I don't know why everybody knocks on Shanelle so much. Does she seem to have any significant talent for the game? Nope, not as far as we can tell anyway. Is she clearly a notch or two (or three) under the competition in many or even most of the events that she plays? Yep. I don't ever recall her claiming to be as good as these other players either though.
She seems to be doing what we all did at one time, particularly when we were still learning. Entering events that were way over our head because we enjoyed it, and for the experience, in an attempt to get better. We were all once "that person". You know who I am talking about, you still see them at every single event you play in. And most of us still are "that person", or at least we would be, if we still had the guts or the desire to enter high enough level tournaments.
Would I personally enter an "open" tournament that regardless of the "open" name I knew was really just a pro tournament that was specifically intended for the pro level players, and that would consist almost exclusively of pro level players, and especially if it is being streamed/televised/reported on? Hell no. A good example would be the few average league player types that managed to get on the IPT tour a few years back. Now my personal decision would be partly out of my "respect for the tournament and the sport", but I also have to admit it is largely out of pride because I would feel like an idiot with the world seeing how out of my league I was. But if someone else isn't as scared, and doesn't let their embarrassment and pride get in the way of their wanting to gain experience and have fun, can I really fault them, particularly when we know that is their reason and not that they think they actually belong there based on their skill?
There is one other difference between Shanelle and the rest of us that are out of our league at the tournaments we play in (or that would be if we played in the right tournaments). We weren't hired to do it--she was. She was blessed with a particular natural beauty and poise, and as such was hired as a representative and promoter of a brand. Her job is to get the brand exposure, and to represent them in a professional manner. It seems to me that she has been successful in fulfilling both of these things.
She is having fun competing in these tournaments. She is wanting to learn and grow from the experience of being in over her head. She is fulfilling what she was hired to do by bringing good exposure to a brand. At the end of the day I can't say I can truly find fault in any of that.
Not to mention that she is human and saying hurtful things about her (which I'm sure she reads and/or hears about) serves no purpose and isn't deserved. She knows she isn't a world beater. It would be one thing if she thought she was, then I could understand people lashing out at her. But she is just a girl that wants to get experience, improve, have fun, and as a side bonus while doing something she enjoys, get a little financial reward by delivering on a job that she was hired to do.
