Last year for Tao of Poker? Pauly talks about calling it quits
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Popular poker blogger Paul ‘Dr. Pauly’ McGuire, best known to most online poker players for his writing over at Tao of Poker, published a lengthy post today that raised the possibility of 2008 being the end of the line for McGuire’s involvement in poker, at least on a full-time basis.
The post, located here, details Pauly’s increasing disillusionment with poker and the task of writing about it for a living. Excerpt:
Maybe I should walk away from poker right now? Cash out. Sell the Tao. I have a big stack in life thanks to my tremendous good luck in poker. I should quit while I’m ahead and use the money I earned to fund my personal projects. I have seen poker’s ugly side and many of my friends have gotten their collective asses kicked by poker. They have left empty-handed.
Maybe I should just quit after the 2008 WSOP?
At the end of the 2008 WSOP, I’ll make that tough decision. If I choose to walk away from poker entirely, well then that’s what’s going to happen.
I’m at a crossroads. I have grown bored with poker when there’s so much other interesting and compelling stuff going on in the world right now. I could take an assignment to cover the Olympics in Beijing, or hit the campaign trail and follow the leading candidates on their run for the White House, or I could venture into one of the world’s hot zones and become a combat correspondent, or most likely, I’ll head for the plastic hills of Hollyweird and churn out mindless static for the motion picture industry (once the writer’s strike is over).
As much as poker has given me more financial freedom (i.e. I’m out of debt), I have also found it suffocating me artistically. I have all these gestating ideas and my inability to follow through on them due to time or work constraints has been extremely frustrating to endure.
