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World Series of Poker Europe II

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 21:05:10 +0100

The 2008 World Series of Poker Europe (WSOPE) announced it will be hosting its event under one roof at the Casino at the Empire, LCI's newest club in the heart of London at Leicester Square.

Now if you are not a poker insider, you may not remember that last year the inaugural World Series of Poker Europe was played at three different London casinos to accommodate all the players. The "under one roof" is just one of the improvements we can expect from the WSOPE now in its second year.

The event to be held from September 19 to October 2, 2008, will feature four bracelet events, which is an addition of one event from last year. Cash games, satellites and more non-bracelet tournaments will also be increased over last year's offerings.

September 19th , 2008 - Event #1 - £1,500 – No-Limit Hold'em Day 1A (3-day event/2 opening days)
September 22nd , 2008 - Event #2 - £2,500 – H.O.R.S.E. (3-day event)
September 24th , 2008 - Event #3 - £5,000 – Pot Limit Omaha (3-day event)
September 27th , 2008 - Event #4 - £10,000 – World Championship No-Limit Hold'em (5-day event)

The final table participants from the WSOP Main Event in Las Vegas, the "November Nine" were all invited and incentivized, we are told. Thus far three have indicated they will travel to London to play: Ivan Demidov, Peter Eastgate and David Rheem.

For full details of the tournaments and other events here.

PartyPoker'S Irish Poker Championship

Sun, 03 Aug 2008 20:59:23 +0100

Building on the success of the 2008 PartyPoker.com Irish Poker Championship, preparations for next year’s event in Galway are already underway with the creation of a special land based tour offering a unique chance to qualify for Europe’s first major tournament of 2009. The PartyPoker.com Irish Poker Championship Tour launches this evening at the Eglinton Card Room and Casino in a Galway buzzing with punters attending the showpiece horse racing events.

The PartyPoker.com Irish Poker Championship Tour really cranks into gear with seven more events across the Emerald Isle, finishing in December. On the second leg of the tour in Waterford the top three players in the €2000 added event receive 2009 IPC seats, while in the remaining six stops the top five in the €2000 added event all get seats into the major tournament. The tour features €20,000 in added money and includes €4000 put up for a special league based on performances on the tour as a whole.

Online qualifiers are also available at Party Poker.

The 2008 Irish Poker Championship was a €2,000 buy-in tournament organized by PokerEvents.ie and sponsored by PartyPoker.com. It attracted 298 runners on a day when snow engulfed Ireland and produced a final prize pool of €542,500. Amongst the familiar faces at the tables were ‘Ambassador of Poker’ Mike Sexton, Noel Furlong, ‘Flying Dutchman’ Marcel Luske, Ciaran O’Leary, Michael Keiner, Robert Williamson III, Padraig Parkinson, Jon Kalmar, Scott Gray, Bruno Fitoussi, Jan Sørensen, Roy Brindley , Mad Marty Wilson, Marty Smith, Katharine Hartree, Jeff Duvall, Alan Vinson, Tom Franklin, Steve Wong, Neil Channing, Tony Cascarino and Rory Liffey. The eventual winner was Galway ’s Jude Ainsworth.

PARTYPOKER.COM IRISH POKER CHAMPIONSHIP TOUR - SCHEDULE

Waterford Aug 30th/31st Tower Hotel

Dublin Sep 6th/7th Fitzwilliam Card Club

Cork Oct 17th/18th Macau Casino

Dublin Nov 8th/9th City West

Mayo Nov 14th/15th Park Hotel, Kiltimagh

Athlone Nov 28th/29th Springs Hotel

Letterkenny Dec 12th/13th Gold Club Casino

Spam a Politician for Poker

Thu, 31 Jul 2008 01:10:15 +0100

I hate spam and I would never solicit anyone to send spam but in this is really more like poker activism or perhaps simply Enlightened Governmental Expression.

The Republican Party in the U.S. has had this plank in their presidential platform for the last two elections.

"We support legislation prohibiting gambling over the Internet."

Now I know a lot of poker players who really want the government to get the hell out of our living rooms and our laptops but... they are not single issue voters and cannot bring themselves to vote for a democrat even though the republicans are against online poker. So there is a solution: TELL THEM!

The folks writing the 2008 republican party platform are soliciting input from voters and since email cannot be traced to a city, state or country... Everyone should feel free to let them know what you think on this issue.

It's easy, here's how to let them know you are watching:

* Go to this site to register.(you’ll receive an email with your password for the site).
* Click "Submit Text Entry" (at the top right) to submit a typed message.
* Write a short pro-poker message, choose a category, then click submit. It's that easy!

For any non-poker readers, there are lots of other topics to sound off about. I gave them a piece of my mind on stem cell research while I was there.

A "Too Successful" Poker Room

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:07:34 +0100

With poker rooms opening in some areas and closing in others; with various police agencies raiding home poker games and allowing others; with some governments restricting online poker and others taking down all legal barriers; from all of this conflicting mess comes a strange notice from Nottingham, UK.

The Dusk Till Dawn poker room has made the somewhat surprising decision to cut back upon their scheduled opening hours because they are too successful!

In a statement issued by Managing Director Rob Yong, he pinpoints the fact that Dusk Til Dawn are in danger of becoming victims of their own success, with the level of service being offered to members being highlighted as one of the major reasons behind the decision to reduce the number of hours the club is open per week from 80 down to 40, a full 50% decrease.

“DTD has now been open for nearly 8 months. After the exhausting 2 year fight to legally open the UK’s first poker club, I was finally looking forward to relaxing and enjoying playing a bit of poker with my friends. However, everything has run at a million miles per hour and DTD just feels like “another one of my businesses", rather than the type of escape from the business world that my football club provides me with. However, running another large business is never what I wanted; my goal was to create a unique poker experience based on the personal approach, high quality service and something very different from the casino poker model.”

We have a suggestion Rob . . . Hire some experienced poker room staff to run your business, rather than close it down.

For those who might wish to play at Dusk to Dawn (well actually that would be Near Dusk Til Sometime in the Middle of the Night), the new schedule is below.

Party Poker Celebrates a Birthday

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 20:14:11 +0100

is counting down to celebrating its 7th birthday and is giving players an opportunity to join in the party with a $1,000,000 guaranteed Birthday Party bonanza tournament.

There will be no cake, no disco and definitely no unwanted gifts, just a cool $1,000,000 guaranteed prize fund that will be up for grabs in a special tournament on Sunday 10th August at 1245 ET. Daily qualifiers are now taking place at PartyPoker.

Players can buy-in directly to the championship-style blind structured main event for $640. As always, PartyPoker will provide a diverse qualifying structure allowing ALL players, no matter the size of their bankroll, an opportunity to qualify and participate in the $1 Million Birthday Million. Qualifiers start from as little as $1 with a range running daily. It is possible to get involved in the action by using just 15 PartyPoints. Detailed information on qualification can be found here.

A PartyPoker spokesman said,

“There is no doubt this is a party not to miss. It is not often you go to someone else’s birthday celebrations with the chance of walking away with a share of $1,000,000. It will definitely feel like a birthday and Christmas all rolled into one for our big winners. The birthday celebrations will start on Monday 4th August, with a range of special celebration tournaments.

Backlog from the World Series

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 21:15:33 +0100

Time to sort through all of those non-WSOP notes and see what has been happening outside of Las Vegas for the past two months.

The most recent Ultimate Bet cheating scandal is still apparently not fully investigated and the results are

"expected to take an additional two to three months."

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You can read a semi-complete account of the current state of the affair based on a conversation between Barry Greenstein and Russ Hamilton, former principle in UB.

There is a documentary based on the final table of the 2005 WSOP about to be released. It's called "Pass the Sugar", yes 2005 when Joe Hachem won the Main Event. Not surprisingly this is an Australian production and Tony Hachem, Joe's brother is a co-producer.

The fact that the press noise around this release says that "Pass the Sugar also will feature interviews with Jennifer Tilly, Jose Canseco and other celeb cardplayers", makes me want to repeat that Jose Canseco is not a celebrity but a old baseball player who thinks it's appropriate to play in Ladies Only events and impose his own warped view of the world on others because he once took steroids and could hit a baseball.

Sticking with show business, the Venetian is going to open a show next month based on poker. The Real Deal will apparently be audience interactive and will include in its cast on a rotating basis, many name poker professionals including: Doyle Brunson, Daniel Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth, Jr., Antonio Esfandiari, Gavin Smith, Eli Elezra, Jennifer Harman, Phil Laak, Scotty Nguyen, and Todd Brunson. The pros will participate in shows each month, taking on the Las Vegas audience members in interactive games. More on The Real Deal can be found here.

The Game Show Network, after deciding not to renew the World Poker Tour and subsequently seeing the WPT move to Fox Sport Network, well GSN decided not to remove poker completely from its lineup and has renewed Poker After Dark for another year.

Betting Odds on the November Nine

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 20:29:16 +0100

Chipleader Dennis Phillips (26,295,000) is not the odds on favorite to win the WSOP Main Event, he is listed at 5/1 on PartyBets.

Ivan Demidov (24,400,000) with the second largest chipstack has been installed as the favourite to win the November World Series of Poker main event final table. Ivan currently is listed at 3.68/1.

Scott Montgomery (19,690,000) is offered at 6/1.

Peter Eastgate (13,750,000) is 7/1 to win at PartyBets, while David Rheem (10,230,000) is listed today at 9/1. Ylon Schwartz (15,525,000), Darus Suharto (15,2000,000)and Craig Marquis (10,210,000) are all 11/1.

And finally the chances of short stack Kelly Kim (2,620,000) taking down the $9 million prize are rated at 26/1.

Ivan Demidov 3.68*
Dennis Phillips 5.00*
Scott Montgomery 6.00
Peter Eastgate 7.00
David Rheem 9.00
Ylon Schwartz 11.00
Darus Suharto 11.00
Craig Marquis 11.00
Kelly Kim 26.00

*Demidov and Phillips opened as 4/1 co-favourites, apparently some early money came in on the Russian.

World Series of Poker: Television Schedule

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 18:06:08 +0100

With the actual WSOP events nearly over and on hiatus, ESPN will begin broadcasting the 2008 World Series of Poker this week. Below is the U.S. based television schedule. ESPN affliates around the world will be picking all of part of this schedule, I will post those times and channels when they are released.

July 22 -- 8-10 p.m. $10,000 pot-limit hold 'em
July 29 -- 8-10 p.m. $1,500 no-limit hold 'em
Aug. 5 -- 8-10 p.m. $5,000 mixed hold 'em
Aug. 12 -- 8-10 p.m. $1,000 no-limit hold 'em with rebuys
Aug. 19 -- 8-10 p.m. $50,000 HORSE
Aug. 26 -- 8-10 p.m. $10,000 pot-limit Omaha
Sept. 2 -- 8-10 p.m. $10,000 no-limit hold 'em main event
Sept. 9 to Oct. 28 -- 9-11 p.m. $10,000 no-limit hold 'em main event
Nov. 4 -- 8-10 p.m. WSOP main event final table preview show
Nov. 11 -- 9-11 p.m. WSOP main event final table

World Series of Poker: Tournamentus Interruptus

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 18:22:21 +0100

"And then there were nine."

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The World Series of Poker got down to the nine survivors; the final table; the November Nine. There were a lot of different reactions when that finally happened.

Relief that it was over.

A sense of being cheated because it wasn't really over.

The beginning of a long period of delayed gratification.

A cool celebration at the final table.

An unsatisfactory celebration because we had not a champion.

As you all know, I was for the delayed WSOP final table from the beginning but you also know I was pulling and praying for at least one "name" player to make the final nine; that did not happen. So we begin a long walk and wait until November. How will this all play out? Well at this point everyone has an opinion and no one has an answer.

This is just the first of many "9" posts.

World Series of Poker: Four Letter Word

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 18:08:11 +0100

Whatever your favorite four letter word is, today is the time to mutter it under your breath. No need to shout it out loud, no need to shake your fist and rant to the gods, just mutter it quietly and dream of what might have been. There will be no "big" name at the World Series final table in November. I know the odds were long on someone making it but yesterday they played down to 27 and lost Hellmuth and Matusow. Damn that would have been great. Four months of either of those guys would have been just amazing for poker.

Now the publicity machines will have to focus on the nine who survive today and try to create some interesting characters. Tiffany Michelle is the one player remaining who it might be possible to elevate to some real level of celebrity. Also in the mix are Brandon Cantu and Phi Nguyen both are "know professionals" to the poker world. But it was sad and painful when Matusow left the field in 30th place. The last chance at a truly big show for November was resting on his shoulders and, of course, he got nailed by a 3 outer; but the real bad beat was delivered not to Mike but to the Fall Final.

World Series of Poker: A Penalty Delayed?

Sun, 13 Jul 2008 17:47:44 +0100

I was at the ESPN final table last night when the Day Five play ended and Phil Hellmuth was given a one orbit penalty for player abuse. Details of the incident are everywhere, I will only add that I am not convinced Phil did more than he ever does and, in fact, he pointed out to the floor supervisor at one point that: "You guys don't put me at the television table to be quiet."

However, I have a problem with penalties that are accessed beginning with the next day's play. If a player is going to sit out a round of play based on his or her actions; then shouldn't the players who were at the table when the infraction took place benefit from the penalty? I mean Phil will be giving up 81,000 chips [30K/15K blinds, 4K ante] to eight players who were not at his table when the penalty was given.

Let's not even deal with the increased blinds since the penalty was given or the fact that no penalty was considered until the offended player loudly complained to the floor staff. By the way, the other player, Cristian Dragomir, should have also been warned for his behavior but in the shadow of a full Hellmuth rant, it may have been hard to see his rule bending behavior.

I will suggest to the Tournament Director's Association that if a player is given an "overnight" penalty and if there is also a seat/table redraw for the following day that those penalized blinds and antes be removed from play and the player simply is dealt out of the hands. This causes some issues with the blinds but free chips, as is the current solution, seems a not well considered remedy.

World Series of Poker: The Remaining Schedule

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 17:51:35 +0100

After a somewhat abrupt suspension of play last night at 189 players, the Main Event of the World Series should play out something like this over the next three days:

Thursday Day 3: 1308 played down to 474
Friday Day 4: 474 played down to 189
Saturday Day 5: 189 playing to 81 or 72 (or less)
Sunday Day 6: 81 or 72 playing down to 27
Monday Day 7: 27 playing down to November Nine
November: Final Table

Today is the critical day, with a full five levels scheduled the field will definitely go under 100. Trying to anticipate the pace of play is a skill developed by good tournament directors but about as accurate as predicting the weather (we had lightening last night in Las Vegas; 90 degrees at midnight and lightening). The key to today's decision is a balance between the number of remaining players and the stack sizes. When the field is full of stacks of similar sizes, play takes longer; when there are a good number of short stacks, play is quicker.

Because the staff has the option of stopping play at any time, we know they definitely want to make tomorrow (Day Six) a reasonable length day getting down to 27 but even with this in mind, no one would be surprised if a fast pace lowers todays field to 63 or even 54 and then on Sunday we go for a final two tables at 18.

This is all about managing the pace of an unpredictable game at ten or twenty different tables. What we do know is that Monday evening or early Tuesday morning, we will have nine players left standing.

World Series of Poker: Survivor's Prayer List

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 19:44:53 +0100

Let's be honest, there are WSOP officials on their knees every morning praying that at least one BIG name player makes it to the November final table. Nevermind what they say in public, ESPN programmers are burning incense and killing chickens hoping that someone everyone knows makes it to the final nine.

I heard a veteran poker writer say the other day that if a big name pro gets as close as Scotty Nguyen did last year, they would drag him away from the table so he can't donk off his chips and miss the monster TV event.

So who is still around to fulfill this fantasy?

Dag Martin Mikkelsen 931000
Alexander Kostritsyn 887000
Matt Matros 822500
Jon Turner 726500
Shawn Sheikhan 724000
Brandon Cantu 710000
Jeff Kimber 632500
Phil Hellmuth 475000
Victor Ramdin 471000
Mark Vos 468000
Hoyt Corkins 439500
Mike Matusow 438500

World Series of Poker: Top Ten on Day 3

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 01:10:18 +0100

Some of the early conversations today were about how one player had a 2-to-1 chiplead on the entire field. Brian Schaedlich begins play with 801,000, which is not a 2-1 lead since the counts are all in from yesterday, he did hold a 2-to-1 lead on the Day 2A field. I thought it might be interesting to track our top ten for the entire day. I will try to catch them three times during the day to see just how much a chip lead means on Day Three of the WSOP Main Event.

Here are the top ten starting stacks at noon with 1,307 players remaining:

Brian Schaedlich 801,000
Peter Biebel 531,000
Alex Outhred 486,800
Raja Kattamuri 411,100
Hunter Frey 397,000
Jeremiah Smith 386,000
Steven Goosen 362,100
Patrick Fortin 355,900
Reagan Silber 355,500
Kellen Hunter 354,100

At 5 PM, two levels in, the original top ten now with 852 players still in the field:

World Series of Poker: Playing Down to Nine 2008 vs. 2007

Thu, 10 Jul 2008 19:08:24 +0100

When the Main Event resumes today for Day 3, there will be 1308 players left standing. Lots of reports expressed surprise at the pace of both Day 2's. But compared to 2007, we still have a long way to go.

Here is how '07 played down:

Day 3: 797 played down to 337
Day 4: 337 played down to 112
Day 5: 112 played to 36
Day 6: 36 played down to 9
Day 0: Day Off
Day 7: Final Table

Those who were here last July remember some very late nights on Days 4, 5 & 6. But the schedulers have noted that problem and added one full day to the 2008 Final (Summer) Week.

Thursday Day 3: 1308 playing down to xxx
Friday Day 4: xxx playing down to yyy
Saturday Day 5: yyy playing to zz or zzz
Sunday Day 6: zz or zzz playing down to 36
Monday Day 7: 36 playing down to November Nine
November: Final Table

The Plan remains in place to play five 2 hour levels each day or less as needed to reach the final table. As of now only Day Six or Seven seem in any jeopardy of needing extended time, which is normal for any large field tournament.