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

 
The $80 Tip and a Trio of Crazy Asian Ladies

By Pauly
(LAS VEGAS)

I squeezed in a last minute binge in before I fled the defiled streets of Las Vegas for the plastic hills of Hollyweird. The last three places I played poker in Las Vegas were at Green Valley Ranch, Red Rock, and Planet Ho. At all three poker rooms, I encountered at least one Asian woman who played like a maniac. One rivered runner-runner quads on me. I tilted one with a junk hand and Michalski fell in love with the third one. Plus somewhere along the way, I managed to toss an $80 tip a Russian dealer named Svetlana after I won a high hand jackpot. These are among the random stories that went down post-WSOP.

* * * * *
Green Valley Ranch

As I waited for a 3-5 NL game, I sat down at a 4-8 limit table with a half kill. At mid-afternoon, the room looked empty with only five tables in play. I sat down at a nine-handed table filled with retired people, aside from myself, an overzealous kid from Minnesota to my left, and a cleavage-showing, bubbly housewife with a rock the size of a golf ball on her left ring finger.

The kid next to me talked shit the entire time and his stack fluctuated since he played every pot. He was the table captain and most of the weak-tight locals stayed out of his way. He had just moved from Minnesota and he said he was looking for dealing jobs. When I sat down he was bitching about a beat he took at the hands of the housewife. She was in her late 30s and looked like Agent 99 from Get Smart. She sipped a cranberry with rum drink and had a big stack. From the moment I sat down, she and the kid from Minnesota became my marks. The rest of the table didn't matter. if I was going to scoop a big pit, it was going to be against two loosest players at the table. They also happened to be the loudest as they dominated 90% of the conversation.

I got stuck early as I quickly got used to all the terrible players and suckouts. That's when I went to work. I looked to get into pots cheaply against the housewife (aka Agent 99) or the kid. I knew they played any two suited cards, any ace, and cold-called to any raise after the limped in with crap.

I tilted the kid when I raised from the button and he called from the small blind. The flop was 10-10-7. He bet and I raised with 6-6. He called. We both checked the turn when a Queen fell and the river was the 6. He bet. I raised. He three-bet and I raised. He called. I flipped over my pair of Sixes for a full house. He showed the 7h and tossed the other card at the dealer. He muttered something like "Nice catch."

"You're not in Minner-sowter anymore," I said as he dug into his jeans and pulled out $200 to rebuy.

After the third cranberry-rum cocktail, Agent 99 looked and sounded sloshed. That's when she began nipping out. Good lord. It got chilly quick in the poker room and you could hang a winter coat on the end of her nipples.

Anyway, the drunk chick kept dirty stacks which she'd occasionally knock over (with her hands but it's quite possible one of her nipples accidentally grazed a stack) when she picked up her cards or bet out at a pot. She began to bleed chips. I was ready to pounce. That's when I found Ks-Kc and she called my raise preflop. The flop was As-K-3 and we got into a raising war on the flop along with the Crazy Asian Lady (CAL) in short pants who played in her first hand since sitting down. I knew that Agent 99 called my raise with a weak ace and I hoped she would pay me off. The turn was the 9s. With two spades on the board and it was capped three-way. The river was the 6s. I got a sick feeling in my loins because I knew one of those two made a flush. I checked-called a bet from the CAL after she raised Agent 99 on the river. I tabled my black Kings knowing that a set was beat. CAL showed 7s-2s for the suited hammer. Agent 99 flipped 6-3o, She flopped bottom pair and thought her two pair was good on the river. I waited for an hour to flop a better hand than Agent 99 and the CAL swooped in and took that rather large pot away from me... on the first hand she played. Crazy Asian Lady 1, Pauly 0.

Two hands later, I flopped a flush with Ah-10h. Holding 4-4, CAL caught running 4s to scoop a monster pot since it was capped all the way to the river against a WWII vet who held Kh-Jh for a second-flush. Too bad we both lost to the CAL. Crazy Asian Lady 2, Pauly 0

Within a couple of orbits, the kid and Agent 99 went busto. I didn't get any of their chips. CAL went on a rush as she played close to twenty-three hands in a row. She vacuumed up chips from my marks as she built a monument of four columns of chips donated courtesy of the Minnesota kid's moving to Las Vegas money and the trophy wife who donked off her stack. Once CAL felted the dead money, she tightened up and shifted gears. She eventually left. Hitting and running. That was supposed to be my money she was racking up. No such luck.

* * * * *
Red Rock

I sat down at a 1-2 NL table at Red Rock and tilted one dude when I bluffed him with A-Q. The guy looked like Kevin Johnson (former point guard from the Phoenix Suns). He just walked off the golf course and went right to the tables. I sat down in mid-conversation. Actually, he was delivering a tear-jearking soliloquy about his demise. Like a tragic character in one of Shakespeare's plays, he had it all and then lost in. He was running bad ever since he had a big score in LA in February. He blew through his bankroll during an ugly run that began in March and would not stop. He took on a partner during the WSOP and only cashed once. He told us that his fiancee left him for someone she met in bible study. He owed his backer over 20K. And at that moment, he was down to last couple of hundred dollars donking around the 1-2 game at a local's casino.

The guy radiated loser vibes. He was broke, complaining about it, and an easy target. Whenever he limped, the sharpshooters at the table quickly raised him. They were putting him to the test. Sure they listened to his recent woes with a sympathetic ear as his reenacted bad beat after bad beat that cost him his bankroll. But they also knew he was vulnerable and exploited him every moment. Another lesson learned... never reveal how bad you are running at the tables. You just make yourself a bigger target. The locals can smell fear and some pay their rent on players embattled during a losing streak.

I found A-Q in MP and raised to 12 against two other limpers. Kevin Johnson raised to 30 from the small blind. The limpers folded and I called. Heads up. The flop was 7-7-3 and he shook his head. Everyone at the table knew he missed the flop. He emphatically checked. I said, "Check."

The turn was a red 10. He checked. I bet the pot. He folded and started a Hellmuthian tirade. The dealer pushed me the pot. I mucked my cards.

"I can't believe you called me with A-7. I can't win with Ace-King," he said.

As soon as I head him mention Big Slick, I quickly snatched my mucked cards from the dealer as she was about to pull them in for a scramble. I showed A-Q. If he really had A-K, that would put him even more on tilt. That showboating made him more angry. He eventually busted out two hands later when he open-shoved with 8-8 and ran into a guy with Kings. He stormed off and I switched tables.

I sat down at a new game... 4/8 limit with a half kill. I took Seat 3. A figidity Asian lady in Seat 1 sat down. Over the next hour, she would buy in for $100 at a time and piss through $500. She played almost every pot. I overheard her tell the dealer that she only had an hour left to play before she had to go pick up her three kids at the baby sitter.

I busted CAL when I flopped a straight with 6d-4d. She had A-4 and the board was 5-3-2. We were heads up on the river and with unlimited raises, I took the last of her chips. She cursed at me in her native tongue as she whipped a $100 bill out of her purse and slammed it on the felt. She threw the Ace of clubs at the dealers chest and threw the Four of hearts so hard at the middle of the table that it skipped off a chip and flew into the dealer's chin. Crazy Asian Ladies 2, Pauly 1.

* * * * *
Planet Ho

My flight from NYC arrived around 11pm and by Midnight I was drinking at the Palms with Benjo and Ed. They were telling me about their weekend in LA and I told them about my quick trip to NYC. We sat down at a Pai Gow table. The pit boss had just changed the table minimum to $25 instead of $10. There were two other players betting $10 since they were seated before the limits were jacked up. I started out at $25 a hand and got a little crazy after betting $100 after a while. I only ended up stuck $90 by the time we got bored of Pai Gow.

Benjo had grown tired of the pits so I suggested bowling at the Gold Coast. They had a late night special... $5.50 got you three games, free shoe rental, and a free drink at the bar. What a deal. The only bad thing was that they only comped you a domestic beer instead of an import. I have not had MGD in a bowling alley in some time. Although I'm not an avid bowling, I'm a fan of drinking excessively and hurling 12-15 pound objects at white pins with rednecks. Bowling was one of the few classes during college where I got an A. I had it scheduled after my southern politics class. A friend of mine (who hailed from the rough and tumbled streets of G-Vegas) was in both classes with me. We'd listen to Widespread Panic bootlegs in his car and blaze up on the way to the bowling alley. I'm convinced that's how I got an A.

Anyway, I bowled a 120 and a 130 during my first two games. Benjo wanted to wager on the last game. His average was 110. Mine was 115. I offered him a handicap of 20 pins and he eventually accepted the bet. He started out ahead over the first two frames but then went cold. I picked up a strike and never looked back. I ended up with my best game of 166. Benjo asked for a buyout after the 5th frame. I let him off the hook on the 6th. Ed thought I threw the first two games on purpose to shark Benjo. I didn't. I just got better as it got closer to dawn.

The next night was Benjo's last night in Las Vegas before he flew home to France. He had been in Las Vegas for a month too long and was eager to get home. I met him, Ed, and Michalski down at Planet Ho for some donkoliciousness. It happened to be a busy night at the karaoke bar next door. Drunken tourist after drunken tourist stumbled up onto stage and spewed out their unmelodic versions of random cover songs. I felt bad for the dealers in the poker room right next door who had to sit through that torture night after night.

I was seated at a 1-2 NL table with a gaggle of frat boys. It was one of the rare moments when I was the oldest player at the table. Two factions of friends sat at opposing ends of the tables. They both drank heavily and played way too many pots. It seemed like a fun game and the worst player at the table had the biggest stack. He became the focus of my attention.

Michalski sat down in Seat 2. I was across from him in Seat 4. We chatted for a bit and I ordered a beer from the waitress while he asked for a McCallum's. She told him that they couldn't comp him that, but he could get Dewer's. He agreed. A Russian woman named Svetlana sat down to deal. She spoke in a thick Russian accent and reminded me of one of the evil female agents from the Bond flick From Russia with Love.

On the first hand, she dealt me two black Queens. Michalski opened for a raise. I re-raised. Four callers including Michalski. The flop was Qh-10x-2x. Michalski bet and I raised. He called and everyone folded. The turn was the Qd. Michalski checked. I hoped that he would put me on a bluff, so I overbet the pot. He counted out the chips and thought for a few moments before he folded. He told me he had J-8 and almost called. I flipped over my Queens to show him my quads.

Planet Ho had a high hand jackpot. I had no idea. Quad Queens paid $188. When the dealer pushed me the pot, I tipped her $5 and looked at the big board in front of the room that listed the bonus hands and payouts. A few hands later, the floor manager walked over and made me sign some paperwork. He gave me $188 in casino chips and made me put them in my pocket because I had more than $200 at the table in my stack. Before I put the chips in my pocket, I picked out three green $25 chips. I tossed them to Svetlana.

"That's the biggest tip I've ever seen," said one of the frat boys.

"Oh my God!" shouted Svetlana the dealer. "Thank you!"

"That was for stomaching all those bad drunks singing horrible karaoke," I joked. "And for good karma."

Of course, the karma didn't fall my way. I made a move with As-10s. The flop was Queen high with two spades. I check-raised all in after four players limped in. The worst player at the table with a decent size stack called with Q-10. His hand held up as I pulled out some chips out of my pocket and rebought for $200.

Michalski had pushed me off a couple of pots. He's a cagey player who plays any two cards. He made me fold my pocket Queens with an Ace on the board. During that time, Benjo was quietly reading a Chuck Klosterman book at his NL table.

I felted Michalski with Ad-Qx. He opened for a raise. I re-raised and we were three-handed with one of the blinds. The flop was Qd-Jd-10x. Everyone checked to me and I et the pot. The big blind folded. Michalski moved all in and I called. He flipped over 9d-5d. He missed all of his draws.

Michalski bluffed me out of another pot. I had 3d-2d and raised in MP. I got two callers including Michalski. The other player was all in and there was a side pot of $2.The flop was 5-4-4. Michalski and I both checked. The turn was the 8. He checked. I bet the pot and he called. The turn was the 2. He bet about 1/2 the pot and I folded. He flipped over As-7s for a complete bluff. I folded the better hand. We both lost the main pot.

After I flopped Quads, the table loosened up even more. A young Asian woman wearing Lisa Lobe glasses sat down at the far end of the table. She straddled a pot and we noticed she was almost in every hand. When the seat in between Michalski and I opened up, she asked the dealer for a change. He let her move next to us and she said she was happy because we looked like we were having a good time at our end.

"My end is too boring," she explained. "I'm here to gamble."

Michalski admitted later, "I think I have fallen in love with the Crazy Asian Lady. There's something about her..."

We straddled each others blinds and got a couple of big pots going. Sadly, none of us won any of them. The last big hand I played was a losing effort to the CAL. I held Kd-10d and caught an enticing flop of Qd-Jd-4x. I couldn't get her off the hand on the turn with a big bet that she just called. I missed all of my outs a her set of Js held up. Crazy Asian Ladies 3, Pauly 1.


Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/30/2007 11:43:00 AM | Permalink |

 
Unusual Dysfunctional Gambling Tales

By Pauly
(LAS VEGAS)

I was kinda/sorta forced into a week-long hiatus. I intended to take a few days off from the grind of blogging and writing to escape to New York City for a three-day weekend before I returned to Las Vegas to take care of post-WSOP stuff, business meetings, saying good-bye to friends, random poker, and eventually moving out of the Del Bocca Vista. One of my favorite bands (Widespread Panic) was booked to play Radio City Music Hall in NYC and I didn't want to miss another epic concert. Working a seven-week assignment in the middle of the summer means that I get to miss out on several of my favorite bands touring around Colorado, California, and the Pacific Northwest. That's something I had done since my teenage years. When the summer came around, I hit the road and followed the Grateful Dead until I ran out of money or their summer tour ended... whichever came first. After Jerry Garcia died, I spent most of my summer hours during my late 20s following Phish over North America and even once to Japan. Now in my early-30s, I spend my summers drinking away my work-tilt with Otis and wandering around the Rio in a half-baked daze getting chipcounts on Phil Ivey and making lists like "Last 5 Pros I Pissed Next To..."

I caught one Panic show in Las Vegas before the main event started. Beat up by sheer exhaustion, the show at Planet Ho was about average but I didn't have an amazing time. I fought to stay awake. Alas, I knew that the Radio City Hall show would be a lot more energetic. I flew to NYC with Change100 and we partied hard for three days with Derek and The Rooster before we reluctantly flew back to Las Vegas on Monday.

I used to get excited when I sat around in front of the gate in the JetBlue terminal at JFK airport moments away from boarding a flight to Las Vegas. These days, I get the same feeling that used to consume my battered soul when I waited on a subway platform for an express subway to whisk me downtown to the Wall Street station. The definition of Las Vegas has evolved for the worse over the last three years. I equate the two words with "work and depravity." Aside from trips for March Madness with Derek and Senor, most of my time in Las Vegas is relegated to work. Someday that might change, but for now it's a bitter reality. I didn't want to leave NYC. I wanted to stay for ten months to write and hang out with my brother watching the Yankees or Knicks or Rangers or the Jets.

When I had to make a decision on when to leave my apartment in Las Vegas, that date kept getting moved forward. I'm the type of traveler who often stays extra days in a place and incurs extra charges to switch flights because I'm having such a good time in the moment that I don't want to leave. But all I kept thinking about was how much Change100 missed California and how badly I needed to get out of the Las Vegas valley. My work assignment was done and I didn't have anything else until mid-September when the WSOP- Europe kicked off in London. My body was in Las Vegas, but my mind was thinking about spending time in LA, New York City, Holland, Belgium, France, England, and Miami over the next two months. Writing and reading and catching up on my friends' lives were more important than staying in Las Vegas for two more weeks. I called the guy who rented me the place at Del Bocca Vista and asked him to check me out early.

My laptop had died the day after the WSOP ended. Good timing. But, it left me without something to work on and I was forced to have less than an hour a day online over the past week. As much as I was frustrated at times trying to get my connection fix (the desire to be connected and to waste endless hours surfing the web and fucking around in solitary confinement), the lack of access was a positive thing for me because it forced me to think about the future and reflect on the previous seven-weeks of insanity. So that's the other reason for the blogging hiatus. I was a blogger without a laptop which is kinda like a gunslinger without a gun or more like a stripper without a pole, or even a televangelist without a pulpit.

I bought a new laptop and in about a week, I should be back in the normal routine of writing regularly. For now, my time online and endless hours handcuffed to my laptop has been reduced as I'm forced to share Change100's laptop. Over the last few days, I made preparations to leave and in the meantime, played random poker during the last week or so that I was in Las Vegas. The previous two summers, I stuck around for a while after the WSOP ended and played as much poker as I could. And like the last two years, I left Las Vegas with a padded bankroll for the duration of the trip. Having a winning trip to Las Vegas is not hard to do, but when you are stuck in the middle of the desert for up to two months, the relentless heat and recycled casino oxygen warps your brain. Most friends that I know who are working media have awful sessions during the WSOP. Covering poker turns you into an action junkie. I had a couple of bad days but thanks to a couple of timely prop bets (on Erick Lindgren's insane golf prop and the gambling on overall totals of the main event) along with the cash in a $1,500 donkeyfest, I'm leaving Sin City with a nice profit. I should want to stay, but my wayward soul has been pleading me to cash out.

Anyway, here are a few stories of last few days in Las Vegas that involved lurking around the tables with international journalists and getting caught in between an intense discussion between David Sklansky and Paul Darden.

* * * * *
Treasure Island

The day before the final table, I ventured down to the Treasure Island and I played in their 7pm tournament with Simon (British journalist working with Otis at PokerStars Blog), Change100, and Benjo (from Poker.fr and other various French outlets). I had played that TI tournament once before on Jen Leo's birthday. I cashed and took third (Jonno ended up in second and Change100 cashed in fifth). I know those tourist-friendly tournaments are crapshoots with plenty of inexperienced drunken and sunburned tournament players. Bad beats circle around and infest the TI poker room like those crazed flying monkeys in Wizard of Oz. But if you managed to go deep and make a final table, you're guaranteed a decent payday for a $60 investment.

Over the last three summers, I have played my share of low buy-in Strip tournaments. Grubby and I went nuts trying to final table the nightly 7pm Sahara tournaments, although I suspect that we only went because Grubby liked the free sandwiches they gave at the first break. The Sahara along with the TI allowed you to buy back in as a new player if you busted. I had a good record going where in the dozens and dozens of Strip tournies that I played (Sahara, Aladdin, TI), not once did I buy back in as a new player because I always survived to the first break and the end of the registration period (usually an hour after start time).

That all ended at the last TI event I played. Yeah, I bought in twice for a total of $125 (I made it to the first break during my second buy-in and got extra chips for a $5 add-on). Anyway, I was seated at Benjo's table. On the third hand, I found 8s-7s and limped in for 50 from EP. The big blind raised to 300. I looked up and saw the prototypical LA douchebag looking at me. He wore knock-off designer sunglasses and an overpriced shirt from Fred Segal. He was a fake tanner with hair that Derek would describe as perfectly messy. If I was taking notes, I would have scribbled down the keywords "vain assmuncher." By the lack of smoothness of his chip tricks, I figured he had been playing for probably six months max. I wanted to move all in but just called. Two players. Me versus the LA douchebag fake baker.

The flop was Ah-8d-7c. I knew one of us was getting felted. I had that feeling. I checked and he bet 300. I check-raised to 900. He waited ten seconds then called. The turn was the 3d. I moved all in for my last 1800 in chips. He called and flipped over A-Q with no diamonds. The dealer burned and then dealt the river card. The Qh spiked and I was eliminated. Felted on a five outer. Nice catch, cumstain.

Benjo looked stunned and couldn't believe that hand. We had a last longer for $20 and had swapped 10% of each other. He said that he mucked a Queen and the guy next to me said that he folded an Ace. Hearing that I had less outs always makes the beat feel much better. It's like finding out that your cheating girlfriend sucked 3 more cocks than you had originally thought.

I left the table and pulled $60 out of my pocket by the time I got up to the front desk. I bought in as a new player and the floor guy led me over to Change100's table. She had won a pot or two and was raking in another as I sat down. I made a couple of moves and tried to quickly build a stack. I raised a lot of hands from early position and took down small pots on the flop with continuation bets. I won a medium sized-pot on the turn bluffing with a straight flush draw. No action. I made it to the break and was just below the average stack. That's when the LA douchebag was moved back to my table... with my chips.

Change100 bluffed a pot with the Hammer, but she busted out before me. I headed to the rail when I took another sickly beat. Old guy raised 3x UTG and the button called. I found Js-Jc in the small blind and moved all in for almost 9 times more. The old guy called and the button folded. He showed K-Jo. He flopped a King and I couldn't catch the case Jack for a resuck. Busted before I had a chance to get my chips back from the LA douchebag.

After that awful showing in the TI tournament we played Pai Gow. Benjo is addicted to the game and I feel bad that I taught him how to play it at the $5 tables in Bally's during the WPT Championships. I have been enabling his inner action junkie. But I've since shrugged it off. He gets paid in Euros and he's gambling with the faltering US dollar. It's like Monopoly money for those European fat cats. Last time I checked, a $100 bill was worth like 14 Euros or something outrageous like that. Last time I was in Amsterdam, I cashed in $1000 US and only got back enough Euros to buy a stale croissant and a couple of doobies.

Anyway, Change100 went on SPGT (Semi-Pai Gow Tilt) and had violently mucked her hand on two instances after the dealer pulled a few massive hands out of his ass. I think I walked away with a slight profit but left somewhat early to head home to write final table bios. When I left, Benjo had wandered over to the blackjack tables.

* * * * *
Bellagio

The day after the main event, Change100 and I wandered over to the Bellagio's poker room. We bumped into Miami Don and the SNG Machine, who were both on their way out. They had a killer session at the 2-5 NL and I headed inside and quickly found a seat at a 2-5 NL table. Change100 got a list for 8/16 as I sized up the players at my table. I lost about 30 in the first two orbits trying to see a couple of flops with low pairs.

That's when Benjo and Ed from Gushot tapped me on the shoulder. They were on their way out of town after renting a Hummer to drive to LA. I would have gone with, but I was supposed to fly to NYC for the weekend and declined. Change100 found Dixie and I also spotted David from Gushot and Andrew Webking playing a big NL cash game. Cyndy Violette and David Sklansky was playing 400/800 Stud in the high limit area, while Paul Darden was up there too.

When they spread a new 8/16 Limit table, Change100 told me that they were only five-handed. I didn't like my NL table so decided to play 8/16 until they got a full table and then I'd get on a different NL table. I never made it back to NL because inside of an hour or so, I ran over the table and left with close to a $500 profit.

I sat in Seat 8 next to an old guy from Florida with a golf tan. He said that he was married three times.

"My ex-wives each have a house," he lamented explaining to me why I should not get married.

He was a nice guy and I took on the role of the chatty guy. I ordered beers for guys on my end and tipped the waitress jacked up on happy pills for them. Change100 would have described me as "Crazy Pauly" where I would raise so much and hit flops with junk hands that I would tilt the entire table in ten minutes.

I flopped The Wheel with 5-4o and my pocket Aces held up. I can't recall too many other hands. I didn't take notes. I know that I caught a flurry of mediocre cards (which go up in value in shorthanded games) and hit my draws. Change100 was up $300 at one point and then was down to about even when I cashed out.

The funniest moment happened in the bathroom next to the sports book. To set the scene, a young woman sat behind Sklansky in the high limit area. She barely looked 21. Everyone that reads 2+2 knows Sklansky's penchant for young women. Anyway, I wandered into the bathroom and walked over to a urinal. I spotted someone to my left as someone walked up to the urinal on my right.

"Yo, David. Is she a dancer?" Paul Darden said.

I turned to my left and realized that I was pissing in between Sklansky and Darden.

"I met her when she was 17," said Sklansky.

"Is she a dancer?" asked Darden a second time.

"She's a nice girl from Las Vegas. She's in the medical field now."

"Shit, David. You're not answering the question."

"She used to be," Sklansky finally revealed.

"I thought so," said a content Darden.

"She has a great body, right?" said Sklansky as they left the urinals and headed over to the sink.

"I dunno," shot back Darden. "I haven't seen her naked."

Less than an hour later, we spotted Sklansky and the former-stripper turned nurse who were canoodling on a bench outside as they waited for the valet to bring around his car.


Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/26/2007 01:17:00 PM | Permalink |

 
Truckin - July 2007, Vol. 6, Issue 7

I totally spaced out and forgot to mention the latest issue of Truckin'. July features a couple of veteran Truckin' authors such as Change100 and Clay Champlin. Dingo returns with another sordid Las Vegas tale and I'm happy to introduce Johnny Hughes to the mix.

1. Snapshot by Paul McGuire
Some people find the truth in photographs. It's a person's soul captured at one moment in time and space. The picture cannot lie like a human can. A couple of months ago, I sorted through an old box and I came across an envelope with several photos of a trip that I had taken to New Orleans... More

2. Hard Luck Harry and the Owl by Johnny Hughes
Harry believed in luck more than any gambler you have ever met. If the Cowboys lost in the final seconds of a football game, Harry thought it was because he'd spilled the salt shaker at the Truck Stop... More

3. Decades by Change100
I turned 10 in Belmar, New Jersey. My grandfather had fallen ill and my mother decided to move my sister and I out there with her for most of the summer of 1987 so she could take care of him. The three of us squeezed into the pullout couch at night in the living room of my grandparents' doublewide trailer on Route 71... More

4. Bingo by Clay Champlin
I developed a hatred for bingo at an early age. In third grade we played every Friday. Sister Mary Grace would give each kid a bingo card, and a handful of dry navy beans that she kept in a Folgers can, to mark the cards... More

5. Randi the Schizo Hustler by Dingo
Randi had a thick eastern European accent, straight blonde hair and a mischievous smile. Tatyana wore her hair in waves/curls and was very serious and often depressed. She would cry about nothing in particular and from the whopper stories she told and her sniffling I concluded Twin 2 was a heavy coke head... More

Thanks for your support.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/25/2007 12:28:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Epilogue: A Leap of Faith

By Pauly


Courtesy of Flipchip
When I visited Australia earlier in the year, for the first time since the UIGEA rippled through the American poker scene, I saw a glimmer of hope for the future of poker. The entire poker room (aptly called the Las Vegas Room) at the Crown Casino in Melbourne was packed with players. They were not just Australians and Kiwis but plenty of players from surrounding Asian-Pacific countries. That's when I knew that poker took a big hit in America, but overseas they were on a cusp of a poker gold rush.

When I flew out to Monte Carlo to cover the European Poker Tour Grand Finale I was more than impressed with the set up. Their media room was five times the size of the one at the Rio for less media reps. The participation numbers had been way up across the board during the third season of the EPT. And even when France cock-blocked one of their events, two other countries stepped up and wanted to add stops on the EPT.

Poker had also been popular in the UK, Ireland, and France for a few decades and over the last few years it has been rapidly sweeping through parts of Europe such as Germany, Italy, Russia, and the various Scandinavian countries like a viral phenomena. Depending on who you talk to, the Swedes will boast that per capita, they are the best poker players in the world. The Fins, Danes, and Norwegians will tell you otherwise. Right now in Norway, there are 16-year olds with bankrolls approaching seven figures. Not only are they're routinely crushing the competition, but after they felt you a couple of times in ring games, they cash out. They're not hitting and running or ratholing your money. They simply have to go to sleep and wake up to go to school the next day. What happens when they turn 21 and come to Las Vegas for the first time?

When it came to betting on main event players, I leaned towards the Scandis. Over the last few years, a Swedish player went deep at the WSOP. I expected unknown Scandi wearing capri pants and $600 designer sunglasses would amass a monster stack late in the tournament. That ended up being Philip Hilm from Denmark. I wasn't the only one thought Hilm had a great shot at winning the WSOP main event. Oddsmakers had him the favorite on their board. He had all the chips at the time and his playing style was difficult to adjust to. The reputations that Scandis have are that they are wild, erratic, constantly switching gears, and unable to read. They love playing big pots and will shove all in on any street and at any moment. However, what makes Hilm such a tough competitor also ended up being his down fall. He's the type of player would would see a flop with 8d-5d out of position after a player raised in front of him. And he's also the type of player who would try to semi-bluff his opponent off a pot with bottom pair and a weak flush draw.

Hilm did just that on the 15th hand of the final table. Instead of persuading Jerry Yang to lay down TPTK with A-K, Yang called. And just like that, the young gun from Denmark was standing off to the side and conducting an interview with ESPN, while Yang slowly stacked up all of his chips. The Hilm elimination would end up being an indication of things to come. Hilm would be one of seven players that Yang would knock out on his way towards the 2007 WSOP championship.

The first 60 hands went by faster than anyone imagined. A wave of giddiness swept everyone in media row. They wanted to go home. Badly. The space in front of the media room became a refuge for luggage. The European press was set to catch cabs to the airport and fly home as soon as the last hand was dealt. Plenty of other friends were dying to escape the Rio after seven weeks of insanity. Otis had that look in his eye that he was wrought with anguish. His hearts and mind was with his family back in G-Vegas, but his physical being was shuffling around the Rio, like a dead man walking back and forth from the ESPN stage back to the media room.

Everyone secretly wished for a fast final table. I also do in whatever event that I cover. I accept the fact that it will go late and often will take the over when anyone sets a line on ending time. It's win-win for me. If the table ends early, I win and get to go home. If the event runs late, at least I get monetary compensation for my troubles. Unlike a football game or timed sporting event, poker can be over super quick or become a marathon session like Chip Reese and Andy Bloch's heads up battle at the $50K HORSE event in 2006.

However, I knew history was a good indicator that I should not get my hopes up too high. The last two main events last anywhere from 13 to 14 hours. When BJ set the line at 3am, I quickly took the over. I figured it would go to about 3 or 4am. Phil Gordon had set the line at 5:32am (or something like that). Nolan Dalla wanted action. I heard that the amount of the wager was anywhere from $500 to $5,000. Gordon knew the event would go late, but he set his line a couple of hours too long. The final hand was actually completed around 3:46am.

With just four players remaining it appeared that everyone might get done by Midnight. My veteran experiences knew better. It's not the how fast the first five go... it's how fast that the last five go which matters.

Yang busted the most well-known pro at the table in Lee Watkinson on Hand #21. Yang was ahead on that hand and his better Ace held up. On Hand #28, Yang sent Lee Childs to the rail. Yang was trailing on that hand, but got caught up in the battle of the blinds with Childs. Alas, Childs was ahead until the turn when Yang spiked an 8. Childs could not improve and he was the third player to be busted by Yang.

Rain Khan was very quiet at the final table. I'll have to check the broadcast to see if he was playing passive or just card dead. He made a move with A-Q and unfortunately Yang woke up to pocket Jacks. Khan went out in 6th place and aside from Hilm, he was my pick to take it down.

On Hand #60, South Africa's Raymond Rahme picked up Jacks and won a race against England's Jon Kalmar's Big Slick. At that point, four players remained. Alex Kravchenko was shortstacked for the last three days and he managed to squeeze into the final four players. He survived all of his all in attempts and doubled up during the right spots. Players with much bigger stacks busted out before him. When it got down to 11 players, everyone expected Alex KGB to bust out next.

Unfortunate for Scotty Nguyen, he imploded and bluffed off his chips when he should have probably left the table and hung out in the hallway posing for autographs, smoking ciggies, and downing Coronas. But Nguyen made a few moves which cost him his third final table at the 2007 WSOP and a shot at $8.25 million while finally trying to quell his inner demons surrounding his previous world championship and the death of his brother.

When four-handed play began on Hand #61, Jerry Yang had over 70M and over 55% of the total chips in play. Alex Kravchenko was the super short stack with around 8M. But the Russian showed everyone why he's one of the toughest and baddest motherfuckers on the block. Once it got five-handed, Kravchenko was guaranteed to become #1 on the All Time Russian Money List surpassing Kirill Gerasimov. He had won a bracelet earlier in the WSOP and had stuck around to play a slew of events. You couldn't miss him wandering around the Amazon Ballroom during preliminary events. He carried a cold and blank expression on his face and glanced at you with the eyes of a sniper. Usually clad in an Adidas jumpsuit, I expected to see the old Soviet regimes' CCCP stamped on the back.

We started developing wild theories that Kravchenko was a hitman for the Russian mafia and came out to Las Vegas to whack Vinnie Vinh or collect a monster debt from Eskimo Clark, but he liked playing poker much more than extinguishing deadbeats, so he gave up his day job and settled on poker instead.

Joking aside, Kravchenko played the best poker at the final table when compared to the other eight players. How he survived with a short-stack is beyond me, but he managed to help slow down the action. It would take 107 hands before he would bust out. It another classic race, Yang ended up winning a coinflip. Kravchenko raised with Big Slick. Yang shoved with 8-8 and Kravchenko quickly called. Yang flopped a set and Kravchenko could not improve.

Two hands later, Raymond Rahme busted out on Hand #169 courtesy of Yang who outflopped his pocket Kings. The heads up match between Tuan Lam and Yang lasted 36 hands. That was much longer than Greg Raymer-David Williams; Joe Hachem-Steve Dannenmann; and Jamie Gold-Paul Wasicka's battles.

Lam played extremely passive at the final table. He gave Yang a walk at least four times (I'm too lazy to read my notes to confirm) in the big blind. Lam only won 12 out of 36 hands they played and aside from one double up, they were small pots. Yang won the one hand that counted the most. On Hand #205, Jerry Yang took out Lam. Yang would end up winning 91 out of 205 dealt hands at the final table. I wondered how many hands he was actually involved in? Again, I'm too lazy to check, but I'm guessing he was involved in more than 50% of the total hands at the final table. Talk about forcing the action.

The final table definitely had an international flavor to it as an Asian-born player eventually won this year's WSOP. The railbirds for the other final table players where showing their nationalistic pride. You could see flags from Canada, Russia, and South Africa proudly displayed. Lee Watksinon's fiancee busted out an American flag but she had it upside down, which is a symbol of distress. Perhaps she was foreshadowing Watkinson's early exit?

The final table was boring at times and filled with excitment during the other moments. When the audience was awake usually during big hands, the scene resembled a soccer match. There was plenty of singing, chanting, and rowdy railbirding going on in the crowd. The South African contingency was the most visible wearing green shirts that read "Everybody Loves Raymond" in support of their local hero Raymond Rahme. Several of the guys in the crowd had South African capes drapped over their shoulders. They had a cool chant which they would sing after Rahme won a hand. They also would scream, "Ship it to Africa!" as the dealer pushed him pots.

Tuan Lam's friends and family had miniature Canadian flags and one big one. They constantly waved those during the few hands he was in. At one point, Lam was draped in the Canadian flag after he doubled up against Yang during heads up play. He had some of the loudest railbirds and would break into a chorus of "O, Canada" whenever he won a pot.

Alex Kravchenko had a substantially smaller cheering section, but they brought along the Russian flag. They too would chant something. My Russian is bad and I couldn't make out what they were saying.

As I described, the stands surrounding the final table was devoted railbirds of the final table players. Jon Kalmar had to give his drinking buddies a talking to before the final table started. They showed up in a much behaved manner than on Day 6 when one of his mates was yanked out of the No Limit lounge for too much consumption of shitty beer which made him act belligerent.

Jerry Yang had his family and friend sweating him as well. Jen Creason pointed out one of his crew who sat on the floor and constantly prayed. Yang is a very religious person and he could also be spotted praying during big hands.

During his post-victory interview with ESPN, Yang constantly spoke about how he could not have achieved what he did without the help of God.

"I had a feeling inside," said Yang as he fought back tears. "I kept praying. If God could help me, I knew I could win. I had a funny feeling inside that I could do it. I thank the Lord. The glory goes to him. Thanks to the heavenly Father, I am here today and victorious. With this money, I can do a lot of good for people out there who need the help."

When Norman Chad asked him if he was having the best day of his life, Yang mentioned that when he came to America for the first time, "It was the first day I found freedom. My family tried to escape Laos and we failed. They (communist regime) hunted us down. Then we escaped to Thailand. When I found out that we were going to America was the happiest day of my life."

"Do you think this is the most poker that the Lord has ever watched over?" joked Chad.

"The Lord was watching over me," replied Yang. "When I had 4-4 and I was all in I prayed, 'Lord, give me a set.' Then the flop had a 4 and I survived that hand. I have seen the miracles of God at the World Series of Poker."

Yang also mentioned about his strategy. He knew that the only way he could win was to play aggressive.

"I did a lot of bluffing, trust me," he joked. "I played a lot of bad hands. 7-2o even."

You gotta love Yang for dropping the Hammer. He never showed it, but I hope the ESPN hole cams caught at least one of those hands.

When he was asked about his future, Yang joked, "When I made the final table, I called my boss and told him I needed a few extra days off. I plan to go back to work... to give my two weeks notice."

I think Yang was also holed up at the Redneck Riviera for a while because he said that he did not move to the Rio until he made the final table.

"I was staying at a local motel. I won't say its name. It's bad. Trust me. You don't want to go there."

Then he got serious when he said, "My wife works the night shift. I told her that she doesn't have to work anymore. We have six small children and we want to make sure they get the best life and education."

Yang will be donating 10% of his winnings to various charity including the Make a Wish Foundation, Ronald McDonald House, and Feed the Children. I suspect that he's going to use some more of that to help other people in his community. I'm glad that Yang won on that account. Instead of donking it off at the tables and pissing it away on high stakes games, he's going to use it to help ease the burden in people's lives that need it the most. Before the final table started, I wrote that Yang has all the karma points on his side because of his social consciousness. Maybe the poker gods were paying attention after all.

Yang's victory is good for poker because he will be an amazing goodwill ambassador. Check out the interview that Jerry Yang did with Tiffany Michelle. He's an honorable, articulate, and humble man. I really hope he does some good over the next year, not just for poker but for the people in his life.

Poker is dominated by the dark side of humanity. It doesn't help when the WSOP is held in the middle of flashiest blackest hole in the universe... Las Vegas. But sometimes, there are rays of hope. Guys like Barry Greenstein (Children Inc.) and Phil Gordon (Bad Beat on Cancer) are working hard to help charitable causes. Plenty of Asian players like Kenny Tran, Scotty Nguyen, and Liz Lieu donate their winnings to help their family and communities back home in Vietnam. The guys over at PokerStars teamed up with the cast from Ocean's Thirteen and helped raise money and awareness for the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.

We live in a time in America when the religious right has infiltrated our government and backed certain politicians who stiff-armed online poker. A devout Christian and religious man like Jerry Yang can help draw positive attention to the poker community. Poker can be a conduit for goodwill. Sure it's a form of gambling, but so is beating the stock market. Heck, praying for an imaginary being (aka God) is the ultimate gamble. What's the difference between shoving all in with a Big Slick vs. a middle pair and believing in God? There is none. Both are coinflip situations. God either exists or doesn't. That's a race situation that church goers gamble with every single Sunday.

I've long given up the quest to determine if our original creator is Allah, Buddha, Jesus' dad, or some alien scientists cross breeding themselves with apes. There is a more powerful force out there. Or maybe there isn't. The existentialist in me believes that this is a darkened, random, and godless universe. Spending too much time in Las Vegas makes you abandon hope and the entire notion of God.

The most important conversation I had the entire summer was with a French journalist named Benjo. And we talked about lobsters. He got me off of work and life tilt. Here's what I wrote at the end of June:

During one of the breaks of the HORSE event, I went outside for a few minutes for a smoke break. It was around 3am and Benjo told me a weird story regarding John-Paul Sartre. I actually started the conversation by asking him something about Sartre. I think it was about him banging Simone de Beauvoir. Anyway, Benjo told me how Simone de Beauvoir made him take a holiday in Southern France because he was too burnt out after experiencing hallucinations, specifically one about a lobster following him around. He had been doing too much mescaline and was feeling the residual effects of that drug. For years the lobster would follow him around and he made the decision that he was not going to see the lobster any more... and the lobster vanished and ceased to exist.

I had a moment of clarity and finally figured it out. Everything. Especially what Sartre was trying to teach us... that we have to make a choice in life. And not just about what we do, but what we believe, and the values we hold. Those choices are not going to be made for us or nor should they be dictated by those around us. He decided to stop seeing the lobsters and they were gone.

If Jerry Yang thinks that he won the WSOP because of God's help, then so be it. Was it God or luck that brought him the 6 on the river to beat Tuan Lam? I'm not going to debate him on that fact. After all, it's great publicity and PR work for all of poker. You see, according to the new WSOP champion, the Lord loves poker. God is helping the good guys take away money from the bad guys to be distributed among the poor and needy. Maybe the Jesus freaks out there will see that there is some good to be made with poker and they will ease up on pressuring the government to keep online poker on the sidelines.

Just when I was ready to give up on humanity, I got a lesson in faith... in the middle of a casino in Las Vegas of all places.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/19/2007 04:00:00 PM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 47: Jerry Yang Wins the WSOP Main Event

By Pauly

Jerry Yang took down the 2007 WSOP. He might not be the best player in the Main Event, but he had the most faith and had the biggest heart out of the 6,358 players. He won $8.25 million and will be donting 10% of his winnings to three different charities.


The Final Hand - Yang's 8-8 rivers Lam's A-Q
Yang is the epitomy of the American Dream. He escaped Laos after the communists invade. He lived in a refugee camp in Thailand before he was able to come to America. And now, he took down the World Series of Poker.

He was humble when he spoke in his post-victory interview.

"I know what it's like to be poor and I want to give back to the people," Yang said as he was on the verge of tears.

The poker world is full of assholes, scumbags, and deadbeats. It's a sincere pleasure to see a true gentleman take down the WSOP. I'm happy to know that some of his winnings will be devoted to chairty and to help his family and people in his community.




2007 WSOP World Champion Jerry Yang
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/18/2007 07:32:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 46: The Main Event Final Table Bios

By Pauly

There are moments in life that define your existence. Winning the most prestigious poker tournament in the world, outlasting a field of 6,358 players, and collecting $8.25 million for first place is definitely one of them. One person is going to become immortalized as he joins an elite group of champions who can claim that they have won the World Series of Poker main event. This is what every poker play dreams about. And tonight, someone's dreams are about to become a reality.

Here's the final table of the 2007 WSOP:

Seating Assignments:
Seat 1 - Jon Kalmar
Seat 2 - Lee Childs
Seat 3 - Philip Hilm
Seat 4 - Jerry Yang
Seat 5 - Raymond Rahme
Seat 6 - Tuan Lam
Seat 7 - Alex Kravchenko
Seat 8 - Lee Watkinson
Seat 9 - Hevad 'Rain' Khan

Final Table Chip Counts:
Philip Hilm - 22,070,000
Tuan Lam - 21,315,000
Jon Kalmar - 20,320,000
Raymond Rahme - 16,320,000
Lee Childs - 13,240,000
Lee Watkinson - 9,9250,00
Hevad "Rain" Khan - 9,205,000
Jerry Yang - 8,450,000
Alex Kravchenko - 6,570,000

Final Table Payouts:
1 - $8,250,000
2 - $4,840,981
3 - $3,048,025
4 - $1,852,721
5 - $1,255,069
6 - $956,243
7 - $705,229
8 - $585,699
9 - $525,934

Poker will be crowning a new world champion as the final table gets underway at Noon local time on Tuesday. The next champion will be one of nine players collectively representing America, Canada, Vietnam, England, Denmark, Laos, South Africa, and Russia.

If you want to find out who wins, stop by PokerNews.com for live updates starting at Noon. I have one of the best seats in the house, only ten feet from the final table, and I've been waiting for this moment for over 46 days.

In case you never heard of any of the final table players, here's a run down of who's who including chip counts and the latest odds to win set by BoDog. In case you were wondering, all of these photos are courtesy of Flipchip.

* * * * * *

Seat 1 - Jon Kalmar
Chip Count: 20.32 million
Hometown: Chorley, UK
BoDog Odds: 4-1


Jon Kalmar
Kalmar is a 33 year old from England who is married with one kid. He's a professional poker player but had a stint as a singer in a punk band. He listed "drinking" as a hobby and his railbirds were definitely partaking in his favorite hobby over the last couple of days. I expect his contingency to be a rowdy bunch.

He learned poker by playing online, which he started to do to curtail his other gambling (sports and casino). He's been playing for four years and this is his third WSOP. He flew to Vegas to play a bunch of preliminary events. He didn't cash in any of them and had blown through his bankroll. Due to his catastrophic lost of his bankroll, he was ready to give up poker for good. Like most tortured souls who go broke in Sin City, he tried to book an earlier flight back home. The cost to England was too high so he decided to stick around and play the last mega-satellite at the Rio. He won his seat to the main event at the last minute. Not only did he cash, he made the final table and is trying to return to England a millionaire.

When asked about the one thing he wanted the audience to know about him, he wrote, "I'm not really a Britney fan."

Kalmar has a sense of humor and is second in chips. According to BoDog, he's the second favorite to win. The Brits would love nothing more than to have the next WSOP champion be one of their own.


Seat 2 - Lee Childs
Chip Count: 13.24 million
Hometown: Reston, VA
BoDog Odds: 8-1


Lee Childs
The 35 year old Virginia native recently left his computer systems job to devote more time to poker. He has his dad in the crowd who's way more nervous than he is while sweating his son. He learned how to play poker from the internet, books, and attending WPT boot camp. He's been playing for about five years and bought into the WSOP main event directly. He said, "I wouldn't have gotten here without my incredible wife, dad, and all the support of family and friends."


Seat 3 - Philip Hilm
Chip Count: 22.07 million
Hometown: Cambridge, UK
BoDog Odds: 14-5


Philip Hilm
Philip Hilm is originally from Denmark and currently resides in Cambridge, UK. He's a poker pro and I first took note of him when he played on the feature table at the EPT Grand Finale Championships in Monte Carlo. He's played in the WSOP during the last three years and bought in directly. He has one previous WSOP cash. Fellow Danish pro Lars Bonding was on the rail sweating him.

When there were 50 players left in the Main Event, I offered to bet Change100 that he'd win the WSOP at 20-1 odds and she could take the field. She declined. He's the current chipleader and will make me look like a genius if he wins. I said a Scandi would win this year and he's their last hope. Like most Scandi's he's hard to read, aggressive, and could play any two cards. With a chiplead, he's even more dangerous.


Seat 4 - Jerry Yang
Chip Count: 8.45 million
Hometown: Temecula, CA
BoDog's Odds: 9-1


Jerry Yang
Jerry Yang is originally from Laos. The forty year old lives in California with his wife and six kids. He's a psychologist and social worker that earned a master's degree on health psychology. He's been playing poker for two years and this is his first WSOP. He won a $225 satellite at Penchanga. He's got the most karma points coming into the final table. He will be donating 10% of his winnings to the Make a Wish Foundation, Feed the Children, and the Ronald McDonald House.

Jerry Yang is one of the most deliberate players at the final table. He always takes his time to make decisions. He's been successfully using his skills as a psychologist at the table, analyzing his opponents behavior in order to make a better decisions.


Seat 5 - Raymond Rahme
Chip Count: 16.32 million
Hometown: South Africa
BoDog's Odds: 7-1


Raymond Rahme
Rahme is the oldest player at the final table. He's 62 years young and hails from South Africa. He's married with six children and is an avid golfer. He's a self taught poker player who's been playing for about two years. This is his second WSOP. He's made final tables in tournaments overseas. On the bio sheet question... What's the one thing you want the audience to know about you? He wrote, "Never give up."

Rahme missed time when the final table was set with ten players. Out of the 36 hands, he was there for less than half of them. One media rep suggested that he had bladder issues. Change100 suggested that he might have been interviewing with the South African film crew. He has a documentary film from ALL Africa TV following him around. One of their channels shows poker 24/7. He's going to be having his own show. He happens to have the most loyal railbirds that chant and sing and sway back and forth and yell things like, "Ship it to Africa!"


Seat 6 - Tuan Lam
Chip Count: 21.315 million
Hometown: Canada
BoDog Odds: 7-2


Tuan Lam
Tuan Lam is originally from Vietnam and currently lives in Canada. The forty-one year old's birthday falls on January 1st. He used to be a poker dealer and is now a full time poker player. He's married with two kids and enjoys soccer. He's been playing poker for 17 years and learned from friends. He's played in the WSOP three different times and he bought in directly.

According to Otis at PokerStars Blog... "Known as BABYHAN on PokerStars, you'll find him regularly playing the high-limit cash games to a lot of success. Lam finished runner-up in the 2005 World Championship of Online Poker $200 short-handed no-limit hold'em event."


Seat 7 - Alex Kravchenko
Chip Count: 6.57 million
Hometown: Moscow, Russia
BoDog Odds: 9-1


Alex 'KGB' Kravchenko
...taken during his bracelet winner's photo a few weeks ago
Alex Kravchenko listed that he was born in Archangel, Russia. He's married with two kids. He's not a pro poker player and makes his living as a businessman, but if you've seen him play, he's all business. He displays the least emotion at the table and you can't get a read on him because he gives off the same intimidating blank stare, like Ivan Drago in Rocky IV.

He's a self-taught poker player who's been dabbling in the game for over a decade. He's won over $219K in tournaments held in Europe and starting playing smaller buy in tournaments about six or seven years ago in Moscow. He bought into the WSOP main event directly and could definitely afford it. He's is the only other WSOP bracelet winner at the final table aside from Lee Watkinson. Kravchenko won an Omaha 8 event and beat Bryan Devonshire heads up to win. This is his third final table at the WSOP and hr's cashed five times (not including the main event) for about $269K. He's also cashed in two previous WSOPs and cashed four times on the WPT.

My nickname for Kravchenko is Alex KGB. He totally looks like a throw back from those 1980s cold war flicks like Fire Fox, Gorky Park, or Red Dawn. I could picture him wearing a red jump suit with the CCCP initials across the back. He seems quiet at the table and never cracks a smile, but I saw him chatting with his Russian friends on the rail and he seemed extremely friendly and animated.

He'd get better odds if he had more chips. Everyone thought he was going to bust out once it got close to the final table bubbles. But he hung on with a short stack and survived as Scotty Nguyen busted in 11th place. Once the final ten were set, he was the super short stack and doubled up to advance to the final nine.


Seat 8 - Lee Watkinson
Chip Count: 9.925 million
Hometown: Cheney, Washington
BoDog Odds: 7-2


Lee Watkinson
Lee Watkinson left his bio sheet empty, aside from his phone number. The forty year old made four final tables at the WSOP and won one bracelet in the $10K PLO last year. He also made two final tables on the WPT and took second place twice, once to Doyle Brunson and the other to Eli Elezra (which also happened to have Scotty Nguyen and Gabe Kaplan at his table.) Lee Watkinson is Derek's least favorite player have he felted him in a 2/4 NL game on Full Tilt. Watkinson is the biggest named pro at the table and he has monkeys.

"He's fleecing the donkeys to save the monkeys," explained Benjo.

Watkinson and his fiance rescued retired chimps that have been exploited in show business or for research. They have taken them in and provide a safe haven for them. Part of his tournaments winnings goes to fund that and he also does his part to raise awareness for various aninal rights groups.


Seat 9 - Hevad "Rain" Khan
Chip Count: 9.205 million
Hometown: Poughkeepsie, NY
BoDog Odds: 7-1


Rain Khan
Rain Khan is a 22-year old online poker pro from upstate NY mostly known as RainNKaHN on PokerStars. He listed that he was homeless on his bio sheet. He attended SUNY Albany and wrote that his hobbies are "eating subway and bulldozing." This is his second WSOP and has two previous cashes in the $1,500 donkfests. Khan won his seat to the main event via an satellite online. He's the guy who was accused of being a bot for playing 40 SNGs at once. His personal record is 43 and after PokerStars frozen his account, he sent them video proof that he was not a "robot." He's claimed to have played over 35,000 SNGs on PokerStars. Unreal.

Rain Khan is quiet most of the time with outbursts of feral energy. He jumps up and down. Shakes his head back and forth like the chick in The Exorcist and screams out random things. He's been seen running around with a chair on his head. But ask Otis and he'll tell you that he's one of the nicest guys you would ever meet.

Rain Khan completely shifted gears on Day 6. He played with less crazed aggression and picked his spots to go nuts. Aside from Hilm, he's my pick to take it down.

* * * * *

Bonus Code: Pauly
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates of the final table including chipcounts, photos, and videos.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/17/2007 03:27:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 45: Main Event Day 6 - The Final 9

By Pauly

Less than twenty minutes ago, Scotty Nguyen bused out in 11th place at the WSOP main Event. I had not been that dejected in a tournament since I saw Fossilman bust out in Benny's Bullpen during the 2005 WSOP. Deep down, I was rooting for Scotty Nguyen. I think we all were.

Scotty started the day 27th in chips out of 36 remaining players. He went on a run and doubled up as the field started to hit the rail quickly. After the dinner break, Nguyen won a couple of pots to jump into 5th place in chips. He sat at the feature table with a big smile and quickly became the crowd favorite. Harrah's suits, ESPN execs, and the majority of the media were rooting for a Scotty Nguyen final table.

"It's good for poker," Laurie the dealer said.

She was right. Scotty Nguyen is one of the more animaed characters in poker. It seemed as though he could have folded into the final table. With 11 players remaining, he was a lock. Then things got ugly. Fast.

Tuan Lam raised from the small blind to 480K. Scotty Nguyen reraised from the big blind to 1.48M and Lam called. The flop was Kh-5s-4h with over 3M in the pot. Lam checked and Nguyen fired out 700K. Lam called. The turn was the Kd and both players checked. The river was the Jd and Lam bet 1M. Nguyen went into the tank before he raised to 3.5M. Lam sat and went into the tank for several monutes before he called with 10s-10h. Scotty Nguyen tabled 4d-3d. Lam took down the pot woth close to 11.5M.

Scotty Nguyen was visibly rattled. He looked pissed and had that look like, "How the fuck could you call me, baby?!?"

Then Nguyen lost a big hand to Philip Hilm from Denmark in another battle of the blinds. Scotty Nguyen raised to 530K from the small blind and Hilm called from the big blind. The flop was Qc-6h-5d. Nguyen bet 600K and Hilm called. The turn was the Kd. Nguyen checked and Hilm fired out 1.2M. Nguyen moved all in and Hilm could not have called any quicker with 5s-5c. Nguyen flipped over Ah-Qd. He was drawing dead and by the look on his face, Nguyen knew that. The river was meaningless and he slipped to 2.35M.

Just a couple of hands earlier, Nguyen appeared as though he was going to make his third final table of the 2007 WSOP. Instead he busted out in 11th place. When he missed his flush draw against Philip Hilm to get eliminated, Nguyen shook Hilm's hand and made a quick exit off the feature table. His diappeared for a while.

When Nguyen returned to the final table to tape his interview with ESPN. According to BJ Nemeth, after that was complete, Nguyen took the microphone and said...

"First, I want to congratulate all the players here, and I wish the best to all of you. But the most important thing is, I want to thank the fans. Without you guys, we wouldn't have Scotty Nguyen. We're disappointed, but let me tell you, you guys gave me all I need."

At this point, a woman screamed out, "We love you!"

Scotty continued:

"I want to thank ESPN, the Bluff, the whole crews, the whole staff, and everybody here. I wish I could give you more, but for 2007 [he pronounced it as "two-thousand-oh-oh-seven"], that's the end of me. I'll see you back here in 2008."

Flipchip told me he saw Scotty Nguyen leaving the Rio with a armed security guard and a plastic bag with bricks of cash. He won $476,926 for 11th place.

I heard a sad story about Scotty Nguyen, which probably is why he was totally crushed after busting out of the main event. When he won the WSOP in 1998, his brother back in Vietnam was so excited that he jumped on his moped and drove around their village telling everyone the good news. Sadly, his brother died in an accident when he was hit by a car. To this day, Nguyen lives with a tremendous burden of guilt. He honestly believes that he caused his brother's death by winning the WSOP. Had he not won, his brother never would have been riding around and would have averted that fatal accident.

The final table was set as the ten remaining players were consolidated to the feature table. They would play down to nine. Here's the final ten players:

Seat 1 - Raymond Rahme - 12.875 million
Seat 2 - Alex Kravchenko - 2.81 million
Seat 3 - Lee Childs - 18.05 million
Seat 4 - Jerry Yang - 6.13 million
Seat 5 - Lee Watkinson - 11.715 million
Seat 6 - Steven Garfinkle - 4.925 million
Seat 7 - Tuan Lam - 20.1 million
Seat 8 - Philip Hilm - 19.31 million
Seat 9 - Jon Kalmar - 20.2 million
Seat 10 - Hevad "Rain" Khan - 11.035 million

Hevad "Rain" Khan is one interesting dude. I first read about him on PokerStars Blog. Actually, what caught my eye were the deranged look on his face on multiple photos that were captured by Stars photographer Neil Stoddart. I heard rumors that Stars froze his account because they thought he was a bot. Why? Because he was playing 40 SNGs at once. He videotaped him doing that and sent a copy to Stars support. They quickly unfroze his account.


Rain Khan
Khan has been screaming a lot, almost always at the top of his lungs. On Day 4, he kept yelling, "Bulldozer!" as he ran over his table.

I caught one hand that might have been one of the biggest hands for Khan thus far in the WSOP. Jerry Yang limped and Hevad Khan raised 500K. Yang called. The flop was Ad-Ks-Qd. Yang checked. Khan counted out his chips and gently pushed out a 650K bet. Khan had been deliberate about how he bet the entire time. Most online players have a big flaw and that's how they handle their chips. Seasoned pros will pick up on the slightest variation on how you bet when you have a strong hand, a weak hand, a drawing hand, or a stone cold bluff.

Khan had been unusually quiet for most of Day 6. He sat in dead silence as Yang counted down his chips then announced a raise to 1.65M. Khan looked at Yang, then looked at the board, before he moved all in for 1.825M more. Yang stood up as Khan sat in silence looking down at his cards. He avoided eye contact and sat still holding his breath as Yang went into the tank for a few minutes and stared at Khan.

"Get a read yet?" shouted someone from the rail.

Yang sat down before he said that he'd call.

"I got two pair," said Khan as he flipped over Kc-Qs

Yang shook his head as he sheepishly turned over Ac-6c for just top pair. Then Khan unleashed his inner monster.

"Hold. Hold. Hold!" screamed Khan as the volume of his voice increased as Laurie the dealer burned and then dealt the 5d. Yang was praying to the poker gods for help as Khan prayed that he would avoid elimination and double up. The 8h fell on the river and Khan went berserk. He jumped up and down and ran over to his friends on the rail. He looked like a player at Lambeau Field who just scored a touch down and dove into the stands at the end of the endzone. Khan looked as though he was ready to dive into the spectators and start crowd surfing like Kurt Cobain at a Nirvana concert circa 1992. Khan jumped up and down several times before he returned to the table.

"Thank God!" he screamed as he looked into ESPN's camera. "I play this game to win, not to lose!"

That hand pushed Khan over the 7 million. After being card dead for most of the afternoon, Khan woke up. He made the final table and when his name was announced he stood up and let loose with a few spastic moves and loads of screaming.

"I bet that guy Rain is amazing in bed. I hope he doesn't live in an apartment," joked Tom Sexton.

Moving on...

It took 36 hands before Steven Garfinkle bubbled off the final table. He was busted by Ray Rahme in 10th place.

Here's the final table of the 2007 WSOP:

Seating Assignments:
Seat 1 - Raymond Rahme
Seat 2 - Alex Kravchenko
Seat 3 - Lee Childs
Seat 4 - Jerry Yang
Seat 5 - Lee Watkinson
Seat 6 - Tuan Lam
Seat 7 - Philip Hilm
Seat 8 - Jon Kalmar
Seat 9 - Hevad "Rain" Khan

Final Table Chip Counts:
Philip Hilm - 22,070,000
Tuan Lam - 21,315,000
Jon Kalmar - 20,320,000
Raymond Rahme - 16,320,000
Lee Childs - 13,240,000
Lee Watkinson - 9,9250,00
Hevad "Rain" Khan - 9,205,000
Jerry Yang - 8,450,000
Alex Kravchenko - 6,570,000

Final Table Payouts:
1 - $8,250,000
2 - $4,840,981
3 - $3,048,025
4 - $1,852,721
5 - $1,255,069
6 - $956,243
7 - $705,229
8 - $585,699
9 - $525,934

Day 6 Money Winners:
10 Steven Garfinkle $476,926
11 Scotty Nguyen $476,926
12 Ray Henson $476,926
13 William Spadea $429,114
14 David Tran $429,114
15 Bob Slezak $429,114
16 Kenny Tran $381,302
17 Kevin Farry $381,302
18 John Armbrust $381,302
19 Scott Freeman $333,490
20 Mikkel Madsen $333,490
21 Jason Welch $333,490
22 Stefan Mattsson $333,490
23 Bill Edler $333,490
24 Ryan Elson $333,490
25 Daniel Alaei $333,490
26 Roy Winston $333,490
27 Jeff Bryan $333,490
28 Paulo Loureiro $285,678
29 Ron Kluber $285,678
30 Jason Koshi $285,678
31 Peter Darvill $285,678
32 Kevin Kim $285,678
33 Christian Togsvard $285,678
34 Hoa Nguyen $285,678
35 Allan W. King $285,678
36 Robin Bergren $285,678

The chipleader is Philip Hilm with over 23M. BJ Nementh and I will be live blogging the final table for PokerNews.com starting at Noon on Tuesday.

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Main Event Day 6...

The uber-drunk railbirds returned. They could really be heard after the final ten players were seated. The TD had to say something more than once. One guy let loose a few f-bombs. A few of them were cheering for Scotty even though he had busted out almost an hour earlier. Lightweights could not hold their liquor. EVentually, Nolan Dalla got sick of the drunk and 86'd him. A security guard escorted him from the Milwaukee's Best No Limit Lounge.

In the World Series of Online Poker Branding, Full Tilt edged out PokerStars. It was like 10-7 at last time I checked.

Rain Khan wore a PokerStars SuperNova shirt that looked a little tight. I think it shrunk. Hey Otis, hook the brother up with a new shirt!

I tried to throw a wadded up paper towel at Feldman from ESPN while he stood in the hallway and I nailed a security guard in the face by accident. He wasn't happy.

Otis finally won something at Lime Tossing. He almost nailed it in the trash. Alas, he still hit the garbage can and I lost $20.

Jesus was in media row hanging out, while Phil Gordon looked like he was doing prep work for his ESPN PPV final table broadcast.

There was a Johnny Chan sighting at one point. I wonder who he had a piece of.

Last 5 Pros I Pissed Next To...
1. Alex KGB Kravchenko
2. Kenny Tran
3. Chris Jesus Ferguson
4. Lee Watkinson
5. Scotty Nguyen

* * * * *

Bonus Code: Pauly
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/16/2007 08:07:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 44: Main Event Day 5

By Pauly


The temperatures in the Amazon Room vary from boiling hot to frigid. It fluctuates every twenty minutes and varies depending on where you are sitting or standing. It was freezing on Day 5 and I caught a cold. I got sick at he start of Day 5 and went home at the dinner break. I needed to rest up for Day 6 and the final table.

For the first time during the entire Main Event, I had to follow along with the live updates on PokerNews.com. I experienced the WSOP like most of you get to do. I finally had that perspective and it was both entertaining and interesting. I don't want to jinx our coverage, but so far it's been pretty good. I'm biased but I also know the difference between last year's coverage and what we've bee cranking out.

What you don't know is that there's a rotating group of 30 or more people who have been busting their asses during the main event. While no one is perfect and since you can't please everyone out there following along, I'm more than pleased with the effort and content. For the last two days, we're hoping to step it up even more. And the final table is going to be a ton of fun. It will be much easier than the 50K HORSE event and I'm looking forward to doing the color commentary while BJ does the play-by-play.

Of course that's not until Tuesday night. And there are 36 players left in the mix. On Sunday, we'll find out who the final tables will be. On Saturday, we sat and watched as the field thinned down from 112 to 36. The action started out fast. Thirty players busted out fairly quickly, then the eliminations slowed down to a trickle.

The plan was to play five levels or until 27 players remained, whichever came first. If there were more than 36 players left after five levels, action would not stop until there were 36 players. That ended up happening... and at 2am, Ayaz Mahmood busted out in 37th place. Day 5 was complete.

Maria Ho was the last female standing. She busted out in 38th place. I'm sure she'll get some ESPN face time. Her bustout hand ended up being shrouded in ugliness. Here's what Jonno wrote:

When Maria Ho busted, needless to say she was disappointed. To add insult to injury, Kevin Farry's supporters are two-deep on the rail and are extremely intoxicated. When the river card fell, they screamed *very* loudly and leant all the way over the ropes to high-five Farry.

The rail is very close to the table and Farry is in the 5 seat, however Maria is in the 4 seat and was unable to stand up due to the arms hanging over her head, holding her captive.

Scenes of joyous celebration are nothing new in poker, however what we just witnessed showed a total disregard for the player whose tournament life has just come to an end, and a complete lack of respect for the great game we all love.

Yeah it sucked that Ho had to sit right next to a bunch of drunk idiots. The last two days featured a ton of railbirds. For the first time during the main event, everyone had access. However, I also noticed that there were several people who were not just drunk... but shitfaced, shithoused, and downright sloppy.

The No Limit Lounge offered up free cans of Milwaukee's Beast on Friday night and everyone up there got shitfaced. A 90 year-old woman was two fisting Beast Lights for a while and even an ESPN camera man captured that on film. I hope that ESPN shows that clip.

Anyway, I assume that since it's the weekend, there were more drunks around than normal. It sucked having to sit at the media desk and have drunks pester you about stupid things. But to be playing for $8.25 million in cash and have to sit at a table and be harassed by drunks is something that I'd complain about if I was still in the tournament.

Several of the big names headed to the rail on Day 5 including Huck Seed, Gus Hansen, Humberto Brenes, Kirk Morrison, Chad Brown Julian Gardner, Cory Carroll, Isaac Haxton, and Brandon Adams. Former chipleaders Dag Martin Mikkelsen, Jeff "Mr. Rain" Banghart, and Dario Minieri failed to advance to Day 6.


Dario Bustarino
The biggest name who advanced to Day 6 was none other than Scotty Nguyen. He's had a fantastic WSOP with two final tables. He's looking to win his second world championship. He's towards the back of the pack but anything can happen on Day 6. Danny Alaei and Lee Watkinson are among the other big names still in the main event. 2007 WSOP bracelet winners Bill Edler and Alex Kravchenko are also alive and seeking their second bracelet on the WSOP.

Here's a list of the remaining 36 players with chipcounts:
David Tran 10,280,000
Philip Hilm 9,950,000
Ray Henson 8,250,000
Hevad "Rain" Khan 7,585,000
Kevin Farry 7,400,000
Scott Freeman 7,360,000
Lee Childs 6,520,000
Jerry Yang 5,090,000
Kenny Tran 4,955,000
William Spadea 4,575,000
Tuan Lam 3,600,000
Lee Watkinson 3,500,000
Stefan Mattsson 3,260,000
Raymond Rahme 3,100,000
Bill Edler 2,680,000
Ron Kluber 2,6750,00
Jon Kalmar 2,665,000
John Armbrust 2,600,000
Peter Darvill 2,430,000
Hoa Nguyen 2,205,000
Bob Slezak 2,115,000
Jason Welch 2,115,000
Steven Garfinkle 2,115,000
Jeff Bryan 2,100,000
Mikkel Madsen 2,080,000
Christian Togsverd 2,030,000
Daniel Alaei 1,995,800
Scotty Nguyen 1,960,000
Ryan Elson 1,785,000
Paulo Loureiro 1,645,000
Alex Kravchenko 1,555,000
Jason Koshi 1,175,000
Allan W. King 1,080,000
Roy Winston 1,071,000
Allan King 1,000,000
Kevin Kim 610,000
Robin Bergren 520,000

* * * * *
Quick Stats
Players Remaining: 36
Chipleader: David Tran

Day 5 Money Winners:
37 Ayaz Mahmood $237,865
38 Maria Ho $237,865
39 Rep Porter $237,865
40 Philip Yeh $237,865
41 Jeff Banghart $237,865
42 Dag Martin Mikkelsen $237,865
43 Avi Cohen $237,865
44 Senovio Ramirez III $237,865
45 Stig Tap Rasmussen $237,865

46 Reagan Silber $190,053
47 Nicolas Atlan $190,053
48 Markus Gonsalves $190,053
49 Adam White $190,053
50 Ken Smith $190,053
51 Lamar Wilkinson $190,053
52 Tom Peterson $190,053
53 Mickey Seagle $190,053
54 Richard Harris $190,053

55 Paul Kershaw $154,194
56 Kirk Morrison $154,194
57 Hyon Kim $154,194
58 Naseem Salem $154,194
59 Floyd Clark $154,194
60 John Spadavecchia $154,194
61 Gus Hansen $154,194
62 Jeff Tunkel $154,194
63 Matt Keikoan $154,194

64 Julian Gardner $130,288
65 Bjorn-Erik Glenne $130,288
66 Ryan Lawrence $130,288
67 Diego Cordovez $130,288
68 Dennis Perry $130,288
69 Brandon Adams $130,288
70 Warren Karp $130,288
71 Ed de Haas $130,288
72 Billy Willis $130,288

73 Huckleberry Seed $106,382
74 Rich Murnick $106,382
75 Leonard Pruzansky $106,382
76 Josh Evans $106,382
77 Willie Tann $106,382
78 David Names $106,382
79 Tommy Le $106,382
80 Sven Niklas Heinecker $106,382
81 Thierry van den Berg $106,382

82 Francis Cagney $82,476
83 Humberto Brenes $82,476
84 Mark Ellerbe $82,476
85 David Wells $82,476
86 Justin Sadauskas $82,476
87 Jeffrey Weiss $82,476
88 Jared Hamby $82,476
89 John Bird $82,476
90 Francois Safieddine $82,476

91 Cory Carroll $67,535
92 Charis Anastasiou $67,535
93 Michael Zinna $67,535
94 Isaac Haxton $67,535
95 Kelly Jo McGlothin $67,535
96 Dario Minieri $67,535
97 Chad Brown $67,535
98 Alan Levin $67,535
99 Joe Shield $67,535

100 Cody Slaubaugh $58,570
101 Pete de Best $58,570
102 Alan Keating $58,570
103 Brian Tracy $58,570
104 Richard Crowell $58,570
105 Zhuang Han $58,570
106 Travis Belles $58,570
107 Jimmy Blevins $58,570
108 Paul Spitzberg $58,570
109 Christopher Lovelace $58,570
110 Andreas Krause $58,570
111 Andrew Gunderson $58,570
112 Thomas Koo $58,570

I'll post official end of Day 5 chip counts as soon as I have access to that data.

I wish I could write more, but the Nyquil has kicked in and I'm feeling a little loopy. Best to head off to sleep and wake up in the morning to add more to this post. And hey, you never know... I might be doing some random "semi-live" updates from the floor of the Rio on Day 6.

* * * * *

Bonus Code: Pauly
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/15/2007 05:33:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 43: Main Event Day 4 - Dealing for Dario

By Pauly

One of my favorite scenes from Goodfellas is the Copacabana tracking shot that starts from the street from the point of view of Karen's character as she's taken inside the famous club to the back entrance through the kitchen, past tight spaces and winding corridors and eventually at a private table to the front of the stage. Very few directors could pull off a long tracking shot like Scorsese.

There are instances where I get that same feel in Goodfellas when I embark on a similar route from the emergency exit from the media room. I sneak out into the service corridors. I don't know if I should be back there, but I haven't been caught in two years. Wil and I discovered them last year and it was an amazing short cut to the floor and to the bathrooms since we avoid the crowded and congested hallways in front of the Amazon Ballroom and in front of the poker kitchen and the media room. I've also called that spot in front of the poker kitchen... Bad Beat Alley. I've never heard so many bad beat stories as I have in that spot.

Anyway... as soon as you step into the back corridor, you see a couple of huge refrigerators, bins of ice, and plenty of shelves with condiments, shiny coffee pots, stacks and stacks of Diet Pepsi, and several cases of energy drinks. There are caged steel shelves with boxes of apples and oranges and crates filled with bananas and potato chips. A separate steel shelving unit holds hundreds of pieces of linen and table clothes for the various banquets rooms. If I took a banana would anyone notice?

As I pass the sparsely populated dealers room, I almost always trip on three large jugs of water sit on the ground along with scattered empty coffee cups and a copy of Poker Player Newspaper. There's also a TV set, broken lights, and even a plate of half-eaten buffalo chicken wings sitting on the edge of a chair. After I turn the corner and pass the Bluff Production room, I have to squeeze by a few large wooden crates before I reach ESPN's area. The hallways by their control is cluttered with various equipment boxes, right next to chairs that are stacked twenty high next to several ladders that are locked up. I guess people steal ladders more than anything in the service corridors. That's the only thing locked down.

I don't see too many people walking around back there. Perhaps the occasional dealer with a cushion tucked under their arm rushing back from a break or a guy in a black Rio shirt picking up the garbage. I've seen Norm Chad roam the corridors at random times and he's never said hello once to me so I always snub him back. I say, "What's up Lon?" from time to time just to tilt him. Lon on the other hand is always cheerful and I've seen more of him at the 2007 WSOP more than the last two years combined.

There's the graveyard for broken and wobbly chairs along with poker tables with limp legs and large spills on their felt, and a few comfortable dealer's chairs that I'd sit in to make phone calls. Sometimes I'd sneak into the hallways to write for ten minutes to avoid the insanity of the floor.

The hallways would be perfect to shoot scenes from any Aaron Sorkin drama or a PT Anderson long tracking shot with long and narrow walkways with high ceilings and random shit all over the place with plenty of random doorways and unexpected confrontations with angry cameramen, overworked floor supervisors, or half-baked media reps.

When I finally reach the doors that leads into the Amazon Ballroom underneath Puggy Pearson's portrait, I take a deep breath. Then I jump into the tumultuous waters. The sounds hit you in the face. The chip clattering nearly pierce my eardrums as the corner of the room was jam packed with media and spectators.

Day 4 was one of the busiest since it was one of the most important. The field started with 337 players after a full day of poker, a little more than a hundred would remain. We're getting closer and closer to the final table and the group of notable players gets thinner and thinner. The short stacks are trying to hold on long enough until the next money jump or looking to double up to stay alive. The medium stacks are trying to not make any stupid mistakes and slip under the average stack or some of them are seeking edges that will propel them to the front of the pack. And the big stacks are worried about conservatively maintaining their lead while some are throwing their weight around bullying the table as their stacks get bigger and bigger. And some wait for that one knockout punch where they double up against an overzealous big stack and take over the chiplead.

By this time in 2005, Greg Raymer became the first player past the 1M mark. Matusow would jump to 1.4M with under 100 players to go.

Last year with about 135 players left, at the 2006 WSOP Jamie Gold was the chipleader with 3.7M and led by over 1.4 million.

At the 2007 WSOP, there is no clear cut leader. When things started to matter the most, Gus Hansen ended Day 2 as the chipleader and failed to hold onto it. Dario Minieri snagged the chiplead on Day 3 and he also failed to protect it. Day 4's chipleader was Dag Martin Mikkelsen from Norway. We'll see if he can hold onto it as the field goes from 112 to the final 27 or 36.


Random Scandi chipleader - Dag Martin Mikkelsen
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
In my last post, I suggested that a Scandi would take over the chiplead late on Day 4. Nice catch, eh? Just after dinner break, Norwegian Dag Martin Mikkelsen jumped past the 3M mark after he took down a mosterpotten with a flopped straight. His opponent Jeff Weiss flopped second pair and a flush draw... and missed.

When Day 4 ended there were two ladies left in the field.... Mario Ho and Kelly Jo McGlothlin. There were also two previous world champions remaining. Scotty Nguyen and Huckleberry Seed were trying to win their second championships. Berry Johnston busted out on the last hand of the night. Just before dinner break, Carlos Mortensen and Robert Varkonyi also headed to the rail as their attempt to repeat came to an abrupt ending. Hey, at least Varkonyi cashed and got that monkey off his back or in poker terms... get that hook out of his mouth.

And don't forget about Porsche Boy. Dario Minieri went to the ESPN feature table with the chiplead and his Harry Potter scarf. He bled chips away with hyper-aggressive play. He slowly built his stack back up when he was moved out onto the floor. He was constantly getting a massage as most of the media kept their eyes on his table. Tao of Poker reader and Las Vegas pro Mark Muchnik was on his table for most of the day. Muchnik would bust out in 147th place. He had a pretty good WSOP and missed out on winning his first bracelet when he took second in a preliminary event.

Dario Minieri is an interesting example the struggle between rival online poker sites and the ambush marketing strategies that they employ. As long as I've been in the business, PokerStars and FullTilt have been fighting for players while Party Poker sits on the sidelines. Aside from Mike Sexton, there's really not any other pros attached to their site. As one of the official sponsors of the WSOP, they get enough exposure, but the two big dogs are constantly wrestling over the same players. At the same time other sites are getting into the mix going for the second or third rate players.

At this stage of the tournament with about ten or eleven tables left, the marketing folks strategically try to pick the guys that they think will go deep or get camera time. In the past, once a player was affiliated with one site, they were unofficially off bounds. That changed at the 2005 WSOP when Full Tilt made a last second deal with Noah Boeken and Marcel Luske. They were scheduled to play on the ESPN feature table and FT was able to get them to wear their hats and shirts for a wad of cash. That irked the suits at PokerStars and rightly so. Boeken had qualified for the main event through Stars and had been wearing their gear for the entire WSOP.

Dario got the friggin Porsche after he cashed in 3 million FPP points from PokerStars. And yet FullTilt reps were lurking the hallways and wooing his friends and translator. For a brief moment, Dario wore a Full Tilt patch on Day 4. He felt conflicted due to his relationship with PokerStars and took it off. Marco Traniello gave him the FT patch. Not only is Traniello a fellow Italian, he's friends with the Italian Pirate Max Pescatori (a FT player) and Traniello is married to Jen Harman one of the members of Team Full Tilt. Since Dario Minieri was also Italian, the Italian pros were sweating him hard to join the FT stable. Sweet sweet Dario became the latest pawn in the never ending battle for the quest of online poker dominance.


Dario sporting a FT patch
Ambush marketing among online poker sites has become a multi-million dollar a year business. I knew one woman who worked for an online poker site last year. She had two gym bags. One was filled with cash. The other was filled with hats and t-shirts. Her job was to find out who made TV tables and buy them off. Unknowns were worth $10-20K while well named pros went for $40K and up. During the later stages of the main event, the price tags go up.

With unscrupulous second rate poker agents corrupting the scene as well, things are even uglier. They're jacking up the prices and gobbling up dozens of the remaining 100 players promising them to hook them up with sweet endorsement deals. Some naive amateurs and inexperienced pros often get fucked over twice ... by shady agents signing them up to crappy deals with third rate online rooms that only insomniacs in Iceland play on.

Whoever gets Dario to wear their stuff on Saturday will be hoping that Dario survives another day and not repeat last year's performance when he donked off his big stack.

Moving on...

How about some numbers?

Players Remaining: 112
Chipleader: Dag Martin Mikkelson

Players who might have heard of that advanced to Day 5... Bill Edler, Lee Watkinson, Julian Gardner, Gus Hansen, Huckleberry Seed, Dario Minieri, Jeff "Mr. Rain" Banghart, Kirk Morrison, Humberto Brenes, Scotty Nguyen, Warren Karp, Daniel Alaei, Chad Brown, and Brandon Adams.

Players that you might have not heard of who advanced to Day 5... Alex Kravchenko, Rep Porter, John Spadavecchia, Matt Keikoan, Cory Carroll, Willie Tann, Philip Hilm, Maria Ho, Kenny Tran, Isaac Haxton, Francois Safieddine, Ayaz Mahmood, Jared "WacoKidd" Hamby, Mickey Seagle, and Andreas Krause.

Notable bustouts on Day 4... Berry Johnston, David Levi, Peter "Nordberg" Feldman, Neal "Bad Beat" Channing, Billy Baxter, Thor Hansen, Mark Muchnik, Mathew Brady, Nick Binger, Donnacha O'Dea, Robert Varkonyi, Donna Blevins, Hal Lubarsky, Sorel Mizzi, Matthew Hilger, Jason Lester, Amanda Baker, Gary Benson, Tobey Maguire, Carl Olson, Mimi Tran, Hans "Tuna" Lund, Darrell "Gigabet" Dicken, and Hasan Habib.


Day 4 Money Winners:
113 Berry Johnston $58,570
114 Edward Betlow $58,570
115 Bart Hanson $58,570
116 Zackary Clark $58,570
117 Justin King $58,570
118 Matt Stout $58,570
119 Jonathan Moonves $58,570
120 Ang Pang Leng $58,570
121 David Levi $58,570
122 Sylvester Geoghegan $58,570
123 Rajesh Verma $58,570
124 Andrew Barnes $58,570
125 James Williams $58,570
126 Kenneth Evanowski $58,570
127 James Kasputis $58,570
128 Patrick Huse $58,570
129 Tim Begley $58,570
130 Claude Cohen $58,570
131 Neil Channing $58,570
132 Vadim Trincher $58,570
133 Peter "Nordberg" Feldman $58,570
134 Thor Hansen $58,570
135 Bryan Swanson $58,570
136 Billy Baxter $58,570
137 Robert Lauria $58,570
138 Wolbert Bartlema $58,570
139 Greg Huffman $58,570
140 Jay Benjamin Franklin $58,570
141 Michael Mills $58,570
142 Samuel Cadget $58,570
143 Phillip Liow $58,570
144 Martin Miller $58,570
145 Adam Weiss $58,570
146 Robert Nehorayan $58,570
147 Mark Muchnik $58,570
148 Alin Rapoport $58,570
149 Justin Rollo $58,570
150 Imran Ahmad $58,570
151 Karim Vegas $58,570
152 Mark Weitzman $58,570
153 Marco Mills $58,570
154 Brent Catalano $58,570
155 Bo Sehlstedt $58,570
156 Benjamin Lamb $58,570
157 Daniel Elizondo $58,570
158 Sean Boles $58,570
159 Mathew Brady $58,570
160 John Dutchak $58,570
161 Man Montgomery $58,570
162 Mark Kim $58,570

163 Tristan Wade $51,398
164 Gonzalo Flores $51,398
165 Nick Binger $51,398
166 Clint Schafer $51,398
167 James McCrink $51,398
168 Joseph Brandenberg $51,398
169 Kenny Rundh $51,398
170 Fernando Reyes $51,398
171 Donnacha O'Dea $51,398
172 Clifford Pappas $51,398
173 Yuval Friedman $51,398
174 Brett Kimes $51,398
175 Terry Kane $51,398
176 Deborah Blair $51,398
177 Robert Varkonyi $51,398
178 John Parker $51,398
179 Donna Blevins $51,398
180 Alex Michaels $51,398
181 Joe Pharo $51,398
182 Henry Ma $51,398
183 Priyan Demel $51,398
184 Randal McLoughlin $51,398
185 Sven Abelsson $51,398
186 Jonathan Campbell $51,398
187 James Lucas $51,398
188 Michael Souza $51,398
189 Michael Laing $51,398
190 Alen Patatanyan $51,398
191 Robert Damiano $51,398
192 Richard Klein $51,398
193 David Cowan $51,398
194 Robert Starkey $51,398
195 Laughlin McKinnon $51,398
196 Conor Tate $51,398
197 Hal Lubarsky $51,398
198 Trey O'Brien $51,398
199 Christopher Overgard $51,398
200 Randall Holland $51,398
201 Karlo Lopez $51,398
202 Phivan Tran $51,398
203 Jason Sell $51,398
204 Kenneth Lawrence $51,398
205 Esfandiar Dara $51,398
206 Karga Holt $51,398
207 Matthew Olim $51,398
208 Sorel Mizzi $51,398
209 Adam Noone $51,398
210 Oyenson Benoit $51,398
211 Gary Friedlander $51,398
212 Tristan McDonald $51,398
213 Bobby Poole $51,398
214 Evan Marshall $51,398
215 Alexander Dietrich $51,398
216 Justin Sellers $51,398
217 Carlos Mortensen $51,398
218 Stephen Austin $51,398
219 Richard Weisman $51,398
220 Stephen Ma $51,398
221 Matthew Hilger $51,398
222 Antonio Arce $51,398
223 Tinten Olivier $51,398
224 Frank Schram $51,398
225 Kenneth Stead $51,398

226 Jason Heidema $45,422
227 Jose Padillo $45,422
228 Steven Lynch $45,422
229 Steven Jacobs $45,422
230 Jason Lester $45,422
231 Sebastian Zink $45,422
232 Theodore Park $45,422
233 Matt Cohen $45,422
234 Jeffrey Dambrosia $45,422
235 Steven Guiberson $45,422
236 Terris Preston $45,422
237 Sully Erna $45,422
238 Matthew Sterling $45,422
239 Richard Munro $45,422
240 Mao Qui $45,422
241 Cyrus Farzad $45,422
242 Roy Vanderswis $45,422
243 Timothy Debenport $45,422
244 Moritz Hopfner $45,422
245 Takashi Takil $45,422
246 Rami Bookai $45,422
247 Guang Lu $45,422
248 Daniel Quach $45,422
249 Brad Mills $45,422
250 Michael Yoshino $45,422
251 Kristian Obbarius $45,422
252 Noah Schwartz $45,422
253 Amanda Baker $45,422
254 Toc Helness $45,422
255 Elie Said $45,422
256 Brian Miller $45,422
257 Keith Ogren $45,422
258 Roger Tichenor $45,422
259 Thomas Barnard $45,422
260 Christopher Lines $45,422
261 Sang Kim $45,422
262 Rodney Knight $45,422
263 Bryan Curtis $45,422
264 Zachary King $45,422
265 Dorman Atchison $45,422
266 Randall Jacobson $45,422
267 Albert Riccobono $45,422
268 John Matwey $45,422
269 Ketul Nathwani $45,422
270 Qing Sun $45,422
271 Kit Mander $45,422
272 Jacques Arama $45,422
273 Gustav Ludholm $45,422
274 Douglas Gehring $45,422
275 David O'Neil $45,422
276 Stephen Crockett $45,422
277 Ut Nguyen $45,422
278 Gregory Owen $45,422
279 Kenneth Gacek $45,422
280 Jason Mellross $45,422
281 Daniel Melan $45,422
282 Craig Edwards $45,422
283 Gary Benson $45,422
284 Wayne Johnson $45,422
285 Laurence Hughes $45,422
286 Daniel Smith $45,422
287 Jason Peed $45,422
288 Mark Sanchez $45,422

289 Alex Melnikow $39,445
290 Mitch Garshofsky $39,445
291 Suk Sung $39,445
292 Tobey Maguire $39,445
293 Kevin Howatt $39,445
294 Petri Pollanen $39,445
295 Stephen O'Dwyer $39,445
296 Christoph Stiehler $39,445
297 William Wood $39,445
298 Robert Preston $39,445
299 Ira Mazie $39,445
300 David Terry $39,445
301 Jim Geary $39,445
302 Sean Walter $39,445
303 Roy Thung $39,445
304 Carl Olson $39,445
305 Ryan McLean $39,445
306 Christopher Viox $39,445
307 Alfred Merabyan $39,445
308 Derek Thorpe $39,445
309 Kenneth Weiner $39,445
310 Scott Mayfield $39,445
311 David Smart $39,445
312 Nasser Hamedani $39,445
313 Lewis Pilkington $39,445
314 Veronica Dabol $39,445
315 Vinod Jadav $39,445
316 Sverre Sundro $39,445
317 Mimi Tran $39,445
318 Jason Glass $39,445
319 Hans Lund $39,445
320 Steven Miranda $39,445
321 David Flusfeder $39,445
322 Nicholas Botta $39,445
323 Darrell Dicken $39,445
324 Abdul Fadeyi $39,445
325 Matthew Shepsky $39,445
326 Patrice McLean $39,445
327 Arthur Cole $39,445
328 Hasan Habib $39,445
329 Samuel Simon $39,445
330 Steven Dargenio $39,445
331 Kenny Dickenson $39,445
332 John Eckerd $39,445
333 Salatore Passariello $39,445
334 Peter Hill $39,445
335 Eddit Stutts $39,445
336 Daniel Schleben $39,445
337 Steven Prentky $39,445

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Main Event Day 4...

Otis and I have had a tradition where we drink a beer at the start of the last level on the night. In Monte Carlo, we'd retreat to the bar overlooking the Mediterranean and wait up to ten minutes to be recognized by surly French waiters. We've been doing that this year and engaging in high stakes Lime Toss at the same time. Over at Pokerati, Michalski wrote up his experiences watching us gamble on Lime Tossing and also posted photos. He wrote... "As mentioned before, there's so much action going on a dwindling number of tables that it's hard to keep up with it all. But that doesn't stop Pauly and Otis from sneaking away for a little lime tossing."

I was busy writing up a couple of hands when a spectator wandered over to the media desk in a specific area he was not supposed to be in. Here's a snippet of our conversation.

Spectator: Is Doyle Brunson here?
Pauly: He busted out on Day 1
Spectator: So is he playing today?
Pauly: No, he was eliminated,
Spectator: Is Phil Hellmuth here?
Pauly: He also busted out on Day 1.
Spectator: Can you tell me what table he's playing today?
Pauly: (frustrated at all the stupid question) he's playing on Table 166.

FYI... Table 166 is an empty table in the cash game area

At 2:01am, Michalski sent me a text..."When we are done with poker, wanna go blog from Iraq?" Flipchip said the same thing a few months ago. Could be interesting. I heard Flipchip is a good shot and has excellent survival skills after surviving the jungles of Vietnam. Since Michalski is from Texas, he's heavily armed at all times. Before I got into poker, I was seeking jobs as a war correspondent. At some point, I'd like to cover a war and the Olympics. Oh and those elephant polo matches in Sri Lanka. I heard the side action on those games get out of hand. My buddy Senor won like 80 million rupees on one match alone. That's worth like $4 US, but that's enough to get you a handjob from a couple of local hookers.

Of course, the Vegas working girls are at the start of their slow season. They have been trickling down to the WSOP hallways and at the hooker bar aggressively seeking clients who just cashed in the WSOP main event and are looking for some bad beat therapy. After seeing some of the tabs that poker players run up with the massage therapists during the WSOP, I wonder how much some of those high rollers spend on hookers per month?

Last 5 Pros I Pissed Next To...
1. Humberto Brenes
2. Willie Tann
3. Mickey "Mouse" Mills
4. Huck Seed
5. Chad Brown

* * * * *

Bonus Code: Pauly
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/14/2007 05:50:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 42: Main Event Day 3 - Bubblicious

By Pauly

"The bubble is my favorite time," Otis has said to me more than once.

He's right. After covering enough poker tournaments over the last three years and getting to experience the bubble in the $1,500 NL event that I played a couple of weeks ago, the bubble is indeed one of the most exhilarating moments during a poker tournament. The bubble time of the main event is the most stressful moment in poker.

The majority of most tournaments are boring affairs with 99% of unaction. However, the bubble happens to be packed with excitement and drama. The future of the tournament is played out in a slow and methodical pace. Players are literally hanging on for their lives. The short stacks are hoping to squeeze into the money while other players are not even looking at their hands during the Hand-for-Hand period before the money bust. I heard about how a few players folded big hands like Aces and Kings. That's also the time when the savvy pros and uber-aggressive players make moves. Lee Watkinson had everyone at his table covered with a big stack. No one had more than 140K in chips. He raised every single hand on the bubble to 150K. He dared anyone to play for all their chips. And no one wanted his action. His stack got bigger and bigger before the bubble burst.

The room was only half-full with an ofd configuration of a rail surrounding the tables. There was a mixture of media and spectators milling around the ropes. Some unauthorized media snuck inside the ropes, while plenty of spectators managed to bypass security and slip through the cracks. ESPN cameras rumbled through the aisles as other media fought for space around a table with a significant hand.

Most of the cameras were focused on Table #67 right in front of the media desk where I sat.

Seat 2: David Wells
Seat 3: Josh Evans
Seat 4: Jeff "Mr. Rain" Banghart
Seat 7: Humberto Brenes
Seat 8: Tobey Maguire
Seat 9: Jared "WacoKidd" Hamby

The ESPN suits were coming in their pants as were most of the other photographers who could have not asked for a better table to shoot. They had one of the top online players in the WacoKidd. Evans was a just 22-year old kid. Tobey Maguire gave them the star-power that could fill an entire episode. Mr. Rain held the chiplead for part of the day and was the monster stack at the table. And Humberto was... Humberto. He was up to his usual antics, pulling out his toy sharks and yelling at the top of his lungs for the cameras.


Tobey Maguire at Table #67
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
During the 2006 WSOP, the Irish media referred to Brenes as the "asshat of sombreros." Phil Gordon can't stand his antics along with other players who have no love for Humberto Brenes. On the other hand, there are hundreds of other players who adore Brenes and admire what he's accomplished for himself and for representing poker for Central and South America. He's a true ambassador of poker and a valuable asset for PokerStars in Spanish speaking markets.

Brenes went deep at the 2006 WSOP main event. I know because he was one of my assignments for two days when I worked for PokerStars blog. He was one of the Team PokerStars players that I had to sweat along with Greg Raymer and Tom McEvoy. If you see reruns of last year's main event, you'll find me standing behind Brenes during his bustout hand. That's when he first introduced The Shark.

Anyway, Brenes was up to his old tricks and mugging for the cameras, busting out the shark and pretending to talk to it. Ed from Gutshot asked Tobey Maguire if he thought Brenes was annoying or a distraction.

"I kind of like it," Spidey said.

The cameras loved every minute of it. I really thought that they should have been on ESPN's feature table. The day started off with three heavy hitters under the bright lights. Chipleader Gus Hansen, Gavin Smith, and Carlos Mortensen were began the day on the stage. Their table eventually broke up and you would have thunk ESPN's suits would have snagged the Spiderman vs. Shark table with special guests. Change100 suggested that Tobey Maguire asked not to be on a feature table. Perhaps he had some pre-arranged deal with the Upper Mouse Suits which excluded him from intense media scrutiny.

Maguire had been ducking photographers all day. He sat next to the lead singer of Godsmack Sully Erna for most of the afternoon. He did his best to get out of way of cameras and would turn his head. Flipchip had to go all ninja on Spiderman and sneak around without being detected. Flipchip would shoot him using a sick lens from three or four tables away.

When Day 4 was over Porsche Boy... aka Dario Minieri was in first place with a 2.4M chiplead. He's an online guru who cashed in 3 million in PokerStars FPP for a firggin' Porsche. Lucky fucker. And he looks like he's in 8th grade. I first came across Minieri during last year's main event when I worked for PokerStars. He was one of their qualifiers. At some point during the main event, he had built up a massive lead. All I could think was, "Who's the little kid with the monster stack?"

When I asked him his name, Minieri spoke to me in broken English. He said he was from Italy and,"I am the sorry. I don't speak your English good."

That's why he could not answer some of the random questions I asked him. Cardplayer fucked up his name and called him Dario Milan for a while. PokerStars had him by his real name until they read our chipcounts and corrected their mistake. Minieri could not maintain his lead and finished up in 543rd place.

Flash forward to April 2007. I stood in the lobby of the Sports Complex behind the Monte Carlo Bay Casino. That's where the EPT Championships were behind held. As soon as you walk into the lobby, a huge banner with a PokerStars logo greeted you. On that particular banner had Dario Minieri's photo. He had made the final table of the EPT Baden and finished in 3rd place.

When I first saw him at the 2007 WSOP, he sported a scarf. Only one other player I knew of wore scarves and that was Scarf Boy George Danzer from Germany. It seems like his trend is catching on with the European players. Anyway, the Italian guy with the scarf with the funny accent who looked like he was 15 years old also owned a Porsche courtesy of PokerStars and had an online bankroll can choke a fuckin' giraffe was leading the WSOP.


Dario
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
Poker is an international game. Denmark's Gus Hansen held the lead at the start of Day 3. Italy's Dario Minieri took it over by Midnight. Can Porsche Boy hold onto the lead or will a Scandi come out of nowhere and jump out to a huge lead? Or can Mr. Rain picked up his game or will a former champion like Huck Seed or Scotty Nguyen make a run? Those questions will be answered in less than 24 hours.

Moving on...

There are 337 players left. They all made the money and advanced to Day 4. They will return to the Rio on Friday at noon. The final table is set for Tuesday.

Players advancing to Day 4 include... Dario Minieri, Jeff Weiss, Kenny Tran, Robert Nehorayan, Jeff "Mr. Rain" Banghart, Hevad Khan, Rep Porter, Gus Hansen, Brock "Tsoprano" Parker, Isaac Haxton, Lars Bonding, Bart Hanson, Kirk Morrison, Conor Tate, Bill Edler, Josh Evans, Huck Seed, Darrell Dicken, Cory Carroll, Lee Watkinson, Maria Ho, Matt Keikoan, Hal Lubarsky, Julian Gardner, John Spadavecchia, Peter "Nordberg" Feldman, Chad Brown, Brandon Adams, Randy Holland, Robert Varkonyi , Alex Kravchenko, Carlos Mortensen, Thor Hansen, Danny Smith, David Wells, Willie Tann, Jared "WacoKidd" Hamby, Warren Karp, Ayaz Mahmood, Matthew Hilger, Ut Nguyen, Sorel Mizzi, David Levi, Mickey Seagle, Scotty Nguyen, Mark Muchnik, Daniel Quach, Mickey "Mouse" Mills, Amanda Baker, Humberto Brenes, Daniel Alaei, Hasan Habib, Terry Magill, Nick Binger, Mimi Tran, Sully Erna, Hans "Tuna" Lund, Billy Baxter, Mike Laing, Tobey Maguire, Berry Johnston, Carl Olson, Don O'Dea, Gary Benson, Vandy Krouch, and Sam Khouiss.

In case you were wondering who cashed. Here's a list of Day 3 money winners...

2007 WSOP Main Event Day 3 Money Winners:
338 Santiago Terrazas $39,445
339 Simone Rossi $39,445
340 Camillo Calabrese $39,445
341 Thomas Burandt $39,445
342 Brian Hearn $39,445
343 Dolph Arnold $39,445
344 Steven Khun $39,445
345 Jose Severino $39,445
346 Jared Okun $39,445
347 Dennis Marcum $39,445
348 Wing Tso $39,445
349 John Doucet $39,445
350 Alexander Johnoff $39,445
351 Kevin Chan $39,445

352 Christian Toth $34,664
353 George Ramsey $34,664
354 Demetrios Arvanites $34,664
355 Nils Ersson $34,664
356 Jesper Hougaard $34,664
357 Robert Mizrachi $34,664
358 George Vazanellis $34,664
359 Thomas Vinas $34,664
360 Robert Roseman $34,664
361 Andrew Brokis $34,664
362 Sam Ditson $34,664
363 James Dawick $34,664
364 Pamela Brunson $34,664
365 Christopher Hamman $34,664
366 Darin Haddock $34,664
367 Michael Ium $34,664
368 Kyu Cho $34,664
369 Weldon Johnson $34,664
370 Jonathan Goldberg $34,664
371 Kathy Jamison $34,664
372 Brian Darmaniu $34,664
373 Keith Gipson $34,664
374 Brian Collins $34,664
375 Lee Biddulph $34,664
376 Franklin Welca $34,664
377 David Wilson $34,664
378 Ronald Philpot $34,664
379 John Strzemp $34,664
380 Todd Philips $34,664
381 Andrew Bartou $34,664
382 William Davidson $34,664
383 Grege Jaffy $34,664
384 Charles Anderson $34,664
385 Stuart Spear $34,664
386 Dennis Lane $34,664
387 Pat Datillo $34,664
388 Michael Cooper $34,664
389 Daniel Prevettegoldstein $34,664
390 Andre Wagner $34,664
391 Brent Sheirbon $34,664
392 Leif Force $34,664
393 Chris Collins $34,664
394 Jong O $34,664
395 Gregory Hobson $34,664
396 Casey Childress $34,664
397 Oliver Maingay $34,664
398 Steven Ettenger $34,664
399 Jay Perkins $34,664
400 Wenlong Jin $34,664
401 Edward Anselmo $34,664
402 Pierre Bounahra $34,664
403 Daniel Heimiller $34,664
404 Davidi Kitai $34,664
405 Daniel Showden $34,664
406 Marcous Naalden $34,664
407 Henry McMillan $34,664
408 Charles Jett $34,664
409 Gregory Liang $34,664
410 Tobias Christensen $34,664
411 Brian Hollywood $34,664
412 Nicholas Nicolaou $34,664
413 Michael Tureniec $34,664
414 Robert Donnino $34,664

415 Eduardo Santi $29,883
416 James Capone $29,883
417 Jefferson James $29,883
418 Scott Epstein $29,883
419 Eugene Foukshan $29,883
420 Diana Hakopian $29,883
421 Fabrice Soulier $29,883
422 Sam Khouiss $29,883
423 Christiane Klecz $29,883
424 Phillip Lowery $29,883
425 Ronald Stubing $29,883
426 Chris Grigorian $29,883
427 Bradley Ellis $29,883
428 Mathew Ciezki $29,883
429 Joseph Fallows $29,883
430 Robert Lipkin $29,883
431 Curtis Vangilder $29,883
432 George Alex $29,883
433 Huyen Nguyen $29,883
434 Andre Boyer $29,883
435 Tony Lee $29,883
436 Yuan Hsleh $29,883
437 William Orvis $29,883
438 Yoeqi Zhu $29,883
439 Louis Merola $29,883
440 Thomas Nielsen $29,883
441 Redmond Lee $29,883
442 Robert Ford $29,883
443 Le Hun G $29,883
444 Hien Tran $29,883
445 Daniel Gelowitz $29,883
446 Cliff "JohnnyBax" Josephy $29,883
447 Goalter Santos $29,883
448 Jonathan Kemsley $29,883
449 Minh Ly $29,883
450 Aditya Agarwal $29,883
451 Wade Chow $29,883
452 Nicholas Cunnane $29,883
453 Ian McDonald $29,883
454 Lance Allred $29,883
455 Jeffrey Weil $29,883
456 Anthony Newman $29,883
457 Alan Hance $29,883
458 Eric Kurtzman $29,883
459 Todd Brunson $29,883
460 Ricardo Nuno $29,883
461 Bruno Fitoussi $29,883
462 Jeppe Nielsen $29,883
463 Bryan Veach $29,883
464 Robby Rose $29,883
465 Shirley Williams $29,883
466 Andrew Grimason $29,883
467 Sara Stohler $29,883
468 Mark Owens $29,883
469 Lloyd Rees $29,883
470 Player Brian de Bruijn $29,883
471 Paul Nero $29,883
472 Phil Lifschitz $29,883
473 Jason Tikijian $29,883
474 Vandy Krouch $29,883
475 Suleiman Aboeid $29,883
476 Eris Staton $29,883
477 Eugene Ji $29,883

478 Nhut Minh Tran $25,101
479 Antonio Salorio $25,101
480 James Campbell $25,101
481 Scott Yeates $25,101
482 William Stocker $25,101
483 Joseph Reichenberger $25,101
484 Peter Valente $25,101
485 Robert Van Hsia $25,101
486 Lee Klosty $25,101
487 Peter Gould $25,101
488 William Cheeseman $25,101
489 Shayan Salehi $25,101
490 Geoffrey Herzoe $25,101
491 David Riley $25,101
492 Irvin Hoffman $25,101
493 Justin Tran $25,101
494 Jonathan Krela $25,101
495 Nikzad Hooman $25,101
496 Jose Barbero $25,101
497 Daniel Fisher $25,101
498 Anmom Filippi $25,101
499 Victor Rooney $25,101
500 Jeffrey Norman $25,101
501 Terrence Magill $25,101
502 David Gurevich $25,101
503 Michael Ward $25,101
504 Wei Yan Chan $25,101
505 Andrew Evans $25,101
506 Nicholas Carrillo $25,101
507 Mark Bryan $25,101
508 Leo Boxell $25,101
509 Joshua Bauer $25,101
510 Steven Wilk $25,101
511 Rahol Maitra $25,101
512 Farrell Hinkle $25,101
513 Richard Wild $25,101
514 Isaac Galazan $25,101
515 Ronald Crosswell $25,101
516 Robert De Forge $25,101
517 Arthur Rhea $25,101
518 Daniel Palmer $25,101
519 Ten Bokkel $25,101
520 Blair Hinkle $25,101
521 Allen Davis $25,101
522 Ziad Alaheddine $25,101
523 Randall Brueckner $25,101
524 Howard Mann $25,101
525 Aaron Eokhart $25,101
526 Robert Blaeser $25,101
527 Gerald Kim $25,101
528 Russell Kamer $25,101
529 Wilson Tien $25,101
530 Ned Griffis $25,101
531 James Tolley $25,101
532 Jeffrey Lewis $25,101
533 Daniel Attie $25,101
534 Jeffrey Nairih $25,101
535 Mitch Ivey $25,101
536 Jules Dreamell $25,101
537 Christian Abele $25,101
538 Per Linus Johansson $25,101
539 Richard Marshall $25,101
540 Kyle Morris $25,101
541 James Lewis $25,101
542 Kevan Casey $25,101
543 Shawn Chang $25,101
544 Samie Zoudo $25,101
545 Montgomery Cole $25,101
546 Aaron Coulthard $25,101
547 Matthew Traudt $25,101
548 Randall Ameil $25,101
549 Michael Puskarich $25,101

550 Marc Friedmann $20,320
551 Ken Webster $20,320
552 Tony Hachem $20,320
553 Joshua Van Dyke $20,320
554 Thomas Laviano $20,320
555 Roger Brooks $20,320
556 Randy McKay $20,320
557 Edson Esquio $20,320
558 Dale Michael $20,320
559 Rolf Slotboom $20,320
560 Tom McCormick $20,320
561 Deric Senne $20,320
562 Ethan Steinberg $20,320
563 Kizirian Armenak $20,320
564 Patrik Petersson $20,320
565 Shawn Chaconas $20,320
566 Glen Questroo $20,320
567 Jason Stern $20,320
568 Jonathon Tare $20,320
569 ????????? - $20,320
570 Paul Kemp $20,320
571 Bernard Strauss $20,320
572 Desmond Portano $20,320
573 Benjamin Gold $20,320
574 Nikolas Liakos $20,320
575 Bette Carswell $20,320
576 Kevin Lake $20,320
577 Richard Salle $20,320
578 Angela Giannino $20,320
579 Darren Woods $20,320
580 Kyle Wilson $20,320
581 Jeff Dumas $20,320
582 Cal Namihira $20,320
583 Andrew Sheperd $20,320
584 Jonas Jerlstrom $20,320
585 Duane Van Keulen $20,320
586 Penh Lo $20,320
587 Wai "Lucky" Liu $20,320
588 Chris Crilly $20,320
589 Robert Daily $20,320
590 Johnathan Stanton $20,320
591 Eddie Gravalese $20,320
592 Gavin Smith $20,320
593 Ryan Osborne $20,320
594 Joe Graziano $20,320
595 Richard Barbino $20,320
596 Frank Holloway $20,320
597 Mohammed Zahour $20,320
598 Juan Fernandezi $20,320
599 Dean Hamrick $20,320
600 Patric Martensson $20,320
601 Michael Quist $20,320
602 Jan Sorensen $20,320
603 Jeremy Joseph $20,320
604 Loi Khuon Tran $20,320
605 Richard Warburg $20,320
606 Ole Bergan $20,320
607 Jeffrey Lowenhar $20,320
608 George Dolofan $20,320
609 Takeo Oishi $20,320
610 Joseph Cutler $20,320
611 John Michael $20,320
612 Christopher Perry $20,320
613 Artur Szczupak $20,320
614 Anders Solheim $20,320
615 Sheldon Saul $20,320
616 Thong Tran $20,320
617 Kiarasa Hamadani $20,320
618 Carsten Jakobsen $20,320
619 Brian Senie $20,320
620 Jorge Albalat $20,320
621 Gregory Treger $20,320

Action resumes at noon. I'll be live blogging Day 4 for PokerNews.com.

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Main Event Day 3...

There were five former WSOP Champions left in the field... Berry Johnston, Scotty Nguyen, Huck Seed, Carlos Mortensen, and Robert Varkonyi.

There's one guy who gets no respect and it's Robert Varkonyi. Storms told me a sad story about how Varkonyi tried to get into the Amazon Ballroom during one of the Day 1s. Only media were allowed inside and spectators had to wait in that insane line to get in. The security guard told Varkonyi to go to the end of the line. Varkonyi argued with the security guard to no avail. Storms stepped in and told the security to walk into the room and look up. Varkonyi's championship portrait happened to be right above the entrance. The security guard apologized and let Varkonyi inside.

Nasser Hamedani was so jacked up with excitement and making the money that he early passed out. He had a panic/anxiety attack and had to be taken to the hospital. The paramedics wanted to make sure he wasn't having a heart attack. Most of his stack was blinded off but his empty chair advanced to Day 4.

I didn't see it, but heard the story about the guy flipping his table over after he busted out. I'm shocked that stuff didn't happen more often. Wish I had seen that and got photos.

Otis picked Mr. Rain to win the main event on Day 2b. I picked Carl Olson. Mr. Rain is a little ahead of Olson, but anything can happy on Day 4.

My sticky fingers smell like limes. After ordering Corona's from the bar in front of the poker kitchen, I had been squeezing limes in order to get enough juice out of them before I'd toss one down a flight of stairs and try to get it in a trash can. I won $20 from Otis on consecutive nights on Throwing Things prop bets. I'm stuck over $200 for the entire WSOP, but I'm slowly chopping away at my debt. We had a group of media watching such as members of the international French and British press who were fascinated with our degeneracy. Even the Pokerati crew of Michalski and the Fresh Princess were curious about our post-Midnight drinking and gambling activities.

24 hours earlier, I sat in the Gold Coast casino at a Pai Gow table with Change100, Otis, and Laurie the Dealer. We unpatiently waited for a waitress to bring us cocktails. She was one of the slowest that I had ever experienced in Las Vegas. Otis was visibly rattled after he won a $250 bonus with a straight flush. All the cracker wanted was a Greyhound. Grapefruit juice and 1/2 a shot of well vodka. Could you blame him? He worked hard all day and was finally able to kick back with friends. He made a rare hand at the Pai Gow tables and nailed a bonus. He wanted to celebrate with a cocktail. But the slow-ass, trailer park, mullet-breeder never stopped by our table. The only solution was to run over to the bar and pay for drinks. It only cost $11 for a beer, a Greyhound, and a White Russian for Nicky. In NYC or in Hollywierd, $11 is the norm for one drink.

Last 5 Pros I Pissed Next to...
1. Lee Watinkinson
2. Danny Alaei
3. Tony Hachem
4. Thor Hansen
5. Minh Ly

* * * * *

Bonus Code: Pauly
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/13/2007 05:56:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 41: Main Event Day 2b

By Pauly

"Do you have a good story?" I asked Amy Calistri.

"God, I wish," she lamented.

Even the gossip queen of the WSOP had a tough time digging up dirt. She knew that I must have been hard up to keep pestering her.

"Maybe I'll write about staring at asses for the last hour," she said.

Calistri and I sat at the media desk right next to Gus Hansen's table. The Great Dane was in the middle of getting massage when Nolan Dalla announced that he was the chipleader with 420K. At that moment every media rep in the room converged on Hansen's table. ESPN's film crew nearly pancaked a Swedish girl snapping photos of Hansen for a Scandi poker mag. A blanket of darkness blanketed us as a dozen people obstructed out view of the table which also featured a PokerStars guy named Rain Khan and one of the most well-known online gurus in Sorel "Imper1ium" Mizzi.

Hansen started building his stack during the first level of Day 2. He busted two players including one that I titled, "Gus Hansen Likes Sick Puppies" in a post for Poker News. I stumbled up this hand by accident. I was only at his table to get a chip count. Instead, I picked up an interesting hand to write about.

Hansen was seated at a table with a bunch of unknowns. He raised on the button. The small blind (with a short stack) called. The big blind moved all in for 46K more. Hansen went into the tank as an ESPN camera crew began to film Hansen as he sat and pondered a decision for a few minutes. He counted out 46K, mostly in orange 5K chips. He took a few deep breaths before he tossed his chips into the pot. The small blind instantly folded. The big blind flipped over Ad-Js.

"I have a small pair," said Hansen as he tabled his cards... the 2d-2c.

"You're one sick puppy," said Hansen's opponent.

The flop was Kd-9c-8h and Hansen still led. The turn was the 6h. The river was the 3d. Hansen's pair of deuces held up as his opponent busted out. On camera too. You know that's going to be immortalized and repeated three hundred times before the year is up. Hansen increased his stack to 165K after that hand.

As I walked away, one of the guys serving drinks said, "Sick fuckin' call. That guy is crazy. Who calls there with fuckin' deuces? Sick. Just sick. I don't know if he's a fuckin' moron or my hero."

Hansen's table broke and as the tournament progressed he increased his stack. Just before dinner he reached 420K and I wrote a post for Poker News called "Gus Hansen Likes 420."

After dinner ended, Nolan Dalla got wind of his big stack and made the announcement. Media crowded the table as they stood for or five people deep. That's when I moved to another part of the Amazon Ballroom to find a more peaceful place to write about the fact there's nothing to write about.

I wandered out to the new media pen, the area roped off in front of the media room, where Harrah's set up spillover tables. I sat down and told them about my inability to find a story. I was worried that I had been here for too long that what used to seem interesting and fascinating was banal and uneventful. Maybe I'm officially jaded and can't motivate myself to find a compelling story for consumption of the folks following the Tao.

"I gotta say, I'm having a difficult time finding a story too," add Michalski.

Over the last three WSOPs, Michalski and I seek each other out when we need the writer's shove. We stepped outside by the loading dock. He chainsmoked while we brainstormed. Lucky for him, he had the Donkey Bomber story to keep him busy over the last few weeks. Since Donkey Bomber writes for Pokerati and won two bracelets, Michalski had a major story fall into his lap. And we both agreed that if the Vinnie Vinh story did not exist, we'd have nothing to write about.

"It's been a boring World Series even with Vinh," another media rep added.

Before Day 2b started, everyone had been speculating and gambling on whether or not Vinh was going to show up on Day 2. I took a picture of Vinh's stack before he arrived.


Vinh has a habit of skipping Day 2s. He did it twice in earlier events, but that was after he made the money. Then he disappeared for a few days before his empty chair resurfaced on Day 1b. We spotted his name on the player's list yet he was absent. It turned out that Vinh was in a hospital and his friends pleaded for a refund. TD Jack Effel agreed. More rumors flooded the hallways and the intertubes that said Vinh was in rehab. I even alluded to the fact that "hospital" was a code for rehab.

We thought that might be the end of the Vinnie Vinh story. We'd all go home after the series ended and we'd forget about the ghost of Vinnie Vinh until he resurfaced again... at a circuit event or perhaps a WPT event. That didn't happen. Vinnie Vinh magically appeared on Day 1d. He sat down and slowly built up a stack. Even Chops was able to snag an interview with Vinh for Raw Vegas TV. When he was asked why he skipped Day 2s, he mumbled something about a dispute with his backer.

Then according to Lance over at The Poker Biz, Vinh had some more interesting things to say...

"I can't win," said Vinh. "If I win this year, I die. So I’m not gonna win."

When asked to elaborate what that meant Vinh was somewhat cryptic.

"These Vietnamese guys, they find me if I win," said Vinh, before sitting down to his stack of 3,200. "So I'm not going to win this year. Next year though, I win."

"This year I'm too crazy."

A few hours after that, I got an anonymous email. Usually they are from Nigerian email scammers that want me to help get a large sum of money stuck in a bank somewhere. This one was different. I couldn't tell if the source was legit, pure bullshit, or if I was getting set up. That's for you to decide. Here's a summary of what I was told.

The guy who emailed me said that he ran into a Vietnamese pro last week in Las Vegas. He had played in tournaments and side games with that pro and they were friendly enough that he could ask him about the Vinnie Vinh story. That's when the pro said to expect Vinh back during the main event because...

"The people he owed money to would make sure he was there because that was the only way they ever figured to get any money from him."

Vinh was stuck with a couple of people including several well known pros and bracelet winners. According to the email...

"They have taken everything he owns, beaten him, locked him up, drugged him, chased him between Vegas and wherever he is from. They have also tried to make sure he has no money so he can't get anywhere... I think that he was locked up with no access to anything but drugs, including very little food."

The email also mentioned that the well known pro said that he expected Vinh to show up for Day 1 then skip out. The series would be the best place for him to find other people to loan him money to get unstuck with the person(s) who had been tormenting him.

The last thing my anonymous emailer said was that Vinh skipped out on Day 2 because he knew that they'd put aside his prize money and he could come back and collect at a later date when his backers were not around. It's an old trick that plenty of old school gamblers used to do in order to avoided of making good with backers who were sweating them.

Like I said before, I couldn't tell you for sure if there was any truth in that email or if I was getting set up. I was given names and chose not to publish those just in case the emailer was trying to get those pros in trouble. I have not verified the story and that's been my mission ever since I got the email. I guess I'd like to get to the bottom of the Vinh story. Maybe he's not a complete junkie like we thought. Maybe his backers helped spin that story in the media to deflect their tactics in trying to get their money back.

We're not talking about the little spat where Newhizzle kicked an empty chip rack at Neverwin and then wrote a lengthy post about their situation on his blog since Neverwin owed him up to 200K. This was a tad more serious. And now those comments he told Lance made more sense...

If I win this year, I die. So I'm not gonna win.

When he didn't show up on Day 1 after the dinner break, I though Vinh took a nap and never woke up. If that email is correct, he skipped out. That's when they called in the bodyguards to make sure Vinh showed up on Day 2. I don't see the point. With only 3,200 to play with, Vinh was a virtual goner.

He showed up, to everyone's surprise. He was eating an ice cream bar as he looked over his table as the rest of his opponents unbagged their chips. He moved all in on the second hand of the day... and busted out. Then he vanished into thin air. No one has seen him since.

So was Vinh a junkie who couldn't pay his debts? Or was he just in a bad spot which got made worse by his backers? Those are questions I'm hoping to find out answers. Maybe I'll reveal them in my book someday.

* * * * *
Here are some stats.

Day 3 Top 10 Chips Counts:
Gus Hansen (Monaco) - 622,300
Hevad Khan (Poughkeepsie, NY) - 592,500
Jeff "Mr. Rain" Banghart (Bennington, NE) - 570,100
Jeff Weiss (Davie, FL) - 550,000
Jon Monves (Los Angeles, CA) - 549,800
Brent Sheirbon (The Dalles, OR) - 549,300
Tuan Lam (Canada) - 538,500
Markus Gonsalves (San Diego, CA) - 512,400
Bradley Ellis (Midland, TX) - 509,400
Robert Nehorayan (Los Angeles, CA) - 505,700

There are around 797 players remaining with Gus Hansen as your chipleader.

* * * * *

Bonus Code: Pauly
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/12/2007 02:58:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 40: Main Event Day 2a

By Pauly

"Am I the chipleader?" Todd Phillips asked Change100.

"I think so," she said as she counted his stack.


Todd Phillips
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
Phillips was well past 300K. The director from Hollyweird was leading the pack on the second day of the most prestigious tournament in all of poker. Not a savvy veteran. Not a former champion. Not a Scandi wearing capri pants, but Todd Phillips. He likes to gamble. Just take a peek at his resume. He dropped out of NYU film school to finish a project called Hated. He started out directing documentary films including Bittersweet Motel, which was an amazing glimpse into the world if one of my favorite bands, Phish. He soon switched genres and received notoriety after his comedy Road Trip hit theaters. Soon after that, the epic flick Old School was released starring Vince Vaughn, Will Ferrell, and Luke Wilson. There are several lines from his hilarious movie that I regularly quote.

Phillips first go street cred in the poker community after his final table appearance at the WPT Legends of Poker. Out of all of the celebrities who played, he made the biggest impact on Day 2. At one point he was the chipleader after busting a few players.

I tried to come up with a big story but I didn't get much. Day 2a finished shorter than scheduled. Only 1,034 players began the day and the bustouts started as soon as the cards were in the air. We had a tough time keeping up. Every few minutes a deal would shout, "All in and a call!" Tables were broken down at such a rapid pace that an entire section of the Amazon Ballroom was bare by mid-afternoon. I guess the big story was how fast players were being eliminated. Their dreams crushed. Their souls spit on. Their fifteen minutes of fame was over.

One by one, the pros and celebrity players started hitting the rail. TD Jack Effel made a decision to only play five levels (instead of six) or until there were 350 players left. With the top 621 players getting paid prize money and almost 1,300 players still to play on Day 2b, he had to set 350 as the cutoff number.

As soon as he announced the change in scheduling, we set lines and started betting on the finishing time. I figured anything before Midnight would be gold. Schecky set the line at 11:25pm. Then we got word that Effel might stop play at the end of Level 4. With ten minutes to go in that level, 399 players remained. By the time level ended, there were 385 players. He decided to keep playing down to 350. Play eventuallys topped after Midnight.

At the 2006 WSOP, the action during the main event unfolded at a brisk pace, however, there was a circus-like atmosphere surrounding the event. Everything was a spectacle from the vendors, to the strippers dancing in the hallways, to all the spectators clogging up every possible open space, to a crush of international media that which the WSOP had never seen before. The 2007 WSOP seemed to unravel at a much lackadaisical pace with a lot less of the insanity. Harrah's was better prepared this year. The strippers were gone. The vendors were not longer hawking their poker shit in the hallways. The online hospitality suites are a distant memory. The fans got wind that it was useless to try to get in since the lines were too long.

Sure, it's the biggest tournament in the world and it's still a spectacle, but everything seems to be much more toned down at the start of Day 2a.

"It's serious poker," said Michalski. "But boring."

The attitude in the room was different for sure. The "aw shucks" crowd is gone. Those satellite qualifiers or those guys who know they are dead money who forking over 10K on the dreams were long gone. They either busted out on the first day or accumulated enough chips that they actually have a shot at going deep. Their "I'm happy to be here attitude" has changed to "let's fuckin' do this thing." The smiles disappear. They're ready to defend their chips to the death.

Otis had a theory on the bizarre mood in the Amazon Room. After a brief chat near the dealers smoking area, we simplified out discussion into this... less hipsters and assholes and more real players. The majority of people who won seats online last year were those raised by televised poker. They entered the poker world during the boom. The pros went about their business seriously, but they represented a small subsection of the internet qualifiers. The remainder of the satellite winners knew that they were longshots to win. So, they took their appearance in the WSOP with a little less seriousness than say someone who spent their own $10,000 or someone who lists "professional poker player" on their tax returns.

I wish I could write more about but I really can't bullshit anymore than I just did. Day 2s are the dead zones. The real stories develop on Day 3 and 4.

Moving on...

ESPN has already started airing episodes of the WSOP. You might have caught Event #1 and Event #3 final tables. Here's the rest of the schedule (not including the main event):

ESPN 2007 WSOP Broadcast Schedule:
Tuesday, July 17 at 8 p.m. -- $1,500 pot-limit hold 'em (Event 4)
Tuesday, July 17 at 9 p.m. -- $1,000 no-limit hold 'em with rebuys (Event 8)
Tuesday, July 31 at 8 and 9 p.m. -- $5,000 pot-limit Omaha with rebuys (Event 7)
Tuesday, August 7 at 8 and 9 p.m. -- $3,000 no-limit hold 'em (Event 28)
Tuesday, August 14th at 8 p.m. -- $5,000 World Championship pot-limit hold 'em (Event 13)
Tuesday, August 14th at 9 p.m. -- $5,000 World Championship heads-up and $2,000 seven card stud (Event 31 and 32)
Tuesdays, August 21 until October 9 at 8 and 9 p.m. -- $10,000 main event no-limit hold 'em (Event 55)
Tuesdays, October 16 until October 30 at 8 and 9 p.m. -- $50,000 HORSE (Event 39)

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

Otis and I came up with a prop bet involving limes. We have been drinking Coronas by the bar in front of the poker kitchen. We were hanging outside on the dealer's smoking ledge. Down a stairwell was a garbage can/ashtry. We bet each other various amounts if we could do one of three things...

$20 to hit the garbage can with the lime
$100 to have it land on the ashtray
$250 to actually go inside the small opening

We missed out on attempts during two rounds of beers. I came close once, but couldn't pick up any easy money off of Otis.

How about Liz Lieu Tuesdays?


Change100 and I covered a section that included the feature table and plenty of celebrities. Spiderman was moved right next to Mandy Baker. Todd Phillips was not far away. That Deanna Dozier chick got plenty of camera time. Everyone was bummed when she eventually busted.

Steve Rosenbloom is a funny guy. He told Otis that he was worried about us. "You guys are working under crazy conditions. I'm worried that you'll snap and become serial killers. When I heard about the New York, New York shootings, I simply assumed it was one of you too." He walked over to me at some point and said it looked like I was on ludes. I fuckin' wish.

I walked past the dealer room around 4:20pm and the entire room was packed. Dealers were scheduled to work, but since too many players busted early, they had no one to deal to.

I spotted two Scandis trying to pick up the Milwaukee's Beast girls. One was writing her phone number down on a piece of paper. The other was clocking her cleavage.

I checked the numbers on PokerStars qualifiers. Out of 1500+ players who won satellites, only 600 showed up at the Rio to play. Stars represents about 10% of the entire field. In previous years, they accounted for 17 to 19% of all players.

One wife of a Las Vegas poker pro was spotted with her children lurking in front of the media room. She was hoping someone would write a story about how her husband is a deadbeat and has not given her money for July's rent.

Last 5 Pros I Pissed Next To...
1. Robert Varknoyi
2. Donkey Bomber
3. Joe Beevers
4. Jeff Madsen
5. Dan Harrington

* * * * *

Bonus Code: Pauly
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/11/2007 04:44:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 39: Main Event Day 1d

By Pauly

There were a few big stories that I kept tabs on during Day 1d...

1. Phil Hellmuth
2. Jamie Gold busting
3. Where the fuck was Vinnie Vinh?
4. The official numbers

Phil Hellmuth was supposed to be sitting at one of the tables I covered. He wasn't there when Senator Al D'Amato said, "Shuffle up and deal!" I didn't expect him for a while and wondered what kind of entrance he'd make. At the 2005 WSOP, Hellmuth showed up with a body guard. He had been practicing his grand entrance the day before when he wrecked the Ultimate Bet racecar with his mug sitting on the hood. Some conspiracy theorists will say that it was rigged. Others will say it was an accident and Hellmuth lost control. That's for you to decide.

I heard rumors that Hellmuth was going to drive the actual car down the hallway of the Rio. When he couldn't, he purposely wrecked his car to generate buzz. But the most rumor I heard was that he was supposed to drive up to the entrance to the convention center, step out wearing a helmut and be escorted inside by eleven scantily clad women. Since he crashed his car by accident, he was forced to take a limo instead.

Snake told me that he was coming at 1:30pm. I grabbed Filipe and told him to snap some photos. Head over to PokerNews to see what he shot. Unfortunately, Hellmuth was even late for his scheduled late arrival.


Hellmuth didn't show up to 2:20pm. I stood outside on the steps in the 155 degree heat as Hellmuth emerged from his limo. Eleven stripper/model types greeted him. They each symbolized one of the eleven bracelets he's won. Even the girls were labeled by specific bracelets. It was total ridiculous and hysterical at the same time. I was fortunate to catch every step that Hellmuth took once he entered the convention center.

Hellmuth paused for a few photos as the ESPN camera crew taped his every move. He signed autographs as fans swarmed around him. The mob of media, ESPN guys, fans, and agents, managers, Harrah's suits, and PR people slowly made its way down the corridor and into the Amazon Ballroom.


Hellmuth entered with his entourage trailing behind him. He took his seat and shook hands with the gentleman next to him.

"This is fuckin' ridiculous," joked Nolan Dalla.


If there was ever a true Hellmuthian moment, that was one of them. Just when I thought the day would be boring, my first 2.5 hours was consumed with Phil Hellmuth.

"He's hurting. With whiplash," mentioned super agent Brian Balsbaugh. "But you know what He told me? 'I've won tournaments when I was hurt before. I've won bracelets under more pain.'"

Hellmuth could dodge bullets, but he couldn't dodge a light pole. Sore or not sore. Rigged or not rigged. It didn't matter. Hellmuth wouldn't make it to the dinner break and eventually busted out at 6:41pm. When Nolan Dalla announced his elimination to the crowd, players actually cheered against Hellmuth.

* * * * *
Hellmuth wasn't the only former champion to bust out. Jamie Gold ended his reign as the world champion. He took a few hits early and slipped to under 10K by dinner break. He couldn't build a stack and busted out when his Qs-9s could not beat A-7. As what happened with Hellmuth, Gold was jeered when his elimination was announced shortly after the dinner break.

In so many ways, Gold can now relax and focus on playing poker instead of being a marked man. He'll always be known as a controversial world champion, but in a few years, we'll forget about Crispin Leyser and Jamie Gold will be a distant memory, or just one of the faces you see hung up on tapestries surrounding the Amazon Ballroom.

He'll return to sweat his mother Jane who advanced to Day 2.

* * * * *
When I rushed out to get a good spot for Hellmuth, I spotted Vinnie Vinh standing around the registration area. He was waiting for Jimmy Sommerfeld. I saw the two talking again in the hallway and shortly after than Vinh was playing in the WSOP main event. Everyone in the room kept an eye on him, players, media, floor people, friends... waiting for him to explode but also hoping he could make a run and change his frenetic life around. One by one the relentless media stopped by his table and gawked, giggled, pointed, and jeerred like he was a side attraction at a carnival. The freak show with the baby with lobster claws for hands or the Siamese Twins or the lunatic drug addicted degenerate gambler one step away from his deathbed yet one turn of the card away from winning $8.25M.

America is a country of fuck ups. Lots of them. And we're suckers for dramatic stories. Perhaps it's the boost in self-esteem that people have when the relish in other people's misfortunes. Or maybe it's the morbid fascination that makes you slow down and look for dead bodies when there's a car wreck on the freeway.

Photographers took turns taking pics of Vinh (and when he disappeared they shot his empty chair) as he muttered how he wanted to go back to sleep. He's be seen resting his head down on the rail at times, when other moments he seemed in control picking up pots and demonstrating that deep down he still had skills at the poker table. Not too many people can boast that the have $2.3 million in career tournament earnings. But it's disturbing to think that someone with talent like Vinh's can piss it all away thanks to his inner demons.


At 8:30pm, Poker News reported that Vinh's stack was 34K. He did not return from dinner and everyone thought the worst. Just six hours earlier, the media paraded in front of Vinh's table checking out the freak and they all returned one by one to take photos of the empty chair. He was blinded off which happened twice before at the WSOP. Those instances, he failed to show up on Day 2 while he was in the money. His stack ended up taking down 20th and 22nd place... both impressive feats considering he wasn't even in the room during his elimination hands.

On Day 1d, Vinh left for dinner break and never returned. I suspected that he was sleeping. He probably took a nap at dinner and never woke up. he slept through his alarm or wake up call. Other friends thought the worse and that he was passed out in a cheap motel after snorting too much (insert drug here).

Where have you gone Vinnie Vinh? Everyone's talking about you. The ghost of Stuey Ungar has returned.

* * * * *
Here are some official numbers...

Total Entrants: 6,358
Prize Pool: 59.7M
Top 621 get paid
Harrah's Juice: $2,670,360
Dealer's Toke: 1,144,440
Millionaires: 5

Payouts:
1 $8,250,000
2 $4,840,981
3 $3,048,025
4 $1,852,721
5 $1,255,069
6 $956,243
7 $705,229
8 $585,699
9 $525,934
10th-12th $476,926
13th-15th $429,114
16th-18th $381,302
19th-27th $333,490
28th-36th $285,678
37th-45th $190,053
46th-72nd $130,288
73rd-81st $106,382
82nd-90th $82,476
91st-99th $67,535
110th-162nd $58,570
163rd-225th $51,398
226th-288th $45,422
289th-351st $39,445
352nd-414th $34,644
415th-477th $29,883
478th-549th $25,101
550th-621st $20,320

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 1d...

Brandi Hawbaker arrived. She had strep throat and was sick for the previous week or so. She looked thinner, but not Vinnie Vinh thinner. She also got a new haircut which I thought made her look less cute and more psycho.

Steve Horton gets credit for this bit... Brandi Hawbaker busted out after Teddy Monroe put a bad beat on her. She pushed with A-7 and Monroe called with Kc-Qc. He flopped a King and she couldn't improve. As she was getting up to leave, he said, "Sorry, Brandi." Her reply? "Go fuck yourself."

The Poker Geek cracked the case on the John Duthie hand where he won a 50K pot in a cash game with just Queen high!! Head over to Expert Insight to get the scoop.

Linda's son Dennis played in the event. He made it past dinner break and was moved to Prahlad Friedman's table. I caught two of his hands including his bustout. Linda was on the rail along with her other son watching Dennis play. Head over to her blog. I'm sure she'll have a recap with pictures.

Al D'amato was in the Rio hanging out with Jeffrey Pollack. It seemed like a cheap photo op, not as cheap as the Hellmuthian stunt, but Al D'Amato is nothing more than a glorified used car salesman who lost his job. He's slumming among the unwashed masses and has as much pull in Washington as Sam Grizzle has.

* * * * *

Bonus Code: Pauly
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/10/2007 04:39:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 38: Main Event Day 1c

By Pauly

Midnight in Las Vegas. Day 1c of the WSOP. I'm hypnotized by the sounds. Sometimes, I can block out the clattering of chips in the Amazon Ballroom and everything goes quiet as I lose myself in my writing. Most of the time that's impossible to do with the madness of the World Series of Poker enveloping around me. The clattering chips is a distinct sound that is hard to replicate like the roar of the trading floor at J.P. Morgan or the eardrum shattering sounds of a subway screeching to a halt in Times Square.

If someone played me different versions of ambient poker room sounds, I could easily pick out the Rio from the rest. Besides the chips, there the thousands of other layered sounds that drive some people crazy. Players use special headphones or earplugs to block out the background clutter. There's a low hum of players talking to each other at the tables but add it all up, it sounds like an orgy of geese fucking.

One sweaty guy in jogging pants is telling another guy in an ugly blue PokerStars shirt a bad beat story. Another player screams, "Yes!" as he sucks out on the river to avoid elimination. Reporters are explaining bustout hands to my Poker News colleagues. You could hear the ESPN crew communicating with each other into their headsets as they rush to get over to a table with Humberto Brenes screaming at the top of his lung as whips out his miniature shark and tells his opponent that, "The Chark is hun-greeeeeeeee!" A dealer in the far corner shouts, "All in and a call on Table 42!" Another dealer screams, "Floor on 12!" as a gaunt cocktail waitress barks, "Cocktails! Red bull!" A railbird asks Flipchip, "Where's Daniel Negreanu?" And I mutter, "Whata douchebag!" under my breath.

For the last five weeks, I have spent the majority of my waking hours sitting at the various media desks on the floor of the Amazon Room underneath the various portraits of former WSOP champions. Sometimes I'm hunched over my laptop underneath the black and white photo of the legendary Sailor Roberts, who won the big one when I was three years old. Other times, I'm sitting underneath a portrait of Berry Johnston. He won the event a few weeks before I graduated grammar school. And a couple of months ago, he busted me out of a FTOPS event on Full Tilt. Despite the fact that the world is a small pond, I'll always be the fish.

The one thing I am unable to do is escape the noise. The only moments of calm are when I'm walking in the secret hallways behind the ballrooms. It's a scene out of Ocean's 11 when one of their guys snuck around the employees area of the Bellagio. They corridors are almost always empty and void of sounds aside from a few dealers gossiping to one another. I like walking around that area, past broken poker tables, boxes of ESPN equipment, and stacks of wobbly chairs. The only other time I get any semblance of peace and quiet is when I sneak off to Change100's car, crank up a Grateful Dead bootleg, and burn one down.

Moving on...

Over the last 24 hours, I've written down various notes such as:

Too many people. Slews of dead money. Too many dreams. Not enough fulfillment.

There might be over 6,000 players in this year's event. All but one will go home a supreme winner. Like Bill Parcells once said, "There are no moral victories. You either win or you lose."

When I think of the Tuna yelling at reporters in the tunnels underneath Giants Stadium, I look at the sea of players in the Amazon Ballroom and see bags and bags of money. Someone is going to become the ultimate beneficiary of all the collective donkey donators. At this point, we don't know who will win the event. It's too early to tell. The odds are in favor of an unknown. But whoever survives this existentialist meatgrinder is going to end up a very wealthy and extremely famous person as they embark on the hardest gig in all of poker... WSOP World Champion. Along with the glory, fame, and cash comes the toughest year of their life as they constantly avoid getting gang raped by every vulture, charlatan, gold digger, and hustler in the industry.

Here are some quick numbers:

Day 1a: 1,287
Day 1b: 1,545
Day 1c: 1,743
Day 1d: ???
Entrants Through Day 1c: 4,575

Day 1d is predicted between 1,600 and 1,700 players. That would push the numbers of the WSOP to over 6,000. It's nowhere close to last year's record breaking year. But it's more than 2005. Even with the UIGEA, PokerStars paid out more satellite winners than last year. Only a percentage of seat winners actually showed up at the Rio. And imagine how large the field would be without the UIGEA? Over 10,000. Easily. There main event would be almost three weeks long to accommodate those massive fields with 20% clad in PokerStars gear.

Day 1c was by far the most exciting of the three. The first two days took forever and annoyed the piss out of me like sipping week-old Jell-O through a straw while sitting in LA freeway traffic with the radio stuck on Rush Limbaugh rant about feminazis. The field on Day 1c was appetizing with a few more named pros such as Phil Ivey, Fossilman, that Moneymaker fellow, T.J. Cloutier, Allen Cunningham, Kenna James, Robert Varkonyi, Melissa Hayden, former WSOP champion Brad Daugherty, Rafe Furst, Clonie Gowan, Katja Thater and Jan Von Halle.


Day 1c also contained a few more celebrities and professional athletes donking off their chips and trying to pretend like they were big time poker pros. Antonio Tarver, Jose Canseco, and Rick Tocchet were among the athletes in the field. Jen Tilly, Shannon Elizabeth, Jason Alexander (aka George Costanza), Jen Tilly, Rene Angelil, Nelly, and Swedish pop star Dilba Demirbag were also playing. Nolan Dalla introduced Shannon Elizabeth and mentioned her involvement in American Pie and how he watched "that scene at least thirty times."

"She's me milking that movie for eight years," said Change100.

"It's a great fucking movie," I reminded her.

I wonder what it feels like to be Shannon Elizabeth and to know that she walked into a room filled with two thousand men who jerked off to her tits in the bedroom scene in American Pie? Multiple times?

I first met Antonio Tarver at the Borgata in January of 2006 when I was hired by them to cover their Winter Open. He played in the main event and found himself at Gavin Smith's table. I kept a keen eye on the two as they battled in several pots together. Tarver mentioned that Smith was crazy, would not stop talking, and that he was a tough opponent. He underestimated how hard tournament poker was and how patient and disciplined he needed to be. Like boxing, he had to wait for his moment, then attack with everything he had. He didn't last too long that day at the Borgata and I'll never forget our conversation as he explained the similarities between tournament poker and boxing. Unlike poker, he was fighting for his life everytime he stepped into the ring.

Rick Tocchet is an interesting story. I grew up watching him play against the Rangers when he skated for the Flyers and the Penguins. He recently pled guilty to his involvement in Operation Slapshot, where he and several other people (such as Wayne Gretzky's wife Janet Jones) were implicated in a multi-million dollar gambling ring. Steve Rosenbloom stopped by the media desk and we talked about how Tocchet had to step down as coach of the Coyotes when he was pinched by the federalies. It wasn't a Pete Rose incident where he bet on games in his own sport. As Jeremy Roenick said, "No one bets on hockey."

Um, actually... I do. I'm a complete degenerate with little scruples and questionable morals. Alas, I thrive the action. The last time I bet on hockey was during March Madness at Red Rock Casino. We were throwing thousands of dollars on single games, so a $100 five team NHL parlay seemed like pocket change for us. I asked Change100 to pick five teams and then I faded all of her picks. I went 4-1. Anyway, I'll save my sports betting hockey bad beats for another time.

By the end of Day 1c, about 670 players remained. Carl Olson was in the top 5 for a while after dinner break. I picked him to win the Main Event before it started. He was making me look like a genius when he became one of the first players past the 200K mark. Pokerati's The Big Randy was among the leaders for the majority of the day.

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 1c...

"I have never seen a bigger field of donkeys," said Aussie pro Emad Tathou after he busted out. "I called Quantas and said get me on the next fuckin' flight to Melbourne. I leave tomorrow morning."

I watched a few of Antonio Tarver's hands. He moved all in during the first orbit. He had Queens and chopped a pot with a Broadway straight. His opponent had A-Q and rivered the tie.

Jose Canseco wore an ugly yellow shirt that read, "Olympic Gardens" on it. I heard rumors that he's MC Hammer broke and that he was sponsored into the event. My guess is the OG. Gotta love strip club sponsorship.

When Nolan Dalla announced to the crowd that Canseco was in the room, a few boo birds showered him with an unpleasant welcome. "Must be an LA crowd," joked Dalla.

Jonno bought an Asian Chicken Wrap at the Poker Kitchen. It comes with a fortune cookie. His read, "It is a sunny day." I told him, "No shit Sherlock. We're in the middle of the fuckin' desert."

Here's some random dealer conversations that I overheard...

Two Dealers in the Hallway:
Dealer A: "I have Jesus at my table."
Dealer B: "Be careful. He might slice your fingers off when he mucks his cards."

Two Dealers in the Secret Smoking Spot:
Dealer A: "What's that? A plane dragging a sign that says, 'Congrats to the newest member of Team PokerStars Daniel Negreanu.'"
Dealer B: "I dunno what was a bigger waste of money for PokerStars... hiring that plane or signing Negreanu. He's a donkey."

The dealers smoke in one area outside near the employees parking lot. One member of the media described the landing as "depressing and full of bad beats. It's sad enough to hear players tell them. It's awful to hear dealers tell them."

When I walked past the dealer's room, a crowd was gathered around one table as a few of them played in a quick SNG.

Grubby has been staying at the Rio. I snuck him into the room a few times. His boss was playing and he wanted to sweat him.

They are limiting how many spectators can come into the Amazon Room. From a media's standpoint, it's a welcome relief. Usually it's difficult to get through the dense crowd. Without them clogging up the walkways, it's a lot easier to do my job. From a fan's perspective or if you're someone who wants to railbird a friend or relative, it sucks camel cock. You have to stand in line for up to three hours and then they only let you watch the feature table without any announcers. I overheard two people complaining about how they waited in line for two hours and got in the room for ten minutes before they were asked to leave because a break was coming up. A couple of angry fans got into a heated shoving match with security guards at one tense moment.

I was walking the floor getting chipcounts when I saw Jose Canseco stand up. An ESPN film crew surrounded his table and he started to walk towards the rail. The dealer had washed the cards and I saw that a player in seat one was stacking up chips. I raced over and bent down on one knee and asked the guy how he busted Canseco. That's when I realized it was Amir Vahedi. "I had A-7 of spades," he said. "He had A-J. The flop was Ks-10s-Q. I bet, he raised, I moved all in, he called. I got a spade on the river."

I was the cooler for sure. I walked over to Jen Tilly's table and she busted out when she moved all in on an open-ended straight draw. After she busted a weird Scandi at an adjacent table wearing a tight blue dress shirt, shorts, and black socks with sandals walked over to me and said in broken English, "What movie was she in?" I shrugged my shoulders. "Is she in any good pornos?" he asked with a sketchy smile.

Otis walked over to me around 4:20 in the afternoon and said that there was a Vinnie Vinh sighting near the Poker Sauna. No word if he'll be playing on Day 1d.

Kenna James lost a big pot and danced with Change100 as she walked past his table. "When you lose a 5K pot, you need to dance it off," said James.

At one point, everyone was looking for Felipe or Flipchip to take a photo of a drunk guy who passed out at his table in a mega-satelitte in the Poker Sauna.

I got word about Phil Hellmuth's car wreck. He drove around an Ultimate Bet race car in the parking lot. He ended up crashing it into a light pole. It totally looked staged. Otis agreed. Hellmuth plays on Day 1d and will be arriving late in true Hellmuthian fashion. RawVegas.tv has the video. Check it out.


Click here to view the Hellmuth crash video via RSS or Bloglines.
Drew, one of the Poker News reporters, has his Mom in town from Minnesota. She's a big fan of the Tao and Pot Committed. She baked us cookies and we went out in the hallway to hang out due to the long lines to get inside. When I told Change100 about the cookies she asked, "Is there pot in them?" There wasn't but the cookies were yummy. Thanks...!

Amy Calistri and I stood int he middle of the floor when one player rushed past us. He smelled worst than a bum on the subway. A few minutes after he left, his stench still lingered. "That boy needs some deodorant," said Calistri. "And some clean underwear," I added. He's among the many people in the room who had not showered in days and weeks.

I lost a last longer bet. I picked Olga Varkonyi to last longer against her husband Robert Varkonyi. I was even giving odds at 3-1. Unfortunately she busted out before he did and I lost.

When I walked into the media room, no less than five people were playing online poker. Junkies. To accommodate the lack of space in the room, Harrah's roped off the area outside the media room and set up several tables to alleviate the cramped space. Nice move in their part, but a few days too late. That took Otis and Scurvy Dog off cramped media room tilt.

Mike "Lucky Blind" Lacey told me a great story about John Duthie winning a pot in a big NL cash game. He called a 17K bet on the river with just King high... and he won. Unreal. Duthie, the EPT creator, ended Day 1a among the chipleaders with over 150K.

* * * * *

Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/09/2007 06:44:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 37: Main Event Day 1b

By Pauly

If Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons was covering Day 1b of the WSOP, he'd say, "Worst WSOP ever."

That might be a little harsh, but Day 1b was pretty boring compared to preliminary events this year and previous Main Events. I can't explain what was wrong. I described Day 1a as "poker on Valium". Well Day 1b was uneventful. The action was slow and the room was rather quiet. I get more excited picking out socks or watching Simpsons reruns.

A quick scan of the celebrities in the crowd will tell you about how hard we were struggling to cover interesting people. Aside from talk-show host Montel Williams and former Saturday Night Live Weekend Update Anchor Norm MacDonald, there were not too many celebs in the field.

Of course, Sam Simon from the Simpsons was playing. He's the executive producer and at one time was married to Jen Tilly. "That's how she got all her money," said Grubby.

And I was geeked about Todd Philips. He directed the Phish documentary Bittersweet Motel and several other films such as Road Trip, Starsky and Hutch, and one of my favorites... Old School.

The day started on time with Penn & Teller (actually just Penn, since Teller never talks) saying, "Shuffle up and deal!"

That's when I got two reports from our field reporters. The first one was that Jamie Gold's mother was playing. The other was that some chick had her tits hanging out on Table #2. I checked out the boobs and were amazed. Felipe took a photo and added it to the PokerNews gallery. Her titage spillage tantalized most of the players at her table and the majority of media reps. There was not a minute that went by in the first level where someone stopped by the media desk and said, "Did you see the tits on table #2?"

Even Nolan Dalla stopped by and said, "Did you see that? They are on the table."


Photo courtesy of Flipchip
I wandered over to Jane Gold's table. She was seated at one of the tables in the "high rollers" cash game area. She drew Annie Duke's table, who showed up a few minutes late. Anyway, I chatted with Jamie Gold for a few minutes and he told me that I needed to watch out for his boy Jimmy D.

"I've been working with him the whole year," Gold said. "He's going to win the entire thing."

I also saw Action Bob, Tony G, Charlie Shoten, Bill Chen, Scotty Nguyen, Action Dan Harrington, and Isabelle Mercier on my first pass of the room.

The most inspirational story involved Jason Holbrook. Tom Sexton stumbled upon his table and Change100 wrote the story up on Poker News:

Close your eyes and imagine playing the Main Event of the WSOP... completely in the dark. Jason Holbrook is doing it right now. Watching Holbrook play poker is an amazing feat to behold. He is blind and has a female assistant who sits beside him to whisper in his ear what his hole cards are and give him a running commentary on the flop, turn, and river. Beyond that, she relates what each player is doing in hands he is not involved in so he can get an understanding of the flow of the game. Holbrook is focused, with his head down, and is listening to everything, with his chips lined up in front of them, organized by denomination. Our hats are off to one of the Main Event's most amazing players.

There were a few former main event champions in the field including Joe Hachem, Scotty Nguyen, Tom McEvoy, and Berry Johnston. If you didn't know, at one time Berry Johnston held the record for most WSOP cashes. He des hold an amazing stat... he's cashed at least one time in the WSOP (includes all events) since 1982.

Montel Williams made a run. At one point he was the chipleader before he doubled up a couple of short stacks at his table. He had his trustworthy bodyguard on the rail and he hung out with us at the media desk for a while. Tom Sexton gave me some good background info on him and I wrote up a post for Poker News. During some background research I stumbled upon an interesting bit. Williams was diagnosed with MS and he's used medicinal marijuana to help him ease the pain. Once Change100 found out, she got excited.

"I wonder if he's holding right now?" she said.

The big story of the day surrounded David Singer's controversial elimination. Here's what went down according to the Poker Geek. On a flop of Ks-7s-4d, a player bet 3K and Singer pushed all in for 9,450. His opponent went into the tank and his cell phone rang. The player removed the phone from his pocket and turned it off. According to surveillance cameras, the phone rang a second time and the player pulled the phone out and shut it off without looking at it. Singer motioned to the dealer to do something about it. That's when the player called.

"His hand should be dead," Singer said as he requested a ruling from the floor.

She deferred to the TD who said that his hand would be considered live. Singer requested a higher ruling and said, "I have a drawing hand here and I obviously don't want him to be allowed to call."

His request was denied and action resumed. Singer flipped over 5s-4s while his opponent showed Kd-Jd. Singer was behind with bottom pair and a flush draw. The turn was the 10h and the river was the 8d. His hand did not hold up as he headed to the rail.

He requested a refund and called Jack Effel who refused to over rule the decision. Singer mentioned that he was going to take the matter up with the NGC.

Check out his interview with Poker News:


Click here to view the David Singer video via RSS and Bloglines
Anyway, by the time Day 1b ended there were around 595 players left.

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 1b...

I heard from a solid source that 5,700 players registered for the Main Event. Day 1a had 1,287. Day 1b had 1,545. That means almost three more thousand players will be playing over the next two days. There are still satellites running and it might actually go over 6,000 players. We'll find out by Monday.

I bumped into Snoopy and Homer from Blonde Poker. They said that their colleague Jen Mason was playing in Day 1b. I forgot that she had won a prop bet with Roland de Wolfe and won $10K for her entry. After the EPT Championships in Monte Carlo, de Wolfe bet Jen that she could not quit smoking cold turkey. In one healthy prop bet, Jen quit smoking and won her seat into the WSOP. Sadly, Jen did not make it to Day 2 and busted out shortly before 2am.

"Nobody gives a shit about the Irish," said Tom Murphy from Antes Up. "And we don't give a shit about anyone else." That's another classic line from Murphy. When I asked Murphy about Andy Black's implosion on Day 1a where he lost all his chips at the tail end of the day, he said that plenty of Irish players were flaming Black in their forums. Best line? "Did Buddha secretly tell Andy to go fuckin' nuts?"

Otis had a minor freak out in the media room during the afternoon. He sent me a text asking me when we were going to start drinking. I had to put it off until dinner time, but I went over to check up on him. He didn't look too good and was on media room tilt. The place was crowded and too small to house all the media reps. One loud person's voice can echo over the entire room. Add two or three and it becomes unbearable. I had several moments last year when the chatter got so loud that I had to go out into the service hallway to write.

Whoever entered Action Bob's chip count made an error. They gave him 144K instead of 14K. When I realized he was the chipleader (second place was 109K), I jumped up and ran over to his table, where he was laughing with everyone else at his table. I looked at his stack and he only had 14K. He told me that his wife called and found out he was the chipleader. He got text messages from friends who were pumped that he was the chipleader. A few minutes earlier, one player at his table noticed the scrolling chipcounts and they said, "Who's this Action Bob?" He told them that was him but obviously the stacks did not match. Action Bob was a good sport about it and had a hearty laugh with everyone at his table. Obviously, when I got back to my laptop, I corrected his chipcount.

Michele Lewis mentioned something about a Jesus Ferguson look-a-like who was hanging out at the Rio and taking photos with fans who thought it was him.

Steve Hall told me that Harrah's removed "Dunk a Stripper" from the Expo. He was disappointed. He also mentioned that there could be no more pole dancing by the strippers in there either. Well shit, why fucking go?

I spotted internet legend Annette_15 walking around the Amazon ballroom. When I pointed the Norwegian online poker whiz out to Change100, she said, "I thought she was in high school? How is she allowed in the casino." She snuck in.

Here's a conversation that took place at 3:01am...

Pauly: Hey look, hookers! (as I pointed at three scantily clad women)
PokerWire Jen: Them? No way. That's what the Milwaukee's Best girls do at night. Actually, one of them is too fat to be a Milwaukee's Best girl. They might just be regular hookers.

Deanna Duzier. Get to know that name. She's the actress who busted Jen Harman. She had plenty of media surrounding her table, after all she was some nice eye candy. She admitted that it was her first tournament. She was moved to Capt. Tom's table as his thought drifted towards late-night POB action.


Deanna Duzier
Photo courtesy of Flipchip
Tilted Kilt Stella Count: 62

Last 5 Pros I Pissed Next To...
1. Juha Helppi
2. Devilfish
3. David Levi
4. Sammy Farha
5. Bill Chen

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/08/2007 06:22:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 36: Main Event Day 1a

By Pauly

1,287.

That's the number everyone wanted to hear about. 1,287 players were registered to play on Day 1a. Rumors began to circulate around the Rio about the final numbers. I heard anywhere from 4,500 to 6,500 quoted among dealers, players, staff, and media reps. Regardless of the actual number, the 2007 WSOP has taken a hit courtesy of the UIGEA.

Even though more players qualified for the WSOP main event through PokerStars than in 2006, they numbers will be lower. They won't get anywhere close to dominating the field like they have in the previous two years where you couldn't look around the room on Day 1 without seeing an average of two players at every table wearing PokerStars gear. However, PokerStars still had the most internet qualifiers in the room on Day 1a.

The good news about the low numbers was that players did not have to sit in the Poker Sauna to play in the main event. That might change on Day 1b or Day 1c, when more then 2,000 players are expected on both days. Editor's Note: As of 3am PDT, Day 1b and Day 1c has 1,500 or so players registered.

During the last two years, Day 1a was a madhouse. This year was hectic at times, yet it seemed more subdued than in previous years. I expected Day 1 to be a raging inferno filled with frenetic energy, but the mood resembled more like any event that ran two weeks ago than the biggest and most prestigious tournament in the world. It was the Main Event on Valium, whored out to the highest bidder.

From the moment Jeffrey Pollack invited a Miller suit to come up and shill Beast Lite moments before cards went in the air, I knew that the main event was doomed. "Drink beer!" she squealed. That was followed up by George Wallace uttering the famous words, "Shuffle up and deal!"

George Fuckin' Wallace? The comedian? Are you shitting me? I have nothing against George Wallace. He's funny but why the fuck was he given the honor of starting up Day 1a of the WSOP. Why? Because he works the Flamingo which is a Harrah's property. That trumps two-time WSOP bracelet winner Tom "Donkey Bomber" Schneider. Or how about Johnny Fuckin' Chan. Or even Spiderman? Why didn't they get Matt Damon to drag his ass down to the Rio. Mike McD from Rounders should be saying "Shuffle up and deal!" not a Strip comedian who tells the same lame jokes night after night to sun burnt tourists from Kenosha.

So who is going to be announcing tomorrow's start up? Will it be the chick who plays Cleopatra at Caesar's Palace or will the portly lady with a lisp that works the seafood buffet at the Rio?

That was the first travesty of the day. The biggest was the stories about checks bouncing from Harrah's that were paid out to players in earlier events. That's a shame. Those two stories would loom all day long as new stories developed.

Day 1a started fifteen minutes late. Players began with 20K in chips and levels were two hours. I was teamed up with Change100 and we had four junior reporters. We had to cover the tournament tables in the cash game section, which would be the first to break. The first thing on the agenda was to identify the biggest names in our section and find the famous celebrities and random C-listers in the room.

Janet Jones, aka Mrs. Gretzky, was in the mix. I'm shocked that she was playing since she was mentioned of being part of a gambling ring last year. At any rate, she looked a little older from when I used to wank-off to her when she pranced around in tights during the 1986 flick American Anthem. She had a bit of botox work done since then ad squeezed out a couple of offspring for The Great One. Here's what Change100 wrote for PokerNews...

"Dressed in a tight white tee, light-wash jeans and carrying an enormous quilted silver lame purse, Jones looks relaxed and focused in her seat at Table 157, her opponents likely oblivious to her fame and notoriety."

That's all she could talk about was her purse. She chugged the cock of the greatest hockey player of all time and all she could talk about was her purse? Chicks, man.

Janet Jones didn't play too well. She donked off her chips and hit the rail early. There was a funny moment when she her original table broke and she had to move. As she passed Devilfish's table, he stopped in the middle of a big hand to watch her walk by as his jaw dropped. The Littlefish in Devilfish's pants liked what he saw.

By the way, according to Lance at The Poker Biz, Wayne Gretzky himself is rumored to play in the Main Event. There were rumors that Jah Rule played on Day 1a. I never saw him, but it was a certified rumor. We did confirm seeing Irv and Chris Gotti from Murders Inc. Amy got a pic of Chris Gotti's baller watch. Penguins hockey player Max Talbot was in the field along with Everybody Loves Raymond stars Ray Romano and Brad Garrett. Romano and Garrett had a last longer where the loser would donate $2,000 to the Maximum Hope Foundation.

I rarely get geeked out by meeting celebrities, but I was giddy to see Kirk Acevedo (actor from Band of Brothers who played Joe Toye) playing in the event.

Several former champions were in Day 1a including Doyle Brunson (who arrived an hour late), Bobby Baldwin, Johnny Chan, and Amarillo Slim. Brunson sat at the final table and busted early along with Chan. Baldwin went late into the night. Tom Sexton gave me a few interesting bits about Baldwin and I posted it on the live updates. He showed Baldwin what I wrote at Poker News:

Bobby "The Owl" Baldwin, the 1978 WSOP Champion, is among the players in the field on Day 1a. Soon after he won the main event, Steve Wynn offered him a job as an executive at the Golden Nugget. Within a year, he was promoted to President of the entire property.

Wynn saw the special qualities that Baldwin possessed. He got a degree in business at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater and as a young player, he routinely beat the biggest sharks in Las Vegas. When Wynn began a new project, he anointed Baldwin to be the person to spearhead the Mirage from the ground up. The Mirage became the standard for the modern Las Vegas as the entire world saw Steve Wynn's vision carried out by Baldwin.

When it was time to start up the Bellagio, Wynn quickly tapped Baldwin to head up that operation. He was promoted to President and CEO. These days, Bobby's Room is a popular attraction in the Bellagio poker room. That's where the biggest cash games in the world take place and feature legends such as Doyle Brunson, Chip Reese, and Jen Harman.

Baldwin has since joined the ranks of the MGM Mirage where he is in charge of the Project City Center. It happens to be a $7.4 Billion construction project that will once again change the face of the Las Vegas Strip.

Baldwin has plenty of gambling stories. Books could be written about his famous golf matches at Shadow Creek. In fact, Baldwin is sporting a Shadow Creek hat while he plays in Day 1a. His stack is around 23,000. Too bad that not many of the younger players out there know about one of the true legends of Las Vegas. Bobby Baldwin is in a class by himself. He's a member of the Poker Hall of Fame, but he's a sure bet to make the Las Vegas Hall of Fame for movers and shakers.

Baldwin dug it so much that he agreed to do an interview with PokerNews' own Tiffany Michelle. It was one of the best interviews that PokerNews did during the entire WSOP. You can check it out here:


Click here to view the Bobby Baldwin interview via RSS or Bloglines
Baldwin said several gems such as, "It's important for the game to have heritage and a foundation."

I wish that Pollack heard him say that before he got George Wallace to start Day 1a. Anyway, Baldwin talked about several topics such as the best player in poker, "Chip Reese is the finest in the world. Out of all around players, he's the best."

When he asked to give advice to you players, Baldwin mentioned, "It's great to have hopes, dreams, and aspirations. But you have to get better everyday. Everyone else is getting better. There's always more to learn about poker. Also, make certain that you can take a punch. You will lose big pots. You will lose everyday for a month sometimes. You have to have the confidence that your game will prevail in the end."

That was such amazing advice that he gave up on the spot during his break. That's why he's a true gentleman and we were lucky to have him on.

And my favorite quote from Bobby Baldwin?

"Even if you are the best player in the world, you still have to contend with Lady Luck. She can be a bitch sometimes."

Classic.

At 3:01pm, I heard something I never thought I'd hear.

"Seat open! 4-8 Hold'em."

Yes, lass than three hours into the biggest poker tournament in the world, the cash games had started up and most people who walked into the Amazon Ballroom were tricked into thinking the main event was raging. When in fact that quadrant had filled up with satellite and cash game players.

Around that time, the staff announced that the first player with a Royal Flush would get a free massage. The players started booing. They wanted cash.

Speaking of free massages, Brad Garrett gave everyone at his table free massages. That was fodder for ESPN's camera along with Eric Molina's early bust out.

I wrote this for PokerNews after dinner break...

The unfortunate souls are praying for that miracle hand which will get them back into contention. Every time a dealer screams, "Seat open!" Another player cringes because they know that their fate can be sealed on the very next hand.

As much as the room was not as crowded, the tension was still there. The remaining players didn't care about the numbers. All they want to do is advance to Day 2 and regroup.

By 3:00am, there were 500 players left on 50 tables. Over 787 were eliminated. By 3:30am, only 470 players were remaining. By the time Day 1a ended at 3:52am, there were around 445 players remaining.

Head over to PokerNews.com for official end of Day 1a chipcounts.

Day 1a Top 10 Chipcounts:
Tinten Olivier 270,500
John Dutchak 209,600
Stephen Austin 205,000
Michael Tureniec 203,900
Aurelio Arcano 166,000
Kitai Davidi 164,700
Scott Yeates 163,200
Dane Lomas 161,800
Andrius Tapinas 159,100
Alex Michaels 155,500
Adam Weiss 151,400

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 1a...

One herb friendly member of the media told me a funny story about how he went outside on a break and there was a WSOP player smoking a joint. He took a few hits and they started talking about The Grateful Dead. The next thing he knew, the guy handed him a second joint. Yeah, I was jealous. Hitting doobies behind the Poker Sauna. Only in Las Vegas.

I heard from one of our guys that Spiderman snuck into the ladies room to piss on one of the breaks since the line to the men's room was too long.

Spectators were all over the Rio specifically camped out in the hallways. One guy asked me for a chip count on his cousin. When I asked him what he looked like, the guy honestly said, "He's wearing sunglasses and a Boston Red Sox hat." Thanks for narrowing it down a bit, Sully.

I got a few Clonie Gowan rumors... from Full Tilt forcing her to dye her hair back to blonde to that FT dropped her. We really don't know and I think this is a case for Michalski to crack.

Dewey Tomko was seated next to Alex Jacob to start the day. Alex Jacob wasn't even born when Tomko lost heads up to Jack Straus in 1982 during the WSOP main event. I thought that was an interesting comparison from both the new school of poker and the old school.

One of the weirdest moments of the day was watching two-time WSOP bracelet winner Jeff Madsen play in a jester's costume. He lost a three-way pro bet with Gavin Smith and Joe Sebok and had to dress up.


I bumped into Michalski outside by the Poker Sauna. He told me that Hemingway said, "You can never write enough about the weather." My next post on Poker News was about the weather. By the way, it was so hot outside that when I went to Change100's car for a smoke break, I took a leak and by the time my piss hit the pavement, it evaporated. Talk about one hot fucking day.

The other big story of the day was about Vinnie Vinh's stack. He was bought into the main event and never showed up. His friends tried to get him a refund because they said he was in the hospital as his stack was blinded off. I dunno if that was a code word for "rehab" but they eventually got TD Jack Effel to make a decision. Vinh would get a refund or chose to play a different day if he was well enough. His empty chair refused to comment to reporters.

I tried to spend break time in the media room, but it was jam packed with reps from all over the world. The newbies took up space from the folks who had been there from Event #1 and there was an air of tension in the room.

"This is awfully crowded," mentioned Benjo. "The scene had changed from three days ago. As you would say, 'we're gonna need a bigger boat.' By the way, the new media rules is huge bullshit."

Benjo gave me the run down on some French players in Day 1a such as 1997 WSOP bracelet winner Claude Cohen. Jan Boubli and ElkY were both playing. They represent the old and new guard. Boubli is the Godfather of French poker while ElkY is part of the new generation of online wizards.

I managed to bump into Feldman from ESPN and Scurvy Dog who is writing for Poker Room. I chatted with Steve Rosenbloom who was the only real writer in the entire building. I was honored when he sought my advice on something. Former beat writer from the Chicago Tribune following the Bulls during their halcyon days was asking me for advice. I was floored.

I ran into the Geek and he helped me out later in the night with some hands. Grubby magically appeared and told me about the slot machine he was going to be on. The Poker Grub is officially big time. I never saw my brother but he hung out with Michalski at the Hooker Bar for a bit. I wish I wasn't so busy. I'd have more time to hang out with friends.

Around 2:20am, Steve Horton told me this gem, "Newhouse posted that several players owe him money and he's going to try and collect this week. Over the last half hour, Newhizzle has been picking on Dustin "Neverwin" Woolf, still in this event, grumbling that Neverwin owes him money. He's even kicked a plastic chip rack in Neverwin's general direction. Newhizzle has not yet been escorted out - right now he's pacing back and forth along the rail like a mountain lion."

Everyone owes everyone at the WSOP. And how many people owe Newhizzle? He's got both Brandi Hawbaker and now Neverwin on his shit list. How about Frankie O'Dell or Eskimo? Poker Geek said that the floor staff warned Newhizzle not to stalk Neverwin for the rest of the tournament. Newhizzle is supposedly owed over 200K from Neverwin. I hope he got at least a hand job out of that one.

By 3:30am, the hookers started trickling into the Amazon Room. I forgot it was a Friday in Las Vegas.

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/07/2007 06:58:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 35: Sediel Captures #8 and the Disease of Conceit

By Pauly

Las Vegas was hotter than hell with tempatures soaring up to 119 degrees. There's the Chinese acrobat scandal where over twenty people were beung enslaved in a house here in Las Vegas. And don't forget about the trigger happy gunman who lit up the New York, New Yrok casino around 1am after he opened fire on people in the casino. The federalies say that he was a local. That doesn't surprise me. Aside from the human slaves, gun-toting locals, and the sizzling weather, there's the World Series of Poker going on down at the Rio.

I ignored the side circus of Day 35. I did not spend one minute at the Rio. It was the last place I wanted to be. The only thing that I wish I got to see was not Matt Damon, or strippers at Sapphire, but to witness Erik Seidel win bracelet #8. He's a true professional poker player and young players should replicate how they approach the game more like Erik Seidel. You won't see him throwing chairs or berating opponents after he takes a bad beat. He's not going to be donking off his winning in the pits and is considered one of the best examples of bankroll management in poker. Most TV execs don't like him because he's quiet and non-confrontational. That's bad for TV so he doesn't get too much face time on programs, which is sad because he deserves it.


Erik Seidel wins #8
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
You can make a solid argument that Erik Seidel is one of the greatest tournament players of all time. Only Phil Hellmuth, Doyle Brunson, Johnny Chan, and Johnny Moss have won more bracelets than Eirk Seidel. He's been able to hold his own against the old guard of Las Vegas sharks and the most recent breed of internet-whiz kids. Everyone (including me) talks about how Phil Ivey or Allen Cunningham would surpass Doyle ad Chan and Hellmuth one day. But no one ever mentions Erik Seidel. After his 8th bracelet (and second in three years), maybe we should start mentioning his name more often?

Seidel took down Event #54 $5,000 NL 2-7 Lowball with Rebuys. Among professionals, it's considered the most prestigious event outside of HORSE and the Main Event. For some secondary pros or wealthy gamblers with deep pockets, it's an opportunity to buy a bracelet. For the top tiered pros, it's an opportunity to beat the biggest sharks in Las Vegas in a game that will feature very few sheep, fish, and donkeys.

Seidel also won his 8th bracelet on the eve of the Main Event. That day before the Main Event is usually a welcomed day off among media reps and players. They finally get some free time during the day, play in the media tournament, then get shitfaced at the multiple parties at night.

This is my third WSOP and by now, I know what to expect on the day before the madness begins. The media room swells up with hundreds of unknown faces from organizations you never knew existed before. The small group of 30 or so media who have been here since Day 1 are all of a sudden outnumbered by fresh faces and people with an abundance of energy and wearing brand new shiny media badges. The rest of media who have been camped out int he media room since Day 1 have a few battle scars and sunken zombie like circles under their eyes from covering way too many multiple events over the last five weeks. I always hated the day before the media event because of the influx of national press most of whom have no idea about poker. What was congested become even more crowded and annoying.

The Hall of Fame ceremony is a farce and should not be done to a handful of national media during the WSOP press conference and should be done at Noon on Day 1 of the WSOP or given it's own night at a major televised dinner like the Oscars with all the big wigs in poker in the audience. I'm not a fan of Babs Enright after she bad beated me and talked shit during a media tournament at Commerce 1.5 years ago, but she deserved the nod. And Phil Hellmuth was inducted but we already know Phil Hellmuth is the greatest poker player in the entire universe. He's told us many times before.

I also wanted to skip out on the Jeffrey Pollack wank fest of a press conference. I had to sit through that atrocity last year and all I wanted to do as puke after hearing all the Harrah's PR bullshit. No one addressed the robberies in the parking lot or the dealer's mutiny. And I expected this year's press conference would be more of the same corporate shilling. According to Lance at The Poker Biz Pollack announced that, "Poker is alive and well and the 2007 World Series of Poker has been a tremendous success."

Tremendous? Meaning how much in juice and shilling fees did you guys collect? He failed to mention that but harped that the WSOP was still a "work in progress."

Housing a kitchen inside a ballroom and having players play the biggest tournament in the history of poker inside a tent is not a tremendous success. It's a shame and an embarrassment that Harrah's would rather sell a ballroom for a wedding reception than eat the cost and have players more comfortable. They fucked the monkey on that one. Sure, Pollack is beloved among the suits at Harrah's because he helped generate over 100 million in endorsement revenue. But has any of that been given back to the players? All you get is a $10 food comp and a crappy cheeseburger wrapped in tin foil.

With the Ante Up for Africa charity tournament, there were more paparazzi stalking out the Amazon Ballroom than usual. Our favorite Hollyweird blonde Change100 suggested that would be the one thing to skip the most on Day 35. I'm not awestruck by famous people and after working almost a decade in the entertainment industry and growing up in Hollyweird, neither is Change100. We made the conscious decision to avoid the carnival-like atmosphere of the charity tournament. Railbirds were packed in which would have been a nightmare to navigate. Enough mainstream press would be there that the event will get picked up and noticed. But I didn't want to have to elbow forty other press people that I have never seen before just to get a chip count on Matt Damon or figure out how George Clooney donked off his chips.

I applaud Annie Duke and Don Cheadle for trying to raise more awareness for the humanitarian crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan. But I also think that the absurdity of the WSOP and its freak-fest of degenerates detracted from the entire mission. Michele Lewis at Pokerati summed it up best...

"The amount of people visiting the Amazon room and the 2007 WSOP Gaming Expo (which is Girls, Gaming and Gear...gee thanks) is causing a traffic jam and an epidemic of claustrophobia. While there is a "dunk the stripper" water tank with a wet girl in a bikini, Ben Affleck seems to be attracting a larger field, which is blocking my view of Matt Damon.

Not only do Annie and Don hope to make a large contribution after today's event (even after Hellmuth asked "do you really expect to win?") they are very excited to increase awareness in the United States.

Yes, you read correctly. In one room there are half naked girls strutting around in very little fabric while in the room down the hall there is a charity event taking place to help people that have been driven from their homes and have lost 200,000 neighbors to war." ... more here

Lewis pointed out about the WSOP Gaming Expo which visitors are being forced to walk through on the way to the Amazon Ballroom. Thank God that I know about the secret entrances, but I'm still forced to walk through there on the way to the Tilted Kilt which adds several minutes to my already sparse drinking at dinner time.

The madness returns to the WSOP and I didn't want to have to spend an extra day dealing with the side drama and bullshit. I also skipped the media event. I don't think I was officially invited. PokerNews.com only got four invites and we couldn't figure out who would go. I final tabled the event in 2005 and raised money for Charlie Tuttle's charity but as you can tell, there's no real money involved. I skipped the event and was happy to hear that Spaceman and Otis went deep. Otis has made two final tables in the last two years.

We had a much cooler idea over at PokerNews.com. Tony G decided to hand out bonuses to all of the reporters in the form of a free roll at Hooters Casino. There were $500 bounties on himself, Caldwell, and Jonno. The final table paid out prize money and first place took home $2,500. That was a nice year-end bonus and all you had to do was beat out 41 other players to get it.

Alas, I busted out early. Ironically, I still won a last longer with Flipchip who busted out a couple of hands before me. Tony G sent two kids to the rail on the first hand of the tournament. The G flopped a full house with J-J on a board of K-K-J and fireworks ensued.

Change100 had her Aces brutally cracked by one of the PokerNews Dutch reporters and I ran my 10s into Amy Calistri's Aces. Since we busted out early and had no desire to head to the Rio we opted for a quiet afternoon and went to see the latest Die Hard flick.

I've had my brother, mother, and other family members in town and have been spending some time with them. Although I skipped going to the Rio on Day 35, my mother checked it out. Her initial impressions was, "It's not a dump like I thought."

She expected the Amazon Ballroom to be covered in stale urine and cigarette butts. "It used to be," I told her. "When it was at the Horseshoe."

I skipped the madness and opted for a few hours of non-poker stuff as I prepared for the 2007 WSOP Main Event. I do not expect to sleep for the next twelve days and will be doing what I can to paint the world picture for everyone who is not here in Las Vegas to witness the spectacle. This is what everyone has been waiting for.
* * * * *
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/06/2007 01:01:00 PM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 34: Hello Cleveland

By Pauly

"Cleveland," said Nolan Dalla to me as I walked into the media room.

Way before Nolan Dalla was involved with the WSOP, he was a sports handicapper and considered one of the best in all of Las Vegas. He knows guys that "know things" and when he gave me a tip on the WNBA a few weeks ago, I initially laughed, then ran over to the sports book to check the lines. I made a promise to myself that I would not bet sports until NFL season started and even though Nolan gave me a sure thing (on the most degenerate of sports betting... the WNBA that's even more sadistic than betting on baseball) I held my willpower and avoided laying any bets. Sure enough, his WNBA picks hit.

"Cleveland is good for a unit," said Nolan as I felt my right pocket. Based on the lump in there, I estimated that I had almost 2K maybe more. Within ten minutes I could scrape together four or five grand. I took a deep breath and decided that a promise to myself meant more than a sure thing. Cleveland was playing the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and it was supposed to be a blow out. Even at -160, there was plenty of value in that bet. I avoided the sports book, yet kept an eye on the game and wished that I lacked self-discipline and bet my poker bankroll on the game.

As I covered my event that day, I kept one eye on ESPN gamecast and the other on one of the many TV screens in the Amazon Ballroom. The game got interesting in the 7th inning. The Indians were ahead 3-0 but the Devil Rays rallied against Fausto Carmon. He walked a batter with the bases load as the Devil Rays trailed 3-2. R. Perez came in relief and saved the day. He struck out a pinch hitter. The next batter he made an amazing catch on a Baltimore chop and threw home to get the force out. He got the next player to ground out to end the inning.

Cleveland blew the game open scoring seven runs in the bottom of the 8th as they won 10-2. The game was a lock just as Nolan predicted. Of course, had I bet five dimes of the game, Cleveland would have lost and I'd be writing about that bad beat in this space.

Sometimes the best bets you make, or the ones you don't make. Just like in poker. Sometimes the best hands you play are the ones you don't play.

Anyway...

The Main Event is starting on Friday and Dan Michalski mentioned that one of his friends signed up and was 2,552. Harrah's canceled a day off (between Day 1 and Day 2) because they expect a big crowd at the Main Event. Did they know something or did they want to avoid seating players in the Rio's actual poker room and the Poker Sauna during the Main Event? There will be Day 1a, 1b, 1c, and now 1d. I doubt they will get close to last year's record. I have big bets out there that the numbers will go over 4,200; over 4,500; over 5,000; and over 5,500.

I still think that they will get at least 6,000 players this year. The main event of the WSOP is the premiere tournament in poker. Nothing else compares or comes closer. Every year, more people buy-in directly than the previous year. You cannot forget about those folks who are willing to chase down a dream.

As much as the WPT and EPT is insanely popular among their players, the winners of those season-ending championship events don't get the coverage and endorsement deals that the winner of the WSOP will secure.

One affiliate guy (name withheld by request) from an online poker site suggested that 20-25% of the players who win a seat online will actually buy-in to the main event. There are many reasons that 75-80% of them won't make it.

1. Wife says no... once the wife or girlfriend finds out that you have $10K in cash sitting in your account, they'll cock block your dreams of winning the big dance. It's one thing if you win a non-refundable seat and she has no choice but to let you go, but with cash in hand, it will be hard to convince her to blow it at the Rio and pad the prize pool.

2. Players donk it off... I hear this happen all the time. Player XYZ gets a nice score and blows it by playing more tourneys or jumping up in levels and getting creamed.

3. Playing a different event... instead of blowing their wad on the main event, some players made the decision to play a smaller buy-in event instead, while pocketing the rest to cover expenses.

4. Moment of clarity... a player who won a seat realizes that they are a super long shot to win it, so they pocket the money instead and use it to pay debts, a nice vacation for the family, or to buy something for themselves like a plasma TV or a new iPhone.

I'm sure there are hundreds of reasons why satellite winners will elect not to come to Vegas, but I still think that the allure of winning the big one will attract more players than estimated. Everyone who plays tournament poker wants to win the WSOP main event. Almost everyone I know desperately seeks fame and fortune if not both. Even if you don't win it and get close, you'll be immortalized on ESPN Classic if you get face time. For normal folks, that's their only shot at the big time. Some will be willing to take that shot because after all, the WSOP is the epitome of the American Dream. That's why it's called the Moneymaker Effect. It's not just for Americans anymore as poker has become an international phenomena. There will be Canadians, Scandinavians, Australians, and players represents dozens and dozens of nations competing for the most prestigious prize in poker.

Last year, I wrote some on PokerStars Blog called The Post-Modern American Dream: The WSOP. Here's a bit:

Several decades ago, author Hunter S. Thompson set out on a "A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream," which ended up being the tagline to his most famous body of work Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. By the end of his psychedelic fueled journey, Thompson was crushed to learn that the dream is only a myth. After the rebellious waves of the 1960s crashed somewhere in the Nevada Desert, the bright and glitzy lights of Las Vegas represented the highwater mark as the revolutionary tide rolled back into the Pacific Ocean.

For the last few decades, the eternal flame of the American Dream dulled to a tiny flicker. For millions of lost souls, they found themselves sleepwalking through life, unexcited about the things, places, and people around them. That was until a mild-mannered accountant from Tennessee by the name of Chris Moneymaker became the focal point of the gambling world. By now you know the story. Moneymaker won a seat into the 2003 WSOP via a satellite on PokerStars and parlayed a $33 investment into $2.5 million.

Maybe it's the name "Moneymaker" or simply timing, but Chris Moneymaker is often listed as one of the primary causes of the recent poker boom. It's not so much a boom as a viral infection or an epidemic and if you've walked down the hallways of the Rio Casino here in Las Vegas, you'll see the Moneymaker Effect in full force. Thousands of poker players from the farthest corners of the world have flown into Las Vegas for their shot at fame and glory. Corporations are lining up as official sponsors. Television companies and channels are churning out poker-themed shows.... More

In less than two weeks, that winner of the main event will become poker's next superstar. It could be a well-known pro, but chances are it will be someone who came out of nowhere. It could be the guy who plays in your cul-de-sac homegame, or the donkey who plays in the same underground club that you play, or some hotshot pro from Sweden as the prove what they've all been saying since day 1... that the Swedes are the best poker players in the world.

Once the champ, always the champ.

If you had one shot at immortality, wouldn't you take it? As Hunter S. Thompson once wrote, "Buy the ticket. Take the ride."

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/05/2007 11:39:00 AM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 33: Smells Like Happiness

By Pauly

Here's what happened on Day 33... umm.... I have no idea because I had a rare day off. I missed out at the $10K PLO Final Table that was won by Robert Mizrachi aka Brother of the Grinder. Texas Dolly failed to win Bracelet #11 and will have to wait to fight another day. Mizrachi also held off Tommy Ly and Patrik Antonius.

Lance over at the Poker Biz had an interesting post called The Sincerest Form of Flattery. Check it out.

Since I don't have anything else to report, how about some stats and a list of bracelet winners? There have been 51 bracelets awarded at to fifty players this year's WSOP. Donkey Bomber collected two. He's also at the top of the Player of the Year leaderboard.

2007 WSOP Bracelet Winners:
Event #1 $5,000 Mixed Limit/NL Hold'em: Steve Billirakis
Event #2 $500 Casino Employee NL: Frederick Narciso
Event #3 $1,500 NL: Cairan O'Leary
Event #4 $1,500 Pot-limit Hold 'em: Michael Spiegel
Event #5 $2,500 Omaha/Seven Card Stud 8: Tom Schneider
Event #6 $1,500 Limit Hold 'em: Gary Styczynski
Event #7 $5,000 PLO w/rebuys: Burt Boutin
Event #8 $1,000 NL w/rebuys: Michael Chu
Event #9 $1,500 Omaha 8: Alexander Kravchenko
Event #10 $2,000 NL: William Durkee
Event #11 $5,000 Seven Card Stud: Chris Reslock
Event #12 $1,500 NL Six Handed: Jason Warner
Event #13 $5,000 Pot-limit Hold 'em: Allen Cunningham
Event #14 $1,500 Seven Card Stud: Michael Keiner
Event #15 $1,500 NL: Phil Hellmuth
Event #16 $2,500 HORSE: James Richberg
Event #17 $1,000 Ladies Event NL: Sally Boyer
Event #18 $5,000 Limit Hold'em: Jard Getzoyan
Event #19 $2,500 NL: Francois Safieddine
Event #20 $2,000 Seven Card Stud 8: Ryan Hughes
Event #21 $1,500 NL Shootout: Don Baruch
Event #22 $5,000 NL: James Mackey
Event #23 $1,500 PLO: Scott Clements
Event #24 $3,000 Seven Card Stud 8: Eli Elezra
Event #25 $2,000 NL: Ben Ponzio
Event #26 $5,000 HORSE: Ralph Schwartz
Event #30 $2,500 NL - 6 handed: Hoyt Corkins
Event #31 $5,000 World Championship Heads Up NL: Dan "Rekrul" Schreiber
Event #32 $2,000 Seven Card Stud: Jeff Lisandro
Event #33 $1,500 PLO w/rebuys: Alan Smurfit
Event #34 $3,000 Limit Hold 'em: Alex Borteh
Event #35 $1,500 NL: Ryan Young
Event #36 $5,000 World Championship Omaha8: John Guth
Event #37 $2,000 Pot-limit Hold 'em: Greg Hopkins
Event #38 $1,500 NL: Robert Cheung
Event #39 $50,000 World Championship HORSE: Freddy Deeb
Event #40 $1,500 Mixed Hold 'em: Fred Goldberg
Event #41 $1,000 World Championship Seniors NL: Ernest Bennett
Event #42 $1,500 PLO 8 or Better: Lukasz Dumanski
Event #43 $2,000 Limit Hold 'em: Saif Ahmad
Event #44 $2,000 Omaha Hi-Low Split: Frankie O'Dell
Event #45 $5,000 NL Six handed: Bill Edler
Event #46 $1,000 Seven Card Stud Hi-Low-8: Tom "Donkey Bomber" Schneider
Event #47 $2,000 NL: Blair Rodman
Event #48 $1,000 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball (Limit) w/rebuys: Rafi Amit
Event #49 $1,500 NL: Chandrasekhar Billavara
Event #50 $10,000 World Championship PLO: Robert Mizrachi
Event #51 $1,000 S.H.O.E.: Dao Bac

WSOP Player of the Year Top 10:
Tom Schneider 255
Jeffrey Lisandro 220
Robert Mizrachi 210
Scotty Nguyen 180
Scott Clements 167
Phil Hellmuth 165
Chris Bjorin 165
Rene Mouritsen 160
Alexander Kravchenko 155
William Durkee 155

By the way, I went to see a Widespread Panic concert on my day off. They played over at Planet Ho and I went with Change100, Spaceman, and Friedman. Anyway, on the way out to the parking garage after the concert ended, we waited for an elevator. The last people who were in the elevator were blazing up because not only did it reek of pot, but there was a heavy cloud of smoke inside the elevator. Anyway, a young very drunk woman was latched onto her boyfriend as they followed us in the elevator. As soon as the doors closed, she said, "It smells like happiness."

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/04/2007 03:14:00 PM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 32: Doyle's Eleven and Liz Lieu Tuesdays

By Pauly

Let's start off with a pic of Liz in honor of LLT!


By the way, when Liz sent me the photo, the file name was , "Lucky Orange."

Moving on...

I covered Day 2 of $10K Pot-Limit Omaha. There were plenty of big names left including Andy Bloch, Scotty Nguyen and Doyle Brunson. Scotty Nguyen had been having an amazing series with two final tables and a handful of cashes. He was trying to go deep once again. It looked like he was going to make a third final table when he busted two players on the same hand to take over the chiplead. However, PLO is a game where you can go from the chiplead to busto in a matter of seconds. Nguyen failed to make the final table, but a guy name Doyle Brunson did.

Brunson is seeking his 11th bracelet, which would tie him with Phil Hellmuth. At this point in his life, Brunson cares more about the bracelet than the money. He's in the twilight of his life and just in case something drastic happens to his health, I'm sure he'd like to win as many bracelets as possible so when he eventually dies, he'll be the all-time bracelet winner. There's no doubt that Hellmuth will win 15 by the end of his career and there might be one or two players who will overtake Brunson (Ivey and Cunningham), but Texas Dolly has his eyes set on #11. He has to get through eight more players to make that happen. He'll start the final table 5th in chips way behind the leader Tommy Ly. Robert Mizrachi held the chiplead for the majority of Day 2 until Tommy Ly went on a rush after the dinner break.

Event #50 $10K PLO Final Table:
Seat 1: Doyle Brunson - 510,000
Seat 2: Patrik Antonius - 650,000
Seat 3: Marco Traniello - 420,000
Seat 4: Rene Mouritsen - 775,000
Seat 5: Tommy Ly - 1,895,000
Seat 6: Jonas Flug-Entin - 445,000
Seat 7: Steve Sung - 175,000
Seat 8: Stephen Ladowski - 360,000
Seat 9: Robert Mizrachi - 1,090,000

Out of 314 entrants, only nine remain. Head over to Poker News to follow the final table action and find out if Doyle Brunson makes history once again.

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 32

"The hooker last night at the Hooker Bar was playing Keno," said Mrs. Otis who recanted her first experience at the place Otis and I dubbed The Hooker Bar. I met Otis, Mrs. Otis, and Change100 for a drink after my shift ended. The Tilted Kilt was closing up so we couldn't drink there. We decided to head to the secret bar instead. That's where I got my first quads at video poker for the 2007 WSOP. I drew two of them too.


A guy walked into the secret bar with a hooker and a flower in a vase that he obviously stole from a table in the buffet. I have no idea what he was thinking.

I walked past a cash game table in the Amazon Ballroom, and I spotted a guy sobbing. I couldn't figure out what was up. He had decent stack in front of him, but why was he crying? I wrote what I saw in my notes and chalked it up to random weirdness that happens in Las Vegas

Wish I could write more, but I'm out of time.

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/03/2007 02:12:00 PM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 31: European Invasion

By Pauly

Last year around this time, the background chatter in the media room took on an international flavor as he Europeans arrived and began speaking in their native tongues. There was some speculation on whether or not there would be a massive European contingency of players and media since Harrah's implemented new international tax laws. Why fly to Las Vegas, win a shitload of money (worth less in Euros), and leave with less after having to pay US taxes? I know that several Scandis decided to skip the WSOP this year in favor of the WSOP-Europe in September and the player-friendly European Poker Tour which kicks off in Barcelona at the end of August.

Regardless of player's tax burdens, there are more international press covering the WSOP than I have seen in recent years. The Germans (led by Klaus) have been here since Day 1. There's the Dutch guys writing for Poker News and Maridu writing about Brazilian players for Poker Stars. Jen, Snoopy, and Homer arrived from London last week to cover British players. And there's a shitload of Scandi's here just like last year. And my favorite international press members... The Irish guys from Antes Up should be arriving shortly.

Since I play a lot of Pot-Limit Omaha and I am familiar with obscure European players, I often get to cover those events. I've covered two PLO final tables and most of the Day 2s. It's one of the good perks about my gig at Poker News instead of getting those brutal assignments like Stud 8 or PLO8, which Change100 and Steve Horton almost always get stuck with.

On Sunday, I was assigned Day 1 of the $10K PLO event with faux rebuys. It was essentially a freezeout but with only 10K in starting chips instead of 20K. Whenever you went below 10K, you had the option of adding on an additional 10K. I dunno why they structured the tournament that way. By Day 31 of the WSOP, I simply accepted that asking why was pointless. Rules and regulations are changed on the fly. Some rules are strictly enforced while others are left up to the individual floor people to interpret. I stopped asking why and simply accept the weirdness that surrounds the WSOP.

Anyway, 314 of the biggest gamblers in the world bought into Event #50 $10,000 Pot-Limit Omaha. You had the biggest names in poker such as Phil Ivey, Phil Hellmuth, and Doyle Brunson rubbing shoulders with European young guns like the Finnish Triad of Patrik Antonius, Jani Sointula, Thomas Wahlroos.

I spotted the former Swedish Monoploy Champion Patrick Martensen among the Scandis in the field along with Swedish players Johan Storakers, Magnus Persson, and Kristian Kjondal (who final tabled the EPT Grand Finale in Monte Carlo a few months ago). I also saw Jan Boubli who is considered one of the Godfathers of poker in France. He won the EPT Barcelona final table that I helped announce almost two years ago. Also in the hunt were several British players... EPT creator John Duthie, El Blondie Dave Colclough, and several Hendon Mobsters such as the Boatman brothers. Irish players Don O'Dea and David Callaghan are short on chips but still alive. The outlasted Andy Black who almost got into a fight during Day 1.

Former WSOP Champions Scotty Nguyen and Greg Raymer are among the 55 remaining players, while Doyle Brunson is trying to make another final table and attempt to win bracelet #11.

$10K PLO End of Day 1 Top 10 Chip Counts:
Jonas Flug-Entin - 366,500
Tommy Ly - 354,500
Kenneth Strandli - 287,000
Antonio Salorio - 264,500
Roy Brindley - 231,000
Patrik Antonius - 205,500
Robert Mizrachi - 204,000
Liekke Kimmo - 197,500
Rene Mouritsen - 189,500
John Duthie - 188,000

Also advancing to Day 2 included... Scotty Nguyen, Steve Sung, Marco Traniello, Tore Lagerborg, Andy Bloch, Annie Duke, Eric Froehlich, Greg Raymer, Doyle Brunson, Magnus Persson, Leif Force, Dave Colclough, Alex Brenes, Kido Pham, Michael Binger, Chau Giang, Jan Boubli, JC Tran, Dario Alioto, Paul Jackson, Tim Phan, Mickey Appleman, David Chiu, Jani Sointula, Joe Beevers, Minh Ly, Donn O'Dea, David Callaghan, and Kristian Kjondal.

Plenty of big names left including a slew of European players that I've come across while covering the European Poker Tour. Day 2 should be one of the most exciting days at this year's WSOP. The top 36 players win prize money. If they can get down to nine players by 10pm, they will start a final table then. If not, players will come back on Tuesday to play it out for a bracelet.

You can follow the action since I'll be live blogging Event #50 starting at 2pm local time for PokerNews.com. Click here to check out the live coverage.

* * * * *
Bouncin Round the Room on Day 31

I was interviewed by rawvegas.tv about the Erick Lindgren golf prop bet. Here's the clip which features a recapof the entire bet. I'm in it at the end for like five seconds.


Click here to view the video via RSS and Bloglines.
The Brazilians have taken over the WSOP. I never saw that many railbirds for a Day 2. They were standing a dozen deep on the rail cheering on their countryman Leandro "Brasa" Pimentel. He went from 140K to over 1M in the last hour as he made the final table. Felipe told me that the Brazilians were going to make an impact at the WSOP as soon as they arrived. He was not kidding. For more info head over to the Brazilian PokerStars Blog and read Maridu's updates.

I have been hearing stories about some of the dealers quitting due to the crappy pay. During the record setting $1,500 event (over 3,100+ donkeys bought in), floor staff had to be put in the box to deal. I spotted a friend of mine who's dealing this year and he said he can't wait for the WSOP to end.

One older dealer challenged me to a fight. He was having an awful day and we got stuck trying to walk through the same door together. Honest mistake and I stepped aside and let him pass. That's when he wanted to go at it and started screaming at me. Personally, I had been having a shitty day and was looking to beat the shit out of somebody. I sternly warned the old guy that I'd wipe his face with the pavement if we really stepped outside since I had been in a pissy mood. I suggested he keep his mouth shut otherwise I'd call his bluff and shove his pillow up his ass. Just because he had a bad down doesn't mean he could treat me like shit. I guess he's the Tao of Poker's Asshat of the Day. Nice work, pal.

Mrs. Otis is in town and she came over to chat for a little bit. We'll try to take her to the Hooker Bar or the Tilted Kilt.

Tilted Kilt Stella Count: 52

Andy Black almost got into a fist fight with Davood Merhmand. I've heard plenty of stories that Davood is one of the most annoying players to be seated at the same table with. As much as Andy Black is prone to slipping into a fit of rage from time to time due to his Irish temper, but you really have to piss off a Buddhist in order for him to want to kick your ass. Black had his arm cocked back and fist clenched ready to drop Davood after he was talking shit to Black moments after his elimination from the PLO event. Black had to be pulled away by a floor person. He was livid. I'm sure a lot of the other players would love to have seen Black drop Davood.

By the way, Davood told me a bad beat story which lasted five minutes. I tired to escape by telling him I had to piss, so he followed me into the bathroom and continued to recant his beat while I took a piss.

Last 5 Pros I Pissed Next To...
1. Davood Merhmand
2. ZeeJustin
3. Daniel Negreanu
4. Dutch Boyd
5. Marcel Luske

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/02/2007 02:50:00 PM | Permalink |

 
WSOP Day 30: Donkey Bomber Wins Second Bracelet and Bill Edler the Stunning One Wins First Bracelet

By Pauly

I knew something was up when I saw Michalski in media row. Michalski is what I call a media drifter. He's all over the place, drifting from the media room, to the tournament floor, to the Poker Sauna, to the No Limit Lounge, to outside on the smoker's stairs. We rarely get to spend he quantity of time we'd like to... but when we do end up crossing paths, our conversations are intense and meaningful.

Late on Friday night, just as my event finished up ariund 2am, Stud Hi/Lo was down to three tables. I spotted Donkey Bomber out of the corner of my eye and Michalski magically appeared a few moments later.

"I'm sweating my boy," said a proud Michalski who wore a nice shirt with a big ink stain on it.


Photo courtesy of Pokerati
Hailing from Arizona, Tom "Donkey Bomber" Schneider was a part-time writer on Pokerati. He's the author of a poker book and has been on the tournament circuit for many years. Michalski knew him from the underground games in Dallas. He won the Pokerati Invitational and that's how Michalski knows him. He already won one bracelet and was trying to win a second. Donkey Bomber survived the long night and advanced to another final table at this year's WSOP.

Stud Hi/Lo was played on the ESPN set without any cameras. It was sort of strange to see action without the crowds packed with spectators, all the sizzling and bright production lights burning down, and surly ESPN camera men swatting you like a pesky gnat buzzing around in the shot. I didn't get to see Donkey Bomber win number two since I was sequestered in the Bluff Production room as another broadcast of an event in the Black Hole went down. I was asigned to the Short-handed NL final table.

I finally got to step behind the curtain and see things from the inside. I still think the Black Hole is the worst idea of the WSOP, but the folks involved like Nick Geiber and Spaceman bust their asses to make sure it gets done right. I applaud them for pulling it off. Not only was it cool to be behind the scenes, but I finally got to work a little bit with Spaceman although I only saw him twice. He was inside the black hole and feeding me chipcounts on a radio. I'd feed those to the Bluff staff and they'd punch it up on the graphics for the broadcast.

I got to see hole cams, which was interesting. Some of the players refused to show their cards, while the lighting was kind of poor so you'd miss a card or two. It's one thing to have an edit broadcast and study the hole cards, but to do that on the fly in real time is difficult. Ian and company drew a tough task of getting simultaneous hold cards... all at once. Heck it was short-handed and it wasn't easy. It must be a bitch to do a nine-handed table.

Anyway, Dutch Boyd did not win another bracelet and he busted out courtesy of a a three outer from Bill Edler. Dutch woke up with Jacks and lost to Edler's A-x. Edler hit his Ace and Dutch Boyd headed to the rail. Dutch has been looking more and more like Fat Elvis these days.

Anyway, Bill Edler survived the crazy Swede Erik Friberg and beat Alex Bolotin heads up to win. He came from behind with A-10 against Bolotin's A-Q and flopped an ace to seal his first bracelet. Gavin Smith and Erick Lindgren (looking like hell from almost dying on the golf course), were among the players sweating on Edler. Amy Calistri was all smiles after the event.

"Score one for the good guys," she said.

It's always great when one of the nicest guys in poker picks up a bracelet and gets the recognition he deserves. Most of the time, the attention gets focused on the biggest douchebags in the room. It was refreshing to get to cover Edler's run and witness him pick up his first bracelet. Congrats to The Stunning One for a stunning victory.

Less than an hour after Edler won, I walked onto the ESPN stage and saw that Donkey Bomber won his second bracelet. Michalski was there taking photos with another guy who was a friend of the D-Bomber. He had two stripper-types with him attached to his hip. I can only assume that he was a high roller from Texas. Old oil money and watrermelon boobs always mix. Everything's big in Texas.

The last time Donkey Bomber won a bracelet, Michalski disappeared for three days during a post-victory binge. I don't expect Michalski to resurface for a few days. He's a drifter.

Congrats to Donkey Bomber for number two. Oh yeah, since this is the congrats post... congrats to Shronk for going deep in the $2K event. He had a nice score. Nice job, bro.

Wish I had more time to write more about lobsters, Donkey Bombers, and douchebags. Alas, my free time has evaporated.

* * * * *
Don't forget to check out LasVegasVegas for Flipchip's WSOP photos and there's the Poker Prof's cool 2007 WSOP Info page.

And come back at the Tao of Poker for daily recaps and head over at PokerNews for live coverage and updates including chipcounts.

For all you fantasy sports junkies, check out our new site... Fantasy Sports Live.

Original content written and provided by Pauly from Tao of Poker at www.taopoker.com. All rights reserved. RSS feeds are for non-commercial use only.
posted by Pauly at 7/01/2007 04:55:00 PM | Permalink |