The concept of a shot clock in poker, in which a person would have only a limited amount of time to act, has taken off recently. The World Poker Tour, for example, surveyed its clientele, who voted 80-20 in favorof implementing a maximum amount of time to act. That spurred World Series of Poker officials to comment that we might see a shot clock on the Circuit this year.

PartyPokerpro Marvin Rettenmaier (pictured) critiqued the concept in a blog post, saying that 30 seconds, the rumored length for a single decision, was simply not enough time to act. “For instance, at the Aussie Millions, I played a hand against Tom Dwan where I raised, he three-bet, and the dealer then took 20 seconds to count out the chips after he three-bet,” the PartyPoker pro said. “It would then give away the strength of my hand if I have to decide within a few seconds what I want to do.”

Members of our industry like Court Harringtonhave repeatedly said that creating an environment that’s warm and welcoming to amateurs will help build poker going forward. According to Rettenmaier, “newcomers are already scared when they have to play in a live setting for the first time” and, with additional restrictions on time, amateurs could be even more intimidated.

Rettenmaier offered two alternatives to a shot clock, saying, “Perhaps the real shift needs to be that it becomes more acceptable to call the clock earlier on opponents… An alternative would be an individual time bank as they have it in chess or online poker, but it still makes playing a poker tournament less attractive to an amateur.” The latter could also prove to be difficult to implement.

If four-fifths of the WPT’s clientele are in favor of a shot clock, then would the tour be unwise to implement it? “A huge majority voted in favor of the shot clock,” Rettenmaier argued, “but I don’t think players have really thought this through and are just thinking, ‘Yes, playing faster is awesome, let’s play more hands,’ but forget the greater spectrum and that it’s basically impossible to implement.”

What do you think? We’ve had PocketFivers come in on both sides of the fence of the shot clock debate. In a recent interview with our site, Michael Mizrachi said a shot clock would be advantageous to pros more so than amateurs. Where do you stand? Let us know by commenting below.

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