Last weekend, the Poker Players Alliance joined nearly twenty Members of Congress at a House Republican policy retreat in Florida. The highlight of the conference was a poker and casino night sponsored by PPA and headlined by PPA Board Member & 2004 World Series of Poker Champion Greg “Fossilman” Raymer.
Throughout the course of the weekend, PPA Executive Director John Pappas, PPA lobbyists, and the Fossilman interacted with lawmakers and explained the merits of online poker licensing and regulation. We were pleased that Congressional champions of poker rights Rep. Frank LoBiondo (R-NJ) and Rep. Michael Grimm (R-NY) were on hand to help make the case to their House colleagues for a regulatory framework that would provide strong consumer protections, bring in revenue without raising taxes, and restore personal freedoms.
Yesterday marked the anniversary of online poker’s Black Friday. Anyone who ever clicked a raise button remembers the fateful day, and many are reminiscing about how their world changed on April 15, 2011.
Here’s a best-of list of links, tweets and general brooding from over the weekend:
QuadJacks.com did a special anniversary live podcast, which included “original Black Friday audio.” Ah, the memories. http://quadjacks.com/poker-radio/
A bunch of pros, like Matt Waxman, told PokerStrategy.com that this year’s WSOP Main Event should hold steady. “It’s like so prestigious and like world renowned, you know, so everybody’s gonna just make it out cause this is the one tournament that like if you’re the guy who plays the nightly home game for 100 bucks, you’re gonna splurge your 10k just so you can play in the main event,” he said. Like riiiight. http://www.pokerstrategy.com/news/world-of-poker/Daily-Rewind-Black-Friday-Anniversary,-New-Gambling-Film,-WSOP-2012-Thoughts_58570/
The Epic Poker League still sounded more like a Sugar Bowl sponsor (as FS+G) when yours truly won his seat into their inaugural $1,500 event at the Palms last weekend. Excited to play … but also thinking ’bout selling it, as I’m pretty sure these seats are transferable, and I already had plans that weekend to learn the ways of a seasoned pro by going on a vision quest at the Poker Sweat Lodge with Greg Raymer and Tom Schneider.
For now, play it by ear …
2011 WSOP – Episode 25: Sit and Go Pro
A group of prolific tweeters play in a satellite to the FS+G Epic Poker League $1500 pro-am — a tournament series taking shape that few know what to make of yet. None other than Bluff correspondent Kevin Mathers shows up to provide a comparative assessment of what he just witnessed — as somehow Dan ends up winning, beating @Alcanthang, @JoeUgly, @Hollywood_Dave, and others with questionable play. A rather large rail developed to hear Kevmath laughing heartily on the inside. Whatev, says Dan, who won a seat, took home some cash, and now apparently thinks he’s a pro.
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Continuing the trend of poker players signing with brick-and-mortar (and in the case of WinStar tent) casinos … Maria Ho joins Greg Raymer as a celebrity endorser of WinStar Casino in Far Far North Dallas, Oklahoma. Just in time, btw, to begin pimpin their upcoming big River Tourney. Apparently the satellites are about ready to open … and this year they are guaranteeing a $3 million prize pool.
This tournament has grown and grown into one of the biggest of the year in the country … and not that it would be all Ho and Fossilman’s doing … but I have a feeling this year people outside of Texas and Oklahoma will start to take note.
Here’s a little behind-the-scenes vid of Maria’s commercial shoot with the Chickasaw … who by the way, just officially bought Lone Star Park in Grand Prairie, presumably changing the dynamic of Texas gambling legislation, but that’s a story for another time … right now it’s all about the value of Asian poker hotties playing the role of high-stakes cash game player. That and/or being a WSOP main event champion still seem to play well in the poker endorsement world.
The World Series of Panel-discussions continues with what I like to think of as a circuit event on Wednesday. The Focus group has invited me and three others for a moderated roundtable that you could call Meet the Poker if David Gregory’s show were relegated to ESPN3.
Join us for this roundtable teleconference on Wednesday May 18, 2011 at 10:00am PT/1:00pm ET to learn more about the economics of the multi-billion online gambling market and recent US government gaming legislation.
Topics include:
1. The history of today’s online gaming market 2. How Las Vegas feels about online gaming 3. “Black Friday” and its meaning for the online gaming business 4. What the online gaming business will look like in 2012
David G. Schwartz, Director of Center for Gambling Research-UNLV Dan Michalski, Founder/Editor, Pokerati.com John Pappas, Executive Director, PPA (Poker Players Alliance) Greg Raymer, 2004 WSOP Champion and Lawyer
Greetings from sunny Southern Florida. I’ve finally thawed myself out from the permafrost of this New York winter, and I’m looking forward to the WSOPC’s first stop down in Florida. In the meantime, let’s look at what’s happened this week.
Vinnie Vinh Makes Day 2, Shows Up, Wins LAPC – Los Angeles, California Vinny Vinh is an enigma in the poker world over the last several years, and rumored debts and drug issues have caused some well-publicized incidents at the World Series of Poker. On two separate occasions, Vinh made Day 2 of a WSOP event, only to no-show under mysterious circumstances. This year’s LAPC is a different story, though, as Vinh decided playing a tournament to completion might be a novel idea, and it worked out pretty well for him. Vinh took down Event 29 last week for a cool $12,000. If you still don’t believe that Vinnie Vinh is anything beyond a figment of your imagination, here he is taking with the great Matt Savage.
In other LAPC news, Tony Ma took down the Tag Team Championship with Restituto Bagaygay, defeating the Road Warriors with a double powerbomb 82 other teams in the process. Jamie Shaevel is on fire, winning three different events at LAPC to lead the Player of the Series race, overtaking Brian Brubaker and David Levi, who won a PLO8 event this week, at two wins each.
Pokerati Player Gets a Ring, too … Circuit Ring, That Is WSOP Circuit – Tunica, Mississippi Team Pokerati juggernaut La Sengphet got matching rings this Valentine’s Day weekend, but La earned it on the felt. After her boyfriend David Clark won a WSOP Circuit event in Choctaw a few weeks ago, La won Ring Event #8 in Tunica, pocketing more than $30,000 and becoming the first woman in nine months to win an open WSOPC ring event. La also ran deep in the Tunica main event, finishing 10th — just a bad beat away (A10 < K10) from another final table and a chance to lock up her seat in the WSOPC million-dollar freeroll.
Fossilman Beats DC Politicos Washington, D.C.
Most of the attention that Greg Raymer has received in the last few weeks has been about his departure from PokerStars, but it hasn’t stopped him from continuing the cause for the legalization of online poker. At last week’s CPAC conference, the PPA ran a charity event to help raise awareness and preach limited government to conservatives. It remains to be seen how effective this message was, but Raymer, as per usual, just seems to keep on winning, no matter what he plays.
Gareth Walker Steals From Rich, Gives to Self in Nottingham UKIPT – Nottingham, England This UKIPT £500 Main Event set a record with 1,058 players, the biggest field ever for a tournament on British shores. There were no Robin Hood sightings, but there was quite a bounty for Gareth Walker, who walked away with £109,000, the biggest prize in the history of the UKIPT.
Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza Draws Big Names Las Vegas, Nevada
At the moment, the Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza is the biggest game in town when it comes to tournaments, and some big names have made some deep runs in these events. James Van Alstyne finished second in a $1,000 event for just under $20,000, with Dennis Phillips finishing in the money in 13th place in the same event. Joanne “JJ” Liu seems to cash wherever she goes, finishing third in an Omaha 8//b event for over $4,000.
This Thursday, I will be making my way to Tama, Iowa to meet up with the Heartland Poker Tour crew once again, this time at their event @ Meskwaki Bingo Casino (Oct 31-Nov 7.)Â Â In preparation for my trip, I’ve been organizing the videos and pics I shot a couple weeks back while covering the HPT Fifth Anniversary Bash in Minnesota.
I found some footage y’all might be interested on this election-day-eve as I posed to a couple burning poli-poker questions to the pstars-patched host, Greg Raymer, asking:
Question 1: What does the PPA front man think of his sponsor blocking players in Washington State?
Question 2: Does libertarian @FossilMan think that internet gambling be allowed for poker-only, or does he feel that all games should be permitted in HR 2267?
Question 3: In Raymer’s opinion, should Indian Reservation casinos, such as the Shooting Star, feel threatened by legalized internet gambling?
After a night of partying and after-partying with the Heartland Poker crew, pretty excited to be celebrating their fifth anniversary, I am reporting (barely a)live from the two-day $1100 main event at the Shooting Star Casino at Mahnomen, MN. I’d rather be playing with @FossilMan, but my AK (er.. offsuit) short-stack jam didn’t hit vs 99 in a $250 Qualifier satellite.
Registration opened @ 2pm CT (noon Vegas-time). Cards get in the air shortly @ 4pm CST/2pm LV.
Play starts with a chip stack of 15000, with blinds at 100-100. Levels are 40 minutes.
Day 1 will play to the completion of 12 levels or after the bubble breaks, whichever comes first. Day 2 will begin @ 10am CST/8am LV. The final table will be televised.
Follow me on my cross-country poker road trip @scarlet_lv, with live-tweeting from @HPTpokertour‘s Shooting Star Casino main event.
I’m en route from Las Vegas to DC, taking the long way I guess you could say, and was driving over the state line of Wyoming => South Dakota when I got the following DM tweet:
@Pokerati to @scarlet_lv: “10/15 is Heartland’s 5th anniversary bash near Fargo ND. Think about going. I can hook u up.”
Fargo?, I thought. Really, DanM? It was about 600 miles in a completely different direction from where I was heading, but free booze …a party?  I quickly rerouted the Prius GPS to head northeast, and arrived in the city-of-the-distinct-accent late Monday night.
Yesterday afternoon, I ate some Thai with Jen Mastrud, GM and Director of PR for the Heartland Poker Tour, based here in Fargo, ND. Waiting for the mint-leaf spring rolls appetizer, we chatted about the festivities, upcoming Season VI and VII events, and some poker poli-biz topics as they relate to a nationwide, smaller-stakes operation such as the HPT.Â
Heartland’s currently in the middle of their Season VI Shooting Star Casino event in Mahnomen, MN (just across the North Dakota border), and Friday will be celebrating their 5th anniversary with a party hosted by Greg Raymer. @FossilMan will also be on hand playing some cash, and will compete in the 2-day $1100 Main Event, which final-tables on Sunday.
Scott Montgomery, 2008 November Niner … he has a bracelet now, but presumably wasn’t wearing it this weekend when he says he got accosted by a knife-wielding bandit inside a Bellagio bathroom. (While taking a leak? That could make a difference in this sitch.)
With all due respect to Montgomery’s 5th place WSOP main-event finish and his donkament bracelet this summer, he’s clearly no Greg Raymer. Montgomery declined his assailant’s implied invitation to brawl for money, and instead simply handed him $2,000 in cash (mo chips?) … yeow, what does it say about the economy when Bellagio doesn’t have armed shoe-shine guys on duty?
Montgomery was at Bellagio to play in a Festa al Lago preliminary event and went to the bathroom on a break from the tournament. As he described it on his Twitter account, “Got mugged today at Bellagio. Black guy pulled a knife on me in the restroom. I gave him the $2k in my wallet and he left.â€
“I called security, but they took like 15 mins so they didn’t catch him. They are useless twits. Didn’t even ask me to look at camera footage,†Montgomery continued. “Security pretty much just said oh well, life sucks, have a nice day. I’m pretty annoyed.â€
Bellagio Poker ≈ Binion’s Self Park?
Though two instances (that we heard about) over the span of nearly 6 years hardly constitute a trend, you just don’t expect certain kinds of violence in luxe resorts with multiple guards outside the parking garage looking for casually waving through possible Al Qaeda terrorists. I mean what is center-Strip, not dark-alley downtown Vegas or daytime Berlin!
But it was indeed at Bellagio — during the 5-diamond — where armed robbers discovered not all bracelet-winning poker players were easy marks. In that situation, December 2004, Greg Raymer, poker’s newest big world champ, fought off two attackers with guns. According to reports, they got away, too (as security let them pass) … however, were caught some five months later in California, and brought back to Las Vegas for trial. (I believe sentenced to something like 3 years, not sure though …)
Pokerati PSA: Remember, next time you’re being attacked in the Bellagio or anywhere in Vegas really, you can tweet for help @LVMPD, hashtag #911.
Beau Rivage Gulf Coast Poker Championship, Biloxi, MS :: Chad Brown holds the chip lead at final table of their $5,000 main event. Winner earns over $177,000 and 2011 Southern Poker Championship seat. BeauPoker Twitter
Commerce Holdem Series :: Guarantees in weekend tournaments go 1 for 2 as series enters week 2. Commerce Tournaments
PokerStars’ WCOOP continues with three more events today. PokerStars Blog.
World Poker Open underway at London’s Palm Beach Casino. Phil Laak defending champion of made-for-TV event, 48 players vying for $200,000 first place money. World Poker Open updates
One of the biggest non-major tournament series of the year is underway in Thackerville, Oklahoma, promising $3 million in guarantees. “The River” — hosted by Greg Raymer and the historically storied WinStar tribe — is 9 events spread across two weeks, Aug 23-Sep 6. They’ve got some sort of overall points leader prize for a Porsche Cayenne overlay, too, worth $70k.
Today’s event, Event #3, happens to be $440 NLH/PLO with $40k Guaranteed. Wonder if they’re aware that Lev Serzhenko was recently crowned the World Champion of $230 NLH/PLO with a Single $200 Rebuy.
Since the main here will be more or less the regional championship in my old stomping grounds — in fact, thinking we might-should call it the North-North Texas Championship in future posts — I find myself wanting to follow these events uniquely as a fan. I’ve got tons of friends playing and would expect to see plenty of past opponents from the Dallas underground, presumably some Batfaces, lots of ole Lodge amateurs, and, I hope, a few Team Pokerati players. Also curious to see what type of pros show up.
But semi-live coverage of the River is hard to come by. Lots of future thoughts on why that is … but in the meantime, here’s where I’ll be checking for River buzz, for starters …
And because Pokerati can’t be there this year (but kinda-sorta would like to be) here are some possible news stories I see shaking out, or at least stuff worth looking into for anyone who might wanna ask some questions or snap pics with their iPhone and send an email or an @reply on Twitter:
With the markup of HR 2267 scheduled during the House Financial Services Committee today, Greg Raymer appeared on Fox Business to discuss regulating and licensing Internet poker. Video of Raymer’s appearance now appears below:
NOTE: Registration for day 1c will reopen Tuesday at 4:40pm PT, while registration for day 1d reopens Wednesday at 4:40pm PT.
Day1a recap
Day 1a of the Main Event got underway after Greg Raymer gave the command to “shuffle up and deal” shortly after 12pm on Monday to the 1,125 player throng, mostly seated in the Amazon room. The Pavilion room had a few tables at the start, but they were the first to be broken and moved into the Amazon room. Raymer was the first big name to be eliminated yesterday, crippled when he moved in with a flush draw against his opponent’s flopped set of tens. The flush didn’t get there, and he was gone a few hands later. During the day he would be followed out the door by notables such as T.J. Cloutier, Victor Ramdin, Isaac Haxton, Chino Rheem, Nick Schulman, Mike Caro, Ray Romano, Billy Baxter and Jimmy Fricke.
When play ended in the middle of level five, 762 players will return Friday afternoon for day 2a with the survivors from Wednesday’s day 1c field. The day 1a leader is British pro James Mitchell Corwin Cole with 241,075 228,200 in chips. Michael Mizrachi is 4th in chips with 142,650, with others near the top of the leaderboard including Barry Shulman (113,325), Chris Moneymaker (107,425), John Hennigan (95,050), Maria Ho (90,700), Scott Seiver (80,100), Vince Van Patten (75,450) Dwyte Pilgrim (68,775), Lacey Jones (67,600), Rene Angelil (52,275) and Matt Glantz (44,000) . The full list of chip counts is now available at wsop.com.
Day 1b preview
Today’s 1b field will bring another crowd of 1,000+ players to the Rio, each holding their $10,000 lottery ticket, hoping for a big payday. Follow all the updates, chip counts and other excitement over at wsop.com, or follow Dan’s lists of Twitterers.
Monday also meant the conclusion of the last two preliminary bracelet events:
Vonk valiant, wins 1000 NL bracelet
The final $1,000 No-Limit Holdem of this year’s WSOP was won by the Netherlands Marcel Vonk as he defeated David Peters heads-up, earning $570,960. Peters earned $350,803 for his runner-up finish, with England’s Paul Kerr in third for $255,076. Full results and Nolan Dalla’s tournament report at wsop.com.
Tomer wins final prelim bracelet
The $2,500 No-Limit Holdem came to an end earlier this morning with Tomer Berda with holding all the chips as he overcame a 2-1 chip deficit against Vladimir Kochelaevskiy heads-up, pocketing a cool $825,976. Kochelaevskiy will receive $510,939 for the second place finish. Full results and Dalla’s tournament report at wsop.com.
Our Pokerati player/parking-lot-correspondent crew is still at it, trying to win their way into the main event while keeping you up to date about the most compelling vehicular storylines at the 2010 WSOP. The driver of this SUV, spotted in the Rio’s WSOP valet lot, did not survive Day 1A, and in fact was the first former main event champion eliminated in 2010.
Long drive back home to Raleigh, I’d presume. (Think poker players honk at him along the way?)
JoeOE18: Had a great session with Deus Ex. Then got to another boss. Contemplating giving up and moving on to something fun. Wish there were cheats. 20 hours ago
![](http://pokerati.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/la-sengphet-win.jpg" "la")
