Recently the Poker Hall of Fame announced that Todd Brunson and Carlos Mortensen would be the 2016 inductees into poker’s version of Mount Olympus. Many in the poker community were a bit surprised (and that is putting it mildly in some cases) that Brunson earned enough votes for induction, citing his lack of tournament success and/or influence over the game (as if $4.3 million in lifetime tournament earnings and a 25-year history of playing high-stakes cash games with unparalleled success is “nothing”). The criteria used to determine new inductees has come under fire from some, none perhaps more notable than Poker Hall of Famer Daniel Negreanu.
Negreanu, who was voted in as soon as he met the Chip Reese Rule in 2014, stated in his blog at Full Contact Poker that there were some “tweaks” he would like to see to the Hall of Fame process. Negreanu’s ‘tweaks” were pretty much a rewriting of the basic ideas governing the voting process, however. Let’s take a look, shall we?
These are the current guidelines for induction into the Poker Hall of Fame:
A player must have:
Played poker against acknowledged top competition
Be a minimum of 40 years old at time of nomination (Chip Reese Rule)
Played for high stakes
Played consistently well, gaining the respect of peers
Stood the test of time
A contributor must have introduced an innovation or contributed to the overall growth and success of the game of poker with indelible positive and lasting results.
Give Negreanu credit, he did put plenty of thought into things. First, he wants to automatically elect a “contributor” once every four years. “I find it difficult to vote for someone in the (contributor) category when it takes up a spot that a player may have gotten,” Negreanu states. But to arbitrarily set a time when one POSITIVELY has to be voted in isn’t inducting a contributor on their merits; it is inducting a person because you have to. If a contributor’s efforts have truly had a lasting impact on the game, they will get in on their own eventually.
(Writer’s note: There is some discussion from Robert ‘Chipburner’ Turner, a well-known card player and casino executive, for a Poker Industry Person Hall of Fame…we’ll have to talk to him about that!)
Negreanu then states that the criteria “are quite confusing and not clearly defined.” In particular, Negreanu sees that the “played for high stakes” and “played against top competition” criterion are vague as to what they should include. There’s a reason for that: like any other Hall of Fame, it is up to the voter to use their judgment as to who deserves to be enshrined. In baseball, for example, there isn’t a written rule that says you have to have hit .300, had 500 home runs or won 300 games to be eligible for induction. In basketball, there isn’t a rule that states you have to have scored 20,000 points in your career to be considered.
To arbitrarily set levels of performance is antithesis to every Hall of Fame ever created. Was Buck Ewing, who hit 71 homers in his career, as great a player as Johnny Bench? Both were catchers but by far Bench’s success in the game outshines Ewing. But many who were a part of the game when Ewing was voted in (he played from 1880-1897) say that Ewing “never had a superior” to him.
This exercise isn’t a method of bashing Negreanu because there are some things that he wrote that are correct. The “stand the test of time” rule is probably one that should be banished because, as Negreanu points out, just how much time should be considered? Poker isn’t like other sports in that you cannot physically play after a certain time, but it is one that you can be a dominant force in for a certain time period and then go to shit. Although I once again don’t like putting arbitrary numbers on things, Negreanu’s suggestion that a player “should have stood the test of time over a period of 15 years or more” is an acceptable suggestion.
Finally, we come to one of the major arguments with the Poker Hall of Fame, its voting process. Negreanu is dead on here and, along with some of his thoughts, I have plenty myself.
At this time, the Poker Hall of Fame Voting Committee is comprised of the living members of the Hall (prior to the induction of Brunson and Mortensen, 25 Hall of Famers were still alive) and a similar number of poker industry and media “insiders.” 50 people? This is far too few to be deciding who should get in the Hall. Every other Hall of Fame has a voting bloc of at least 100 people and, in some cases, it can be several hundred (the Heisman Trophy, college football’s most prestigious award, is voted on by 870 media personnel and the living Heisman winners). To limit the voting in such a manner does make it easy to tabulate the votes but it also makes it a homogenous group.
For the Poker Hall of Fame, there should be at least 100 industry and media folks included and they should represent the world, not just the United States. If you want to break it down, we can dole out 40 to North America (that counts Canada and Mexico), 25 to Europe, 15 to Scandinavia (always a strong card-playing populace), and 10 each to South America and Asia/Australia (and these numbers aren’t set in stone…it could be adjusted). Still allow the living Hall members a voice (as they also respect the game and its history), but bring in more of an international view rather than its current U. S.-centric base.
The other issue Negreanu is correct on is the method of voting. At this time, those choosing the next inductees have ten votes to divvy out as they see fit. Negreanu notes that this method isn’t a solid way to choose as “three living members (can) throw all ten of their votes at a nominee and he is very likely to be inducted.” While it is a stretch, it isn’t inaccurate. With 50 people and 10 votes each, that’s 500 votes. Three people voting unanimously for one person (30 votes) put someone on the path towards earning the 50% necessary for induction, but it is obvious it would take a bigger bloc than that to push someone over the top.
Instead of the current method, Negreanu suggests that those tasked with the voting process should only choose two names and indicate a first and second choice. The person who gets the most first place votes would be inducted along with the person earning the second-best first place votes. Negreanu also suggests a point system, with two points for a first place vote and one for a second place vote and the top two point totals are inducted, but he’s onto something with either method (the points system is the way other Halls handle their voting process and, if necessary, you could go down to the Top Five to hand out points to make sure there aren’t ties).
The fans aren’t left out of Negreanu’s vision for the voting process with the Poker Hall of Fame, but he significantly restricts their input. Negreanu believes that the fans should be able to choose four of the prospective inductees, with the voting members of the Hall filling out the remaining six spots for consideration. This is also a great idea as the fans sometimes are more willing to follow the “hot” take of the moment rather than to consider the entire history of a prospective nominee who perhaps isn’t the “flavor of the month.”
There are plenty of things that could be changed with the Poker Hall of Fame (a physical location, the voting process, etc.) and Negreanu puts up some excellent suggestions. It would be up to Caesars Entertainment to make these changes, however, and it is highly unlikely that they are going to put much attention (or cash) on something that was a toss-in when they purchased (some would say saved) Binion’s Horseshoe in the mid-Aughts. Therefore, we’re probably going to have to live with the process as it is currently established.
