Thanks for the thoughtful question and kind words about our work with
@Mister_Keating
I've thought deeply about live tour events - especially massive ones like today's Main Event. The unpredictability and scale create fundamental storytelling challenges that didn't exist in 2003. I experienced this firsthand during a separate project we're working on.
I think there's a middle path between attempting to cover everything (which inevitably leads to diluted storytelling) and the highly produced retrospective approach we take with Keating.
The key may be focusing resources on fewer storylines but going deeper. The WSOP currently tries to be both comprehensive (covering all tables) and compelling (focusing on personalities), but ends up succeeding at neither.
What if instead of spreading thin, they identified 10-15 compelling characters early and dedicated resources to following their complete journeys - not just at the table, but in between play, their preparations, saying goodnight to their kids 1000's of miles away after making it through day 1? I call this the American Idol approach. Early on, they identify compelling characters, give them exponentially more screen time, and provide backstory that gives us reasons to root for them.
This would mean accepting that some eventual final tablists might get minimal coverage, but the tradeoff would be much richer storytelling. As those initial characters dwindle, you'd have roving producers scouting for interesting newcomers to refresh the roster.
Case in point:
@Liv_Boeree showed up for her first major tournament in years at WSOP Paradise. She wasn't on anyone's initial radar compared to regulars firing $25ks, but quickly became the story of the Super Main. Same with
@CMONEYMAKER in that event.
Another detail: 3 tables cycled for change is too small for feature tables. Even 3 more would double our chances of capturing interesting characters. Cycling 6 tables every break would give 216 players elevated coverage per day - that's meaningful.
There's also an argument that as quality cameras continue to come down in price, a third level of coverage could allow more tables to be captured in a Big Brother livestream style. As interesting personalities are discovered, they could graduate from C-tier coverage to B, and so on.
The current system primarily serves hardcore fans while falling short for general audiences. Moneymaker's original run involved tremendous narrative luck we can't count on happening organically every year.
I'd love to see a bold experiment: dedicate 30% of the WSOP broadcast budget to completely different coverage focusing on a limited player pool, with dedicated crews following them from Day 1. Their stories would likely be more compelling than what we currently produce.
Modern casual fans might struggle to name the past 5 World Champions, but they remember "the guy who bemoaned being called with jack high."
Creating a tiered system for production investment should be based 80% on character/story and 20% on skill. While poker needs to be treated like sport, the most apt comparison isn't football but WWE - where matches are secondary to storylines.
I also think the added expense of trying this should come from the same budget used to pay for marketing and creation of new features from the online sites that foot a lot of our bills. Because if we don't do this...then the audience simply won't grow. But if it works...then that growth pays for this added expense without issue. It's a classic chicken and the egg situation...except we never tried cooking the chicken, or the egg