I genuinely am not bothered by stars rake that much its still super competitive and still beatable at most levels.
I am bothered about the whole super nova elite thing - I thought that was a genuine disgrace.
Im not bothered about the (Personally) about the rake on the turbo DYM's as I hardly play them, but I do believe thats whats fair is fair and the same rake level should be offered across all games.
I also believe poker was built on the dream of making it big and making money and the more the rake rise's the further away we move away from that dream.
This is not a personal attack on Daniel Negreanu or pokerstars and especially not sky I am just posting my honest beliefs
Lol at the Negreanu comment. Have you followed nothing in poker in the last few years?
He's essentially paid a lot of money to make outrageous claims on behalf of Stars. 'More rake is better' springs to mind.
Pretty much respect his opinion on poker related manners
His opinion is not respected in the poker community any more.
Also, live earnings don't equate to live profit. Sorry can't remember the year, but some time in the past few years he tweeted that he had cashed that year for x million dollars but still had a losing year.
If you actually took the time to read the article then he says categorically that he has never advocated " more rake " . The article has got nothing to do with stars , and neither does he mention them. As far as his opinion not being respected in the poker community anymore , outlandishly ridiculous comment to make with zero foundation. People can make up their own minds if his opinions are valid , I know who I'm with .
Have had the good fortune to share a table with Mr Negreanu a few years ago.
He is personable, good for the game generally, and is obviously one of the very best players of all time.
However, his comments were pretty outrageous, and misleading at best.
He forgets to mention that he is paid considerable sums by Stars. He conveniently uses just the 2 types of live player. Not the myriad of different levels that are on Stars. He forgets to mention that, as well as reducing rakeback for the top pros, they were simultaneously reducing rakeback for every single player. At every single level. The "treasure" chest thing must be the nut worst scheme in the industry. And the rake itself remains high.
Do I respect his opinions generally? Of course. Just not the ones where he pretends to be the referee while he has a dog in the fight.
1 thing that needs saying in relation to poker generally, and DYMs in particular, is that higher stakes players have always subsidised lower stakes. And so they should. It costs Sky exactly the same amount of money to run a 28p DYM as a £55. One runs at a loss, subsidised by the 1 that runs at a profit. And so it should. It is the size of the profit that seems wrong.
Finally, Sky have SNGs that run at half the rake of DYMs. I cannot understand why no-one plays the SNGs.
Lol at the Negreanu comment. Have you followed nothing in poker in the last few years?
He's essentially paid a lot of money to make outrageous claims on behalf of Stars. 'More rake is better' springs to mind.
Pretty much respect his opinion on poker related manners
His opinion is not respected in the poker community any more.
Also, live earnings don't equate to live profit. Sorry can't remember the year, but some time in the past few years he tweeted that he had cashed that year for x million dollars but still had a losing year.
If you actually took the time to read the article then he says categorically that he has never advocated " more rake " . The article has got nothing to do with stars , and neither does he mention them. As far as his opinion not being respected in the poker community anymore , outlandishly ridiculous comment to make with zero foundation. People can make up their own minds if his opinions are valid , I know who I'm with .
Have had the good fortune to share a table with Mr Negreanu a few years ago.
He is personable, good for the game generally, and is obviously one of the very best players of all time.
However, his comments were pretty outrageous, and misleading at best.
He forgets to mention that he is paid considerable sums by Stars. He conveniently uses just the 2 types of live player. Not the myriad of different levels that are on Stars. He forgets to mention that, as well as reducing rakeback for the top pros, they were simultaneously reducing rakeback for every single player. At every single level. The "treasure" chest thing must be the nut worst scheme in the industry. And the rake itself remains high.
Do I respect his opinions generally? Of course. Just not the ones where he pretends to be the referee while he has a dog in the fight.
1 thing that needs saying in relation to poker generally, and DYMs in particular, is that higher stakes players have always subsidised lower stakes. And so they should. It costs Sky exactly the same amount of money to run a 28p DYM as a £55. One runs at a loss, subsidised by the 1 that runs at a profit. And so it should. It is the size of the profit that seems wrong.
Finally, Sky have SNGs that run at half the rake of DYMs. I cannot understand why no-one plays the SNGs.
All very well and fair , but what if anything , do you disagree with on the article of his I posted several posts up ?
Winning players suck the life out of poker.
Says the man who wins the most. And gets paid extra to tell it to the little people. Effectively, with their money. Twice.
While the recs get less and less.
A great player. But not so great that he can bluff us all when his cards are face up.
Genuine question .....So if anyone else had said it , you might agree ?
No. Just that when others say it, they don't have a vested interest.
Lol at the Negreanu comment. Have you followed nothing in poker in the last few years?
He's essentially paid a lot of money to make outrageous claims on behalf of Stars. 'More rake is better' springs to mind.
Pretty much respect his opinion on poker related manners
His opinion is not respected in the poker community any more.
Also, live earnings don't equate to live profit. Sorry can't remember the year, but some time in the past few years he tweeted that he had cashed that year for x million dollars but still had a losing year.
If you actually took the time to read the article then he says categorically that he has never advocated " more rake " . The article has got nothing to do with stars , and neither does he mention them. As far as his opinion not being respected in the poker community anymore , outlandishly ridiculous comment to make with zero foundation. People can make up their own minds if his opinions are valid , I know who I'm with .
Have had the good fortune to share a table with Mr Negreanu a few years ago.
He is personable, good for the game generally, and is obviously one of the very best players of all time.
However, his comments were pretty outrageous, and misleading at best.
He forgets to mention that he is paid considerable sums by Stars. He conveniently uses just the 2 types of live player. Not the myriad of different levels that are on Stars. He forgets to mention that, as well as reducing rakeback for the top pros, they were simultaneously reducing rakeback for every single player. At every single level. The "treasure" chest thing must be the nut worst scheme in the industry. And the rake itself remains high.
Do I respect his opinions generally? Of course. Just not the ones where he pretends to be the referee while he has a dog in the fight.
1 thing that needs saying in relation to poker generally, and DYMs in particular, is that higher stakes players have always subsidised lower stakes. And so they should. It costs Sky exactly the same amount of money to run a 28p DYM as a £55. One runs at a loss, subsidised by the 1 that runs at a profit. And so it should. It is the size of the profit that seems wrong.
Finally, Sky have SNGs that run at half the rake of DYMs. I cannot understand why no-one plays the SNGs.
Lol at the Negreanu comment. Have you followed nothing in poker in the last few years?
He's essentially paid a lot of money to make outrageous claims on behalf of Stars. 'More rake is better' springs to mind.
Pretty much respect his opinion on poker related manners
His opinion is not respected in the poker community any more.
Also, live earnings don't equate to live profit. Sorry can't remember the year, but some time in the past few years he tweeted that he had cashed that year for x million dollars but still had a losing year.
If you actually took the time to read the article then he says categorically that he has never advocated " more rake " . The article has got nothing to do with stars , and neither does he mention them. As far as his opinion not being respected in the poker community anymore , outlandishly ridiculous comment to make with zero foundation. People can make up their own minds if his opinions are valid , I know who I'm with .
Have had the good fortune to share a table with Mr Negreanu a few years ago.
He is personable, good for the game generally, and is obviously one of the very best players of all time.
However, his comments were pretty outrageous, and misleading at best.
He forgets to mention that he is paid considerable sums by Stars. He conveniently uses just the 2 types of live player. Not the myriad of different levels that are on Stars. He forgets to mention that, as well as reducing rakeback for the top pros, they were simultaneously reducing rakeback for every single player. At every single level. The "treasure" chest thing must be the nut worst scheme in the industry. And the rake itself remains high.
Do I respect his opinions generally? Of course. Just not the ones where he pretends to be the referee while he has a dog in the fight.
1 thing that needs saying in relation to poker generally, and DYMs in particular, is that higher stakes players have always subsidised lower stakes. And so they should. It costs Sky exactly the same amount of money to run a 28p DYM as a £55. One runs at a loss, subsidised by the 1 that runs at a profit. And so it should. It is the size of the profit that seems wrong.
Finally, Sky have SNGs that run at half the rake of DYMs. I cannot understand why no-one plays the SNGs.
All very well and fair , but what if anything , do you disagree with on the article of his I posted several posts up ?
Winning players suck the life out of poker.
Says the man who wins the most. And gets paid extra to tell it to the little people. Effectively, with their money. Twice.
While the recs get less and less.
A great player. But not so great that he can bluff us all when his cards are face up.
Genuine question .....So if anyone else had said it , you might agree ?
I genuinely am not bothered by stars rake that much its still super competitive and still beatable at most levels.
I am bothered about the whole super nova elite thing - I thought that was a genuine disgrace.
Im not bothered about the (Personally) about the rake on the turbo DYM's as I hardly play them, but I do believe thats whats fair is fair and the same rake level should be offered across all games.
I also believe poker was built on the dream of making it big and making money and the more the rake rise's the further away we move away from that dream.
This is not a personal attack on Daniel Negreanu or pokerstars and especially not sky I am just posting my honest beliefs
It's every bit of a personal attack on Negreanu , when you basically accuse him of making up a story about a poker player , but aren't prepared to back that up with evidence .
So once again you’ve managed to derail a thread Dobiesdraw
I think this is what the thread is meant to be about
“I have played a few SNGs on Sky Poker recently and have come to realise how painfully high the rake is on a lot of them, especially the turbo formats.
Standard practice for poker sites is to charge less rake for games that finish quickly (less use of the sites resources) and how beatable the game format is (so that some people can actually win/ keep games running). For example, It is standard to charge 10% rake for an normal speed MTT, but a lot of sites charge less for turbos or increased variance formats like bounty hunters.
SKY DONT DO THIS. THEY CHARGE 10% FOR EVERYTHING.
some examples:
888 MTT: normal speed (10 mins+) = 10%, turbo (6 mins) = 8.33%, super turbo (3mins) = 5% 888 SNG: hyper dym (2mins) = 4.5%, standard sng (8 mins) = 9%, hyper standard sng (2 mins) = 5.5%
Its also important to note that of all the other sites I looked were either similar or better than pokerstars or 888. Party poker for example has excellent rake on almost all of its products. Bounty hunter tournaments all have 5% rake.
Its also important to note Pokerstars have been absolutely blasted in the poker industry by almost everyone for having high rake, but compared to sky's is great!
SKY charges 10% for Normal MTTs, Turbo MTTS, Normal SNG, DYM, Turbo SNG etc. A turbo DYM with 2 min blinds and 6 people, that is over in 15 minutes should definitely not have 10% rake. Its about DOUBLE anyone would charge and it makes the games very hard to beat, probably impossible if you have a hard table.
Im surprised no one has mentioned this before, and I think it needs to be urgently addressed.
How can sky justify such high, uncompetitive rake?”
So once again you’ve managed to derail a thread Dobiesdraw
I think this is what the thread is meant to be about
“I have played a few SNGs on Sky Poker recently and have come to realise how painfully high the rake is on a lot of them, especially the turbo formats.
Standard practice for poker sites is to charge less rake for games that finish quickly (less use of the sites resources) and how beatable the game format is (so that some people can actually win/ keep games running). For example, It is standard to charge 10% rake for an normal speed MTT, but a lot of sites charge less for turbos or increased variance formats like bounty hunters.
SKY DONT DO THIS. THEY CHARGE 10% FOR EVERYTHING.
some examples:
888 MTT: normal speed (10 mins+) = 10%, turbo (6 mins) = 8.33%, super turbo (3mins) = 5% 888 SNG: hyper dym (2mins) = 4.5%, standard sng (8 mins) = 9%, hyper standard sng (2 mins) = 5.5%
Its also important to note that of all the other sites I looked were either similar or better than pokerstars or 888. Party poker for example has excellent rake on almost all of its products. Bounty hunter tournaments all have 5% rake.
Its also important to note Pokerstars have been absolutely blasted in the poker industry by almost everyone for having high rake, but compared to sky's is great!
SKY charges 10% for Normal MTTs, Turbo MTTS, Normal SNG, DYM, Turbo SNG etc. A turbo DYM with 2 min blinds and 6 people, that is over in 15 minutes should definitely not have 10% rake. Its about DOUBLE anyone would charge and it makes the games very hard to beat, probably impossible if you have a hard table.
Im surprised no one has mentioned this before, and I think it needs to be urgently addressed.
How can sky justify such high, uncompetitive rake?”
Haven't derailed anything , the whole thread is about rake and that's exactly what I'm talking about . I've used Negreanus point of view about rake , because I agree with it , and it's relevant .
Whatever side of the fence one sits on, it is certainly healthy for there to be open debate about the rates and the effects of rake within poker. Increasing awareness and transparency amongst players of all levels can only be a good thing.
I wonder if the popularity of Sky's DYM's would be effected if they were marketed more accurately as 1.82YM's?*
*I rounded up the actual figure of 1.818181818181818 for any of you pedants out there .
So for a while now there has been a misconception that I think raising the rake in poker games is “good for poker.” I’ve never actually said that, but I understand where the confusion may come from because I was talking about some things (facts) that a lot of pros don’t want to hear, and like a game of broken telephone, my position has been distorted. I do not believe that raising the rake is good for poker. Rake increases take more money out of the game and benefit whoever is collecting the rake. That is my position on rake. Period. (Insert Sean Spicer jokes here) He DID actually say that. Its on video. There is a link to a doug polk youtube video where he analyses everything that was said. DNEGs is blatantly lying here. That should should set alarms bells going for pretty much everything else that is said...
Now, let’s take a deeper look at how an increased rake affects players. I’m going to discuss a real world example from my early days as a professional poker player in Toronto. The casino I played at charges a $5 session fee every 30 minutes in a $10-$20 limit hold’em game, while the game across the street charged $10 a hand! Excluding tips, in the game I played in, $100 came off the table every hour. In the game across the street, they were taking $300 out of the game per hour!
So obviously I chose to play in the game with the lower rake as did many other pros I know because we didn’t really think we would be able to beat the rake across the street. What ended up happening was the game I played in consisted of eight pros and two recreational players, while the game across the street had no pros in it at all. The game with the higher rake was obviously juicier, but because the rake was so high it wasn’t really worth it for me and my other pro friends to play it. Our win rate was still better overall playing in the game with the lower rake.
So many problems with these 2 paragraphs! Most live venues charge on the high side for rake, it varies sure. But not by a factor of 3x. That's insane. Do games like this exist still? I doubt it, and If not, that's a warning sign already...
Everyone knows poker was easier in the past. I would say times have moved on since "his early days". We must be talking 20ish years ago. It's ridiculous to even try and compare games from them to ones today.
It is rare to even have one person on your table that doesn't really know what they are doing (above say £2 buy in, since we are talking about money that could mean something to people). This alone completely negates his argument.
We used to have this recreational player named Bhupan come play with us and while we did what we could to ensure he had fun at the table, he was so bad at poker that he got absolutely destroyed when he played with us. In our game, he was constantly playing in heads up or three way pots, while the game across the street routinely saw eight players limping in to see the flop and chasing all the way to the river.
When is the last time you saw this in a real money game ffs
Bhupan also played across the street, and while he lost there too, he didn’t get humiliated and crushed nearly as hard as he did when he was facing a table full of regs. He paid a lot more in rake across the street, but also lost less money. His hourly loss rate was better in the game with the higher rake because the competition he faced was more on his level.
So what your saying is the games are only beatable if you have a bunch of player that don't know what they are doing?
What about those who actually want to get better at the game?
What about the poker dream?... The poker boom came after we saw a recreational player out playing a seasoned pro (and had a cool name). Do you really think all these people started playing poker without the dream of making good money from it like money maker did? The dream needs to stay alive, or poker will die a slow and painful death.
So if you are reading this, ask yourself the following question and be honest: given the choice of these two options, which is a better game to choose if you are Bhupan? Sitting with the sharks, or paying the extra rake and facing off against weaker opponents? Be honest.
If all you aspire to be is bhupan, then fine, maybe you are better off in a game that makes it impossible to win. That way, you can lose all your money slowly to the casino rather than by playing a game of skill against your peers. If that's the case, then why not roulette, or bingo??
I know you don’t want to hear this but it just happens to be true. I get why you would scoff and get your pitchforks out when this point is illustrated and not want to believe it, but its true. For Bhupan and other players at his skill level, HIGHER RAKE WAS BETTER FOR THEM than paying a lower rake in a game against pros. Oh no! Did he just say that? How dare he! Turncoat! Shill! Ahhhhhhhh. Say what you will, but it is true.
congratulations Daniel, you have managed to think of a scenario where paying more rake is actually better. For one player who had no idea what he was doing 20 years ago...
I understand why me saying this would lead people to believe that I think raising the rake is good for poker. I get it, I really do, but it is not the same thing. I do not think raising the rake is good for poker. No rake is “good for poker.” But you need to understand that a game full of pros is far worse for the game than a high rake. To the extreme, if a game is nine close to equally skilled pros and no weak link, guess what happens to the game? POOF. It doesn’t exist. They won’t play.
Actually agree somewhat. Games full of pro's are not good. I promise you, a bunch of pro players are not going to swarm the site if sky suddenly make their rake more competitive. Especially not in £5 and under games, because that's not what they play.
Now, if you are the guy running the poker game its in your best interest that your players/customers don’t go broke. They go broke, you have no games, you have no rake. If you are the guy running the game, the number one cause of players going broke is WINNING PLAYERS. Professionals who bust weaker players. When the weaker players go broke, the winning players don’t play each other, then you are left with no game, and no rake. The primary cause of a losing player losing is WINNING PLAYERS. The secondary cause, usually by a wide margin, is RAKE.
I mean, im not saying it isn't true... but any evidence other than your word, because I'm not all up on that at the moment to be honest Daniel!
So you are saying the solution is to increase rake to the point that there can be no more winning players anymore? Maybe that does mean a truly clueless recreational player does lose slowly. But really, who want to play in a game no one can win at?!
If you think about it, nothing I’m saying here should be all that controversial. It’s common sense, but obviously pros don’t want to hear it. For the professional poker community, RAKE is enemy #1, but for recreational players, what busts them is the better players they are facing. If the balance in an ecosystem swings too far in the direction of a pro dominated poker game, the ecosystem as a whole suffers. I don’t think raising the rake is the solution to fixing the ecosystem, but I do think reducing or eliminating reward bonuses to high volume winning players is a no-brainer.
Oh good, your not saying that... so what is the point of your article? It just seems to me like you are trying to mislead people on what was actually said, whilst saying "I didn't say it, but if you had of said it, it would be ok. But I didn't say it, pretend I said this instead")
Think about it: if you are running a poker game why would you want to add extra incentive for the best players in your game to play more often and longer? Doesn’t it make far more logical sense to incentivize recreational players to redeposit and play longer? If you incentivize the winning players to play more, then its only natural that each game available will be more dominated by winning pros and how is that good for you if you are the one running the poker game? How is that good for the recreational players? The only group who benefits from giving rewards to high volume winning players is… high volume winning players. Everyone else in the ecosystem suffers.
In closing, NO I do not think higher rake is good for poker, but YES, I do think it makes sense to give the majority of the bonuses or rewards to recreational players.
I agree that promotions should be aimed at recreational players. It makes sense to encourage new players to play.
I also think that MOST of them strive to become winning players one day, and without that goal/dream, they wouldn't play. Plenty of people have already said that in this thread, although I do accept there are a few of you that play purely for fun.
would you agree that there are stakes where this no longer is the case for the vast majority though? for example, I could imagine most of the 50p DYM players don't really care if they win or lose, but when you get to £10 level id imagine that to be the opposite.
Am emotive topic, I agree, but let's keep it cool please. It's certainly not trolling, even if we disagree with the points made.
Can this discussion be limited to one thread then please? I started a thread on downswings last week that seemed to do quite well until it was derailed by this same topic (which has nothing to do with the thread I started) being brought up by the same poster
Lol at the Negreanu comment. Have you followed nothing in poker in the last few years?
He's essentially paid a lot of money to make outrageous claims on behalf of Stars. 'More rake is better' springs to mind.
Pretty much respect his opinion on poker related manners
His opinion is not respected in the poker community any more.
Also, live earnings don't equate to live profit. Sorry can't remember the year, but some time in the past few years he tweeted that he had cashed that year for x million dollars but still had a losing year.
If you actually took the time to read the article then he says categorically that he has never advocated " more rake " . The article has got nothing to do with stars , and neither does he mention them. As far as his opinion not being respected in the poker community anymore , outlandishly ridiculous comment to make with zero foundation. People can make up their own minds if his opinions are valid , I know who I'm with .
Have had the good fortune to share a table with Mr Negreanu a few years ago.
He is personable, good for the game generally, and is obviously one of the very best players of all time.
However, his comments were pretty outrageous, and misleading at best.
He forgets to mention that he is paid considerable sums by Stars. He conveniently uses just the 2 types of live player. Not the myriad of different levels that are on Stars. He forgets to mention that, as well as reducing rakeback for the top pros, they were simultaneously reducing rakeback for every single player. At every single level. The "treasure" chest thing must be the nut worst scheme in the industry. And the rake itself remains high.
Do I respect his opinions generally? Of course. Just not the ones where he pretends to be the referee while he has a dog in the fight.
1 thing that needs saying in relation to poker generally, and DYMs in particular, is that higher stakes players have always subsidised lower stakes. And so they should. It costs Sky exactly the same amount of money to run a 28p DYM as a £55. One runs at a loss, subsidised by the 1 that runs at a profit. And so it should. It is the size of the profit that seems wrong.
Finally, Sky have SNGs that run at half the rake of DYMs. I cannot understand why no-one plays the SNGs.
Hey Phil...am I missing something? Seriously not teasing, but I though the rake on regular SNG's and DYM's was the same? Just checked and they are OR am I missing it??
The regular SNGs and DYMs have the same rake.
The "turbo" DYMs with 2 minute blinds are also raked at 10%. Whereas the "Hyper" SNGs (also 2 minute blinds) have only a 5% rake. Which should prove Melty's point.
I did not even know these existed!
Surely they should just be in the regular tab... you have normal speed and turbo speed ones in there but not hyper?
Also....YES! How can you have a standard sng, with 2 minute blinds and charge 5% rake (which by the way is still really high for a hyper), then charge DOUBLE for a sng with the same structure and a lower possible winrate...madness.
If I had my way, it would be 3% hyper (2 mins), 5% turbo (5 mins), 8% standard (7 mins+) for SNGs. That seems reasonable to me.
I would change the names so they match the structure speed (so turbo dyms would become hyper dyms for example)
SNG's use less resources than a standard MTT, its also not possible to have as high a winrate (more players and steeper the pay structure, the higher winrate is possible). so in my opinion they should all have less rake than standard MTTs. Turbo/ hyper MTTs should be raked less, and once the buy in is above £100, it should be rakes less. (sky does £220 vs everyone elses $215 for example)
I would be willing to bet that normal SNGs will actually run at this level, and DYMS will see a big traffic increase, but gradually.
When rake is high and you make a promo aimed at regs (rake race), they will play for a bit, then the top contenders will just make a deal. Its far more + ev than actually playing when rake makes it almost impossible to win at the best of times, never mind when the games are more reggy than normal due to the promotion
"He DID actually say that. Its on video. There is a link to a doug polk youtube video where he analyses everything that was said. DNEGs is blatantly lying here. That should should set alarms bells going for pretty much everything else that is said"
For a number of years, Daniel Negreanu has been berated by the poker community for defending PokerStars´ changes to its rake structure and rewards program. Now Negreanu has published a blog giving a fuller explanation of why more rake could be better for the long-term future of the game.
Daniel Negreanu never said the words “more rake is better”. The alleged quote was taken from a YouTube interview Negreanu gave in 2016, in which he explained why PokerStars reversed a rake reduction at lower stakes in order to prevent pros dropping down several levels of buy-in and destroying the ecosystem. Unfortunately, poor PR won the day and the alleged quote has stuck ever since.
What Negreanu actually said was that high levels of rake keeps pros away from low stakes games because the games become unbeatable. He went on to explain that, although a high level of rake is not a good thing for recreational players, recreational players´ funds last longer when pros keep away. Consequently, recreational players have a better experience than if they had lost their bankrolls (to pro players) in one session and are more likely to redeposit and keep the poker ecosystem growing.
So for a while now there has been a misconception that I think raising the rake in poker He DID actually say that. Its on video. There is a link to a doug polk youtube video where he analyses everything that was said. DNEGs is blatantly lying here. That should should set alarms bells going for pretty much everything else that is said...
Now, let’s take a deeper look at how an increased rake affects players. I’m going to discuss a real world example from my early days as a professional poker player in Toronto. The casino I played at charges a $5 session fee every 30 minutes in a $10-$20 limit hold’em game, while the game across the street charged $10 a hand! Excluding tips, in the game I played in, $100 came off the table every hour. In the game across the street, they were taking $300 out of the game per hour!
So obviously I chose to play in the game with the lower rake as did many other pros I know because we didn’t really think we would be able to beat the rake across the street. What ended up happening was the game I played in consisted of eight pros and two recreational players, while the game across the street had no pros in it at all. The game with the higher rake was obviously juicier, but because the rake was so high it wasn’t really worth it for me and my other pro friends to play it. Our win rate was still better overall playing in the game with the lower rake.
So many problems with these 2 paragraphs! Most live venues charge on the high side for rake, it varies sure. But not by a factor of 3x. That's insane. Do games like this exist still? I doubt it, and If not, that's a warning sign already...
Everyone knows poker was easier in the past. I would say times have moved on since "his early days". We must be talking 20ish years ago. It's ridiculous to even try and compare games from them to ones today.
It is rare to even have one person on your table that doesn't really know what they are doing (above say £2 buy in, since we are talking about money that could mean something to people). This alone completely negates his argument.
We used to have this recreational player named Bhupan come play with us and while we did what we could to ensure he had fun at the table, he was so bad at poker that he got absolutely destroyed when he played with us. In our game, he was constantly playing in heads up or three way pots, while the game across the street routinely saw eight players limping in to see the flop and chasing all the way to the river.
When is the last time you saw this in a real money game ffs
Bhupan also played across the street, and while he lost there too, he didn’t get humiliated and crushed nearly as hard as he did when he was facing a table full of regs. He paid a lot more in rake across the street, but also lost less money. His hourly loss rate was better in the game with the higher rake because the competition he faced was more on his level.
So what your saying is the games are only beatable if you have a bunch of player that don't know what they are doing?
What about those who actually want to get better at the game?
What about the poker dream?... The poker boom came after we saw a recreational player out playing a seasoned pro (and had a cool name). Do you really think all these people started playing poker without the dream of making good money from it like money maker did? The dream needs to stay alive, or poker will die a slow and painful death.
So if you are reading this, ask yourself the following question and be honest: given the choice of these two options, which is a better game to choose if you are Bhupan? Sitting with the sharks, or paying the extra rake and facing off against weaker opponents? Be honest.
If all you aspire to be is bhupan, then fine, maybe you are better off in a game that makes it impossible to win. That way, you can lose all your money slowly to the casino rather than by playing a game of skill against your peers. If that's the case, then why not roulette, or bingo??
I know you don’t want to hear this but it just happens to be true. I get why you would scoff and get your pitchforks out when this point is illustrated and not want to believe it, but its true. For Bhupan and other players at his skill level, HIGHER RAKE WAS BETTER FOR THEM than paying a lower rake in a game against pros. Oh no! Did he just say that? How dare he! Turncoat! Shill! Ahhhhhhhh. Say what you will, but it is true.
congratulations Daniel, you have managed to think of a scenario where paying more rake is actually better. For one player who had no idea what he was doing 20 years ago...
I understand why me saying this would lead people to believe that I think raising the rake is good for poker. I get it, I really do, but it is not the same thing. I do not think raising the rake is good for poker. No rake is “good for poker.” But you need to understand that a game full of pros is far worse for the game than a high rake. To the extreme, if a game is nine close to equally skilled pros and no weak link, guess what happens to the game? POOF. It doesn’t exist. They won’t play.
Actually agree somewhat. Games full of pro's are not good. I promise you, a bunch of pro players are not going to swarm the site if sky suddenly make their rake more competitive. Especially not in £5 and under games, because that's not what they play.
I mean, im not saying it isn't true... but any evidence other than your word, because I'm not all up on that at the moment to be honest Daniel!
So you are saying the solution is to increase rake to the point that there can be no more winning players anymore? Maybe that does mean a truly clueless recreational player does lose slowly. But really, who want to play in a game no one can win at?! Oh good, your not saying that... so what is the point of your article? It just seems to me like you are trying to mislead people on what was actually said, whilst saying "I didn't say it, but if you had of said it, it would be ok. But I didn't say it, pretend I said this instead")
Thanks again chickn for a well thought through and considered response, which enables new, rec players like me start to understand the subject at a deeper level.
I wanted to respond the the original post but didn't for two reasons;
>The post seemed to be 'controversial for controversy's sake so wasn't going to waste the effort- see Adrian Durham reference and more importantly >I couldn't have articulated it appropriately so didn't want to blur the issues you raised and get yet more contentious posts, again just for controversy
Thanks- you could say the chickens have come home to roost??
"He DID actually say that. Its on video. There is a link to a doug polk youtube video where he analyses everything that was said. DNEGs is blatantly lying here. That should should set alarms bells going for pretty much everything else that is said"
What Negreanu actually said was that high levels of rake keeps pros away from low stakes games because the games become unbeatable. He went on to explain that, although a high level of rake is not a good thing for recreational players, recreational players´ funds last longer when pros keep away. Consequently, recreational players have a better experience than if they had lost their bankrolls (to pro players) in one session and are more likely to redeposit and keep the poker ecosystem growing.
I mean again what about the players making a small profit, breakeven, or tiny losses - what does the rake increase do to them? do they stay in the ecosystem?
His points are massively lopsided only focusing on the two extremes.
"He DID actually say that. Its on video. There is a link to a doug polk youtube video where he analyses everything that was said. DNEGs is blatantly lying here. That should should set alarms bells going for pretty much everything else that is said"
For a number of years, Daniel Negreanu has been berated by the poker community for defending PokerStars´ changes to its rake structure and rewards program. Now Negreanu has published a blog giving a fuller explanation of why more rake could be better for the long-term future of the game.
Daniel Negreanu never said the words “more rake is better”. The alleged quote was taken from a YouTube interview Negreanu gave in 2016, in which he explained why PokerStars reversed a rake reduction at lower stakes in order to prevent pros dropping down several levels of buy-in and destroying the ecosystem. Unfortunately, poor PR won the day and the alleged quote has stuck ever since.
What Negreanu actually said was that high levels of rake keeps pros away from low stakes games because the games become unbeatable. He went on to explain that, although a high level of rake is not a good thing for recreational players, recreational players´ funds last longer when pros keep away. Consequently, recreational players have a better experience than if they had lost their bankrolls (to pro players) in one session and are more likely to redeposit and keep the poker ecosystem growing.
Have you watched the doug polk video someone posted? It would be helpful if you did because I'm sure you would at least change your opinion on dnegs a little.
All he does is try and spin pokerstars changes in a positive light, even if pretty much everyone else in the poker world disagrees with him.
But guess who the new players listen to? Obviously the most famous poker player in the world instead of a bunch of nobodies on a forum they have never seen.
I read the article you linked, and my these are my thoughts:
I don't know a huge amount about the spins introduction. I know the community was against it and poker stars went ahead with it. It is a game with much less skill than standard sngs so was seen as a way for stars to collect more rake since skilled players will still find it hard to win and recreational players are attracted by the change of a big win (even if they will lose in the long run). Daniel defended them, which I don't have a big problem with - Stars obviously saw a market and went for it. It seems to have worked out for them too.
The next part is where it gets dicey. Daniel said there would be changes to the rewards system. Again, that's fine and up to stars even if it is also against what the poker community would like to see. The big problem though is the way they went about it. After publicising a promo that is worth hundreds of thousands to players that rake a certain amount in a year for 10/11 months of the year, the removed it without warning. Resulting in hundreds of players working their butts off for nothing. They could of easily waited until the end of the year, but they didn't. They intentionally ripped off poker players for hundreds of thousands each.
It was a huge scandal. Daniel did his best to defend Pokerstars. THIS is where most of the hate comes from towards him and was probably the real turning point for a lot of players deciding not to trust him.
Fast forward to today, and he is doing the same thing with rake. Whether he actually said "more rake is better" is besides the point, he is still defending that view and making recreational players actually think high rake could be a good idea.
"He DID actually say that. Its on video. There is a link to a doug polk youtube video where he analyses everything that was said. DNEGs is blatantly lying here. That should should set alarms bells going for pretty much everything else that is said"
For a number of years, Daniel Negreanu has been berated by the poker community for defending PokerStars´ changes to its rake structure and rewards program. Now Negreanu has published a blog giving a fuller explanation of why more rake could be better for the long-term future of the game.
Daniel Negreanu never said the words “more rake is better”. The alleged quote was taken from a YouTube interview Negreanu gave in 2016, in which he explained why PokerStars reversed a rake reduction at lower stakes in order to prevent pros dropping down several levels of buy-in and destroying the ecosystem. Unfortunately, poor PR won the day and the alleged quote has stuck ever since.
What Negreanu actually said was that high levels of rake keeps pros away from low stakes games because the games become unbeatable. He went on to explain that, although a high level of rake is not a good thing for recreational players, recreational players´ funds last longer when pros keep away. Consequently, recreational players have a better experience than if they had lost their bankrolls (to pro players) in one session and are more likely to redeposit and keep the poker ecosystem growing.
Have you watched the doug polk video someone posted? It would be helpful if you did because I'm sure you would at least change your opinion on dnegs a little.
All he does is try and spin pokerstars changes in a positive light, even if pretty much everyone else in the poker world disagrees with him.
But guess who the new players listen to? Obviously the most famous poker player in the world instead of a bunch of nobodies on a forum they have never seen.
I read the article you linked, and my these are my thoughts:
I don't know a huge amount about the spins introduction. I know the community was against it and poker stars went ahead with it. It is a game with much less skill than standard sngs so was seen as a way for stars to collect more rake since skilled players will still find it hard to win and recreational players are attracted by the change of a big win (even if they will lose in the long run). Daniel defended them, which I don't have a big problem with - Stars obviously saw a market and went for it. It seems to have worked out for them too.
The next part is where it gets dicey. Daniel said there would be changes to the rewards system. Again, that's fine and up to stars even if it is also against what the poker community would like to see. The big problem though is the way they went about it. After publicising a promo that is worth hundreds of thousands to players that rake a certain amount in a year for 10/11 months of the year, the removed it without warning. Resulting in hundreds of players working their butts off for nothing. They could of easily waited until the end of the year, but they didn't. They intentionally ripped off poker players for hundreds of thousands each.
It was a huge scandal. Daniel did his best to defend Pokerstars. THIS is where most of the hate comes from towards him and was probably the real turning point for a lot of players deciding not to trust him.
Fast forward to today, and he is doing the same thing with rake. Whether he actually said "more rake is better" is besides the point, he is still defending that view and making recreational players actually think high rake could be a good idea.
Please do watch it, its quite entertaining and informative.
Of course I've watched it , still hasn't changed my mind ! I find Polk an odious troll and that's being polite , but quite understand why a lot of people on here would side with him .
Massive backtrack with the bolded bit , and it is important and on point .
Wonder how everyone taking the moral high ground on here against Negreanu and Stars in general will adopt their stance , when the inevitable happens and sky gets swallowed up /integrated into the machine that is stars ? Will they still play or take the moral high ground , my moneys on the former.
"He DID actually say that. Its on video. There is a link to a doug polk youtube video where he analyses everything that was said. DNEGs is blatantly lying here. That should should set alarms bells going for pretty much everything else that is said"
For a number of years, Daniel Negreanu has been berated by the poker community for defending PokerStars´ changes to its rake structure and rewards program. Now Negreanu has published a blog giving a fuller explanation of why more rake could be better for the long-term future of the game.
Daniel Negreanu never said the words “more rake is better”. The alleged quote was taken from a YouTube interview Negreanu gave in 2016, in which he explained why PokerStars reversed a rake reduction at lower stakes in order to prevent pros dropping down several levels of buy-in and destroying the ecosystem. Unfortunately, poor PR won the day and the alleged quote has stuck ever since.
What Negreanu actually said was that high levels of rake keeps pros away from low stakes games because the games become unbeatable. He went on to explain that, although a high level of rake is not a good thing for recreational players, recreational players´ funds last longer when pros keep away. Consequently, recreational players have a better experience than if they had lost their bankrolls (to pro players) in one session and are more likely to redeposit and keep the poker ecosystem growing.
Have you watched the doug polk video someone posted? It would be helpful if you did because I'm sure you would at least change your opinion on dnegs a little.
All he does is try and spin pokerstars changes in a positive light, even if pretty much everyone else in the poker world disagrees with him.
But guess who the new players listen to? Obviously the most famous poker player in the world instead of a bunch of nobodies on a forum they have never seen.
I read the article you linked, and my these are my thoughts:
I don't know a huge amount about the spins introduction. I know the community was against it and poker stars went ahead with it. It is a game with much less skill than standard sngs so was seen as a way for stars to collect more rake since skilled players will still find it hard to win and recreational players are attracted by the change of a big win (even if they will lose in the long run). Daniel defended them, which I don't have a big problem with - Stars obviously saw a market and went for it. It seems to have worked out for them too.
The next part is where it gets dicey. Daniel said there would be changes to the rewards system. Again, that's fine and up to stars even if it is also against what the poker community would like to see. The big problem though is the way they went about it. After publicising a promo that is worth hundreds of thousands to players that rake a certain amount in a year for 10/11 months of the year, the removed it without warning. Resulting in hundreds of players working their butts off for nothing. They could of easily waited until the end of the year, but they didn't. They intentionally ripped off poker players for hundreds of thousands each.
It was a huge scandal. Daniel did his best to defend Pokerstars. THIS is where most of the hate comes from towards him and was probably the real turning point for a lot of players deciding not to trust him.
Fast forward to today, and he is doing the same thing with rake. Whether he actually said "more rake is better" is besides the point, he is still defending that view and making recreational players actually think high rake could be a good idea.
Please do watch it, its quite entertaining and informative.
Of course I've watched it , still hasn't changed my mind ! I find Polk an odious troll and that's being polite , but quite understand why a lot of people on here would side with him .
Massive backtrack with the bolded bit , and it is important and on point .
Wonder how everyone taking the moral high ground on here against Negreanu and Stars in general will adopt their stance , when the inevitable happens and sky gets swallowed up /integrated into the machine that is stars ? Will they still play or take the moral high ground , my moneys on the former.
Why is it inevitable sky will get swallowed up by the stars machine? their main interest in sky was buying the betting and gaming. The poker side of things really has little impact on them.
Hopefully things are left how they are BUT if they migrate accounts those who played on stars also will continue to do so and those that dont will probably go to one of the many other smaller sites that run similar to sky. There is a certain site that is literally doing everything the opposite to stars and guess what.... it is getting bigger and bigger and bigger.... it was industry leader at one point and my first ever poker site I played on.
Not sure why you think people would play on stars that don't now - I think you fail to see how many options there actually are for players
Lets also be under no illusions that Doug polk has no interest in the sustainability of online poker , his raison d'etre is self serving publicity . Also read in an article that he said the whole " more rake is better " tshirt and billboard was just for lol's. He finished his little challenge , then said he has no real interest in poker .
Comments
(also should it not be matter rather than manner? - Please correct me if i'm wrong)
I'm appalled that you have sunken to these depths, correcting an entry...like my wife says
" You don't have to become as bad as the worst...'
Keep some standards, please
Yours in optimism
I am bothered about the whole super nova elite thing - I thought that was a genuine disgrace.
Im not bothered about the (Personally) about the rake on the turbo DYM's as I hardly play them, but I do believe thats whats fair is fair and the same rake level should be offered across all games.
I also believe poker was built on the dream of making it big and making money and the more the rake rise's the further away we move away from that dream.
This is not a personal attack on Daniel Negreanu or pokerstars and especially not sky I am just posting my honest beliefs
I think this is what the thread is meant to be about
“I have played a few SNGs on Sky Poker recently and have come to realise how painfully high the rake is on a lot of them, especially the turbo formats.
Standard practice for poker sites is to charge less rake for games that finish quickly (less use of the sites resources) and how beatable the game format is (so that some people can actually win/ keep games running). For example, It is standard to charge 10% rake for an normal speed MTT, but a lot of sites charge less for turbos or increased variance formats like bounty hunters.
SKY DONT DO THIS. THEY CHARGE 10% FOR EVERYTHING.
some examples:
888 MTT: normal speed (10 mins+) = 10%, turbo (6 mins) = 8.33%, super turbo (3mins) = 5%
888 SNG: hyper dym (2mins) = 4.5%, standard sng (8 mins) = 9%, hyper standard sng (2 mins) = 5.5%
Pokerstars MTT: normal speed (7mins, shallow increases) = 10%, turbo(5mins, shallow increases) = 10%, hyper (3 mins, shallow increases) = 5%
Pokerstars SNG: 50/50 (6 mins) = 5.6%, standard Turbo(5 mins) = 7.4%, standard hyper (2mins) = 4%
Its also important to note that of all the other sites I looked were either similar or better than pokerstars or 888. Party poker for example has excellent rake on almost all of its products. Bounty hunter tournaments all have 5% rake.
Its also important to note Pokerstars have been absolutely blasted in the poker industry by almost everyone for having high rake, but compared to sky's is great!
SKY charges 10% for Normal MTTs, Turbo MTTS, Normal SNG, DYM, Turbo SNG etc. A turbo DYM with 2 min blinds and 6 people, that is over in 15 minutes should definitely not have 10% rake. Its about DOUBLE anyone would charge and it makes the games very hard to beat, probably impossible if you have a hard table.
Im surprised no one has mentioned this before, and I think it needs to be urgently addressed.
How can sky justify such high, uncompetitive rake?”
I wonder if the popularity of Sky's DYM's would be effected if they were marketed more accurately as 1.82YM's?*
*I rounded up the actual figure of 1.818181818181818 for any of you pedants out there
So for a while now there has been a misconception that I think raising the rake in poker games is “good for poker.” I’ve never actually said that, but I understand where the confusion may come from because I was talking about some things (facts) that a lot of pros don’t want to hear, and like a game of broken telephone, my position has been distorted. I do not believe that raising the rake is good for poker. Rake increases take more money out of the game and benefit whoever is collecting the rake. That is my position on rake. Period. (Insert Sean Spicer jokes here)
He DID actually say that. Its on video. There is a link to a doug polk youtube video where he analyses everything that was said. DNEGs is blatantly lying here. That should should set alarms bells going for pretty much everything else that is said...
Now, let’s take a deeper look at how an increased rake affects players. I’m going to discuss a real world example from my early days as a professional poker player in Toronto. The casino I played at charges a $5 session fee every 30 minutes in a $10-$20 limit hold’em game, while the game across the street charged $10 a hand! Excluding tips, in the game I played in, $100 came off the table every hour. In the game across the street, they were taking $300 out of the game per hour!
So obviously I chose to play in the game with the lower rake as did many other pros I know because we didn’t really think we would be able to beat the rake across the street. What ended up happening was the game I played in consisted of eight pros and two recreational players, while the game across the street had no pros in it at all. The game with the higher rake was obviously juicier, but because the rake was so high it wasn’t really worth it for me and my other pro friends to play it. Our win rate was still better overall playing in the game with the lower rake.
So many problems with these 2 paragraphs! Most live venues charge on the high side for rake, it varies sure. But not by a factor of 3x. That's insane. Do games like this exist still? I doubt it, and If not, that's a warning sign already...
Everyone knows poker was easier in the past. I would say times have moved on since "his early days". We must be talking 20ish years ago. It's ridiculous to even try and compare games from them to ones today.
It is rare to even have one person on your table that doesn't really know what they are doing (above say £2 buy in, since we are talking about money that could mean something to people). This alone completely negates his argument.
We used to have this recreational player named Bhupan come play with us and while we did what we could to ensure he had fun at the table, he was so bad at poker that he got absolutely destroyed when he played with us. In our game, he was constantly playing in heads up or three way pots, while the game across the street routinely saw eight players limping in to see the flop and chasing all the way to the river.
When is the last time you saw this in a real money game ffs
Bhupan also played across the street, and while he lost there too, he didn’t get humiliated and crushed nearly as hard as he did when he was facing a table full of regs. He paid a lot more in rake across the street, but also lost less money. His hourly loss rate was better in the game with the higher rake because the competition he faced was more on his level.
So what your saying is the games are only beatable if you have a bunch of player that don't know what they are doing?
What about those who actually want to get better at the game?
What about the poker dream?... The poker boom came after we saw a recreational player out playing a seasoned pro (and had a cool name). Do you really think all these people started playing poker without the dream of making good money from it like money maker did? The dream needs to stay alive, or poker will die a slow and painful death.
So if you are reading this, ask yourself the following question and be honest: given the choice of these two options, which is a better game to choose if you are Bhupan? Sitting with the sharks, or paying the extra rake and facing off against weaker opponents? Be honest.
If all you aspire to be is bhupan, then fine, maybe you are better off in a game that makes it impossible to win. That way, you can lose all your money slowly to the casino rather than by playing a game of skill against your peers. If that's the case, then why not roulette, or bingo??
I know you don’t want to hear this but it just happens to be true. I get why you would scoff and get your pitchforks out when this point is illustrated and not want to believe it, but its true. For Bhupan and other players at his skill level, HIGHER RAKE WAS BETTER FOR THEM than paying a lower rake in a game against pros. Oh no! Did he just say that? How dare he! Turncoat! Shill! Ahhhhhhhh. Say what you will, but it is true.
congratulations Daniel, you have managed to think of a scenario where paying more rake is actually better. For one player who had no idea what he was doing 20 years ago...
I understand why me saying this would lead people to believe that I think raising the rake is good for poker. I get it, I really do, but it is not the same thing. I do not think raising the rake is good for poker. No rake is “good for poker.” But you need to understand that a game full of pros is far worse for the game than a high rake. To the extreme, if a game is nine close to equally skilled pros and no weak link, guess what happens to the game? POOF. It doesn’t exist. They won’t play.
Actually agree somewhat. Games full of pro's are not good. I promise you, a bunch of pro players are not going to swarm the site if sky suddenly make their rake more competitive. Especially not in £5 and under games, because that's not what they play.
Now, if you are the guy running the poker game its in your best interest that your players/customers don’t go broke. They go broke, you have no games, you have no rake. If you are the guy running the game, the number one cause of players going broke is WINNING PLAYERS. Professionals who bust weaker players. When the weaker players go broke, the winning players don’t play each other, then you are left with no game, and no rake. The primary cause of a losing player losing is WINNING PLAYERS. The secondary cause, usually by a wide margin, is RAKE.
I mean, im not saying it isn't true... but any evidence other than your word, because I'm not all up on that at the moment to be honest Daniel!
So you are saying the solution is to increase rake to the point that there can be no more winning players anymore? Maybe that does mean a truly clueless recreational player does lose slowly. But really, who want to play in a game no one can win at?!
If you think about it, nothing I’m saying here should be all that controversial. It’s common sense, but obviously pros don’t want to hear it. For the professional poker community, RAKE is enemy #1, but for recreational players, what busts them is the better players they are facing. If the balance in an ecosystem swings too far in the direction of a pro dominated poker game, the ecosystem as a whole suffers. I don’t think raising the rake is the solution to fixing the ecosystem, but I do think reducing or eliminating reward bonuses to high volume winning players is a no-brainer.
Oh good, your not saying that... so what is the point of your article? It just seems to me like you are trying to mislead people on what was actually said, whilst saying "I didn't say it, but if you had of said it, it would be ok. But I didn't say it, pretend I said this instead")
In closing, NO I do not think higher rake is good for poker, but YES, I do think it makes sense to give the majority of the bonuses or rewards to recreational players.
I agree that promotions should be aimed at recreational players. It makes sense to encourage new players to play.
I also think that MOST of them strive to become winning players one day, and without that goal/dream, they wouldn't play. Plenty of people have already said that in this thread, although I do accept there are a few of you that play purely for fun.
would you agree that there are stakes where this no longer is the case for the vast majority though? for example, I could imagine most of the 50p DYM players don't really care if they win or lose, but when you get to £10 level id imagine that to be the opposite.
Surely they should just be in the regular tab... you have normal speed and turbo speed ones in there but not hyper?
Also....YES! How can you have a standard sng, with 2 minute blinds and charge 5% rake (which by the way is still really high for a hyper), then charge DOUBLE for a sng with the same structure and a lower possible winrate...madness.
If I had my way, it would be 3% hyper (2 mins), 5% turbo (5 mins), 8% standard (7 mins+) for SNGs. That seems reasonable to me.
I would change the names so they match the structure speed (so turbo dyms would become hyper dyms for example)
SNG's use less resources than a standard MTT, its also not possible to have as high a winrate (more players and steeper the pay structure, the higher winrate is possible). so in my opinion they should all have less rake than standard MTTs. Turbo/ hyper MTTs should be raked less, and once the buy in is above £100, it should be rakes less. (sky does £220 vs everyone elses $215 for example)
I would be willing to bet that normal SNGs will actually run at this level, and DYMS will see a big traffic increase, but gradually.
When rake is high and you make a promo aimed at regs (rake race), they will play for a bit, then the top contenders will just make a deal. Its far more + ev than actually playing when rake makes it almost impossible to win at the best of times, never mind when the games are more reggy than normal due to the promotion
For a number of years, Daniel Negreanu has been berated by the poker community for defending PokerStars´ changes to its rake structure and rewards program. Now Negreanu has published a blog giving a fuller explanation of why more rake could be better for the long-term future of the game.
Daniel Negreanu never said the words “more rake is better”. The alleged quote was taken from a YouTube interview Negreanu gave in 2016, in which he explained why PokerStars reversed a rake reduction at lower stakes in order to prevent pros dropping down several levels of buy-in and destroying the ecosystem. Unfortunately, poor PR won the day and the alleged quote has stuck ever since.
What Negreanu actually said was that high levels of rake keeps pros away from low stakes games because the games become unbeatable. He went on to explain that, although a high level of rake is not a good thing for recreational players, recreational players´ funds last longer when pros keep away. Consequently, recreational players have a better experience than if they had lost their bankrolls (to pro players) in one session and are more likely to redeposit and keep the poker ecosystem growing.
https://www.pokernewsreport.com/negreanu-fires-back-at-more-rake-is-better-critics-22647
I wanted to respond the the original post but didn't for two reasons;
>The post seemed to be 'controversial for controversy's sake so wasn't going to waste the effort- see Adrian Durham reference and more importantly
>I couldn't have articulated it appropriately so didn't want to blur the issues you raised and get yet more contentious posts, again just for controversy
Thanks- you could say the chickens have come home to roost??
His points are massively lopsided only focusing on the two extremes.
Great posts once again by melt
All he does is try and spin pokerstars changes in a positive light, even if pretty much everyone else in the poker world disagrees with him.
But guess who the new players listen to? Obviously the most famous poker player in the world instead of a bunch of nobodies on a forum they have never seen.
I read the article you linked, and my these are my thoughts:
I don't know a huge amount about the spins introduction. I know the community was against it and poker stars went ahead with it. It is a game with much less skill than standard sngs so was seen as a way for stars to collect more rake since skilled players will still find it hard to win and recreational players are attracted by the change of a big win (even if they will lose in the long run). Daniel defended them, which I don't have a big problem with - Stars obviously saw a market and went for it. It seems to have worked out for them too.
The next part is where it gets dicey. Daniel said there would be changes to the rewards system. Again, that's fine and up to stars even if it is also against what the poker community would like to see. The big problem though is the way they went about it. After publicising a promo that is worth hundreds of thousands to players that rake a certain amount in a year for 10/11 months of the year, the removed it without warning. Resulting in hundreds of players working their butts off for nothing. They could of easily waited until the end of the year, but they didn't. They intentionally ripped off poker players for hundreds of thousands each.
It was a huge scandal. Daniel did his best to defend Pokerstars. THIS is where most of the hate comes from towards him and was probably the real turning point for a lot of players deciding not to trust him.
Fast forward to today, and he is doing the same thing with rake. Whether he actually said "more rake is better" is besides the point, he is still defending that view and making recreational players actually think high rake could be a good idea.
Here is a link again to the doug polk video.
Please do watch it, its quite entertaining and informative.
I find Polk an odious troll and that's being polite , but quite understand why a lot of people on here would side with him .
Massive backtrack with the bolded bit , and it is important and on point .
Wonder how everyone taking the moral high ground on here against Negreanu and Stars in general will adopt their stance , when the inevitable happens and sky gets swallowed up /integrated into the machine that is stars ? Will they still play or take the moral high ground , my moneys on the former.
Hopefully things are left how they are BUT if they migrate accounts those who played on stars also will continue to do so and those that dont will probably go to one of the many other smaller sites that run similar to sky. There is a certain site that is literally doing everything the opposite to stars and guess what.... it is getting bigger and bigger and bigger.... it was industry leader at one point and my first ever poker site I played on.
Not sure why you think people would play on stars that don't now - I think you fail to see how many options there actually are for players
Unibet seems like it would benefit a lot from what I have heard.
He finished his little challenge , then said he has no real interest in poker .