But I stumbled across this last night — a game I read about on the internet back when it was being recorded (I believe in September). It’s just a regular-ole episode (Season 4 Ep. 3). But still much more exciting on video than anything I read about online, and way better than the Poker Stars Million-Dollar Challenge, not to mention Face the Ace:

Starring:

Patrik Antonius
Tom Dwan
Mike Matusow
Chris Ferguson
Gus Hansen
Allen Cunningham
Andrew Feldman
Isildur1

[via LV Poker Source]

Van Alstyne Back in the Saddle with HORSE Triumph

James Van Alstyne, who finished second in the $3,000 HORSE event last week after holding the chip lead, came back in the $1,500 HORSE event to take down his first WSOP bracelet along with the $247,003 winnings. Tad Jurgens was runnerup, Mitch Schock finished third, and Bryan Micon, named one of poker’s “true anarchists” in Nolan Dalla’s final table report, finished fourth.

Boyes Buoyed by Chip Lead

The $2,000 NL Holdem event starts day 3 with 19 players remaining as they play down to a bracelet winner with Jason Boyes the current chip leader at 976,000. Finland’s Mika Paasonen is in 2nd place to try to be the 2nd Finn with a WSOP bracelet this year. Angel Guillen (496,000) and Peter “Nordberg” Feldma (486,000), and Daniel Makowsky (177,000) appear to be the most notable players remaining.

Limit Holdem Left with a Not So Dirty Dozen

The $10,000 Limit Holdem World Championship has twelve players remaining as they resume at 1pm today to reach the final table for a scheduled 2pm broadcast on ESPN360 and wsop.pkr.com. Here’s how the remaining players are seated with plenty of familiar names for the poker viewer:

Seat 1: Maria Ho – 228000
Seat 3: Greg ‘FBT’ Mueller – 485000
Seat 4: Pat Pezzin – 300000
Seat 5: Kenny Hsiung – 831000
Seat 6: Soheil Shamseddin – 385000
Seat 9: Jennifer Harman – 126000

Seat 1: Matt Glantz – 483000
Seat 4: Chad Brown – 545000
Seat 5: Matt Hawrilenko – 601000
Seat 7: Michiel Brummelhuis – 687000
Seat 8: Mark Klecan – 603000
Seat 9: Daniel Alaei – 330000

Unfortunately, Ville Wahlbeck finished outside the money, but maintains his WSOP Player of the Year lead.

The Pros Strike Back Against the Donks

The $1,500 NL Holdem event returns at 2pm with 240 players remaining, only 216 get paid. James Taylor, unfortunately not this James Taylor has the chip lead with 174,400. More notable names are near the top of the leaderboard include: Eugene Katchalov (90,600), Roberto Romanello (89,400), Phil Hellmuth (88,100), Pat Poels (84,500), Quinn Do (80,600), Roland de Wolfe (61,300), and Allen Cunningham (60,200).

Wednesday’s Tournament

Only one event again on the calendar today, with the debut of the $5,000 Pot Limit Omaha event. This event usually is played with rebuys, but their elimination this year makes this a new event. As usual, players will start with 5,000 in chips followed by two “free rebuy” chips to add to their stacks at any time in the first three levels. The WSOP Staff Guide projects a field of 250, but expect closer to 400 when play starts at noon this afternoon. Follow along with the action at www.wsop.com and return to Pokerati during the day for other stuff.

The 40th Annual $40,000 NL Holdem tournament is now in their hour-long dinner break, with 44 players remaining. For those who were wondering if there’s injuries in poker, 2008 WPT Championship winner David Chiu was receiving treatment for an injured right wrist. How this injury came up is unknown, but an explanation may come out shortly. Justin Bonomo entered the break as chip leader with 1,350,000 in chips, with Lex “RaSZi” Veldhuis in 2nd with 1,335,000, and Greg Raymer 3rd at 1,326,000. Day 1 chip leader Bruno Fitoussi was eliminated shortly before the dinner break. When the players return, they have another four levels or 18 players remaining, whichever comes first.

For anyone looking to play in this weekend’s $1,000 Stimulus Special and hasn’t registered, there are over 4,400 who have done so, with over 2,200 registered for day 1a Saturday already. The expected cap for each day 1 is 2,800 and it looks like it’ll be at least one day could be sold out shortly unless more tables get added. Stay tuned for more stuff during the evening.

Otherwise, all is well in my bracket. Got the 4 3 other matches right — Farha d. Cunningham, Eastgate d. Bloch, Lindgren d. Lederer, Elezra d. Chan. Alas, we will not be seeing Gowen vs. Lederer deep, which Ali Nejad reminded us yesterday woulda been great for poker, because it probably woulda been followed on Court TV.

CORRECTION: I guess I changed my pick on Chan vs. Elezra / didn’t go with my gut. Of course Eli was gonna win.

If you wanna follow a little more play-by-play, take your pick:
CardPlayer.com
PokerNews.com
PokerListings.com

Flipchip for really good photos.
Audio stuff TK at PokerRoad.

And it’s still not too late to get in on the bracket-picking action … though points scored on matches already started won’t count in the end. We’re doing this with our forum friends at PokerRoad. Show who’s boss.

UPDATE: Yang defeats Gowen! Boo Jerry Yang! Makin’ us rankers eat it!

We all knew something fishy was going on with Clonie and Full Tilt, right? And we’ve always wondered how exactly Full Tilt operates — seriously it’s kinda a mystery, even to people who work for them — and now, with Clonie Gowen suing four different companies connected to the game so many play with the pros, we should find out quite a bit of interesting info.

As far as I know, this is the first time any online poker biz that operates in the grayish world of processing money from American players (really really light gray, but still … ) will have to show its stuff publicly. Even Ultimate Bet/Absolute, with all the audits and investigations hasn’t really had to show anything it doesn’t want to to anyone outside its own semi-corporate family.

Um, hole-card cameras in the courtroom?

Official court docs here.

Gowen v. Tiltware LLC, et al.,
Plaintiff: Cycalona Gowen
Defendant: Full Tilt Poker, Tiltware LLC, Pocket Kings Ltd., Kolyma Corporation, A.V.V., Raymond J. Bitar, Howard Lederer, Andrew Bloch, Phillip Ivey, Christopher Ferguson, John Juanda, Phillip Gordon, Erick Lindgren, Erik Seidel, Jennifer Harman-Traniello, Michael Matusow, Allen Cunningham, Gus Hansen and Patrick Antonious

Case Number: 2:2008cv01581
Filed: November 14, 2008

Court: Nevada District Court
Office: Las Vegas Office [ Court Info ]
County: Clark
Presiding Judge: Judge Robert C. Jones
Referring Judge: Magistrate Judge Robert J. Johnston

Nature of Suit: Contract – Other Contract
Cause: 28:1332 Diversity-Other Contract
Jurisdiction: Diversity
Jury Demanded By: Plaintiff

They’re talking about it on 2+2, and the summary of her allegations below comes from the Hendon Mob:

In the complaint, she alleges the following —

In 2004, Clonie was offered (and accepted) 1% ownership of Tiltware and FTP in exchange for being a celebrity representative…

Has worn FTP merchandise and promoted FTP in exchange for that ownership interest (no other compensation)…

In May 2007, all Team FTP members received distribution checks but her…she demanded distribution owed to her, refused…

Nov 6, 2007, Lederer offered to pay her $250k for her past performance on behalf of company, she refused cuz only fraction of what was owed to her…

Clonie estimates company worth $4 billion…

Despite not being paid, continued to work and promote company until November 11, 2008, when she was informed that FTP would issue a press statement informing public she was no longer a Team FT Pro…

Still has not been given reason all other Team FT pros given distribution but her…

Claims against all defendants:

1. Breach of Contract — claiming damages of $40 million…
2. Breach of Fiduciary Duties
3. Breach of Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing
4. Unjust Enrichment

5. Fraud/Intentional Misrepresentation (alleges Bitar contacted her in 2004 and told her they wanted her to be “the FTP female pro”…then in May 2004, attended meeting at Golden Nugget in Ivey’s Suite…majority of Team FT was there, and Lederer led the meeting…He informed group that their ownership interests were not only in FTP but also in Tiltware, and Tiltware would charge FTP a high leasing fee.

Go Batfaces!

No more Team Pokerati members still alive … but we do have one Friend of Pokerati still with a fighting chance to make the bigger money — Raj Katamrsaddssldkasdi. He starts the day with 499,000 chips. (Avg. stack is 725k.) His table as Day 5 begins:

Seat 1: Mao Qiu – 1,200,000
Seat 2: Garth Paul – 647,000
Seat 3: Mark Owens – 577,000
Seat 4: Nicholas Sliwinski – 1,408,000
Seat 5: James McManus – 1,761,000
Seat 6: Stephen Kenna – 495,000
Seat 7: Alex Tinsley – 168,000
Seat 8: Raja Kattamuri – 499,000
Seat 9: Yde van Deutekom – 384,000

Others we’ll be paying attention to in the field include:

Phil Hellmuth — the last of the Big Three remaining, he’s impossible not to watch. 581,000

Mike Matusow — seriously, why is it that a guy who would be considered a total miscreant in just about every other profession is generally beloved in the poker world? I know I’d like to see him do well. 458,000

Tiffany Michelle — holy shit, like she can really play or something? Apparently more than just a texter. 909,000

Allen Cunningham — Dan Harrington’s long-lost child? (He’s on the same table as Tiffany.) 1,141,000

The leader at the end of day 4 is Jeremy Joseph with over 2.18m in chips, Nikolay Losev is 2nd with 2.11m in chips. 46 players start play today with over 1m in chips, among those players include Brandon Cantu, Shawn Sheikhan, Alex Outhred, Mark Vos, David Benefield, and Gus Hansen and Allen Cunningham. Phil Hellmuth is the final remaining Main Event winner with 581,000 in chips.

Tiffany Michelle, Kara Scott, Minna Ritakorpi, Karen Manfrede, and Lisa Parsons, make up the remaining female players. To see how everyone will be seated today, head to page 2:

Here’s how the players will be seated when play begins at 12 today (from pokernews.com, official home of WSOP updates):

Table Blue 1
Seat 1: Tri Nguyen – 592,000
Seat 2: Dwayne Stacey – 372,000
Seat 3: Ylon Schwartz – 870,000
Seat 4: Jason Riesenberg – 735,000
Seat 5: Kyle Carlston – 265,000
Seat 6: Mark Wilds – 241,000
Seat 7: Nathan Hays – 312,000
Seat 8: Robert Hwang – 875,000
Seat 9: Nhan Le – 336,000

Table Blue 3
Seat 1: Sean Davis – 851,000
Seat 2: Daniel Buzgon – 775,000
Seat 3: Cristian Dragomir – 2,065,000
Seat 4: Kara Scott – 247,000
Seat 5: David Rheem – 1,851,000
Seat 6: Owen Crowe – 1,100,000
Seat 7: Mike Matusow – 458,000
Seat 8: Jeffrey Anderson – 355,000
Seat 9: Phi Nguyen – 1,500,000

Table Blue 5
Seat 1: Michael Carroll – 454,000
Seat 2: Alex Outhred – 1,377,000
Seat 3: Cory Albertson – 556,000
Seat 4: Robin Larsson – 590,000
Seat 5: Allen Cunningham – 1,141,000
Seat 6: Darus Suharto – 1,428,000
Seat 7: Tiffany Michelle – 909,000
Seat 8: Tim Loecke – 856,000
Seat 9: Lonnie Heimowitz – 650,000

Table Blue 11
Seat 1: Garrett Beckman – 515,000
Seat 2: Allen Carter – 413,000
Seat 3: Brad Johnson – 237,000
Seat 4: Reagan Silber – 671,000
Seat 5: Brent Sheirbon – 919,000
Seat 6: Pontus Khosravi – 629,000
Seat 7: Alexander Kostritsyn – 1,137,000
Seat 8: Andrew Brokos – 678,000
Seat 9: Anthony Clark – 397,000

Table Blue 13
Seat 1: Andy Witek – 367,000
Seat 2: Vito Branciforte – 845,000
Seat 3: Joshua Freeman – 658,000
Seat 4: David Benefield – 1,372,000
Seat 5: Dale Hoy – 850,000
Seat 6: Jamal Sawaqdeh – 1,268,000
Seat 7: Paul Snead – 1,411,000
Seat 8: William Purle – 1,022,000
Seat 9: Mark Ketteringham – 1,600,000

Table Blue 15
Seat 1: Jeremy Gaubert – 696,000
Seat 2: Jason Glass – 204,000
Seat 3: Mikael Johansson – 619,000
Seat 4: Aaron Keay – 363,000
Seat 5: Chris Zapf – 119,000
Seat 6: Joshua Norris – 207,000
Seat 7: Doug Ashmore – 471,000
Seat 8: Jonathan Plens – 1,029,000
Seat 9: Dean Hamrick – 939,000

Table Blue 21
Seat 1: Hai Bo Chu – 100,000
Seat 2: Geoffrey Herzog – 1,695,000
Seat 3: Anton Nikaj – 496,000
Seat 4: Nghia Le – 279,000
Seat 5: Adam York – 95,000
Seat 6: Markus Feurle – 796,000
Seat 7: Bob Whalen – 927,000
Seat 8: Chris Overgard – 607,000
Seat 9: Clint Schafer – 1,017,000

Table Blue 23
Seat 1: Alan Gould – 713,000
Seat 2: Thomas Keller – 251,000
Seat 3: Helge Pedersen – 272,000
Seat 4: Santeri Valikoski – 1,069,000
Seat 5: Cort Kibler-Melby – 235,000
Seat 6: Jeremiah Smith – 955,000
Seat 7: Cedric Kolstad – 1,032,000
Seat 8: Geert Jans – 937,000
Seat 9: Alfredo Fernandez – 787,000

Table Blue 25
Seat 1: Noah Kawashige – 177,000
Seat 2: Andrew Teng – 1,024,000
Seat 3: Jeff Madsen – 690,300
Seat 4: Anthony Meeker – 130,000
Seat 5: Justin Sadauskas – 1,160,000
Seat 6: Chris Barrile – 200,000
Seat 7: Tom Cope – 275,000
Seat 8: Niklas Flisberg – 610,000
Seat 9: Marc Podell – 369,000

Table Blue 31
Seat 1: Anthony Scherer – 1,157,000
Seat 2: Evan Jarvis – 563,000
Seat 3: Justin Scott – 639,000
Seat 4: Matt Matros – 1,126,000
Seat 5: Andrew Rosskamm – 1,764,000
Seat 6: Joel Fischbein – 836,000
Seat 7: Gert Anderson – 277,000
Seat 8: Greg Byard – 476,000
Seat 9: Andy Schultz – 454,000

Table Blue 33
Seat 1: Aaron Gordon – 493,000
Seat 2: Brandon Cantu – 1,981,000
Seat 3: Phil Hellmuth – 581,000
Seat 4: Barry Leventhal – 675,000
Seat 5: Darren Grant – 491,000
Seat 6: Peter Eastgate – 690,000
Seat 7: Felix Osterland – 1,491,000
Seat 8: David Saab – 776,000
Seat 9: Peter Traply – 260,000

Table Blue 35
Seat 1: Eric Bamer – 689,000
Seat 2: Jeffrey Papola – 493,000
Seat 3: Jeff Kimber – 987,000
Seat 4: Keith Hawkins – 406,000
Seat 5: Mark Vos – 1,373,000
Seat 6: Minna Ritakorpi – 257,000
Seat 7: James Mills – 167,000
Seat 8: Cornel Pazai – 506,000
Seat 9: Karle Wilson – 1,070,000

Table Blue 41
Seat 1: Kido Pham – 317,000
Seat 2: Brian Tatum – 919,000
Seat 3: Allen Kennedy – 429,000
Seat 4: Chris Klodnicki – 600,000
Seat 5: Nikolay Losev – 2,110,000
Seat 6: Joe Bishop – 940,000
Seat 7: Aditya Agarwal – 861,000
Seat 8: Charles Dolan – 319,000
Seat 9: Jose Barbero – 1,255,000

Table Blue 43
Seat 1: Sarkis Akopyan – 442,000
Seat 2: Jon Friedberg – 140,000
Seat 3: Shawn Sheikhan – 1,516,000
Seat 4: Sylvain Coeur – 405,000
Seat 5: Tim Taylor – 470,000
Seat 6: Peter Neff – 1,127,000
Seat 7: Jerry Martin – 1,112,000
Seat 8: Jesse McEuen – 309,000
Seat 9: Lou Esposito – 233,000

Table Blue 45
Seat 1: Matthew Jensen – 320,000
Seat 2: Craig Marquis – 1,080,000
Seat 3: Albert Kim – 1,688,000
Seat 4: Diren Yildiz – 625,000
Seat 5: Jerry Cusick – 156,000
Seat 6: Brandon Becker – 348,000
Seat 7: Adam Levy – 720,000
Seat 8: Charalampos Tsaoussis – 506,000
Seat 9: Judet Cristian – 1,096,000

Table Green 3
Seat 1: Terry Lade – 900,000
Seat 2: Chad Layne — 140,000
Seat 3: Matt Lessinger – 308,000
Seat 4: Petteri Pirinen – 222,000
Seat 5: Jason Su – 1,360,000
Seat 6: Terry Stewart – 946,000
Seat 7: Davor Lanini – 1,958,000
Seat 8: Jamal Kunbuz – 837,000
Seat 9: Kelly Kim – 637,000

Table Green 4
Seat 1: Dan Assor – 888,000
Seat 2: Graddus Terwiss Cha Van – 249,000
Seat 3: Will Brewin – 285,000
Seat 4: Scott Montgomery – 1,117,000
Seat 5: Ben Roberts – 214,000
Seat 6: Jens Klaning – 611,000
Seat 7: Deng Dong – 388,000
Seat 8: Karen Manfrede – 195,000
Seat 9: Victor Ramdin – 1,322,000

Table Green 5
Seat 1: Mao Qiu – 1,200,000
Seat 2: Garth Paul – 647,000
Seat 3: Mark Owens – 577,000
Seat 4: Nicholas Sliwinski – 1,408,000
Seat 5: James McManus – 1,761,000
Seat 6: Stephen Kenna – 495,000
Seat 7: Alex Tinsley – 168,000
Seat 8: Raja Kattamuri – 499,000
Seat 9: Yde van Deutekom – 384,000

Table Green 6
Seat 1: Jeremy Joseph – 2,187,000
Seat 2: Justin St John – 552,000
Seat 3: Robert Betts – 969,000
Seat 4: Mauro Lupo – 821,000
Seat 5: Gus Hansen – 1,367,000
Seat 6: Craig Stein – 523,000
Seat 7: Chris Crilly – 896,000
Seat 8: Reggie Lyons – 609,000
Seat 9: Suresh Prabhu – 871,000

Table Green 8
Seat 1: Kellen Hunter – 399,000
Seat 2: Chip Jett – 386,000
Seat 3: Keith Ferrera – 1,268,000
Seat 4: Dennis Phillips – 801,000
Seat 5: Rafael Caiaffa – 697,000
Seat 6: Larry Wright – 826,000
Seat 7: Lisa Parsons – 348,000
Seat 8: Steve Pestal – 200,300
Seat 9: Stephane Hornet – 207,000

Table Green 10
Seat 1: Hoyt Corkins – 305,000
Seat 2: Neil Sweeting – 160,000
Seat 3: Keoni Schwartz – 651,000
Seat 4: Ivan Demidov – 942,000
Seat 5: George Rahme – 128,000
Seat 6: Robert Ford – 1,213,000
Seat 7: Bernie Koerner – 300,000
Seat 8: Greg Debora – 255,000
Seat 9: Patrick Zamarian – 357,000

More updates during the day…

The chip leader appears to be Jeremy Joseph, currently atr 2.8m in chips, 1m more than Brandon Cantu in 2nd. Today’s been a moving day for many pros (live and online), as Allen Cunningham, David “raptor” Benefield, APT winner David Saab, and Alex Outhred have moved into the top 10, More notable names left include Phil Hellmuth, Gus Hansen, Mike Matusow, Hoyt Corkins, Raja Kattamuri, Chip Jett, and Adam “roothlus” Levy. There’s less than 10 female players left (Alana Morin leads the ladies with 1m in chips), but two of them are more known for their work in front of the microphone, as Tiffany Michelle (Pokernews reporter) and Kara Scott (EPT hostess) survived the dinner break as well.

More updates later, as the Amazon room gets more deserted by the elimination…

One notable player absent from the field: Allen Cunningham. No word on why he did not play. Allen Cunningham is here. I must have missed him in my first 5 walk-throughs. He is rather skinny.

Interesting tidbit: Players receive a break between each level and a dinner break after two levels. I suppose paying $50K to play in a tournament deserves some cushy treatment.

In what is certainly a first (at least I think so), two brothers have won a bracelet in the same World Series of Poker. Blair Hinkle, whose brother Grant won the $1,500 NL event last week, took down his own bracelet in the $2,000 NL event, knocking out Canadian Mark Brockington.

More after the jump:

The other final table in action, the $2,500 PL Holdem/PLO final table just went on dinner break with 3 remaining. Max Pescatori is the chip leader with Kyle Kloeckner in 2nd and Greg Hurst in 3rd. Allen Cunningham was recently eliminated in 4th.

The $10,000 Headsup World Championship has one match remaining in its round of 16 (Lyle Berman v David Williams). The other winners waiting for that match to finish are: Gavin Griffin, Vanessa Selbst, Robert Mizrachi, Brandon Adams, Jonathan Jaffe, Kenny Tran and Alec Torelli. They all will play one more match and finish tomorrow with the semifinals and best of 3 finals.

The $1,500 Razz event has made the money and Tom Schneider has cashed yet again, his 4th of the Series. Mike Wattel is the current chip leader, Barry Greenstein, Archie Karas and David Levi are among the 37 left in the field.

The $1,500 NL event is now under 500, with Joe Awada the current leader. The $5,000 PLO w/rebuys event is almost at the end of the rebuy period. Rumor is that Daniel Negreanu (part of infamous table 15) is in for either 16 or 17 rebuys, which appears to be a record for this event.

More updates from me tomorrow, enjoy the rest of your Saturday evening…

The noon $1,500 NL tournament drew a field of 2,706 with about half of that number remaining after just over 3 hours. Early chip leaders include Justin Bonomo, Jean-Robert Bellande and David Benyamine.

The $5,000 PLO w/rebuys event started shortly after 5pm, way too early for any real action at the time of this post.

Final table action:

The $2,000 NL Holdem final table has played just under 50 hands, but they’re already down to 4. David Steicke and Blair Hinkle are almost tied for first, while Daniel O’Brien and Mark Brockington are 3rd and 4th.

The $2,500 PL Holdem/PL Omaha final table has 7 remaining, with Kyle Kloeckner and Allen Cunningham the top 2.

Day 2 action:

The $10,000 NL Holdem Heads-Up World Championship is down to 16, and they’ll start the next round at 7pm. Among those moving on include Michael and Robert Mizrachi, Lyle Berman, Vanessa Selbst, Brandon Adams and Kenny Tran.

The $1,500 Razz event has just under 70 left. Tom Schneider appears to be in the top 5 at this time, just getting tangled with Shawn Sheikhan in a large pot, with the DonkeyBomber taking it down. Others remaining include David Levi, Archie Karas, Andy Bloch and Ted Lawson.

One last update at about 9pm PT (or whenever I get around to it)…

The $2,500 Pot Limit Holdem/Pot Limit Omaha final table was known shortly after 5:00am today. They get to be under the glare of the ESPN360 cameras today at 3pm with this set of 9:

Seat 1: Max Pescatori 212,000
Seat 2: Jonathan Depa 185,000
Seat 3: Kyle Hegeman 198,000
Seat 4: Kyle Kloeckner 494,000
Seat 5: John Paul Kelly 79,000
Seat 6: Greg Hurst 197,000
Seat 7: Lennart Holtkamp 253,000
Seat 8: Minh Ly 174,000
Seat 9: Allen Cunningham 484,000

The other final table, plus other tournament action after the jump:

Starting around 2pm today, the $2,000 NL Holdem final table will consist of the following:

Seat 1: Andrew Jeffreys 1,051,000
Seat 2: Blair Hinkle 1,030,000 (Trying to join his brother Grant as a bracelet winner this year)
Seat 3: Dominik Kulicki 241,000
Seat 4: Daniel O’Brien 456,000
Seat 5: Mark Brockington 552,000
Seat 6: Chris Bjorin 247,000
Seat 7: Dustin Dirksen 867,000
Seat 8: David Steicke 611,000
Seat 9: Stephane Tayar 323,000

Final table conclusions from yesterday:

Scott Seiver took down the $5,000 NL event leading wire-to-wire at the final table before eliminating Dave Seidman. The $3,000 HORSE event was won by FTP Pro Jens Voertmann, Doug Ganger finished 2nd and Marcel Luske rounded out the top 3.

Tournaments started yesterday:
The $10,000 NL Heads-Up World Championship has gone from its original 256 down to their final 32, here’s the matchups for that round:

Jason Rosenkrantz vs. Brandon Adams
Emil Patel vs. Michael Banducci
Roman Paradiso vs. Sam Farha
Kenny Tran vs. Erick Lindgren
Thomas Lutz vs. John Patgorski
Gavin Griffin vs. Alexander Kostritsyn
Andy Black vs. Michael McNeil
Alex Jacob vs. Jonathan Jaffe
Brian Roberts vs. Alec Torelli
Scott Montgomery vs. Isaac Haxton
Daniel “Ansky” Stern vs. David Williams
Lyle Berman vs. David Podgurski
Jean-Claude Moussa vs. Robert Mizrachi
Jonas Entin vs. Evan Sofer
Cliff Cantor vs. Vanessa Selbst
Matt Giannetti vs. Michael Mizrachi

The $1,500 Razz event drew a field of 453, which leaves 104 to come back to day 2 at 3pm. Barry Greenstein is the day 1 leader, with David Levi, Vanessa Rousso, Mike Wattel and Sam Grizzle notables in the top 10.

Tournaments starting today:

Saturday brings the return of the amateur’s favorite tournament: the $1,500 NL Holdem donkament. Expect a sold-out field for this event . Last year’s winner in this edition of the event was Phil Hellmuth in a field of over 2,600. At 5pm, the professionals in the crowd get another chance in their attempt to buy a bracelet with the $5,000 Pot Limit Omaha w/rebuys event. Last year, Burt Boutin took down the title in a field of just 145, with 450 rebuys.

More good stuff from Dan and Jen during the day today. Something from me this afternoon…

Thor Hansen, who rocked this series, is playing today as well as Amnon Filippi (4th in H.O.R.S.E.), Allen Cunningham, Chad Brown, Carlos Mortenson, Chris Ferguson, Chip Jett, Humberto Brenes, JC Tran, looks mean but really a sweetie pie Eric Buchman has about 80k and George Costanza AKA Jason Alexander will get some main event action.

Recent eliminations include David Plastik, Phil Gordon, Joe Sebok, Evenlyn Ng, Tom Schneider, James Van Alstyne and Vicki Coren. No one seems to know if Jennicide played wearing lingerie, in fact, we’re not sure if she played the Main Event at all.

The biggest deal today is HOWARD AND SUZIE LEDERER’S barbecue (w/ STEPHEN Z) the final table of the $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha World Championship … with DOYLE BRUNSON looking to put the screws to Phil Hellmuth:

Seat 1 – Doyle Brunson – 510,000
Seat 2 – Patrik Antonius – 650,000
Seat 3 – Marco Traniello – 420,000
Seat 4 – Rene Mouritsen – 775,000
Seat 5 – Tommy Ly – 1,895,000
Seat 6 – Jonas Flug-Entin – 445,000
Seat 7 – Steve Sung – 175,000
Seat 8 – Stephen Ladowski – 360,000
Seat 9 – Robert Mizrachi – 1,090,000

Click here to follow the Best of Omaha, semi-live.

If you want to follow it closer-to-live, it’s being video broadcast today. Mean Gene tells me word is that the event won’t be sequestered … instead it will be broadcast without the hour delay, but no hole cards visible.

Meanwhile, at the secondary final table of $1,000 SHOE, PAT POELS (above) looks to reclaim the ARIZONA POSSE bracelet lead as he is gunning for his third. He was chip leader for most of the day yesterday, but took a big hit right at the end.

The Final Table:

Seat 1: Vladimir Shchemelev – 168,000
Seat 2: Chip Jett – 40,000
Seat 3: Dao Bac – 266,000
Seat 4: Imre Leibold – 250,000
Seat 5: Patrick Poels – 53,000
Seat 6: Raymond Davis – 235,000
Seat 7: Adam Geyer – 293,000
Seat 8: Michael Craig – 161,000

Click here to follow today’s most important mixed-games action.

Mad props to fellow Andy Beal stalker blogger MICHAEL CRAIG (left), who has made his second final table of the WSOP (and also has some ARIZONA roots apparently). CHIP JETT (right), who I believe hails from Arizona originally, is fighting to hang.

Tomorrow he and his wife KARINA are hosting an party at a Las Vegas strip club, by the way:

Another player to watch … RAYMOND DAVIS (left — not from Arizona) has also been kicking butt this year, and seems due for big score. LUCKY LIU (right) just missed the final table. He is STEVE WONG’S poker mentor. Shout out … nice go, LL!

Both TOM SCHNEIDER and MICHELE LEWIS are competing in the $1,500 Limit Hold’em Shootout today. Tom made the final table in this event last year, and Michele made a final table in Limit Hold’em, and cashed in a No-Limit shootout.

Since shootouts dictate that only one in 10 move on, Pokerati swears we don’t want to see them at the same table for the sake of PHOTOGRAPHIC CONVENIENCE.

DONKEY BOMBER wants to cash really bad in this — the deeper the better — to lock up Milwaukee’s Best Light Player of the Year. He’s trying to hold off JEFF LISANDRO, who is well-chipped going into Day 2 of the $1,000 No-Limit Hold’em w/ Rebuys event. Interestingly enough, these two have a pending $5,000 bet — not on who will finish higher in the POY standings, but over the NUMBER OF ENTRANTS into the main event. Tom has the under on 5,850.

If you have an opinion about the rightness of Ladies events, JENNIFER NEWELL has an interesting article — and new perspective on tournaments lacking a Y chromosome.

Looks like something out of E.T., no?

This presumably has something to do with why a fourth Day 1 for the main event was added. Really would be unfair to any players who had to start in the “poker superstructure.”

As the WSOP rolls on, the cash games are getting bigger and bigger — but where are the pros? Follow coverage of the LIVE ACTION at PokerWorks.

Dallas Dealer BETH LAIRD, seen here with ALLEN CUNNINGHAM and STEVEN Z(olotow) in the $1,000 2-7 Triple Draw w/ Rebuys.

RAFI AMIT won that event in the early Monday a.m. As they tend to do in mixed games, the ARIZONA POSSE represented … with DANNY FUHS just missing the final table, but still scoring a POSITIVE EV cash.