I don't know if you guys know this story, but the first world series of poker was played by about 7 people for around 5 days, and they played until they decided to vote on who the "World Champion of Poker" title will be given to. Most of us know it was won by Johnny Moss, but what a lot of people don't know is that each player was asked to vote on who the best player is, and each player voted for himself. Only when they decided to vote who the second best player is were they able to come up with a winner.

I believe it's true that most poker players think this way. The nature of a good poker player is competitiveness and confidence in his or her own ability. Really good poker players probably thinks they are the best among their peers, and i won't blame them. It is part of their nature to have faith in their abilities because in Poker, every single decision is made by you and you alone, and these decisions will translate into wins or losses.

So, i know most of us are really wondering, who are the best players on our shores today? Well, to make it easier for all of us to find out, we have decided to make 2006 the year where every serious poker player who excels will be recognized according to how consistent they are in winning, and how much cash they are raking in from the tournaments that they join.

We have decided to create the unofficial guide to who are the Philippines' best poker players! Based on the Cardplayer.com and tourney.com system of ranking professional poker players, we will create the rankings on a point system where the tournament buy-in, number of participants, and the players' tournament results (ITM) will be computed accordingly and translated into points. The bigger the number of participants or amount of buy-in, the more points a player gets.

There will be a criteria on which a tournament can be considered in this ranking system, like a minimum number of participants, etc. All major tournaments will of course be considered, and even regular tournaments run by some of our friends will have to be included too. As soon as we have it all fine-tuned, we will start immediatley with the rankings on a new website that will be announced here of course. We hope to start this as soon as possible, hopefully by the beginning of the 3rd week of january.

Sorry to our ring game specialists, but tournament poker is the best way to gauge poker skill. We cannot include how much you win in ring games into this ranking system, much the same way that Doyle Brunson isn't that high up in the poker player rankings, but probably wins in one hand of a $4000-$8000 hold'em ring game what most players will win by placing 1st in a tough tournament.

We hope that this new player ranking system will get players off their butts and start playing more poker! Everytime you play in a tournament, just bear in mind that how well you will do will determine your place in the Unofficial Guide to Who's Who in Philippine Poker.

Shuffle up and Deal!