A Partial Information Game of Divided Attention

I’ve been spending a little bit of time off and on over the last couple of days watching Jason Somerville’s live streaming from the Aussie Millions over on his Twitch channel. Was up late last night doing other work, and so since the live stuff essentially happens overnight for those of us on Eastern time (and 16 hours behind Melbourne), it provided me a chance to keep the stream on as background.

Because I wasn’t wholly focused on watching the action, I was often just relying on Somerville’s (invariably good) commentary on hands, occasionally clicking on that tab to look up from my work and watch whenever it sounded like something interesting was going on. After a while I realized my own method was kind of emulating that of the players themselves who were playing at the feature table there on Day 2 of the Aussie Millions Main Event.

If you’ve watched any of the streaming, you know to what I’m referring. The action was on a half-hour delay, necessitated by the fact that the the hole cards were being shown. That meant most of those around the table were often looking at their phones at Somerville’s stream, taking advantage of the fact that they could learn more about how their opponents were playing by seeing their hole cards from earlier hands.

In other words, just like my own attention on the action was divided, so, too, was the attention of the players only partly on what was happening at that moment and otherwise focused on what went down a half-hour before, as revealed by the stream.

Somerville’s commentary was also sometimes incorporating the players’ discovery of each other’s hole cards from earlier hands. “It looks like Jeff Gross just found out he successively avoided Julius Colman’s set right before the break,” Somerville once noted as a new hand was being dealt, and when I looked up I saw Gross looking down at his phone while chatting with Colman about the hand.

Indeed, a half-hour before Gross had folded ace-queen following a 10-J-4 flop after Colman had bet (see the pic above), saying as he did he suspected Colman had pocket jacks. Now, watching the stream (see at left), Gross was discovering Colman indeed had a set, though with pocket tens.

I got to thinking about how it is a bit of work for the players to catch those moments on the stream, and of course if they’re involved in a new hand that distracts them further from following the action from a half-hour before. Also, it was clear that while most of the players at the table were checking their phones, not everyone was, and so that added another variable when it came to the information-gathering.

Would probably be best just to have the stream running on a screen near the table, much like the tournament clock. Not saying it’s a must (nor wanting to reengage the same old arguments about fairness and televised/streamed poker), although perhaps for final tables -- like, say, at the WSOP Main Event -- it should be considered.

Some tournament should try it, at least, just as an experiment. I’m sure it would get some attention, anyway. Or at least whatever attention most of us had left to give it while we were doing other things.

Images: twitch.tv/jcarverpoker.

Travel Report: WPT Alpha8 Florida, Day 2 -- Florida Finale

The second and last day of the $100,000 buy-in World Poker Tour Alpha8 Florida event played out in relatively rapid fashion, with play starting a little after noon yesterday and wrapping up around 11 p.m. or thereabouts. Steven Silverman ended up winning the sucker, outlasting current WSOP Main Event chip leader J.C. Tran to take the title after a brief heads-up battle.

That up above is a shot Joe Giron took yesterday for the WPT from up in the bleachers looking down on the playing area I was describing before. Kind of an uncanny-looking scene from that vantage point.

Josh and I arrived and set up late morning, then mostly were behind the laptops entering hands, our day broken up a couple of times by breaks. One came early on after Bill Perkins busted in ninth, at which point the crew took some time setting up to shoot the official eight-handed final table. Then another short dinner break came later after start-of-day leader Matt Glantz busted in fourth for a “min-cash” of $243,180.

During that first break Josh and I took a walk around the Seminole Hard Rock property, taking a look at the modest water fountain show play out (kind of a mini-version of the Bellagio’s) while noting the small lizards positioned in the greenery around the water’s perimeter. With temps in the 80s it’s definitely a pleasant time to be in south Florida, and I can imagine a trip to the Seminole might offer a lot to entertain visitors with its sights, shopping, shows, and of course, the casino.

Following that second break for dinner Jeff Gross went out in third for a $364,770 cash. Silverman led Tran slightly to start heads-up play, and Tran even grabbed an early lead before Silverman earned a big double-up and then finished off Tran shortly thereafter. Tran took away $526,890 while “Zugwat” won $891,660. (Hell of a year playing out for Tran, eh?)

Silverman also won a huge trophy shaped as the number “8” -- not sure what it is made of, but it looks silver, man.

None of the four cashers had re-entered the event, and none of the three players who bought in twice cashed. Isaac Haxton was one of those who’d fired twice, and he unfortunately finished fifth after leading with five to go then experiencing some misfortune to fall on the bubble.

As I was saying earlier in the week, more Alpha8 events are certainly in the works, so it’ll be curious to see how this “super high roller” tour fares and whether it ultimately manages to attract the participation of those who regularly play the six-figure events elsewhere during the year.

After all was done and the final interviews were shot, the whole “WPT family” assembled around the table for a final group picture and before too long we were packing up and heading back to the hotel. Got a reasonable night’s sleep, then this morning was able to meet an old student of mine who lives in the area and had contacted me not long ago. Kind of a highlight of the trip to reunite and catch up with him.

Overall it was a fun few days and I got a kick out of getting to know some of the WPT folks and seeing how a yet another group -- an especially well-seasoned and talented one in this case -- puts on and covers a poker tourney.

Looking forward now to getting home and resting up today and tomorrow before flying to Spain on Friday where I’ll again see a lot of the players and other media folks who were here in Florida this week. I guess this was sort of an end-of-summer bash for a lot of folks, with “school” (or the regular curriculum) about to be back in session starting with the always popular EPT Barcelona stop.

Then again, to paraphrase that Emerson, Lake and Palmer quote on the wall at the Seminole Hard Rock, the traveling circus that is the professional poker tourney circuit is kind of the show that never ends.