Unreality TV

  As all of us know, poker television is an incredibly popular entertainment genre. It is not quite as popular as "The Flavor of Love", but how do you compete against a show where 20 women of questionable moral fiber fight for the love of an overachieving crack addict? When we are watching any of the plethora of tournaments and cash games that litter the cable television channels, are we really seeing an accurate portrayal of good poker?  Anybody who thinks they can learn to play poker by watching World Series of Poker coverage probably also believes that watching the "Survivor" contestants compete on a tropical paradise is a good way to learn on how to live off the land.  When we watch the coverage of major poker tournaments we are being shown the highlighted hands: not the 12 hours of conservative, boring poker that preceded a singular exciting event at the table.  The truth is that good players see a low percentage of flops: maybe 25%. As a tournament progresses and the blinds get higher, the threshold for a playable hand goes down in proportion to the raise in the forced bets.  The highlighting of exciting hands makes for good television. It shows situations where people successfully challenge pocket aces with hands that aren't worth betting three M&M's on. This is done because it is impractical to film every hand at every table and air thousands of hours of poker. That would put the dramatic hands in context, but nobody would be left in front of their televisions to see it.  Poker television should be watched with a grain of salt and the full knowledge that what we are seeing is a tournament's highlight reel, not the every play of the game.