It’s Pro’s vs Amateurs in the WSOP Changes Debate

A change is as good as a rest they say, but when it’s the World Series of Poker you’re talking about it seems that the pros and recs have vastly different ideas of what should or should not be done – with antes and event structure discussions blazing across Twitter all week.

We’ll get onto whether those antes should be big blind or button or possibly even your favourite Aunt’s antes, but first up what did the pros start complaining about… well, WSOP bracelet winner Ryan LaPlante had his say…

…and Poker Night in America supremo Matt Glantz piped in with his years of experience running tournaments to back him up, explaining…

From the recreational player side of things, the introduction of such an early ante means that the generally weaker players will be out of events a lot quicker, and summed up the general mood of amateurs by tweeting…

…although legendary pro Todd Brunson tried to inject a bit of humour into the affair by asking…

…a nod to Glantz’s 2015 falling out with WSOP Tournament Director Jack Effel, the latter banning Glantz and some others from his Twitter account for a while when they complained about structures, the quality of cards and several other WSOP matters, although Effel later apologised.

Antes themselves have been much in discussion also, the WSOP introducing the Big Blind Ante (BBA) into some events to speed up play and hopefully avoid the horrible mishaps which have occurred in the past, but Daniel Negreanu hasn’t been too happy about the version of the BBA used in other tournaments, as I wrote a couple of months back…

Former WSOP champ Jared Hamby didn’t seem too impressed with the changes…

…although David ‘ODB’ Baker somehow found a positive along the way…

Back on the rec side of the affair to finish things off, and a voice of reason supporting the WSOP’s decision…