In an ESPN.com chat the day before the Main Event, PPV commentator Ali Nejad said the following in response to a question about online pro Hevad “Rain” Khan:

“He definitely is way over the top with respect to table etiquette…and not in the Hellmuth sort of way. My feeling is that he isn’t pandering to the camera but genuinely passionate and emotional. That said, there has to be a limit to what the tournament directors will put up with. I’d heard that many of the younger players were also being disrespectful during the series, saying things like “ship it” after winning pots. It is really important that in a competitive endeavor like poker that for so long was viewed as attractive only to shady and questionable characters we maintain a semblance of protocol and respect. Do your part!”

I think, overall, I agree with Nejad…but there’s several key points to make:

1) Nejad implying that Phil Hellmuth denigration and embarassment of other players at the table is somehow MORE acceptable than Nejad’s high-volume exuberance is just wrong. Words cannot express how much I disagree with that sentiment. There is NO greater sin we can make, as a poker community, than to allow hurtful and disrespectful speech. If a terrible player with a lot of money decides not to play another big buy-in event because Phil Hellmuth ragged on them for six hours, it wasn’t fun for them, so they’re taking their disposable income somewhere else…that’s an atrocity.

2) Many of the players that we hold near and dear were also some of the most abusive…Johnny Moss, John Bonetti, Stu Ungar, Puggy Pearson and many others are famous for crucifying dealers, floormen, other players. Stu Ungar was almost unable to repeat as champion in 1981 when Benny Binion kicked him out of the Horseshoe for spitting in a dealer’s face. It took a great deal of persuasion from Jack Binion, convincing his father’s of the PR fiasco if Ungar couldn’t defend, to get Stuey back in the building. So I find it really interesting that it takes an online player to get people considering a wholesale change in table talk…prejudice?

3) Any changes have to come from within the tournament directors’ ranks. Drafting fair legislation to balance out the psychology of table talk v. what should be intolerable is important, and should be a #1 priority of a group like Jesse Jones’ WPA.

4) The online world is going to have to make some adjustments when it comes to the world of live poker. I understand that the socially maladjusted or downright weird are drawn to the online universe, and many of them have the focus and drive to succeed at poker. It takes a special gift to play 24+ tables at a time. But you’re killing your action if you’re annoying, obnoxious, or oblivious to what is expected of you as a player in a live setting. I wonder what Professor James Acquaintance would have said if he met some of the “characters” that are populating today’s poker world…maybe we’ll take a guess at that another time.