What’s happening at the WSOP while waiting for the arrival of Phil Hellmuth and the UB Army at 2pm:

A little over half of the 1,928 that started play on Day 1c get to return on Wednesday to meet those who remained after five playing five levels on Sunday. Henning Granstad appears to be leader with about 228,000 in chips. Other notables near the top: David “Bakes” Baker, David Singer, Brad Booth, Evelyn Ng, Brian Townsend, Nenad Medic, and Jeff Madsen.

Today’s the final day for people to sign up for the Main Event, as registration closes at the end of Level 2, or at 2,700 entrants (whichever comes first). Over 2,000 have already signed up, and today’s attendance looks to be the highest for a Main Event in history (2,299 on day 1d in 2006 is the current record). At the moment, first place looks to take down about $9,000,000 when November rolls around, and about $850,000 would be given to each of the “November Nine”.

12:25 Update: Pauly is reporting almost 2,500 entered for today, pushing the total over 6,800 (2nd most in Main Event history). First place will pay over $9,600,000.

More updates during the day…

Pauly and I step into the Poker Kitchen to discuss Ante Up for Africa — essentially the We Are the World of poker tournaments — and in doing so chew on the difference between ’80s famine and Darfur genocide, life outside the WSOP bubble, the mindset of pros playing for a good cause with a tournament underlay, and a lack of charity signage in what’s supposed to be a charity WSOP VIP lounge.

Episode 21: Poker for Africa(feat. Otis)

About an hour ago, Tom Grunheid left the building. After a valiant effort and making it through the better part of the day, he moved his short stack and lost.

Evidently, Tom had a good time at his first WSOP event, and as he remains in town for the next few days, he plans to take down a smaller tournament (or two) at some other Vegas casinos. Best of luck!

It might seem at first glance that Full Tilt and PokerStars fought it out - in the monetary offerings sense - to get Scotty Nguyen to sign some sort of deal. Full Tilt got him for the $50K HORSE final table, and PokerStars got him for the rest of the WSOP, at the very minimum.

An inside source says that Full Tilt reportedly dropped him just after the HORSE win because of his sometimes rude (for lack of a better word) behavior during the final table. Because of the way he acted for a good portion of the play-down, Full Tilt decided they didn’t want him on the team. Soon after, PokerStars picked him up.

However, another source had a bit of an alternate take on it. This version of the story noted that PokerStars had a deal brewing with Scotty for the HORSE final table but dropped the ball and allowed Full Tilt to come in. Since the Full Tilt deal was a one-time table sponsorship, PokerStars was able to get back in with Scotty after HORSE.

It boils down to the fact that the online poker sponsorship business is a cut-throat industry. And it’s only going to get more interesting as the main event final table approaches…

Today’s attendance at day 1c of the Main Event was a vast improvement over the past two days, as 1,928 laid their money down to participate in the Main Event. Rumors are circulating that Sunday will have a complete sellout of 2,700 which would take them near the 7,000 figure that seemed improbable on Thursday. Among those whose dream is already over, such notables as: Huck Seed, Larry Flynt, Sean Buchanan, Gavin Griffin, Mimi Tran, Justin Bonomo, David Chiu, Bart Hanson, and Marco Traniello.

The leader at the dinner break appears to be Michael Martin, who is just under 100,000 in chips. More familiar names near the top: Jeff Madsen, Chris Moneymaker, Mike Matusow, TJ Cloutier, and the lovely and talented Liz Lieu, Clonie Gowen, Evelyn Ng, Kara Scott, and Isabelle Mercier. More updates can be found at the WSOP update site here.

The returning horde of about 1,500 will return shortly to play two more two-hour levels, with those survivors returning to play on Wednesday, July 9.

More updates during the evening…

Drove up to my secret shaded, multi-convenient parking spot today … and I noticed something burning:

Hmm, Jen said it was hot out here, and we know flammables blow up in the heat. But the funny part was the one Rio junior suit running over with a single fire extinguisher to put it out. Nice read, dude. Naturally, of course, the fire department would eventually be called and successfully put out the blaze before it turned the 2008 WSOP into a major newsworthy disaster:

Our horse of the day has about 14,500 chips. He looks very focussed — so much so that he seemed a little put off by some unprofessional media guy who went up to him in the middle of play and said, “Hi Tom, I’m Dan.”

That’s our (Day 1C) guy!

UPDATE: He was down to about 12,000 chips when I first checked on him, but now, at 150/300 blinds, he’s got about 28k in chips.

The Planters nut-mobile has been parked near the convention center entrance at the Rio since Day 1A. I tried to keep from taking a picture of it, but I gave in to the temptation. It’s a yellow nut car, only slightly less embarrassing than the Oscar Meyer wiener-mobile, which is nowhere near the Rio by the way. (But wouldn’t it be great if Oscar Meyer wieners sponsored the WSOP? Oh, so many jokes…)

I’m sure the nut-mobile is energy-efficient. And who wouldn’t want to drive a big nut down the freeway? I wonder if Mr. Peanut actually drives it. He’s been wandering the Rio hallways, so I may try to ask him. “Excuse me, Mr. Peanut, do you drive the nut-mobile?” I hope he would give a funny answer; he’s such a nut.

During this year’s WSOP main event, there haven’t been too many interesting or ridiculous costumes, and those that have appeared have been ho-hum. But today, coincidentally located just in front of the press box in the Amazon Room, the following scene occurred just after the cards got in the air.

The fanboy is Garry Gates, director of tournament reporting for PokerNews, and the object of his affection is obviously Evelyn Ng. It all started with a Guitar Hero bet, which technically consisted of two bets. The bigger bet was $1000 to the charity of the winner’s choice, and the side bet involved Ng wearing a PokerNews patch on her shirt during the main event if she lost and Gates being Ng’s fanboy - in full costume - for one hour of the main event.

Gates lost the Guitar Hero challenge, all of the three games, though he claimed the third one was close (he scored 99% and Ng scored 100%). Since PokerNews sponsored Gates in the event, they paid $1K to a Canadian hospital for sick children. And Gates proceeded to the costume store to get the outfit. He then showed up here to feed grapes to her and fan her during the first half hour of Day 1C of the main event, though the fanning had to stop when WSOP tournament director Jack Effel decided it was too distracting to other players. Ng then graciously stopped the fanboy activities after that period of time so Gates could get back to work.

Pokerati reader Tom Grunheid won his seat to the 2008 WSOP main event and is representing a group of 28 friends here today.

He was here about 20 minutes early when the doors first opened with his carry-cooler full of snacks and other necessities. Included in there was his massive visor that earned him the nickname “SuperVisor.” He has yet to don the visor at the table, but he might just be waiting for the right moment.

After the first hand, Tom still had a full stack. Way to go! No big names at his table, which is probably the most desirable way to start his first WSOP event ever. We’re sitting behind our computers rooting for you, Tom!

You can follow along as he texts his updates to CSR throughout the day.

I meet up with Pauly in the Amazon Room, observing the end of Day 1A, where we speculate on on the over/under for the overall main event field size and the price of my watch. Otis then jumps in with tales of being forcibly removed from the tournament area by a mocking floorman amid fears of over-soiled chips and accusations of semi-murder at the tables.

Episode 20: Surviving Day 1A (feat. Otis)

The smallest opening day field (1,158) since the WSOP was first held at the Rio in 2005 started play shortly after noon yesterday. The attendance for days 1c and 1d look to be much more encouraging, with at least 3,000 expected to play over the next two days. They’re going to need another 800 to sign up over the next couple of days to match last year’s total, and it looks to be a close call if that actually happens.

The 636 who made it through day 1a are now combined with the 615 who made it through the end of play earlier this morning to play July 8th at 12 noon. Ben Sarnoff is the day 1b leader with 177,500 in chips. Notable names near the top of the leaderboard: Robert Mizrachi, Erick Lindgren, Marc Karam, Thor Hansen, Hal Lubarsky, Hoyt Corkins, Patrik Antonius, John Duthie, and Victoria Cohen. You can see the other chip counts at the WSOP site here (or wait until later for some sort of list by seat assigment/alphabetical order).

Another 1,700+ souls descend on the Rio today to start their chance at WSOP glory shortly after 12, who knows what musical act/attraction will greet the nonplussed group.

More updates during the day…

Poker pros, poker media, WSOP execs, agents, and interns convened a couple days ago at the Sapphire Club for the Bluff Magazine party — a delightfully rancorous fête celebrating the end of regular WSOP season and kicking off the main event playoffs … and of course, Tao of Pokerati was there. In this episode, Pauly gets a lapdance, I miss my days in the strip-club biz, and Otis tries to arrange a $1,000 beer pong game with Doyle Brunson. All in all, the poker field trip to the industry’s favorite Vegas titty bar leads to lower-midstakes ballin’ at its most pathetic finest.

Episode 19: Topless Beer Pong (feat. Otis)

The 4th of July holiday certainly put a damper on the size of day 1b, as a disappointing 1,158 showed up to play at noon today. Pauly notes that some country music singer did the Star Spangled Banner and some sort of flag ceremony was attempted that didn’t go as planned. The players are currently on their dinner break, with about 850 remaining. Among those whose dream is over: Kenny Tran, Ram Vaswani, Orel Hershiser, Jamie Gold, Greg Raymer, Tuan Le, Ted Forrest, Daniel Negreanu, among many others. The early chip leader appears to be Patrik Antonius, with Robert Mizrachi, Erick Lindgren, Vanessa Rousso, and 2007 ME final tablist Philip Hilm near the top of the leaderboard. Follow the progress when they return on the WSOP.com website here.

More updates as they warrant…

One site that didn’t even make it as a write-in contender, but I clearly have been enjoying since recently discovering it: Melted Felt.

Basically The Onion of Poker. Some recent hedlines:

Iran Introduces Hanging for Slowrollers
PPA Upbeat on Donations as HR 5767 Defeated
WSOP Chaos as Gus Hansen’s Ears Run Amok!

There’re certain truths to their fake poker news that makes the limeys behind Melted Felt, imho, worth the RSS-subscribe.

We’ve got a new poll up on the right — go ahead and start your ballot-stuffing as we try speculate wildly on who is most likely to win the WSOP main event. Should be fun, albeit different than our last one, which was actually useful.

For the past week we’ve been unscientifically asking Pokerati readers which site — other than Pokerati, of course — was most essential to their understanding of the summertime poker fun that gives them so much jolly. You can see the complete results here. Nearly 200 of you went through the effort of actually clicking an extra button, and to that extent, amongst the geekiest most intelligent of poker geeks, the sites that matter most, in order of their finish:

Tao of Poker
Pauly’s whole purpose in life is to make me look bad, and hey, it seems to be a worthy pursuit. He wins this poll by a landslide.

Hold’em Radio
I’m scratching my head, too, as I haven’t really seen the folks based at Binion’s paying much attention to the WSOP, but hey, they apparently know how to motivate a portion of the “pirate” web community to outvote PokerRoad, so we’ll give them the props.

PokerNews
They paid a hefty price for the privilege of hiring bloggers to slave away write up hands and keep official chip counts, and it’s clearly worth something to people who care about big-tourney action.

More…

It’s still a little too early to say, obviously. But right now it’s a guy named Mark Garner. Brandon Adams is close behind. They get to play with the comfort of knowing that essentially, theoretically, they could not play another hand and make the money. I say that loosely because we all know how blinds and antes work … and neither of them have quite what will be an average stack when we do burst the money bubble. But in general, finishing Day 1 with nearly 10x your starting stack is a pretty good place to be.

Other players of note making it through to Day 2 include:

Click below to see the complete list (the same as the one in the previous post) sorted by stack size:

More…

A lot of people. 636 out of 1,297 to be exact. Did your poker beloved cut the WSOP Day 1 main event mustard? Click below to see an alphabetized list of everyone so far moving on — with their chip count and seat assignment going into Day 2:

More…

Erick Lindgren

When Event 53 came to an end with Matt Graham capturing the $1500 LHE Shootout bracelet on the morning of Thursday, July 3, the 2008 World Series of Poker Player of the Year race ended, as the main event doesn’t count for points. And out in front of the POY leader board was Erick Lindgren. He was ten points ahead of Barry Greenstein, and E-Dog’s five cashes (one of which was a bracelet) and $1,348,528 in winnings this summer added up to the win.

It was announced yesterday that Lindgren officially captured the title. Congratulations!

The entire list of players in contention for the 2008 WSOP POY race can be found here.

Yesterday afternoon, 1,197 people started with $10,000 and a dream, to win the Main Event of the World Series of Poker. By the time play ended after 1am this morning, only 643 get to return on July 8th for day 2a. Mark Garner was the day 1a chip leader with 194,900. Other notable names near the top: Brandon Adams, Kido Pham, Chau Giang, Tim West, Darren “Gigabet” Dicken, Hasan Habib and Ray Romano. You can find chip counts of all the survivors of day 1a here.

The talk among those in the poker media appears to be Harrah’s concern on the number of entrants who’ve registered so far for the Main Event. They may have finally crawled over the 5,000 figure this morning, but with talk of day 1d being “sold out”, and the “green box conspiracy”, it may be doubtful that they reach last year’s 6,358 figure. Today’s figure will be interesting because of the 4th of July holiday if they can match the 1,545 that played on day 1b last year. If not, expect the discussion will begin anew on whether the final table delay played a part in the decrease, and what measures that Caesars’ will undertake for the 2009 Series (ie. raising the buyin, moving it overseas, etc.).

One thing for certain, I think the players won’t be tortured with the vocal stylings of Wayne Newton with the UNLV marching band. Expect other Harrah’s properties entertainers to kick off the festivities for the other day 1’s.

12:10pm UPDATE: Pauly reports that as of 11:00am, just over 1,100 signed up for day 1b.

More updates during the day, stay tuned…

I’m seriously trying to stop it. In truth, I wouldn’t call it stalking… But every time I see the hot talented actor/producer/director in a field of poker players at a tournament, I just can’t help myself. But it is true that I haven’t exactly covered Ray Romano or Jason Alexander the same way… I suppose I might have a bias toward Mekhi.

When I saw Mr. Phifer at the Ante Up for Africa tournament yesterday and proceeded to take his picture, he had a certain look about him, one that said, Seriously? You again? or A call to Security might be in order here. So, when I was told that he was in the field today, I got control of myself and decided that I should leave him alone for the day. I already know he will be at a party I’m attending on Monday night, so I shouldn’t overdo it.

But lo and behold, he is sitting close to media row. Argh! Self-control is hard! But when I was made aware that he was doing quite well, I looked from afar and asked Dan to take a picture of his chip stack.

Take a look at that stack - it’s huge! Seriously, though, he had 55K going into the dinner break and seems to be playing a good game today while trying to stay under the radar. If it wasn’t for my well-intentioned and un-scary inability to stop following him around the poker tables his PokerStars patch, he might just go unnoticed.

UPDATE: Phifer has been eliminated from the tournament with less than an hour left in Day 1A.

Play started about 12:20 this afternoon for day 1a of the $10,000 NL Holdem Main Event, with the UNLV Marching Band and Wayne Newton kicking things off. I’m sure those who’ve chosen days 1b-1d are thankful that they didn’t have to experience that for their start as it will probably be a bit more low-key for them when play starts. It appears that the day 1a numbers will be around 1,297, which is very slightly above the day 1a figure from last year. The mysterious figure so far appears to be in the 4500-4900 range for now, as there are 468 spots currently showing for the prize pool (of course no $ figures as of yet) if you take a look at the picture on Pauly’s site.

Among those that won’t have to worry about making the November Nine: Raymond Rahme, Tuan Lam, Roy Winston, Tom “Durrr” Dwan, Vanessa Selbst, Eli Elezra, Katja Thater, Phil Galfond, Bob and Maureen Feduniak, Chad Brown, Lyle Berman, Dan Harrington, Jason Alexander, and plenty of other names (known and unknown). The current chip leader going into the dinner break is David “Chino” Rheem, who is currently at 103,000 in chips. Other recognizable names: Blair Hinkle, Svetlana Gromenkova, Kido Pham, Noah Boeken, Anna Wroblewski, Mekhi Phifer, Maya Antonius and plenty of others. Follow the updates during the evening at the WSOP.com site here. Play starts again shortly, as they play two more 2-hour levels, then the survivors get to return on July 8 for day 2a.

More updates during the rest of the evening…

Harrah’s, the WSOP, and just about everybody is being tight-lipped about how many folks are gonna be in the Big One ‘08. Presumably because no one knows. I’m still thinking 7k is a pretty good over-under. We have no totals for Day 1A itself yet, but that’s why we can presume the number that briefly flashed on a special computer screen and observed by Benjo is accurate for the total count as of now. 4,649 with three days of sign-up to go.

The 2008 World Series of Poker main event - $10,000 World Championship No-Limit Hold’em - is underway!

Just a minute or so after noon, the players were allowed in the Amazon Room to find their seats. After a bit of confusion over table numbers and section colors, everyone was in place and the intros began.

Tournament Director Jack Effel said a few words, and Commissioner Jeffrey Pollack introduced Wayne Newton. Yes, the Wayne Newton! Maybe I’m old school (no jokes on my birthday, please!), but Wayne is a classic. And from my close-up view, despite the heavy make-up, his skin was flawless and he was full of energy and smiles. It didn’t hurt his look to be surrounded by about 10 dancers from the Jubilee show at Bally’s, either. There was also an appearance by the UNLV marching band, but to be honest, I was a little too mesmerized by Mr. Las Vegas to know what song they played.

After Wayne did the “Shuffle up and deal!” honors, the cards were in play.

Numbers? We certainly won’t have anything official until after the first break, but initial rumblings have the number at only 1400. The cap would have been 2700. E-gads. With that said, most players I know have signed up for Day 1C or 1D, so the numbers could definitely pick up as the days go by. But right now, the final number is anyone’s guess.

We’ll keep you updated as the day progresses and as I irritate myself by humming “Danke Schoen” over and over…

A certain WSOP blogger turns what may or may not be the same age as the WSOP today. We, of course, couldn’t be more delighted to have her spend this day hunkered down for the start of the Main Event enjoying a well-earned day off from the rigors of Pokerati.

After all, it’s not like there’s not gonna be another Day 1 tomorrow, and the next day, and the next … I think you folks can survive for just a little bit. Probably can’t say as much for all the Day 1A players, but still …

Finishing up the last two prelim events (eventually) while the rest of the poker world anxiously awaits the start of the Main Event.

The $1,500 NL Holdem winner turned out to be David Daneshgar, besting Scott Sitron in heads-up play while Dan Heimiller wound up in 3rd. Daneshgar takes his first bracelet and just over $625,000 while Sitron wins over $385,000 for finishing 2nd.

The $1,500 Limit Holdem Shootout is finally over as Matt Graham outwitted, outplayed and outlasted Jean-Robert Bellande to take down his first bracelet plus just over $278,000. Bellande will have to survive out of whatever he gets from the $173,000 he won for finishing 2nd.

The more important tournament happens at 12pm today, as thousands of people put down their $10,000 (however they got it) and start down the road to winning the Main Event on November 10th with day 1a. I’m sure there will be plenty of glowing praise from the dear commissioner Jeffrey Pollack, and maybe even Jerry Yang will show up to do the “shuffle up and deal” announcement. The Main Event brings out all the celebrities who think they can play poker to get a few seconds of ESPN time to promote their new movie/TV show/pet project. With the celebrities comes the hordes of media who couldn’t be bothered to cover the preliminary events (or bother to learn the basic facts of poker), taking over the media room while the members of the poker media get pushed to the side.

Eleven days of mayhem start in a few short hours, time to buckle up and enjoy the ride, wherever it takes you…

Also from the barbecue/Phil Ivey charity thingy at Golden Nugget …

Ran into fellow blogger and WSOP commish Jeffrey Pollack. His stylish pink enticed me to move in for a kiss, but like a 7th grader at a bar mitzvah party I could only bring myself to whistle in his ear.

photo: Flipchip / LasVegasVegas

Good thing Michael DeMichele didn’t win, or the inscription “Standing the Test of Time” might seem a little presumptuous.

Chuck in Fort Worth writes in with some kudos and a question about the Chip Reese HORSE trophy. I do not know the answer, but I am betting somebody Kevmath does.

Hey Dan,

As like all your other Texas poker god-children I have enjoyed following the WSOP on Pokerati along with your interesting and lively commentary. I have a question that I am sure you can answer for me. I am some what of a trivia buff and enjoy storing meaningful but otherwise useless information in my brain. What is the significance of the hand on the Chip Reese H.O.R.S.E. Trophy, 4 4 7 7 A. Is that the hand that won the tournament for Chip Reese in 2006? Just curious. Hope to hear from you soon.

Thanks for writing in, Chuck. From what I understand the intent of the trophy is to make it sort of a Stanley Cup of Poker. We’ll see if that works — frankly I think that will be difficult because it has too many sharp edges, looks to be awkwardly weighted, and is made of metal that is more likely to break than bend. The Stanley Cup is the Stanley Cup, after all, not only because it is hoisted/passed around by full teams — hey, I suppose that’s another issue altogether if, say, Full Tilt had it one year, Ultimate Bet another — but also because it can be dented when taken to a party with Pantera thrown off a balcony into a pool. Those sorts of legends will be hard to create with this award … but still, it’s a good to have, I can only presume.

Catching up on the final two preliminary events of the Series before the Main Event.

The $1,500 NL Holdem event is down to three players: veteran Dan Heimiller, rising pro David Daneshgar, and relative unknown Scott Sitron. They just went on their one hour dinner break, so to see how this turns up, follow the updates on the WSOP site here.

The $1,500 Limit Holdem Shootout just created its final table and one of those who will be moving on is Jean-Robert Bellande, who may have a fellow pro railing him at the final table. You can follow the updates of their action here.

Here’s how the final table will look like, everyone starting with 300,000 in chips:

Andrew Prock
Brandon Wong
Danny Wong
Jean-Robert Bellande
Joe DeNiro
John Kranyak
Mike Kachan
Spencer Lawrence
Matt Graham

Graham was the last to make the final table, and was extremely upset that the levels leaped from the 6,000/12,000 level to 10,000/20,000 when the stacks were level at 150,000. It seems to have worked out for him to make the final table, we’ll see if it propels him to the bracelet.

I’ll return tomorrow to preview Day 1a of the Main Event and give the final winners…

Let me start out by saying that the Ante Up for Africa tournament is a stellar effort to raise money for Darfur refugees and awareness of the mass atrocities taking place in Africa and around the world. The ENOUGH and Not On Our Watch projects are doing wonderful things, and I hope this tournament raises a great deal of money for the causes.

The tournament was held in the Brasilia room here at the Rio. That’s all I know. How many players? Didn’t have time to count because the media was given 15 minutes for photos before we were kicked out. Names of all the celebrities and poker pros? Again, not enough time to write them down. Hopefully, a press release will be issued with all of the information at some point.

Good news? Mekhi Phifer was playing in the tournament.

Bad news? I’m not sure where to begin.

Blanket statement: The media aspect of this day was handled poorly. Very poorly.

More…

We take you into Tao of Pokerati studios on a random Sunday evening bustling with action. Pauly and I look at Kiddie Table HORSE and discuss how a new player-of-the-year point system — with Scotty Nguyen and Erick Lindgren at the Big Dog HORSE final table — presents real possibilities for a WSOP Triple Crown. Special appearances by Isabelle Mercier, David Benyamine, Donkey Bomber, Jerry Buss, Cyndy Violette, Richard Brodie, and Chris Ferguson.

Episode 18: Triple Crown-and-Coke

What happened last night, as we finish the preliminary events of the Series today before the Main Event begins tomorrow:

Phil Hellmuth was unable to take down the $1,500 HORSE event for his 12th bracelet, as he finished in 3rd place. James Schaaf, from Torrance, California takes down the bracelet in what also appears to be his first tournament cash. Tommy Hang follows up on his 3rd in the $10,000 Limit Holdem World Championship by finishing in 2nd.

The $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha World Championship was won by Irishman Marty Smyth who eliminated Canadian Peter Jetten in one of the more exciting final hands of the Series. Both players flopped a straight when all the money went in, but Smyth was freerolling to a club flush. The turn was a brick, but when the 6 of clubs appeared on the river, the Irish part of the crowd exploded with delight while the Canadian contingent groaned in despair at Jetten’s turn of events. Smyth takes down almost $860,000 with the bracelet, while Jetten is consoled with the fact of winning $528,000 for second place. Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi ground to a halt in 3rd.

The last two tournaments conclude today, the ESPN360 table and the WSOP POY on page 2:
More…

Eric “Rizen” Lynch announced yesterday on his blog that he is no longer associated with the UltimateBet brand.

He chose not to release any details:

After a lot of reflection and thought, I have decided to separate myself from the Ultimate Bet brand. I hope that everyone will respect my privacy, as I wish to not go into the decision in any great detail at this time. At this point in time I just believe that the things I’m trying to accomplish in my career are not in sync with the Ultimate Bet brand.

There are many interesting levels to this. Eric chose to sign on with UB as the online poker site just barely came clean about its superuser cheating scandal, and it came just after Cliff “JohnnyBax” Josephy signed a deal with UB. Evidently, Eric took a lot of crap from the forums for his decision, and whether that had anything to do with his withdrawal from the sponsorship remains to be told. But whatever made him end the deal must have been of a significant nature because he did it even before the main event of the WSOP.

Oh, and for those who thought the UB statement concluded the superuser scandal, it is by no means concluded. UB was careful to send out their statement of resolution the day before the WSOP began this summer, but what was not widely reported was another statement posted on the website less than a week later. It quietly notes that their oh-so-thorough investigation that took many months was not so thorough and numerous accounts involved in the scandal may have been missed.

Click below for the hush-hush sweep-it-under-the-rug release:

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The Daily Show had its Stephen Colbert and Happy Days gave us Mork from Ork. At Tao of Pokerati we’ve got Benjo, the sometimes Angry, sometimes -orny Frenchman. While a little drinky at the Gold Coast, the top blogger in all of Europoker stepped up to the mike for the betterment of American and non-American listeners alike. In these episode add-ons, Benjo reports on what you learn from watching poker on a colleague’s computer; Bellagio tournament chips being used to pay (stupid) hookers; and the under-the-table pressures on a grown-up French schoolboy working the WSOP …

Episode 17.1: Barely Legal

Episode 17.2: Tournament Hooker Chips

Episode 17.3: Le Masturbe

What’s been happening at the WSOP since last night, while Dan Michalski anxiously awaits his attempt to make good on his $300 All-In “investment”:

The $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha final table has been set, this group of 9 faces the hot lights of the ESPN cameras:

Seat 1: Kido Pham 1,080,000
Seat 2: Brandon Moran 1,286,000
Seat 3: Peter Jetten 492,000
Seat 4: Michael Mizrachi 1,767,000
Seat 5: Billy Argyros 729,000
Seat 6: Greg Hurst 637,000
Seat 7: Tom Hanlon 192,000
Seat 8: Marty Smyth 1,068,000
Seat 9: Richard Harroch 372,000

The other final table scheduled for today and the other tournament action on the next page:
More…

Something interesting just came over the WSOP transom, with food for thought on when in a tournament you may or may not wanna get your chips:

• Eric Crain was the chip leader at the End of Day One in this event. He finished in 13th place. Through Event #48, the End of Day One chip leaders have gone on to cash 80 percent of the time — 36 of 45 occasions (the chip leader was not applicable on three events). Only twelve of these same 45 chip leaders (26 percent) made it to the final table. Only one chip leader went on to win the event. That lone wire-to-wire winner was Vanessa Selbst in Event #19.

• Marco Johnson was the chip leader at the start of this final table. He ended up as the runner-up. Through Event #48, eighteen of 43 chip leaders at the start of the final table (40 percent) went on to win the event. Twenty-six of 45 chip leaders (58 percent) went on to finish in the top three spots. Two events did not have a chip leader (Heads-Up and Shootout tournaments).

Through 49 events …

After Scotty Nguyen’s big HORSE win, looks like winning the Mainer is California’s only hope of claiming the Poker Capitol crown, which Nevada clearly has a solid grasp on at this point — even after player transfers.

World Standings newcomers over the past few events:
Malaysia
Chile

Regional moves of note:
Vermont – the WSOP latecomer scored its ITM finish, a final table no less, moving it past Hawaii (21 cashes), Washington DC (5 cashes), and Belarus (4 cashes) in the money grab.

Speaking of money … we’ve also continued to fix a few bugs, make corrections, and recalculate on the pirated version of Bank Street Writer that powers these standings, and in doing so have reduced the margin of error to 1.88 times e to the 6th power percent … whatever that means. But overall, in tracking nearly $106.5 million in payouts, we’ve got the dollars totally accurate, give or take 100 bucks.

Full list of WSOP results by country, state, and in some cases protectorate here.

Easycure points out that Antarctica is the only continent thus far shut out from the WSOP money.

Pauly and I take the Tao of Pokerati studios remote — and set up shop in the Milwaukee’s Best Light Lounge to watch the chipstacks of a PLO/8 final table (on dinner break) as Eric Seidel goes for bracelet #9 (against Casey Kastle) in what may or may not be a record final table. While Phil Hellmuth has the decades left to stay ahead of the pack, Seidel stands a better chance than Doyle Brunson of catching him, chronologically at least.

Episode 16: Generation Bracelet

I’m thinking about going to the Palms Party, too — started a few minutes ago — just downing another All In Root Beer to see if I have it in me to go. (Huh, do these things even have any flavor any more?)

Big tourney for me tomorrow, of course. Half a million bucks at stake in what seems sure to be an organizational fustercluck.

In the meantime, as of a few days ago, none other than PokerStars is all over (literally) the Palms. Get the sense that with hundreds of main event online qualifiers shacked up across the street from the Rio the low-stakes cash games will be extra-juicy there?

What’s happening tonight at the WSOP, while Wicked Chops Poker is celebrating the good news.

JC Tran takes his name off of the “Best player to never win a bracelet” list, taking down the $1,500 NL Holdem event against Danish pro Rasmus Nielsen. JC, at one point down 3-1 headsup, chipped away at Rasmus until he eventually took the chip lead, winning when his KQ nipped the Dane’s QJ on a Q-high flop. Tran takes home over $631,000 plus 100 WSOP POY points, moving him into 6th in the race with 1 event remaining. Nielsen will be consoled with almost $390,000 to take back to Denmark.

Other tournament happenings on the next page:
More…

And Tao of Pokerati is all over it a day and a half ago! Listen live, or at least semi-live, as Pauly and Benjo (filling in) speculate on my whereabouts (and the Pokerati sex slave business empire) when their hardcore reporting and potential slander of California Jen is interrupted by Doyle Brunson’s cashing for $124k in the Big HORSE event.

Bonus Episode: Pimp-Doyle News