Men “The Master’ Nguyen
Photo: WhoJedi / LAPC

Today’s Boxscore

Men Nguyen $21,255 – 2013 LAPC $125 No Limit Hold’em Rebuy
Jon Seaman $10,080 – 2013 LAPC 2-7 Triple Draw/No Limit SD
Ryan Wince $29,010 – 2013 LAPC NLHE Doublestack

The big news over the last few days, unless you are Jean-Paul Pasqualini or Cedric Rossi, was the World Series of Poker finally releasing their summer schedule. Some players were getting ansy, now they are all settled down and able to make their plans to invade Las Vegas for the 2013 WSOP, whether they are a small ball newbie or an “every event” grinder.

The series will feature 62 bracelet events along with the standard non-stop non-bracelet side tournaments and their crazy draw. The WSOP always likes to throw something new at their customers (2009 Stimulus Event anyone?) and this year around is The Millionaire Maker on the opening weekend. This tournament will be a $1,500 No Limit Hold’em with two starting flights on the same day and players can re-enter 1B if eliminated in 1A. The big twist is the guaranteed 1st place prize money of $1,000,000 to the winner. Guarantee should be in quotes since the payout structure will be adjusted to make this work, not money added to the standard structure.

Last year’s Big One for One Drop was so successful they will have two smaller versions this summer. The $111,111 One Drop High Roller and $1,111 Little One for One Drop which will feature unlimited re-entries through 4 levels. There is also some pretty decent buzz around for an event which won’t even award a bracelet. The WSOP will run a trial $5,000 Open Face Chinese poker tournament during the Main Event. This is the newest, latest, greatest big thing for the youngns.

Perhaps the biggest change this year is to the Ladies Championship, where now it’s technically a $10,000 event but women will receive a hugely discounted price of $1,000. It’s probably the best way to severely discourage men from entering the tournament as their EV is ridiculous. Poker legend Linda Johnson expects that any man in the event would need to make the final table just to have a positive ROI.

I am interested to see how they handle any issues which arise with post- or pre-operative transgender players trying to enter the tournament. If they’ve made a comment about it, I haven’t seen it.

Back later this week with a more detailed 2013 WSOP schedule rundown later.

Tweet of the Day – Uber Limit guro Matt Matros with his take on the 2013 WSOP schedule.

I’m a very sad poker player tonight. Three Limit HE events (counting Mixed as Limit) taken off the schedule for 2013. #wsop

— Matt Matros (@Matt_Matros) February 15, 2013

Don’t get cheated on the Open-Face Chinese app – Huge news for those playing on the popular Open-Face Chinese Poker app and wagering on the side (as opposed to through the app itself, for now). There is obviously a HUGE security hole, so buyer beware. I’m surprised this hasn’t made a bigger splash but maybe most people already know who they’re playing against and trust them. Barry Greenstein is not one of those people.

Global Poker Index “suspends” two players from the system – GPI savior and guru Alex Dreyfus announced last week they were “suspending” Jean-Paul Pasqualini and Cedric Rossi after some very shady behavior at the 2009 Partouche Poker Tour final table. Seemingly well earned but does this restart the “Standards and Conduct Committee” discussion? Please say no.

Newsjacking and Poker Marketing – Speaking of the GPI, Barry Carter with a look at the trend of “newsjacking” to market a poker product. Not that uncommon or remotely new.

Tech Industry Sets Its Sights on Gambling – Another mainstream media article, this time by the NY Times discussing how online gaming companies are positioning themselves for onling gambling.

Ole Schemion
Photo: Partouche Poker

Ole Schemion €1,172,850 – Partouche Poker Tour Main Event
Chris Ferguson £87,640 – UKIPT Newcastle Main Event
Mark Edwards $107,730 – WPT Regional Jacksonville
David Benyamine €94,050 – WPT Rendez-Vous à Paris PLO

Chris Ferguson wins a poker tournament! Ridiculous use of an exclamation point (with apologies to Jess Welman) and it wasn’t the same Chris Ferguson who is currently under indictment by the Department of Justice. But it did give a small moment of humor during a time when there are few remotely chuckle-worthy things going on in the world of poker.

Chris “Not Jesus” Ferguson won the UKIPT Newcastle Main Event at the same time German Ole Schemion was busy winning the absolutely final Partouche Poker Tour Main Event. Schemion picked up €1,172,850 for his victory and defeated some of the hottest pros in the world right now including Dan Smith’s Nubs and Dan O’Brien. It was an unfortunate way to end a tour which had become a popular destination and was drawing many top players from the States.

In other news, the WSOP announced the ten finalists for the 2012 Poker Hall of Fame class. There are six new names on the list with four returning from last year in Scotty Nguyen, Jenn Harman, John Juanda, and Tom McEvoy. Two great new additions to the nomination list include a couple of top non-American players with Chris Bjorin and Thor Hansen. Ballots are being sent out to voters with results being reported at the beginning of October and the ceremony during the November Nine (refuse to call it October Nine) ceremonies.

You can check out the full list on the link above.

Link Dump

Tweet of the Day – Doyle Brunson voiced his Hall of Fame support for old time gambler Brian “Sailor” Roberts as well as Juanda, Harman, and Drache

I’m going on record, Sailor Roberts is the most deserving player on the ballot. He lost credibility at the end of his life because of drugs.

— Doyle Brunson (@TexDolly) September 12, 2012

But Sailor was the most complete player (outside of Chip) that ever lived.

— Doyle Brunson (@TexDolly) September 12, 2012

DOJ Files Second Amended Complaint; Alleges Lederer Funded Assets with Unlawful Proceeds – Looks like the DoJ isn’t quite done dropping the hammer on the FTP gang and would like a few dollars from them. A second amended complaint is looking for $137,000,000 in forfeitures from Lederer, Ferguson, Bitar, and Furst.

Reid poker bill would prohibit all interstate and intrastate online gambling except horse racing and online poker – QuadJacks has a nice breakdown of the Harry Reid/Jon Kyle online gaming bill floating around Congress. Interesting developments including States will need to Opt In instead of that being the default position. They also posted a transcript of the Reid/Kyl summary. (Can someone please teach the boys at QuadJacks how to write a goddamn headline?)

WCOOP Final Table Coverage – Since I’m writing about the out-spoken ones, QuadJacks has been getting some pretty decent traffic for their live WCOOP Final Table coverage online. There are few options for U.S. bound players to watch the World Championship of Online Poker but they are a good option.

WCOOP 2012: Inside the PokerStars Radio Studio – For a very entertaining listen during the WCOOP, you should check out PokerStars radio with the always jovial Joe Stapleton. Friend of the Pokerati Brad “Otis” Willis has a fun look behind the scenes.

PokerNews Weekly: Latest Tournament Winners, Partouche Controversy and WCOOP Radio – PokerNews Kristy Arnett and Sarah Grant discuss the latest poker developments.

With this year’s WSOP Champion just a few hours from being crowned, most of the eyes in the poker world are affixed squarely on Las Vegas. But there is quite a bit of other action going on around the world, including a slightly less publicized delayed final table that dealt with a cheating scandal, as well as a couple of WPT events.

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.

The Tournament Trail

WPT London :: 21-year old Jake Cody wins his 2nd major of 2010, WSOP win away from Triple Crown. PartyPoker million dollar man denied. PartyPoker Blog

WPT London High Roller :: Justin “Boosted J” Smith defeats Tony G heads-up in marathon final table, earning £141,000 WPT High Roller report

Partouche Poker Tour, Cannes :: Vanessa Selbst, Fabrice Soulier and Phil Laak near top of leaderboard as field plays down to final 18.

River @ Winstar :: Greg Raymer has a very good week: Finishes 6th of 101 for $760 in $330 Jack and Jill tournament with his mom in her first time playing, returns for final day 3rd of 20 for main event. Winner takes down over $600,000 Day 3 lineup from 2+2 WinStar’s Twitter providing updates

Beau Rivage Gulf Coast Poker Championship, Biloxi, MS :: Chad Brown holds the chip lead at final table of their $5,000 main event. Winner earns over $177,000 and 2011 Southern Poker Championship seat. BeauPoker Twitter

Commerce Holdem Series :: Guarantees in weekend tournaments go 1 for 2 as series enters week 2. Commerce Tournaments

Also …

Controversy in side event of Partouche Poker Tour regarding floorman’s decision, tales of alleged bias against non-French players.

PokerStars’ WCOOP continues with three more events today. PokerStars Blog.

World Poker Open underway at London’s Palm Beach Casino. Phil Laak defending champion of made-for-TV event, 48 players vying for $200,000 first place money. World Poker Open updates

After a quiet period in the poker community, the tournament circuit has come back to life with a variety of tournaments spanning the world. Some highlights:

WPT Legends of Poker

Andrew Frankenberger defeated Kyle Wilson to take down the title at the Bike in LA, collecting $750,000 for the win. Notables who finished in the money: Former WPT Player of the Year Jonathan Little (12th), Allen Kessler (20th), Erica Schoenberg (30th), Joe Sebok (32nd), November Niner Soi Nguyen (34th) and Joe Hachem (43rd). Click here for results.

WPT London Poker Classic

Monday is day 1a of the first WPT event in the UK, with the £5,000 + £300 buy-in London Poker Classic at the Palm Beach Casino. Jack McLelland from the Bellagio is helping run the tournament, with registration remaining open until 1:30pm on Wednesday. Live updates available over at PartyPoker’s blog here.

EPT Villamoura

Day 2 of the PokerStars.net European Poker Tour stop in Portugal starting with 384 players, creating a prize pool of €1,862,400, with the winner collecting €467,835. Currently, less than 130 players remain, with the current chip leader is Grzegorz Cichocki of Poland with 312,000 in chips. Other notables still in the field: 2008 EPT Grand Final winner Pieter de Korver, Brandon Cantu, Liv Boeree, Sorel Mizzi, Lex Veldhuis, David Williams among many others. Follow the live updates and pictures of players enjoying the sun (as photography is banned inside the casino) at PokerStarsblog.com

WSOP Circuit – Council Bluffs

The first $1,500 Main Event of the WSOP Circuit started on Sunday with a field of 251 entries, creating a prize pool of $361,440, with the winner cashing in for $88,555 and entry into the $1,000,000 National Championship in May. Day 2 resumes today with 75 players playing down to the final table. Another way to earn a seat is to be the “Casino Champion” at each tour stop, to the player who earns the most points in the 10 WSOP-C ring events. To view the “unofficial” leaderboard after 8 events, check it out here. WSOP Circuit legend Dwyte Pilgrim won one of the many non-ring events that support the WSOP-C for a mid-four figure sum. For results so far check out the WSOP site and PokerPages for the non-ring results.

The River @ Winstar Casino

As noted in an earlier post, the Winstar Casino in Thackerville, OK is in the midst of their River $3,000,000 Guaranteed tournament series. What passes as results for Winstar is to show the points earned for those that make the final table, without stating how much each player received.

Gulf Coast Poker Championship – Beau Rivage

Another major series that got underway over the weekend is the Gulf Coast Poker Championship at Beau Rivage in Biloxi, Mississippi. Their main event takes place Sept. 4th with a $5,000 NL Holdem Main Event. Their schedule can be found on the beaurivage.com website here.

Commerce Holdem Series

Matt Savage returns Sept. 1st to the Commerce Casino in Los Angeles for the Commerce Holdem Series, featuring several guaranteed prize pools events as well as the $1,100 Ironman tournament. More details available here.

Partouche Poker Tour – Cannes

One major tournament that starts later in the week when the French Partouche Group of casinos have their Main Event in Cannes Sept. 2nd. The 8,500 Euro buy-in event has a 3,000,000 Euro guaranteed prize pool with 1,000,000 Euros guaranteed for first. Like the WSOP Main Event, their final table will be delayed, taking place in late October and aired live across Europe on the EuroSport network. I believe there’s also live streaming available (in French) during the tournament. Further details available on the PPT site.