Poker2Nite inked a deal for a second season of the poker-news-talk-variety show presented by UB.net, featuring Scott Huff, Joe Stapleton, and Joe Sebok. After a start-up run on FoxSports — and seen regularly on Pokerati — season 2 will run for 12 episodes on the Versus network … Versus was formerly the Outdoor Life Network before rebranding itself as a sports and lifestyle channel in late 2008. This seems to be in line with their development of slightly non-traditional sports programming.

We’ll see how any new embedding options work, and what else may or may not change with the new channel. But glad to see the industry still able to support two semi-independent poker television news shows … the other, of course, being ESPNs The Inside Deal presented by PokerStars.

The new season begins on Wednesday, March 3, supposedly at 11 pm … though I am thinking that must be Eastern Time since the Cox Las Vegas listings say it airs at 8 pm and re-airs on Fridays at 2:30 pm. Channel 38.

And a little bubbling-under semi-related to the show … Cohost Sebok says he tried to buy out of his face-tattoo prop bet with Gavin Smith and Jeff Madsen, but they wouldn’t accept … which you know how that works … makes him the odds-on favorite to win the permanent lasts-longer bet for the LAPC main event.

I like PokerNews’ globetrotting on-camera chick Gloria Balding’s Top 5 thingies …

This go-round she tackles some of the challenges of international travel that are unique to poker players jetsetting into and out of action … and specifically the need for a good poker face when moving through Customs.

I gotta say, @Phil_Hellmuth really is turning into one of the best poker reporters out there … I read his blog, follow his tweets and generally occasionally love his vids; you can tell he is actively working on his 21st-century media game.

Most recently, at his own TASER Foundation charity tourney in Phoenix — the biggest high-society charity poker shindig of the year in Arizona — he was there to report on Brandon Cantu’s being shot with a taser gun … Cantu was paying off a prop-bet he lost at last year’s event with Clonie Gowen.

Damn, ouch … but cool … didn’t realize you could bounce back so quickly from those things.

BTW, an extra-funny … @DonkeyBomber was there as one of the “star poker players” who help make the event extra fun for the Big Charity donors who play … but even on his home turf, our favorite business-exec-turned-author-turned-2007-WSOP-POY-turned-struggling-poker-pro is no Layne Flack or even Roy Winston:

More…

photo: PokerStarsBlog.com

For a good bio, check out this good old-fashioned newspaper article about Joe Cada, the reigning poker hero of Metro Detroit … written before they knew he’d be the one playing heads-up against Darvin Moon. It’s been a wild ride, he says, since making the November Nine — one that ended with a $150k losing streak leading up to the big dance.

Here’s an interview PokerStars did with “the kid” (now “the comeback kid” in Stars parlance) — who started his career as on all-American online pro at age 18 shortly before the start of this weekend’s great-big sit-n-go:

Coulda told you all along he was gonna win it. (I know he hasn’t yet, but still …) Looking back at some emails with The Poker Beat crew (we were tossing around the idea of an on-air prop-bet) … sure enough, Cada was the dude I picked! Joey Stapleton apparently saw something in “the kid”, too:

(Note: You don’t see the other guys’ picks because I mucked things up by showing mine to soon. I also thought Darvin Moon’s name was “Garvin” at the time.)

More…

As the November 9->2 comes to a close, Pauly and I evaluate the make-up (TV- and industry-wise) of the Final Three … and when Antoine Saout goes down, a double-crushed Benjo finds himself baffled by Joe Cada yet still tickled that his countryman’s play allowed him to lock himself in a giant room for 17+ hours to witness this final table spectaculaire.

Episode 7: The Final 3

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Episode 8: Wave the Flag

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Not to get all Lady Gaga over Phil Ivey … but seriously, the dude who’s only the third-biggest tournament winner in history seldom speaks to anyone not engaged in some sort of gamble with him for more than 30 seconds at a time. But he sat down for nearly 9 minutes with Poker.se and tells what it took to develop his game (15-16 hrs/day, 4-5 yrs), how rough it is to make it as a pro, bankroll management, the importance of Bobby’s Room during the WSOP, his bracelet prop-bet odds, November Nine preparation, etc.

via PokerNews

He’s not broke, he swears, but he is, like everyone, way more money-minded than before … because he has to be! You have no idea how much a prop bet against Phil Ivey can affect the price of a barrel of oil.

Phil Hellmuth sat down for an hour with PokerTube.com the other day (an hoouuurrr), and while most of it’s gag-worthy, I did find his explanation of bankroll management and his personal cash sitch interesting:

He really really really wants you to buy his stuff at PokerBrat.com.

I’m watching it, for the first time. ESPN just did the sidebar piece on Justin Bonomo’s prop bet on one of the 40something players living in Panorama Towers winning a bracelet. (Does anyone know if he won that bet? I’m sure Panorama Towers had at least as many final tables as Denmark.) Greg Raymer just busted out … Norman Chad’s same ole shtick seems fresh, not tired … and the poker itself is good.

I gotta say, like the way the 2009 season is starting … I could see a few people getting hooked during a weekend marathon. Go ESPN. I think my reluctance to give a shit about first airings might say more about an evolving desire to watch TV podcast-style, at one’s own convenience, than it does about non-excitement for what is clearly a great poker show. Well shot, well edited.

MORE: The cutover to the Champions Invitational … with Raymer coming over after busting out in third, to take a seat amongst a bunch of recognizable-to-grandma champions … nice! Seriously, semi-interested in that tourney now. (If only it had more money at stake.)

As you know, Poker Shrink put together a little pool amongst a handful of media making our picks for the final table with 64 players left. Here’s the complete list of who picked whom, and who stands to win the $320 winner-take-all:

More…

How smart are we? Wait…That’s a loaded question. Rephrase: How close can we come to predicting the November Nine?

We shall see! The Poker Shrink is putting the poker media to the test by encouraging our degeneracy asking us to bet on our picks for the November Nine. With 64 players remaining, some media members are picking our favorites/randoms to go all the way over the next two days at the WSOP. Who are we to shy away from a challenge?

Jen’s Picks:

Dennis Phillips
Phil Ivey
Billy Kopp
Ben Lamb
Ludovic Lacay
Leo Margets
Tom Schneider
Nick Maimone
Andrew Lichtenberger

Dan’s Picks:

Phil Ivey
Tom Schneider
Tommy Vedes
Antonio Esfandiari (Go Iran!)
Ludovic Lacay
Eugene Katchalov
Ben Lamb
Andrew Lichtenberger
James Akenhead

Kevin’s picks:

Billy Kopp
Phil Ivey
Jeff Shulman
Eugene Katchalov
Tom Schneider
Andrew Lichtenberger
Jeff Duvall
Nick Maimone
Ludovic Lacay

Seen on a coffee table in Pokerstarzistan’s WSOP embassy (aka Joe Hachem’s “Champion’s Lounge”) … a new edition of All In Magazine (where I got my poker-media start):

Huh. We kinda figured “the world’s leading poker magazine” had lost the All-In lasts-longest bet to the energy drink. I guess not. Expect some reverse payouts in a few dead-or-alive props, too.

Phil Ivey, as we know, may be the most marketable player in poker, yet he seems to be settling in to his role as multi-bracelet, camera-dodging recluse. Thus far succeeding at keeping himself off the ESPN featured table until November — when really, he’ll have no say — he looks to be a real main event threat, sitting pretty going into Day 4 with 341,000 chips. That’s kinda what today’s all about — to see who’s really here to play, or more precisely, contend.

Tina from PokerRoad tracked him down in his private RV while he was on dinner break of Day 2b, when he had less than half that many chips, and got a minute with him where he explained why he played fewer tourneys in the latter stretch of the WSOP … and acknowledges that yes, he coughed back at least one of his big bracelet bets on the $50k HORSE:

They were at 152 teams as of about five hours ago registered for the July 12-13 Dream Team Poker event. This makes it already the largest Dream Team event ever, already …granted it will be only their third, but still …

I think for the Caesar’s tourney a few months ago, they had about 95 pre-regs, and ended up with something like 144 teams total. By that math, it looks like it should be a pretty close call on the over/under of 300 … but I still like the over.

Working toward that side is that it’s such a fun, relatively inexpensive event that only takes one person to really want to play in it for them to get three players. Working against: a lot of folks want to get the hell out of Vegas (and specifically the Rio) as soon as they (or their home game loved ones) bust from the main event.

Today is the first day of the 2009 main event. I’m sticking to my guns and saying the field size will be anywhere from 3,000-12,000 and offering 10:1 odds on anything outside of that. Just made a wager on the over for 5,000 … easy. Anyone else wanna offer that line? Seriously, it’s such a wild guessing game, and yet in the end, why do I think it’s gonna be just a few hundred less or just a few hundred more than last year’s main event field of 6,844? People can get their money off of PokerStars, right?

Meanwhile, Team Pokerati final tableist Gregg Merkow won his main event seat last night … and now is trying to figure out the differences between Day 1A-1D:
via Facebook

Winner winner chicken dinner won my seat to the main event in mega sat. today but can’t decide what day to play fri,sat,sun or mon.

Good question. Though as Kevin points out the numbers will likely differ noticeably as the 96 hours that constitute Day 1 progress, is there really a difference in the types of fields you can expect on each day? One more donkey-filled than another, for example (and is that a good or bad thing, lol).

Choosing when to play, of course, is the first of many decisions that will be part of someone’s journey toward becoming the winner. But it may also be the least relevant and simply depend on the player and his or her life schedule.

Interesting evening at the Rio tonight…

“Miami” John Cernuto was spotted at the Rio today after being released from the hospital just days ago. When I finally caught up to him tonight, he said that he’s been playing cash games today but is not in tournament shape yet. He still holds out hope that he’ll feel well enough to play the main event, but he’s not sure.

As a side note, John appreciated the concern for his health in our Pokerati posts. Our message to John? Don’t collapse anymore, please! The controversy that ensues is interesting but…

In other news, a random walk down the hallway of the Rio found my favorite stalkee Nelly and friends leaving the cash games and being confronted by a group of drunk? people that struck up a conversation with the rap star. Someone challenged someone to a foot race, but after Nelly threw out betting numbers in the $20K range, talks quickly fell apart as Nelly got annoyed with the ridiculousness of the bet. With that, Nelly and his crew left the building through the back door.

I catch up with Pauly just before the end of Day 1 in $50k HORSE. As the good doctor and I celebrate our victories having bet the under on the projected field size for this event, Pauly breaks it down even further to explain the Warren Buffet method of prop-betting and his 40k+50k=300 formula for the 2009 WSOP.

But before you start thinking Pauly is smart, consider his thoughts on the connection between the Mark Sanford affair and Michael Jackson’s death … which is the model he uses to surmise that the God Save the Queen anthem fiasco might actually just have been a cover to distract from the real stories about the significance of losing a third of the starting field size in an event that’s supposed to be one of the biggest deals of the year in all of poker.

presented by:

Tao of Pokerati at the 40th WSOP
Las Vegas, NV

Episode 11.24: Running Numbers
3:30

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Episode 11.25: Tinfoil HORSE
3:52

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A little smoking area convo with Dutch Boyd (after a heads-up from @robertgoldfarb) led to this little tidbit. Dutch Boyd and Roy Winston supposedly made a $5,000 prop bet at the 2008 WSOP regarding to Player of the Year points. Boyd supposedly won the bet, and when it came time to pay up at the start of the 2009 WSOP, Winston indicated that he would not pay.

Jen: “Did Winston specifically say he wasn’t going to pay you?”
Dutch: “Pretty much, yeah.”

And from his Twitter:

Feeling rather annoyed… A liitle short in the horse and Roy “the Oracle” Winston is welching on a 5k prop bet. Lame.

Methinks “The Oracle” didn’t anticipate Boyd would pursue this any further. Whoops.

From official WSOP reports … (with a WSOP historical info, Phil Ivey bio stuff, and post-game interview):

The Winner –

· The 2009 World Series of Poker $2,500 buy-in Omaha High-Low Split / Seven-Card Stud High-Low Split champion is Phil Ivey, from Las Vegas, NV.

· Ivey collected $220,538 for first place. He was also awarded his seventh WSOP gold bracelet.

· With this victory, Ivey joins Billy Baxter with seven WSOP titles, which ranks sixth on the all-time wins list. Remaining ahead of Ivey are Phil Hellmuth (11 wins), Doyle Brunson (10 wins), Johnny Chan (10 wins), Johnny Moss (9 wins), and Erik Seidel (8 wins).

· According to the official records, Ivey now has 7 wins, 19 final table appearances, and 33 in-the-money finishes at the WSOP.

· Ivey currently has $3,439,386 in WSOP winnings.

· Ivey won three of his WSOP gold bracelets at the 2002 WSOP.

· Ivey has never won a WSOP gold bracelet in Hold’em.

More…

As seen on wsop.pkr.com

Enjoy it while it lasts … here’re the last few hands of Phil Ivey’s winning his bracelet (and more prop bets) last night. I really just wanted to share with you all Micon and Jimmy Fricke’s winner’s interview (the last couple minutes of the above vid), but the video portion isn’t showing on WSOP.com, and the Bluff site doesn’t have their embed options turned on, so you know … we figured we’d do them a favor and help spread this example of fine work covering what some consider too-boring-for-TV, lol.

Micon and Fricke do a pretty good job of explaining the game, and after it’s all over of talking to someone who doesn’t really like to talk with those who can’t gamble with him. They even get a little clarity on the Phil Ivey prop bets, confirming that indeed, as The Insider revealed on The Poker Beat, Ivey did accept a buyout when they were down to 3-handed in the 2-7 Lowball that required him to win a second bracelet to make good on the original bet.

UPDATE: Ah, Pokernews also got a minute with Ivey, too … and though he doesn’t give any clue to how much he really won yesterday, he does tell Melissa Castello that the price he was laying was 2.5 : 1.

For those who missed our debut special-for-the-WSOP Monday episode live, here’s the podcast … where The Poker Beat crew waxes poetic about Phil Ivey’s bracelet, Daniel Negreanu’s non-bracelet, non-Finnish national anthems, Ladies events, what makes an “online” player, and Joe Sebok’s lie detector prop bet over his knowledge of Beth Shak’s marital status or lack thereof. Also, Chops shows up to declare this World Series the “Year of the Brother” … or maybe it’s the Year of “tha Brothah” … but either way, leave it to the Entities to celebrate poker in all its multicultural greatness.

on PokerRoad

The Poker Beat
Caldwell, Michalski, Nemeth, Chops, Stapleton
6/08/09

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This episode, btw, marks my personal umpteenth appearance on The Poker Beat — making me the “last man standing” amongst hosts and panelists (Go free labor!) and the only guy to appear on every episode since the show’s inception. While that factoid may mark a certain pathos, I’d also like to point out that I am the only one — even with all those extra minutes — who has yet to be called out by the Insider for a factual misstatement.

That’s not to say I haven’t made any errors — made a big one about something really important a month ago, but I guess it just slipped by our wheezey, phlegmy ombudsman.

I’ve got a horse in the ladies event … Gabriela Hill, whom you can follow at @GabrielaHill. She’s not a Pokerati patch-wearer (yet) or anything, but I was the lone media representative to accept the very odd offer from her disgruntled former agent, @OliverTse.

Seriously, it was a strange prop bet offer … one deemed “unprofessional” by some, and made one other refer to Oliver as the Kim Jong Il of Poker. Though Oliver is Chinese, not Korean, the metaphor kinda sorta holds … because by all means he is sometimes an ostracized “player” in the industry, left to his own devices … and let’s face it: the guy would presumably love to get his hands on some nuclear weapons and wreak havoc on all who ever have tormented him since high school.

I’ll share with you more details of the wager itself as I learn to understand them. But basically – and these are the odds that just seemed too good to pass up on my end — if she’s still alive by the time I show up at the Rio, I’ll get my $10 back. If she makes it to the final table, I get $1,000. There are all sorts of other increased payment tiers along the way.

Though she probably doesn’t remember it, Gabriela Hill and I actually met last year — Oliver introduced us. At the time he told me (with extra emphasis on the rolled R’s) that she was a hot Latin American player. Good enough for me! This is her first ever WSOP bracelet event, apparently. Go Gabi Hill! You the girl!

(FYI, she has only like three followers on twitter, so click on over and become an “early adopter”.)

Meanwhile, as Gabriela’s working on building her stack in a way that makes Dan money! justifies her trip to another continent, we’ll also be following Gregg Merkow closely, as this longtime Pokerati fan — wielding a bankroll fueled at least in part by the high-roller contingent of Batfaces — has his best chance for a bracelet in as long as we can remember.

He’s the chip leader with 18 players left in $2,500 NLH. The short stack going in there, btw, is Phil Ivey … who hasn’t even showed up yet, but has already outlasted three players who started the day.

Click here to follow that action.

UPDATE: Merkow went out 9th. We swear his donning a Pokerati patch and the subsequent cooler effect was purely coincidental.

UPDATE: Supposedly Gabi is out, too. I hope you’re happy, Oliver!

It’s a special moment as Vitaly Lunkin, from Moscow, receives his bracelet for the $40k, and Benjo and Pauly are there to hear the first ever playing of Gosudarstvenny Gimn Rossiyskoy Federatsii, aka the “State Hymn of the Russian Federation” — while contemplating what a European bracelet and Harrah’s diamond card means for international relations. Meanwhile, yonder down the Rio hallway, two elderly Texans race their scooters on what reliable sources say is a $50,000 prop bet. But with Amarillo Slim on his comeback tour, did Doyle Brunson take a dive?

Tao of Pokerati at the 40th WSOP
Las Vegas, NV

Episode 11.9: Ruskies Win
3:03

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Episode 11.10: Scooter Race Action
6:51

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Dan joins Pauly at the Rio, where everyone’s settin’ up shop and getting the lay of the Amazon-ish land. In doing so, the podcastic duo begin scratching at the complex corporate relationships between Harrah’s, the WSOP, the Rio, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Bureau, technology, and strip clubs … but abandon attempts for bathroom humor to explore over-under prop-betting lines on the anticipated field size for the 40k, along with the World Series of Divorce.

With special appearances by Devilfish (trying to position himself as the Zac Efron of Poker?) and Change100.

Tao of Pokerati at the 40th WSOP
Las Vegas, NV

Episode 11.3: High School Musical
2:50

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Episode 11.4: Getting Pissy
3:19

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For a more verbose explanation of any and all WSOP shenanigans, don’t forget to get your daily fill of Dr. Pauly at Tao of Poker.

Your favorite intrepid degen journos are back for the 40th WSOP — and what better way to get poker’s version of summer camp started than with some festive prop-betting over a friendly game of bowls at the South Point Casino? Of course it doesn’t take long for old grievances to re-emerge, and by the 9th frame of the second game, Pauly and Dan engage in a battle of dirty tactics that serves as perfect preparation for the world of excuse-making, tilt-induction, substance abuse, and repressed homosexuality that they’re about to step into.

Tao of Pokerati at the 40th WSOP
Las Vegas, NV

Episode 11.1: How We Roll
2:42

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Episode 11.2: Questionable Tactics
2:57

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See the video here.

I hate this video … but it is what it is — bowling for dollars with Pauly and Jen:

Just to keep track of the prop betting that we’re willing to publicly acknowledge here’s how it’s broken down so far:

$60 from Dan -> Jen (for G’s to Gents payoff)
$30 from Jen -> Dan (for bowling, two games at $15 each)
$40 from Dan -> Pauly (for bowling, two games at $20 each)

Pending
Dan <-> Jen: $20 over/under on 300 teams at the Dream Team Poker event
Dan <-> Kevin: $100 that his team of ESPN fantasy scrubs can beat 6 of the 11 official selections

I blame it all on a text that put me on tilt for about four critical frames … regardless, to close out his most recent visit to Vegas, Pauly and I went bowling at the South Point casino for an intense heads-up match and some prop-betting education … and because he’s not on Facebook and we couldn’t wager status-update control, we had to play for cash:

Go Team (cont.)
Episode 10.7: Bowling for Dollars

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An interesting prop bet reportedly went down this weekend … good, clean, generally non-lethal fun between Clonie Gowen and Brandon Cantu.

I wasn’t there nor have I spoken to either of the principals, but reliable sources say it was a simple lasts-longest bet (at a Phil Hellmuth charity event for the Taser Foundation for Fallen Officers, at Fort McDowell Casino in Arizona) with the winner getting to tase the loser.

Um, OK.

As you probably know, these high-society fundraiser tourneys don’t exactly have the best blind structures. But they do have great gift bags, which at this event apparently came with gift certificates for taser guns. At one point Cantu supposedly had Clonie out-chipped like 5:1 … and she was getting really nervous. But he took a few bad beats and soon was out. So now Clonie gets to zap Cantu with 50,000 volts at the time and place of her choosing.

UPDATE: The authenticity of this report has been confirmed.

ALSO: Tase-Mania … and award-winning story on the greatness of high-voltage, police-force shocking.

Pauly and I have some side-action … on which dealer is going to deal the final hand.

I’ve got homegirl Linda Tran, of course (who goes on in the third down) and Lou the old white guy.

He’s got Jena Phillips (2008 WSOP Dealer of the Year, who’s on now, in the first level), and Anthony Shawn the black guy.

All bets are off if the young white guy ends up pitching the winner/loser.

We’re thinking of additional side action based on whether or not the last hand is a bad beat, bad call, or a straight-up winner with cards falling the way they’re supposed to.

UPDATE: We’ve learned only three dealers are in play — Jenna, Linda, and Lou. Advantage Michalski.

ALSO UPDATE: Pauly and Otis have way more prop bets going on the types of hands that will win and lose the money, whether or not the opening hands of levels will be walks, etc. This prop bet is merely a little extra action for Dr. Baller — but hey, I don’t mind competing on a JV level in this world! (This world of final table heads-up action prop bets; not this world Earth.)

I wasn’t the biggest supporter of the WSOP delayed final table. I had many reasons to be against it, but in the end, I assumed it wouldn’t be popular with the fans. I was about as right-on there as I have been with most of my prop bets.

The Penn & Teller Theater is packed tonight. Sure, there are a handful of friends and family members of the Demidov and Eastgate in the building, along with a smattering of poker pros like Chris Ferguson, Jamie Gold, Jeff Madsen, Chris Moneymaker, “Miami” John Cernuto, Cyndy Violette, and Erick Lindgren, but the vast majority of this crowd filling the place to (or dang close to) capacity are simply fans of the game. They’ve come here to see history on giant plasma screens, and despite not being able to actually see the table with their own eyes, they seem happy enough to simply be here.

Even Erick Lindgren, upon accepting his Player of the Year award before play began, noted that he was happy to see the theater filled with fans, though he sarcastically wondered aloud why they all came to see poker.

I’m going to go out on a short limb here and say that this delayed WSOP final table is a success. Consider this eating my words for being so quick to dismiss the idea many months ago.

First off, let me tiltily say I’m a little pissed at Tom, who paid our election bet via PokerStars. Granted, I told him that would be fine … after all, Tom is different from most people in the poker biz, in that he likes to pay off his debts as soon as possible … but as a non-frequent casher-outer on Stars, I didn’t know I couldn’t withdraw these recently deposited funds for 48 hours.

Total bullshit! Though I still for the life of me can’t see how this is any different from transferring funds via TD Ameritrade, it’s not cool to know these winnings are still at risk! I mean my goodness, an extra chunk of cash, right there just a few clicks away from games bigger than I usually play? How on earth could any reasonable degenerate be expected to resist?!?

The set-up below: I had been playing at this table for 15 or 20 minutes … started with $200, and my stack was at its session peak when the hand began. While my first mistake was probably even just being in the hand, this was 6-max NL, baby! Am I wrong to think this is a game of trying to out-felt each other? Grinding is for full tables, and limit … I knew what I was doing here.*

Ugh. So greedy. What’s even worse is pocket 9s is pretty much what I put him on … possibly the nut flush draw, but probably pocket 9s or 10s … even before the river hit. When it did, I quickly assessed the sitch and decided he didn’t have the straight flush, but then I just pretended that 99 also was unlikely. Pretending can’t generally be the right move. How hard, really, in wild-crazy shorthanded NL, should it have been to just call his first bet on the chance that he did indeed hit his two-outer?

* As I say this stuff, I really do believe it, but it really just doesn’t sound like it should be right.

Textual hand history below:

More…

5 am: The prop-betting evolves … as Pauly discovers (much to Benjo’s dismay) the Hungarian offshoot of lime tossing: trying to hit bums with apple cores. The ethically questionable game of skill comes up as Pauly is on prop-bet tilt after losing a scaled down apple bet. From there, the good doctor and his Euro-conscience debate what games of bum abuse may or may not be acceptable.

Book 3: Budapest (w/ Benjo)
Episode 3.4: Euro Core-tossing 3:17

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In case you missed the multi-network coverage last night of my prop-bet with Tom … I won! The main bet was an easy victory, but I had to sweat it out on the 5-percent point-spread sidebet.

But in the end, the American people have spoken — and I’d like to thank them for showing up in droves on my behalf. Though the exact number could change a bit — 3 percent of the vote is still uncounted — Pokerati is going to declare a full victory for Michalski over Schneider, as Obama is currently ahead of McCain in the nationwide popular vote by 6.071945 percent.

See, already the economy is looking up!

UPDATE: 6.149579 percent difference, with 98 percent reporting.

Prop bets among the international press break out at the EPT afterparty, and, of course, Benjo and Pauly are there to moderate/get in on the action. The big bet comes when Matt Showell challenges his PokerListings colleague Rod Stirzaker’s claim that he can eat 50 apples in 90 minutes. Legal concerns emerge (what’s the rule on a prop bet that leads to death?) before it turns into a scavenger hunt to find 50 edible Granny Smiths at 3:30am in Budapest.

Book 3: Budapest (w/ Benjo)
Episode 3.3: Competitive Apple Eating 4:08

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Sorry I’ve been a little out of pocket in recent days weeks months. But I got kinda hooked on election coverage. Dammit, promised myself four years ago that I wouldn’t get caught up in the BS-laden pre-election horse race coverage, but instead ended up making the biggest prop bet of my life about a month ago — $1,000 on Barack Obama.

Since then, I’ve spent my days and nights flipping news channels and scouring YouTube for funny/insightful political vids to send to that great online Deuce-to-Seven player, luvgamble, aka Donkey Bomber, aka Tom the Plumber. My original offer was $500 +3 points, and when given the opportunity for better odds without the points, I had to double my wager. (That’s just smart gambling, right?) So when the pundits are saying there’s a lot at stake this election … they ain’t kidding!

Tom’s an Arizona homer for McCain who’s been mass-forwarding easily disprovable, often hypocritical right-wing propaganda for about a year-and-a-half now — the sort that screams, imho, “Holy shit, is America really gonna put Hillary Clinton a black guy in there!?!” To be clear: I’m not saying luvgamble nor any of his email distro cronies are racists or sexists. I’m just saying they’re white … and probably don’t own any Dr. Dre.

And that’s why I felt (and still feel) that I had a better read on the election than he did.

More…

I offered “Shmom Schmeider” a sizable-to-me-but-big-blind-to-him wager on the outcome of the US presidential election. I even was willing to give up a few points on behalf of Obama, but he wanted to bet it straight up for “any amount” because he’s obviously a little bit of an Arizona homer with the hots for Sarah Palin … so, um, yeah, I’m thinking about borrowing some zeroes if ya know what I mean. So any of you with a few extra (tens-of?) thousands lying around, please be in touch.

He also probably doesn’t realize I have the inside scoop with the ongoing Pokerati presidential poll (to your right).

This might be the most thought you’ve given the “November Nine” thus far, that is, if you really take a look at the numbers in this post. And I hope you do and analyze it for me. Thanks.

Bodog has put up the odds for the 2008 WSOP final table, and it’s looking pretty good for my STL player, Dennis Phillips. Never mind that he’s the chip leader, but he’s a 3-1 favorite. Kelly Kim from Southern Cali isn’t looking too good with 25-1 odds, but he’s the short stack. As for the rest of the pack, I’m not sure how the odds were calculated, which makes it a good thing I’m not a sports bettor.

Here are the odds and chip counts as of July 25th:

Dennis Phillips (3-1) – 26,295,000 chips
Scott Montgomery (4-1) – 19,690,000 chips
Ivan Demidov (9-2) – 24,400,000 chips
Peter Eastgate (11-2) – 18,375,000 chips
David “Chino” Rheem (15/2) – 10,230,000 chips
Ylon Schwartz (8-1) – 12,525,000 chips
Darus Suharto (17-2) – 12,520,000 chips
Craig Marquis (10-1) – 10,210,000 chips
Kelly Kim (25-1) – 2,620,000 chips

And just for kicks, here is a picture of them all. You are welcome to copy and use it as your screen saver, or you can Photoshop them all into pretty dresses – your call.

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

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

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photo: Aaron Hendrix / The Poker Mentor

It’s clear Phil Ivey is a problem gambler. The question is whether he’s a problem for casinos and his prop bet opponents or himself. One well-respected ambassadorial poker friend of Ivey’s has said he worries that Phil is too into gambling — to the extent that he doesn’t really have the time of day for anyone who isn’t up for a big-money wager. And this year one of his Full Tilt cronies has reportedly said that if he keeps up the prop bets at his current pace, he’ll be broke in two years.

Yeow, I don’t know Ivey’s real numbers, but his friend who said the latter certainly knows a thing or 12 about going broke. The dollar amounts circulating for Ivey’s off-table wagers are $2 million. On two separate wagers — one about whether or not he will win a bracelet, and the other on the outcome of the Laker-Celtics series. Supposedly Ivey has $2 million riding on the LA winning the NBA Championship. Not sure if I believe it of course — just seems a little coincidental that both his big bets would tally $2mm on the dot … but maybe … regardless, a lot of people saw Ivey auditioning to be the next Spike Lee courtside at Game 1, and yesterday, Game 3/Day 1 of a $2,000 Limit Hold’em event, it was very apparent that he had a lot of something riding on the outcome.

During the tournament, Ivey had no problem convincing the floor to replace the big-screen tournament clock with the basketball game, and his opponents at this table got a rare glimpse of Phil without his usual inscrutable poker face (as Daniel Negreanu occasionally popped by to laugh).

ALT HED: I Like Big Bets!

Phil Ivey’s Laker Tells
Photos by Benjo:

Mike Matusow is shrinking.

Due to a $100K weight loss bet with Ted Forrest, he has been dieting and losing weight recently. Mike showed up today at the WSOP as a fraction of his former self. He is thinner for sure, but whether he lost the actual 60 pounds required to win the bet is unknown. As of a few days ago, he was a few pounds short. Hope he made it.

One thing he didn’t lose is his voice and his erratic behavior. Weight loss is evidently not a cure for ADD.

Bluffing hasn’t gone well for me lately … just curious if anyone would believe me if I told them I lost a big shirts vs. skins prop bet to Pauly:

Leftover example of a prop-bet loss — PokerStars EPT annoncetrix Kara Scott getting her bunny on in San Remo, Italy:

Isn’t the proper etiquette to wait two weeks when responding to a prop bet challenge via a blog post?

Ok, so in my defense, I was actually out-of-town when Karridy posted his challenge.  The 9 days since I’ve been back in town? Karridy stole my other defense – so I’ll just go with “I’m a slacker”.

With my timeliness out of the way – let’s get back to the challenge.

I’m definitely a “Hell Yeah!” for another prop-bet challenge.  The loser “has to wear a dress all the way to Vegas”?  I’m gonna go with a big “NO” on that part:

1. You already frequently wear a dress as a fill-in for: Dan’s lover Sang; and for Tom’s daughters.  How then is that a punishment to you when you lose?
2. Now that you’ve decided to play in more than one event – we are flying out to Vegas at separate times.  How will I get good video to share with everyone of your traveling to Vegas in a dress if we aren’t on the same flights?
3. The terms of the first prop-bet state that the loser of that bet would be the one issuing the rematch.  So – the initial terms should come from me.
4. I’ve proven I’m a good sport when it comes to the prop-bets:
   
   so I don’t want to hear any bitching from you about how you won’t be able to wear a dress.

The inspiration for my challenge hit me as I was reading Pokerati on my mobile device from the shitter my “other office”.  It got me thinking of an old Beyond The Table episode where I was lamenting of how I was the only one of the crew who was not attending the 2007 WSOP.  I declared then that I would attend the 2008 WSOP.  As things tended to do on BTT - the conversation then went down the drain… literally.  While there, I promised that I would interview people “Senator Craig” style from the safety of my own stall – asking questions like “Do you know who Tom Schneider is?”.  I think an even better idea is that the loser of our prop-bet has to conduct interviews from a restroom frequented by tournament players at the Rio, with the audio then posted on a public website.  Some, or all, of the interview questions would come from suggestions from our fellow pokerati.

Here then is my official challenge (we can haggle on further specifics in private):

• SitNGoSteve to play Karridy in a best of 7 heads up match in No Limit Hold ‘Em. 
• The matches must be completed before May 30th, 2008.
• The loser will conduct interviews from a bathroom located in the Rio hotel in Las Vegas that is frequented by WSOP 2008 players.
• The interview(s) must be conducted between May 30th, 2008 and July 7th, 2008.
• The loser must conduct the interview from within a closed bathroom stall – it is NOT sufficient to just ask questions while in the bathroom (i.e. while people are washing their hands).
• The interview questions will mainly be comprised of, but not limited to, suggestions from our fellow pokerati.  Karridy and SitNGoSteve will finalize the specific questions before traveling to Las Vegas for the WSOP 2008.
• The official interview list will contain no less than 5 and no more than 10 questions.
• An interviewee is defined as a person who has answered and responded to all of the pre-defined interview questions OR has at least responded to the majority of the questions.
• The loser will interview no less than 3 people and will produce no less than 15 minutes of audio of interviewees responses.  The only exception is as interrupted by security or law enforcement.
• The loser can NOT utilize any written materials to communicate with an interviewee.  i.e. no slipping paper under the stalls that say things like “I lost a bet and have to interview people in the bathroom”.
• The audio must be published to a publicly consumable website within 14 days of the loser returning home from Las Vegas.
• The audio must be of “acceptable” quality.  i.e. the loser should place their recording device below the bathroom stall divider to hear their interviewees responses clearly.
• The winner, or a pre-defined appointee of the winner, will be present in a capacity that will verify that the loser met and honored the spirit of the above terms.

What say you Karridy?

p.s. California Jen: Karridy only shared his sushi with you because he doesn’t really like Sushi – so that shouldn’t stop you from rooting for me to win!

Still no word from SnG Steve on whether or not he’s man enough to wear a dress.

I’m sure he’ll say that he was busy at work… Whatever. Stephen, if you’re truly afraid of the dress, you can always get iced out.

The rest of you haterz can get yo Poker Grillz HERE.

SnG Steve… You can run briskly walk, but you can’t hide.

It’s true … word just trickling in that Pokerati’s own Jennifer Newell, the self-proclaimed worst prop-bettor in the world (how else could she beat me in bowling and still end up losing money?) has broken her prop-bet cold streak by beating Change100 for a meal bill.

She’ll be giving a press conference with details about the feat shortly, I am sure.

I’d like to make a quick cheesy New Year’s toast to Pokerati for welcoming me to the site in the fall months of 2007. *Clink*

I also want to wish everyone a Happy New Year – much happiness, health, success, and all-around poker goodness in 2008!

As for Cali Jen’s New Year’s resolutions, let’s just say they include playing more poker, writing more about poker, learning to walk away from prop bets, and actually reading the 30-some-odd poker books that currently collect dust on my bookshelves. In my non-existent non-poker life, there are things on my resolution list like exercising, learning Italian for an upcoming trip, and studying world history. I know… Yawn.

Happy 2008, Everyone!

click to enlarge

From the creators of Life’s a Bluff.

While the WPT has been lounging working to host a tournament in Turks & Caicos this past week, they’ve also been documenting some prop bets through the live updates and video updates.

Side note: Kimberly Lansing has been in better form during this tournament – no rapping or other embarrassing less-than-professional antics. And so far, Layla Kayleigh has stayed away from the video camera and Kimberly while she’s schmoozing flirting working.

The prop bets, while common amongst poker players, are normally silly but not life-threatening… until now. Sean McCabe willing to pal around with sharks, even entice them with “chum” to increase the danger level, is swimming in the danger zone. I think they’ve gone too far.

The first big bet recorded (thanks to BJ Nemeth) in Turks took place yesterday, during a day off before the WPT final table. Matt Gianetti, a player from Austin, TX, took a $15k bet that was based on being able to stand in the deep end of the pool for 12 straight hours. He came out severely pruned but alive and well. No harm, no foul.

The second bet didn’t take place… yet. But the details of it are a bit disturbing. Mark Seif challenged Sean McCabe to stand shoulder-deep in the ocean for 24 hours. The bet was supposed to be for $100,000, but after discussing the risk of sharks and other dangerous ocean creatures, Mark was willing to place odds at 2-1 if he could toss blood and fish guts in the water surrounding Sean. Sean claimed to have the upper hand as a certified rescue diver, but they were arranging for a local doctor to be on call during the bet because of the dangers of the situation.

The bet actually fell apart because Mark finally became concerned about the safety issues involved, though Sean claims he is willing to take the bet if someone will put up the money.

Boys, boys, boys. Putting lives in danger? I understand the appeal of the money, but are these guys so hungry for action that they’ll step over that line? I may sound like their mother telling them not to run with those scissors, but someone is going to come close to death (or actually die) in one of these prop bets, and then they’ll be sorry.