 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.
 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
 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.
By: Lenny – July 29, 2008
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.
 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.
 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.
By: Lenny – July 18, 2008
 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.
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
"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.
By: Lenny – July 14, 2008
 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.
 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.
 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
 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:
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.
 Here are some of the words of wisdom I have overheard at the tables during the '08 World Series of Poker.
"Man I took those after my back surgery, how do you stay awake at the table?" "Who said I stay awake, this is only poker."
You get to meet so many different people at the Series:
"They have broken my table four times today; its not that I mind moving but you guys are nowhere near as cute as my last table."
In the different strokes for different folks category:
"I don't want to win the free massage, my wife would never understand."
"What does your wife do?"
"She dances in the Folies at the Tropicana."
The next four were all sung badly by two players at a 7 Stud table:
"Momma don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys."
"Momma don't let your babies grow up to be poker players."
"Momma don't let your babies grow up to be dealers."
"Momma don't let your babies grow up to be President."
Player busting out late on Day 2B:
"I woulda made money in any other event."
In fact he outlasted 4500+ players, which would have easily won every WSOP tournament, except of course, the Main Event.
At the World Series of Poker, you get to play against all those great professionals you see on television:
"I like Annie Duke on those days when she is Howard Lederer's sister but sometimes she acts like Phil Hellmuth is her brother."
This is my favorite, a guy with a good read but no follow thru.
"I hate it when I'm drawing dead . . . . how much did you bet?"
And finally, what we have all come to know as The Moneymaker Dream:
"If Jerry Yang can win this thing then so can I!"
 I had several interesting conversations in the last 24 hours about the math involving entrants on the Day 2's of the Series. Surprisingly there is a wide range of opinions about these numbers.
The basic formula we are talking about is this:
Day 1A survivors + Day 1B survivors = Day 2A combined field
Day 1C survivors + Day 1D survivors = Day 2B combined field
Which works out in actual numbers to this:
636 + 615 = 1,251
1026 + 1352 = 2,378
This all comes about because the starting fields for Days 1A & 1B were much smaller than for Days 1C & 1D.
The question is: Are players at any disadvantage starting their Day 2 with a field of 1,250 or 2,378 and if so, why?
What surprised me is that some of the same "mathematical" reasoning goes into arguments that either of the two fields gives some hidden and unfair advantage to the players in that flight. Here are a few of the "facts" I have heard:
 As I mentioned yesterday, this is the official Day Off for the 2008 Main Event. There is a $500 Casino Employees event and a Charity Media Tournament but the only real high or low-lite will be the WSOP News Conference, if anything comes out of that lovefest, we will report details later; otherwise--see you tomorrow for Day 2A of The Greatest Tournament in the World brought to you by Milwaukee's Best Lite.
Day 1D has turned out to be the largest single day field for a World Series Main event. Lindy will get you the final numbers later but it looks like the field is in the neighborhood of 2200, which will surpass the old record from Day 1D of 2006. This means that the '08 Main Event will be larger than '07 and second only to '06.
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With every table in all five locations around the Rio in play today, some of the tables were playing ten-seated. As registration closed after the first two levels the first order of floor business was to break those tables down to nine players before any other tables were broken and players were moved. All-in-all the process went smoothly.
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Today was clearly the Day One of Choice for the professionals, even with the huge number of tables in play, it was easy to stroll through any of the venue sites and spot big names among the online wannabes and the next Jerry Raymer, Chris Yang or Greg Moneymaker.
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Not quite sure why there is an off day tomorrow. Last year the Day 1A & 1B players were back to play Day 2A and then the Day 1C & 1D players were on for Day 2B. Then we had the day off on the 7th day. This year with tomorrow off, it will be Day 2A on Tuesday and Day 2B on Wednesday and Day 3 on Thursday. This means the Day 2B players will have to go back-to-back, while the Day 2A players get another day off. Wonder why?
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Until today I have been impressed by the stamina of the media corps this year. While this has been WSOP-lite for me in 2008, many others were in the trenches every day and the survival rate has been high. Today, I noticed the tell tale signs that a few of my colleagues have been in one place far too long. It's not Vegas, it's one big poker room with the same story over and over. Hard to find the "story of the day" for six straight weeks.
 As expected Day 1C was a much bigger field than either 1A or 1B. Estimates for tomorrow's Day 1D are all over the board with many predictions of over 2,000*. To match last year's Main Event total the magic number is 1,985*.
Lots of name professionals are playing tomorrow and plenty of other players are coming in after spending the Fourth of July with family and friends. So, "close" will be the operational word tomorrow for all of those over/under wagers* on the total runners in the 2008 World Series of Poker Main Event.
TODAY: 2008 Main Event Day 1C: 1928 entrants [4,373 three day total]
2007 Main Event Day 1C: 1743 entrants [4,575]
2008 Main Event Day 1B: 1158 entrants [2455 two day total]
2007 Main Event Day 1B: 1545 entrants [2832]
2008 Main Event Day 1A: 1297 entrants
2007 Main Event Day 1A: 1287 entrants
2008 Day 1D: Sunday?*
2007 Day 1D: 1783 entrants
*Late/Early reports or Early/Late reports are that the field for Sunday is over 2200 and counting.
As expected a much bigger field showed up for this Day 1C on a Saturday. Both the Amazon and the Brazilia rooms at the Rio were near full. Rumors were that Day 1D tomorrow was sold out but we can confirm this is only a rumor and seats remain available for Sunday. Lindy will provide accurate numbers when they become available.
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The Mega Satellites were smaller yesterday but those fields have come back big today too. The 1 PM Mega Satellite was sold out and seats for the 4 PM,6 PM, and 9 PM were going fast.
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Another "two of my favorite players" sighting today. Mike Matusow was playing at the ESPN feature table and doing well. Liz Lieu was also in the field and after a Diva-like tardy arrival, she also was on the upside of the chip race.
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Interesting that some of the media, who came in only for the main event, are now complaining about the long hours. My fellow full-time, full-tournament media friends can only laugh at those who find covering one tournament a day for only five rounds to be a tough assignment.
This year Day 1B was smaller than Day 1A, unlike 2007 when the field grew each successive day. But we still have two big fields to count on Days 1C & 1D.
In 2007 the final two days had much bigger fields and that is anticipated again this year; some early registration numbers indicate Saturday and Sunday will be much larger.
2008 Main Event Day 1B: 1158 entrants [2455]
2007 Main Event Day 1B: 1545 entrants [2832 two day total]
2008 Main Event Day 1A: 1297 entrants
2007 Main Event Day 1A: 1287 entrants
2008 Day 1C: Saturday?
2007 Day 1C: 1743 entrants
2008 Day 1D: Sunday?
2007 Day 1D: 1783 entrants
A lot of people seemed surprised that today (Day 1A) "only" had as many entrants as last year. Seems like a pretty good number for a Thursday and one full table ahead of last year.
2008 Main Event Day 1A: 1297 entrants
2007 Main Event Day 1A: 1287 entrants
A tantalizing comparative field (1297) turned out for the first of four Day One flights. Speculation on just what that means for the total 2008 Main Event can wait a couple of days; I would point out this is Thursday with a big weekend in front of us and tomorrow is the Fourth of July here in the States. But just a couple of days will tell all we need to know.
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There is a 25 table Mega Satellite ($1060) going on across the hall which will produce another two dozen players for the Main Event. I spotted Kenna James and Steve Dannenmann playing for a cheap seat. Another five Megas go off each of the next three days.
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Michael Craig and Dave "Devilfish" Ulliott were involved in four hands heads up in just the first hour of play. Michael dragged all four of those pots. Methinks the Devilfish will be after Michael the rest of the day. Maureen Feduniak is also at this table and I expect her to stay away from the boyz squabble, unless she can stack one of them. [Update: Suhail Falchouri ended the Devilfish vs. Craig confrontations by taking QQ against Ulliott's 99 and he Devilfish is gone]
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I spotted one of my personal favorite players today, Dale Pinchot, he has been active though, we just have missed each other. Dale has two cashes in the Series this summer to go along with his two from last year.
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I have been catching up with many of the dealers I know from past WSOP summers and have heard some interesting stories about this WSOP and the overall dealer climate in Las Vegas. I will save those for a "dealers only" article later on in the Main Event.
 The beginning of the beginning of the end....
Fifty-One bracelets have been handed out; two more are ready to be presented today; the Player of the Year has been determined, congratulations to Erick Lindgren; the Ante Up for Africa event goes off today. Then, finally, we get to the Main Event and we answer most of the questions everyone has waited for.
Will we have more entries than last year?
Will the professionals somehow continue their dominance they have shown thru 53 preliminary events?
Will it all run as smooth as the tournaments have run so far? By the way, nice job to the WSOP staff this was truly a nicely run Series so far. Minor mistakes, quick fixes and overall solid and uniform floor decisions. Kudos to Tournament Director Jack Effel and his WSOP floor staff.
Another great move comes later this week, when the WSOP Media event is brought back with substantial prizes given to the favorite charities of the final table participants. A great solution to that on again off again event.
Then tomorrow we reach the 2008 World Series of Poker $10,000 No Limit Hold'em Main Event. Four Day One flights, two Day Two flights and five more days to play down to the "November Nine" or the "Fall Final". Then all the WSOP eggs go into that ESPN/November basket and we all wait, watch, hope and pray. No matter who you favor in that mass of poker humanity, say a little prayer that at least one or two "names" make it to the final nine. Nothing could be better for poker than to see Scotty, Mike, Phil, Phil, Erick, Jennifer, Antonio, Gus, Daniel, Joe, Johnny** or heaven help us Doyle! make the final table.
It all starts tomorrow.
**Dewey, Cyndy, Bill, Gavin, Carlos, Chris, Doug, Liz, David, Tony, Lyle, Barry, Berry, Huck, Patrik, David, the other Phil and the other Phil, Greg, Layne, Chad, Isabelle, Todd, Freddy, T.J., Michael, Mike again, Ted, Gabe, Andy, Howard, John, John, John or John, Lee, Annie, Eli, Hoyt, Andy or even Jerry.
 A short week five to compare as we are now on the threshold of the Main Event. Fifty-three events are in the books or about to be and here are the numbers:
53 Preliminary Events:
25 events had increased entries
15 events had decreased entries
12 events were new tournaments or increased buy-ins
1 tie
Here are the week four comparisons:
2008 Event #48
$2,000 No Limit Hold'em
Number of Entrants: 2,319
2007 Entries: 2,038
(Big increase)
2008 Event #49
$1,500 No Limit Hold'em
Number of Entrants: 2,718
2007 Entries: 3,151
(down over 400 from the old record, but the event was capped so it had no chance of hitting 3,000)
2008 Event #50
$10,000 Pot Limit Omaha
Number of Entrants: 381
2007 Entries: 314
(a strong increase for a $10K event)
2008 Event #51
$1,500 H.O.R.S.E.
Number of Entrants: 803
2007 Entries: 730
(this was a $1,000 S.H.O.E. event last summer)
2008 Event #52
$1,500 No Limit Hold'em
Number of Entrants: 2,693
2007 Entries: new event
(an added 7th $1,500 NLHE event)
2008 Event #53
$1,500 Limit Hold'em Shootout
Number of Entrants: 823
2007 Entries: capped at 720
(the cap was raised this year, so we’ll call this an “other”)
Next, I will be watching the four Day Ones of the Main Event to see where those numbers go.
Week Four Comparison
Week Three Comparison
Week Two Comparison
Week One Comparison
 First and foremost, congratulations to Scotty Nguyen for taking down the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. and being the first player to hold the Chip Reese trophy. Scotty has an amazing track record over nearly 20 years of playing poker. His record, of course, includes the 1998 World Series of Poker main event championship and tournament earnings approaching Ten Million Dollars. Now Scotty adds to his legend, taking down the most prestigious tournament in professional poker.
But like so many great careers there is a dark side to Scotty's, one episode of which took place last summer at the 2007 WSOP main event. With twelve players remaining in the hunt for the final table nine, Scotty Nguyen was the chipleader and, as we all know, he did not make the final table. That crash and burn troubled Scotty for many months and will probably never be forgotten in poker lore.
Fast forward to this summer, the very next World Series of Poker main event and add to the mixture: the delayed final table. Combine these two events and I offered to you the "Scotty Nguyen Syndrome".
Syndrome: a predictable, characteristic pattern of behavior, action, etc., that tends to occur under certain circumstances
I don't know when it will hit and it will not affect all players at the same moment but somewhere around 18 players or 27 players; maybe even as high as 36 or even 45 players for some, it will appear. This is not just the World Series of Poker Final Table, no this is the "November Nine", the "Fall Final".
And as sure as it will be 108 degrees in Las Vegas, each an every player who survives to Day Six on July 13th and certainly to Day Seven on July 14th, each of those players will experience the "Scotty Nguyen Syndrome".
To get that close to four months of publicity and interviews and endorsements and fame and potential fortune and who knows what else... The "SNS" is going to massively effect play whenever it sets in. Players will get tight, really tight; decisions will take longer, a lot longer; tempers will shorten, in some cases really, really shorten; table talk, hand winning celebrations and anything resembling angle shooting will be scrutinized, analyzed and penalized? Floor decisions will be magnified out of all proportion, imagine giving a player a two round penalty on the bubble!
The final table bubble itself will be much bigger, extending out to at least 27 players. The media coverage will be more intense and more critical than ever before. And the players...? Well the players will not be themselves because they will be playing under the influence of the "Scotty Nguyen Syndrome".
Rumor has it that Corona will lessen but not alleviate the symptoms of the syndrome but there is a rebound effect if you excede a twelve pak in less than two full tournament levels. Perhaps Harrah's should supply extra massage staff for the final four tables or just rig cold showers above the tables like they do in hazardous material labs. And people say poker is not a sport.....
 Through 47 events here is how the '08 Series is standing up to the '07 Series:
47 Events to Date:
23 events have increased entries
15 events have decreased
8 events were new tournaments or increased buy-ins
1 tie
Here are the week four comparisons:
2008 Event #38
$2,000 Pot Limit Hold'em
Number of Entrants: 605
2007 Entries: 599
(up a few still counts as UP!)
2008 Event #39
$1,500 No Limit Hold'em
Number of Entrants: 2,720
2007 Entries: 2,778
(down a few still counts as DOWN!)
 Day One of the $50,000 Hold'em, Omaha 8, Razz, Stud, Stud Eight or better tournament is in the books. Event #45 of the 2008 World Series of Poker is the fifty thousand dollar World Championship H.O.R.S.E. tournament, which is perhaps even more anticipated than the main event starting next week. The 50K HORSE is a very unique event at the World Series of Poker, here are some random observations from Day One of this truly unusual tournament.
Exactly 148 players started last year's $50K H.O.R.S.E. and the same number of runners turned out this year. The over/unders bets year-to-year were a push. Although the betting lines this year were for many more players, I pushed my year over year bet but cleaned up on the pros who were so sure the numbers would reach 175 or even 200, silly rabbits.
Only eight players busted on Day One and I would venture to wager all of these eight got bad beat more than once. The event is simply too deep stacked with 100,000 starting chips for any professional to play loose. Phil Hellmuth is out, so are David Williams and Amnon Filippi. Three players managed to double their stacks to over 200,000 but remember this is a five day event for a reason.
One entire quarter of the main tournament room is being used for the eighteen tables of the H.O.R.S.E. event. There is a lot of rail space for spectators and at least three meters between each table. Lots of room for players to wander about and chat; plenty of room for media. The accommodations for this event are superior to any tournament I have ever covered.
 For poker fans on site and the media, today is the best day of the World Series of Poker. I wonder about the thoughts behind today's schedule as far as player comfort but the who cares today will be fun.
At noon there is the second of the $1,000 No Limit Hold'em w/ rebuys event. As you probably know the professionals play these rebuy events very differently than the amateurs. The pros will show up with the cash for 20 or more rebuys and they play the early rounds to get money out on the table. Building a big stack can only be accomplished at an "action table", so the pros create action. In the early rebuy rounds you will see two things over and over: first, there will be lots of all-ins pre-flop and even more players pushing on the flop; second, you will see a lot of shell-shocked amateurs with one or two rebuys in their pocket being run down by the pros ready to indiscriminately gamble it up.
This is a fun two hours of rebuy poker madness, well maybe not so much fun for those spendthrift rookies with only a single rebuy. And today's event will be even more wild since about 150 or so of the top players will be throwing even more chips around because if they can't build a monster stack than they would rather bust out early because they have another appointment later this afternoon.
 The size of the World Series of Poker has grown dramatically over the past decade. In 1999, the entire Series was 16 events. In 2002, for the first time, there were more than thirty separate tournaments. In both 2007 and 2008 the WSOP has offered 55 bracelet events. With the "poker boom" has come some conflicts between the desires of the professional players for a more diverse (non-Hold'em) schedule with higher buy-ins and the attempt to make the World Series truly open to all players. The focus of this "low end" diversity has become the $1500 No Limit Hold'em tournaments.
In 2007, there were six $1,500 No Limit Hold'em tournaments, which amounted to about one every Saturday. In 2008, there are seven of these events. But has the increase in "small buy-in" events worked for the WSOP. And, yes we notice, that $1,500 is not what most poker players on the planet consider "small", but that is fodder for another post.
Five of the seven $1,500 NLHE events have been played this year and to date the numbers compared to last year are up about 700 players in total. Perhaps more significantly, we are talking about events that have drawn in excess of 2300 players for each start. The only other WSOP events over 1,000 players this year have been the two $2,000 NLHE tournaments and the $1,000 Seniors event.
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