NBC Heads-Up Championship was on today. Did anyone see it? I saw about 10 minutes of it — but I blinked so I missed Tom.

However, interestingly, I was watching it with a non-poker-player … and he was a little confused, thinking it was live. He seemed a little disturbed when I explained it was shot like 6 weeks ago or so. Then, unsolicited from me, he said, “Why don’t they show poker live? That would totally be sick. I would really get into it if it [were] live.”

“What you are saying is more interesting than you realize,” I said. “It’s kinda a hot topic right now.”

“So you already know the winner of this?” I nodded and he changed the channel to hockey.

Tomorrow be sure to watch the World Poker Tour on GSN. Tom is back to his old tricks finishing in fourth place and getting a full 10 seconds of TV time.

The BTT crew: Poker talk fused with gay jokes and fat commentary was all the rage in 2007.

Some of you have been wondering, why no new episodes of Beyond the Table? Tom, Karridy, and I have been wondering the same thing. It’s been a good run, and with drinks in the air, three guys who clearly love/hate the sounds of their own voices are calling it podcast quits.

Back when we started, our show about poker but not really about poker stood out as revolutionary in a sea of lame poker interviewcasts with questionable audio quality. Soon after iPod sales were booming as more and more of the world got hooked on downloading poker audio with funny intros and Angry Julie cameos. But Tom couldn’t handle the celebrity and Karridy developed a crack addiction lives got busy and producers for Beyond the Table fared about as well as drummers for Spinal Tap. The show hired Shamus at a fraction of a Cambodian farmer’s wage to pump up our numbers — did he ever get his T-shirt? — but with a new generation of poker podcasts getting better and stronger (Lou Kreiger, Gary Wise, 2+2, Pocket Fives, Ante Up, Poker Road, et al) old-school payola wasn’t enough to save us from going out on the podcast bubble.

Listen below to a heretofore unpublished episode (recorded on 2-27, my dream flop) as your favorite semi-amateur yammerers phone it in for the last and final-ish time:

Beyond the Table: Fin

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Thanks for listening via RSS, iTunes, play-in-popup, and direct download … we already miss ourselves.

You can still prank call Karridy on the Beyond the Table listener line at 888-820-8091.

Jonathan Little’s most recent accomplishment was making the “Elite 8″ in the NBC Heads-Up Championship, scoring a $75k payday before being slapped by eventual winner and Full Tilt honcho Chris Ferguson.

While account-sharing is hardly the worst offense when it comes to poker ethics, it is in violation of Full Tilt T&C’s for their pros. So Little, who’s FT stock was on the rise, is now out. Stupid kid Yo, bummer dude.

Confirmed by Full Tilt here.

When a player on Full Tilt Poker plays against and chats with a red pro on the site, it is imperative that they be able to trust that it is really the advertised pro playing the account. Given that Mr. Little violated that trust, we have decided to sever his ties to the site, and close his account.

The first well-known pro to get busted for online account-sharing was Phil Hellmuth (outed here, and confronted about it here).

After that, Howard Lederer reportedly sent out a memo to all the Full Tilt pros letting them know that if they ever did something similar, they would be canned immediately. Little wasn’t part of the team when that went down, so maybe he didn’t embrace the seriousness that Full Tilt places on its integrity. Gotta wonder if these sorts of indiscretions will occur more regularly as Full Tilt continues to sign up more and more pros. Also wonder how long Little’s FT page will stay up online.

Brick-and-mortar tournament success here.

Here are the final results for the last-minute bracket fun. We’ll have to do something more fancy with this next year. But for now, big congrats to Taylor Larkin, who miraculously got in the game late and managed to pick the most winners. Those whose names are semi-known around these parts did less well:

Rank Predictor Score Predicted Final Winner
1 Taylor Larkin – 58 Huck Seed
2 don essinger – 49 Allen Cunningham
3 champsampson – 49 Ted Forrest
4 Scott – 46 Daniel Negreanu
5 Randy Brown – 32 Phil Hellmuth
6 California Jen – 27 Scott Clements
7 Kevin Mathers – 24 Daniel Negreanu
8 dan michalski – 21 Howard Lederer

I’m out either $20 or $40.

ALT HED: Thanks for Playing

Well shoot, got scooped by my own peeps. I was-gonna surreptitiously pimp my own pimping by talking about the actual substance of the article by Gary Wise, and his suggestions for improving the selection process in the National Heads-Up Poker Championship, which could be an even bigger deal for NBC if they want it to be:

• Pick some of the players through pre-established criteria: WSOP champion, WSOP Champion one year removed, HORSE Champion, WSOP heads-up champion, WPT World Champion, WPT Player of the Year, Card Player Player of the Year, Bluff Magazine Player of the Year, European Poker Awards Player of the Year, EPT Grand Finale Champion, NHUPC Champion, NHUPC Champion one year removed. That should do it. Make these criteria available to the public.
• Continue to allow sponsors to fill some slots, but do so by having them submit a list of representatives with the understanding that the producers get to choose from that list. The producers could hand select, appoint a committee of poker people from across the industry or…
• Pick some of the players through fan vote: Want an old-schooler who reminds us of days of yore? Hey fans, come to our Web site and participate in the “rounders” vote for one of T.J. Cloutier, Billy Baxter, Jay Heimowitz or Berry Johnston. Pick two players from our “Big Game” election, two from our “online stars” election and one from our “divas of poker” election. At least this way, you’re getting representatives of each archetype the people actually want to see.
• Get rid of some of the personalities who haven’t done anything in years. Guys like Ferguson, Ivey, Daniel Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth and Doyle Brunson will give you an entertaining broadcast anyway.

Dr. Chris Ferguson and his support-posse rejoice behind a trophy, a watch (or is it a bracelet?), and a plateful of half-a-mil. Fabolosa on his lap.

He pushes all-in on a board of [cards]10c 3s 7s 7h[/cards]. (He’s holding [cards]js jc[/cards].) The audience — fewer than 80 people, but crammed together to make them look like more — jumps from their seats when Jordan announces the all-in and crowds around the mini-table. Andy Bloch thinks and thinks for several minutes, flips a two-headed quarter and calls with his [cards]10s 4s[/cards].

River is [cards]7c[/cards].

People are wondering about the call. I contend it woulda been the right decision had he gotten a better river.

Tom Dwan, aka Durrr, cracked Phil Hellmuth’s pocket aces with pocket 10s in the third hand of the opening round of the National Heads-Up Poker Championship … and now there is talk of a rematch for $100,000.

(Hellmuth already made about $90k from other players offering insurance on the hand while waiting for the flop.)

Phil wrote about the hand itself — and he’s right, Durrr made a bad play — unless of course the online phenom was possibly taking Chris Ferguson’s philosophy that worked against TJ Cloutier into account, which says that when you are outmatched it is mathematically in your interest to gamble. Anyhow, here’s Hellmuth’s recall of how the 2008 hand went down … and here are the terms of a potential rematch:

After I told him that I wouldn’t have lost $3,000 with 10-10–which is the truth–Durr handled himself with class, albeit he did what all the young guys do when they’re a bit insecure, he challenged me to play heads up for $100,000. Durr knew he played the hand poorly, and if he doesn’t know now, he will understand how bad a play he made in two or three years. Will I play him heads up in the real world? Absolutely! But on my terms. I don’t need the money, and I have nothing to gain from playing him heads up, whereas he does have something to gain. He could say that he beat me. Despite that, here are my terms: I will play him in the bay area, in a casino (his terms, and I echo them), during the daytime (like starting at noon), whenever I feel like it (I choose the date). I don’t need to play him, I crushed him in three hands on NBC!! He may have won the chips, but the world knows who really won the hand!!

Andy Bloch caught an ace on the river to best Huck Seed … so he moves on to what is theoretically his second-biggest heads-up match of his career (the first being the 2006 $50k HORSE finals against Chip Reese) vs. his longtime poker pal and Full Tilt cronie Chris Ferguson.

This matchup is also an East Coast vs. West Coast thing … pitting Dr. Ferguson’s game-theory upbringing and Ph.D. in computer science from UCLA against Bloch’s degree in electrical engineering from MIT and JD from Harvard Law … so let’s hope no one gets shot.

Chris Ferguson beat Phil Ivey when his pocket 8s held up against Ivey’s pocket 6s (who was drawing to a 6, 2, or 7 when they got it all in).

This makes it three-out-of-four years in the history of this event that Ferguson has made the finals, and puts him position to arguably claim to be the best heads-up player out there — though being Jesus-like he probably wouldn’t ever claim to be king of anything … as he tends to leave that sorta boasting to Hellmuth … who right now happens to be sitting between Ferguson and Orel Hersheiser, apparently relaying the story to Orel about how he crashed the race car into that pole that pole got in the way of his malfunctioning race car.

Andy Bloch and Huck Seed, meanwhile, are still engaged in a pretty sedate-but-heated battle that NBC may or may not realize is fascinating to the poker geeks out there even without the long hair, big mouths, and all-ins.

NBC Heads-Up Championship announcer Jordan Siegel, who may or may not have won the gig in a $1,000 Bellagio tourney.

The NBC heads-up announcer whom I was criticizing the other day for not acknowledging runner-runner possibilities and generally lacking a little excitement in his live play-by-play is Jordan Siegel, a semi-accomplished player in his own right, who seems to be runnin’ pretty good recently, too.

We’ll see if we can’t get a photo up here before it’s too late to be relevant so you know who I am talking about. I think he has been on TV once before.

Seriously, I wasn’t trying to pick too hard — a gig is a gig and we all want to do well, especially when the HD cameras are rolling — but this event, for all the excitement around it, is reportedly struggling in the eyes of NBC. And that has me thinkin’-bout soccer, which any real fan can tell you hasn’t quite taken off in America not because the sport isn’t exciting enough, but because the broadcasters and commentators don’t know how to cover it like not-basketball, or in this case not-golf.

ALT HED: I Hope He’s Not Related to Bugsy

The Final Four is set … and PokerStars, Ultimate Bet, and Bodog have all been fully eliminated. The upcoming matches:

Phil Ivey vs. Chris Ferguson
Huck Seed vs. Andy Bloch

Holy crap, it looks like it will be some actual hardcore competition amongst four notably accomplished players. Who woulda thunk it?

Also totally shocking commendable is that CardPlayer’s coverage is kicking butt …

More…

Orel Hersheiser and Minh Ly:

Hersheiser, of course, is proving to be the Gonzaga of the 2008 National Heads-Up Poker Championship. The final 8 tomorrow:

Jonathan Little vs. Chris Ferguson
Gus Hansen vs. Phil Ivey
Andy Bloch vs. Orel Hershisher
Huck Seed vs. David Benyamine

All of the above are guaranteed $75k. The final four make $125k, 2nd place gets $250k, and first is still $500,000.

Just about everyone’s brackets have fallen apart — though Gavin Smith is still throwing around the $2,000 wagers on the outcome of each game, and considering that I have no one left alive in my bracket, I gotta pretty much surrender my $20:

Rank Predictor Score Predicted Final Winner Completed
1 Taylor Larkin – 42 Huck Seed 2/29/2008 2:20pm
2 don essinger – 41 Allen Cunningham 2/29/2008 1:05pm
3 Scott – 38 Daniel Negreanu 2/29/2008 1:20pm
4 champsampson - 29 Ted Forrest 2/29/2008 1:39pm
5 Randy Brown – 24 Phil Hellmuth 2/29/2008 12:12pm
6 Kevin Mathers – 24 Daniel Negreanu 2/29/2008 12:32pm
7 California Jen – 23 Scott Clements 2/29/2008 9:43am
8 dan michalski – 21 Howard Lederer 2/29/2008 3:41am

Taylor, Don, and Scott seem to have quite a battle brewing … though it appears they may have made their picks after it got started? Floor!?!

So it was fun making picks … but not so fun to watch the results trickle in. Everyone’s talking about their brackets around Caesar’s Palace — lots of money being unofficially wagered as heads-up fans excitedly bemoan the upsets and sometimes gloat over the mental errors of others.

Gavin Smith: “How can you pick Howard to win a heads-up tournament?!? Pshaw!”

Um, I dunno, just a hunch? Thought he had worked through his game and had incentive to win? I was betting on uniforms. Below are the standings after the first round in the impromptu Pokerati bracket fun. Cali Jen, TBR, and I aren’t exactly representin’:

I think you still might be able to get in on the bracket action, fyi.

Rank Predictor Score Predicted Final Winner Completed
1 don essinger – 13 Allen Cunningham 2/29/2008 1:05pm
2 Scott – 13 Daniel Negreanu 2/29/2008 1:20pm
3 Taylor Larkin – 13 Huck Seed 2/29/2008 2:20pm
4 Kevin Mathers – 11 Daniel Negreanu 2/29/2008 12:32pm
5 champsampson – 11 Ted Forrest 2/29/2008 1:39pm
6 dan michalski – 9 Howard Lederer 2/29/2008 3:41am
7 California Jen – 9 Scott Clements 2/29/2008 9:43am
8 Randy Brown – 8 Phil Hellmuth 2/29/2008 12:12pm

Here’s where I’ll be continuing to follow the games tomorrow — even when I’m there, sitting a few seats away from CP‘s reporters in the rafters.

Yikes, of my final four, only one remains. Go Freddy Deeb!

6:45 — Johnathan Little d. Erik Seidel. “Plenty of awfully good players are going down,” says TJ Cloutier to Seidel.

6:46 — “Gavin Smith has moved all-in” [to quote the NBC announcer. “Gavin Smith with about 10,000. 10,300. Tom Schneider has the rest, Gavin smith moved in on the button, Tom Schneider makes a quick call.”

6:47 — TJ Cloutier, to friend: “Heh-heh, I got to go to a make-up appointment!”

6:51 — We’re still waiting for a flop. Robert Goldfarb can be seen across the room reading my text and not responding. I guess we both know the situation.

6:52 — Still waiting for the flop. Joe Hachem has come over to read Gavin’s copy of Tom’s book before Smith gets eliminated. Tom has AJ vs. Gavin Smith’s KJ. Flop is 2-3-4. Crowd is screaming for a king. “Only a king can help,” announcer says. “That’s not true,” a few of us think. 6 on the turn.

6:53 — 5 on the river. Chop-chop. Gavin Smith stays alive.

6:54 — Pokerati can’t stop thinking about how unexciting and technically inaccurate this announcer is and wondering what his presence might have to do with this events falling ratings last year (which were 15 percent smaller than the previous year’s showing).

6:55 — Pokerati removes its jump-to-conclusions subhed, which read “Tom moves on.”

6:57 — Gavin Smith all-in again, with 7-8o against Tom’s Q-Q. “He’s a lot more behind,” says the announcer. “A Gavin Smith race,” says Michael Craig. Flop comes K-5-6. Turn is a 9. Gavin takes the lead.

7:00 — Tom is all-in with 9-9 against Gavin’s Ac-10c. Flop is K-10-J. 8 on the turn. River is 5h.

7:01 — Tom is out after getting it all-in with the best hand three times in a row. Gotta love heads-up, especially for $20k!

7:03 — Matusow is all-in against Hachem, the announcer says “has to get a 4″ … and the audience and media start calling out a bunch of other turns and rivers that could help.