The gambling ramblings of Pauly -- a writer, traveler, and degenerate

 
Monday: Back to Work, WPBT Summer Classic, and Folding into the Money

By Pauly

After seven straight days of covering the WPT Championship, I had two days off (alas, I still had to meet deadlines over the weekend so it was a total reprive). Now that it's Monday, I'm back to work covering the WSOP Circuit event at Caseser's Palace for Poker News. Once again Shecky assembled our all-star reporting team of the Poker Shrink, Amy Calistri, Change100, Shronk, Tiffany, Leanne, BJ, ad myself. Head over to Poker News and check out our live updates starting at Noon local time. There will also be plenty of photos and videos. The WSOP Circuit event will be the fifth poker tournament (in four different cities; Melbourne, LA, Monte Carlo, and Las Vegas) that I have covered for Poker News.

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Congrats to brdweb for winning AlCantHang's blogger bracelet race. I could not play and donated to the worthy cause. I posted and folded into 22nd place. Any of you who finished after me should be embarassed that you placed behind a dead stack! AlCantHang is hosting another one soon that will be open to both readers and bloggers. Stay tuned for more details.

And stop by Falstaff's blog to get more info on the blogger gathering this summer in Las Vegas. Since it's smack in the middle of the WSOP, my participation will be limited. Schedule permitting, I'll do my best to join in the festivities.

Also stop by Sloshr's blog for details on the blogger tournament at the Orleans. Both Falstaff and Sloshr are working hard to make sure you have a great trip, so when you get a chance, thank them for their work. Organizing any event over 50 people is a pain in the ass and they're doing an amazing job. Thanks guys.

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Shecky wondered if my gambling loses in Las Vegas had eclipsed my paycheck from PokerNews for the WPT Championships and WSOP Circuit at Caeser's. It's getting close. With expenses like travel, rooms, and food... plus the loses at the sports book, craps tables, and poker... I'm close to breaking even!

Last night, the Suns covered which helped ease the pain. I'm only stuck about 1.7K betting on sports this trip. I seem to win all my baby bets and can't win a big bet to save my life.

And I'm making good decisions at the poker table, although I've posted two losing sessions in consecutive days at Green Valley and at Red Rock.

Change100 and I played up at Red Rock and she continues to run well. I played 8/16 Limit with a half kill to 12/24. I was the third youngest player at the table that featured plenty of local rocks. I quickly labeled the one of the younger guys a sausage jockey/calling station in my mental notes. He'd say, "Nice catch!!" to everyone if they beat him in a pot.

He also pissed through three buy-ins while I was there after I tilted him. Everyone folded to him on the button and he raised my big blind. I defended with 10-6o. The flop was J-10-3 and I check raised him. I knew he had nothing but he called anyway. I fired out at the turn when a King fell. He folded and said, "Nice catch."

I flipped over my hand and said, "I defend my blinds so you better have good cards or the balls to call me to the river, sausage boy."

I missed almost every big draw that I had and did not flop any sets even though I got a barrage of small and medium pairs. The biggest pot that I won was with Jd-7d. Before the cards were dealt, I decided to make a move regardless of my hand. I had not played any post in two orbits and I was in late position. There was a limper in front of me and I raised. Four players in the pot and I flopped a flush draw and bottom pair. I turned a gutshot and made my flush on the river. I beat a guy who rivered a set and another who rivered a straight. That was the biggest pot I won that session.

The largest pot I lost in the session was with A-K in a kill pot. There must have been close 150 in the pot preflop and I flopped a King. I jammed the pot on the flop and on the turn. Even though an Ace fell on the river, my hand was no good as a clubs flush filled in on the last card. I made a crying call with two pair knowing I was beat to a flush.

I've been in Las Vegas for ten days and I'm stuck about $400 playing live poker. I've posted a profit for the same amount hitting and running at 15/30 on PokerStars and 8/16 on Full Tilt from the comforts of my hotel room at the Castle. Ironic, don't you think? Like rain on your wedding day...

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/30/2007 11:33:00 AM | Permalink |

 
AlCantHang's Bracelet Race, French Pai Gow, and Tilting Locals

By Pauly

Tonight, AlCantHang is hosting a WSOP bracelet race for bloggers only. See below for the details.


Sadly, I have a function to attend and will not be playing in the tournament tonight. I signed up and will be donating to the worthy cause.

I rarely get to play in blogger tournaments any more due to a hectic work schedule, or I'm on the road traveling, or real life gets in the way. I really wish I had more time to play these things and when I do end up playing, it's in an airport terminal somewhere or in a hotel room or I'm busy multi-tasking and working on a deadline.

Best of luck to everyone tonight.

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In the first seven days I was in Vegas, I played poker for an hour and that was the WPT media tournament at Bellagio. The only other gambling I've done was a couple of losing bets at the sportsbook. I'm stuck a little under 2K betting on the NBA. Thank God for Utah last night, otherwise it would have been worse.

Meanwhile, Change100 had been on a tear. She final tabled one tournament at Planet Ho, chopped the media event, and schooled the locals at the Mirage. We finally had a chance to gamble on Saturday. We went to Paris for brunch with Benjo and he wanted to learn how to play Pai Gow. We taught him at Bally's and he picked up the game quick. I won a few bucks but we donked it off at the craps table. No TJ Cloutier sightings.

We went to dinner at Green Valley Ranch last night and met up with the Poker Prof and Flipchip for sushi. After dinner, we headed to the poker room where I bumped into Mike from PokerPages and Charlie Shoten.

I signed up for 10-20 Limit but the list was never called. I donked around at 4-8 with a half kill and ended up tilting my table by playing hands like 6-2s, 8-6s, and 7-4o. I scooped a monster pot when I cracked some guy's K-K. He looked like Borat and said very bad things about women and their place in poker... according to him, they shouldn't be playing.

"If you lose to a woman," he said, "you should leave and quit playing poker."

It was great to crack his Kings. He raised preflop and I called. The flop was J-7-3 and he bet out. I raised and got the guy next to me to fold. Borat three-bet and I four-bet. The turn was another 7. He bet, I raised, and he called. The river was a blank and he check-called me. I flipped over 7-4o and the dealer almost fell out of his chair. The guy next to me mucked A-7 after my raise on the flop. Borat looked like he wanted to punch me then shook my hand. My response? "High five!"

My tilty table broke and I was moved to Change100's table. She was on slight tilt courtesy of a Vietnam veteran who was playing looser than a tranny hooker from Ho Chi Minh City. Her table was not as fun as mine and I lost a monsterpotten in a kill pot. I saw a flop in a seven way pot with 9s-7s. I flopped an opened ended straight draw, check-raised the flop of K-10-8, turned the straight when the 6 fell and kept jamming until the river when a Jack spiked. I bet out and a woman who reminded me of Joy Behar from The View raised me on the river.

"I can't believe you were chasing a gutshot with A-Q," I said as I called her raise.

She showed A-Q and I said, "Nice catch, twat."

I cashed out and got a shake at Fat Burger instead of playing any more with menopausal women and Vietnam vets.

When we got back to the Strip, I couldn't sleep so I fired up PokerStars and played 15-30 Limit for an hour. I won a small profit and cashed out. I was sweating a 500/1000 NL full ring game on Full Tilt that featured Ozzy87, Patrik Antonius, Gus Hansen, Tony G, and Malaysian billionare Michael Sampoerna... who I met in Australia.

I have Sunday off before I have to cover the WSOP Circuit Event at Caesar's from Monday through Wednesday for PokerNews. That will be the last tournament I cover until the WSOP. I can't wait to take four weeks off from poker and rest up before the WSOP begins on June 1.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/29/2007 12:09:00 PM | Permalink |

 
Carlos Mortensen Wins the 2007 WPT Championship

By Pauly

After a week of non-stop poker action, the WPT Championship concluded on Friday night with the final table. Held in the Bellagio Ballroom at Bellagio Casino in Las Vegas, the final table was being taped for the 100th episode of the WPT. It's also the last show that will be aired on the Travel Channel as the WPT switched channels and heads over to the GSN for Season 6.

There was a little extra hoopla surrounding the final table. Plenty of WPT execs and suits were milling around because of the 100th episode. In addition the tournament was the WPT Championships... and the largest tournament that the Bellagio has ever held and the largest prize pool in the history of the WPT. Aside from the last three WSOP Main Events, no other poker tournament had awarded a richer first place prize.


Final Table Players
(Photo courtesy of BJ Nemeth)
Despite all the distractions that the WPT had to endure in Season 5 (the lawsuits, the headache with French authorities, the death of Paul Hanum, and ending the relationship with the Travel Channel), the final table of the WPT Championships truly epitomized everything that is great about poker. At the same time everything that is absolutely wrong with the industry was magnified at the WPT Championships. The yin and the yang. Bottom line... the poker boom would not have been possible without televised poker and without online poker. The WPT and ESPN play a major role in igniting the boom from helping bring poker into your living room and spreading the excitement and addictive quality of poker to the farthest corners of the globe.

The final six players entered the ballroom hoping to make poker history and take down $4M. I picked Carlos Mortensen to win for a reason. He was the best player at the final table and he's played under the bright lights. Playing in the Fontana Room is one thing. Having to bring your A-game on a TV set in a room filled with press and fans is an entirely different beast. Players have to deal with more distractions. That's when the entertainment side takes precedent and poker becomes the afterthought. Poker tournaments usually have their own rhythm. Sitting at a WPT final table can be erratic with unscheduled breaks due to technical issues like mics falling off or lights not working. Plus the crew has to take breaks to load more films into the cameras. The worst thing about the final table is having players recreate some of the action after it happens. Such as folding your hand again or showing your cards to the hole cams because the crew didn't get a good shot. Alas, that's part of poker these days.

Carlos Mortensen was also chasing history and when it was all over he smashed a few records and made a distinction for himself that may never be replicated ever again. After winning the 2007 WPT Championships, Mortensen became the first ever player to have won a WSOP Main Event and won the WPT Championships. Mortensen also set a record at Bellagio by being their first $5M man. No other person has won that much in multiple Bellagio tournaments. Mortensen made one of the most amazing comebacks that I have ever witnessed at the final table of a major tournament. Mortensen also won the richest prize in WPT history and made a few leaps on poker's all time money list. If there was ever a doubt who's the best tournament player to ever come from Europe, Mortensen's track record will be hard to dismiss. El Matador is not just one of the best players to hail from Europe, he's proven that he's one of the best tournament players... of all time.

Mortensen had a little help at the final table. Chipleader Paul Lee played super passive and allowed Mortensen to jump into the lead. The shortest stacks in Mike Wattel and Tim Phan busted out and out of the four remaining players, Mortensen was by far the most experienced. He'd need to use ever bit of his poker acumen when he was crippled down to just over 1M. It was an odd hand against Kirk Morrison. Mortensen flopped TPTK with A-Q but Morrison flopped a set of Jacks. All the money went in on the flop as Morrison doubled up. It appeared that El Matador was toast. Down to just 1M with WPT's hyper accelerating blinds, the future looked bleak for Mortensen.

He never lost his cool and fought back. He stole some blinds and doubled up to 2M. Then 3M. Then he caught a break. Guy Laliberte, one of the richest men from Canada, busted out in 4th place. Laliberte played fearless poker over the last couple of days. Since he was already filthy rich, the prize money did not mean that much to him. He was able to separate the money from the game and that's part of the reason he played so well. With the rich guy out of the tournament, Mortensen found himself as one of the last three players. Morrison held the monster lead and the passive Paul Lee became a target for both Morrison and Mortensen.

Mortensen patiently waited for his moment to strike and fought back into contention after he doubled through Lee on Hand #86. He went from 1M to 12M in one of the most remarkable comebacks in WPT final table history. Lee busted out on the next hand courtesy of Kirk Morrison. When heads up play began, Mortensen trailed Morrison 19.4M to 12.8M in chips. The majority of the pros in the room gave the edge to Mortensen despite the chip count.

"Carlos is one of the top 3 heads-up players in the world. Behind myself of course," mentioned a shitfaced Gavin Smith who had been drinking heavily in the crowd. "There's nobody in the world that I'd rather play less than Carlos Mortensen heads-up."

It took 95 hands but Mortensen managed to emerge victorious. Too bad that the heads-up match was a crap shoot thanks to the crazy blind structure at WPT events. The first five days featured 90 minute levels. The final table levels decreased to 60 minutes but when players get heads up, the levels are 30 minutes. At one point the blinds were 600K and 1.2M. Mortensen had about 10 big blinds left. When the level was bumped to 800K and 1.6M with 300K antes, there was 3M in the pot before the dealer dealt the cards! That represented 10% of the total chips in play. The blinds had never gotten that high at a WPT event according to Linda Johnson.

The last twenty or so hands became a push-fest like a turbo SNG on PokerStars or one of those poorly structured tournaments on the Strip that hungover sunburnt tourists play. It's a shame that the biggest tournament on the WPT manipulated the play so badly.

"This is not poker," said Daniel Negreanu. "There's no skill left. It's just go all in. The only way you can screw up is to fold."

"This is a total crapshoot," agreed Joe Sebok. "This is why internet players do better at this point."

But at least it was exciting. Whenever one play got close to busting the other, they'd miraculously spring back to life. Like an old school heavyweight boxing match that you'd see on ESPN Classic, the two just beat the shit out of each other and just when you thought one player was done... momentum swung the other way. Morrison caught the 10d twice on the river to come from behind and double through Mortensen. While Morrison could not deliver the knockout blow to Mortensen.

And on Hand #182 of the final table, Carlos Mortensen raised to 5M and Kirk Morrison raised all in. Mortensen called with Kh-Jh. Morrison flipped over As-4d. He flopped a pair on a board of 7c-4h-3c but Mortensen took the lead when the Jc fell on the turn. The river was 3d and Morrison ran out of river luck.

The Money Winners:
1. Carlos Mortensen (Las Vegas,NV) $3,970,415
2. Kirk Morrison (Topeka, KS) $2,011,135
3. Paul Lee (Los Angeles, CA) $1,082,920
4. Guy Laliberte (Beverly Hills, CA) $696,220
5. Tim Phan (Westminster, CA) $464,110
6. Mike Wattel (Phoenix, AZ) $309,405

Carlos Mortensen - 2007 WPT World Champion
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
Erick Lindgren backs Mortensen so I have no idea how much Mortensen actually won, nor do I know who else had a piece of him. What I do know is that the quiet and humble Mortensen said very little after he won.

"I do not have the words to describe how this feels," he said to the audience.

I think Mortensen summed it up best when he said, "I tried really hard."

Mike Sexton described Mortensen as a "player's player." He also remarked that we might never see anyone win both the WPT Championship and the WSOP Main Event.

"Carlos got knocked down so many times," said Gavin Smith. "He got up and kept fighting. If you are going to make it in tournament poker, you to be able to handle adversity and tonight Carlos proved he's the best in the world at handling that."

Kirk Morrison was a gracious second place finisher. He said, "This was fantastic. I couldn't be more happier than to lose to Carlos. I've been gone for a very long time but this is tremendous."


Click here to view the video with Kirk Morrison.
Morrison had taken about five years off from tournament poker. Since his return, he cashed in four straight WPT events which tied a record held by Daniel Negreanu.

Carlos Mortensen used to be known as the quiet guy at the table who erects weird chip sculptures. Now, he'll be known as one of the best tournament players of all time. I'm glad for Carlos Mortensen because there are some really nice guys in poker and he's one of them. I'm thrilled that he won instead of a douchebag like some of the other assclowns on the poker tour.

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Don't forget to check out Flipchip's WPT Championship photos.

Also take a peek at the Poker News extensive WPT Championship video gallery that includes dozens of videos by together by our mulitmedia guru Shronk. He has videos if Doyle Brunson, Patriik Anotnius, Gavin Smith, Daniel Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth and Joe Hachem.

You can review the live blogging updates of last night's final table on Poker News. If you liked our work at PokerNews, tune in Monday for our coverage of the WSOP Circuit evet at Caesar's Palace.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/28/2007 02:52:00 PM | Permalink |

 
WPT Championships Day 5: Making the Final Table and Tommy Vu Bitch Slaps Hellmuth

By Pauly

The great 20th century American poet Calvin Cordozar Broadus, Jr. (a.k.a. Snoop Dogg) once said, "I got my mind on my money and my money on my mind." That line seemed appropriate at Day 5 of the WPT Championships as the 27 remaining players slowly made their way down to the final 6.

Last Saturday at the Bellagio, the first flight of 639 players forked over $25K with one thing on every entrant's mind... to make the final table and be in a position to win $4 million. After 99 episodes of the WPT, there's not a sane person in poker who does not know that WPT final tables are a crap shoot. Even though chipleader Paul Lee has over 1/3 of the chips in play... anything can happen at the final table of a WPT event due to the accelerated blind structure at the TV table.

While WPT co-creator Lyle Berman played in the WPT Championships, he was constantly told that the structure sucked ass. Roland de Wolfe, who is the only player to have won an EPT event and a WPT event, told Berman that the WPT should use the same final table format that the EPT does. Berman's response, "Send me their blind structure and I'll take a look."

Alas, there's nothing he can do about it right now. The levels were ninety minutes in length with a gradual increase in blinds. Once the final table starts, the levels drop to under an hour with much bigger jumps. The suits at the WPT want action for the TV program... not to have an event where the final six players actually play poker to determine who's the next WPT World Champion. That's what I loved about the WSOP main event with two hour levels and that's why the European players prefer the EPT over the WPT.

The WPT Championship Final Table (with chip counts):
1. Paul Lee (Los Angeles, CA) 11.8M
2. Carlos Mortensen (Las Vegas, NV) 6.5M
3. Guy Laliberte (Beverly Hills, CA) 4.69M
4. Kirk Morrison (Topeka, KS) 4.194M
5. Mike Wattel (Phoenix, AZ) 2.887M
6. Tim Phan (Westminster, CA) 2.162M

Final TV Table Payouts:
1. $3,970,415
2. $2,011,135
3. $1,082,920
4. $696,220
5. $464,110
6. $309,405

Day 5 Money Winners:
7 Thomas Wahlroos $278,465
8 Scott Fischman $247,525
9 Tommy Vu $216,585
10 Jimmy Tran $185,645
11 Grant Lang $154,705
12 CK Hua $154,705
13 David Levi $154,705
14 Jake Minter $154,705
15 Sorel "imper1um" Mizzi $154,705
16 Jim "KrazyKanuck" Worth $123,670
17 Richard Anthony $123,670
18 Phil Hellmuth $123,670
19 Loi Phan $123,670
20 Ben Johnson $123,670
21 Tom Pniak $92,820
22 Raymond Davis $92,820
23 David Baker $92,820
24 Paul Wasicka $92,820
25 Adeeb Harb $92,820
26 Roland de Wolfe $92,820
27 Robert Wazelle $92,820

Here's some quick background on the players...

Chipleader Paul Lee doesn't play too many big events, but a glance at his Hendon Mob stats show that he plays tons of smaller buy-in events all over Southern California. He was freerolling into the WPT Championships after winning a different event at the Bellagio last week.

Carlos Mortensen is the best player to come out of Spain and is considered one of the top 10 pros in all of Europe. The 2001 WSOP bracelet winner is trying to become the first WSOP Main Event champion to win a WPT World Championship. Mortensen is in an elite club of four players (along with Joe Hachem, Doyle Brunson, and Scotty Nguyen) who have won the WSOP and at least one WPT event. Mortensen is clearly the best player at the final table. El Matador is my pick to win it all.


Guy Laliberte
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
Guy Laliberte sneezes $100 bills. The guy named Guy is originally from Montreal and the founder of Cirque du Soleil. Whispers made its way through media row about his estimated net worth. Some said $5 billion but the actual number is somewhere between $1 and $2 billion. BJ did his homework and said that Forbes listed him at $1.5 billion. He's playing for chump change, which means he's fearless at the tables. He was tipping the Bellagio cocktail servers $20 bills for bringing him Fiji water. Change100 said that he wore a $600 cashmere sweater. All I could say was, "I like the eagle on the back."

Kirk Morrison won a WSOP bracelet back in 1988 and has been away from tournament poker the last few years. What a way to make a resurgence into poker! Out of everyone who made the final table, Morrison gutted out some of the toughest situations.

Mike Wattel is a former WSOP bracelet winner who had been best known as Cyndy Violette boyfriend. I think he looks just like Mike Gordon (the bass player from Phish). I have also never seen Wattel not wear shorts. I wonder if they'll make him wear long pants for the final table. He went from 1M in chips to 3M in less than fifteen minutes winning several small pots in a row. He stepped up his game late in Day 5.

Tim Phan just made his second WPT final table. I'm a fan of Phan because he uses his tournament winnings to support his extended family in California and overseas.

So what happened on Day 5?

Phil Hellmuth showed up late. Not like Hellmuthian late (anything over one hour), but the Poker Brat was the last player to arrive and had not sat down until the second hand was dealt. On the first hand that he played, he doubled up. He started 18th in chips and that hand put him closer to the Top 10. However, his run would not last long.

Hellmuth headed straight for tiltdom after his Kings were cracked by the Lizard King Kirk Morrison. Both Flipchip and I agreed that Hellmuth played his hand poorly on all streets. The best NL Hold'em player in the world succumbed to FPS... Fancy Play Syndrome.

Here's the hand: A very loose Morrison raised 75K preflop and Hellmuth smooth called with Ks-Kh. Mistake #1. The flop was 6s-5c-3s and Morrison fired out 150K. Hellmuth smooth called again with a flush draw and gutshot on the board. Mistake #2. The turn was the 3d and Morrison checked to Hellmuth who underbet 150K when the pot was 450K. Mistake #3. Morrison called Hellmuth's weak bet. The river was the 2s and Morrison fired out 225K. Hellmuth called his value bet with straights and flushes out there. Morrison tabled As-7s for the nut flush, while Hellmuth angrily showed his pocket Kings. That's when Hellmuth blew up and began berating Morrison.

Everyone in the room knew that Hellmuth fucked up and that his anger was misdirected. Hellmuth should have punched himself in the balls. The best NL Hold'em player in the world is not supposed to make a rookie mistake like that with $4 million and history on the line. I could justify the smooth call pre-flop in order to trap Morrison. But not raising the flop with all those draws was a total rookie mistake.

"I'll get all of his chips," Hellmuth steamed as he referred to Morrison in the third person. "Tournament after tournament these donkeys give away their chips to me. I don't have to chase them down. They come to me eventually."

Hellmuth and Tommy Vu (yes that Tommy Vu from those 1980s infomercials) were jawing back and forth. Vu sensed weakness and went for the attack. They had some interesting banter on one particular hand where Hellmuth min. raised preflop and Vu called. The flop was Kc-8h-7s and Vu checked to Hellmuth. He bet 70K and said, "I'm expecting you to check-raise me, but I have to bet my set of Kings."

Vu went into the tank for a few minutes which irritated Hellmuth.

"I'm playing against the best player in the world," sarcastically quipped Vu. "I need time to think."

Hellmuth called a clock on Vu as he counted out his chips. Vu min. raised Hellmuth as he pushed 140K past the betting line. Hellmuth quickly min. reraised 70K more.

"Let's see if you really have something," Hellmuth said.

"I don't have a clock still on me," joked Vu to the TD.

When the TD said no and walked away, Vu counted down some more chips and took more time. That bothered Hellmuth even more.

"Come on Tommy! If you have a set of 8s, let's do it. Just push all of it into the pot."

Just before Hellmuth called a clock on Vu for the second time in that hand, Vu min. raised again as he tossed out 140K chips.

"Looks like they are playing limit poker," joked the TD to the crowd.

Hellmuth was steaming. He stood up and sighed. He said he had Queens and folded. Vu didn't show his hand as Vu became a quick crowd favorite for standing up to the Poker Bully.

Hellmuth busted out an hour later at the hands of Thomas Wahlroos from Finland. Hellmuth went to battle with J-J but ran into Wahlroos' A-A.

"First time I got (pocket) Aces in the last two days," Wahlroos told me.

The young Fin, who made the WPT Paris final table, got a large applause from the spectators at the Bellagio on the rail who were cheering against Hellmuth.

Former WSOP Joe Hachem was on the rail most of the afternoon. Tiffany and Shronk got an interview with him where he discusses WPT final table strategy.


Click here to watch the Hachem video.
Thomas Wahlroos issued the Bad Beat of the Day. With 8 players remaining, he cracked Scott Fischman's Aces with the Hilton Sisters. Wahlroos rivered a four flush to cripple the surly Fischman who was in a bad mood the entire tournament. He is not as loud as Hellmuth or Matusow, but he has a reputation to be a constant complainer at the tables which is why most of the pros I've talked to don't like his attitude.

"What are you in such a bad mood for?" teased Tommy Vu. "You just won at least a quarter of a million!"

My pick to win it all, Thomas Wahlroos, ended up being the TV bubble boy when his As-10s did not hold up against Paul Lee's A-Q. If Wahlroos came from behind and won that hand, he would have been the chipleader. His luck ran out as he headed to the rail. Here's the picture of that intense moment that BJ took as I stood right behind Wahlroos.


(Photo courtesy of BJ Nemeth)
The final table is set to go at 5pm local time. BJ Nemeth and I will be co-blogging the final table together for Poker News. He'll be doing the play-by-play while I will be providing the color commentary. Check out our live updates at Poker News.

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 5

The WPT hosted a media tournament for us in the Fontana Room before the action started for Day 5. Chops from WCP and RawVegas played as did Lacey Jones, along with a slew of us from PokerNews such as Gaz, Shecky, BJ, myself, and Change100. I was crippled in the first orbit when I turned a boat and my opponent had been slowplaying quads on me. Ouch. I got my money back when I open-shoved with K-9o and was called by Ed from Gutshot. He had 8-8 and I flopped a King. I lost a race against Owen when his Hilton Sisters beat my Big Slick. I busted out on the next hand with Q-4o. Meanwhile, Change100 made the final table and went on to win it. She chopped with Craig from Gutshot when they were even in chips. She won two free nights at the Bellagio and a free meal for two at any MGM/Mirage eatery! Nice score.

Phil Hellmuth drew the most railbirds in the Fontana Room. They stood six or seven deep to catch a glimpse at the Poker Brat. It reminded me of rubberneckers on the highway slowing down to look at the carnage of a car wreck. Hellmuth would need to jaws of life to get his ass out of the mess he was in.

Charlie Shoten made a cameo early on and told me about the movie he's trying to make in Hollyweird. It's a mocumentary about poker and the concept seems hilarious.

Johnny Chan walked around in media row and stood on the rail most of the day. That's rare. Several members of the media tried to ask him who he had a piece of but he didn't say.

Other pros wandered around and Snoopy from Blonde Poker asked, "What level of poker celebrity do you have to be in order to be allowed inside the ropes?" I told him that you have to be high up. Chan and Hachem get automatic entry along with guys like Gavin Smith who have won a WPT event. I'm sure if Dutch Boyd tried to cross the line, he'd get tossed out.


(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
Carlos Mortensen must have been inspired by influenced by Antoni Gaudi's buildings such as La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona. If you ever watch Mortensen play in a tournament, he'll do weird things with his chips like line up all the side designs in a row or erect his chips into odd shapes. At one point, Mortensen took several minutes to undo his sculpture in order to count out his chips when he moved all in with K-K. Tommy Vu was bothered that Mortensen was slowing up the game. "He not allowed to build a house no more!" Vu complained to the dealer. The most upset seemed to be Scott Fischman who sat right next to El Matador. Mortensen's sculpture drew the attention of the media including every photographer in the room who wanted to snap a photo of his masterpiece and Fischman doesn't like any media around his table.

Snoopy offered me $1 to knock down Mortensen's stack. I offered him $100 to snatch Fischman's hat off his head. We both declined.

A drunk Gavin Smith wandered up to the final table with a cocktail in his hand and chatted with Wahlroos. "Rum and coke?" asked Wahlroos. That Finnish kid makes some amazing reads.

The final table (of ten players) had a true international flavor to it with four players of Asian descent, three Americans, two Europeans, and one French-Canadian.

Change100 approved of all three of Isabelle Mercier's outfits. The poker fashionita made three appearances in the Fontana Room and she wore three different outfit changes. That's a move right out of Joe Speaker's playbook.

One anonymous reporter in media row referred to another media person as "the biggest tool in poker." Snoopy wanted to know what that meant. I guess British people don't use that term. I explained to him what a "tool" was and he gave me some comparable British slang such as... tosser, tosspot, twat, shirt lifter, or poo pusher. Of course my favorite one was... sausage jockey. Heh. The former biggest tool in poker now has the new title of... The biggest sausage jockey in poker!

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out Flipchip's WPT Championship photos.

Also take a peek at the Poker News extensive WPT Championship video gallery put together by our mulitmedia guru Shronk. The video gallery includes interviews with final table players Paul Lee and Kirk Morrison.

BJ and I will be live blogging the WPT Championship Final Table directly from the Bellagio for Poker News. It starts at 5pm local time or 8pm for all you east coasters.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/27/2007 02:15:00 PM | Permalink |

 
WPT Championship Day 4: The Carrot Top and Hellmuth Blows Load

By Pauly

When I arrived at the Fontana Room, the fountains in the Bellagio lake were being cleaned by guys in scuba gear. While word was out that James Woods was lurking around with his new 17 year old girlfriend that he picked off of MySpace. Jimmy Woods is a pussy magnet but he wasn't playing at the WPT Championships this year. Wonder why he missed it?

Day 4 of the WPT Championships continued with 54 players. 27 players would bust out in less than three levels and play would be suspended by TD Jack McClelland. The eliminations went quick and I welcomed the short day especially because the Fontana Room was opened to spectators and several of them would wander off into where I was working.

Phil Hellmuth entered Day 4 as the chiplead and he squandered it all. He didn't go on mega tilt. He decided to play loose and aggressive to start out the day and that cost him a few chips. Then he took two big hits doubling up David Levi and Sorel "imper1um" Mizzi. When the day ended he had slipped to 19th place in chips with more than one million less than he started with.

Paul Lee jumped out of nowhere to take the lead. He won a monster pot off of Loi Phan which helped put him in the lead. Carlo Mortensen went on a rush to end the day third in chips. Mortensen got the majority of his stack after flopping a set and having it hold up against Ray Davis' nute flush and guthot straight draw. If there was one time to have your flopped set hold up... it would be on Day 4 of the WPT Championships.

Doyle Brunson came by to sweat Lyle Berman. He was trying to get Berman to donk off his chips so they could play over at Bobby's Room in the Big Game.


Click here to see the Doyle Brunson video.

Doyle Brunson thinks that Hellmuth and Mortensen are the two best players left in the field. My pick to win it all is Finland's Thomas Wahlroos. He made a final table at the WSOP last year and final tabled the last WPT event in Paris at the Aviation Club. Keep an eye on that Scandi.

I'm also rooting for a guy named Robert Wazelle. He looks like a guy you'd see in the parking lot of a Grateful Dead show selling doses. The old hippie wears Birkenstocks and has long scragly hair.

Noteworthy players who cashed on Day 4 included... Lyle Berman (29), David Oppenheim, (31), Mark Gregorich (32), Bill Gazes (33,) ZeeJustin (35), Jared "TheWacoKidd" Hamby (44), Patrik Antonius (52), Danny Alaei(53).

Here's a Top 5 chipcount:
1. Paul Lee 3,601,000
2. Kirk Morrison 2,980,000
3. Carlos Mortensen 2,429,000
4. Sorel Mizzi 2,256,000
5. Thomas Wahlroos 1,847,000

Notable Stacks:
Tim Phan 1,273,000
David Levi 1,258,000
Grant Lang 1,201,000
Mike Wattel 1,060,000
CK Hua 760,000
Phil Hellmuth 738,000
Paul Wasicka 581,000
James "KrazyKanuck" Worth 556,000
Roland de Wolfe 460,000

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 4

I could hear the screams from the neartest craps table about 150 yards away from the Fontana Room. There was a hot shooter throwing which meant that people were winning money. I love it when the average Joe gambler takes money from a casino.

Hellmuth and Lyle Berman were discussing endorsement deals for various companies like soft drinks. Hellmuth mentioned Jay-Z's deal with Pepsi a couple of times. Hellmuth likes rap and he loves Jay-Z. I wonder what he thinks of Hellmuth?

At one point Hellmuth liked how Mike Wattel played a hand and he took time out to commend him. "That's the Hellmuth Seal of Approval," mentioned Snoopy who happened to be standing there next to me on the rail.

Tim Phan explained to some of his tablemates that 25% of all tournament earnings goes to his family. "My family is my charity," he said. They should be happy because he's going to win at least 23K. He still has plenty of chips so his family is still in the running for 1M.

After you spend enough time in Vegas, you come to accept things that would normally make you shake your head in disgust. I heard a bizzare story involving Carrot Top. It's an off the menu thing that most of the local hookers know about. It's sort of like ordering from the secret menu at In & Out Burger. As the story goes, comedian-freakazoid Carrot Top would pick up high priced hookers and pay them double. They would do a sexy striptease for him before he made them get down on their knees and he jerked off on their faces. So the next time a working girl comes over to you at the Hooker Bar, ask her how much a Carrot Top costs.

John Bonetti came by to sweat his good friend Phil Hellmuth. Bonetti is in his late 70s or early 80s and needs the assistance of one of those scooters. While trying to navigate a tough corner, he smashed into the table where the Gutshot guys were working. Bonetti spilled all the drinks on their table.

Last 5 Pros I Pissed Next To...
1. Lyle Berman
2. Phil Hellmuth
3. Loi Phan
4. Mark Gregorich
5. Patrik Antonius (and no Dan, I didn't peak but I know you would have!)

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out Flipchip's WPT Championship photos.

And you can follow the WPT Championship by visiting our live updates over at Poker News.

While you are there, peek at the Poker News extensive WPT Championship video gallery put together by our mulitmedia guru Shronk. The video gallery includes interviews with your favorite pros such as Phil Ivey, Doyle Brunson, Tim Phan, and Thomas Wahlroos.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/26/2007 10:43:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WPT Championships Day 3: Tilt-a-Phil

By Pauly

"Fuck!" screamed Phil Hellmuth as he slammed his fist on the table after the pot was being pushed to Shawn Buchanon.

Hellmuth had been on fire despite having Carlos Mortensen and Gavin Griffin at his table. Just a few minutes earlier he was the first player past the 1 million chipmark. Before that hand was dealt, his stack topped 1.5M after he took two big pots off of Paul Lee with K-K and a set of 10s. Hellmuth was calm and in control until that hand. Then he exploded.


I took this photo moments before the blowup
Here's what happened. Hellmuth raised under the gun to 20K and Buchanon reraised to more than 50K at the CO. Hellmuth called as the flop was 10d-6d-3h. Hellmuth check-called a 120K bet. The turn was 7d and both players checked. The river was the 9c and both players checked again.

"I got a pair of sixes," announced Hellmuth as he tabled As-6s. Buchanon flipped over K-7 for a pair of sevens.

"Fuck!" screamed Hellmuth as he slammed his fist on the table.

I still can't tell if those outbursts are genuine or fabricated. Regardless, for the next twenty minutes, Hellmuth put on a show for everyone in the Fontana Room. He spoke so loudly that you could have heard his whining across the street at the Paris casino. A wall of media surrounded his table as he berated Buchanon.

"This motherfuckin' kid just bluffed off 200K to the best player in the world! Nice play, genius! There's no way you are going to last the day," Hellmuth said as he pointed at Buchanon who was sporting a retro Boston Redsox Ted Williams jersey.

"Playing against the best players in the world and bluffing off your stack with K-7? Nice play genius," he continued. "You're supposed to be busted."

"Who's stacking the chips, Phil?" needled Amnon Filippi who sat at the adjacent table.

"Sit down you baby," another pro shouted.

Hellmuth ignored the catcalls from the other tables and stood up.

"Sucking out on me? I can see right through your soul," he said as I tried my best not to laugh. "I'm at the top of my game and you suck out on me. He looked right at me and I saw it in his eyes."

"Learn to take a beat," said Buchanon who was visibly rattled after waking up the sleeping giant.

"Everyone knows not to bluff me. They tried yesterday. Time after time and I picked them all off with Ace high. Bottom pair. Second pair. Didn't matter. I always knew when the were bluffing. Make sure you write that up on the internet," he said as he pointed directly at me.

"I'm playing for $4 million and history, pal. What are you playing for?" the Poker Brat continued. "The way you're playing you won't last the end of the day."

Hellmuth's verbal tirade lasted over thirty minutes as he would not let up. His table was next to be broken up and he pleaded with the floor person not to break them up.

"I got to get my chips back from that donkey," he said.

Side note... Buchanon would end up busting out in 57th place winning $46,410 while Hellmuth was moved to Raymond Davis' table. Davis would take the chiplead for a while before Hellmuth made a rush near the end of the day to finish up as the chipleader with 1.8M in chips and 54 players remaining.

The big story on Day 3 were the rapid fire bustouts. Although 212 players started the day, the money bubble broke as some of the bigger names in the field failed to cash such as Phil Ivey, Jen Harman, Chip Reese, Billy Baxter, Shannon Shorr, Gavin Griffin, Erica Schoenberg, My Main Man Freddy Deeb, Isabelle Mercier, Amir Vahedi, Allen Kessler, Joe Sebok, Berry Johnston, Vinnie Vinh, Andy Black, Martin De Knijff, Jamie Gold, Hoyt Corkins, Jani Sointula, Liz Lieu, JC Tran, David Singer, JohnnyBax, NeverWin and Nordberg.

Here's the payout list:
1: $3,970,415
2: $2,011,135
3: $1,082,920
4: $696,220
5: $464,110
6: $309,405
7: $278,465
8: $247,525
9: $216,585
10: $185,645
11-15: $154,705
16-20: $123,670
21-30: $92,820
31-40: $77,350
41-50: $61,880
51-100: $46,410

Noteworthy players who cashed included Ross Boatman, Barny Boatman, Joe Tehan, Humberto Brenes, Lee Markholdt, Bob Stupak, Anna Wroblewski, Ram Vaswani, Bryan Devonshire, Sam Grizzle, Melissa Hayden, James Van Alstyne, Sammy Farha, Johan Storakers, and David Daneshgar. They took home $46,410 each.


Vanessa Rousso
Photo courtesy of Flipchip
Everyone kept an eye out for the Poker Pixie (as dubbed by Otis). Anna Wroblewski was among the chipleaders to start Day 3. She was trying to make the money along with attempting to be the last female standing. She took out Isabelle Mercier. Liz Lieu was eliminated when she tried to bluff at a pot on the turn. Jen Harman busted out early followed by Erica Schoenberg who cashed in last year's WPT Championships. Although Melissa Hayden was shortstacked and not catching any cards, she outlasted everyone except Anna and made the money. Hayden was freerolling into the event after winning a seat in the Super Satellite the day before the event started. Hayden is currently 10th on the Women's All Time money list and has made 3 final tables at the WSOP.

The Poker Pixie's run ended when Grant Lang rivered a flush on her and she finished in 70th place.

"I was impressed with how she played," mentioned Phil Ivey in an interview with PokerNews. "She's tough to read and mixes up her play a lot. And she's a presence at the table. That's a good thing."

With the final table set for Friday, there's three days of poker scheduled with only 54 players remaining. There's a small chance that they could get down to 6 players by the end of Day 4. Tournament officials will have to make a decision during play on Wednesday. It would be nice to get a day off or having a very short day on Thursday.

Top 10 in Chips:
1 Phil Hellmuth (Palo Alto, CA) 1.827M
2 Raymond Davis (Commerce, CA) 1.704M
3 Loi Phan (San Marino, CA) 1.419M
4 Kirk Morrison (Topeka, KS) 1.327M
5 Roland De Wolfe (London, England) 1.287M
6 Thomas Wahlroos (Helsinki, Finland) 1.189M
7 CK Hua (Rosemead, CA) 1,041M
8 Carlos Mortensen (Las Vegas, NV) 939K
9 Mike Wattel (Phoenix, AZ) 935K
10 Ian Johns (Seattle, WA) 862K

Notables:
15 Sorel "imper1um" Mizzi (Toronto, Canada) 703K
16 Abe Mosseri (New York City, NY) 646K
17 Tim Phan (Westminster, CA) 646K
20 ZeeJustin (Los Angeles, CA) 625K
24 Paul Wasicka (Boulder, CO) 558K
25 Jimmy Tran (Las Vegas, NV) 550K
28 Bill Gazes (Las Vegas, NV) 510K
29 Lyle Berman (Minneapolis, MN) 501K
31 Jared "TheWacoKidd" Hamby (Henderson, NV) 494K
35 David Oppenheim (Los Angeles, CA) 424K
37 David Levi (Las Vegas, NV) 360K
39 Mikael Thuritz (Stockholm, Sweden) 333K
43 Danny Alaei (Las Vegas, NV) 278K
47 James "KrazyKanuck" Worth (Toronto, Canada) 230K
48 Praz Bansi (London, England) 219K
49 Mark Gregorich (Las Vegas, NV) 197K
54 Patrik Antonious (Las Vegas, NV) 38K

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 3

Before Day 3 started I walked into the bathroom and saw Paul Wasicka trying on a baby blue Full Tilt hat. He normal wears a magnetic logo but left it at home. "Guess I'll have to go with the hat today," he said.

There were two Chops sightings in the Fontana Room in consecutive days. Chops from Wicked Chops Poker fame and now RawVegas.tv was checking out the scene. I love Wicked Chops Poker...

Change100 and I ate breakfast at the Bellagio's cafe behind the conservatory. We had a nice seat along the rail overlooking the flowers. She opted for the Bellagio omelet which is filled with Maine lobster. Jani Sointula sat at a nearby table.

When I set up my laptop in media row about thirty minutes before the start of Day 3, I overheard two dealers talking about poker they played off the Strip. They each shared bad beat stories. I decided to come up with a rate sheet to hear bad beat stories:

Liz Lieu = Free
Readers = $1
Dealers = $5
Bloggers = $27
Pros = $100
European Pros = 100 Euros

Just before the action began, Shecky told me that he saw Phil Ivey at the Fontana Bar buying a watch from some guy wearing a PokerStars shirt.


Sweet Sweet Erica
Erica Schoenberg wore a white silk shirt and black shorts. She also has a pink iPod mini and might be the sweetest person in poker.

In his interview with Poker News, Phil Ivey said that he's only playing two WSOP events this summer. Guess which ones?

"They think I'm an idiot," imper1um told LeAnne our new PokerNews reporter. No one at his table knew that he was the number one ranked online player in the world. At the end of the day, he was 15th in chips.

At one point play was suspended as officials "went to the tape" to figure out a chip discrepancy. I got an unexpected fifteen minute break so I sprinted to the sports book with Benjo. The French kid is my new sidekick. I'm thinking about adding him and Snoopy to my NYC entourage with Derek, The Rooster, and F Train. Anyway, I got Benjo hooked on sports gambling. I feel awful because he's down since the trip started. Everything we bet on goes to shit. I even made him cash out all of his $50 bills and get new ones. I told him about Grubby's superstition that $50 are bad luck. He told me that it is tough to get $100 bills from French banks because of all the counterfeit issues. Anyway, we lost on the Nets-Raptors game. Spread was 5 and Nets lost by 6. Merde!!

I think that I got a waitress fired because she refused to serve me (either water or mineral water - I go to the bar to drink booze) on two consecutive days in media row. All the other waitresses brought me Perrier or bottled water. One even told me to take back my a tip. Anyone who's been around me knows that I'm a generous tipper. For some reason that one waitress snubbed me. She really set me on tilt when she actually pretended to take my order than never brought me anything. I metioned that to one of the floor supervisors that I know. He said that some pros complained too and that he'd pass along the complaint. We never saw her again. I wonder if they'll ever find the body...

Once the money bubble approached, for some reason security guards were letting in spectators which was a nightmare. Sometimes I see how casinos run things and I'm amazed at their decisions. With $4 million on the line, you figured that the Bellagio would ban all spectators and rope off certain areas. But that didn't happen.

The Poker Shrink almost pummeled a reporter from a different outlet. If you have never met the Poker Shrink, he's one of the nicest guys that I've met. But he's also a big dude. I definitely wouldn't want to piss him off. That guy was lucky I talked the Poker Shrink down. Otherwise he would have gotten an atomic wedgie been tossed into the Bellagio lake.

Foiled Coup showed up with his German stripper friend, who wore a lime green Marilyn Monroe dress. He was still sans camera and hoped that James Van Alstyne would bring one in for him.

Amy Calistri and I did a dial-a-shot at the Fontana Bar with AlCantHang.

Shronk told me that he saw Ray Davis shooting dice with Davidson Matthew and Amnon Filippi on one of the breaks. Davis was still in the tournament and was late a few minutes getting back to his seat.

At one point Gavin Smith was doing chipcounts for PokerWire. It's a tough life. One minute you're a millionaire. The next you're broke and doing chipcounts on Roland de Wolfe. I'm joking about Gavin being broke. Then again, when you drink as much as he does and throw around a ton of cash in outrageous prop bets, I'm shocked that he's not busto.

Linda Geenen dealt in the Fontana Room during the last level. I had not seen her yet on this trip but I barely spent any time in the poker room. She gave me a big hug.

I lost $20 doing coinflips with Gaz. Talk about a bad beat. I called heads and tails fell. So rigged. By the way, Gaz told me a hilarious story about getting pulled over by Las Vegas police. Gaz is an Aussie and staying at a friend's house while he's away on business. Gaz drove Hux's car from the Bellagio to the house.

"Hux tells me if I get pulled over, the registration and insurance is in the glovebox," Gaz said. "Sure enough, I got pulled over about 10pm on the way home tonight. I think maybe it was just cos I didn't look like I knew where I was going (I missed the turn-in to the condos) and was riding the inside turning lane a little. Anyway, the cops get out of the car and I do the donkiest thing of the year. I go to get the paperwork out from the glovebox. Cop A shouts "He's reaching!" and both cops draw their guns. My hands were in the air so fucking quick. Scary shit. I reckon if I hesitated, they shoot. So they get to car, tell me put my hands on head and get out, so I do, explaining to them I am from Australia and Australian license was in pocket. They checked it, tell me next time put my hands on the steering wheel if I am pulled over, and let me go."

Gaz was almost shot by trigger happy Las Vegas cops. They let him go when realized he wasn't a tweaker, just an Australian.

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out Flipchip's WPT Championship photos.

And you can follow the WPT Championship by visiting our live updates over at Poker News.

While you are there, peek at the Poker News extensive WPT Championship video gallery put together by our mulitmedia guru Shronk. The video gallery includes interviews with your favorite pros such as Phil Ivey, Zee Justin, Humberto Brenes, Roland de Wolfe, and Patrik Antonius.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/25/2007 12:26:00 PM | Permalink |

 
WPT Championship Day 2: Phil Hellmuth Poker

By Pauly

I wanted to sleep in on Monday morning, but I had to get up early for an appointment with a real estate guy about an apartment rental for the World Series of Poker this summer. My guy found a good property less than ten minutes away from the Rio. He showed Change100 and myself the furnished apartment with a big screen TV and free internet. It was in a gated community with tennis courts and a couple of pools. All I could think was... 1. Who the fuck plays tennis outdoors in balmy Las Vegas? and 2. I wonder if the gates are tall enough will keep the miscreants out?

Sure the Redneck Riviera might have been fun to read about, but it was an unpleasant experience living there. I'm still shocked that my building unit didn't blow up from the homemade meth lab upstairs or that I didn't get clipped in a drive-by-shooting. The bright lights of the Strip don't reach out into those darkened areas of Las Vegas where the sketchy souls operate. Most of them gravitated to where I used to live on Tropicana.

I ended up renting the new apartment for two months. It's not as nice as my apartment with Grubby in Henderson, but it's much closer to the Rio which will cut down on my commute from almost an hour a day. That means about five or six extra hours of sleep per week this year. Plus the apartment in the Bella Vita was the first and only place I had to look at. The last thing I want to have to do is schlep all over Vegas seeking out Tweaker-free apartment complexes with a decent internet connection. I paid my deposit and was set up before the action started for Day 2 of the WPT Championships at the Bellagio.


Anna "The Poker Fairy" Wroblewski
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
The nymph-like Anna Wroblewski began Day 2 as the chipleader and did her best to keep herself at the front of the pack. She has been playing with an air of confidence that I had not seen in a very long time. Plus she's been having fun. Although she admits she's a little nervous, she's been running over her table at times despite the fact she's barely 90 pounds and has been drinking heavily like AlCantHang at happy hour. At one point, the Poker Fairy was knocking back a shot of Jagermeister chased by a glass of Red Bull. Most of the day, she sat at her table on two stacked chairs and swigged a bottle of beer.

You should check out an interview that Tiffany did with her during one of the breaks.


Click here to view the video of Anna
Phil Hellmuth and Jamie Gold started Day 2 in the poker room since the Fontana Room could only hold 24 of the 48 tables that would be needed to host the remaining 479 players. For the most part both players were behaved as they focused more on the hands in front of them than talking smack with one another.

Gold struggled for most of the day but managed to advance to Day 3 after he rivered a set of 10s and his opponent thought he was bluffing. Hellmuth caught cards and avoided playing big pots. That's a trait that plenty of the old school poker pros have a habit of doing. In the early stages of a major tournament, they are not willing to risk the majority of their stack unless they got the best of it. Hellmuth slowly accumulated chips as he played conservatively throughout the session. In an interview with PokerNews, he managed to refer to himself in the third person. "I'm playing small pots poker. That's Phil Hellmuth poker."

Thanks for the quote, bro.

Day 2 went as fast as I had seen a tournament progress. With ninety minute levels, play should have gone a tad slower. However, there were so many eliminations that we missed dozens and dozens because they flew by us so fast. I did see a few big named pros bust out like former WSOP Champions Johnny Chan, Jim Bechtel, Doyle Brunson, Joe Hachem, Tom McEvoy, Huck Seed, and Scotty Nguyen. Last year's champ Joe Bartholdi busted out along with Barry Greenstein, Chau Giang, Allen Cunningham, Erick Lindgren, Daniel Negreanu, Mike Matusow, Marcel Luske, Gavin Smith, Gus Hansen, Kathy Liebert, Vanessa Rousso, Dewey Tomko, Devilfish, Bill Chen, and David Sklanasky.

Roland de Wolfe avoided losing most of his stack when he flopped two pair and it held up against JC Alvarado's flush draw. That hand pushed him over the 500K mark as he snagged the chiplead away from Hellmuth in the last hour on Day 2.

Here are the unofficial Top 10 in chips:
1 Roland de Wolfe 535K
2 Phil Hellmuth 528K
3 Sorel Mizzi 499K
4 Steve Wong 476K
5 Paul Wasicka 430K
6 Patrik Antonius 408K
7 Stan Fulton 397K
8 Jake Minter 396.5K
9 Can Kim Hua 384.8K
10 Paul Lee 382.7K

Notable Stacks:
Anna Wroblewski 346,600
Isaac "I Got 800K Stuck in Neteller" Haxton 318,700
Mike Wattel 313,100
Gavin Griffin 291,400
Sammy Farha 253,300
David Oppenheim 253,000
Daniel Alaei 237,300
Freddy Deeb 235,600
Ram "I Owe Phil Ivey a Shitload of Cash" Vaswani 234,900
David Levi 233,700
Krazy Kanuck 228,200
Barny Boatman 223,500
Carlos Mortensen 220,900
Amir Vahedi 218,500
David Daneshgar 194,500
ZeeJustin 193,300
Scott Clements 171,400
Chip Reese 171,100
Robert Mizrachi 163,300
Martin De Knijff 160,500
Joe Tehan 153,400
Hoyt Corkins 148,600
Abe Mosseri 147,900
Quinn Do 145,000
Phil Ivey 143,400
NeverWin 140,700
Vinny Vinh 129,300
Rob Hollink 128,000
Amnon Filippi 122,200
Jon Little 121,300
Bill Gazes 117,600
Sam Grizzle 112,000
Rehne Pedersen 111,100
Jennifer Harman 110,600
Billy Baxter 109,500
Johan Storakers 109,300
Erica Schoenberg 107,200
Scott Fischman 101,500
Erik Friberg 101,400
Jani Sointula 91,500
Jamie Gold 91,000
Mark Gregorich 84,100
John Myung 83,100
David Dicken 83,000
Ross Boatman 81,100
Lyle Berman 80,500
Isabelle Mercier 79,600
James Van Alstyne 77,300
Liz Lieu 76,500
Joe Sebok 73,900
David Singer 73,200
Ben Roberts 70,500
JohnnyBax 70,200
Melissa Hayden 66,400
Thomas Wahlroos 64,100
Greg FBT Mueller 62,200
Bob Stupak 61,200
Berry Johnston 58,400
Bob Feduniak 55,100
Allen Kessler 52,400
Shannon Shorr 51,500
Andy Black 48,800
Humberto Brenes 44,300
JC Tran 33,700
Nordberg 26,400

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 2

Before the tournament started, one player (presumably a satellite qualifier) asked Todd Brunson to autograph his hat. Twenty minutes later, Todd Brunson busted out. At last year's WSOP, Snoopy was the first person to point out that Todd is a dead ringer for Comic Book Guy on The Simpsons. When Brunson busted out yesterday by a set over set, I muttered underneath my breath, "Worst beat... ever."

Dan Alspach's theme of the day was cats. He had a visor and a matching Hawaiian shirt with plenty of cats on both. Doesn't he know that cats are symbols of bad luck in some cultures? Alspach lost a race late in the day and busted out, joining his main squeeze JJ Lui on the rail.


The Birth of Cool: Sammy Farha
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
Sammy Farha got the nod for funkiest shirt of the entire field. It looked like he took one of my tapestries from the good old college days and turned it into a shirt. Far out man. But seriously, is there a poker player in the universe with a higher cool quotient than Sammy Farha?

Carlos Mortensen was playing his PSP at the table while Barry Geenstein was sending text messages and emails during the down time at the tables. The TD had to make an announcement that players had to step back from the tables to text message and use their phones.

Aaron Scott gets the award for Best Boart Impression. He had his entire table laughing in stitches, including the dealer. Everytime he scooped a pot, he'd say, "Niiiiiiiiiice!'

I was pulling for a few younger Scandi players to do well like Johnny Lodden and William Thorson. Both busted out on Day 2. The Fins are looking strong with Patrik Antonius and Jani Sointula still alive.

Ram Vaswani and Phil Ivey have been avoiding each other while they focus on poker. Been hearing both sides of their golf-prop bet story ever since I was in Australia and word got out that Ram lost his shirt. My two cents... Ram got hustled because he didn't do his homework. He should have known that Ivey's golf game improved and he had been playing in Mexico with Michael Jordan. Ram should pay his debt, take the hit like a man, and get the money back on the course after the WPT ends. It's not like Ivey would ever shy away from any future prop betting. Speaking of Ram, several members of the Hendon Mob are still alive including both Boatman brothers.

Although Isabelle Mercier, Melissa Hayden, Liz Lieu and Erica Schoenberg all advanced to Day 3, I lost track of Kristy Gazes. Jimmy Choo's favorite customer was shortstacked most of the day and busted out. Anna Wroblewski still leads all of the remaining women in the field.


Erica Schoenberg
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
Newhizzle didn't look too good with series bags under his eyes. The kid looked like he had been up for a week straight. He wore a Phil Lesh and Friends t-shirt while the day before he sported an Allman Brothers Band shirt. I'm laying good odds that Newhizzle has had some experience in high altitude training.

Huck Seed, on the other hand, always looks like tired like he just got up and had been waking and baking before work. The number on his Full Tilt jersey read.... 69. I have earned enough points on Full Tilt for a FT sports jersey. Too bad they won't let me do 420 as my number.

Devilfish complained about his table that featured Joe Hachem, David Oppemheim, and Young Pham. "Slowest table in the world," he screamed. "You guys must have been out smoking joints."

Foiled Coup, everyone's favorite homeless British photographer, showed up wearing a black suit with white socks. He was with a slutty looking blonde in a skimpy outfit and took a few photos of her on the veranda. He insists that she's a model from Germany, but I could have sworn that I've seen her exotic pole work at the Rhino sometime in the past. I was shocked that Foiled Coup has shifted his deviant focus off of Asian women.

I love a good segue. I was trying to come up with a nickname for Anna Wroblewski. I started calling her Anna the Poker Fairy. But man, that's kinda lame. I could do better. How about Anna the Little Lebowski? Leave your vote for her nickname in the comments.

Scotty Nguyen had three stacks of $10,000 in bills at his table. With a shortstack to start the day, he was getting his cash handy for a high stakes cash game after he busted out.

Andy Black put his Eminem t-shirt on hold as he wore a pink Capt. American shirt instead.

Capt. Tom's Penis is still alive. He's been keeping his eye on Anna's back.

During one of the breaks, I walked over to the sports book to put a bet in on the Pistons. Fuckers barely covered. I pushed as the Pistons won by 8. A push is almost as good as a win in Pai Gow, but sucks horribly in sports betting.

In case you were wondering, the WPT Championships have been ending early around 9pm. They have been playing without a dinner break which means straight poker from Noon to Nine with four fifteen minute breaks after each ninety minute level. Since the action is over early and I rush out of the Bellagio to go back to my room to write... there has not been too many hooker sightings at the Fontana Bar. Not to worry, there will be a few late nights on the schedule. Plenty of time to get new material for my upcoming book... Existentialist Conversations with Hookers.

And back by popular demand...

Last 5 Pros I Pissed Next To...
1. Humberto Brenes
2. Mike Binger
3. The Grinder
4. Gus Hansen
5. Jim "KrazyKanuck" Worth

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out Flipchip's WPT Championship photos. He's the best in the business.

And you can follow the WPT Championship by visiting our live updates over at Poker News.

While you are there, peek at the Poker News extensive WPT Championship video gallery put together by our mulitmedia guru Shronk. The video gallery includes interviews with your favorite pros such as Phil Hellmuth, Paul Wasicka, and Vanessa Rousso.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/24/2007 12:14:00 PM | Permalink |

 
WPT Championship Day 1B: Gary Greenburg and the $100 Belly Poke

By Pauly

As I walked out of the Fontana Room a quick flash from a camera blinded me. A woman the size of Lawrence Taylor wearing a fanny pack and a WPT visor snapped three photos in a row as I struggled to regain my vision. She was trying to get a picture of Doyle Brunson who lumbered behind me. I wanted to grab Texas Dolly's crutch and spear the overzealous tourist in the ribs.

Almost three hundred players filtered out into the casino area where they were mobbed by hundreds of fans, friends, and family members. The scene has become all too common at poker tournaments. Our celebrity culture worships anyone we see on the boob tube including poker players. The result is a swarm of autograph seekers. Of course in the 21st century the autograph has been replaced by the photograph as people fumbled with their camera phones and disposable cameras.

The air quickly filled with cigarette smoke as nicotine jonesin' players lit up. It had been over ninety minutes since their last cigarette and they chainsmoked and told other smokers bad beat stories while they fought off the sunburnt camera vultures. Several more camera phones appeared out of nowhere as fans grabbed a piece of any poker pro they could find. One young woman got groped by Devilfish as they posed for a photo near the slot machines. Another guy and his nine-year old son took a photo with Scotty Nguyen who held a beer in one hand and put his other arm around the kid.

"Excuse me," asked one forty-something guy with a beer gut the size of a boulder said as I made my way through the dense deluge of people. "Is Gary Greenburg playing?"

"Gary who?"

"Gary Greenburg. That guy who gives all his money to those African kids."

"You must mean Barry Greestein," I corrected him.

"Yeah Gary Greestein," he said.

"No. He played yesterday, but his son is over there," as I pointed to the Fontana Bar where Joe Sebok talked with a slimmer Gavin Smith.

I rushed over to the sportsbook and put in a couple of bets on the NBA playoffs. Since I had not played a single hand of poker since my arrival in Las Vegas on Friday, I needed my gambling fix. I craved action and bet the Mavericks, the Spurs, and the Cavs. I also bet the Yankees heavily. They had not been swept in Boston in what seemed like almost a decade. The game seemed like a lock. I went 1-3 with my picks as I found myself stuck a grand without playing one hand of Hold'em or Pai Gow.

I felt bad for Benjo because I got him involved with one of my vices.

"What have you done to the poor chap?" Jen from Blonde Poker said in her very proper English accent. "He's been in America for two days and he's picking up your bad habits."

"Strips clubs are next," I answered.

After reading about my March Madness adventures in the sportsbook at Red Rock with my brother and Senor, Benjo was intrigued about the sportsbooks in Las Vegas. He asked me about sports betting with the spread when we were in Monte Carlo. Back in France he bets on football but wanted to get in on some sportsbook action. He pulled out a $50 bill out of his wallet and told me to put it on the same team I was going to bet. Since Tony Parker was also French, it seemed like the right thing to bet on the Spurs. Of course, I felt terrible that my pick went down the crapper. Not only did I piss my money away, I also lost Benjo's money.

I grabbed a beer at the Sportsbook bar and walked back to the Fontana Room. I stood outside to observe the scene while the break ended. Spectators pestered the maroon blazered security guards to let them inside, while a wedding party walked through the entire crowd. They must have been taking wedding photos in the conservatory that had been pumping out flowery aromas due to the recent rotation of flora which fit into the spring theme. The groom carefully held up the bride's train as they navigated the crowd of degenerate gamblers and poker wastrels and all I could think was that 1 out of every 2 marriages fail in America. The young couple were a walking coinflip.

Back in the Fontana Room, there was barely any room to walk. A Dutch film crew camped out on the table in front of me which made it difficult to get in and out of my work area. I must have ruined dozens of shots as the camera guy cursed me out in Dutch.

The day was quiet even though Mike Matusow played. He was on the other side of the room and was relatively calm. Compared to the first day, the action was slow and nowhere as entertaining as the Phil Hellmuth and Jamie Gold spectacle. Those two should go on the road together.


Photo courtesy of Flipchip
The only fireworks involved Vinny Vinh and Devilfish. The two are feisty and love to talk smack. Vinh had been needling Devilfish all afternoon.

"You are not a Devilfish. You are a little fish," explained Vinh.

"Who are you?" shot back Devilfish. "Come to talk to me after you write a poker book."

That might have been the only banter all day which was minor compared to the Hellmuth-Gold pissing match.

The big story had to be the strength of the field with some of the best players in the history of poker. Over 20 multiple WSOP bracelet winners played on Sunday in the WPT Championships such as Doyle Brunson (10), Johnny Chan (10), Erik Seidel (7), Billy Baxter (7), Layne Flack (5), Ted Forrest (5), Huck Seed (4), Scotty Nguyen (4), Allen Cunningham (4), Daniel Negreanu (3), Chip Reese (3), Chau Giang (3), Dewey Tomko (3), Bill Chen (2), Mile Matusow (3), Minh Nguyen (2), Carlos Mortensen (2), Sam Farha (2), Humberto Brenes (2), Pat Poels (2), and Steve Z (2).

Oh in case you had a hard-on for things like chipcounts... Sammy Farha ended Day 1B as the chipleader with over 200K. Anna Whatshername ended Day 1A as the chipleader in her flight.

Players who did not advance to Day 2 included: Phil Laak, Erik Seidel, Clonie Gowen, The Grinder, Antonio Esfandiari, Ed Moncada, Marco Traniello, Layne Flack, Jen Tilly, Max Pescatori, Gene Todd, Bill Edler, Nam Le, sbrugby, Jeff Madsen, John Gale, Cyndy Violette, John Juanda, David "The Dragon" Pham, TJ Cloutier, Shaniac, Men The Master, Barry Shulman, Doug Lee, Mike Woo, Tuan Le, Johnny World Hennigan, Chad Brown, and Davidson Matthew.

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 1B

Ted Forrest busted out on the second hand. He had his Aces cracked by the Hilton Sisters. Hollis Stabler rivered the set. Live poker is rigged.

Mike Matusow showed up to the tournament feeling sick. He skipped the first hour of play and took a nap on one of the plush circular couches that lined the wall of the Fontana Room.

Joe Hachem arrived fashionably late as he took a page out of Hellmuth's book.

Gus Hansen sat a table with Erick Lindgren, Lee Watkinson and Doyle Brunson. After hands that he played, he'd been see talking into a voice recorder in Danish.

Doyle Brunson bluffed Erick Lindgren out of a pot with.... 10-2. He showed the cards and flashed a huge smile. Lindgren rapped his fist on the table and said, "Nice one."

At the EPT Championship in Monte Carlo, there were over 200 press badges issued in a 604 player tournament. That's a ratio of 1 press member for every 3 players. At the WPT Championship, there were around 60+ badges issued for 640 players or one member of the press for every ten players.

Isabelle Mercier listened to a pink iPod mini at the table. Jen Harman has the same one but in green. Isabelle also sported a Montreal Canadians t-shirt. For most of the day, she was perched up on her chair... barefoot. She smoked a lot on the veranda where most of the European players hung out on their breaks.


Max Pescatori wore all red (from the waist up) including a red shirt and a red skull cap. The Italian Pirate was seen drinking Pellegrino.

Steve Hall aka Foiled Coup is having another rough tournament. Poor guy. Last year at the WPT Championships, he had his badge confiscated because it was a Poker Pages badge and he had quit their organization. The owner found out he was using their credentials and she bitched out a few WPT suits. They grabbed the badge and threw it in the trash can. This year, Foiled Coup has a badge since he's working for an Italian poker site. However, his laptop is on the fritz along with his camera. He had a borrowed digital camera with instructions that were in German. He would have switched it to English, but he couldn't figure out how since it was stuck in German mode.

Antonio Esfiandari's girlfriend somehow convinced the security guard to let her into the Fontana Room. She delivered him a pizza and a fruit cup. He didn't get a chance to finish the fruit cup. The magician busted out on the last hand of the day when his 9-9 ran into J-J.

Jen Tilly stormed out of the Fontana Room after she busted out. Hey, at least Bride of Chucky outlasted her boyfriend The Unabomber.

Benjo sweated David Benyamine's table in the poker room (where they had to use a couple of tables for the tournament). A few drunk fans on the rail were joking about Benyamine's recent weight gain. One guy offered Benjo $100 to poke Benyamine in the stomach. Benjo walked over to Benyamine and told him (in French) that he had a shot at free money if he could poker his belly. Benyamine laughed and said it was OK. Benjo poked him a few times and collected a $100 bill. He was up for the day after I lost him $50 on the Spurs game.

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out Flipchip's WPT Championship photos. And you can follow the action from live updates over at Poker News that are written by yours truly.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/23/2007 11:35:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WPT Championship Day 1A: The Golden Bluff and Anna Who?

There could have been worst places to work than the Fontana Room at the Bellagio Casino. Even though I was wedged up against the back wall on a table that was underneath one of the gigantic plasma screens and my laptop barely fit on the tiny table more suited for hobbits than a tournament reporter, I couldn't complain. As I glanced over my shoulder out the glass window that overlooked Las Vegas Blvd., I could glimpse at the majestic Bellagio fountains with the faux Eiffel Tower in the background. Then right in front of me sat the greatest show in poker.... Phil Hellmuth.

Ten time-bracelet winner. Youngest WSOP world champion. "Best NL Hold'em player in the world," as he's often claimed, the Poker Brat is as much as a marketing genius as he is a sensationalistic megalomanic hyena-hooting crybaby. Love or hate him, you can't take your eyes off the guy who is often the tallest player in the room and compulsively clad in all black. Aside from Mike Matusow, there's not a louder guy in poker.

Since I started covering tournaments, I've seen Hellmuth kick over chairs, call dozens of his opponents donkeys, admit that he can dodge bullets, and walk off the TV stage at the WSOP main event over to media row where he asked BJ and I what we were writing about him. I even interviewed him in the hallway at the Rio and I asked what was on his iPod. He happily showed me a ton of rap and hip-hop.

"I like Jay-Z," he said.

In the past two years, I had never had a better seat to cover poker. I sat right in the middle of Phil Hellmuth and Jamie Gold's tables. To my left was Hellmuth who berated everyone within a twenty-five foot radius and to my right was Gold who played nearly every hand and talked a fast as he played. There was never a dull moment in the Fontana Room because both players constantly jawed at their tablemates and when they grew bored of that, they talked shit with each other.

Hellmuth was operating in rare form. He arrived ninety minutes late in true Hellmuthian fashion. He sat down at his table just as the players went on the first break. He walked outside to the veranda where he chatted with Gold who sat at a table and ate a jumbo shrimp salad. John Bonetti, dressed like an old-time NBA referee wearing black sweat pants and a white and black shirt, pulled Hellmuth aside and quickly told him about Gold's bluff.

Gold sat at one of the most difficult starting tables that I had ever witnessed live. The Poker Shrink and I dubbed it the Champions Table which included: Tony Cousineau, Abe Mosseri, Hoyt Corkins (2003 WPT Foxwoods Champion), Maureen Feduniak, Adam Weinraub (2007 WPT Invitational Champion), Tuan Le (2005 WPT World Champion), Jamie Gold (2006 WSOP Champion), Francois Safieddine, and Scott Clements (2006 WSOP bracelet winner). England's John Duthie, the EPT creator and first player to ever win $1 million on a televised poker tournament, was moved to the table late in the afternoon along with 2004 WPT Champion Martin de Knijff.

If his table was not tough enough, Tuan Le drew a nightmare assignment as he sat to Gold's immediate right. Le's hellacious day began with the big bluff from Gold. It was still the first level, not even an hour in with the blinds at 25-50 as the players began with 50K in chips each. Both players had a penchant for playing any two cards. Known as a cagey and unpredictable player, I was surprised to see Le check on a board of 2s-2c-Jh-7d-4c. There must have been five or six thousand in the pot and Gold looked down at his stack and announced all in. Le sat and stared at the flop for several minutes as a panicked look blanketed his face. He said he had K-K but we'll never know for sure. I put him on A-7 or a small pair like 6-6 or 5-5 because he thought for a long time as Gold stood up. At that point, a wall of media reps surrounded the table. Camera crews fought for position as Gold paced back and forth behind the table.

"Will I be the first player out?" Gold asked the media.

When he was told that no one had been busted out yet, he turned to Le and said, "I've got a huge hand. I don't know, if it's taking you this long maybe you have a huge hand, too. If you do have me beat it'll be an amazing call."

Le must have put Gold on trip 2s if he actually held pocket Cowboys. Like I said, we'll never know what he really had. Le reluctantly tossed his cards into the muck as Gold flipped over 6c-3s for the bluff. Gold flashed a crooked politican's smile as he stacked up the pot. A stunned Le sat there as he resembled a man who just crapped his pants.

"He was about a minute away from sending me home. It wasn't looking good," Gold said to no one in particular.

Once Hellmuth got wind of the bluff, he challenged Gold to a prop bet. Gold gave Hellmuth 3 to 1 odds. If Gold advanced to Day 2, Hellmuth would give him $5K. If he busted out, he would have to give Hellmuth $15K. Hellmuth tossed him a Bellagio $5K chip to hold on to.

"I expect to get that back plus 15 more," he barked.

The two kept on trash talking for several minutes when Hellmuth announced, "You're the only one in the room who had the balls to bluff Tuan Le. Every hand that I'm in with Tuan, I make sure I have the nuts. But you pulled off a bluff. Every time you bluff Tuan, I'm going to give you $500. Cash."

Gold accepted the bounty and within a few minutes he called Hellmuth over. He successfully bluffed Le and Hellmuth forked over five one hundred dollar bills. Hellmuth said he'd up the bounty to $1,000. But then he got gun shy.

"I didn't think anyone could outplay Tuan. I have to scale that back down to $500," said Hellmuth as Gold shrugged his shoulders.

Twenty minutes later Gold shouted, "Phil, you owe me another $500."

Hellmuth tossed Gold $500 more in cash as Le sat there like a sullen muppet. Dejected and on mega tilt, he'd bust out towards the end of the day when he ran into Hoyt Corkin's pocket aces.

Although at one point, Hellmuth apologized to everyone at his table about his constant whining, he eventually continued his verbal diarrhea as he shit all over his opponents.

"You throw away A-K and this donkey shows you 5-6 off suit. They think it's a good play. They don't know how bad that is," he scolded one player.

After he flopped a set with J-J and turned a boat, he took a nice chunk of one of his opponents stacks as he admitted, "I was setting you up all day for that hand and you walked right into it. That's why I broke all those records at the World Series. I know my customers."

While Hellmuth and Jamie Gold put on a show for everyone in the Fontana Room, along the other wall everyone had their eyes on Anna Wroblewski. The 21-year old came out of nowhere to win an event at the Bellagio a week earlier. As the story goes, the nymph-like Wroblewski grew up in Chicago and moved to Las Vegas when she was 19 to play poker for a living. She played around town illegally before she went broke and headed back home. She returned to Sin City after she was finally legal but lost her bankroll again. Determined to stay in Las Vegas, she found a job in the service industry grinding out a $10/hr salary. Her first paycheck was $300. Grubby would have been proud, because she cashed it and headed for the Bellagio. She bought into a satellite for a $3K NL event and won a seat. Then she managed to win the entire event collecting a free seat into the WPT Championship and $337K in cash for a first place prize.


Anna Wroblewski
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
Wroblewski bounced all over the room and out to the veranda a couple of times. At one point, Tiffany spotted her double fisting beers while she incessantly talked as the rest of her table sat in silence

"Why isn't anyone else talking?" she asked.

"Because we were waiting for you to stop," answered Irish pro Padraig Parkison.

The guys at the adjacent table had a 50K prop bet going on Wroblewski's weight. The over/under was set at 90 pounds.

She played with a ton of confidence as she became the first player past the 100K mark. She sent Jeff Madsen packing early after she flopped a set of 2's against the two-time WSOP bracelet winner. She added more chips after she scooped a hefty pot with just Ace high.

"Don't you hate it that I keep doing the right thing? They said I was a calling station," Wrobleski joked as her opponent tried to bluff at a pot with the Varkonyi and lost.

Around 8pm, Wrobleski passed the 200K mark and she ended Day 1a as the chipleader with 211K.

"Anna who?" one pro mentioned when he asked us who the chipleader was.

Exactly.

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 1A

The first day of the WPT Championships featured 304 players in all and only 220 players advanced to Day 2. More than half the field has to play on Sunday, but some of the biggest names in poker were at the Bellagio on Saturday. The field was so large that both the Fontana Room and the poker room had to be utilized.

Meanwhile in the glass encased Bobby's Room, a high stakes mixed game began that featured Gus Hansen, David Benyamine, Amir Vahedi, and Patrik Antonius.

Change100 would have had a field day ragging on the fashion choices of some of the players. Dan Alspach arrived in his typical accoutrements that included an extremely loud Hawaiian shirt and a matching visor. His wife JJ Lui sported a black Full Tilt basketball jersey with the #88 on the back and JJ Lui written on the back.

Gavin Smith went for a sophisticated new look with a sleek black Kangol newsboy cap and I hope he burned his old FT baseball hat.

Johnny Bax wasn't wearing his lime green or baby blue shirts. He opted for a canary yellow number which would be perfect if a thick London fog all of a sudden encompassed the entire Bellagio. We'd still be able to see Johnny Bax.

I spotted a couple of Europeans playing in Day 1a including Norway's Johnny "Bad_ip" Lodden and Finland's Jani Sointula. Johnny Lodden is an exceptional player who's biggest fault is his inability to shift gears... mainly into low gear. Lodden only knows how to play super fast and he's been known to amass monsterstacks in EPT events and then implode late into the tournament afer he loses several "monsterpottens" as the Swedes would say. While Patrik Antonius and Juha Helpi are often mentioned as the preeminent players from Finland, you cannot over looked Jani Sointula's game at all. He's the best Scandi poker player that you never heard of. And you can't miss the guy. With long blonde hair, he looks like one of the German terrorists and Hans Gruber's right hand thug from the first Die Hard movie.

I noticed that Hoyt Corkins wore ear plugs at the tables and I wondered if that was to prevent him from hearing Hellmuth and Gold yap back and forth.

Andy Black wore his favorite Eminem shirt. Stephen Bartley from Gutshot described Andy Black's dressing habits in Monte Carlo better than anyone I've read. Bartley wrote, "Andy Black wears the same clothes as yesterday. It's minimalist poker."

I forgot to mention the odd moment when TJ Cloutier walked up to Hellmuth and handed him a wad of cash and a couple of chips. I wondered if TJ was paying back a loan or if he was giving Hellmuth his cut after staking him.

Barry Greenstein sat with his back to one of the plasma screens. He must have had money on the Bulls-Nets game because he turned around every thirty-seconds to check the score.

Over seven tables filled with media reps crammed into the far corners of the Fontana Room as there was barely any room to squeeze through the labyrinth of poker tables. With photographers, cocktail waitresses, floor staff, and players walking back and forth, it was impossible to gain access to some tables because there was simply no way to get close to the action.

CardPlayer and PokerWire took over two full tables while the Poker Shrink, BJ, and I shared one table as other members of the PokerNews crew would stop by to use our laptops. The European press shared a table and it was great to see Snoopy and Jen from Blonde Poker covering the first ever WPT event along with Benjo, a French poker journalist that I met in Monte Carlo who loves The Sopranos. Just to put things in perspective... the entire press room in Monte Carlo was bigger than the Fontana Room where the WPT Championships were being held. Maybe it's time to host the tournament in a bigger facility such as the Bellagio ballrooms where the final tables are taped.


Liz Lieu
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
The always lovely Liz Lieu played in Day 1a. She had a set outdrawn early in the day and also got her Aces cracked. She told me about the hand where her opponent called a big raise preflop. On a board of 9-9-2, she bet out 3.2K, he re-raised to 5K, she re-raised to 12K, and he moved all in. She knew that he either held A-9 or 2-2. Either way, she was beat and folded A-A. Pros can and do fold pocket Aces when they have to. Her opponent flashed her his hand... 2-2. He flopped the boat and luckily for Liz that she didn't lose her entire stack. She finished the day around 43K. I didn't charge her for the bad beat story.

And last but not least, back by popular demand...

Last 5 Pros (and Guy Who Gets to Put His Penis in Celine Dion) that I Pissed Next To...
1. Jani Sointula
2. Jamie Gold
3. Renee Angelil
4. Brad Berman
5. Tom McEvoy

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out Flipchip's WPT Championship photos. And you can follow the action from live updates over at Poker News.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/22/2007 06:02:00 AM | Permalink |

 
2007 WPT Championship Preview

By Pauly


Last year, this is how I described the scene at the Bellagio:

I spotted a crowd of poker fans and enthusiasts milling around the front of the Fontana Room like a a rabid circle of vultures ready to devour a dying carcass. A few random poker pros smoked cigarettes near slot machines and I quickly realized that they were on a break. I spotted Jen Harman taking photos with a few fans as they whipped out their cell phones and took several blurry photos.

"One more photo Jen, please! You're my favorite poker player!"

More fans circled around Marcel Luske, sporting a $4,000 tailored suit from London. Marcel always looks like a million bucks and always accommodates picture requests. He had his arm around two fans on each side of him as he blinked when the flash went off from one of the cameras. The Unabomber posed in front of a dozen tourists as they snapped photos like a drunken menagerie of Japanese businessmen. I elbowed and sidestepped my way past the carnage towards the entrance of the Fontana Room. It was a cluster fuck there too, with players leaving and entering and fans gawking and relatives of players trying to get quick updates. The geniuses who set up the tournament decided to place a souvenir stand right in front of the entrance to maximize profits, but made it almost impossible to get by. I walked past the embankment of star gazing tourists hopelessly clutching sharpies and random poker magazines and desperately seeking autographs from their favorite pros... More

As the WPT Season 5 comes to a close, I'm expecting the same circus-like atmosphere to surround the $25K buy-in championship event, which will officially kick off on Saturday at the Bellagio. The defending champ is Joe Bartholdi who took down over $3.7 million last April. The young gun is looking to make history by becoming the first repeat WPT World Champion.

This year's first place prize is expected to top over $4 million. Let me repeat that again since I want to emphasize the possible first place booty. The WPT is projecting a $4 million first place prize. Only Jamie Gold ($12M minus $6M), Joe Hachem ($7.5M), Paul Wasicka ($6.1M), Greg Raymer ($6M), and Steve Dannenmann ($4.25M) have won more money in a single tournament.

WPT Season 5 was the largest in its history with 18 events including the first ever event in Canada. The first stop on the tour began last May with the WPT Mirage Poker Showdown and since then 17 different players have won WPT titles including 13 first place winners who each walked away with at least $1 million. Over $76 million in total prize money has been awarded in Season 5 and some of the champions included WSOP bracelet winners such as Joe Hachem (1), Johnny World Hennigan (2), and Ted Forrest (5).

Joe Hachem added his name to an elite list of players who have won both a WPT event and the WSOP Main Event. That exclusive club includes Doyle Brunson, Scotty Nguyen, Carlos Mortensen, and Joe Hachem.

"How cool is it to be in a club with only four members?" mentioned Hachem after he took down the Bellagio event last December.

Here's a list of WPT Season 5 Winners:
Mirage Poker Showdown: Stan Weiss $1,294,755
Mandalay Bay Poker Championship: Joe Tehan $1,033,440
Grand Prix de Paris: Christian Grundtvig $907,066
Legends of Poker: Joe Pelton $1,577,17
Borgata Poker Open: Mark Newhouse $1,519,020
Festa Al Lago: Andreas Walnum $1,090,025
North American Poker Championship: Soren Turkewitsch $1,225,920
Foxwoods World Poker Finals: Nenad Medic $1,717,194
Bellagio Five Diamond Classic: Joe Hachem $2,182,075
PokerStars.net Caribbean Poker Adventure: Ryan Duat $1,535,255
World Poker Open: Bryan Summer $913,986
Borgata Poker Classic: John Hennigan $1,606,223
L.A. Poker Classic: Eric Hershler $2,429,970
WPT Celebrity Invitational: Adam Weinraub $125,000
Bay 101 Shooting Star: Ted Forrest $1,100,000
World Poker Challenge: JC Tran $683,473
Foxwoods Poker Classic: Raj Patel $1,298,405
WPT World Championship: ????

And here's a glimpse at the final tables and stats for the previous WPT Championships. Please note that the stats and numbers might be incorrect. My sources were the Hendon Mob's database and the WPT webiste. There were several instances when both sites published conflicting numbers. So take these stats as a rough estimate of what went down:

2003 WPT Championships
Apr 18, 2003
Buy-In $25,000 + $300
Number of Entrants: 111
Prize Pool $2,691,750

Final Table Players
1. Alan Goehring $1,036,886
2. Kirill Gerasimov $506,625
3. Phil Ivey $253,313
4. Doyle Brunson $159,987
5. Ted Forrest $119,990
6. James Hoeppner $93,326


2004 WPT Championships
Apr 23, 2004
Buy-In $25,000 + $300
Number of Entrants: 343
Prize Pool $8,342,000

Final Table Players
1. Martin De Knijff $2,728,356
2. Hasan Habib $1,372,223
3. Matt Matros $706,903
4. Richard Grijalva $457,408
5. Russell Rosenblum $322,660
6. Steve Brecher $232,660


2005 WPT Championships
Apr 24, 2005
Buy-In $25,000 + $500
Number of Entrants: 452
Prize Pool $10,961,000

Final Table Players
1. Tuan Le $2,856,150
2. Paul Maxfield $1,698,390
3. Hasan Habib $896,375
4. John Phan $518,920
5. Rob Hollink $377,420
6. Phil Ivey $264,195


2006 WPT Championships
Apr 24, 2006
Buy-In $25,000 + $500
Number of Entrants: 605
Prize Pool $14,671,250

Final Table Players
1. Joseph Bartholdi $3,760,165
2. David Matthew $1,903,950
3. Roland De Wolfe $1,025,205
4. Claus Nielsen $659,120
5. James Van Alstyne $439,375
6. Men The Master Nguyen $292,915

How sick are some of those final tables? Phil Ivey has made two of them. Quick side note: Phil Ivey is the best big buy-in tournament player in the world. In five events (four 25K WPT Championships and the 50K HORSE at the WSOP) with buy-ins over 25K, Ivey has made three final tables. As Daddy would described, "Pure sickness."

OK, let's get back on track. How about the first ever WPT Championships final table... Phil Ivey, Doyle Brunson, Ted Forrest, Alan Goehring, and Kirill Gerasimov. The WPT doesn't make final tables like they used to. That might have been one of the episodes that helped thrust both poker and the WPT into the mainstream. Although that final table did not air on the Travel Channel until the Spring of 2004, the first WPT Champion was technically declared a couple of weeks before Chris Moneymaker won the WSOP Main Event.

Due to the popularity of the WPT, the number of entrants in the past years have increased at the WPT Championship. 111 to 343 to 452 to 605. I'm setting the line at 706. That's how many players participated in the EPT Championships earlier in the month.

Last year's WPT Championship featured a slew of online satellite winners. I'm going to find out just how many entrants qualified online this year. Due to the UIGEA, I wonder what the drop off will be for internet satellite qualifiers... 50%? 25% 10%? That interesting number could be an future indication of how many players will be qualifying online for the WSOP championship which will affect the overall numbers at this year's event.

So who should you be keeping your eye on at the WPT Championship?

The hottest player has to be JC Tran. He took down a $3K event at the Bellagio two weeks ago and left with a nice score of $272,320. He's free-rolling into the WPT Championship after winning a free seat after his victory at the WPT World Poker Challenge at the Reno. Indeed, JC Tran es fuego! He won the largest and most prestigious online poker tournament after a first place finish in PokerStars WCOOP Championship event. JC Tran is also one of the most prolific players on the tour. In the last few years, he has made five final tables on the WPT including bubbling out in 7th place twice (WPT TV tables are six-handed). Tran has also made four final tables at the WSOP.

There has not been a female WPT Champion in its five year history. Kathy Liebert and JJ Lui came close. JJ has won over 600K this year so watch out. You have to keep an eye on both of them. You can't help but think that Erica Schoenberg and Vanessa Rousso's performances at last year's WPT Championship helped secure them sponsorship deals. They both went deep and all of a sudden became hot property according to online sites. Don't forget about Liz Lieu. She won an event at Commerce in February during the LAPC and she'd love to add a WPT final table to her resume.


Men the Master sits between Erica and Vanessa at the 2006 WPT Championship
James Van Alstyne is at the top of several poker magazine's player rankings. He's won close to 600K this year and made the final table at the Season 4 WPT Championship. When he's on, Van Alstyne is one of the toughest players on the circuit. He's a very polite and mild mannered player which is why he rarely gets any ink or face time.

Paul Wasicka made the final table of the WPT LA Poker Classic and a few hours after the tournament ended, he drove out to Vegas to play in the NBC Heads-Up Championship. As a last minute replacement for Phil Hellmuth, Wasicka went on to win the entire event. Wasicka has over 1M in tournament earnings so far in 2007.

I watched Gavin Griffin outlast the best players in Europe to win the EPT Championship a few weeks ago. He also made the final table of a WSOP circuit event earlier in the year and has been running hot.

Don't overlook Marc Karam, the Canadian who took second place to Griffin in Monte Carlo. Karam also made the final table at the Aussie Millions in January.

The darkhorse has to be Jon Little, a young pro that most of you have not heard of. He lost heads-up to JC Tran during the 3K event at the Bellagio two weeks ago. He also made a final table at the Bellagio last week in addition to cashing in the EPT Championships and the LA Poker Classic. Little also made the final table of the WPT PokerStars Caribbean Adventure.

In some regards, Season 5 of the WPT is their most successful to date. They introduced new hostess Sabina Gadecki along with a brand new set. They also shifted the focus on their coverage and featured more personal stories than just the poker action. The WPT also added new events while some of the older events featured record number of entrants and prize pools.

However, off the felt the WPT had to endure a lot of drama such as the death of an employee, two high profile lawsuits, ending their relationship with the Travel Channel, the dissolution of the PPT, and having French officials deny the WPT's cameras access to the Aviation club.

The most tragic downturn involved the sudden death of WPT photographer Paul Hanum in August of last year. The poker industry is a small community and his death affect many media reps and players especially his co-workers at the WPT. Although I was not friends with Paul, it does seem weird to not see him on the stage snapping winner's photos after the final tables have been completed.

How about those lawsuits? Former hostess Shana Hiatt sued WPTE in September. Her lawsuit sought immediate injunctive relief to allow Hiatt to take a job with NBC after the suits at the WPTE decided to cock-block her and claimed that she had signed a non-compete clause. Hiatt's suit also claimed that the WPT created a hostile work environment.

Then there was the lawsuit filed by some of the top pros in the game in which they claimed the WPTE and their partner casinos had conspired to eliminate competition and violated the intellectual property rights of every player. Some of the players listed on the lawsuit included Howard Lederer, Greg Raymer, Andy Bloch, Joe Hachem, Phil Gordon, Jesus Ferguson, and Annie Duke.

As Phil Gordon mentioned, "With an average of 13 big blinds at the final table, the WPT is a crapshoot."

The controversy surrounded the image release that every player had to sign to play in a WPT event.

Regardless of the outcome of either law suit, the WPT didn't come out looking too good. Of course, their run of bad luck continued when the WPT and the Travel Channel ended their five year relationship as the next season of the WPT moves over to the Game Show Network. The WPT has been the highest rated show on the Travel Channel, yet they decided to not pick up the option on the WPT this year.

According to Amy Calistri's article in PokerNews, "GSN agreed to pay $300,000 per episode for the upcoming season's twenty-three episodes. As part of the deal, GSN has also committed to spend at least $3,000,000 in marketing costs for each season."

The price per episode has decreased due to the over-saturation of televised poker programming. The GSN also has the highly popular High Stakes Poker which many poker purists prefer watching than the WPT.

Most recently, the WPT found themselves getting stiffed by France. There will not be a WPT stop in Paris at the infamous Aviation Club. The W in WPT stands for World and although there were only two events during Season 6 scheduled outside of the US and Caribbean, there is not much of an international flavor to the WPT once the French officals said, "Non" to VVP and Mike Sexton. The Aviation Club is still hosting their championship event, but they will not permit the WPT to film the final table. In January, French officials also told the EPT to screw off when they stepped in and forced the EPT to cancel their stop in Deauville.

Despite all the bad stuff that went down, the WPT has recently announced a stop in Barcelona, Spain as their European replacement to Paris for Season 6. Good news for Spanish poker fans and myself. Barcelona is way cooler than Paris. I had a ton of fun there when I covered the EPT event in Barcelona in 2005 and I'm looking forward to returning to Spain in October.

The WPT is hoping that their Championship event to end Season 5 will be another record setting tournament to cap off another epic year. I'll be at the Bellagio starting on Saturday covering the biggest tournament in Las Vegas outside of the WSOP. I'll be posting on the Tao of Poker regularly throughout the event and don't forget to stop off at LasVegasVegas to see Flipchip's WPT Championship photos. There's not a better photographer in the business.

I'll also be live blogging the action for PokerNews. John Caldwell and the Poker Shrink have assembled one of the best reporting teams that I had ever seen to cover the WPT Championships. I'll be at the Bellagio along with Amy Calistri, Change100, Tiffany Michelle, Shronk, and BJ Nemeth.


Yes, that's correct. BJ Nemeth is back and I'm fortunate that I get to work along side the best tournament reporter in the business. Like Matt Damon's quote in Rounders, I hope to... "fall into our old rhythm like Clyde Frazier and Pearl Monroe."

Stop by Poker News for our live updates, including videos of the WPT Championships.

* * * * *
Check out the Tao of Poker archives to read last year's coverage of the WPT Championships. I consider those posts to be some of the best tournament coverage that I've done to date.

And lastly... Happy 420 Day to all my stoner friends, old hippies, Deadheads, Phisheads, and all my pothead readers. Roll one up. Burn one down. And have a groovy day. After all, it's Friday...

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/20/2007 10:51:00 AM | Permalink |

 
Hold'em Radio Spot

By Pauly


Just a reminder that I will be on Hold'em Radio tonight. Amy Calistri and Lou Krieger have a weekly radio program called Keep Floppin' Aces and I'm fortunate that they booked me as a guest on their show tonight. Their show airs at 9pm ET (or 6pm for all you Left Coasters). I should start my segment at 9:15pm or so.

Stop by the Hold'em Radio website or to listen in...

PC users click here to listen
Mac users click here to listen

Let's see if I can squeeze in POB, The Hammer, and at least one mentioning of the Redneck Riviera during the segment.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/19/2007 10:30:00 AM | Permalink |

 
Ode to John Paul I or Why I Won't Be Working at ESPN

By Pauly

Remember Pope John Paul I? His stint as pontiff lasted less than one month.

Remember my gig at ESPN.com? That lasted about one week.

Why? I will not be working with ESPN at the WSOP this summer due to creative differences. We have since parted ways.

It's still my life long goal to write from them someday. It just won't happen right now. I do not blame anyone that handles the poker section at ESPN. I was their number one choice from the start and as far as they knew... the position was mine and they gave me the go ahead to mention it on my blogs. Feldman even left a comment on the Tao last week expressing, "Glad to have you aboard."

That all changed after a conference call on Tuesday afternoon. A suit in the upper brass (and non-poker person) had an issue with my philosophy of covering poker. The WSOP is not figure skating. It's cut-throat poker in Las Vegas, held in one of the most dangerous cities in the world where crystal meth abuse runs rampant, gangbangers frequently blow each other away, female players offer anal sex for tournament buy-ins, and poker players get robbed in the parking lot of the Rio by gunpoint. Heck, just this past weekend, a pro named William Gustafik was brutally stabbed to death by his wife... in Las Vegas.

That's just the beginning. If you dig deeper, it gets worse.

Phrases like the Hooker Bar or POB (penis on back) is the type of stuff that scares suits in boardrooms. The masses want to hear about those exact things while the mainstream media ignores the deviant side of poker. Anyone who has spent any time on the tour knows that it's a tough life, with too much travel, serious sleep deprivation, casinos taking out too much juice in poorly structured tournaments, while several of your favorite pros seem to be always broke. We're not supposed to talk about how the final tables at the WPT are virtually a crap shoot with their escalated blind structures. We're supposed to stay mum about the deals to chop up prize money that are being made or who has what percentages of who at the final table. That's the reality of tournament poker. And most of the time, you really don't know is backing who.

There's cheating and drug abuse in poker, but you knew all about that already. Half the room at the Rio was flying high on something last year and it wasn't Red Bull, which they ran out of after a few weeks. There are hookers flocking to tournaments and hanging around looking for an easy mark. Even one pro got robbed of his bracelet by two ladies of the night. That seediness hasn't changed in years. Winners piss away their prize winnings faster than they cash their checks. Some players get so burnt out on the grueling lifestyle that they are never heard of ever again. Players fool around on their spouses. Players fuck each other over on shady business deals. Players hustle each other at other forms of gambling whether it's action on the golf course, outrageous prop bets, or straight up at the tables.

And I'm not limiting that aberrant behavior to just poker or professional sports. If poker is a microcosm for real life... those same issues are happening in your neighborhoods and at your workplace. The world is an imperfect place and we're all prone to the immoral side of the road. Throw in a slew of degenerate gamblers, good old fashioned American greed, plus the darkside of Las Vegas and you have a glimpse into the nefarious side of humanity.

The more money that gets involved in poker and the more fame and publicity that the players get helps foster an even harsher scene, where there's more at stake than just the chips on the table. You just have to walk down the halls at the Rio last year to see the most prestigious tournament in all of poker whored out to corporations who in turn hired scantily clad part-time call girls and jacked up strippers to hawk their goods.

Of course there are very few places you will read about those aspects of poker. I was hoping to make a difference this year. I wanted to equally highlight the most spectacular aspects of poker (of which there are many that I'm overlooking in this post) along with the utter lows. As readers and poker players, you deserve to be told the truth about what goes down at the series. And I wanted to be the guy to give you the straight dope.

You know what? I'm still going to do that. It just won't be at ESPN. It will be here at the Tao of Poker, where I don't have an editor hanging deadlines over me. I don't have any suits reminding me about ethics, morality, appeasing advertisers, and towing the company line. There's only one person for me to answer to and that's... me.

Besides, I attract substantially more traffic on the Tao of Poker than at any place I could write for. It's better that I post all my best material here rather than selling it off to someone else and letting them benefit from my spill over traffic that I busted my ass for four years to cultivate and retain.

When I broke the good news last week, the biggest piece of advice that I got from friends and bloggers was, "Be yourself." Even Byron mentioned to me on Sunday, "Please keep your own style."

In a perfect world, I'd be able to do just that and write for ESPN. Right now, that's not going to happen. Perhaps in the future, the climate might change. I hope so.

And please, don't weep for me. This minor disappointment is nothing compare to the kids who got whacked down at Virginia Tech. Weep for their families.

And there's no need to trash anyone at ESPN. They made a mistake and they'll have to live with that decision. I'll be fine. This new development opened up the chance for me to write with complete creative freedom and it also gives me an opportunity to work with some people that I respect and admire. Stay tuned for that announcement shortly.

Again thanks to everyone for their support before and now. The more I think about not altering my writing style and changing my voice... the more it makes sense. Maybe I wasn't cut out writing for The Man. I've always been better off doing things my way. After all, that's what got me here in the first place. Rest assured, you'll get your poker fix this summer... by coming back to the Tao of Poker everyday.

Side note... I will be appearing on Hold'em Radio as a guest on Amy Calistri and Lou Krieger's radio show. That airs from 9pm ET to 10pm ET this Thursday. You can stream it live. I'm sure they will want to discuss this latest situation. Tune in on Thursday to hear my guest spot.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/18/2007 02:31:00 AM | Permalink |

 
Happy Birthday Amy!

By Pauly


Today Amy Calistri turns 32. Happy birthday! This is my favorite pic of Amy that I took during the 2006 WSOP at Tao nightclub during the BoDog party. Not only is Gavin Smith groping her boobie, she's double fisting a cocktail and holding a pack of Marlboros. God bless her!

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/17/2007 10:53:00 PM | Permalink |

 
Tranquilize Your Mind

By Pauly

Things are not the same today. Gaming executives are getting met at airports by stiff G-men with short-hair cuts, earpieces, and the same puke-grey off the rack suit who haul them off to only God knows where. Home games in sleepy suburban cul-de-sacs are getting raided by overzealous law enforcement types wearing enough battle gear to fight the Ansar al-Islam in downtown Baghdad.

Just last month, a good friend who works in conjunction with a popular online poker site almost shit his pants after he missed his flight to Italy and was forced re-book with a stopover in France, the exact country he hoped to avoid in order to stay off the radar from the watchful eyes of trigger happy French authorities itching to bust an online gaming fat cat. He was not the only one who had to enter Monte Carlo from the Italian side of the border. Italy is poker-friendly while the US and France are sending not so thoughtful messages. It's gotten so bad that people actually have to sneak into cities just to do their jobs.

Poker used to be underground and played at your own risk in dingy backrooms, run by chubby desperados with a smile that only a pimp could unfurl at 3am. Then poker got thrust to the center of popular culture under the bright lights of Hollyweird. The result was an onslaught of TV shows, movies, and celebrities playing for charity at the Playboy Mansion. Then there's the misfits venerated as heroes... the slew of scumbags you wouldn't leave alone in the same room as your kids for thirty seconds were all of a sudden the next generation of rock stars appearing in mainstream commercials, popping up on talk shows, and demanding outrageous appearance fees at corporate functions.

And now players are running for shelter. Poker is creeping back into the shadows as it reluctantly heads back underground. The endless struggle and pissing match between big business and the U.S. government has infiltrated several aspects of poker players lives. Everyone is a criminal it seems as the battleground is spilling over into your kitchen home games, onto your favorite online poker sites, and even onto the floor of the World Series of Poker.

The stakes have been raised and you're no longer just risking your bankroll. With every hand you play, you're also risking fines, imprisonment, and having your civil rights violated. According to Pokerati.com's outstanding coverage of Dallas poker raids, there are ten poker rooms in the Dallas area (and four just outside) that have been shut down by the local federalies.

"Dallas po-po says they know about 'a majority' of local games. And even though we have yet to see a single conviction (by judge or jury) of more than 200 potential defendants," wrote Michalski, who is always willing to whip up funny slang for the police.

"The state of Dallas poker is to some extent a microcosm of the bigger, worldwide poker world," Michalski wrote to me in a recent email exchange. "The landscape has shifted, and some are adjusting better than others. And, of course, the law and politics of it all make a difference. It is not the scene it once was - but that doesn't mean it isn't setting itself up to be bigger and better in the not too distant future. There are still people in Dallas just discovering the greatness of the game. And there are still people who are less greedy than others willing to serve them like the valued customers they are."

Hard working people like yourself are old enough to make their own decisions. And if you want to use your free time to play a ring game on Full Tilt or chase down a dream by playing a WSOP satellite at PokerStars or to play in a low stakes cul-de-sac tournament with some friends and neighbors, well in my eyes you all earned the right to do so. It's your life. Your time. Your money.

Life is tough enough without the current Nanny State telling you what you can and can't do. Life is a total grind. If you don't have problems on the home front, you got them at the workplace. The last thing you gotta worry about if a bunch of shotgun-toting deputies wearing ski masks are going to kick down your front door while your neighbor is in the middle of sucking out on you during your weekly homegame.

You have to shovel around enough shit everyday that you deserve a few moments of happiness. Life is about small and simple pleasures. Poker is a gateway to moments of joy and excitement. Like flopping a set against two pair. Like boating up on the river when you know it made your opponent a flush. Like making a big score in a tournament. Like meeting a really amazing new friend through poker. It's those little moments that add up and keep you sane on those horrible days when you wants to bash in the skull of your spouse or co-worker or that assclown sitting next to you on the subway that smells the wipe towel that's shared by the entire second story of a Juarez brothel.

Poker is also a social lubricant that brings together people from all walks of life. College kids. WWII vets. Staunch Republicans. Pinko liberals. Men. Women. Other. Red Sox fans. Yankees fans. Sanitation workers. Politicians. Chefs. Stockbrokers. Immigrants. Jocks. Norwegian teenagers. Former Star Trek actors. Military doctors. Lesbian nurses. Hippies. Grandmas. Taxi drivers. Even bacon loving fat kids from Hilljack, Indiana are playing poker with vegans from Orange County. Humans making connections with other humans. We live in such a disjointed society that poker is a rare instance when people are coming together.

We live in an inharmonious world and poker might be the only thing that two people can agree on. Off the felt it's a different story but while the cards are in the air and as long as chips are getting passed around, for a brief moment... people representing all types of diversity are united. That's the power of poker. Like music, poker brings people together, while politics divides us. I think Bob Marley said it best, "Politics no interest me. Dem devil business. Dem a play with peoples minds. Never play with peoples minds."

I don't know why you play poker, but I have a good feeling that the root of your reasons are filling a gap in your life, whether it's monetary, social, competitive, or sheer boredom. Your minds are getting messed with and there are so many mixed messages out there about the current state of poker. Even the shit that I'm spewing is being made up on the spot.

The best advice I can offer the confused ones is to tranquilize your mind. No need to overthink things. You have to do what your gut tells you. If that means no more poker, then so be it. If it means to keep moving ahead, then go for it. I doubt that any of this mess will be cleared up anytime soon. Prepare for the long haul. I know that I am. It might be a little harder to get money online, or to find a game, or to visit raid-free home games. You might have to risk more to gain access to poker. But so what?

"Life's not fair," as Jimmy Carter once said. That old peanut farmer from Georgia has a point.

Poker is still legal in lots of places. Vegas will always be Vegas as long as it's here, the WSOP will never die. Poker tournaments with million dollar prize pools are popping up all over the globe. There's still plenty of Americans playing poker for a living and making money in related businesses. Pros and entrepreneurs alike are trying to milk the poker cash cow before our federal government and local officials stomp it out like a bad case of the crabs. Who knows if this mess will be resolved in the next six months or the next six years. Poker will continue to grow. You just might not been seeing it in your backyard.

The consolidation of the industry has begun in some areas while in other parts of the world, poker is in the midst of a full out boom or on the cusp of the boom. A perfect example of that is an article I penned about the L.A. Poker Classic. I wrote it for my column in Poker Pro. In the US version, the issue was a little gaunt, not with content because it was a good as it has been, rather there were less ads which was part of the reason I had to take a pay cut. The European version (Poker Pro Europe) that I read in Monte Carlo was a lot more meatier. My article was in there but the issue had less content, yet the ads were plentiful.

Entire football matches in Europe are sponsored by online poker rooms and casinos. Your rake is getting put to good use and has been spreading around into other industries. That boost in income creates jobs and stimulates growth. Whereas Neteller had to fire support staff and some online poker sites such as UB and Absolute Poker terminated contracts with professional poker pros, other poker and gaming related companies in different countries such as Germany, Australia, Israel, and Sweden have been experiencing a hiring boom. They need workers. Fast.

I was in Monte Carlo for less than two days when I was pitched several employment opportunities ranging from writing, to editing, to helping organize a tournament in a country I had never heard of before. A couple of months ago I had only a handful of paying clients (those cheapskates at High Roller have still yet to pay me) and I finally made contact with several people who were being overwhelmed by the viral growth of poker in their home country.

Poker is going to go on no matter what the US courts decide and whether or not other countries want to classify poker as a criminal activity, legitimate sport, game of chance, or nothing harmless like a hit off a hash pipe or getting a blowjob from a professional penis masseuse.

Now a flashback...

Three years ago, a group of poker bloggers joined together to play in an online poker tournament called the Grublog Poker Glassic hosted none other than Grubby himself. That informal group known as the WPBT would run many events that would take place on different poker sites. The eclectic group would also gather in different Las Vegas poker rooms semi-annually to play a live tournament. In 2005, a series of satellites took place where four bloggers earned seats to a $1,500 WSOP event. Joe Speaker, Big Pirate, Russ Fox and Bobby Bracelet were among the lucky bloggers who went to play at the Rio. It was moments after he won his seat that Bobby Bracelet picked up his moniker originated by Derek.

More satellites were held in 2006 and a few more bloggers such as Gracie went onto the WSOP. So who's gonna be next? AlCantHang is hosting a satellite for the 2007 WSOP in less than to weeks. Here's the info:

What: Blogger Bracelet Race
When: Sunday, April 29th, 7pm ET
Where: Full Tilt
Format: NLHE Deepstack
Buyin: $24+2 or token
Password: Send email to blogger_wsop@yahoo.com

This event is only open to bloggers. I encourage everyone to get the word out about the WSOP satellite and help send another one of your peers to Las Vegas this summer to fulfill a common dream held by most poker players... to embark on a pilgrimage to play in their very first WSOP event.

Hope to see everyone there.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/16/2007 12:20:00 AM | Permalink |

 
Sunday Pimp: The Big Game and Quick Links

By Pauly

First of all, I'd like to express a big thank you to everyone who called me about the ESPN gig. My thanks also includes those of you who left comments on the Tao of Pauly and Tao of Poker, sent me emails, text messages, and voicemails. Oh and I even got an e-card! Seriously, thanks for the kind words and thoughts of encouragement. It's the biggest writing gig of my life I'll do my best. I'm just happy to be here and hope I can help the ball club. I just wanna give it my best shot and Good Lord willing, things'll work out...

Here are a couple of quick links:

Caesars Palace Poker Room Review
Robert's Rules of Poker
2007 WSOP Schedule
ESPN's TV Schedule for 2007 WSOP Events

If you are going to Las Vegas in the next few weeks or months and have never played poker at Caesars Palace's (relatively) new poker room, then you should check out Flipchip's review which includes a few cool photos.

By the way, congrats to Flipchip for winning a seat into a 2007 WSOP event courtesy of a freeroll at Sam's Town.


Also, tonight is The Big Game... hosted by Miami Don over at Full Tilt. It is the 4th Big Game this year. I won Big Game #2 in February. Hope to see you there, even though it starts in the middle of The Sopranos and Entourage.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/15/2007 09:43:00 AM | Permalink |

 
Eight Online Hands: Cracking Zeem, Rivering Quads, and More Puerile Donkament

By Pauly

I've been playing a slew of 8/16 and 10/20 Limit on Full Tilt during the last couple of days. Those games have been juicy with tremendous swings. That 10/20 full ring is difficult to find during the times I've been lurking online. At those limits there are a few solid players, but the rest of them are weak-tight or outright horrendous. In the end, I don't make money beating good players. I make the majority of my money by exploiting weaknesses and mistakes from a core group that consists of marginal players, newbies, and bad players. Conversely, I lose most of my money on bad reads, simply getting outplayed, and making rookie mistakes.

Here are eight interesting hands that I encountered in the last few days.

Ah-Jc at 10/20 Limit on Full Tilt: The subtitle of this hand is "Why I'm Glad You Overplay K-J." I found Ah-Jc at an eight-handed table in MP and raised. The button and both blinds called. Four way pot and the flop was Jh-8h-4h. I flopped top pair with the nut flush draw. The blinds checked, I bet, the button raised, and the small blind check-raised. Bastard. The big blind folded and I capped it. The button folded and the SB called. Heads-up. The turn was 10s. The SB bet and I raised. The SB went into the tank and called at the last second. The river was the Kh and I picked up my nut flush. He checked-called my river bet. He showed Ks-Js and I scooped a pot over $300.

6c-6s at 8/16 Limit on Full Tilt: It's an unexciting table and I'm in the big blind at a table with eight players. MP raised and the cutoff called. The small blind re-raised. I called three bets with 6-6 hoping that I flop the Anti-Christ in a four-way pot. The other two players called. Flop was Ks-6h-4s and on cue I flopped a set on a board with two flush cards. I dug in deep to my chair because I knew that was going to be a big pot. Either I was gonna lose big or win big. The small blind bet out and I raised. MP called and the cutoff re-raised. The small blind mucked and by then I put him on Queens or Jacks since he three bet pre-flop. I re-raised to cap it. The other two players called. I put one of my opponents on a flush draw and the other on Big Slick. The turn was Kd as I picked up a boat. I bet out and MP called. The cutoff raised all in for $25 total. I re-raised to $41 and the MP called. The river was 5d. I bet out with a boat and MP called with only $14 left. I won the side pot and the main pot. MP had Ad-Kc and the cutoff had 4h-4d. Too bad they were both short-stacked and all in. The $333 pot would have been bigger if they had more chips. Ugly cooler hand on that flop of K-6-4. Top pair and set over set. Online poker is rigged.

6d-6s at 8/16 Limit on Full Tilt: More wacky adventures with pocket sixes. I subtitle this one... "Cracking Zeem's Over Pair." I'm in the small blind with 6d-6s and Zeem raised UTG. He got one player in MP to call along with myself and the big blind. The flop was 3s-2h-2d. Both of us in the blinds checked-called Zeem's bet. Turn was 5d. The blinds checked and Zeem bet. I check-raised from the SB with a gutshot hoping to find out where Zeem was at... did he have Big Slick or a big pair? The BB folded and Zeem called. I found myself heads-up with Zeem. The river was a lucky 6c. I rivered a six outer. Sweet Jesus. Zeem had 10s-10h. Sorry for the suckout Zeem. It's not my fault. Online poker is rigged.

7h-7c at 8/16 Limit on Full Tilt: I'm in the small blind with a middle pair 7h-7c. I called a raise in a four player pot. I'd been on a "flopping a set" rush and decided to press my good fortune. The flop was a blood-curling As-7s-5s. Although I flopped a set, it was on an all spades board. Obviously not too thrilled about that. Even though I considered check-raising, I pussed out and check-called a bet from the original pre-flop raiser. The other two players folded. Heads-up. Turn was 4d and I check-called again. The river was 7d. I wish poker were that simple. I asked the poker gods to pair the board and they did. Rivering quads after flopping a set is like getting a hummer after you just got laid. Or for you female readers, it's like getting the kitten kissed after a tender love making session. I was ahead all the way. My opponent had Ac-Qd. More proof that online poker is rigged.

Ac-10c at 8/16 Limit on Full Tilt: Seven-handed table and I had been catching a blitz of big cards that held up. I was on a mini-rush when I found Ac-10c UTG and raised it up. There was one caller and the button re-raised. I called along with the second player. Flop was Jc-10s-3c. I flopped second pair and a nut flush draw. Time to jam. I bet out knowing that I'd get raised. The second player called and the button re-raised. I three-bet it and the second player mucked. The button capped it and I called. The turn was Jd. I bet out and the button only called. The river was the Qs. I missed my draw big time. I checked and so did the button. He turned over As-Ah for two pair... Aces and Jacks. That beat my paltry Jacks and Tens.

Js-Jc at 8/16 Limit on Full Tilt: Only four hands after I lost a big pot against A-A, I found myself heads-up with the same player. And guess what? He got Aces twice inside of four hands. Both times they held up as he raided a couple hundred bucks from my stack. Unreal. I found Jc-Js on the button. UTG + 1 raised and I re-raised. Everyone else folded and he smooth called. The flop was 10c-3d-2h. He bet out and I popped him for a quick raise. When he three-bet the flop, I knew I was in trouble but called anyway because I'm the fucker who can't fold a big pair in Limit Hold'em. I called bets on the turn and river when the 10h, then the 8d fell. He turned over As-Ad. Ouch. Aces twice in four hands? So rigged.

8c-7c at NL MTT on Full Tilt: I ended up taking 13th out of 339 players in a MTT early one morning last weekend. I was shocked because not only did I actually play a non-blogger MTT but I actually cashed in it! I played super loose and ended up amassing a stack early when I cracked pocket Aces. My opponent was a maniac at the table. Based on his erratic play and weird bet amounts, I suspected that he was some sort of whacked out druggie who was a habitual shoe-polish huffer or someone addicted to over the counter cough medicine who had been up all night with the cold sweats running around gnawing on dog biscuits and playing fourteen tables at once. Regardless, I had no respect for his raises. The blinds were 50/100 and I found 8c-7c. Maniac huffer raised to 300, which was an actual normal sized bet. He had been betting 4x or 5x or 6x the BB every hand pre-flop. I called the raise and the flop was 7s-6c-3c. Top pair and a flush draw against the maniac huffer looked promising for me. He underbet the pot about and I raised. He called. The turn was 5h. I picked up more outs an open-ended straight draw. He checked and I moved all in for about 2K. I had him covered by 400 and he called. He showed Ah-Ad. Two red aces. Yikes. He trapped me for all my chips but I still had outs. The river was 8s. I missed my flush draw but I rivered two pair which was good enough to crack pocket aces. Rigged. So fuckin' rigged. That hand put my stack over 7K in chips. In the second level, I was among the chipleaders.

8s-5h-5c-3d at a PLO MTT on Full Tilt: I had 8s-5h-5c-3d in the small blind at a six-handed table. Blinds were 60/120 and I was the big stack at my table. Three players limped and I called from the SB as the BB checked. Five out of the six players saw the flop of 10h-9c-5d. I flopped bottom set which means I'm gonna go broke or double up. I was first to act and checked. The BB bet the minimum and the button called. I check-raised to 1K. The BB folded and the button called. The turn was the 2h. I bet close to 3K. The button had 1550 remaining and was all in. The river was 6h. I had a set of 5s while he showed As-Jh-Tc-9s for just two pair. He busted out and I ended up making the final table of that PLO tournament. Of course, I bubbled out of the money in 8th place.

The leading candidate for Bad Beat of 2007 has to be a hand that happened on Wednesday night. I suffered one brutal river suckout where my soul was shattered into a billion fragments, but I'll spare the specific details. Let's just say it was tough enough to stomach what I thought was a two-outer on the river, but the testicle-numbing pain intensified as I hurdled into the upper stratum of Mega-tilt when one of the players piped up in the chat, "I folded the other King pre-flop."

* * * * *
I finally finished my Amsterdam II photo gallery over at Flickr which features 90 pics that I took last week during my 60 hour getaway. You can also check out the Amsterdam II slide show, if you like those sorts of things.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/13/2007 08:37:00 AM | Permalink |

 
ESPN at the WSOP > Monte Carlo Reprise

By Pauly

I have good news. I'm the newest feature writer for ESPN.com. Yes, it's true. Andrew Feldman hired me to cover the 2007 WSOP for ESPN.com. I have huge shoes to fill... following in the footsteps of legendary sportswriter Steve Rosenbloom who provided the content for ESPN last summer.

I guess this makes it an official announcement. I'll be covering the WSOP for ESPN.com and writing feature articles for their poker section. I'll be focusing on writing features and not blogging... which is something I really wanted to do.

The official media guidelines have not come out yet, so I have to wait and see which other outlets that I will be working with. Rest assured that I will be posting on the Tao of Poker and contributing to LasVegasVegas.com as well, I just don't know in what manner or frequency yet.

The ESPN gig is a major milestone. Aside from getting a book published, selling a screenplay, and writing for Rolling Stone... landing the ESPN gig is one the four major goals I wanted to accomplish as a writer. ESPN has published some of my favorite writers including Hunter Thompson, Chuck Klosterman, and Steve Rosenbloom. I'm still a little dazed and confused over the good news.

This has to be of the most humbling and exciting moments that I've ever experienced. I was dreading the WSOP and now I can't wait for it to get here. By the way, check out the 2007 WSOP Schedule.

I never could have made it this far as a poker writer without the support and friendship of my brother and so many of you... friends, readers, and bloggers alike. Special thanks goes out to Flipchip and the Poker Prof for being the first organization to hire me to cover the WSOP back in 2005. Without their initial support, I never would have been in a position to be hired by other outlets and get recognized by ESPN.

And an extended thanks goes out to people who had faith in me and hired me to write for them over the last couple of years. That list includes Flipchip and Poker Prof at LasVegasVegas.com, Wilko and Mickey, Stan Sludikoff at Poker Player Newspaper, Otis and everyone at PokerStars, Trey at FoxSports, Lou Krieger, John Caldwell at Poker News, Johnny Quads at Poker Pro, and last but not least.... Feldman at ESPN.

My first featured article will be published in a couple of weeks. Now I just have to come up with something to write about.

Moving on...

Monte Carlo was a bitch of an assignment and perhaps the toughest assignment of my tournament reporting career. My responsibilities were the most that I've ever had to handle. I grew a deeper respect for people like the Poker Shrink and Otis who have to manage entire blogging teams during poker tournaments. I'm obviously more comfortable with writing than managing. My most dreaded moments occurred when I had to tend to managerial duties instead of sitting down to crank out some writing.

Poker News was shorthanded in Monte Carlo (due to a bad back from the Poker Shrink and the last minute addition of an extra day thanks to the EPT who scheduled it 10 days before the start). But you wouldn't know we were running on a skeleton crew from the coverage since everyone involved did a kick ass job despite the obstacles.

Filipe's photos were some of the best I've seen in the business. Tiffany's work in the videos is excellent and her ability to get players to commit to doing them on their breaks is even a more valuable asset. Shronk was always a professional from the moment I met him in Australia and his video work is the best in poker. He's been able to think quick on his feet and work in difficult environments. He provides the best quality despite having to deal with plenty of technical problems. Shronk is the Charles Oakley of Poker News. He does all the necessary dirty work that doesn't show up in the boxscores.

Sure the workload in Monte Carlo was intense, but I was fortunate to work with cool people, just like in Australia. Whenever you have a core group of people you trust and can get along with, anything is possible. I used to be serious when I said that I could endure working in an Alaskan fishery gutting fish on an assembly line as long as I got to pick the people working next to me.

One of the biggest problems I faced in Monte Carlo was proving my worthiness to the European media reps. Over 200 media badges from organizations from all over the world were issued. The media room was immense and the same room that they held the tournament in the year before. The EPT media room dwarfed anything on the WPT or the WSOP. In short, the EPT and PokerStars treated us tremendously well which included free coffee, tea, Evian water, cokes, and bottles of Pellegrino.

I might be known in some poker circles in Las Vegas or in AC but in Europe I'm a nobody. In some people's eyes... all Americans are the evil offspring of George Bush and I had a Scarlet Letter superimposed on my forehead everytime the other media reps heard American English spew out of my mouth. To some, I was the guy who showed up at the EPT Championship and skipped all the other events along the way. I became the media guy that I loathed at the WSOP who showed up the day before the main event.

I had to gain the respect of the European press and their biggest pros. Even though I had covered two WSOP and poker tournaments all over the world, I was still a fresh fish and a rookie in the eyes of the other people in that media room. I had to prove my worth fast. And unlike prison, I couldn't just walk up to the biggest and baddest motherfucker in the room and pick a fight. I had to do things in more subtler terms. That involved booze.

Pacing yourself during the first two days of any major poker tournament is vital to a reporter. Figuring out the backstory is the second most important thing. That involves collecting gossip from any of the other media reps. Good relationships with other media outlets is essential to attaining information when it matters the most. It's a shit job but when you are able to pool information down the stretch, the job gets a little easier. That's what is lacking in the American media that covers various tours. There's so much paranoia and competition that the grunts on the ground are having a tougher time covering events because of the strict rules put forth by their bosses who are in constant pissing matches with each other. In Europe, it was a much more relaxed working environment... that is, when they know you. Otherwise if you need help, you get that stonewalled expression that most Scandi poker players have made famous.

Booze is a social lubricant in any language and the bar saved my ass in Monte Carlo. The act of buying someone else a drink is a timeless gesture of good will. Garth told me that I should buy rounds or "shouts" in Australia to get on the good side of the Aussies. And you know what? He was right. Same thing worked in Monte Carlo. I offered to buy everyone drinks at some point. That time at the bar within steps of the media room was used to mellow myself out and forge new friendships and alliances. I also used my new contacts to attain essential information on the featured players from their home country. I had no idea who 95% of the players at the EPT Championships were. I needed a crash course in tournament poker in Europe and the other media reps helped me out. A few like Snoopy and Chris from Blonde Poker physically walked the floor with me pointing out wild Scandis or unknown Brits that I had no clue existed.

You also get juicy stories from other media reps, like Dave Colclough catching his wife Rhowena in bed with another guy or a famous Scandi poker pro who had a penchant for hookers and blew most of his winnings in Germany on one of the many working girls. That's stuff is gold in my eyes and I could never get those types of stories if I did not schmooze the "local" press.

I wanted to use the first two days to socially interact with as many foreign media reps as possible. By the third day, I knew who the top Dutch, Norwegians, Swedes, Brits, Italians, and French players were. The slow process of schmoozing and learning new players took a lot of time, something I had very little of during the EPT Championships. I did what I could during those 18-20 hour days.

Overseas poker is on the rise. 200 media reps? 706 players in the EPT Grand Finale? 1.8 million Euros (or $2.4 million) for first place? In short, I was impressed with the output that the entire EPT put forth. I'm looking forward to covering more European Poker Tour events in the future.

When I was wandering around Amsterdam, I considered getting an apartment there for a few months to write and stay at if I decide to focus on more EPT events. I even looked at a few places. Amsterdam is a major airport hub in Europe which is essential. You can take the train some in many other places. It would be a great home base for me and I'm sure the location would give me even more inspiration to write. And it's only a 7+ hour flight to NYC.

Amsterdam is another place for me to consider moving to after the WSOP is over. I have narrowed the choices down to NYC, Amsterdam, and LA. I guess a lot of that decision hinges on what I do at the end of 2007 and see what the state of poker in America is at after the WSOP ends. If I walk away from poker and focus on writing, I'll settle down in NYC or LA and crank out a book. If I decide that the next season of the EPT is for me (or if some really hip and cool publishing company wants to give me a fat advance to write a book about one year on the EPT), then I'll consider Amsterdam. Then again, if ESPN has any interesting projects for me, I'll be up for them.

Currently, I'm in NYC for a few days with a trip to Hollyweird and Las Vegas on the horizon. The EPT will have to wait a while. I have the WPT Championships at the Bellagio coming up at the end of the month and then there's the WSOP this summer, which I'll be covering for ESPN. I still can't believe it.


Photo Credit: Thanks to Otis for the original photo and to Mookie for the photoshopped version!

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/11/2007 12:02:00 AM | Permalink |

 
Otis, Three Brits, and a Swede Walk into a Bar...

By Pauly

"Everything being a constant carnival, there is no carnival left." - Victor Hugo

4am. I stood at the front desk in the lobby of Le Meridien Beach Resort, my four star hotel located on Princess Grace Avenue next to the Monte Carlo Bay Casino where the EPT Championships were held. That's when I spotted Otis stumble into the lobby followed by several inebriated Brits, one of whom carried a silver case.

Only a few hours earlier Gavin Griffin won 1.8 million Euros as he took down the EPT Grand Finale. Since that moment, I sat through a boring press conference, drank several beers in media row with Stephen from Gutshot and Benjamin (a French poker journalist and blogger), and started the toughest part to covering any tournament... fulfilling deadlines for my current employer (PokerNews.com) along with any other news organizations and publications that I promised a story or article. I was scheduled to leave Monte Carlo at 11am and was on the clock with multiple deadlines. I always overextend myself and have to write my way out of a jam. The completion of any major poker tournament is like reaching the top of Mt. Everest. Writing everything up after sheer exhaustion and minor jubilation is like making your way down from The Mountain. And that's when most climbers die... on the way down.

I wrote as much as I could in media row, then headed back to my room so I could watch the Championship game of the Final Four. I did not have a bet in but one of my sheets was still alive. If Florida won, I had a shot at securing second place in the Pauly's Pub March Madness Pool behind Change100 who had a shot of winning it all. If Ohio State won, I was shit out of luck as Ferrari from the Blue Parrot fame would pick up the $400 first place prize.

I blazed through one deadline while the game flickered on NASN (North American Sports Network) in the background. Usually NASN showed hockey at weird hours but in that instance, they gave me a live feed of the NCAA hoops championships as I rushed the last bit of my work. I was in slight awe as I watched the game in Monte Carlo of all places. Most of the time I watched American cartoons or Beverly Hills, 90210 dubbed into French. The few English-speaking channels were CNN or the BBC which focused on the hostage crisis involving Iran and those 15 British sailors.

"The start of WWIII," I muttered to myself as I jotted down a note to get my broker on the phone ASAP to pull all my money out of the US stock market and decided to press it heavily on companies that fed the war-machine.

Halftime of the Florida-OSU game appeared out of nowhere and I went down to the lobby. Part of my duties at the EPT Championship involved handling payment of the hotel rooms. Originally it was a five day tournament and less than two weeks before it went off, it was bumped to six days. Poker News booked and paid for everyone five days at Le Meridien. They added an extra day but had not paid for it. That's where I came in. A popular European pro gave Shronk 2K in Euros of which the bulk was for me too use to pay the rooms. Since everyone was checking out early, I had to pay their rooms before they left while I slept. For most of the week, I walked around with three 500 Euro bills in my pocket. Of course that amount of cash got you jack shit in Monte Carlo.

I paid the room bills for Poker News which included our photographer, Filipe, along with our on air talent, Tiffany. I waited for the front desk guy to print up a receipt when in walked Otis. Or shall I say... in stumbled Otis.

"Doctor!" he shouted as the Brits headed directly to the bar.

They were all staying next door, but their bar closed at 2am. They drank for free after hours until they were finally kicked out. The best thing about my hotel was the 24 hour cafe and bar in the lobby. That meant random sketchy characters showed up looking for overpriced food or someplace to drink when all the other bars closed.

As I walked to the bar area, I spotted Andy Black leaning up against the bar. He tossed aside his raggy Eminem shirt and wore a smart and sleek blazer. He was hoisting his glass and making an inaudible toast with his friends. Otis and the gang were off to the side and huddled around a plush leather couch and an antique coffee table that probably cost more than your car. A burning Chesterfield dangled off the lip of Ed, one of the British media reps, as he carefully set up chips.

"200 Euros. Max buy-in. 1-2 NL," said Otis as he handed me a Monaco beer.

Not only were we going to drink, we were going to play poker at 4am in a darkened corner of my hotel's lobby bar.

"Sure," I said as I opened up my wallet and saw less than 160 Euros. I stashed some cash in the safe and only had a grand in American bucks on me. I peeled off three greenbacks and slyly handed it to Ed, who acted as the banker. Maybe I was buzzed, or brimming with confidence, but I knew I didn't have to go to the front desk to change my US currency for Euros. I knew that I was going to get my original $300 back.

"300 US gets me more than 200 Euros," I said as Ed nodded.

The rest of the players were hammered, including Otis. They had been drinking for three or four straight hours while I frantically rushed three writing assignments and watched the Florida-OSU game.

The Late Night Bar Lineup:
Seat 1: Simon... One of the many Brits at the EPT, he's also known as The Suffolk Punch and was the first blogger to post the now infamous pic of a drunk Bill Chen sans shirt.

Seat 2: The Swede... Like most of the Scandi poker pros I met, they spoke near perfect English, were certifiably crazy, played any two cards, and wore Izod shirts one size too small.

Seat 3: Otis... For a guy who spend most of his working life on tilt, Otis was reasonably calm during the EPT. In a scene out of Star Wars or Casablanca, Otis had to sneak out of Monaco over the Italian border in order to secure safe passage to America due to entanglements with the French government who may or may not have pegged our favorite G-Vegas personality as a criminal. Then again, who in Monte Carlo isn't a criminal?

Seat 4: The Luxembourg Pro... At first glance, the Luxembourgish fellow walked right out of a James Bond flick. He was well dressed, friendly and cheerful, but you knew you couldn't trust him. Was he a good spy? Or bad spy? Or was he just working both sides and might sell you out in one instance, and save your ass the next? As a rule of thumb, I read enough WWII spy novels and seen The Bourne Identity enough times to know that you can't trust anyone from the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, let alone anyone who brought his drunken Eastern European sizzling blonde of a girlfriend to the game.

Seat 5: Pauly... Your hero should have been in his room writing, but instead he was getting drunk with Otis and playing poker with a menagerie of ebullient Europeans. At least it wasn't PLO.

Seat 6: Ed... The author of the infamous Ed Reports was also one of the drunkest at table. Good thing we let Ed act as the banker and set up the chips.

Seat 7: London Writer... I forgot the guy's name but he said he had to leave at 6am to catch a ride to Nice airport so he could get an early flight home back to London. He said he was going to work that day. What a trooper.

Before we started the action, the concierge wandered over and said, "Monsieur, the game is not for real money?"

"Just for chipzzzzzzz," slurred Ed. "See? Chips. No money anywhere."

The concierge gave us a skeptical nod and slithered away into the darkness. If that situation happened in Las Vegas, we would have stood up and slipped the guy a Benjamin. Of course, if you tipped a Vegas concierge three more, he'd offer you an eight ball of Pervuian blow and point out a place to get a moderately priced hooker. But we weren't in Las Vegas. We were in its weird and decadent twin sister. Where trim and tanned puerile offspring of barons with Swiss bank accounts run rampant and where that one millionth of a percent of the world's population burns money like toilet paper for fat guy on the shitter with a bad case of Montezuma's Revenge. Alas, Monte Carlo is a non-tipping culture. And besides, $300 US won't even get you a half-assed handjob from the portly French maid with Diabetes that left chocolates on my pillow every night.

Our table was poorly lit and we played by candle light. I sat back and folded the first few minutes as I sized up the table. A bunch of drunks and a Swede meant plenty of raising.

I finally picked up a hand. Pocket Eights. In games like that instance, I like being he first to act. Instead of having to make tough decisions on making calls, I'd rather put the decision making on everyone behind me. I raised to close to 12 Euros which was the standard pre-flop raise. Everyone folded except Simon and The Swede. The flop was Q-6-2. I bet out 30 Euros. Simon called and The Swede folded. The turn was 6. There was an overcard on the flop and a paired board. I bet out 50 Euros and Simon moved all-in. I knew from the way he took a drag on his cigarette that he was bluffing. If I had trips, I would have smooth called unto the river. If he a weak Queen, then so be it. My gut said he was bluffing. I glanced at Otis and smirked. I flashed him my cards and he shrugged.

"I call. Show me your Queen!" I said.

Simon let out a disgusted look when he tabled 10-7s.

"How could you make that call?" he said as he took an even deeper drag on his cigarette.

"I knew you were bluffing," I said as Otis nodded in his approval.

Hey, it was around 4:20am and everyone was drunk. How could I not make that call?

The river did not help Simon as I jumped out to an early chiplead. I almost doubled up and saw a couple of flops over the next thirty minutes. I watched The Swede tilt Otis have he issued a wicked bad beat with a junk hand.

"Rebuy!"

Otis took a few more bad beats. He'd get his money in with the best hand and he was run down time and time again. I slowly added more chips to my stack. I slowplayed The Swede when I flopped second set against him and he called me all the way to the river with top pair. Or I should note, he said he had top pair. I couldn't put him on any hand. I simply got lucky that time.

By 5am, my stack looked healthy and was on its way towards the 600 Euro mark. I nearly tripled up and then it slowly slipped away. I think that The Luxembourg Pro called in the Cooler. His girlfriend magically appeared out of nowhere and sat down on the arm of my lounge chair. Yes, she was blonde and had a funny accent from one of those "stan" countries or from a Soviet Bloc country.

She spoke several languages and was fascinated with Belgium. She would not stop talking about Belgium frites, "Zo much better zan French Fries."

She was also a connoisseur on Belgium Beer.

"La Chouffe," she said, "It iz zee best beer. Tastes sweet and za little spicy."

"Just like your pussy," I said.

"Vat?"

"Just like Monaco Beer," I said as I hosted my bottle.

"Zat is shit beer," she said. "La Chouffe. Drink it in Amz-erdam."

Was she The Cooler? I dunno. Maybe she was just a drunk, bored, Eastern European blonde who would not stop talking. She was dirty hot for sure, didn't mind when I stared at her tits, and gave me a crash course on all things Belgium especially on their chocolate.

I caught Otis occasionally checking her out. He gave me a look like, "Good God, she's hot."

I was distracted but still managed to play tight. I lost one big pot to the London Writer when I flopped a King high flush draw with Ks-Qs and two spades on the flop of Js-8s-3c. I jammed on the flop was re-raised all in by a short stack for about 100 Euros more and I called. He flipped over A-J with no spades. I had two overs and a lot of outs for a flush. The 9 of hearts fell on the turn. Sweet Jesus, I picked up two more outs. I didn't get there on the river as I lost about 1/3 of my stack.

I lost even more chips around 5:45am when I was all-in preflop with J-J against Ed's K-10 and The London Writer's A-K. In a 500 Euro pot (or "monsterpotten" as the Swedes would say), I led all the way to the river until an ace spiked. Sacre bleu.

"Fuckin' Riverstars. This game is rigged, just like PokerStars," I joked to Otis.

All I know is that before the blonde started lecturing me on Belgium, I was up three buy-ins. After she sat down I was minus 60 Euros as the London writer won another big pot from me. What the fuck? Maybe the Luxembourg Pro was a bad guy after all who did his homework and prayed on my weakness for blondes and lengthy discussions of Belgium food stuffs and beers.

I won a small pot on the next hand and was -41 when the time reached 6am. I still had two deadlines and the game looked like it was about to break. I cashed out and gave the banker 41 Euros in cash and the rest of my stack worth 159 Euros. He handed me $300 US back.

That was the only poker I played in Monte Carlo. Aside from a couple of bets on the initial Final Four games, I only did some minor prop betting in media row. I guess the karmic balance evened out. I schooled the British press for a few quid during props, but when it was all over, the Brits got it all back in poker.

I went back up to my room and wrote until 9am or so as I watched the sun slowly creep over the Monte Carlo hills and through the crevices created by the high-rise hotels and apartment buildings. I packed my gear and then passed out for an hour or so on one of the most confortable beds outside of the Borgata, before the phone rang indicating my wake up call. I jumped up and out of bed. After a long week, I finally got to leave Monte Carlo. I didn't spend as much money as I anticipated and made every deadline.

I didn't get arrested or detained by French customs agents. I didn't have to avoid France and sneak out into Italy like some friends were forced to do thanks to the French government's anti-online gaming hard-on as they fined and harassed several gaming officials. Me? I was "un inconnu" or an unknown. My departure was simple. All I had to do was make it to Nice's Aeroport Cote d'Azur on time and board a flight to Amsterdam. That's when the rest of my time in Europe gets a little fuzzy.

* * * * *
I uploaded 34 Monte Carlo pics to my Flickr account. Take a peek at my Monte Carlo photo gallery. You might have seen a couple, but you have not seen the rest like the pic of the 23 Euro cheeseburger from Room Service!!

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/09/2007 12:05:00 AM | Permalink |

 
Sunday Pimp and April Truckin'

By Pauly

First of all, take a peek at the updaed Robert Rules of Poker courtesy of the Poker Prof. It's a great guide especially if you are in need of a refresher course on poker rules.

Nick Cantwell, a devoted reader reader, blogger, and Truckin' contributor, reminded me of a Euro-freindly tournament that he's inviting bloggers and reads alike. He wrote: "Just to let you know we have started a blogger game in the UK. It takes place on Sundays (3.30 EST 8.30 BST)." Stop by his blog to get the password. I might have to miss it this week because of Easter, but I'll do my best to make it sometime soon.

If you don't read Jonny Vincent, then what are you waiting for? He's got to be one of the funniest writers I've come across in a very long time. He's an Aussie poker pro and ee met for the first time in Melbourne at the Aussie Millions. Take a peek at his blog aptly titled Poker Crack.

I met Nat Arem when I was in Monte Carlo. He's long overdue for a link. He's got some amazing photos on his site along with a holarious tale of degenrate gambling.

Hugo Martin is a writer for the Poker Verdict. He gave the Tao of Poker a shoutout in his blog roundup. Thanks Hugo.

In older news, RawVegas.tv has a video that is worth sharing where Jamie Gold admits he screwed up. And then there's the running prop bet series with Gavin Smith and Joe Sebok. In this latest installment, the two go head to head with female Thai kick boxers.

And lastly, a reader named Mr. Goss is running for city council in his neck of the woods. Take a peek at Dave Goss for Council. Good luck, bud!

* * * * *
Truckin' - April 2007, Vol. 6, Issue 4

I just published the latest issue of Truckin'.

1. Flight of the Stripper by Paul McGuire
Just before the flight attendants closed the airplane doors, two extremely loud women with Fendi purses rushed in and sauntered down the aisles. One was a skinny black woman wearing oversized Chanel shades carrying a pink jacket. The buxom blonde wore a pink Juicy track suit and had the biggest and worst fake boob job I had seen since the days when I lived at the Redneck Riviera... More

2. Some Times by Sean Lovelace
My friend S____ is a huffer. Gasoline, Freon, silver spray paint, etc. If you were to believe what you read, what the medical professionals say, my friend will eventually suffer marked atrophy of the brain, and has about a three in five chance of living to age twenty-five... More

3. Earning Hazzard Pay by Matt Siller
I spent the night in a restless sleep, every noise sounding like the pop pop AK47 gunfire, loud then faint. My guess is that's probably what it was. As long as there were no explosions, I'm okay with distant gunfire - that's nothing new to this area. Most of it is liquored or 'gack'ed up troops firing into the air in the wee hours of the morning... More

4. Petite by Sigge S. Amdal
These girls, they were nice and all, but they couldn't have been more than seventeen. They have this puppy quality to their skin, and their eyes reflect the streetlights. Looking seventeen, they were probably around fifteen, sixteen maybe, making it a no-no for me. Too much emotion... More

5. The Night 911 Failed to Ring by May B. Yesno
The logical individual to approach would be the Sheriff. This individual, however, is a first water Bigot and an out right Chauvinist who has been in a position of some little authority far too long... More

6. Sure, My Name is Dave by Paul D. Lane
Oh well, I thought to myself, I made it through the Gulf war; I can make it through this crap. The Marines go on these deployments for six months at a time. The mission was we go around on ship for six months and hope we don't see much action... More

7. Flush by Mike Wenner
Somewhere in the middle of dinner, John's queasy feeling subsided when he let out a huge fart. He felt it coming and tried to contain himself as best he could so not to embarrass himself since a loud fart at the wrong time isn't always funny. But as you know, a loud fart in certain circumstances can be downright hysterical... More

April 2007 is one of the strongest Truckin' issues to date. I'm fortunate that the writers this month gave me the honor of publishing their stories. Sean Lovelace wrote about trying to persuade his sister not to join the National Guard. Matt Siller was behind the lines in Darfur Sudan and shared one of the most chilling Truckin' stories to date. Paul D. Lane weaved a personal story about being on leave in Oz as a marine. Mike Wenner's bathroom tale is a hilarious read. May B. Yesno is among the returning authors with another story, this one titled The Night 911 Failed to Ring. And our favorite Norwegian writer whipped up a bit about a night out on the town in Oslo. Of course, what's a Truckin' issue without a good old fashioned story about strippers on a plane from yours truly?

Thanks to the writers who exposed their souls to the world and wrote for free. I'm lucky that you were willing to take that leap of faith with me. Thanks for inspiring me.

Thanks for everyone for their support. We could not have gotten this far without you... the reader! And please help spread the word about Truckin'. Good karma will come your way if you pimp Truckin' on your blog and tell to your family, friends, co-workers about what Truckin' is all about.

* * * * *
By the way, Happy Easter to everyone. I'll be back to normally scheduled programming on Monday. In case you were wondering, the next tournament I'll be covering for Poker News is... the WPT Championships at the Bellagio.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/08/2007 03:03:00 AM | Permalink |

 
Guest Post: Fatty McLiarson's Friday Thunder

Editor's Note: Time for another guest post while I'm taking a few days off from writing and blogging. Say hello to... Fatty McLiarson.

Friday Thunder by Fatty McLiarson

Dr. Pauly, everyone's favorite primary care physician is in Amsterdam on vacation, has kindly recruited me to bring the "Friday Thunder" here at the Tao of Poker. It's a deal that should result in an additive effect. Like that time in high school where I figured if two fingers was good, then four must be better. Only this will probably result in less blood and/or screaming.

Hi, I'm Dr. Pauly's Physician Assistant. You can call me Fatty McLiarson.

I live near Derek, hardly ever play poker, probably will never talk about poker, stand 6'2", sit about 3'7", stay away from the hard stuff but put down alcohol as if on some sort of mission, miss having Tang for breakfast, have never been to Bangladesh, needed spell check to spell Bangladesh for me, love pizza, hate shitty sitcoms, and have what you would call "strong" opinions on things.

I've known Pauly for many years, dating back to when he had a head of hair reminiscent of a young John Stamos. The deal is quite simple. I'm supposed to post something every other Friday at first, possibly moving to a weekly post sometime soon after. I post, he buys McDonalds. It's that simple. Double Cheeseburger meal, plain with extra cheese. Super-sized, because that's how I roll.

Speaking of super-sized things...

I have what you'd call, "a way with the ladies." It isn't so much any sort of theory on how to interact with women. No, it's more the fact that I'm not terrible looking and I have a large penis. Yep. As it turns out, bigger is better.

As a kid I remember going on some dates that were particularly painful to look back on. Being 16 or 17 years old with a hard-on that knows not the boner etiquette that a seasoned penis owner recognizes, means many an embarrassing evening. From a bumpy car ride with our chaperones, to an unfortunate incident involving Moon Pies, the young McLiarson was no stranger to the completely random appearance of his boner. Add to the mix a large and girth-tastic member and you've got a recipe for many a mortifying evening.

It was those times and recent dating disasters that led me to just cut right to the point and post this on Craigslist:

WANTED: Cavernous vagina for my enormous junk.

(Tiny vagina's need not appy! )

Do you find yourself bundling multiple tampons together with twine in a futile attempt to find something that fits? Were you laughing and joking with the nurses while painlessly giving birth? Have you ever lost anything in your tunnel of love? Well, if any of these scenarios leave you nodding your head in agreement, my penis might be for you! This month (and this month only) I'll be accepting applications for lucky Giganti-ginas (Medical term) which are in desperate need of junk that fits.

Qualifications? But of course.

My junk has been confirmed many times by smoking hot ladies as, "Huge!" My penis has seen action in some of the most alarming conditions known to man. In fact, the machete only exists because I once chatted up an entrepreneurial pharmacist on the subject of the best way to slay a seemingly impenetrable woman's bush. Applying the same principals that led him to design the tiny sword with which I hacked my way to Vaginaville that day, a larger scale version was produced to critical acclaim from drug lords everywhere! I've jarred things loose before. I drive a stretch limo because I'd risk shattering the windshield of a normal car if, for instance, a stretch of particularly bumpy road tricked my penis into thinking it was "Go Time!" I use empty Wonder Bread bags as condoms. I once found myself the unfortunate victim of a mugging. I didn't have any weapons, and when the mugger told me to give him everything I had in my pants, I pulled out the ol' Alabama blacksnake and clubbed him to death with it.

But enough about me.

Are you embarrassed by the constant echo's? During especially cold winter months do you offer homeless people a spot in your vagina to sleep for the night? Are you able to carry three watermelons out of a grocery store without any assistance?

Would you be willing to participate in a one person study involving my penis and your vagina?

If any of this sounds like music to your ears, and of course to your ginormous vagina, then email me. But hurry. My penis can't wait forever!

Related Link: Do You Have What It Takes?

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/06/2007 06:13:00 PM | Permalink |

 
Gavin Griffin Wins EPT Champioships and Change100 Wins Pauly's Pub March Madness Pool

It's finally over. After logging 84 hours at Bay Casino in Monte Carlo, I can finally enjoy Europe before I fly back to New York. If you don't know by now, Gavin Griffin won the EPT Grand Finale, marking back-to-back wins for Americans in the biggest event in Europe. Brandon Schaefer took second in the event three years ago. Had he emerged victorious in 2005, the Yanks could have swept the EPT!!

Would you like to view the winning hand of the EPT Championships? Poker News has a cool Feature Hands toy which plays back hands.

You can read the (formerly) live blog from the event which was authored by yours truly.

Also, check out the Poker News extensive video archives from the EPT. There are some hilarious interviews in there, particularly the ones with Devilfish and the one with Andy Black.

And do't forget about Filipe's EPT photo gallery. Some good stuff.

Since I arrived in Monte Carlo, I have not gambled much. I lost 41 Euros playing poker late last night/early this morning with Otis and some drunken Brits from PokerStars, one wild Swede, and a Belguim guy who had a hot girlfriend who would not stop talking to me for most of the game. I'll write it up at some point.

I managed to win wagers on 2 out of 3 Final Four Games and cleaned up on a prop bets with Otis. I made plenty of props with other bloggers/journalists in media row at the European Poker Tour Championships. I schooled the British media, Snoopy from Blonde Poker and Stephen from Gutshot, with last longers involving British and American players. Although, I lost smaller bets to the Norwegian and French press particularly Benjamin from Team770.

Here's a pic of Snoopy settling his debt. He's not happy:


I leave Monte Carlo in a few hours. I fly from Nice to Amsterdam where I shall disapear for a few days and unplug. Can't wait. Speaking of Holland... here's a pic (courtesy of Filipe) of that Dutch interviewer who exposed her goodies to me by accident. Too bad it wasn't a more risque photo.


Dutch Banana Girl
* * * * *
Congrats's to everyone who cashed in my March Madness Pool. These are considered unofficial stats. They become official when I get back to the States.

Money Winners in Pauly's Pub March Madness Pool:
1 Capt. Tom and the P.O.B.s (Change100) 1330
2 Jack Tripper Stole My Dog (Pauly) 1320
3 The Marcus Hookers (Schanzer) 1290
4 Logan's Run (Gracie) 1230

Yes, not only did two chicks place in the money, Change100 won it all. What the fuck? She had Oral Roberts going deep until I scolded her. Unreal. I lost by 10 friggin' points. Congrats to her and Gracie (the only two chicks in the pool) for cashing. Change100 takes home a cool $400. Lucky mofo.

At least Florida covered and I won a few dollars after losing about 3K in Vegas last weekend.

That's it. Signing off from Monte Carlo.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/03/2007 04:42:00 AM | Permalink |

 
EPT Grand Finale: The Final Table

By Pauly

I will be live blogging the final table of the EPT Championships from the Salle des Etoiles at the Bay Casino in Monte Carlo. This is the third final table that I will be live blogging for Poker News.

Yes, I'm Dr. Pauly. You might remember me from such illustrious final tables as the Aussie Millions (won by Gus Hansen) and the LA Poker Classic (won by a luckbox who beat out JC Tran). And today's final table should be just as intense since it features some familiar faces. So stop by Poker News and check out the action to find out who wins 1.8 million Euros or roughly $2.4 million. That's one helluva a score for a 709 person tournament.

I've already logged 72 hours working at the casino thus far (since Wednesday), so let's hope it's a quick final table. The final table starts at 4pm local time or 10am for your East Coasters ot 7am if you live on the Left Coast. If they don't firewall Poker News at work, please check in for live updates.

Here's the final table:

EPT Grand Finale - The Final Table:
Gavin Griffin (USA) 2,597,000
Marc Karam (Canada) 1,742,000
Soren Kongsgaard (Denmark) 1,612,000
Josh Prager (USA) 1,593,000
Kristian Kjondal (Norway) 1,203,000
Steve Jelinek (UK) 758,000
Andy Black (Ireland) 683,000
Ram Vaswani (UK) 432,000

There are two Brits, two Yanks, two Scandis, and Irishman and a Canuck. Sounds like the start to a bad ethnic joke...

Andy Black walked into a bar...

Actually, Andy Black said one of the funniest things I heard in a very long time. He offered any of his fellow poker players 100 Euros if they could find him "a scruffy dog." No one has collected that win so far. If you have never been to Monte Carlo, the entire place is pristine, including all the dogs and the high priced hookers who wear shoes that cost more than your entire online bankroll

There's no trash anywhere in Monaco which is odd because their is no garbage cans anywhere either. I have never visited a more cleaner place. Even the busboys in the media room come through and sweep up the empty bottles and glasses. Doesn't matter if you are still drinking... if there is less than 40% of your beverage in a glass, they will clear it from your table in media row. I have had several beers snatched up by industrious bus boys, not to mention dozens of half-dranken bottles of Evian and Pelligrino.

I almost decked one busboy in particular when he snagged my 9 Euro beer.

"C'est ma biere, vous retardez!" I shouted.

Moving on...

I have a prop bet with Snoppy from Blonde Poker which we started yesterday when there were 6 Brits and 6 Yanks left in the mix. He's supporting his fellow countrymen while I got the Americans. I also made a bet with Stephen from Gutshot last night, but I had to give him odds since both Brits are at the back of the pack and Gavin Griffin is the chipleader.

Yes, I'm being patriotic with my prop betting. Even the Norwegian press wanted to get in on the action and would take any bets against their homeboy Kristian Kjondal.

I won my only prop bet that I made so far at the EPT Championships when I took down a last longer with Otis. He had Isabelle Mercier and I had Erica Schoenberg. That was a nice score. I tried to get Otis to eat wood last night at the buffet. It's a long story, but suffice to say, he wouldn't do it for less than 500 Euros.

Here are some photos:


Media Room is non-smoking


Carlos Mortensen and Chad Brown's table on Day 3


Hellmuth praying to the Poker Gods on Day 1
* * * * *
By the way, if you read the Tao of Pauly, you have already seen this bit about some of my articles getting translated into multiple languages:


Pauly in Chinese

Pauly in German
Pauly in Polish
Pauly in Italian
Pauly in Finnish
Pauly in Greek
Pauly in Portuguese
Pauly in Japanese
Pauly in Chinese (Mandarin)
Pauly in Chinese (Cantonese)
Pauly in Hungarian
Pauly in French

Unreal. I always wanted to be read in Budapest.

* * * * *
Don't forget to stop by PokerNews to follow the EPT Grand Finale Final Table action:

Live Blogging Updates (from yours truly)
Photos (from Filipe)
Videos and Player Interviews (from Shronk and Tiffany)

This is my last night in Monte Carlo. Let's hope it's a fun one.

* * * * * Semi-Live Updates * * * * *
6:15pm... I won two bets already from British media. Sweet Jesus! The Yanks won the last longer. I won 30 Euros from Snoppy (Blonde Poker) and Stephen (Gushot). I also have a bet with Benjamin, a member of the French press. He's got Marc Karam and I got the Norwegian kid. Benjamin is blogging over at Team 770.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/02/2007 06:46:00 AM | Permalink |

 
EPT Grand Finale Day 4: The Final Four

Action in the EPT Championships ended early last night as we're down to the final four table but I stayed up past 5am watching the NCAA Final Four on NASN (North American Sports Network... which had been showing a ton of hockey all week via TSN). I nailed by big bet on OSU and lost a few bucks on UCLA. At least I wiped out my loses from last weekend at the Red Rock sportsbook.

The big news was the crazy side action that had been going on in the Salle des Etoiles. Since there's a law prohibiting cash games so there's been some big SNGs. One of them involved a 20K Euro buy-in SNG with a hand-shake agreement that everyone would be paid online. That included Japanese industrialist Masaki Kagawa, Fossilman, Joe Hachem, Johhny "Bad_ip" Lodden, Sweden's William Thorson, Haralabos Voulgaris, Finland's Jani Vilmunen, and Norwegian internet pro Tore Lagerborg. Everyone was drinking heavily and having an amazing time.

Shronk taped footage of one of the SNGs and he posted some of it over at Poker News' video gallery.


Click here to view the Day 3 Recap and 20K SNG
At one point Fossilman said to Jani Vilmunen, "I'll play you heads-up 17-card Chinese Poker with two wild cards fr 25K."

A shitfaced Jani blurted out, "I don't know how to play... but sure!"

Generally speaking, Scandis are very shy people and don't like talking to the press or having the photograph taken. But the Scandis are crazy gamblers and loosen up (socially) when they get a few drinks in them. That group also drank until 5am and played two other 20K SNGs and a 40K SNG afterwards.

"It was insane to watch!" said Hiroshi, who is a friend of Masaki.

The other night, William Thorson played Masaki Kagawa heads-up on PokerStars Battleship for 25K a piece. They played six matched and split 3-3.

Here are a few photos I took in the last few days:






Action at the EPT Grand Finale will start in a few moments. There are 32 players left and they will play down to the final 8 for the TV table. Andy Black is still the chipleader and there are 12 British and Americans (combined) left in the field. I have a last longer bet with Snoopy from Blonde Poker. I'm wagering that the Yanks will fare better than the Brits. Our boys don't have as much experience playing againstthe reckless Scandis, but what the hell. I'm an action junkie.

Yesterday's bustouts included: Chad Brown (USA), Thomas Wahlroos (Finland), Joe Beevers (UK), Gunnar Ostebrod (Norway), Jesse Steinberg (USA), William Hill (USA), Johnny Loddden (Norway), and Jonathon Little (USA).

End of Day 3 Top 5 Chipcounts:
1. Andy Black (Ireland) 709,500
2. Dean Sanders (UK) 695,600
3. Antony Lellouche (France) 651,300
4. Gavin Griffin (USA) 629,200
5. Christian Neirinck (Belgium) 549,800

By the way, stop by PokerNews to follow Day 4's action:

Live Blogging Updates (from yours truly)
Photos (from Filipe)
Videos and Player Interviews (from Shronk and Tiffany)

Oh and check out this link to the EPT Live, where you can follow along the action by watching the feature table online. Change100 was watching the live feed and spotted me in the crowd. I'm going to be sweating Andy Black (if he's not at the feature table) so if they cut away to the other tables, look for me wandering around.

Here are some articles and recaps that I have written for Poker News:

EPT Grand Finale Day 1a
EPT Grand Finale Day 1b: Chad in Charge
EPT Grand Finale Day 2: Back in Black
EPT Grand Finale Day 3: Bubble Burts

I have a few other prop bets with some other members of the press and one includes if that hot female Dutch interviewer will or will not be wearing a bra today. Of course, I'm betting on that she'll be showing off her free range bananas.

Braless Dutch journalists, hot Swedish railbirds, 20 Euro cheeseburgers, prop bets in media row... yep, just another day in Monte Carlo.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 4/01/2007 07:33:00 AM | Permalink |