Recently, poker has been recognized as a mental sport, and we see influencers and chess players start to participate more and more in the game. There are also a large number of recreational poker players who mostly enjoy playing poker tournaments, as there is a ranking similar to a sport and life-changing money for those who finish on top and become champions.
But the question that comes to mind is, what is the path to becoming a good poker player? If we compare it to other sports like soccer or chess, there is a whole science and “how to” that is suggested for young kids who start their path in traditional sports or games. In those disciplines, there’s a tried-and-true development system in place, one that begins early, fosters talent in structured environments, and emphasizes long-term growth.
Lack of Structure
For example, it is known that it is best for kids to start at the age when they start going to school, so 6 or 7. Then, their development is followed and monitored while they are enjoying and having fun, while also socializing and making friends with other kids. Coaches and parents are trying to teach kids healthy lifestyles and working habits, and the kids start to develop competitiveness and gain a sense of progress through work.
- Read more: Process of Modern Poker Study
But if we look at poker, there is no system or path, and for most players, it is a lone game and self learning project where everyone is forced to improvise and figure it out by trial and error. Yes, there are guidelines, poker coaching sites, solvers, and other tools, but the path is much more “foggy” than the one in sports. The main problem is that poker is allowed to be played only by people who are 18 or older, and it is still a taboo subject to the average person.
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Undeveloped Potential
This also brings the question of whether we really had any masters of poker ever? It is a scientific fact that brain neuroplasticity is most significantly developed in childhood, which means that the progress in the formation of many neural connections could take us half a decade in adulthood compared to months in childhood. Some kids can start learning the basics of chess as early as 4 or 5, and one of the best chess players ever, Magnus Carlsen, was five years old when he first learned how to play chess from his father. He participated in his first tournament at the age of eight.
This is the 10 to 13-year gap before poker players start learning the game. It is also possibly harder to solve or figure out than chess, as it has more variables and less information available to players.
The one that comes to mind is Phil Ivey, as he has said many times that he started playing poker as a child with his grandpa, who introduced him to poker. Ivey’s mother has also spoken about her son’s poker talents potentially being inherited from his uncle, who was a gambler.
Everybody who followed poker during its golden era before solvers, when improvisation and creativity were the main skills, knew that Phil Ivey was different from other players. He was seen by his closest competitors as the absolute number one poker player in the world. But as he got older and solvers started to become more popular, Ivey started to lose the edge and fade away from the toughest games.
First Poker Grandmasters Are Just Being Born
Suppose we consider chess players like Gary Kasparov who is a top level chess grand master and can probably beat 99.9 percent of chess players in the world at age of 62, while in poker we have players like Phil Hellmuth, Daniel Negreanu, etc.. who most likely can’t compete with an average NL50 online regular (on a sample larger than one heads-up Sit and Go tournament). In that case, we can say there are no true high-level grand master players in the world, and that once we see a player who will start learning poker at an early age, with the implementation of a solver in maybe his teens, we will see the first true grand master in poker.
Once this happens, everything might change for poker, as others will be following the same path, and high-stakes poker will be reserved exclusively for elite minds who started very early and followed the plan for two decades. This might also lead to lowering the rake in poker, as edges will be thinner, online poker operators will reject action from top-tier players like casinos, and there will be a rise in VR poker with a face recognition system.
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