2009 Aussie Millions: A Poker Media Tale
There is a "Shout Box" on the PokerNews live reporting page (click here for an example). It allows the readers of tournament coverage to interact with each other and with the writers. It also is frequently the bane of the writers' existence.
Time and again crotchety readers get in the Shout Box and demand to know why we haven't updated their friend, Random JoeDonkey. Of course, we have no idea what Random JoeDonkey looks like. He or she could be anywhere in the field -- we don't always have a starting table list and even when we do, well, tables break. Never mind staffing issues. But the Shout Box readers want to know why we can't march down to his or her table and get a count and a few hands' worth of action. It is irritating to say the least.
Last night, as we were wrapping up Day 1c of the 2009 Aussie Million Main Event, a slew of people invaded the Shout Box asking for information on a friend of theirs named David Docherty. There were enough people pitching enough of a fit that when I had a few minutes I went off in search of him in order to placate them. I found Docherty with a stack of 12,000. That was fairly short for the last level of the night. When our field reporter asked if he should follow Docherty, I told him not to worry about it. But I did throw Docherty in the counts page and gave his count to the Shout Box. They seemed happy with that.
Docherty started Day 2 with 10,950 chips. Limits were 400 and 800. His fans were back in the Shout Box, asking for updates. I fully expected him to bust early but figured, "What the heck. We'll keep an eye on him." Improbably, the kid started building a stack. 39,000; 46,000; 59,000; 142,000; 148,000; 155,000 chips. His chip count kept going up.
About eight hours into the day Docherty sent the 2008 WSOP Main Event runner-up, Ivan Demidov, to the rail. In the process his stack moved into the top fifteen in the room. I knew that the news would elate his cadre of supporters (by that point his "mum" was following along) and therefore spent a few extra minutes writing the hand and asking the reporter for as much detail as he could remember. It wasn't just "another hand" to be reported at that point. It was a hand that was going to mean an awful lot to a small group of people following along half a world away.
The reaction of the Shout Box was beyond anything I could have predicted. They were over the moon. And I don't know, call me a softie, but it gave me a real sense of pleasure and accomplishment to know that I was the conduit for the elation those people felt. They were pulling for their boy as much as they could and had no way of knowing what he was going in the Crown Poker Room beyond what I was writing.
Docherty started the day in the bottom tenth of the counts. Out of 320 runners, only 22 had smaller stacks than he did. He finished the day in the top five, having amassed 362,000 chips. We don't have the official list of survivors yet but I don't think that any of the stacks that were shorter than his are still in the field. That's a helluva day.
There is no doubt at all that his supporters will be back in the Shout Box tomorrow, rooting for him to make the money and position himself for a deep run. I'll be at my keyboard bringing them the action, and I have to admit -- I'll probably be rooting for him too.