A little poker gossip because sometimes in serious times we like the petty …

Melanie Iglesias vs. WPT (and QuadJacks?)
The guys at Quadjacks have called it “Flushgate” — and reportedly have received quite a bit of wrath from non-poker types over “the abrupt resignation of three Royal Flush girls” — 2010 Maxim Hometown Hottie winner and now MTV personality Melanie Iglesias, Michelle Banzer, and brand spankin’ new RF girl Mica Javier, who had only been on the job for a few weeks. The purging all went down last month right around the time of press announcements for the World Poker Tour’s new Season X … ooh, juicy! You could almost be certain somebody was gonna cry, if not more formally cry foul.

Catpacking in AC
We can only imagine how cut-throat that world can be — where looks absolutely are tied in with your success. Call us old-school here at Pokerati, Melanie is great and all, but she’s still no Lacey Jones, who recently did a lingerie photoshoot with power-model Katerina Van Derham. Meanwhile, here’s a new video featuring Lacey and Maria Ho helping Christina Lindley pick out a dress for her birthday party at the Borgata in Atlantic City this weekend … and New Jersey celeb-hunter Michael Berman interviews this threesome, being dubbed “the Cat Pack” here for the kickoff of WPT Borgata, where there may or may not be openings for three new Royal Flush Girls.

Auction Player?
Speaking of old school, Phil Hellmuth appeared last week on the A&E show Storage Wars — advising a group about strategy in their game of swag auctions, which apparently involves a combination of luck and skill. Not too familiar with that show … when do we get to hear someone say to Phil, “Going, going, gone!?”

Dealer’s Choice: From Poker to Pot
A relatively unknown poker player named Jim Rice is representing poker (whether he likes it or not) and pot on Survivor 23: South Pacific. Supposedly a pal (and business partner?) of Paul Wasicka’s, the 35-year-old from Chicago is now a medical marijuana dispenser in Colorado (woot!). His most recent cashes include a 3rd and a 23rd on the Heartland Poker Tour, this year and in 2008, respectively. And now with online poker more illegal than selling weed (in some US jurisdictions) … makes you wonder if certain poker pros would rather be Jim Rice or Jean-Robert Bellande.

Jack Black Rising or Falling Poker Celebrity?
There’s always new Hollywood celebrities getting in on poker — and hosting a charity tourney is often their first foray into niche hero-status and/or business opportunity around their personal poker addictions. Could Jack Black be the latest? The last-place finisher in the WPT’s 2009 Hollywood home game is hosting a charity tourney next month at the Commerce Casino in California, but otherwise still has much to prove before he becomes the next James Woods, whom you may recall back in 2004-05 kicked off his effort to become the Adam West of Poker.

Vegas Living: Closing Down Blush
The luxe but laid-back “boutique” nightclub Blush, at the Wynn, is closing after a four-year run. Ahhh … I remember this “ultra lounge” as the site of multiple VIP poker parties and the place where upon moving to Vegas I met a guy who explained to me the process of importing women to the US for a life of hooker-dom before having to excuse himself to go sell coke. But perhaps more famously, Blush is the place where Antonio Esfandiari “lost” a game of who’s got bigger ballers to Kobe Bryant — with the NBA star supposedly racking up a $21,000 champagne bill that had celebrity and sports media mocking some poker player being called “the magician” … even though he somehow got Kobe to pay for the last 15 bottles of Cristal.

Meanwhile, @KobeBryant’s Twitter account got suspended last week, and @MagicAntonio’s, who had a surprisingly similar number of followers, did not.

Once again wearing a patch would not bring the players good luck with Allen Bari being eliminated fifth place for $211,997. He was followed shortly by Abbey Daniels who took home $286,819.

The final three players would battle it out into the early hours of the morning before Justin Zaki, the last player from Florida, was eliminated. From there it only took Taylor Von Kriegenbergh 8 hands to finish off Curt Kohlberg for his first live win since hitting the circuit earlier this year.

Here is a look at how the final six finished with payouts:

1st: Taylor Von Kriegenbergh – $1,122,340
2nd: Curt Kohlberg – $586,109
3rd: Justin Zaki – $415,680
4th: Abbey Daniels – $286,819
5th: Allen Bari – $211,997
6th: Tommy Vedes – $166,272

Stop me if you have heard this before; Patch watch is over. After the elimination of Mike Sexton in Day Four it was assumed that the rest of the tournament would play out without a single player with a patch.

That was until James Mackey showed up with his fifth place stack wearing a Hero Poker Pro patch. It seems that wearing a patch may not be a good thing for these players as Mackey became the TV bubble boy when he was eliminated in 7th place by Taylor Von Kriegenbergh.

Von Kriegenbergh goes into Day Six with a 2.187 Million chip lead over Justin Zaki in second place. Von Kriegenbergh and Zaki will be joined by the four other final table members on Monday to battle it out for the $1,122,340 first place money. Here is a look at the remaining six with chip counts according to seat position.

Seat 1: Abbey Daniels – 2,192,000
Seat 2: Tommy Vedes – 1,570,000
Seat 3: Allen Bari – 1,984,000
Seat 4: Taylor Von Kriegenbergh – 4,384,000
Seat 5: Curt Kohlberg – 655,000
Seat 6: Justin Zaki – 2,197,000

With only six players left in the field and no Full Tilt representative on site to patch up players this possibly could be a final table without a patch. Check back with us for the final table report to see if the the plug was indeed pulled on patch watch after Day Five.

Although both players started out the day in the lower half of the leader board they only needed to outlast 6 players to make it to the money which they both managed. Clark would eventually be eliminated in 33rd place while his table mate Sexton managed a 27th place finish.

We caught up with Clark before he was eliminated to discuss Black Friday and how it is affecting his sponsorship deal. He declined to comment on anything exactly what he is being told but did tell us that he inquired about wearing his patch for the tournament and they told him to operate as normal when it came to that.

Coming back for Day Five is Blair Hinkle, who became the first player to win seven figures in a single tournament on Full Tilt back in March in the FTOPS Main event when he chopped three handed to receive $1,162,949.74, sits atop the leader board with 1,783,000. Catching up with Hinkle during a break he discussed his FTOPs score and told us that he had not moved the majority of his funds off Full Tilt before Black Friday. He did not seem overly concerned that he would have trouble getting the funds off site, but did state that it would be nice to just win this event for his second 7 figure score of 2011.

Day Six will start at noon today with 18 players playing down to the final 6 in the High Roller room of the Seminole Hard Rock Poker Room. With no patches left and no one left to patch up players when the final six are determined this will be the first WPT final table in some time without a single player wearing a patch. Maybe that is a sign to come for future events in this post Black Friday era.

Mike Sexton and Zachary Clark will be the only two players returning for Day Four wearing Party Poker and Doyle’s Room patches. Sexton returns with 192,000 while Clark is close to the bottom of the standings with 119,000.

It appears that if one of these two players do not reach the final table that the final six will be completely patchless since the representative for Full Tilt that usually ensures the two of the final six are patched is leaving on a flight on Saturday.

At the top of the leader board is Taylor VonKriegenbergh with 1,080,500. He is closely followed by the only female left in the field Abbey Daniels who has 1,016,500.

The players return to play down to the final 18 or for six levels on Saturday at noon.

With 406 players in the field today only 13 players were found wearing either a Full Tilt Poker or a Ultimate Bet patch. The one “big three” site that did not have a single patched up player was PokerStars, even though WPT regular and PokerStar Pro Jason Mercier was in the field.

Also in the field today not wearing their normal patch were Maria Ho (UB) and Antonio Esfandiari (Victory). The fact that these two are not wearing a patch for their respected site while Adam “roothlus” Levy (UB) and Jonathan Little (Victory) are patched up definitely creates more questions.

Here is a rundown of the players found in todays field that were wearing patches:

Since we are on the discussion of who is wearing what Tony Dunst, who is known for always being well dressed was not wearing his normal suit today due to a delay in dry cleaning. Instead he was wearing a V-Neck shirt and a pair of jeans. Dunst will be returning tomorrow, hopefully in his freshly cleaned suit, to grind out his short stack.

After 5 levels of play only 290 players remain with registration open until the start of play with Randy Dorfman at the top of the leaderboard with 160,000. Other players returning for day two are Vivek Rajkumar, Shannon Shorr, Annette Obstread, Mike Sexton, Kathy, Leibert, and Lauren Kling.

The players will return at 12 noon local time tomorrow for the start of day two of this six-day event to play another 5 levels.

World Series of Poker Main Event (Las Vegas, Nevada): Well, unless you’ve been living underneath a rock for the last four months, you know that the final table of the 2010 WSOP Main Event finally got back underway Saturday night, and did not disappoint as far as excitement goes. If you weren’t checking out Pokerati for some strange reason for your Main Event coverage you should definitely check out the work Michael Reed and Mark Gahagan were doing, as well as Dan and Pauly rattling off quite a few episodes of Tao of Pokerati.

Heads-up play between Jonathan Duhamel and John Racener will take place tonight (Monday) at 8 pm PT. Duhamel holds a substantial 6-1 chip lead over Racener, thanks to a hand with Joseph Cheong that will be discussed for a very long time amongst poker fans. The winner will receive $8.9 million, the third largest prize for a WSOP champion, trailing just Jamie Gold and Peter Eastgate. [WSOP]

Partouche Poker Tour Main Event (Cannes, France): The other table that came back from a months-long hiatus was the Main Event of the Partouche Poker Tour in Cannes. It should have been a “November Nine” for them as well, but when play resumed they were one player short.

German player Ali Tekintamgac was disqualified when tournament staff reviewed tapes from earlier in the tournament and discovered he was being tipped off to other players’ hands. He was working with people who obtained media credentials for the sole purpose of signaling Tekintamgac. This is not the first report of him allegedly cheating, as a post from several months ago on Two Plus Two apparently refers to a similar incident.

When they actually got underway, it was Vanessa Selbst beating out a fairly impressive final table that included Fabrice Soulier. Selbst took $1.8 million for her win, bringing her lifetime cashes to almost $4 million, and capping an impressive year that also saw her win the NAPT Mohegan Sun main event. [PokerStars Blog]

WPT Foxwoods (Mashantucket, Connecticut): It was almost a week ago now, but Jeffrey Forrest came out on top of a final table of impressive young players that included Tom Marchese, Nikolai Yakovenko, and Kevin Stammen. Forrest won $550,00 for his efforts, besting David Inselberg heads-up. [Foxwoods Live, WPT]

WPT Amneville (Amneville, France): Forrest wasn’t the only one to capture a WPT title this week. Sam El Sayed won the first ever WPT Amneville for just under $600,000. He also won a $25,000 seat to the WPT Championship at Bellagio, while second place finisher Franck Pepe settled for $320,000 and a $10,000 WPT Paris seat. [PartyPoker Blog]

MPCC Main Event (Lisboa, Macau): The PokerStars-affiliated Macau Poker Cup Championship held their main event this week as well, drawing 254 players. The final table featured players from seven different countries on four different continents, with Jilian Hasse of Germany winning the title and HK$1,064,000. [PokerStars Blog]

Caeser’s Classic (Las Vegas, Nevada): The Main Event of the month-long tournament series brought out quite a few of the local pros, as 290 players came out to play in this one. Among those making it into the money were Bryan Devonshire and Sorel Mizzi. Phillippe Boucher was the winner, beating a final table that included Blake Kelso and Justin Young for a first place payday just short of $60,000. [Cardplayer]

Elsewhere… Kurt Fraser of Schaumburg, IL won the HPT Tama in Tama Iowa for $75,000… Karina Jett already has one big buy-in out of the way as she won her seat in a charity event hosted at the Rio during the day off between nine-handed and heads-up play at the WSOP Main Event.

Online: “NickDandalos” channeled the Greek, beating Jason “strassa2″ Strasser on his way to winning the PokerStars Sunday Million and $195,000, while “salue” took down the $750K on FullTilt. Annette_15 finished second in FullTilt’s Sunday Mulligan.

Two of the bigger names, Hoyt Corkins and Jason Mercier, were the first two to hit the rail on Day 5. It took less than three hour-and-a-half levels to cut 12 in half and finish up the action for the day.

There is 36:18 remaining in Level 23, which is 4,000/12,000/24,000. The average stack is 1.21 million. Tom Marchese went wire to wire with the chip lead on Day 5.

Here are the chip counts heading into the final table:

1. Tom Marchese – 3,022,000
2. Jeff Forrest – 1,949,000
3. Mohsin Charania -1,024,000
4. Nikolai Yakovenko – 624,000
5. Dave Inselberg – 344,000
6. Kevin Stammen – 341,000

Play will resume at 4 pm Tuesday.

EPT Vienna (Vienna, Austria) Daniel Negreanu was chasing history Sunday, attempting to complete the third stage of the poker “triple crown” by adding an European Poker Tour title to his WSOP bracelets and WPT title. He was also in line to regain the top spot on the All-Time money list. He fell short of both of these goals, settling for 4th place and €175,000. Michael Eiler of Germany was your winner, banking €700,000 for his efforts. [PokerStars Blog]

WPT World Poker Finals (Foxwoods, Mashantucket, Connecticut) Just 12 players remain from the 242 who started. Play reached the money after more than three hours of hand-for-hand play Sunday. The slow start eliminated any possibility for a day off Monday for sleeping in … err, players recuperating before the final six get down to business Tuesday. Tom Marchese is the chip leader with over 1.8 million, almost twice that of second place. Jason Mercier, Sorel Mizzi and Hoyt Corkins are among those still in contention. You can find full chip counts and a recap here. [Foxwoods Live]

WSOP Circuit Midwest Regional Championship (Hammond, Indiana) The revamped World Series of Poker Circuit had its first big test as the first of four televised $10K Regional Championships was held this week. 226 players showed up to the Chicago-area Horseshoe Hammond, and the final table featured quite a few familiar names, including Shannon Shorr, Brandon Adams, David “Doc” Sands and Bernard Lee. Jim Anderson parlayed a seat he had won, which was added to the prize pool of a $200 event that he had won earlier in the series and turned it into $525,449. All nine players who made the final table have qualified for the million dollar freeroll that will award a bracelet to the winner at the end of the season. [WSOP]

WSOP-Circuit South Africa (Emerald Casino, South Africa) One of the quirks of the new WSOP Circuit schedule was a brand new stop in South Africa. Well an unofficial official stop that doesn’t count towards the $1 million dollar freeroll or award a ring, but a stop with quite a bit of money on the line nonetheless. Maria Ho finished sixth in this event, while the title was captured by Warren Zackey, who won $223,155 for his efforts. [Bluff South Africa]

ANZPT Darwin (Darwin, New Zealand) The biggest story of this Main Event had to be rapper cum poker player known simply as “Brotha D”. Danny Leaoasavaii, who captured the APPT Main Event in September, is the first to own a title on both the APPT and the ANZPT, as well as the first New Zealander to win on the ANZPT. The true test will come in the summer of 2011 as he looks to challenge Jeff Madsen and Prahlad Friedman as the best poker rapper in the game, which should be pretty anticlimactic. [PokerStars Blog]

Caeser’s Classic & Venetian Deep Stacks (Las Vegas, Nevada) Two tournament series’ with smaller buy-ins are now going strong in Las Vegas as the final Venetian Deep Stacks of the year has gotten underway. Action at Caeser’s is still going strong and attracting some interesting names. Among those who have made final tables in the last week are Barry Shulman (Event 13, 9th) and Kenna James (Event 16, 3rd).

In the Online World… There was some lack of name recognition in the Sunday Majors action, but don’t take that to mean that there wasn’t a whole boatload of money to be won. Amongst those who pocketed six figures were “Zareta” (PokerStars Sunday Million, $230,513), “chickface” (FullTilt $750K Guaranteed, $140,967), “Levan1971″ (PokerStars Sunday Warmup, $188,860) and my personal favorite, “monkeybudgie” (FullTilt Sunday Brawl, $106,737)

The 28 players that started the day quickly became 27, but after the redraw for the final three tables it would be over two hours before there would be another elimination, with the money bubble looming at 25. After another half hour or so of hand-for-hand play the bubble finally burst.

One of the early eliminations in the money was Gavin Smith, who lost a monster pot to end the previous day and never seemed to get traction on Day 4. Upon his exit, Gavin took quite a bit of the early afternoon rail with him. Josh Arieh, who had a lot of chips entering the day as well, fell victim to some unfortunate luck and was not long for the tournament today either.

Ronnie Bardah, who enjoyed a deep run in this year’s Main Event, got into the Halloween spirit by donning a wig for several hours during play today, which you can see here. He survived on the short stack for quite some time, earning a few double-ups before ultimately succumbing to the blinds.

There are still some big names in contention for this title. The chip leader heading into Day 5 is Tom Marchese with 1,832,000 but there are some heavy hitters chasing him including Jason Mercier, Sorel Mizzi, Hoyt Corkins, Kevin Stammen, and Mohsin Charania.

Play will resume at 12 pm Monday.

Chip Counts:

1. Tom Marchese 1,832,000
2. Jeff Forrest 979,000
3. Sorel Mizzi 789,000
4. Nikolai Yakovenko 690,000
5. Chris Bonita 610,000
6. Besnik Ziba 500,000
7. Keven Stammen 400,000
8. Hoyt Corkins 335,000
9. David Inselberg 331,000
10. Jason Mercier 322,000
11. Mohsin Charania 283,000
12. Ben Klier 269,000

Average Stack: 605,000

For more information on today’s action as well as live updates throughout the rest of the tournament visit foxwoodslive.com and worldpokertour.com.

With 25 spots paid, it’s likely to be a short trip into the money Sunday. Players will redraw after one more elimination as they get down to three tables.

Then the issue of time becomes the biggest factor, as the tournament is scheduled to finish on Tuesday. Depending on the pace of play on Sunday, there will either be a day off (if they get down to six) or a short play down to the final table.

The chip leader going into Sunday is Chris Hunichen with 714,000. Josh Arieh, Jason Mercier and Gavin Smith are all in the top ten heading into Day 4. Other notables remaining include Tom Marchese (249,000), Hoyt Corkins (239,000), Mike Beasley (120,000), Ronnie Bardah (112,000) and Kyle Bowker (70,000). The average chip count is 259,285

Play will resume at 12 pm.

Top Ten:

1. Chris Hunichen – 714,000
2. Nikolai Yakovenko – 580,000
3. Josh Arieh – 548,500
4. Ben Klier – 465,500
5. Keven Stammen – 387,000
6. Mohsin Charania – 349,000
7. Jeff Forrest – 342,500
8. Jason Mercier – 342,000
9. Gavin Smith – 307,500
10. Bryon Springer – 293,000

You can find the remainder of the chip counts and live updates during the action at foxwoodslive.com or worldpokertour.com

• The biggest money of the week was on the line at the Festa al Lago, the latest stop of Season 9 of the World Poker Tour. There were some heavy-hitting young guns that reached this final table, including Andy Frankenberger, who was coming off of a victory at the Legends of Poker. Randall Flowers managed to add “youngest two-time WPT winner” to an already impressive resume at the tender age of 22. Flowers, who banked $831,500 for his win, was also the youngest to win a WPT title, which he did in Barcelona before he even turned 21. [World Poker Tour]

• The $1,500 World Series of Poker Circuit at Horseshoe Hammond Main Event wrapped up early Monday morning, with the appropriately named Kurt Jewell snagging the circuit ring and $242,909. Amongst the notables at this final table were William Reynolds, who took third, and Bryan Devonshire taking seventh. The $10,000 Regional Championship, which will air on Versus, will get underway Monday. [WSOP]

• There are many different options for the members of the November Nine as they prepare for the WSOP final table. They could follow the major poker tours and play other big buy-in events, take a trip to clear their minds, or hire a coach to fine-tune their skills. Or, as in the case of Filippo Candio, they could get in amongst the grinders and play a $230 prelim event, in this case Event #1 at the Caesars Classic. Candio brought his A-Game in this one, reaching the final table in the 232 player field before falling just short in 3rd place, banking a cool$4,726. (The attached story is in Italian, so if you don’t have a knowledge of the language it might be time to crack out the Google translator, or maybe go old school and try Babelfish). [Tuttosport]

• Maybe Candio started a trend, as he wasn’t the only November Niner doing well in prelims. With the World Poker Finals Main Event (the next stop on the WPT) fast approaching, John Dolan made a deep run in a $1,500 event, eventually making a three-way deal and taking second place for $45,000. In a twist that might be more appropriate for Soccerati, ESPN Soccer commentator Adrian Healey took third place for $40,000. [Foxwoods Live]

• In the online world, Sorel Mizzi started things off early with a win in the PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up for $149,737.10. The biggest money of the day online was to be had in the $1.5 million guarantee, with “Bodog Ari” Engel making the final table and finishing seventh for $32,856; “ramondemon” won $246,424 for taking that one down. On the FullTilt side of things, “EatMyBluff8″ was the big winner in their $750,000 guarantee, winning $135,939.

• And just in time for Halloween, we have a tale from beyond the grave. The late, great Dean Martin made the final table in a recent Borgata $1,000 event. Although I always thought Atlantic City was more a Sinatra town. Oh well. [Cardplayer]

The winner of the £20,000 High Roller event was Team PokerStars pro Jose “Nacho” Barbero of Argentina, defeating Finland’s Jani Sointula heads-up, earning £556,000. This is the fourth PokerStars-sponsored tournament Barbero has won this year, after back-to-back LAPT Main Event wins and a France Poker Series win in May. The report for this event is also available at the PokerStars blog.

Elsewhere …

WSOP Circuit Southern Indiana, – Elizabeth, IN :: Samuel Serdard bested a field of 570 players in the $350 NL Holdem event, winning $47,171. The final table report is available at WSOP.com, with the full list of players who cashed listed here.

World Poker Tour :: Professional poker player Tony Dunst named “Raw Deal” host – WPT Press release

Day 2b eliminations

Day 2b got underway Saturday afternoon with Bruce Buffer, who finished with 160,000 in chips, offering the command to shuffle up and deal to the 2,700+ hopefuls at the Rio with varying chances of making it to Monday’s Day 3. Some of the notable names who won’t be returning include Phil Ivey, Todd and Doyle Brunson, Darvin Moon, Andy Bloch, Josh Arieh, Roy Winston, Orel Hershiser, Shannon Elizabeth, Sam Simon, John Phan, John Duthie, Chris Ferguson, and Team Pokerati/Loudmouth Poker sponsored pro Tom Schneider.

Day 2b survivors

After four levels of play, concluding in the middle of level nine, the unofficial chip leader is David Assouline from Canada with 387,800.
Notables also returning Monday include Vanessa Selbst (265,000), Archie Karas (242,700), Dan Bilzerian (216,600), Phil Galfond (195,400), Jason Mercier (186,300), Karina Jett (170,000), Eric Buchman (134,200) and Dan Harrington (114,500). The full list of the over 2,500 players returning to day 3 are available here, while the Day 3 table draw is now available.

WPT Bellagio Cup VI starts today

Saturday, the WPT held a press conference announcing various changes for the ninth season, with their first event in the US at the Bellagio starting today, Bellagio Cup VI. In a last-minute scheduling change, late registration is now available until Tuesday afternoon, with four 90-minute levels Sunday and Monday. Here’s an interview RawVegas.tv had with CEO Steve Heller and Kimberly Lansing:

Watch WPT CEO Steve Heller Comments on Recent Changes to the WPT on RawVegas.tv

UPDATE: Late registration for Bellagio Cup VI will now be open until the start of level 12 on Tuesday. Sunday and Monday will be five levels each day.

Day 2a eliminations

Day 2a of the Main Event saw the return of over 2,400 players filling the Amazon and Pavilion rooms at the Rio in Las Vegas, with the field playing four full levels. As can be expected during the Main Event, the eliminations happened at an accelerated pace. Among the notables who won’t return to the Rio with chips on Monday: Mike Sexton, John Hennigan, Tiffany Michelle, Antonio Esfandiari, Eli Elezra, Liz Lieu, Dennis Phillips, Greg Mueller, Sara Underwood, Dutch Boyd, Daniel Alaei, Ted Forrest, Carlos Mortensen and “Miami John” Cernuto, who didn’t return Friday afternoon due to illness and was blinded off.

Day 2a survivors

With play concluding halfway through level nine, a field of 1,200 will enjoy their weekend before returning to join the day 2b survivors as the field will be in the same tournament area for the first time on day 3 at 12pm Monday. The day 2a leader is Boulos Estafanous of Darien, Florida with 340,100 in chips. Other notables with a healthy chip stack include Johnny Chan (281,600), Tony Korfman (275,100), Patrik Antonius (258,600), Sammy Farha (226,500), Annie Duke (176,600), Padraig Parkinson (153,100), Joe Cada (122,400), Chris Moneymaker (104,000), Kathy Liebert (87,000), Scotty Nguyen (67,800), and Matt Savage (54,400). The full list of chip counts can be found at wsop.com, a partial table draw will also be linked here and on my Twitter account.

Saturday at 12pm, over 2,700 players make their way to the Rio for day 2b of the Main Event with half the field expected to be out the door by the time play concludes. Follow the action over at WSOP.com.

WPT Press Conference Saturday

Matt Savage takes advantage of his days off to hold a press conference at 11am at the Bellagio regarding the upcoming season of the WPT. The press conference will also be streamed over the Internet at Ustream.TV here. The first US event of WPT Season IX is the Bellagio Cup VI Main Event, starting Sunday.

Seat 1: Hasan Habib – 455,000
Seat 2: Phil Hellmuth – 1,433,000
Seat 3: Andy “BKiCe” Seth – 2,164,000
Seat 4: Matt Keikoan – 371,000
Seat 5: Mclean Karr – 1,112,000
Seat 6: Dan O’Brien – 1,129,000

Other big names who missed the final table: Scotty Nguyen (8th), “Miami John” Cernuto (11th), Nick Schulman (13th), Chau Giang (14th), and current WPT Player of the Year leader Faraz Jaka (18th). Live updates will be available from BJ Nemeth and the other good people over at the WorldPokerTour.com site.

In other news related to Hellmuth, Ultimate Bet has decided to cancel the 2010 Aruba Classic as they decided to expand their offerings online, including having a second Ultimate Bet Online Championship series each year.

9 November 2009

PartyGaming Plc
(“PartyGaming” or “the Company”)

Acquisition of World Poker Tour completed

PartyGaming, the world’s leading listed online gaming company, announces the completion of the acquisition of the business and substantially all of the assets of WPT Enterprises Inc. (“WPTE”) for a cash consideration of $12.3 million plus an additional minimum aggregate payment of $3m over the next three years relating to an ongoing revenue share agreement.

The assets being acquired include, inter alia:

· The World Poker Tour® brand, rights to a number of land-based events in the US and Europe and all other intellectual property rights associated with the World Poker Tour
· An extensive library of over 150 hours of poker programming that is broadcast in more than 150 countries
· The ClubWPT subscription poker offering that has more than 16,500 paying subscribers in 37 US states

Commenting on today’s announcement, Jim Ryan, PartyGaming Chief Executive Officer, said:

“This deal brings together two of the biggest brands in online and offline poker – www.PartyPoker.com and World Poker Tour – that we will market internationally to build our poker business. Our plans also include using the ClubWPT subscription platform to leverage our 12 million-strong US player database via a Party-branded website and the launch of a European WPT-branded poker and casino site. We are excited about the opportunities that WPT, a proven marketing channel for the Group, will create for PartyGaming, particularly if the US regulates and licenses online gaming.”

Steve Lipscomb, the founder of WPTE, said:

“PartyGaming has been an important partner for a number of years and we are confident that they will be an excellent manager of our brands in the future. Combining two of the pioneers and leaders in the poker and online gaming markets will create a strong vehicle for the WPT brand to continue its global expansion.”

WPT ENTERPRISES, INC. ANNOUNCES RESULTS OF SPECIAL MEETING OF STOCKHOLDERS

Los Angeles, California, November 1, 2009 — WPT Enterprises, Inc. (NASDAQ:WPTE) announced that, at a Special Meeting of Stockholders held on October 30, 2009 (the “Meeting”), stockholders approved the Asset Purchase Agreement (the “Agreement”) dated as of August 24, 2009, by and between WPTE and Peerless Media, Ltd (“Peerless”).

In the final vote count by the independent inspectors of election, 13,996,639 WPTE common shares (approximately 67.93 percent of the outstanding common shares) were represented at the Meeting, in person or by proxy, and the Agreement was approved by 85.28 percent of the shares voted and 57.93 percent of the shares outstanding.

The closing of the transaction is anticipated to occur in the early part of November 2009.

Additionally, on October 29, 2009 WPTE received a written offer from Mandalay Media to merge Mandalay Media with WPTE for the payment of cash and stock in Mandalay Media (the “Mandalay Proposal”). The board of directors of WPTE reviewed the Mandalay Proposal and concluded that it was not a Superior Proposal (as defined in the Agreement). On October 30, 2009, WPTE received a modified written offer from Mandalay Media (the “Modified Mandalay Proposal”). On October 31, 2009 the board of directors of WPTE reviewed the Modified Mandalay Proposal and concluded that it was not a Superior Proposal.

About WPTE

WPTE is one of the most recognized names in internationally televised gaming and entertainment with brand presence in land-based tournaments, television, online and mobile. WPTE has led innovation in the sport of poker since 2002, when it ignited the global poker boom with the creation of the World Poker Tour television show based on a series of high stakes poker tournaments. WPT is now broadcast globally. WPTE also offers a unique online subscription and sweepstakes-based poker club, ClubWPT.com, which operates in 38 states across the U.S. WPTE also participates in strategic brand license, partnership and sponsorship opportunities.

Safe Harbor for Forward-Looking Statements

The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 provides a “safe harbor” for forward-looking statements. Certain information included in this press release (as well as information included in oral statements or other written statements made or to be made by executive officers or directors of the Company) contains statements that are forward-looking, such as the timetable for completing the transaction. Such forward-looking information involves important risks and uncertainties that could significantly affect anticipated results in the future and, accordingly, such results may differ from those expressed in any forward-looking statements made by or on behalf of the Company. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the risk that the asset sale is not closed. For more information, review the Company’s filings with the SEC.

(Hat tip goes to Wicked Chops Poker for the story)

UPDATE: Mandalay’s offer increased to $36.5m Friday morning.

Prahlad Friedman Wins Million-Dollar Prize, Schaffel Takes Second

The final table of the $10,000 WPT Legends of Poker resumes at 4pm PT today, with November Niner Kevin Schaffel the chip leader at 2,234,000. Here’s how the rest of the final table will be seated:

1. Sam Stein – 743,000
2. Todd Terry – 2,219,000
3. Kevin Schaffel – 2,234,000
4. Prahlad Friedman – 1,476,000
5. Mike Krescanko – 1,209,000
6. Toto Leonidas – 580,000

Steven Begleiter, the other November Niner remaining from action on Tuesday, finished in 9th. Here’s what the final table is playing for:

1 $1,034,500
2 $471,670
3 $231,300
4 $144,600
5 $116,225
6 $89,220

BJ Nemeth and company will be providing hand by hand coverage of the final table on their live updates page.