Lets say I earn a living playing Tiger Woods gollf 2006 on the PC (tournaments do exist!)

I do not expect to enter the PGA tour (as an amatuer i might add lol) and get past the first round of qualiying. Why? Because I cannot even hit the ball.

Extreme... I know

Also irrelevant, golf on a computer is a fundamentally different game to golf. Poker on a computer is fundamentally the same - as evidenced by the completely virtual poker tables now available which combine both.

If you earn an income (rather than a bit of spare cash) from poker then you're a professional poker player.

Internet players may not be in the same league when it comes to a live tournament as they are online but as most recreational players will come into poker from playing online then take the same amount away from their skill and the differential still remains. And would you seriously consider it being amended to an amateur (unless you earn your money online) tournament?

A professional online player, a professional tournament player, a professional cash player - they're still all professionals and not amateurs.

In a pot where I had the nutflush draw after the flop and the bet was soo small I got 8-1 on value.
After the turn makes my flush and the guy (original raiser) goes all in and gets 2 callers + me.

how the hell can you call with a flush draw?...you are the biggest fish I have ever played with!


Man I love cash games online.

In a similar situation - but in a tournament - the player I knocked out didn't bother with technically misguided criticism, he just put, "I hope you die in a car crash".

Some people take their $5 MTT's way too seriously!

Playing against better players may bring out the best in an amateur though.  It will also give them a lot more respect from other players  if they have beaten a stronger field...

There's a time and a place for this. An amateur tour isn't either.

I'd love to play against pros too, don't get me wrong, but if I'm entering competitions to try and win a seat to bigger events and it's aimed at amateurs I'm going to be a bit miffed if it's full of people that are just there to make easy money.  Happy to face the pros in the next level up, or even just one or two in this level but I think it would take the fun out after a while if you know that you stand a less than average chance of winning.

 

This does suggest that maybe Doubleups definition incorporating tournament winnings might be the way to go.

If you've won less than a certain amount in the last 12 months before the registration of the first tournament you can enter all the tournaments for the following season (this would stop anybody finding themselves in the position of being unable to enter halfway through the season just because they've won some cash in a tournament).

doesn't adopting an entry criteria based on any of the following

- career winnings over $xk
- last year winnings over -$xk
- if you are in say top 200 of Euro rankings

risk penalising the successful amateur who might have a full time job and yet have hit any of these crtieria


Do you not prefer merely excluding those who are sponsored pros?

What other ways are there to define entry away from the very grey area of "who is a pro?"

If you only include the 12 months prior to the first tournament this will penalise a successful amateur - but only for a year. If they are winning over this amount on a regular basis I'd say they'd have to be classified as a semi-pro at least. And if you did have such a successful year wouldn't you want to build on it by entering more professional tournaments the following year? This may seem odd being able to skip between being a pro and an amateur but I think it leaves a workable solution to the problem and I totally agree now that this should be the way to go.

Barring sponsored players may also have the benefit of clarity but the reason I started mentioning anything about the pro/am debate at all is because the consensus seemed to be heading towards allowing anybody who isn't sponsored - this is an awful lot of people. A large proportion of professionals and I would expect nearly all semi-professional players aren't sponsored. The pros are using their winnings and cash games to enter and the semi-pros their main job. These are precisely the people who I would worry about coming to dominate the tour and who would put off the true amateurs from participating.

This does suggest that maybe Doubleups definition incorporating tournament winnings might be the way to go.

If you've won less than a certain amount in the last 12 months before the registration of the first tournament you can enter all the tournaments for the following season (this would stop anybody finding themselves in the position of being unable to enter halfway through the season just because they've won some cash in a tournament).

Frankly, I think the only way to resolve the pro/amateur debate is by setting some sort of list of exclusions i.e. if you have won £x in a tournament in more than x occassions you are excluded or a money won limit. 

....

I don't think that these tournaments are aimed at me, so the criteria should exclude me.  Players could be excluded by winning a certain amount (gross) over the last year - my suggested figure is €25000. 

This is transparent and clear and anyone entering who has won more than this knows they are cheating.

I don't think a specific amount needs to be set, although it would at least provide a concrete definition. If people can't work out for themselves whether they count as amateur or not they can contact APAT before tournament registration. And if a complaint is made about a player who has entered being a professional I would expect it to be investigated (tax returns wouldn't be necessary as live tournament winnings, and to a lesser extent online winnings are available in the public domain) and then for APAT to use the powers available to them to clear someone or expel them.

I commend you on your commonsense and I would hope that the majority of those players who know that this tour isn't aimed at them (however much value - economic or social - it represents) would have the appropriate judgement to not enter. I don't expect 100% of players in this category to do this, but as long as they are in the minority these tours should still be a big pull for the recreational/hobby/amateur player.

Does anyone know how other sports who have in the past had to make this distinction have managed it? The only definitions I've come across in the past is that you're a professional if you earn all your money from the sport (including sponsorship), and you're a semi-pro if you earn a significant portion of your income from the sport (still depends on the definition of significant) - I would expect both of these groups to be excluded as not being amateur.

I don't like/play rebuys either

Like I said this can only work if it is self policing, and the level this is done will only be able to be measured after the first year or so.

But if the winners of some/all the first year's events are shown to be players who have earnt several thousands playing poker (Hendon Mob Player database for live, Tournament Reporter website and others for online), then this tour is not going to represent value for the recreational, amatuer player - and the semi-professional/professional-in-all-but-name players will be the only ones entering the tour for subsequent years - this will certainly be contrary to APAT's stated aims.

Why is there any problem with pros playing at all?

Is it to do with the added prizes or lack of space?

It seems most of the amateurs on here would love them to attend the blonde bash so they can play against them? ...

The whole argument of who can enter seems to have missed what I would consider the vital point.

The Pros might want to enter it for the social aspect which is fair enough, but just because they're not entering because of the 'easy money', it won't make them worse players. If the more experienced and skilfull semi-professional type of players enter, it's more likely they will win and less likely that a proper full time, recreational amateur player (say for example, me) will win instead.

Although I would quite like to play against some named players live some time (even online playing against some pros on Full Tilt has been quite cool) I would also like to win - or at least cash - or at least get some points. All of these are less likely the higher the bar is set for who is allowed to play.

If these events end up being dominated by players who already earn £000's a year playing poker then I won't even consider staying with it for a second year. The benefit this tour offers over those weekly games is the added money, the title etc - if I have no chance of winning these I might as well stick to online or, if live, the weekly poker tournaments in casinos.

As I mentioned several pages ago, it should come down to common sense - if somebody asks you what you do, and your natural response is, "I'm a poker player", then you're a professional and shouldn't play. Although the APAT's rules do allow for expulsion, this can only really work by self policing and can only really work if it is left to the amateurs to slug it out.

Is the tournament registration going to be through the Paypal system like the joing up registration was? This was easy - I wouldn't mind this.

[Amateur]

I am a professional player and I can see lots of reasons why I would like to play in this type of event, why do you want to exclude me?

No one has tried to answer this question.

Well obviously you want to enter - lots of recreational players you'd have a better chance of beating for a value added prize pool - doesn't this answer your question?

And isn't the word Amateur a clue in the organisation name?

Is that wrong? Am i a poker snob? Probably, but unless I missed something am I right in thinking that for a lot of people on this forum this apat is not aimed at them?

The association is aimed at all amateurs. As such apat is aimed fair and square at many blondeites.

As to the Live comps, they are designed to deliver "festival" levels of return for a lower buy in, and as such suit those on a more limited bankroll. Again, that seems to me to suit many blondeites

But, as Acidmouse pointed out, £75 is still a fair whack for many a recreational player.   If, as someone else suggested, most festivals start at £100 rebuy, are there really that many more people that can comfortably afford a £75 freeze than can't stretch to a £100 rebuy?  I'm not trying to stir anything up here, it just seems that the target membership might be fairly limited.

This is the main event though.

Before I saw this I was looking at playing in a big tournament and the cheapest main event I could find for 2005 was £300. This would be a stretch for me, but next year I might manage it.

But I'm not going to bother spending £300-£400 on a £100 rebuy side event when I might just be outspent by other people anyway.