Ed. Note: This post woulda been much more relevant and timely had it gone up yesterday, when it was written.

Despite slightly lower numbers, the WPT World Championship will still likely end up being one of the five biggest tournaments in the Milky Way this year … and Day 2 has just gotten underway. Pokerati would love to beyotch about not having access to the makeshift WPT TV studio at Bellagio to do our brand of non-chip coverage, but we’ve been invited to a WPT Party tonight with free food and booze, so we’re obviously all good with the status quo.

421 of 545 starting players remain … A few names that I’ll be paying attention to for various reasons, and where they stand in relation to their starting 50k chipstack include Carlos Mortenson (defending champ – 172,075), Tom Schneider (25,400), Clonie Gowen (93,975), Gregg Merkow (40,075), Nenad Medic (12,425), Rodeen Talebi (18,000), Ray Henson (89,550), and David Sklansky (41,050).

Click below to see how the whole pro-studded field shaped up as of noon-Pacific today, and click here to follow the action throughout Day 2.

More…

LAS VEGAS – Nope, you’re wrong. A six-handed final table is a…six-handed final table and Hoyt Corkins took it down. I’ve discussed my fantasy poker point system with LB at The Poker Biz, aka Wicked Chops Junior. None for me. Then he scolded me in front of everyone in the media room today for not reading your post. But hey, I’ve got money to lose.

And thanks for the kudos but I have been eliminated from the limit $3k NLH event. My high pocket pairs were up against a higher pocket pair every time. Just down right cold decked. My table was less than exciting but all around me sat Joe Sebok, Amir Vahedi, Annie Duke, JC Tran, Phil Hellmuth, Eric Seidel and David Sklansky.

FYI – This would typically be a comment; however, the comment feature is still unavailable.

Hello? Is anyone out there?

LAS VEGAS–Shuttergypsy sends word of an ado brewing yesterday between Clonie Gowen and Brandi Hawbacker, seated to her left. According to Gutshot (scroll all the way to the bottom) Clonie wasn’t too appreciative of the apparent coaching being given to Brandi (dubbed the Lindsay Lohan of Poker by Pauly) by master game theorist (and young-girl lover) David Sklansky.

For whatever reason, Clonie insisted it was not Sklansky but rather some random old guy — because surely Sklansky would never violate any terms of rules and etiquette, right? With all due respect to the original boom-era poker babe, I am willing to bet, oh, I dunno, how ’bout $250, that Clonie is so wrong. Not about the coaching, but about the identity of the bald and scruffy rail rooster, who looks very similar to this guy, shot by Shuttergyp last year wearing his lucky shirt:

Lest we forget that poker is going on in places other than Texas, Harrah’s has revised its payout structure for WSOP bracelet events. Donkey Bomber was just bitching about the the disappointment of his buddy Mike Wattel’s $300k payday (for 6th place in the WPT Championship) … and less than a week later the WSOP steps forth with a pro-friendly plan to differentiate itself from its biggest brand-name competition.

I know the pros like to say they are always trying to win, but really … they are trying to get the max return on their investment of time and money. So if you have, say, an 80 percent chance of winning $100k and a 5 percent chance of winning $1 million, what’s the better prize to go for? This is simple Deal or No Deal math, even according to Sklansky. Making the payouts a little less top-heavy hass gotta change at least a few players’ near-bubble strategy, no?

Harrah’s explanation of how the new payout system would have applied to last year’s main event field:

Overall, 846 players last year would have won substantially more money – in some case, more than double – what they collected in 2006. The top 27 players would have received less, however.

For example, the 2006 Main Event would have paid $22,266 for 873rd through 775th places, up from $14,605 or $15,512. Places 82 through 73 would have paid $126,173, up from $66,010. First place would have paid $10,028,715, down from $12 million, while second place would have been worth $5,442,769, compared with $6,105,900.

By the way, semi-related … interesting to see all the PartyPoker ads all over the (new and improved) official WSOP website.

I’ve got a fun little speaking gig this weekend — visiting the Beth Torah men’s club to talk poker.

Last year’s appearance went well — in fact, click here if you’ve got 90 minutes to kill listening to some questionable audio — but while regaling the breakfast crowd with poker-boom lore, home-game theory, and tales from the WSOP, I did stumble on one question … “Are there any Jewish poker pros?”

“Absolutely,” I said. “A lot of them. Like, um … uh … um … oh! Barry Greenstein! He’s Jewish, right? Wait, is it GreenSTEEN or GreenSTINE? I never remember.”

Oy.

More…

Seriously, c’mon … does this guy (right) look like a potentially predatory ephebophile to you?

So David Sklansky, author of The Theory of Poker, had a legally questionable fling with “Saura” … not knowing that she was a 16-year-old runaway. (Aww, that is so sweet … she just needed someone to take care of her.) Mad props to the Sklanster! I mean not for his bridging multiple generation gaps with his comforting arms and Mensa-like mental acuity, but for respecting the principles of open dialog on the internet to such an extreme that he’s letting his own forum serve as the, er, forum for his now-legal lass to share her societally questionable Lolita story. Great for free speech/traffic!

Here’s some of the Saura saga on 2+2.
And here’s some of what Sklansky himself has to say.

Perhaps fueled by the historic Brandi Hawbaker / Tom “Captain Stabbin'” Franklin thread, some 2+2 posters are having a field day attacking the dirty-old-pokerman du jour. I swear, by the tone of some of their posts, you’d think they were talking about this guy: … not this guy .

Fun related commentary at Neverwin, too, as you might expect.