Paul Klann, WPT LAPC Champion
Photo: LAPCNews.com/WhoJedi

Today’s Boxscore

Paul Klann $1,004,090 – 2013 WPT LA Poker Classic
Jonathan Tamayo $206,020 – WSOPC Palm Beach Kennel Club
Rodger Johnson $182,315 – 2013 LAPC High Roller
Jon Turner $27,750 – 2013 LAPC 6-Handed PLO with rebuys

The 2013 LA Poker Classic wrapped up it’s Main Event last night with Paul Klann overcoming a big chip deficit against Paul Vople. The WPT LAPC drew 517 entrants this year which is another annual drop, from 549 a year ago, at one of the biggest stops on the tour. Klann collected over $1,000,000 for the win which includes the WPT Championship buyin, but 7-digits is much prettier than 6.

Next big tournaments on the schedule include the popular WTP Bay101 Shooting Stars event, the WSOP-C series at Caesars in Atlantic City, and the always huge Heartland Poker Tour in Blackhawk, Colorado.

Link Dump

Tweet(s) of the Day – Not everybody is in love with the Commerce Casino, David Bach is isn’t the first or last player to comment on some of the shadier aspects of playing there. I still standby the breakfast burritos at the Cafe.

I say this with reservation: because of course there are plenty of honorable people in poker. But…. This Commerce Casino is the:

— david bach (@gunslingerbach) February 28, 2013

Scumbag capital of Poker. I cannot count how many angles and examples of dishonesty I have seen here in my 3 week stay. Just Disgusted.

— david bach (@gunslingerbach) February 28, 2013

Epic Anniversary – One year ago FS+G filed for bankruptcy killing Epic Poker along the way with a bunch of unpaid invoices (yours truly included). It’s still a touchy subject with some of us but Short-stacked Shamus has a nice recap. Check back to his site later for some of his article I published on the Epic website

A Look at Poker’s Falling Fortune in Las Vegas – The sky is falling, the sky is falling! It’s either that or the Vegas poker rooms are feeling the crunch of the online poker crackdown. We’ll see what happens when new players can be pulled in via online poker when it returns.

Team PokerStars v Team Full Tilt: Don’t Believe the Hype – Daniel Negreanu “called out” Gus Hansen, now there will be a HU battle in London. Not nearly the big brouhaha as it would have been prior to Black Friday and the PS/FTP buyout.

Pretty Broad Podcast – Three favorites from PokerNews (Kristy Arnett, Lynn Gilmartin, and Sarah Grant) started their own website PrettyBroad.com. It’s a fun concept from a fun group who get to travel to great places around the globe. Give them a look and listen to their first full podcast.

URL-envy? FS+G apparently wanted to own all things epic, wicked and otherwise on the web.

Lawsuits and bankruptcies are a corporate voyeur’s dream. Legal disclosures offer an upskirt peak at a company’s financial panties. In the case of Federated Sports & Gaming, parent of the troubled Epic Poker League, bankruptcy filings reveal a full-fledged internet domain-name fetish. Literally hundreds of domain names were listed among Federated’s personal property … and in that list, perhaps, lies a bigger story about Epic’s intent.

Companies often buy variants of their own domain names to foil malicious cyber squatters and aid surfers prone to typos and spelling errors. This explains why Federated bought epicpoker.us, epicpoker.xxx, eepicpoker.com and eapicpoker.com along with its primary domain name, epicpoker.com. 

Perhaps proving Federated was more psychic than solvent, epicpokerfail.com and epicpokerfailure.com were among the company’s portfolio of web properties. Of course my favorite was fuckepicpoker.com.

And why epicpokerstars.com but no epicfulltiltpoker.com?

It’s hard to know whether names like epicbridge.com, epiccasino.com, epiccheckers.com and epicsportsbook.com represent Federated’s expansion plans, reveal a business model dependent on online gambling legalization, or was just the results of a bad case of domain-name OCD. 

The list goes on and on — everything from palmspoker.eu, .net, and .co.uk to epicscotch/rum/tequila.com — and you can only wonder what market verticals Epic was thinking about when they locked down ticklemedanny.com.

But particularly curious are dozens of web addresses starting with “wicked” — wickedpoker.com, wickedchess.com, wickedbasketball.com, etc. Since Federated isn’t based in Boston, this presumably has something to do with the talented boys over at Wicked Chops Poker. No wonder their coverage of the #EpicFail has been so … well … I hear they had to take last week off just to search for the near-NSFW pics to pair with their story of who ultimately got who’s what in the end.

Read the relevant bankruptcy court document here.

UPDATE: Wicked Chops apparently has more to say on this matter — and they’re naming names! Not just domain names, but real human ones too.

There’s a corporate rush like something that hasn’t been seen for a while in the casino industry — to secure and develop poker-related assets. After the Department of Justice’s quiet reinterpretation of the 1961 Wire Act, and subsequent political buzz it created , corporate gaming partners jumped into bed together faster than you can change a relationship status on Facebook.

• Kentucky-based horse racing and casino company Churchill Downs acquires the assets of Bluff Media.

• Caesars Entertainment extends its partnership with 888 Holdings.

• MGM, Boyd Gaming, and BwinParty looking for a wild poker three-way.

• Vegas-based ShuffleMaster dangling diamonds in front of OnGame Network.

• Pinnacle Entertainment in acquisition talks with newly formed Epic Poker League.

• Golden Nugget partners up with ChiliGaming for online poker.

What’s next? Will Pokerati be getting a bid from Palms Casino Resort?

More…

Oh, almost forgot to tell you … two Pokerati Game players are/were bounties in this weekend’s Epic Poker Pro-Am satellites. Both have far more accomplishments to their Hendon Mob cred than just playing 1/2 NLH/PLO with me, obv … but still, happy to declare that this is plausibly proof that playing in the Pokerati Game at the Palms is key to satellite success.

Kathy played yesterday, and Stacey takes her seat in just a couple hours — so get to the game @PalmsPokerRm ASAP! Today’s event is a $100 NLH with $50 rebuys. More Epic satellite details here.

The final table of the Epic Poker League Main Event at the Palms is now set as the remarkable year of Erik Seidel continues with another final table. He’ll attempt to improve on his 2nd place finish to Chino Rheem in the first EPL event.

Day 3 started with 23 players with a dozen making the money. Day 2 chip leader Fabrice Soulier was the short stack on the money bubble, but when Allen Bari shoved over Soulier’s raise with pocket jacks, Isaac Baron woke up with pocket aces to eliminate Bari in 13th place.

Matt Glantz, Tim West and Amit Makhija were eliminated after the dinner break, earning $46,020. Adam “Roothlus” Levy bubbled the televised final table for the second straight EPL event, also pocketing $46,020.

David Steicke, who earned most of his tournament winnings in high buy-in tournaments in Asia and Australia, starts the final table as chip leader with Seidel a close second, the only two with over 1,000,000 in chips. The winner will collect over $780,000 with the top five earning a six-figure payday.

The rest of the final table consists of 2011 WSOP bracelet winners Sean Getzwiller and Fabrice Soulier, “young guns” Isaac Baron and Mike McDonald, Nam Le, and Dutch Boyd. For the second straight event, a Pro/Am qualifier (Getzwiller) makes the final table.

Boyd’s appearance at the final table will cause consternation among some in the poker community after seeing Rheem placed on probation after the first EPL event for failure to pay back players he owed money.

Here’s how the final table is seated when play resumes Friday at 3pm with 18:05 left with the blinds at 5,000/10,000 with an ante of 1,000:

Seat 1: Fabrice Soulier – 537,000
Seat 2: Mike McDonald – 357,000
Seat 3: David Steicke – 1,059,000
Seat 4: Dutch Boyd – 359,000
Seat 5: Isaac Baron – 876,000
Seat 6: Sean Getzwiller – 235,000
Seat 7: Erik Seidel – 1,031,000
Seat 8: Nam Le – 362,000

Hand-for-hand updates of the final table at www.epicpoker.com.

Day 2 of the Epic Poker League at the Palms concludes with 23 players remaining as Fabrice Soulier’s decision to bypass playing the World Poker Tour stop in Paris is currently paying off as he starts Day 3 as the chip leader. Only 12 players make the money, so expect a long day starting at 12pm Thursday as the field will play down to the televised final table of eight.

Players sent to the rail on day 2 included EPL debuting players Tom Dwan and Mike Matusow. Michael Binger, Andrew Robl, Pro/Am winner Greg Mueller, Phil Hellmuth and November Niner Ben Lamb also had to leave the Key West room when they were left without chips.

Chasing Soulier among the top five in chips Soulier is David Steicke, Erik Seidel, Nam Le, and Matt Marafioti. Jaime Kaplan finishes the day 9th in chips as Matt Glantz, Christian Harder, Chino Rheem and Allen Bari also remain in contention make the money and take advantage of the season-ending $1,000,000 freeroll.

Here’s the top ten chip counts:

1. Fabrice Soulier – 453,500
2. David Steicke – 436,000
3. Erik Seidel – 353,500
4. Nam Le – 306,000
5. Matt Marafioti – 306,000
6. Dutch Boyd – 262,000
7. Adam Levy – 253,500
8. Chris Moore – 250,000
9. Jaime Kaplan – 245,000
10. Isaac Baron 217,500

Thursday also features a $2,000 turbo tournament open to all players, information available along with Day 3 updates at www.epicpoker.com.

Annie Duke appeared on the Craig Ferguson show earlier this week to promote the Epic Poker League coming to CBS later this year.

When asked by the late-late night host (around the 1:30 mark) if poker was illegal, Duke responded: “Only online.”

Watch the entire interview here:

Well, the buck torch has been passed and it has fallen upon me to summarize the latest and greatest happenings in tournament poker. Seeing as how the last entry was pre-WSOP, I will take it upon myself not to pick-up we Pokerati left off, choosing instead to focus on the past few days…during which time millions were pocketed in prize money.

The Australian Poker Hall of Fame Adds a T.D.
Casino Grand Lisboa, Macau, China

Danny McDonagh

At the commencement of the Macau Poker Cup: Red Dragon, it was announced that Danny McDonagh had been inducted into the Australian Poker Hall of Fame.

Ok, so he didn’t win big bucks in a grueling tournament, but being the the first non-player to be inducted into the Australian Poker Hall of Fame is a big win in my book. McDonagh is considered the leading Tournament Director authority in the Asia-Pacific region and works officially as the PokerStars Director of Live Operations. This man makes it happen and is credited for having one hell of an impact on poker tournaments worldwide. What has he done, you ask? Just the biggest events in the region, including the Aussie Millions, Asia Pacific Poker Tour, and Macau Poker Cup series at PokerStars Macau. Well played, Sir.

Operation USA Scores $53,800 in an Epic Show of Generosity
Epic Poker Charity Event – The Palms Las Vegas, Las Vegas NV

On August 7th, Epic Poker held its first charity poker tournament as part of its Inaugural Event. While Andy Frankenberger mowed down the likes of Gavin Griffin, Dwyte Pilgrim, Justin Young, and Mike McDonald, the big winner of the evening was Operation USA, through whom 100% of the $53,800 raised will benefit the victims of the tornadoes that devastated Joplin, Missouri.

While I’m not really sure exactly how many people played in the charitable event, I have it on pretty good information (I read it on the Epic Poker website) that the total funds raised included all of the $200 buy-ins and rebuys and an additional $2,000 that Frankenberger donated to the the cause out of his $2,500 First Place prize money. Way to raise the bar, Andy!!! I hope others follow the example you have set. Frankenberger didn’t walk away empty handed though, he was the first person to ever receive the Epic Poker Champion’s bracelet and Champion’s Ring.

You again!!! Crane Ships it at Borgata a Second Time
$300K Guaranteed Deep Stack Double Play- Borgata, Atlantic City NJ

Russell Crane - March 30, 2011 | Photo by Jay WhoJedi Newnum

Borgata’s Deep Stack Double Play was a scheduled 4-day No Limit Hold’em poker tournament that began on August 7, 2011. Even in these lean times, Borgata managed to attract 400 players to pay the $1,650 buy-in during the course of the double day entry period for a shot at the $300,000 guarantee, doubling the prize pool to a whopping $600,000.

Russell Crane AKA “rcrane082985” beat out 399 poker players to secure a repeat shoutout here on Pokerati and, in doing so, made a little extra pocket change to the tune of $148,704. This 23 year old is on a serious heater. This latest score marks his third 1st place finish in a row since winning $37,308 in $1,000 NLH Deepstack at the Foxwoods Poker Classic on March 30th. Keep an eye out for this one… I’m willing to lay odds that he on route to Connecticut.

Saucedo Gets Max EV for Pocket 3s in the Mega Millions
Legends of Poker Mega Millions Event – The Bicycle Casino, Bell Gardens CA

Fausto Saucedo | Photo by Marie-Lizette C. Acoba

The Bicycle Casino kicked off its annual Legends of Poker signature series with a $1,000,000 Guarantee for the mind-blowingly low buy-in of $250 (plus an $100 optional rebuy). It took 20-flights spread over ten days, but when all was said and done, a total of 7,239 players, including Maria Ho, Tiffany Michelle, Cuong (Soi) Nguyen, Scott Clements, Frankie O’Dell, and Brent Carter took a shot (or two, or three, or more) at the guaranteed $300K for first.

With a record number of entries, bested only by the WSOP, and 5,939 rebuys, the prize pool bloated to an astronomical $1,453,811 (that’s a lotta bank for your buck). Former WSOPC Ladies Event Champ, Greg Sessler (invested for nine bullets) found himself heads-up against admitted Moneymaker Effect protégé Fausto Saucedo, and was poised for the biggest cash of his poker career. However, it was not meant to be. After a 4-hour long heads-up rollercoaster ride, Saucedo claimed the Wild Bill Hickok trophy and $340,191 worth of bragging rights when his pocket 3s bested Sessler’s A/J off, all-in pre.

Season One – Tournament Series One Goes to Chino Rheem
Epic Poker League Main Event – The Palms Las Vegas, Las Vegas NV

If you don’t know that David “Chino” Rheem won a Million Dollars in the 6-Max Epic Poker Inaugural Event, you may want to crawl out from under the rock you’re living under. If you didn’t follow along on Twitter, Facebook, or EpicPoker.com, poker-trivia whiz Kevin Mathers recapped the 4-day event from “Way Outside” right here on Pokerati.com.

David "Chino" Rheem | Photo by Marie-Lizette C. Acoba

The exclusive No Limit Hold’em tournament was only open only to Epic Poker League members and 9 Pro/Am Qualifier Main Event seat winners, but still drew an impressive 137 players to pay the $20,000 “no-rake” buy-in. Although it was disclosed that $400 from each buy-in would go to pay the dealers, the $400,000 added to the prize pool negated the expense guaranteeing that 18 finalists would get a minimum 5-figure piece of $3,085,200.

The star-studded final table began on Friday, August 12th with Hasan Habib in the lead, Erik Seidel, Chino Rheem, Gavin Smith, Jason Mercier, and short-stack Huck Seed rounded out the final 6. Seed did what he could to rally from behind, and after a third of the total final table hands had been dealt, he was back in the game until Mercier sent him packing in 6th place, followed by crowd favorite Smith in 5th. Early in the match Rheem crippled Habib’s stack, then dealt the final blow sending Habib to the rail in 4th place. Seidel, having won several high-roller events this year got Mercier out of the way and it was heads-up: Rheem vs. Seidel. The two traded the lead on more than one occasion, and both the grand-stand sweaters and twitter rail were kept on the edge of their seats while the button past back and forth like a ping-pong for 50 some-odd hands. Both Seidel and Rheem made exceptional showings, but in the end the $1,000,000 and Championship ring went to Rheem (and his eager creditors).

The Second Time is a Charm at Foxwoods
Mega Stack Challenge Poker – Foxwoods Resort & Casino, Mashantucket, CT

Sal Morello | Photo by Jay WhoJedi Newnum

Salvatore Morello redeemed himself on August 14th, after coming in second place in the Foxwoods Spring into Summer Mega Poker Championship last month, by claiming first place in the Foxwoods $600 Mega Stack Challenge event. Morello beatout 499 players, and single-handedly eliminated 5 of the 9 final tableists (including runner-up Ronnie Pease, who maintained the chiplead for the majority of the 2-day event) to claim the trophy and the first place prize of $60,202.

Across the Pond, Fintan Gavin Won the UKIPT Edinburgh
UK & Ireland Tour – Edinburgh Corn Exchange, Edinburgh, GB

Fintan Gavin, Winner's Photo

The last, but not least of this week’s Big Winners, Fintan Gavin is the first Irish champion of the 2nd Season of the PokerStars UK & Ireland Tour. The UKIPT attracted a field of 519 poker players in the £500 Main Event, creating a prize pool of £251,715.

When it got down to heads-up, I suspect people had their money on Gavin. A veteran at the felt, Gavin showed Hawksby (playing his first live tournament) how it’s done, grabbing the title and £61,500 in prize money. With $1.2 million in live cashes, Gavin is an old hand and is one of the organisers of Irish Poker Championships.

The highly anticipated debut of the Epic Poker League held their first $20,000 Main Event Tuesday afternoon at the Palms Casino in Las Vegas. The first day of the “rake-free” tournament ($400 of each buy-in went to the dealers) with $400,000 added ended with three of the hottest players in poker, Eugene Katchalov, Ben Lamb and Brian Rast the top three in chips.

The first EPL event featured plenty of notable names absent as Daniel Negreanu, most of Team Full Tilt, and Doyle Brunson deciding not to participate. Card-holding members need to enter at least one Main Event, Pro/Am and charity event each season to maintain their card.

In a radio interview last week, Phil Hellmuth wasn’t sure if he’d play in the first event. After making his “announcement” on Twitter Monday, he made his traditional late appearance, but was eliminated shortly after the dinner break.

The EPL will hold tournaments in a variety of no-limit hold’em formats, with the inaugural event played six-handed. Registration closed at the start of level 5, nearly 8 hours after play started. The tournament clock showed 137 players entered to create a $3,085,200 prize pool. The winner at the conclusion of play Friday will earn as the top 18 places make the money. The top 27 EPL money earners return February for the $1,000,000 League Championship freeroll.

Jason Mercier and Sean Getzwiller (a Pro/Am qualifier) are the other bracelet winners from this year’s WSOP among the 63 players returning Wednesday afternoon at 12pm PST to play another six levels.

Top ten chip counts:

Eugene Katchalov – 356,300
Ben Lamb – 287,200
Brian Rast – 260,500
Antonio Esfandiari – 248,100
Noah Schwartz – 220,200
McLean Karr – 191,800
Hoyt Corkins – 187,400
Isaac Baron – 167,700
Dan O’Brien – 163,300
Erik Seidel – 161,200

The full list of chip counts along with live updates, table draws, videos and more can be found at www.epicpoker.com

Pre-M.E. Festivities

Before the Main Event, the EPL kicked off over the weekend with The $1,500 Pro/Am tournament, offering nine Main Event seats, drew a combined field of 190 entrants as the final table was filmed for the Heartland Poker Tour. Steve O’Dwyer was the winner, earning $23,810 plus his EPL Main Event Seat. The only EPL-eligible player to snag a seat on the cheap was Andy Bloch, eventually finishing 3rd. Michael Craig recaps the final table.

While the Pro/Am final table was in action, 81 players put up $240 (plus a ton of $100 rebuys and add-ons) to raise over $50,000 for Operation USA, with the money earmarked for the victims of tornadoes in Joplin, Missouri. Plenty of goodies were given to all players with Zappos contributing $2,500 to the winner. Reigning World Poker Tour Player of the Year Andy Frankenberger won the title, donating the winnings to the charity.

You’d think practically living at the Palms with @Ziggy_Susan from Epic Poker League for the past, um … summer … that I might get a little inside info hook-up, but alas, I have to read about it in the “Hollywood media” upon retweet from @Mark_Gahagan. I’m away for barely a week and outta-sight outta-mind, I guess?

Anyhow, so Epic Poker League … the one with a $1,500 Pro-Am that I won a seat into and will air in Heartland Poker syndication … continues to develop, and it looks more and more like a real poker contender, with the league now having locked down the “pro” part of their TV deal.

Major network CBS will be airing Epic’s big $20k invitational events, with ousted WSOP film crew 441 Productions handling camera duties under the aegis of former NBC Sports exec David Neal. Longtime real-sports dude Pat O’Brien will be the TV host, with Ali Nejad as his analyst sidekick.

In my mind, this is yet another part of “the reconstruction” of poker we are currently witnessing, and testament to what can be may have to be done without the help of traditional online poker sites that previously pushed poker on TV but now face criminal indictment.

Also in with this deal is additional TV coverage — live-minus-30 maybe, or is that just wishful thinking on my part — on a soon to be relaunched Discovery B-side channel called Velocity. It’s supposed to be “a turbocharged network for an upscale male audience” now, according to the network … which, I dunno, haven’t seen yet so not gonna diss — channel launches in October; real, fully legal advertisers to follow — but sounds kinda, um, Epic?

Special thanks to Tricat in Vegas, who snapped a video of Pokerati Game, the Movie, as it played on the big screen outside on Flamingo. It’s an epic saga of … er … it’s an action/adventure in NLH/PLO told as a silent film of about 12 seconds. Powerful stuff:

And speaking of the game … congrats to TJ Downing and @JaKatkin … who won president and vice president in our Pokerati Game “election” on Thursday. For the wins, TJ will be representing in tonight’s $340 satellite* to the $1,500 Epic Pro-Am at Palms Poker Room … and Katkin will be taking a stab in a Sunday $180.

* special bounty tournament

I really hope everyone had a great time this summer playing 1/2 No-Limit Hold’em/PLO at the Palms. I know I did … even though my own poor performance over the past couple weeks kept my summertime bankroll graph a little below sea level. But still, it was great to sit down for just some good old-fashioned poker with so many friends, colleagues, old Dallas players, low-stakes Vegas grinders, poker media hangers-on … as well as various new players from multiple continents with whom I got to enjoy some incarnation of sucking out. Thanks to all who played and especially thanks to those who embraced the Pokerati Game commitment to keeping the best low-stakes action in Vegas douchebag-free. (A bigger challenge than you might think.)

Tonight, we’ve got a little game-sweetener: The two best players in the game will get satellite seats for the Epic Pro-Am (also at the Palms) — one for a Saturday $340 and one in a Sunday $180.

And to determine who these players are, we’re gonna vote. Totally subjective and very unscientific, befitting of my ongoing social poker experiment, aka The Pokerati Game … and hey, if you don’t like the way we do it, you’re welcome to heckle from the rails. (2-drink minimum, though.)

That’s pretty much it. We’ll be playing the game as usual tonight — 1/2 NLH/PLO round of each, $100 min $400 max buy-in, game changes on the one seat, option to run it twice in both games, $5 button straddle gets ultimate last action — except everyone who plays will also get a ballot. And on that ballot they get to cast two votes:

+1 ____________

-1 ____________

More…

Josh E (right) went from Southern circuit grinder to playing heads-up “live minus five” in Las Vegas for more than $600k and a magic bracelet on my iPhone.

The WSOP-Circuit has been good to many a Pokeratier and Pokeratizen alike. It’s a place where minor-league heroes are born … and some build the bankroll to live life as a real pro. With the Global poker year coming to a close this week, for so many serious players it’s time to think about starting all over and hitting the grind again.

(Only this go-round will be completely without Sunday Millions or Rush Poker bankroll supplements.)

Players get a month-and-a-half break … and then it’s off to Bossier City — “Shreveport,” we used to call it  — for the beginning of the 8th incarnation of the WSOP-Circuit season. (Texas politicians take note: the Dallas market alone is so juicy that the WSOP added a second stop to serve it.)

Below the jump for the details on what’s different this year. New point system, adios $10ks, “12 rings in 12 days.” New stop, obv. It’s Rounders & Road Gamblers — hey, that sounds like “social gaming” — brought to you by the World Series of Poker!

[Beow-neow-neow beow-neow neow … ]

The WPT has its own version of a lower-stakes Circuit tour, of course — in similar locations — and now Epic/Heartland seems to be stepping in to make something more of the recreational-to-semi-pro players who swarm from up to 250 miles away to compete in mini-poker festivals wrapped around a $1,500-ish main event.

It’s arguably the most competitive part of the live poker landscape in the US these days. Wonder if all WSOP Circuit events will offer free Wi-Fi.

More…

I won my seat early … and since then I’ve been watching the field grow for Epic Poker’s inaugural $1,500 pro-am at the Palms, Pokerati’s regular low-stakes NLH/PLO home.

With @Donkeybomber so far my toughest potential competition … well, let’s just say I’m starting to get excited about the actual poker at hand in early August. And though TV exposure had nothing to do with my initial interest … that’s apparently now part of it, with Epic’s recently acquired sister company, the Heartland Poker Tour, coming to Vegas to film the tournament for syndicated distribution on its nationwide network of local TV stations, some of which are actually in HD.

(Yay!)

That might seem a little minor-league for the more-pro, less-am players in Vegas … but hey, this $1,500 event will be my second-biggest tournament to play in ever — so HPT coverage seems just about right for me and Tom Schneider at this point in my pro career. Having won my way into the August 5-7 tournament, I’ve clearly got game that’s ready for UHF.

Satellites running at 7pm on Saturday and Sunday in the Key West Room at the Palms.

The Epic Poker League still sounded more like a Sugar Bowl sponsor (as FS+G) when yours truly won his seat into their inaugural $1,500 event at the Palms last weekend. Excited to play … but also thinking ’bout selling it, as I’m pretty sure these seats are transferable, and I already had plans that weekend to learn the ways of a seasoned pro by going on a vision quest at the Poker Sweat Lodge with Greg Raymer and Tom Schneider.

For now, play it by ear …

2011 WSOP – Episode 25: Sit and Go Pro
A group of prolific tweeters play in a satellite to the FS+G Epic Poker League $1500 pro-am — a tournament series taking shape that few know what to make of yet. None other than Bluff correspondent Kevin Mathers shows up to provide a comparative assessment of what he just witnessed — as somehow Dan ends up winning, beating @Alcanthang, @JoeUgly, @Hollywood_Dave, and others with questionable play. A rather large rail developed to hear Kevmath laughing heartily on the inside. Whatev, says Dan, who won a seat, took home some cash, and now apparently thinks he’s a pro.
[audio: https://pokerati.com/podcast/tao/TOP_W11_25_SNGPro.mp3]
#
For more episodes, visit the Tao of Pokerati archives or subscribe to the feed .

Ahh, now I get it! Concept behind Federated’s Epic Pro-Am series starting to make sense.