My friend Kevin Brackett sent me a story about a guy who won a small poker tournament at the Seminole Hard Rock casino in Florida. Why am I writing about it? Because he won a ladies tournament.
Florida bars poker rooms from keeping men out of events for women, and this 70-year-old guy exploited the law. He busted out twice before buying in for a third time and outlasting the other 80 entrants to take the $5,555 first prize.
There’s a word we poker players use to describe guys like this: asshole.
The reason ladies events exist is because not enough women feel comfortable surrounded by men at a poker table. I have written about this sad fact many times in the last 20 years. In the Main Event of the World Series Of Poker, a mere 2-3% of the field is female, and because the numbers are so small, none has made the final table in this century. I do see more women in poker rooms in Las Vegas, but it’s rarely more than one or two in a game.
The actions of this putz will only give many women even more reason to stay away. Of course, when verbally challenged by some of his opponents, the putz responded by saying he “could pretend to identify as a woman because they allow anything these days.”
Too bad he couldn’t identify as a person with class.