Standardizing Tournament Writing

It was a giant leap for mankind and poker when the Tournament Directors Association devised and agreed on a uniform set of rules for tournament poker. It's true that one of the rules, the one that declared a player's hand dead if he wasn't in his seat when the hands were dealt, did create some controversy. For example, can you visualize the resulting explosion if Phil Hellmuth were to have his hand killed, causing him to miss winning his 10th bracelet, because he suddenly had an urge to stand up and scratch his butt just as the last card was dealt?

Overall, however, it made life a lot easier for players, knowing that the rules were the same wherever they played. And now that we have uniform rules for tournament playing, how about uniform rules for tournament writing? Until now, those of us who labor in the trenches churning out reports for casino tournaments have pretty much made things up as we went along in regard to writing style. Therefore, I have taken it upon myself to end this anarchy by proposing a TWA (Tournament Writers Association) list of standardized rules.

First or last? Let's start with one of the most perplexing decisions dividing writers: whether to put the name of the tournament winner in the first paragraph or save that information for last. As a former newspaper reporter, I have been trained to lead off with the most important information – in this case, the name of the winner. Once I did attempt the "mystery" format of saving it for the end, but the results were disastrous. I began by writing: "Tonight's tournament was the most exciting and unpredictable event I have ever covered, and you will be stunned when you learn who the winner was."

Unfortunately, the headline I wrote above the story was: "Dirty Wally Wins First Tournament in 70 Years."

Are we writers or critics? Another dilemma is whether to just do a straight reporting job or try to analyze the play of a critical hand, perhaps even critiquing a player for his strategy. My advice to tournament writers is to just stick to the facts and not try to play the expert – especially after the fact. Consider this: If you think you're a more astute player than he is, how come he's at the final table and you're just doing the writing? Of course, you can always ask the player to explain his strategy, but that doesn't always work, either. Most of the time a player will either give you misleading information so as not to give anything away, or just make up some convoluted reasoning to disguise the fact that he misread his hand. For example, consider one of the most discussed hands in World Series history. At the final table of the championship event in 1995, Barbara Enright moved in with pocket eights and Brent Carter broke her by calling with 6-3 and flopping two pair. I've asked Brent about six times why he called with that hand, and so far I've gotten six different answers.

Player identification: I strongly believe that tournament reports are more informative if the writer knows the names of the players he's writing about. Unfortunately, in smaller local tournaments, the usual question is, "Who's that?" Years ago I devised "bio sheets" for players at the final table to write down their names, occupations, the cities they're from, poker accomplishments, and so on. The trouble is, I'm lucky if any of the players even take the time to write down their names. If they do, it's usually in an undecipherable scrawl. Forget about occupations. How many poker players do you know who even have jobs?

But the names are the worst nightmare. They keep changing. Every Tuan Hua or Hieu Nguyen has a nickname like "John" or "Tony." Every Luigi Maximiliano calls himself "Max." And every Jacob Abromovitz is "Jack." One name shows up on the bio sheet, another on the tax form, and a third on the final results list the casino posts on a bulletin board somewhere. So, who knows which one to use? And some names evolve. For years it was "Scotty Warbucks," and then Charlie "Scotty Warbucks" Shoten. At last, thank goodness, it's simply Charlie Shoten. And some players, for whatever personal reasons they have, don't even want you to use their names at all. So, it's some fanciful moniker like "Captain," or Prince of Docness," or "Grey Ghost," or just "Unknown." I mean, how many pro football players or golfers use the name "Unknown"? As a professional writer, it just rubs me the wrong way when I have to write, "The winner of tonight's $500 Omaha eight-or-better event is unknown." Under the new TWA rules, each player would be obliged to provide his real name, verified by a driver's license and a fingerprint.

Penalties: This is a very sensitive subject. Say that a player gets a costly timeout penalty when his cards fall on the floor. Should a tournament writer describe the incident to send a warning to other players? Or, should he just overlook it to avoid embarrassing the penalized player? Well, it depends. Does it depend on whether or not it was an accident? No, it depends on whether or not the player in question tips you. Of course, it's difficult to avoid mentioning a penalty when a player gets blinded out of the tournament while sitting on the sidelines. If that happens, a writer may employ some creative writing. Instead of saying that Joe Blow's cards fell on the floor, just say that the cards fell wrong for him tonight.

Deals: These can be just as sensitive to write about as penalties. For example, in the official results, Joe Blow might have won the tournament, but in actual fact, Joe might have been the short stack when a chip-count deal was made for most of the prize pool with six players left. This presents a dilemma. Do you credit Joe Blow with the official prize payout or the money he actually won? You would think this is nobody's business, but it's vitally important information for railbirds because it lets them know whom to hit up.

The solution lies in delicate sidestepping and some more subtle phrasing. Here's what I wrote for one such situation. "Joe Blow placed first. First place was worth a handsome trophy, 16 points in the best all-around points race, and $50,000. Well, two out of three isn't bad."

Style: Each writer, it seems, has a different way of typing in hands. For example, one writer might use "Jh 10s," and another "J 10." Which one will it be? Using symbols to identify the suits is more elegant and provides instant identification, and I urge all tournament writers to adopt that style. In my case, however, I'll keep using Jh 10s. Who wants to bother, when using Microsoft Word software, to keep going through several extra steps to find the symbol selection area and pick through for the appropriate design? I'm a writer, not a graphic designer. If you want to look at pictures, go to an art gallery.

Chip identification: Let's say a player has $25,000 in chips. The problem is that they are just tournament chips, and not worth $25,000 in cash. Consequently, there is no agreement among writers on how to label them. Should we write "$25,000 in chips," "25,000," "25K," or even "T25,000"?

You know, the truth is that I don't know and don't really care. Trying to make all of these decisions is starting to hurt my head. So, let's just stick to the present tournament writing rule: every man (or woman) to himself.