But this new venture from a couple of Poker Beat cohorts on the tournament coverage frontlines could actually do it for me, as I can’t think of a more morning-friendly way to find out all I need to know about WPT-Bellagio/Festa as it nears the money bubble. It’s like Regis & Kelly for poker junkies in a G4 generation.

Topics of the day include Allen Kessler, Phil Ivey, Annette Obrestad, and Matt Affleck … but really, it’s way more fun that that.

The Poker Beat: July 22, 2010

Rookie twitterer @GaryWise1 took his turn in Capt. Huff’s chair as @BJNemeth and @JessWelman panel-bantered about:

• The pre-markup hearing in DC with Annie Duke
• Make-up of the 2010 November Nine
• The value, if any, of poker agents — and how the WSOP accommodates them during the main event
• BJ’s philosophical non-dilemma over coverage of Matt Affleck’s emotional bustout *
• The difference between poker media and poker journalism
• The Year of Mizrachi and the accidental WTF? of the current WSOP Player of the Year scoring system
• Annette Obrestad’s B- performance
• The 3-headed Monster of Team WSOP without @JeffreyPollack
• WSOP numbers and final table times

* great explanation, BJ. But question … Is there any discernable line where the “field of play” in poker begins, and ends?

Other episode-relevant links:

The Redemption of Matt Affleck by Gary Wise
The Long, Lonely Walk of Matt Affleck by Howard Swains (with photos by Joe Giron)

Next ep coming tomorrow. Play along in the PokerRoad forums.

Montgomery leads 1k NL

Five players remain in the $1,000 No-Limit Holdem, with original November Niner Scott Montgomery moving into the chip leader with 3,200,000. Adam Richardson is close behind with 2,700,000. See who comes out on top at PokerNews.

Obrestad, Tran make early exits in shootout

The two big names in the $1,500 No-Limit Holdem Shootout, Annette Obrestad and JC Tran, both were eliminated short of the final table, finishing in 11th and 13th respectively. Derric Haynie (1,365,000) leads the remaining 9 players, follow the updates and see who wins at PokerNews.

Final five in Razz

The $2,500 Razz is down to five players with the most recent elimination being Jennifer Harman in 6th place. Melville Lewis (945,000) leads the field with Maxwell Troy (545,000), Vladimir Shchemelev (455,000), Frank Kassela (390,000) and Mikko Pispala (385,000) rounding out the field as they take their dinner break and/or play in the $10,000 HORSE. Updates available at wsop.com.

Baker leading $1,500 PLO 8 day 2

Jeffrey Baker (no relation to the dueling David Bakers) holds the chip lead with 160,000 chips with about 60 players remaining in the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha 8 or Better. Notables still in the field include Barry Greenstein (153,000), Kevin MacPhee (89,000), Mike Matusow (68,000) and Phil Hellmuth (60,000). Find more updates and chip counts at wsop.com.

Another large field in $1,500 NL

The first of Wednesday’s tournaments drew a field of 2,521 players for the latest $1,500 No-Limit Holdem tournament. Less than 1,000 players returned from dinner break with the early chip leader Arnaud Mattern reported as leading with 46,000 in chips. Other notables: Eric Lynch (33,000), Shane Schleger (25,500), Jon Friedberg (22,700), Bernard Lee (17,000) and Lauren Kling (14,000). More information on the happenings in this tournament at PokerNews.

High stakes HORSE underway

The 5pm tournament was the debut of the $10,000 HORSE World Championship, which drew a field of 241 players. The top 24 players make the money, with the winner earning $611,666. David Oppenheim is the early leader with 52,000 chips, followed by Jimmy Fricke (44,000), Maria Ho (40,000), Team Pokerati’s Tom Schneider (36,000), Erik Seidel (34,000) and Joe Hachem (31,000). More updates and info at wsop.com.

Kwaysser makes it two for Hungary

Valdemar Kwaysser of Budapest, Hungary defeated Matt Marafioti heads-up for the $10,000 Pot-Limit Holdem Championship bracelet, along with $617,214 as he joins Peter Gelencser as Hungarian bracelet winners this year. Marafioti earned $381,507 for the runner-up finish, with the planned rematch from the NAPT Venetian final table fizzling out with Tom Marchese finishing 6th for $123,264 and Sam Stein finishing 10th for $44,010. Full results and Nolan Dalla’s tournament report available shortly at wsop.com.

Obrestad, Tran highlight final day of $1,500 Shootout

The final day of the $1,500 No-Limit Holdem Shootout will have 14 players seated at two seven-handed tables playing down to a winner starting at 2:30pm. Here’s the list, each starting with 450,000 in chips:

Annette Obrestad
J.C. Tran
Dustin Dirksen
Michael Cooper
Derric Haynie
Heinz Kamutzki
Steven Kelly
Jeffrey King
Johnny Kitchens
Reagan Leman
Michael Pesek
Justin Scott
Brett Shaffer
Paul Varano

Final table for 1k NL set

The $1,000 No-Limit Holdem event started with 38 players when play restarted this afternoon, deciding when to stop and play it out today at 2:30pm. Here’s how they’ll be seated:

Seat 1: Scott Montgomery – 604,000
Seat 2: Adam Richardson – 702,000
Seat 3: Daniel Fuhs – 1,251,000
Seat 4: Peter Dufek – 780,000
Seat 5: Sebastien Roy – 1,867,000
Seat 6: Michael Michnik – 307,000
Seat 7: John Dolan – 967,000
Seat 8: Timothy Beeman – 1,788,000
Seat 9: Mick Carlson – 917,000

Lewis leads final day of $2,500 Razz

The third bracelet to be determined today will have Melville Lewis (504,000) leading the final 15 players in the $2,500 Razz when play resumes at 3:30pm to determine a winner. Other contenders for the bracelet include: Stuart Rutter (295,000), Chris Bjorin (163,000), Frank Kassela (144,000), Jennifer Harman (108,000) and Vladimir Shchemelev (81,000). Full chip counts and updates available at PokerNews.

Chappus chips up at PLO8

The lone tournament to start on Tuesday, the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha 8 or Better restarts at 2:30pm with 157 players returning to the felt. Michael Chappus (133,400) leads the field, with notables James Dempsey (119,800), Barry Greenstein (83,000), Mike Matusow (54,700), Ben Grundy (46,000) and Phil Hellmuth (31,600) in contention. The full list of chip counts and updates available at PokerNews.

Wednesday’s tournaments

Another pair of bracelet events return to the Rio, starting with another $1,500 No-Limit Holdem tournament at 12pm. Last year’s version of this event was won last year by Ray Foley in a field of 2,715, good for $657,969. The 5pm tournament is the $10,000 HORSE World Championship, the first time a $10,000 HORSE event has been held at the WSOP. This event replaces the $10,000 Mixed Game Championship, won last year by Ville Wahlbeck in a field of 194 for $492,384.

(Also, by standing on such principles, I didn’t have to tell Tom he had a more promising future in selling pants than trying to qualify for the TOC.)

However, because the Maven Awards presumably isn’t looking to open an online poker room in the near future, and because, frankly, I was feeling bad for women in poker after the punk-bitch episodes in this year’s WSOP-Ladies event … I decided to give up my IP address to support the cause … somebody’s cause … in a way that seems like a good step toward someday negating the need for a separate Women in Poker Hall of Fame.

Much to my plausibly noble delight, it turns out The Maven Awards has an anonymous voting option that still does a decent job of preventing blatant ballot stuffing. (I tried; would require too much work for me to vote twice.)

I’m not sure when their voting deadline is, but it’s gotta be soon … so I encourage you to get your votes in, too, by voting here. Below are whom I voted for in each of the 14 categories and why:

Best Role Model for Women in Poker Award
Jennifer Harman
Kathy Liebert
Annie Duke

Ooh, tough one right off the top. There’s little not to like about Jen, but I’m not so sure I’d want my daughter aspiring to become such a high-stakes professional gambler — too many potential negatives that go with living in what can be a rather cold, hardcore world.

Kathy … she knows I have mad respect for her game and generally feel she deserves more props. But again to my imaginary offspring … I’d think my daughter some day should know a bit more about effectively shaking her moneymaker … not necessarily in a skanky ho-jiggle way, but to allow her to use whatever that moneymaker for her might be to her best advantage.

Annie … likewise, I think she’s a true and accomplished leader who wouldn’t be thought of as so bitchy if she were male. But hey, just as women have the advantages of sex appeal to work with, they also must bear the cross of maneuvering through a world where men often see strength from females as a negative … and sometimes not without reason.

So Jen Harman gets the nod here. If that theoretical daughter were going to choose a life of high-stakes Vegas poker — I’d prefer she not, but hey, it’s better than stripping — then indeed, I’d hope she could do it with both grace and prowess, to which Jen Harman serves as a fine role model.

Woman in the Poker Industry Who Has Excelled in Encouraging or Promoting Women in Poker Award
Linda Johnson
Kathy Raymond
Lupe Soto

Wordy category … But clear and easy winner here in Linda Johnson. Kathy has also done impressive stuff at the Venetian, but not with any specific female-empowering focus. Lupe maybe someday, but not yet.

Most Female Friendly Online Poker Room Award
Full Tilt Poker
PokerStars
Maria Poker

Maybe the cutthroat way Full Tilt looked to bury Clonie is just testament to their commitment to equal treatment for men and women alike. But regardless … have never heard of Maria Poker, and Stars has often promoted women as strong and viable players without resorting to hoochie-mama tactics.

Most Female Friendly Poker Room Award
The Venetian, Las Vegas
The Borgata, Atlantic City
The Bicycle, California

Clearly couldn’t be the Bike. Have never played at the Borgata. Easy vote for The Venetian, which isn’t just a great poker room, but one that never seems to have a shortage of female players, many of them plenty cute. Kathy Raymond must be doing something right to make sure these players like it there.

Overall Best Tournament Series Award
World Series of Poker
PokerStars Caribbean Adventure
The Borgata Open

Another easy one … women love the WSOP, and the WSOP loves its lady players.

Best Ladies Only Poker Tournament or Series Award
High Heels PokerTour
WSOP Ladies Tournament
Pokerstars EPT Ladies Events

Same as above. WSOP-Ladies … the House that Linda Johnson and Jennifer Tilly built?

High Heels might be a good one, but those Ladies-Only Tourney League/Series ops can be pretty cutthroat in their efforts to corner the Y-less chromosome sector of the poker market. Not really sure how HHPT plays. EPT-Ladies events are probably really good, but for all their action, don’t recall any EPT-Ladies-specific tourneys — whether via overall field size or impressive final table — resulting in something that made me take note.

Most Appealing Poker Marketing Campaign to Women Award
Australian Poker League
Vanessa Rousso Bootcamps
Pokerica Ladies Team

What, no Victory Poker here? Vanessa Rousso does really good work with her boot camps, I’ve seen from afar, and don’t know anything about the other two.

Most Encouraging Poker Forum Award
Twoplustwo.com
Cardrunners.com
LuvinPoker.com

Ack-gag-bleh! “Encouraging”? Why do you ladies even care about that kinda nonsense? You talk such a big sisterhood group-love game, but aren’t forums more a place for the claws-out back-stabbing realities of poker chickdom?

But OK, so you want encouraging … 2+2 obviously doesn’t belong — they don’t encourage anybody (which is probably why so many uber-poker-geeky dudes like the place). CardRunners is a current advertiser … and I’ve never seen anything disrespectful to women in their world.

LuvinPoker is a former advertiser (who presumably woulda been happy to continue on had Pokerati not made a recent decision to sever relationships with online poker sites). I’ve heard many stories specifically about how “supportive” their little group of players were in their forums, but it all sounded rather small and newbie.

Slight edge to CardRunners, for keeping a lady-friendly environ in a significant sector of the poker world.

Favorite Blogger or Author Award
Kate Dozier
Gary Wise
Jennifer Newell

Hmm, another potentially biased ballot, in a category featuring the lone male nominee. You can’t exactly consider Gary Wise a party-crasher akin to the shemale ladies-event players. They chose him … for some reason, so my pal and Poker Beat cohort must be a really standout good-for-women type of writer. But Jen is also a friend, and someone who’s helped this site a lot over the years as a blogger … AND who has turned into an admirable blogger in her own right.

Her gung-ho leftie politics may drive me to tilt, but I can’t let that get in the way of acknowledging that she deserves the nod for effectively pushing buttons on women-in-poker-related isues. Also snicker at the conflict of principles the mere existence of these awards would present for her (and Annie Duke) if Gary Wise weren’t a nominee.

Humanitarian Award
Liz Lieu
Annie Duke
Linda Johnson

Clear winner. Celebrity Apprentice and Ante-Up for Africa alone should be plenty by all measure. Inspiring women while shepherding the future of poker for everyone is nice (Linda) … and Liz doesn’t seem to be volunteering her time and resources on the ground for charitable efforts in Vietnam with accolades in mind. But making a needle-moving contribution to combatting genocide and oppression — on a scale noteworthy in a non-poker world … that’s gotta get the prize this go-round.

See conflict of principles bonus described above, too!

Most Notable Performance of 2009 Award
Annette Obrestad
Kathy Liebert
Vanessa Rousso

Another tough call. And though it may be my knowledge weakness not recalling the specifics of Annette’s or Kathy’s recent wins (think Kathy won a non-main event at Borgata?) … Vanessa’s win runner-up at the National Heads-Up Championship is what I insta-remember, which has to mean it is the most notable.

CORRECTION: Vanessa got 2nd, not first. Maybe a lucky ballot for her.

(And what about Daphne Turner, the woman who beat Allen Kessler heads-up to become the first two-ring woman on the WSOP-Circuit?)

Top Female Media Personality Award
Kara Scott
Michelle Orpe
Linda Johnson

A tweet from Kara is what prompted me to vote and do this post. I’ve met her a couple times and she seems nice, too. A heart-worthy media personality for the Web 2.0 generation, for sure.

Notable Upcoming Female Poker Player of 2009 Award
Annette Obrestad
Amanda de Cesare
Vanessa Selbst

NAPT-Mohegan Sun = notable by definition. Go Annette, but Selbst making moves on the table without the help of media and PR consultants. Seems appropriate, too, that poker should have a female bad-ass capable of appealing to fans of the WTA, LPGA, and WNBA. Hope Vanessa can get to that level of import in the world of power-fem competition.

Outstanding Professional Player of 2009 Award
Vanessa Rousso
Kathy Liebert
Liz Lieu

There we go … finally one that easily goes to Kathy. She’s an all-poker poker pro’s poker pro … putting up consistent and ongoing results year after year, including 2009 and 2010. So it doesn’t matter where the year this awards is honoring begins and ends … she should be the winner in this category for sure.

So there you have it … one Pokerati editor’s ballot that means no more no less than any other … with probably way too much explanation of why I believe some finalists are more deserving than others … of an honor that hasn’t yet proven itself of any real merits, but could play a relevant role in poker should these accolades go to the right winners over time.

Again, you can vote (anonymously if you wish) for the who’s who of poker females here.

Seniors’ event sets record

The $1,000 Seniors’ No-Limit Holdem event drew a record 3,248 entries this afternoon when play started shortly after 12pm today. Not only was this a record field for a Seniors’ event, it was the largest field to start a tournament on a single day in poker history. The current leader is Team Pokerati and Loudmouth Poker’s own Tom Schneider with 29,000 in chips. Other notables include: “Minneapolis Jim” Meehan (16,000), Lon McEachern (14,500), Alan Boston (13,000) and TJ Cloutier (11,000). The field is currently on their dinner break with four levels remaining for the field to play. Follow the occasional updates over at PokerNews.

10k Heads-Up sells out again

The $10,000 No-Limit Heads-Up Championship drew a sold-out field of 256 entries, with two rounds scheduled for today. Winners of round 1 matches include Gavin Smith, Tom Dwan, Jason Mercier, Annette Obrestad, Josh Arieh, Phil Gordon, Blair Hinkle and Phil Ivey. The 128 winners will return at 10pm for round 2 action. See who moves on and who moves out at PokerNews.

Barbieri leading HORSE final table

The final table of the $1,500 HORSE has returned from their dinner break with eight players remaining. Here’s the chip counts when play resumed:

Al Barbieri 635,000
Konstantin Puchkov 605,000
Blake Cahail 540,000
Hani Awad 520,000
Andrew Revesz 475,000
Dustin Leary 420,000
Robert Mizrachi 250,000
Ken Lennaard 250,000

Follow the updates over at wsop.com.

Gonzales leads 1500 NL day 3

Christopher Gonzales (2,700,000) holds a large chip lead in the $1,500 No-Limit Holdem final day with 11 remaining. The field will be returning from dinner break shortly, see if anyone can run him down at wsop.com.

Brady leads bunch at 5k 6-max day 2

Dinner break ends shortly for the 56 players remaining in the $5,000 No-Limit Holdem 6-max event, with 54 making the money. Matt Brady (465,000) holds a slight chip lead over McLean Karr (460,000) when play resumes. Other notables include David Ulliott (265,000), Christian Harder (255,000), Isaac Haxton (185,000) and Eric Baldwin (157,000). PokerNews will be there to follow the action when play resumes.

Tieman leads during day 2 of PLO/PLH

The $2,500 Pot-Limit Omaha/Pot-Limit Holdem field is on dinner break with 54 players remaining, but only 45 make the money. Joshua Tieman is looking for his 2nd WSOP bracelet this year as he leads the field with 209,500 in chips. Victor Ramdin (155,000), John Kabbaj (98,000), David Chiu (87,600) and Burt Boutin (67,000) are among the notables looking to get a return on their investment when play resumes. The fine reporting team at PokerNews will be there to see who bubbles and who bounds into the lead.

It looks to be a long night for some of these events to get finished, but for those who don’t want to stay up that late, another report will be forthcoming in the morning.

Star Studded Final Table

Six players remain in the $10,000 Seven Card Stud event, with Men Nguyen the current chip leader with over 1,000,000 in chips. The rest of the final table consists of Nikolay Evdakov, Brandon Adams, Michael Mizrachi, Joe Cassidy and Steve Bilirakis. The first two to to cash from the final table are Vladimir Schmelev ($55,991) and Sirious Jamshidi ($46,206). Follow the final table activities, and other WSOP events over at PokerNews.

Dempsey Dominant at Pot-Limit

The final table of the $1,500 Pot-Limit Holdem event is down to heads-up, with James “Flushy” Dempsey holding the chip lead over Steve Chanthabouasy. JJ Liu fell short of triumph, finishing in 3rd for $86,512. Updates of the battle are ongoing over at PokerNews.

$1,500 NL in the money

Less than 100 remain in the $1,500 No-Limit Holdem, with chances appearing slim that a final table will be reached. Notables remaining: Blair Hinkle, Tom Dwan, Neil Channing, Roy Winston, and Alex Bolotin.

$1,500 Limit Day 2

The field in the $1,500 Limit Holdem event is down to 77 after their dinner break, with 63 making the money. Michael Miccio is the current chip leader at 85,000, followed close behind by Jameson Painter (82,000), Terrence Chan (81,000), Jason Potter (74,000), and David Plastik (56,000) in the top 10. Play continues until they reach the final table or around 3am, whichever comes first. More updates available at PokerNews.

Donkament #2 Numbers Down

1,922 handed over their money for day 1a of the $1,000 No-Limit Holdem event, a decrease from last week’s 2,600 day 1a. The remaining 450 players remain with play ending for the night when 15% of the field remains or 10 levels of play, whichever happens first. Some of the notable post-dinner break survivors: Phil Gordon, Kathy Liebert, John Cernuto, Tony Cousineau, Liv Boeree, and Vitaly Lunkin.

2-7 NL Lowball Draws a Crowd

A field of 250 players decided to give the $1,500 No-Limit 2-7 Lowball, Single Draw event a try, with notables such as Annette Obrestad and Eric Baldwin making their lowball debut. Players start with 1,500 in chips along with three $1,000 “rebuy” chips that can be used anytime within the first 4 hours. Nick Schulman appears to be the early chip leader with 25,000, but the volatile nature of the game means anything can happen over the eight levels of play this evening.

Friday preview

Last year’s Casino Employee’s winner was Andrew Cohen, a bartender at the Palms, who won $83,833 in a field of 866 players. Hopefully Team Pokerati member John Harris can improve on his 25th place finish last year. This is the first year for the $50,000 Players’ Championship, a five-day event that is replacing the $50,000 HORSE event that was held the previous four years. David Bach won what appears to be the final $50,000 HORSE event last year, besting a field of 95 to earn $1,276,806. The Chip Reese trophy that was given to the HORSE winner will now go to the Players’ Championship winner.

Where to find information

For those looking for updates, the official WSOP site will have live updates powered by PokerNews. This year, the WSOP.com site will also be making various tournament information available to everyone, including entry lists, end of day chip counts, tournament reports from WSOP media director Nolan Dalla, as well as the media guide. CardPlayer, Bluff Magazine, PokerListings, PokerRoad, ESPN.com’s poker section and other poker media outlets (like Pauly) will provide updates, reports, gossip, video segments and other stuff for the poker enthusiast.

2010 WSOP storylines

With 56 bracelets up for grabs over the next seven weeks (with the final one decided in November), there’s plenty of interesting angles to find in this year’s WSOP:

Does the Year of the Woman continue? With the wins of Annie Duke at the NBC Heads-Up, Vanessa Selbst at NAPT Mohegan Sun and Liv Boeree at EPT San Remo, the poker media is anticipating a breakout WSOP for women. The last year more than one woman won an open bracelet event was in 2004 (Annie Duke, Kathy Liebert and Cyndy Violette).

How will Annette Obrestad perform? This is Annette’s first year she can actually play at the WSOP in Las Vegas instead of being a spectator limited to the hallway, a moment that has been eagerly anticipated by the poker community since she won the 2007 WSOP Europe Main Event at 18. She’ll be the most followed, scrutinized, criticized, fawned over, etc. newcomer of this year’s group of WSOP newbies.

How will the UIGEA affect the WSOP? With the June 1 deadline rapidly approaching, online sites and players are wondering what will happen in the next few weeks. Does the US Department of Justice swoop down on the Rio and arrest Team Full Tilt? Will players not be able to get their funds in time for the Main Event? Will it be business as usual, with no noticeable drop in attendance at the Rio?

Betting on Bracelets Bracelet bets for big money is not reserved to Phil Ivey and his fellow pros. Justin Bonomo was laying 10 to 1 (1k minimum to Justin’s 10k) that at least one person from a list of people living at Panorama Towers will win a bracelet at the WSOP. Bonomo offered the same bet last year, laying 7 to 1, and Greg Mueller’s two bracelets had Bonomo winning his bet. The big Phil Ivey bet this year is with Howard Lederer: Ivey has the 2010-12 WSOPs to win two bracelets, WSOPE bracelets count only towards making the bet a push, for $5 million. Talk of other bets Ivey will surely hit the rumor mill over the coming weeks.

More updates to come during the next few weeks, and good luck to all the players.

The Poker Beat
5/6/10

The Poker Beat
1/28/10

Here are the other winners:

Favorite Poker Personality: Mike Sexton
Top TV Poker Show for 2009: High Stakes Poker
Favorite Poker Podcast: The Poker Beat on PokerRoad.com
Top Poker Blog for 2009: WickedChopsPoker.com
Favorite Poker Forum: TwoPlusTwo.com
Best Poker Twitterer: Doyle Brunson
Favorite Las Vegas Poker Room: The Bellagio
Favorite Poker Room Outside of Las Vegas: The Commerce
Favorite Online Poker Site: Full Tilt Poker
Favorite Online Poker Resource: CardRunners.com
Top Story of 2009: Phil Ivey Makes WSOP Main Event Final Table
Best Online Poker Player: Tom “durrr” Dwan
Favorite Poker Villain: Phil Hellmuth
Favorite Player of 2009: Phil Ivey

Elsewhere around the world, the big action is going at the Borgata Winter Poker Open in Atlantic City, at EPT-Deauville in France, and the Aussie Millions in, er, Australia … where our favourite under-25 Betfair-blogging scrapper fought FTW in the $1k PLO event. @Annette_15′s inspirational tweet-story:

Dinner break in plo, avg 32k, got 20k. Lost half my stack with KxJxTs9s on KJs8sAx5x board lol. 30 something left, 16 paid. Start in 1h.

22 left. At avg

Got 50k. Avg 56. On the bubble now. 17 left. Good table

Itm yay

Final table . 9 left. Cont. tomorrow at 4. Avg 100k. I got 150k. 40k for first. 1x?

One hour break. Got 550k i think. Didnt count. 4 left. Got over half the chips in play. Go me

yayyyyy i won!!!!

A nice little roadmap on how to move from the middle of the pack to the final table with the momentum it takes to go all the way, no? 40k AUD ($36.7 USk).

REMINDER: Today is Omaha day at the Hard Rock in Las Vegas. Playing 1/2, half no-limit hold’em, half PLO … w Run-it-2x. I like to think of this game as PLO with training wheels. Did you know sets aren’t necessarily all that good in Omaha?

The WSOPE’s made-for-TV special event:

Team Europe is comprised of – Annette Obrestad, Peter Eastgate, Dario Minieri, Bertrand “Elky” Grospellier, Ilari Sahamies, Patrik Antonius, Gus Hansen, and John Harvey – Betfair Qualifier.

Team Americas in comprised of – Daniel Negreanu, Doyle Brunson, Phil Hellmuth, Phil Ivey, Huck Seed, John Juanda, Jennifer Harman, and Barry Greenstein.

Caesars Cup began at 1 pm on Friday, 25 September at the Empire Casino in London. Play is expected to last until Friday evening, when one team wins four match victories and wins poker’s ultimate bragging rights.

You can follow American coverage here. And for a European perspective, our friends at Betfair have it here.

Aww, sad for Annette_15: The European captain is the only player without a sponsorship patch, and it’s her site’s event!

Click below for a closer look at the trophy that Fake Phil Ivey is just dying to win. Says Fake Phil: “Winning this will be the pinnacle of my career. My patriotism is on the line. I’m doing it for America. I’m doing it for Barack Obama … oh and Jesus, of course, but I’m always doing it for Jesus. Big ups!”

Cup check: The most coveted trophy in poker since the Binion's Cup at the 2009 WSOP-LV.

John Paul Kelly 2009: 2 bracelets, 2 continents.

The first event of the 2009 World Series of Poker Europe is completed and we have crowned the first champion. He ended Day 1 as the chipleader and finished the tournament in the same vein, step forward Mr JP Kelly.

The £1,000 entry-fee appealed to pros and amateurs alike, with Day 1a attracting 295 runners including the likes of Phil Hellmuth, Roland de Wolfe and Dave ‘Devilfish’ Ulliot with the former being eliminated very early on into proceedings.

After raising preflop, then calling a re-raise from Eddie Hearn, Hellmuth somehow managed to get all his chips in the middle holding 5h6h which gave him an open-ended straight draw. He definitely needed to hit as Hearn held pocket kings, but a 9s turn followed by a Qc river saw ‘The Poker Brat’ heading for the rail.

The action was thick and fast due to the shallow starting stacks and hour long blinds and by the end of play only 41 players still had chips remaining!

Day 1b showed no signs of slowing down either, despite it been a more pro-heavy day with Phil Ivey, Chris ‘Jesus’ Ferguson, Annette Obrestad and 2008 WSOPE Main Event winner John Juanda taking to the tables. Out of the 313 that started, only 58 would return for Day 2.

JP Kelly was the overnight chipleader with 99,000 chips but Richard Kellet, Ian Frazer andFabian Dunlop were all hot on his heels with stacks around the 65,000 mark. Of the 89 remaining players, only 63 would make the money, meaning 26 unlucky players would be going home empty handed.

Robert Lim was the unlucky “bubble-boy”, after being eliminated by Raymond Rahme in 64th position. Rahme raised ‘Under The Gun’, a raise which Lim called on the button for almost one third of his stack. On a flop reading 6c9h7h Rahme open-shoved only to see Lim instantly call. Rahme showed a pair of nines for top set and was way in front of Lim’s pocket aces. No help arrived on the turn or river and Lim walked away with nothing but memories whilst the rest of the 63 players would be guaranteed £2,006.

One by one the players fell by the wayside and with each elimination the dream of a WSOP bracelet came closer to reality. Eventually the 89 players who started has been whittled down to just 10 and they all gathered for the unofficial final table to play ten-handed until the final table bubble burst.

That honour went to the extremely vocal Ganesh Bathmanathan who saw his push from the hijack with As7h called by Richard Allen’s AcKd. The board changed nothing and our final table was set, with Fabian Dunlop leading the way with 538,000 chips.

The remaining nine players returned to The Empire the following day but James Tomlin was soon leaving again after pushing his short-stack in the middle with Ac7s only to see William Martin re-shove and Thor Drexel call! Tomlin was in bad shape as both his opponents held Big Slick and when the board ran out JcKc4c4d8s, Tomlin was eliminated with £13,115 for his efforts.

Drexler was next to go when his queens lost a race with Adnan Alshamah’s Ace-king and he was quickly joined on the rail by William Martin who’s AsJs could not outrun Fabian Dunlop’s pocket sevens.

Dunlop then took his stack to 985,000 when his kings triumphed over Neil Suarez’s pair of fours but JP Kelly was trying his best to keep up with him when he eliminated Anthony Roux with a kings versus tens situation, all-in preflop. Play went from four-handed to heads-up in a remarkably short space of time, first Richard Allen’s Ace-four came up short against Kelly’s pocket nines and then Dunlop’s Ah8h turned an ace to beat Alshamah’s KhQs which had flopped a king.

JP Kelly started the heads-up battle with a 498,000 to 1,365,000 chip defecit but this was soon wiped out when both players were all-in preflop, Kelly holding AcTc against Dunlop’s Ad5d. A flop of Td8sJd brought something for both players but the 4s and Js fell to ship the pot to Kelly.

After cracking Kelly’s slowplayed aces, Dunlop then lost a huge pot when he and Kelly were all-in, both chasing diamond flush-draws, which hit on the turn but Kelly’s king-high flush was much better than Dunlop’s Jack-high version. This left Dunlop with just 19,000 chips, slightly over one big blind.

Obviously Dunlop was all in blind for the next couple of hands, winning them both but his luck soon ran out when his 4h9h was against Kelly’s QdJh on a board reading QhQcTc6sKs. Trip Queens more than enough to beat the nine-high of Dunlop and Britain had it’s first-ever WSOPE bracelet winner in JP Kelly.

This was Kelly’s second bracelet after he won a $1,500 Pot-limit Hold’em Event in Las Vegas earlier in the year. The £136,803 first prize here was enough to take his career winnings to over the $800,000 mark.

Click Here for WSOPE Live Updates.

From inthenews.co.uk:

The ad for Betfair showed a photo of a young woman with the tagline “Online experience is measured in games, not years. Join the new breed. Annette_15″.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has upheld a complaint made about the advert, saying it “was likely to have particular appeal to children and young people, and that, by representing a successful young poker player with the implication she was 15 years old, it could encourage young people to gamble and was therefore irresponsible”.

NOTE TO SELF: Scrap plans for British Under-12 and Under-14 Poker Championships.

What might be surprising to Americans is that this advertisement wasn’t a billboard next to a schoolyard or anything like that, it was a Betfair email promotion — sent out to their own registered players. But what really got them is that the ASA apparently has a rule that says “no one under 25 years of age should be featured gambling in a marketing communication, or playing a significant role.” Case closed. Annette Obrestead is only 20. (She turns 21 on Friday.)

As a result:

“Notwithstanding that, Betfair said clear instructions had been given to their marketing department not to use Annette Obrestad again in marketing material directed at UK consumers and they were disappointed she had been, and apologised for the error.”

Ironic … regulatory attempts to prevent young children from gambling push a young adult to make more of her living on the tables, having severely hampered her off-the-table earning potential until 2013.

Rough beat.

Team Americas: Daniel Negreanu (captain), Phil Ivey, Phil Hellmuth and John Juanda

Team Europe: Annette Obrestad (captain), Peter Eastgate, Dario Minieri, Bertrand Grospellier

I still don’t quite have a grasp on the format, or how the other four slots will be selected. But I do know Euros can qualify for a seat on their team via our good mates at Betfair Poker.

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.

Not only do I enjoy the Doylism of the Day, but also, Big Poppa can write! In his most recent post, he explains why having backed John McCain doesn’t make him anti-poker any more than it makes him a racist:

First, I’m about as far away from being a racist as you can get. I’ve had black friends all my life, and I mean really good friends. That was back before it was “fashionable” to have blacks as friends.

Hmm, that might be a dig at anyone like me who has specifically been courting black girls, thinking interracial intercourse is about to become all the rage (just kidding LaTasjia — you’re still my #1 shorty). But seriously … check it out — not only does Doyle’s blog have other good blogstuff such as a relatively personal Flickr gallery, but also he was able to make a solid point for voting McCain in four paragrafs that neither Tom nor my dad could do in four weeks of email manifestos and belligerent phone calls. It’s the kinda writing I’ve grown to expect from Brunson, who clearly has refined his skills in the 36 years since authoring Super/System.

Another pretty good one comes from Annette 15. Even though the Michelle Wie of Poker (?) says she’s really more of a forum girl, Annette Obrestad’s blog (added to the poll by a reader) is filled with worthwhile reads from a young pro making her way through the high-stakes world, live and online. I really dug her post introducing “set mining” to me (the phrase, if not the concept), with a simple, straightforward math-based explanation of when it’s worth seeing if you’re pocket pair can trip up.

Anyhow, just a couple that I’ve found worth the clicks and eyeball time, and possibly a few votes.

But the WSOP Europe can’t seem to grow its numbers. Amazingly, two of this year’s London events had the exact same number of entrants as in 2007.

2007 HORSE – 105 players
2007 PLO – 165 players
2007 NLHE main event – 362 players

2008 HORSE – 110 players
2008 PLO – 165 players
2008 NLHE main event – 362 players

The only major difference is that there was on additional event at the 2008 WSOPE in the form of a NLHE tournament that drew 410 players. With that extra event, one could say that the overall turnout for the WSOPE grew, but that’s not the real story. THE story is that the World Series of Poker has had such high hopes for the growth of its brand, even throwing out the idea of expanding to Latin America and Asia in the coming years, but the first two years of the WSOP Europe haven’t indicated that there is a real public demand for it.

Are there simply too many tournaments out there? Is London just too expensive for players to afford, considering the high buy-in (£10,000) for the main event and the general cost of living? Would European players rather play the outrageously popular EPT events because they’re so well organized and publicized? Is the US economy, and thus the world economy, finally having an impact on the poker tournament circuit?

Many thought that 18-year old Annette Obrestad’s victory at the inaugural 2007 WSOPE main event would bring more players to the tournaments this year, but that didn’t seem to happen. Personally, I thought it would grow this year, but when I considered making plans to cover it, it was suggested to me by more than one fellow reporter that any money spent on a London trip would be better spent to cover the EPT event rather than the WSOPE, mainly due to the cramped media quarters and the expected turnout difference between the two events.

While the 2008 WSOP in Las Vegas set records and saw an overall increase in players, even in the main event, the WSOPE can’t seem to gather that same momentum. We’ll have to see who wins the main event this week in London…and wait for the 2009 WSOPE plans to be announced next year to see if they believe in this enough to keep it going and what Harrah’s might be able to do to grow it.

A couple pics coming in over the transom from the Empire Casino in London:

click to enlarge

And here’s the cozy 25-table joint where it’s all shaking down:

Righteous kill indeed!

This time Dr.P and I take a leisurely stroll through the Amazon room while discussing bad t-shirts, sunglass technology, and the relationship between Milwaukee’s Best Light, the WSOP, college kids, and Annette_15.

Episode 11: Floorplay