Still liking our 3,000-12,000 number.

Until I can get back to the Rio (tomorrow hopefully) — and since honestly, I hardly care about Day 1 chip counts ever — I’m following the action of course here, and mostly here, and then a little bit here. Not saying you shouldn’t also be looking elsewhere, but at the moment I have to really limit my computer screen time, so before I can catch up with everything more in depth online and in real life, I’m sticking with the clicks that I know will give me the most in a few seconds of skim. I’d include Wicked Chops, but I get their goods daily via email … and you know, trying to cut back on the screen-stare for a blip.

The Main Event got underway today with Jack Link’s mascot Sasquatch grunting his way through the “Shuffle Up and Deal” with a field of 1,116 (down from last year’s 1,297) starting day 1a. Jeffrey Pollack’s vlog with Wicked Chops Poker, shown below, hopes to get 5,000 entrants, which would be about 25 precent below last year’s 6,844. The lower than expected numbers could also explain the decision to play only 4 two-hour levels on days 1 and 2.

At the moment, there’s about 4,000 registrants already signed up, most of which are on days 1c and 1d, so don’t be surprised if you hear rumors about Monday’s day 1d being “closed” for registrations to add some entrants to days 1b and 1c. Notables who have already been eliminated today include: Jerry Yang, Freddy Deeb, Orel Hershiser, John Phan, Gabe Kaplan, Davidi Kitai and 2009 EPT Grand Final winner Pieter de Korver. The unofficial chip leader is Dragan Galac at 110,000 in chips, followed by by 2006 EPT Grand Final winner Jeff Williams at 106,000.

Other notables with chips: Jason Alexander (84,500), Eli Elezra (84,300), Tom Schneider (57,000), Phil Laak (46,000) and Jimmy Fricke (45,000). Follow the last level of play at the WSOP site here. Chip counts should be available in the early morning hours, but if you want to see who decided to pay their $10,000 today, a list of Day 1a entrants can be found here. More stuff this weekend, so come back to Pokerati often.

Watch Jeffrey Pollack Vlog on Day 1A of the 2009 WSOP Main Event on RawVegas.tv

Internet filtering software specifically targeting online gambling sites is here! Plus, why is the Barney Frank Bill about to be delayed up to two months?

It’s the first episode without the Wolfman, but you should still listen as the WSOP media-osos gather outside the Amazon room to discuss $50k HORSE, late registration policies, WSOP parties, PokerPalooza, the big question of whether or not the WSOP is polarizing into varsity and JV divisions, and … the best and worst ideas in play at the 2009 World Series of Poker.

Special pass-bys by Charles Barkley, Mike Tyson, and Oliver Tse … plus the Insider and the Tight Laydown. Dr. Pauly sits in with the crew … and gotta say, as the first episode I’ve ever heard just as a listener, this Poker Beat thing is a pretty good show!

on PokerRoad

The Poker Beat
Caldwell, McGwire, Wise, Nemeth, Stapleton
7/2/09

In case you missed it (I did) here is some Pokernews video from the first of about a dozen big WSOP main event run-up parties, this one hosted by Ultimate Bet at Studio 54 in the MGM.

So much sayable about this, lol … and we can use the phrase “lol” because twitter comes into play. More Phil Hellmuth making a mockery of a few orbits before being pulled from the 2-7 Triple Draw … Tiffany Michelle talking about experimenting with UB and her breasts … Layne Flack being Layne Flack … Shawn Rice and Debo sitting … and just about everything else you might expect from a celebration of, by, and for “anyone who is anyone” in the UB poker world:

Today is the first day of the 2009 main event. I’m sticking to my guns and saying the field size will be anywhere from 3,000-12,000 and offering 10:1 odds on anything outside of that. Just made a wager on the over for 5,000 … easy. Anyone else wanna offer that line? Seriously, it’s such a wild guessing game, and yet in the end, why do I think it’s gonna be just a few hundred less or just a few hundred more than last year’s main event field of 6,844? People can get their money off of PokerStars, right?

Meanwhile, Team Pokerati final tableist Gregg Merkow won his main event seat last night … and now is trying to figure out the differences between Day 1A-1D:
via Facebook

Winner winner chicken dinner won my seat to the main event in mega sat. today but can’t decide what day to play fri,sat,sun or mon.

Good question. Though as Kevin points out the numbers will likely differ noticeably as the 96 hours that constitute Day 1 progress, is there really a difference in the types of fields you can expect on each day? One more donkey-filled than another, for example (and is that a good or bad thing, lol).

Choosing when to play, of course, is the first of many decisions that will be part of someone’s journey toward becoming the winner. But it may also be the least relevant and simply depend on the player and his or her life schedule.

Click below for Nolan’s official report — all the data you could want, complete with quotes from celebrity players, information on who exactly played (and won), and info about the fundraising component. A few things that stand out to me:

• 138 entries. Up from 88 last year, which was way down from 167 in 2007. Wonder what’s up with that — The economy? Celebrity Apprentice?
• The Scheinbergs played? I was under the impression that the family atop the PokerStars pyramid was taking a long vacation from the United States, particularly in light of the payment processor crackdown … but maybe not? Different Scheinberg family from New York?
• Philip Tom, dad of accused online-poker bad guy, cashed, finishing in 10th place. Charity makes everything good.
• Belorussian wins. (Should this event be included in the Pokerati World Standings?)
• Who was the one player who didn’t play ball with the donation process?

More…

Congrats to Matt Hawrilenko, winner of just over $1,000,000 in the $5,000 NL Holdem 6-max earlier this morning.

The big day has finally arrived, the final bracelet event of this year’s World Series of Poker, the $10,000 NL Holdem World Championship starts shortly after 12pm today, after the various festivities that kick off the event conclude (marching bands, Wayne Newton, or whatever they decide to do this year).

Each Day 1 will play 5 two-hour levels of poker, with a 20-minute break after each level and a two-hour dinner break. Thousands will swarm the various tournament rooms of the Rio to either play or spectate, some hopefully catching the eye of the ESPN cameras that will be around to film all the action. Expect a return of the mysterious Post-It note covering the total number of registrants on the tournament clock, which eventually revealed 6844 entrants. This year’s WSOP Staff Guide projects a field of 7323, and if last year is an indicator, Days 1a and 1b (being the 4th of July) will have the smaller fields, while Sunday and Monday’s days 1c and 1d will be much larger as people decide to enjoy their weekend before plunking $10,000.

As always, plenty of updates will be available at www.wsop.com and Dan, Jen and the rest of Team Pokerati will do their part to describe the action over the next two weeks.

One of the great WSOP traditions is fast becoming the Bluff/Sapphire party (3rd year?) … where hundreds of Amazon-entrenched pokerers — from pros to media to dealers — who have lived for more than a month in a pen mostly void of conjugal relief gather to collectively release steam before hunkering down for the main event … and what a perfect night when the other big party is the “elitist” Ante-Up for Africa afterparty. There’s something delightfully egalitarian about being entertained by 98-percent naked aspiring starlets making money while having a grand-ole beglittered time … personal degeneracies be damned.

AlCantHang fills in for yours truly to record the first ever Tao of Pokerati episode mid-lapdance — an “event” joined by DrizzTDJ and (briefly) Calfornia Jen. Change100 gives the (awesome) play-by-play. Plus Kathy Liebert … and is that Tom McEvoy?

Tao of Pokerati at the 40th WSOP
Las Vegas, NV

Episode 11.27: The Best Party of the Year (feat. AlCantHang)
1:27

Episode 11.28: Grindcore Poker (feat. Change100)
2:51

(Interlude …)
0:05

Richardson, accused of taking a less-than-charitable payout option.

Kinda bummed I missed Ante-Up for Africa yesterday … Hollywood A-list celebrity-related traffic aside (and pictures of Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Charles Barkley, Don Cheadle, Jason Alexander, Dean Cain, Brad Garret, Herschel Walker, and Sarah Silverman playing poker) … this is arguably the biggest charity poker tournament of the year (in the world) … and I was curious how the money worked. It was my understanding that originally, 50 percent of the prize pool went to Refugees International a charity* … and the big winners, being already-rich folks moved by the excitement of no-limit hold’em and thoughts of a tax-deductible feel-good gesture, often chose to give their cash prize over to the honorary good cause as well.

But this year people were telling me it was a mere request for generosity — that winners give at least 50 percent of their prize payout to AUFA, which would be shipping the money to the Sudanese cause via the Enough Project (and the IRC?). That seemed a little odd to me, because hey, if the wrong person wins, there could be a problem. Sure enough, an email just came in over the transom — skewering a player named Adam Richardson, who most recently finished in 143rd place in a $1,500 NLH at this year’s WSOP, and 624th in last year’s main event — with the subject line, “What a Prick!”:

Not sure if you got this news. But the prick who won second place in the World Series of Poker charity event which is Ante Up For Africa, completely stiffed the charity.

Players do not have to give any money, according to the rules. But all the players know this is an important event set up to help a very good cause.

Many witnesses said the player was approached afterward by some of the organizers. He was asked politely if he cared to leave a donation, and replied that no one could do anything to stop him and that he was leaving with all the prize money. He walked out the door with like over $100,000.

The player was rude during the tournament and obviously had his own agenda, which was not in the spirit of helping the Ante Up for Africa cause. He likely saw a softer than usual field and took advantage. He had every intention of enriching himself at the expense of the charity.

The player’s name is Adam Richardson, from Poway, California.

He is bad for poker and needs to be called out for taking an angle shot in this event. I hope you will agree this is despicable behavior. The guy is a total prick. Roast his fucking ass.

Hunter

Hmm, if this is true, indeed, arguably poor form. We have not confirmed any of this (and I wasn’t there for the actual event), but the above is the email that’s circulating, and it at least raises the question why a certain chunk of the prize pool isn’t automatically taken out for the charity itself (as it is with most charity poker events).

* Ante Up for Africa “designated charities” have included the Enough Project, Not on Our Watch, and the International Rescue Committee. Refugees International was the recipient of Annie Duke’s Celebrity Apprentice fundraisers.

NOTE: Adam Richardson (unconfirmed) responds to “Hunter’s” accusations in the comments below.

The final update before the Main Event for me, as it’s final table time in the $5,000 NL Holdem 6-max event. The final table is now four-handed consisting of Josh Brikis, Sean Keeton, Matt Hawrilenko, and Faraz Jaka. Jonas Wexler and Matthew Waxman finished 5th and 6th respectively. Live updates are available at www.wsop.com

Ante Up for Africa is being filmed now for ESPN, and it has plenty of Full Tilt Poker pros with Rafe Furst, Chris “Jesus” Ferguson, Phil Gordon, Erik Seidel, Jennifer Harman and John Hennigan appearing at the final table. Hopefully Dan and/or Jen will have more updates when there’s a result.

Friday afternoon starts the Main Event, and all the fun and chaos that brings to the Rio. Pokerati will be there to catch the action, so come back, please.

Starting with today’s lone tournament starting, one with a very worthy cause:

Ante Up for Africa

The big charity event of the WSOP is this afternoon’s Ante Up for Africa, a star-studded affair with a $5,000 buy-in, with a request that those who make the money donate 50% of their proceeds to Refugees International and The Enough Project to attempt to end the crisis in Darfur. It’s also the shortest tournament of the WSOP, with it’s 20-minute blind levels in the first hour followed by increases every 15 minutes, the tournament is projected to finish in just five hours. ESPN’s cameras will be following the action as it’s scheduled to dedicate two hours of their WSOP coverage to this event.

Finishing up the Wednesday night tournaments:

Veckey Victorius in $1,500 NL

Tony Veckey makes his first career cash a WSOP bracelet in the $1,500 NL Holdem, good for $673,276 defeating Jason Wheeler heads-up. Nolan Dalla’s tournament report notes that Veckey is a software engineer with Motorola and a graduate of the DeVry Institute. He was hoping to play in Saturday’s $1,500 NL Holdem event, but it was sold out, leaving him to make this his first WSOP tournament. He’s returning back to work and has decided not to parlay this success into this year’s Main Event, choosing to wait until 2010’s Main Event.

Abe’s Awesome in Triple Draw

As noted in the post below, Julie Schneider finished 3rd in the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball with high stakes veteran Abe Mosseri picking up his first career WSOP bracelet, along with $165,513. Masayoshi Tanaka finished in second, denied Japan’s first WSOP bracelet, picking up $102,313.

Sweet Sixteen Survive in Six-Max

Sixteen players remain in the final preliminary event of the WSOP $5,000 NL Holdem 6-Handed . They resume this afternoon at 1pm to play down to a winner and this is how they will be seated when play resumes:

(Table 58)
Seat 1: Peter Feldman - 1328000
Seat 2: Aurelien Guiglini - 549000
Seat 3: Josh Brikis - 294000
Seat 4: Thorsten Schaefer - 1094000
Seat 5: Matthew Waxman - 1132000
Seat 6: Alex Venovski - 684000

(Table 59)
Seat 1: James St Hilaire - 876000
Seat 2: John Conkright - 749000
Seat 4: Rory Mathews - 1358000
Seat 5: Jonas Wexler - 848000
Seat 6: Eugene Katchalov - 356000

(Table 60)
Seat 1: Robert Kay - 1213000
Seat 3: Frank Calo - 569000
Seat 4: Sean Keeton - 641000
Seat 5: Matt Hawrilenko - 1327000
Seat 6: Faraz Jaka - 778000

Phil Hellmuth finished in 24th place, if he remained it probably would have given ESPN’s production team quite the difficulty in covering his run for bracelet number twelve and the Ante Up for Africa event.

Follow the updates of today’s activity at www.wsop.com and Pokerati will surely be there covering all the high-profile celebrities in action.

Big congrats for the deepest run of any Team Pokerati player in 2009, who just finished 3rd in the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw. From WSOP.com:

Julie Schneider played a remarkably clean tournament right from the start of play on Day 1. She quickly proved to her male competitors that she was more than just a pretty face at the table, picking off one opponent after another with her well-timed bets (and a few favorable draws). Her deep run comes to an end in third place, good for $66,285 and a big hug from husband Tom

Though we still need to run the calculations and wait for the main event to finalize, as of now, it looks like Mrs. @DonkeyBomber will win the Team Pokerati Net Results Challenge — and though not quite enough for Tom to quit his job and become a stay-at-home dad, it should be enough to keep the Schneiders out of indentured servitude. (Phew!)

What? You didn’t know the Team Pokerati Net Results Challenge existed? Either did we, but hey we swear it might be disastrous cool … tallying up not just winnings, but winnings-minus-buy-ins to see who’s really tearing it up at the WSOP.

Unofficial standings in that department:

1. Julie Schneider
2. Pat Poels
3. Gregg Merkow
4. Cliff Fisher
5. John Harris
6. Robert Goldfarb
7. Shoegal
8. Karridy Askenasy
9. Whit Blanton
10. Tom Schneider

Recapping the other Wednesday night action:

Rui Ruling 5k NL Day Two

Rui Cao leads with ~60 players remaining in the $5,000 NL Holdem 6-max, as they play down to 6 players or 3am, whichever comes first. Others in contention include Shaun Deeb, Phil Hellmuth, Blair Hinkle, Darrell Dicken, Faraz Jaka, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Bill Edler, Raymond Davis and Shannon Shorr.

$1,500 NL Final Table

Nine players remain in the $1,500 NL Holdem event, Jason Wheeler is the chip leader, followed by Christopher Bonita, Christopher De Maci, Joseph Chaplin, Tony Veckey, Andrew Malott, David Jaoui, Miha Remic and Sergey Konkin.

Short update tonight, check out www.wsop.com for updates, and good luck to Julie Schneider, who just won a key double up in the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball.

Karridy had to leave the Julie final table to go play in his own tourney … just getting underway at Caesar’s is the WSOP Academy’s Tournament of Champions, where K-man is competing for a main event seat.

Follow his self-twittering action here.

UPDATE: Never mind.

As you probably know by now, Team Pokerati-er “Angry Julie” Schneider is making a real stab at bringing home a bracelet in the $2,500 2-7 Triple-Draw.

A lot’s on the line with this, of course … not only is this the second-to-last non-main-event chance for a woman to win, but also it may make the difference on whether or not the Schneiders can save the family farm.

They’re on dinner break now … and she’s got some work to do.

Abe Mosseri - 1,012,000
Masayoshi Tanaka - 399,000
John Juanda - 366,000
Julie Schneider - 163,000

You can follow the event here, and Julie-centric coverage via @DonkeyBomber.

That’s what’s happening here … new faces showing up, old faces showing up, events coming to a close, PokerPalooza getting set up, parties every night … all in preparation for what the rest of the world calls “the World Series” … and what we call “the main event”.

Oh, my, and I almost forgot about Ante Up for Africa … plausibly the biggest charity event in all of poker for the entire year — with tons of Hollywood celebs and presumably real bona-fide non-poker paparazzi and an after-party that lots of people want to get into.

We’ll be sure to bring you coverage of something, in some way … but what, I’m not so sure. As you may or may not have heard, I’ve suffered an injury, which you can see below (watch the guy on the right):

Julie Schneider just made the final table of six in the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball.

Brad Libson - 432,000 6th place
Blair Rodman - 418,000 5th place
Abe Mosseri - 342,000
Masayoshi Tanaka - 325,000
John Juanda - 220,000
Julie Schneider - 207,000

Follow the updates at www.wsop.com here.

The final table of the $50,000 HORSE finally concluded at 10am PT with David Bach defeating John Hanson in a marathon final table that lasted over 475 hands, making it the longest final table in the history of the World Series of Poker in the United States. Heads-up play between Bach and Hanson lasted for nearly seven hours total.

The final hand was in razz, with Bach starting out with 7-6-4-A, as Hanson was far behind with J-9-8-5. But for those that have played razz, it’s an intensely frustrating game, and it was for Bach when he went A-Q while Hanson went 6-5 to take the lead with his jack-low. The final card gave Hanson a deuce for 9-8-5-6-2, but Bach caught a nine to just edge him out 9-7-6-4-A to take down the bracelet, the Chip Reese trophy, and win $1,276,802, doubling his career tournament winnings. Hanson takes down $789,199 for the second place finish.

Recapping the still ongoing action from Tuesday night:

$50k HORSE Final Table, It Keeps Going, and Going, and Going…

It’s 9:15am PT, but the final table of the $50,000 HORSE is still going with David Bach and John Hanson playing heads-up with Bach holding a slim chip lead. Erik Sagstrom finished in 3rd, Vitaly Lunkin was eliminated in 4th, Huck Seed finished in 5th and Ville Wahlbeck finished in 6th place. Unless Wahlbeck makes a deep run in the Main Event, Jeff Lisandro appears to have locked up the WSOP Player of the Year with Wahlbeck a close second. For those of you who have followed the nearly 17-hour final table from beginning to end, God bless you.

“Whackjob Surprise” Goes Deep in $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw

Nine players remain in the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball when play resumes at 2pm. Here’s how the remaining players will be seated:

Seat 1: Hertzel Zalewski - 111000
Seat 2: Nam Le - 95000
Seat 3: Masayoshi Tanaka - 345000
Seat 5: Brad Libson - 146000

Seat 1: Kris Lord - 87000
Seat 2: Julie Schneider - 163000
Seat 3: John Juanda - 182000
Seat 4: Blair Rodman - 358000
Seat 6: Abe Mosseri - 447000

The reason for the title of this section is that it was a comment made regarding Julie Schneider by Daniel Negreanu on his Twitter. He would later add the following upon finding out she read his Twitter: “Apparently the lady reads my twitter. Oops lol. Oh well, when I sat down I swore she was a little off or slow. My bad!”. Negreanu eventually finished in 16th.

Halpern Lawyers Up in Stud 8

New Orleans attorney David Halpern defeated William Kohler heads-up to take down the $1,500 Stud Hi/Lo 8 or Better picking up his first WSOP bracelet along with $159,048.

Piesert Gets Bracelet for Dessert

The country of Germany gets its second WSOP bracelet winner with Jorg Piesert taking down the $3,000 Triple Chance NL Holdem title along with $506,800, defeating Jason DeWitt in heads-up play. After going 50 events without a win, Germany wins on consecutive days, following Carsten Joh’s win in the $1,500 NL event Monday night.

Final Day of Final $1,500 NL

Sergey Konkin, who may also be Sergey Pomerantsev as Konkin’s name didn’t appear on the Day 1 chip counts, is the chip leader (1,400,000) with 28 players remaining in the $1,500 NL Holdem Spectacular when play resumes at 1pm. The most notable name of the remaining 28 is Vivek Rajkumar at just 216,000.

$5,000 NL 6-max

Day 2 of the $5,000 NL Holdem 6-max event begins at 2pm with 160 players remaining, with 90 players making the money. Rory Mathews leads with 369,800 in chips. Others with chips: Faraz Jaka (294,500) , Davidi Kitai (166,300), Justin Bonomo (138,600), Raymond Davis (131,400), Shaun Deeb (114,800), Yevgeniy Timoshenko (107,100), Phil Hellmuth (101,200) and Kenna James (85,500).

More stuff from Pokerati during the day, and follow the live updates this morning for the HORSE event, as long as it’s still ongoing at www.wsop.com

Interesting evening at the Rio tonight…

“Miami” John Cernuto was spotted at the Rio today after being released from the hospital just days ago. When I finally caught up to him tonight, he said that he’s been playing cash games today but is not in tournament shape yet. He still holds out hope that he’ll feel well enough to play the main event, but he’s not sure.

As a side note, John appreciated the concern for his health in our Pokerati posts. Our message to John? Don’t collapse anymore, please! The controversy that ensues is interesting but…

In other news, a random walk down the hallway of the Rio found my favorite stalkee Nelly and friends leaving the cash games and being confronted by a group of drunk? people that struck up a conversation with the rap star. Someone challenged someone to a foot race, but after Nelly threw out betting numbers in the $20K range, talks quickly fell apart as Nelly got annoyed with the ridiculousness of the bet. With that, Nelly and his crew left the building through the back door.

Recapping Tuesday afternoon’s action:

Lunkin Leads Six Pack of HORSE Finalists

Six players remain in the 50k HORSE, when they return from their dinner break at around 9pm PT, with the players returning to limits of 80k/160k:

Vitaly Lunkin 3,760,000
Erik Sagstrom 3,395,000
John Hanson 3,075,000
Huck Seed 1,730,000
David Bach 1,185,000
Ville Wahlbeck 955,000

The final table is available on ESPN360, www.bluffmagazine.com/live and wsop.pkr.com

Peisert Looking to Give Germany Bracelet #2

Jorg Peisert leads the final six players at the final table of the $3,000 Triple Chance NL Holdem. Michael Katz, Jason DeWitt, Benjamin Gilbert, Michael Noda and Jason Somerville make up the remaining field.

Kohler Looking to Sink Halpern in Stud 8

William Kohler and David Halpernare headsup for a bracelet in the $1,500 Stud Hi/Lo 8 or Better with Halpern currently holding the lead. Congrats go to Matt Savage, who finished in 5th, and a belated congrats to Norman Chad, for his 32nd place finish earlier today.

Boivin Buoyant in $1,500 NL

Day 2 of the $1,500 NL Holdem has about 130 players remaining, trying to whittle the field down as much as they can before the 3am deadline, which will certainly create a long day 3 tomorrow. Don Boivin (401,000) appears to be the chip leader at this time, with Vivek Rajkumar (115,000), Alex Bolotin (88,000), Richard Lee (64,000), Raymond Rahme (54,000), some of the notables remaining.

Libson Looking Live in Triple Draw

Brad Libson (164,000) leads the remaining 33 players in the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball, of which 24 will make the money. Notables remaining include: Abe Mosseri, John Juanda, Jerrod Ankenman, Hasan Habib, Allen Kessler and Julie Schneider. They’ll be playing down to the final 7 players or the 3am deadline, whichever comes first.

$5k NL Six-Handed

The final prelim of this year’s WSOP, the $5,000 NL Holdem Six-Handed event drew a field of 928 entries, of which 384 return from the dinner break. The winner will take down just over $1,000,000, which is the third largest first place prize of this year’s WSOP, following only the 40k NL and $50k HORSE.

Unfortunately, there’s no established chip leader, but if you head to www.wsop.com one may be better established during the evening. Also check out Pokerati to see if Dan will have some exciting news, like the Jack Link’s Stacked Jacks promotion.

The first ever Caesars Cup is set to happen at the World Series of Poker Europe this year. The WSOPE (presented by Betfair) will offer four tournaments, and in the midst of it all will be the Caesars Cup, an invitation-only tournament to pit the Europeans against the Americans, on September 25.

Annette Obrestad is heading up the European team, and today at the Rio she made her first pick. Peter Eastgate will be joining her on the team, along with several other players to be announced, one of whom will win his/her way onto the team through a Betfair online poker leaderboard competition. Daniel Negreanu is the team leader for the Americas, and his first pick was announced by Jeffrey Pollack as Phil Ivey.

Annette Obrestad & Peter Eastgate v. Daniel Negreanu & Phil Ivey

Hard to place any bets at this point, considering many picks have yet to be made.

$50k HORSE starts late with a smaller field than hoped for, but the final “Donkaments” are selling out — leaving some players, known and unknown, shut out. Is it all a twitter-based conspiracy spearheaded by Harrah’s? (And if so, who’s on the inside?)

presented by:

Tao of Pokerati at the 40th WSOP
Las Vegas, NV

Episode 11.26: DonkTwit Conspiracy
4:54

@Phil_Hellmuth

UB party starting at Studio 54 at MGM! On my way, i am making my entrance on a trapeze!! also i signed up for 2-7 tourney, c em a 11 pm
about 13 hours ago from txt

Drinking Dom in VIP booth with wife. Trapeze stunt from 5 stories up at 10:40 pm…Scary!
about 12 hours ago from txt

I am pretty drunk!! Chris Ferguson just called me and told me they picked me up in 2-7 tourney!!
about 9 hours ago from txt

Sunday July 5 i show up to WSOP as ‘Caesar: with 100 models, 11 muses w body paint, a chariot w 2 horses, and a drummer dropping rose petals
about 8 hours ago from txt

15,200 extra chips are in play going into Day 2 of the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw — roughly a third of which belonged to no-show Phil Hellmuth before tournament officials removed his remaining stack (in level 5) and refunded his late buy-in.

Plenty of grumblings about this situation from the rail …

Hellmuth bought into WSOP Event #55 by proxy — presumably near the last possible minute — with his 7,500 starting stack brought to the felt shortly before the end of the break between levels 2 and 3. His seat in the Brasilia Room remained empty for hours as he attended a much-ballyhooed Ultimate Bet party at Studio 54 in the MGM.

Hellmuth’s stack had been blinded down to about 2,500 when the event TD approached Chris Ferguson, who was playing, and asked if he had Hellmuth’s phone number. Ferguson did, and the TD called but got no answer. So he then called his supervisor, who apparently instructed him to remove Hellmuth’s chips from play.

Shortly thereafter — in Level 5 still — the number of entrants on the screen was reduced from 258 to 257, and prize payouts were downgraded accordingly.

At the end of Day 1, the 73 remaining players bagged a total 1,942,700 chips, even though the appropriate number for 257 players in a $2,500 event would be 1,927,500. No word yet on where the 10,000 chips that didn’t belong to Phil Hellmuth came from.

Click here to follow the action in $2,500 2-7 Triple-Draw when play resumes at 2 pm pacific. Plenty of interesting big-name pros and 2009 bracelet winners still in the hunt — Negreanu, Ankenman, Sung, Mueller, among them — along with a few dozen lesser known mixed-games grinders … all competing for a $166k $165k bracelet.

More…

The Brits have notched up their third bracelet of the 2009 WSOP following the victory of John Kabbaj in the $10,000 World Championship Pot Limit Hold’em event. Kabbaj, known as “large” to his London poker pals, had already gone close in two previous events this year. An 8th and an 18th in the $2,500 Pot Limit Omaha/Hold’em and $5,000 Pot Limit Omaha events respectively saw Kabbaj “in the zone” and he capitalised on his good form by taking down the $10k Pot Limit Hold’em tournament for $633,335. Russia’s Kirill Gerasimov was the unlucky runner up, for $391,369, in what was a European laden event. Davidi Kitai, from Germany took 4th place for $183,638. Further down the money list saw Swedes Ken Lennaard and Thomas Pettersson in very creditable 13th and 14th places.

The bracelet ceremony for Kabbaj was somewhat marred during the playing of the national anthem. Organisers decided to play the Sex Pistol’s version of God Save the Queen instead of the normal British national anthem. Following complaints, Jeffery Pollack apologised to Kabbaj and a new ceremony, with the correct anthem, was hastily arranged.

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Recapping Monday night’s tournament action:

Final Table Set in 50k HORSE

The final table of the $50,000 HORSE was established early Tuesday morning, with Gus Hansen the unfortunate final table bubble boy. Here’s how the final table will be seated, with streaming coverage starting around 2pm PT at www.espn360.com and wsop.pkr.com:

Seat 1: Ville Wahlbeck - 645000
Seat 2: Erik Sagstrom - 3675000
Seat 3: John Hanson - 1700000
Seat 4: Huck Seed - 1380000
Seat 5: Vitaly Lunkin - 2490000
Seat 6: David Bach - 2345000
Seat 7: Erik Seidel - 965000
Seat 8: Chau Giang - 1075000

While Lunkin and Wahlbeck will be trying to win their 2nd WSOP bracelet this year, Wahlbeck will lead the WSOP Player of the Year race with just two tournaments remaining if he finishes first.

Carsten Joh Wins One for Germany

Carsten Joh took down the next to last $1,500 NL Holdemtournament picking up a WSOP bracelet and $664,426, besting Andrew Chen in heads-up play.

DeWitt DeLeader in Triple Chance

Jason Dewitt (1,599,000) leads the remaining field of 16 in the $3,000 Triple Chance as they play down to a winner starting at 1pm this afternoon. Among those trailing behind Dewitt: Alex Millar (1,006,000), Karga Holt (715,000), Jason Somerville (320,000), Max Greenwood (294,000), Eric “rizen” Lynch (230,000) and An Tran (216,000).

Swinford Stud Leader

Brian Swinford leads (292,000) the day 3 field of 14 in the $1,500 Stud Hi/Lo 8 or Better when play resumes at 1pm this afternoon. Notables remaining: Chad Brown (284,000), Max Stern (216,000), Allie Prescott (202,000), Richie Sklar (134,000), Matt Savage (106,000) and Vince Burgio (40,000).

Christensen Leads Final $1500 NL Event

Jon Christensen of Oslo, Norway leads the field when day 2 of the $1,500 NL Holdem returns Tuesday afternoon with 160,800 in chips with action resuming at 2pm. Among the notables among the 397 returning players: Alexandre Gomes (76,000), Raymond Rahme (51,800), Dean Hamrick (39,500), Richard Lee (and his San Antonio sweatshirt - 34,300) and Vivek Rajkumar (31,800). 297 players will get paid over the next two days as they get close to the final table by the 3am deadline.

2-7 Triple Draw

Adam Ewenstein (71,800) leads the returning 73 players for Day 2 of the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball, with only 24 players making the money when play resumes at 2pm. Notables returning: Rick Fuller (55,200), Blair Rodman (46,500), Tuan Le (42,000), Justin “Boosted J” Smith (33,700), Shawn Sheikhan (31,100), Julie Schneider (25,700), David Sklansky (22,600), and Jimmy “Gobbo” Fricke (18,700).

Tuesday’s Tournament

The final preliminary tournament of this year’s WSOP starts at 12 noon with the $5,000 NL Holdem 6-max event, won last year by Joe Commisso in a field of 805 for over $900,000. The WSOP Staff Guide projects a field of 865 today, which could delay the start of Day 2 in the $1,500 NL and $2,500 Triple Draw Lowball events.

Live updates of the last day of six tournaments begins around noon at www.wsop.com and Pokerati will surely have all sorts of stuff during the other parts of Tuesday.

An unsettling tournament rules situation … just in from one of our undercover Pokeratizen investigators playing in the $1,500 NLH … and, of course, it involves texting.

This took place at a table in the Miranda Room, shortly after the first break … a player was re-raised all-in, and he supposedly went into the tank for a good two minutes. During that time, the player with his tournament life on the line reportedly stood up from the table and sent a text. A few seconds after getting a reply, he folded.

Though no one called the floor during the questionable texting, the table did bring it up after the hand, and the dealer apparently said that no, they are not supposed to issue any sort of reprimands for texting-related issues. The assumption around the table was that this dealer simply was a bit clueless … but then when a new dealer came in, the players brought up the same hand and issue, and the new dealer concurred, that yes, they are not supposed to stop any such activity.

I think we all know that this shoulda been a dead hand — sorry dude, your tourney’s over — but with the new dealer echoing the same thing, perhaps there was something misconveyed to the dealers about non-enforcement of original texting rules at the table, exception to the exception obviously being when a player’s in a hand?

We’ll see if we can’t find out more. Obviously you’d hate to boot a player on a rule violation or technicality in a $1,500 Donkament Super-Amazing Intraductory Pokerthon (we’re still workshopping a new name) … but at the same time, to avoid that, you’d think the dealers would need the authority to pipe up and say, “hey you, Mr. Amateur who doesn’t follow these sorts of things on Pokerati, stop that or your hand will be dead!”

Recapping Monday’s six-pack of tournaments:

Last $1,500 NL Draws Capacity Crowd (Again)

Monday’s $1,500 NL Holdem event drew a field of 2818 entrants for another sold-out event. Around 1,000 players will be left when the players come back to play four levels when play concludes for the evening. The unofficial chip leader is JC Tran (51,000) followed by Theo Tran (no relation) at 42,400.

HORSE Gallops to Final Table

12 players remain on Day 4 of the $50,000 HORSE, with the remaining players on their dinner break. Erik Sagstrom is the current chip leader (3,782,000) followed by David Bach (2,800,000), Vitaly Lunkin (2,060,000) and Erik Seidel (1,315,000). John Hanson, Huck Seed, Ville Wahlbeck, Gus Hansen, Ray Dehkharghani, Chau Giang, Mike Wattel and David Chiu make up the remaining field as they play down to the final 8.

$1,500 NL Final Table

The $1,500 NL Holdem event that started on Saturday finally reached their final table, now streaming at bluffmagazine.com/live and wsop.pkr.com with this lineup with Jason Helder the chip leader:

Seat 1: Owen Crowe
Seat 2: Carsten Joh
Seat 3: Steven Levy
Seat 4: Jason Helder
Seat 5: Thibaut Durand
Seat 6: David Walasinski
Seat 7: Georgios Kapalas
Seat 8: Nathan Page
Seat 9: Andrew Chen

Triple Chance Stumbles into the Money

The $3,000 NL Triple Chanceevent just eked their way into the money before taking their dinner break. Jeff Lisandro got knocked out just short of the money in his attempt to put the WSOP Player of the Race out of reach. Jason Dewitt (375,000) is the current chip leader, followed by notables Jason Somerville (245,000), Karga Holt (230,000), Shane Schleger (155,000), Eric Lynch (140,000), Joe McGowan (135,000) and Nick Binger (125,000). The remaining field will be playing until 3am, unless they get down to the final table of 9 before the deadline.

Sugar Bear Sweet on Stud 8 Bubble

Al “Sugar Bear” Barbieri is the current chip leader (130,000) with 49 players (the money bubble) in the $1,500 Stud Hi/Lo 8 or Better event. Max Stern, Andy Bloch, Chad Brown, Barry Greenstein, Bryan Micon, Justin Bonomo, Norman Chad and Matt Savage make up some of the noted names remaining in the field as they play down to the 3am deadline.

2-7 Triple Draw

A field of around 250 entrants signed up for the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball event, with another five levels of play left on their day 1. Eli Elezra and Shannon Elizabeth are two very early eliminations, with several more to come during the wee small hours of the morning.

More live updates can be found over at www.wsop.com, and discussions on donkaments, entry fees, and all other things WSOP can be found on Pokerati during the evening.

Yet we still don’t know how many runners are coming. We can tell you that players are showing up an hour early to take their seats — a sign they won’t win — but the actual number … well that’s a complicated algorithm. It has something to do with numbers of tables available based on other events … and then of course, like all things Vegas, they have to save a few seats for those extra-special VIPs.

(Not sure what they do with those seats when they aren’t taken and there are no alternates … but bottom line is that if Barack Obama or Bono or plausibly even Jeffrey Pollack’s brother showed up to play, they’d find them a seat … even if it meant finding a farmboy from Iowa and tying him up in the back room until dinner break.)

The $1,500 NLH that sold out a few days ago had 2,790 players. And the Seniors Event had 2,707. So there’s your ballpark.

[Fact-check props to the Tao.]

UPDATE: 2,818

And to show the love because Vinny B. has us feeling snippy under his claims that we don’t give proper props to the no-names, click below for a complete list of every single person who showed up today with $1,500 and a dream, but not necessarily a plan on how to really achieve it

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Recapping Sunday night’s action:

Bracelet Winners go 1-2-4 in Limit Shootout

Greg Mueller becomes the fourth double bracelet winner at this year’s WSOP, taking down the $1,500 Limit Holdem Shootout, good for $194,854 as he denied Marc Naalden his second bracelet this year. The only year where more players have won more at least two bracelets was 2003 (Ivey, Juanda, Men Nguyen, Ferguson, Chan and Flack) . Millie Shiu finished in 3rd, tied for the highest placing woman in an open WSOP event this year(Ming Reslock in the $1,500 Omaha-8 and Laurence Grondin in the $2,000 NL Holdem). David Williams finished in thirdfourth..

Lunkin Looking to Make it Five in $50k HORSE

Vitaly Lunkin, winner of the first open bracelet ($40,000 NL Holdem) leads the remaining 19 players in the $50,000 HORSE event going into day 4. Three players will make zero on their investment, as they play down to the final table today starting around 2pm. Here’s how the remaining players will be seated:

(Table 58)
Seat 1: Erik Sagstrom - 1315000
Seat 2: Erik Seidel - 464000
Seat 3: Steve Billirakis - 576000
Seat 5: David Chiu - 397000
Seat 6: Mike Wattel - 779000
Seat 7: Chau Giang - 616000

(Table 60)
Seat 1: Huck Seed - 672000
Seat 2: Ray Dehkharghani - 262000
Seat 4: Brett Richey - 671000
Seat 6: Todd Brunson - 145000
Seat 7: Vitaly Lunkin - 1527000
Seat 8: Frank Kassela - 499000

(Table 62)
Seat 1: Tony G - 642000
Seat 2: David Bach - 1265000
Seat 3: John Hanson - 815000
Seat 5: Ville Wahlbeck - 842000
Seat 6: John Kabbaj - 678000
Seat 7: Freddy Deeb - 1300000
Seat 8: Gus Hansen - 801000

Durand Looking for Durability in $1,500 NL Holdem

Day 3 of the $1,500 NL Holdem starts with 30 players remaining, with Thibaut Durand (1,650,000) holding the chip lead when play resumes around 1pm PT. Owen Crowe (1,025,000), Josh Schlein (875,000), and Alex Jacob (274,000) are the most recognizable names remaining. When the final table is eventually reached, bluffmagazine.com and wsop.pkr.com will stream all the action.

Australians go 1-2 in Triple Chance

Day 1 of the $3,000 Triple Chance NL Holdem ended with 149 players remaining and it’s two Australians who hold the top spots when play resumes around 2pm today. Tim Horan is the chip leader (149,000), followed by Harris Pavlou (137,300). Notables returning on day 2 include Jeff Lisandro, Antonio Esfandiari, Shane Schleger, Nick Binger, Mike Caro, Noah Schwartz and Praz Bansi.

Prescott Gives Field Allie Can Handle in Stud 8

Day 2 of the $1,500 Stud Hi/Lo 8 or Betterevent resumes around 2pm with 146 players remaining, with Allie Prescott leading the field with 52,500 in chips. Notables returning include Jim Geary, Annie Duke, Marcel Luske, Daniel Negreanu, Barry Greenstein, Jon Turner, Matt Savage and Norman Chad.

Monday’s Tournaments

The 12pm $1,500 NL Holdem Donkament is already sold out, although there’s always the slim chance they’ll open a few more seats during the day. This is the seventh event of the $1,500 NL Holdem of this year’s WSOP, so it’s a “new” event, not having a winner last year. The 5pm (if it starts on time) event is the $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball event, won last year by John Phan for just over $150,000 in a field of 238. The WSOP Staff Guide projects a field of 262 entries.

Today and tomorrow will both be extremely busy with six tournaments going on at the same time, so check out www.wsop.com for live updates, and Pokerati for other stuff during the day.

It really couldn’t be much more clear … this will probably be good evidence for poker as a game of skill:

· Multiple Gold Bracelet Winners at the 2009 WSOP:

Jeffrey Lisandro — 1st, 1st, 1st
Brock Parker — 1st, 1st
Phil Ivey — 1st, 1st
Greg “FBT” Mueller — 1st, 1st (+7th)

· Gold Bracelet Plus 2nd-Place Finishers at the 2009 WSOP:

Ville Wahlbeck — 1st, 2nd (+ 3rd)
James Van Alstyne — 1st, 2nd (+ 6th)
Pete “The Greek” Vilandos — 1st, 2nd
Angel Guillen — 1st, 2nd
Vitaly Lunkin — 1st, 2nd
Brandon Cantu –- 1st, 2nd
Marc Naalden — 1st, 2nd

· Multiple Top-Three Finishers at the 2009 WSOP:

Ville Wahlbeck — 1st, 2nd, 3rd
Eric Baldwin — 1st, 3rd
Steve Sung — 1st, 3rd
Scott Clements — 2nd, 3rd

Recapping Sunday afternoon’s activities:

Mueller Muscling His Way to Bracelet #2

The final table of the $1,500 Limit Holdem Shootout has 6 players remaining after returning from their dinner break. Greg Mueller is the current chip leader (950,000), followed by Marc Naalden, Millie Shiu, David Williams, Flaminio Malaguti and Matt Sterling.

Erik Looking to put the 123 on the HORSE Field

Erik Sagstrom, an early Internet poker sensation, is the current chip leader (1,280,000) of the $50,000 HORSE with 31 players remaining. Ville Wahlbeck (775,000) is in 2nd place, followed by Vitaly Lunkin (735,000) in 3rd as the players take their dinner break. Day 2 chip leader Gus Hansen (670,000) is still in the top 10, along with Todd Brunson (610,000) and Freddy Deeb (560,000).

Hedler Ahead of the Field in $1,500 NL

Jason Helder (440,000) is the current chip leader in the $1,500 NL Holdem with about 120 players remaining as they try to play down to 9 before the 3am deadline. Notables with chips left include Men Nguyen, Cody Slaubaugh, Jason Potter, Owen Crowe and Vinny Pahuja.

Triple Chance NL Holdem

A field of 854 started today’s debut of the $3,000 NL Holdem Triple Chance event, with a field of approximately 400 remaining. No chip leader has been named yet, but the updates say that there’s a few players with stacks of 70,000 from their starting stacks of 9,000.

Stud 8 or Better

A field of 467 showed up for the $1,500 Stud 8 or Better event that started at 5pm, they have eight levels of play today, with the only notable casualty so far being Perry Friedman.

Check out www.wsop.com for more updates, and some stuff overnight from Pokerati.

Recapping the rest of Saturday’s action:

Cantu Wins Bracelet #2

In a battle of bracelet winners, Brandon Cantu defeated Lee Watkinson heads-up to win his second career bracelet in the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha 8 or Better event, good for $228,867.

Hansen HORSE Honcho

Day 3 of the $50,000 HORSE resumes at 2pm Sunday with 53 players remaining and Gus Hansen (686,000) the chip leader. Other notables close behind include Erik Sagstrom (560,000), Scotty Nguyen (463,000), and Tony G (433,000) in the top 10. The entire list can be found here.

Limit Shootout Final Table

Unfortunately, Tom Schneider won’t be there, but there will be three WSOP bracelet winners at the final table of the $1,500 Limit Holdem Shootout, each starting with 450,000 chips when play resumes at 2pm:

Seat 1: David Williams
Seat 2: Flaminio Malaguti
Seat 3: Greg ‘FBT’ Mueller
Seat 4: Joep Van Den Bijgaart
Seat 5: Jose Barbero
Seat 6: Marc Naalden
Seat 7: Matthew Sterling
Seat 8: Millie Shiu

Bonita Benefits with Donkament Lead

Christopher Bonita (131,700) will start day 2 of the $1,500 NL Holdem event when play resumes at 2pm. Other notables include: Cody Slaubaugh (125,900), Jason Potter (100,100), Amnon Filippi (77,700), Men Nguyen (71,200) and Joe Reitman (41,200).

Sunday’s Tournaments

The noon tournament is the debut of the $3,000 NL Holdem Triple Chance event. With no rebuy tournaments this year, the twist is that players start with 3,000 in tournament chips. They’re also given two “add-on” chips, each good for an additional 3,000 in chips. These can be used any time within the first three levels and any players who still have the chips will have it added to their stack at the end of level three. The WSOP Staff Guide projects a field of 700 for this event. The 5pm tournament today is the $1,500 Seven Card Stud 8 or Better event, which was won last year by Ryan Hughes for over $180,000 in a field of 543. The WSOP Staff Guide projects a field of 598.

More stuff during the day from Pokerati and over at www.wsop.com

When Team Pokerati-er Whit Blanton rivered a royal flush at the Hard Rock at the beginning of the Series, I publicly congratulated him but inside poo-pooed his blurry handheld photography. But after flopping one of my own while playing 2/5 NLH at the Rio last night, I think I have a better understanding … as you kinda can’t help but be shaking a bit.

Click below for the uneventful details of how the hand played out:

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Tom Schneider (front) may have been the crowd favorite, but FBT (far table) is still having a better 2009 and shut down Schneider’s hopes for redemption as the DonkeyBomber fan base looks on.

So close … but in the end, Tom missed the final table in the $1,500 Limit Hold’em Shootout event — losing heads-up in a hard-fought battle to Greg FBT Mueller. So rough, too … he played so well, fought so hard … so much money not won.

(Swear it wasn’t my fault, despite what others are saying.)

NOTE: Tom says things turned on the first dealer error he’s encountered the whole Series (which sounds like a lot of clean cards for a long time, but not really when you go out around dinner break in most of your 19 events).

Tom got dealt 3-3 … Mueller had 7-7 … but one of the 7s got exposed, so his new card was 3s. They were at 8k/16k, and a 3 and two spades came on the flop, giving Tom a set, and FBT a pair with a flush draw. Tom bet, Mueller called. Blank on the turn; Tom bet, Mueller called. Spade on the river = flush for FBT, compliments of his burn-card 3.

For those who missed it live … here’s this week’s episode of The Poker Beat, where the topics of the day include Jeff Lisandro, the Lindgreanu / Greensandro bet, National Poker Week, and Miami John coverage.

on PokerRoad

The Poker Beat
Huff, Nemeth, Wise, Michalski, Stapleton
6/25/09

Recapping the Saturday afternoon action:

Cantu v Watkinson Heads-Up

Brandon Cantu and Lee Watkinson are the last two standing in the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha 8 or Better event, each going for their second career bracelet. At the moment, Watkinson holds a 2-1 chip lead over Cantu.

Habib Handling HORSE Headline

Hasan Habib remains the chip leader (453,000) with 77 players remaining in the $50,000 HORSE event as they return from a dinner break with three more levels remaining in today’s play. David Bach (426,000) and John Kabbaj (340,000) are the top 3 in chips at the moment. Among the eliminations today, Justin Bonomo, John Juanda, Eli Elezra and Jennifer Harman. More updates can be found over at www.wsop.com

Limit Holdem Shootout

The field of 64 that started round 2 of the $1,500 Limit Holdem Shootout on Saturday is down to 38 players spread over eight tables. Among the remaining players, David Williams, Tom Schneider, Humberto Brenes, Marc Naalden, and Jean-Robert Bellande.

More Donkament Carnage

A sold-out field of 2781 in the next to last $1,500 NL Holdem event is down to about 975 players as they return from dinner break. The unofficial chip leader is Thomas “titantom32″ Braband at 78,000 with another 4 levels before play ends for the day.

More updates available at www.wsop.com and Pokerati for other stuff during the evening.

It was a moment for those of us who believed it to be. Surely, it was a moment for 24-year old Bahador Ahmadi, who was celebrating a WSOP victory that came with $278,104 and a gold bracelet, but it was a bit more than that to him. At the Saturday bracelet ceremony, the Iranian-born Canadian resident requested that the anthem played on his behalf be that of his native Iran. He told Nolan Dalla after his win:

In a post-tournament interview, Ahamdi wanted to point out that he is proud of his heritage and supports change in his native country. He believes that playing the Iranian anthem at the WSOP will enable many poker players and the public to better understand the pro-Western attitudes held by many Iranians, both who live within Iran and abroad.

With all of the unrest going on in Iran surrounding the recent election, it was a thought that the people in the Amazon Room would stand with extra pride, exert some sort of extra support for the people of Iran, and it would be a grand moment representing the state of the world (or something like that). In fact, the moment was like any other bracelet ceremony, as the majority of the room stood to respect the anthem of the winner’s country, the winner seemed consumed in his own private moment of silence, and it was over.

Perhaps, however, that is what is notable about the World Series of Poker…and poker tournaments in general. Conflicts that may arise between groups of people or warring countries are not apparent at the poker tables. It’s the demeanor of the person at the table, along with playing style and respect for others that gets the attention rather than their ethnicity or skin color. Others like Dr. Pauly contend that the WSOP is simply so all-consuming that no one responds to news unless it hits them in the face like the death of Michael Jackson. Iran? Never heard any of their music so… Read the Tao of Poker take on the mindset of the players here.

That’s what @JeffreyPollack wants to know — after today’s $1,500 NLH maxed out with 2,790 entrants (one of which is The Big Randy, fyi). Specifically, he twitters:

should WSOP events ever sell out? Do sell-outs conflict with our brand promise? Or, are they okay?

Though I’m not exactly sure what the “brand promise” of the WSOP is beyond free beef jerky for media (hey, can we get the strips instead of the nuggets? that’d be great … thanks … sesame please), I gotta think the answer is no.

If you let alternates run, then it ultimately becomes the players’ choice whether or not to buy-in.

There could obviously be exceptions for numerically dependent tournaments such as Shootouts and Heads-up events. But I’m not even so sure that those should ever close until X number of necessary logistical minutes before cards go in the air.

Send your thoughts to the Commish in 140 characters or less here.

I catch up with Pauly just before the end of Day 1 in $50k HORSE. As the good doctor and I celebrate our victories having bet the under on the projected field size for this event, Pauly breaks it down even further to explain the Warren Buffet method of prop-betting and his 40k+50k=300 formula for the 2009 WSOP.

But before you start thinking Pauly is smart, consider his thoughts on the connection between the Mark Sanford affair and Michael Jackson’s death … which is the model he uses to surmise that the God Save the Queen anthem fiasco might actually just have been a cover to distract from the real stories about the significance of losing a third of the starting field size in an event that’s supposed to be one of the biggest deals of the year in all of poker.

presented by:

Tao of Pokerati at the 40th WSOP
Las Vegas, NV

Episode 11.24: Running Numbers
3:30

Episode 11.25: Tinfoil HORSE
3:52

Munzer

Steve Hall knew poker columnist Lee Munzer better than most of us … and respectfully honors his fancy for the ladies as Wicked Chopsian before Wicked Chops was cool existed.

And while you’re at PokerGossip … Steve also has a good piece — from a Brit’s perspective — on yesterday’s “God Save the Queen” bracelet goof. Check it out.

After a valiant 0-for-18 start, with only one Day 2 in the mix, everybody’s favorite @DonkeyBomber has finally made the money — winning his first-round table in the $1,500 Limit Hold’em Shootout, an event he finished 5th in back in 2006.

Yep, it’s a guaranteed $4,350 payday ($2,850 net). We know he’s got a long way to go against a bunch of other tough pros to stop the bankroll-bleeding … but c’mon, golf-clap … baby steps. Now all he needs is a third-place finish (or maybe second) to get him pretty close to even for 2009 WSOP tourneys.

Click here to follow.

Other notable players advancing include:

David Williams
David Plastik
Juha Helppi
Humberto Brenes
John-Robert Bellande
Brock Parker
Nick Binger
Diego Cordovez
Greg Mueller
Ray Henson

… and a lot of others that have 2-4 WSOP cashes under their belts.

Here’s Tom’s 2nd Round table:

Tom Schneider - 45000
Juha Helppi - 45000
Mike Thorpe - 45000
Daniel Kraus - 45000
Michael Byrne - 45000
Brock Parker - 45000
Greg ‘FBT’ Mueller - 45000
Mike Beasley - 45000

If you tally up Hendon Mob Results and WSOP hardware for all the players still left (64 out of 572), this table represents the 1st most difficult out of 8. Must-win.

Recapping the rest of Friday night’s WSOP, and paying respect to the passing of Lee Munzer (1943-2009).

Habib Holds High HORSE Hierarchy

Day 1 of the $50,000 HORSE has 91 of the 95 original entrants remaining, with Hasan Habib holding the chip lead. The list of notables with chips is too many to mention, but you can see who else is remaining by checking out this link. Day 2 will begin around 2pm4pm with another sixfive levels of play scheduled.

Cantu Leads PLO 8 Final Table

The final table of the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha 8 or Better has been established and Brandon Cantu has maintained his lead, with the final table seated as follows when play resumes at 2pm:

Seat 1: Lee Watkinson - 412000
Seat 2: Steve Jelinek - 260000
Seat 3: William McMahan - 168000
Seat 4: Brandon Cantu - 1025000
Seat 5: Ted Weinstock - 250000
Seat 6: Aaron Sias - 353000
Seat 7: Jacqmin Mathieu - 552000
Seat 8: Ronnie Hofman - 76000
Seat 9: Tommy Vedes - 334000

Day 2 of Limit Holdem Shootout

64 players remain from the starting field of 571 in the $1,500 Limit Holdem Shootout. Among the first round winners: Jean-Robert Bellande, Nick Binger, Humberto Brenes, Dan Heimiller, Juha Helppi, Greg Mueller, Marc Naalden, Brock Parker, Tom Schneider, David Williams and Todd Witteles. Eight eight-handed tables will play down to a winner starting around 2pm Saturday, with the eight winners returning Sunday.

Saturday’s Donkament

The only tournament starting today is the penultimate $1,500 NL Donkament, starting at noon today with a projected field size of 2,800 taking the felt, which will surely delay the other three tournaments that are scheduled to start later this afternoon. Last year’s version of this event was won by David Daneshgar in a field of 2,693, taking down over $625,000.

Change100, via Tao:

Change100 compiled a list of last year’s players who are not playing in the 2009 50K Horse event. That included… second place finisher Michael DeMichele, Phil Hellmuth, Lyle Berman (who final tabled the event last year), durrrr, Dario Minieri, DonkeyBomber, The Grinder, Brandon Adams, Kirill Gerasimov, Amnon Filippi, David Williams, Isabelle Mercier, Ted Forrest, Billy “The Croc” Argyros, Allen Cunningham, Marcel Luske, and Robert Williamson III.

Iranian bracelet.

You just could tell … 2009 was sure to be a big year for Iran! Thought it was gonna be Farzad Rouhani who did it first at the WSOP — but he got Lisandro’d in a Stud event.

Bahador Ahmadi took down the $2,500 Mixed Hold’em event (limit and no-limit — first prize: $279k).

We’re probably not gonna get the conundrum-y bracelet ceremony I was hoping for … because though Ahmadi is Iranian, he currently calls Canada (BC) his home. But if he were to claim this victory for Iran — and the WSOP were to play the Iranian national anthem — do we stand? Do we turn our backs? And whom would we be speaking to by doing so — Ahmadinejad or supporters of Mousavi?

I suppose that’s kinda what they’re fighting about in the streets of Tehran …

UPDATE (from Cali Jen): They’ll be playing the Iranian national anthem tomorrow at 2:20 (or 2:50 - whatever they decide)

As Kevin pointed out … great story (like true narrative from a non-poker person who kinda gets poker) in the New York Times Magazine about a mother trying to come to grips with her son’s extensive online poker play … and the transition from successful scholar-athlete to internet poker pro.

(What’s a mom to do when cutting a 19-year-old kid off financially carries no weight — other than follow his chipstack online while he’s playing live in the EPT?)

Recapping the Friday afternoon action…

Vallo Valuable in $50k HORSE

As the players return from the dinner break, Martin Vallo is the unofficial chip leader (245,000) in the $50k HORSE event with all 95 players who registered remaining. The players are now on level four, with three more levels of play scheduled before play ends for the day. Among the early leaders, Daniel Negreanu (200,000), Jeff Lisandro, (188,000), Patrik Antonius (175,000) and Todd Brunson (168,000).

Letting Ylon’s Be Bygones

Ylon Schwartz is the current chip leader (2,000,000) with three players remaining in the $2,500 Mixed Holdem event as they return from their dinner break. John McGuiness (1,200,000) and Bahador Ahmadi (750,000) round out the field. Barry Greenstein finished in 5th before heading off to join the $50k HORSE field.

Cantu Crushing PLO8

With 36 players remaining in the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha 8 or Better event, Brandon Cantu (525,000) is the dominant chip leader, with Tommy Vedes (225,000) a distant second. Other notables remaining: Lee Watkinson (70,000), Noah Boeken (62,000), Phil Hellmuth (58,000), and Randy Holland (46,000).

Limited Field in Limit Holdem Shootout

The late afternoon tournament, $1,500 Limit Holdem Shootout drew a field of nearly 600, seated at 64 tables. The round one winners play at eight eight-handed tables, and those winners will return on Sunday to determine the winner. No table winners have been determined yet, but expect some notable winners included in the morning update.

Catch up with all the updates over at www.wsop.com and more stuff from Team Pokerati during the evening.

On a day when the world’s eyes will likely be focused on Day 3 of $50k HORSE USA vs. Brazil, 60 minutes is rerunning their story on the biggest scandal to hit online poker.

Curious timing. It could just be a throwaway piece of filler, or it could be given an introductory time-hook connecting it to the kickoff of the WSOP. (The non-poker world that hasn’t been following us for the past month thinks the World Series starts next week.) Or … might the replay have been pushed in connection with National Poker Week and the supposedly soon-to-be-heard Barney Frank bill?

ADDENDUM: Yep, pushed back to September.

If that’s the case, you gotta wonder which side pushed for that — the side that contends prohibition is necessary because online poker is a crooked, degenerate pursuit, or the side trumpeting regulation in part because of the assistance needed to keep the game clean.