One thing that I’ve been noticing a lot in the online poker world is some questionable signings. And what I mean by this is people who don’t necessarily show all of the merits that a typical signed player should.
The prime suspect in this discussion is Bodog Poker, which has dumped all of its male pros like David Williams and Josh Arieh in favor of an all-female contingent of Amanda Musumeci, Tatjana Pasalic and Evelyn Ng. Now I do have to say that Ng has been with the company for a while, having cashed for a respectable $377,191. However, not a whole lot of people get signed to a major poker room with $377k in winnings, and the sultry Asian went nearly two years between 2008 and 2010 without any cash at all.
Of course, this is better than Musumeci, who has zero live cashes. Fortunately, there is some merit with signing the Pennsylvania native since she has over $770k in online tournament cashes. But once again, your average, chubby male grinder doesn’t get signed by a site like Bodog with $770k in online cashes. No, they’d have to be an attractive younger woman to swing this deal.
Last up on this list is Tatjana Pasalic, who has virtually no poker experience away from her reporting and presenting duties. Pasalic has less than $6,000 in live cashes, which doesn’t really qualify as much more than a good poker TV host. Even fellow hostess Kara Scott has a nice playing career with $561,603 in live cashes.
Now all of this isn’t to say that Bodog and other rooms shouldn’t be signing attractive female players because it not only appeals to red-blooded males, but also encourages other women to get into poker. But trying to turn your stable of pros into a swimsuit calendar isn’t exactly the most respectable thing to do.