying they are the same thing, just that they can be compared. Hell you can compare anything that requires repetitive actions or competition versus an opponent to a sport. You can compare sales to a sport. I think it's important to be open minded and take certain techniques from various fields to improve in others. That's all I was saying, I didn't literally mean to stop writing blogs, just that if you can't see similarities between the two then it's worrying.