Sleep With the Fishes, Dine on the Whales

So my buddy, Eric, who used to blog on www.gulfcoastpoker.net has (for the most part) traded the poker circuit for the film festival circuit.  He graciously reviewed Mississippi Grind for us after seeing it at Sundance.  It's one thing for somebody outside "the life" to review a movie about poker and gambling and it's another thing entirely for somebody from within to give their opinion.  Here's his review of the movie that hits close to home for a lot us. MISSISSIPPI GRIND movie review by Eric Johnson Ben Mendelsohn and Ryan Reynolds give stellar performances as gamblers on a road trip down the Mississippi. Some guys just can’t stop. It’s in their DNA. Faced with even less-than-mediocre prospects against the option to stand pat in a good spot, the gamble gets the best of them. It’s the action that separates them from the squares and in Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck’s MISSISSIPPI GRIND , it’s what separates Ben Mendelsohn from a stable life. Ultimately, it’

Once you get competent at poker, it taints your perception of sports to some degree.  As you grow as a poker player dealing with the element of chance you learn to not be results oriented.   You focus on making the right play-- the one that is most profitable, most often. The individual result of the play to some degree is irrelevant.  This kind of thinking doesn't translate to talking heads and/or evaluations of sports figures.   Instead we have to suffer knee jerk reactions, overreactions, and hyperbole.  One play goes different and the majority of people have completely different world-views. Here's an example, last night a Patriot defender made a great play to intercept the ball and here's what the talking points are: 1.  Tom Brady is the greatest quarterback ever. 2.  Tom Brady can play into his 40s 3.  The Patriots are one of the all time great dynasties 4.  Bill Belichek (autocorrect wanted to fix Blichek to bellyache, kind of funny cause he al