Why do I watch Celebrity Apprentice when I know it’s just gonna tilt me!?
It’s the 10th anniversary of Chris Moneymaker, and the big poker events are here — starting with the WPT World Championship, where the final table looks to be a lesson in makeup and collections. But hey, even at only $1.1 million for first, a televised $25k buy-in is still enough to make Bellagio the busiest room in Vegas again. Meanwhile, Dave finds the new lowest stakes action on the Strip in a $.50/$1 NL game at the Quad (which ain’t a bad way to chase the Megabeat) … and does yours truly find his poker passion re-ignited by a missed connection at Red Rock, where a self-professed high-stakes online pro says he’s really impressed by my $1-3 play. (Argh, why didn’t I get his name!?!) Meanwhile, Andrew is keeping it real and chill poolside, with the opening of a new dayclub flavored by the Light Group and Cirque du Soleil. And in our version of “What Would You Do?” the VG crew breaks down an ethical quandry about dealer error and cards speaking when the table won’t … which begs the question: is there a difference between angle shooting another player and pocketing cash from a casino slip?
The latest Poker Beat was a bit of a clusterfucky episode for us on the backend — computer breakdowns and internet snafus during a week where the only meaty topic we had for a full segment was David Williams’ stepping up to a new level of poker bad-assness by winning the WPT World Championship … and even that devolved into a Gary/Dan vs BJ spat about whether or not the mind coaching of Sam Chauhan has any tournament value or is just an Extenze-like sales success story for his brand of hypnotic snake oil.
But before we even get to that, we break down all sorts of poker buggerings … Daniel Tzvetkoff denied bail, poker recognized as a mind sport, Adam Junglen’s prosthetic leg, Cole South bowing out of CardRunners, PokerStars buying up abandoned poker blogs, Harrah’s selling the Rio, a new right-wing poker+politics show, and a study saying online gambling leads to jobs.
It was one of those episodes where so much was going wrong before we even got started that the crew just had to rely on shooting the shit about what we may or may not know … all while Huff attempted to keep the ship from running aground. I think it worked!
It really is getting almost eerie the success “mindset” guru Sam Chauhan’s clients are finding at the poker table … not to mention in the MMA octagons. If you haven’t noticed, Chauhan is the non-player who has been showing up all over various poker places of late. He’s currently the subject of the cover story in the April issue of Bluff Magazine (by Lance Bradley), which tells how a guy who hardly knows the difference between suited connectors and a busted flush draw has helped turn around results for Antonio Esfandiari, Paul Wasicka, Gavin Smith, and the ever-tiltable Phil Hellmuth.
But since that story went to press, Chauhan has put up even more impressive results — most recently standing by the side of newly crowned WPT World Champion David Williams. In fact, three of the Top 16 finishers were Chauhan clients, two of whom made it to the final table. (Hellmuth went out on the TV bubble.) Away from poker, he gets credit (at least a small percentage, based on coaching deals we’ve learned about) for helping rising MMA star Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal take the Strikeforce light heavyweight title from Gegard Mousasi, who was a 3-to-1 favorite in the match.
That all kinda blows my theory that the key to Williams’ re-found success had everything to do with his new hair. Check out the video snippet below of a bushy-fro’d Williams stepping outside the Fontana room for some mantra and affirmation exercises before taking his seat at the final table:
Wow, that’s all there is to it? Didn’t realize winning at anything, let alone life, was so easy. Seems like if you could turn that into an iPhone app Sammy might really be able to help people. Chauhan, however, is not without his haters (just ask Google). But poker players know you can only get super-lucky so many times.
If you missed it last week, one of our more astute hirsute co-panelists on The Poker Beat was break-dancing the fine line between news and conspiracy theory in analyzing the changing legal landscape of poker and what it means to the business we all dabble in.
Also BJ and Gary look at actual numbers in comparing/contrasting the WPT to the EPT. All while assessing whether or not PokerStars is taking over the world. Plus Liv Boeree kicking arse as Huff celebrates the glorious life of Gang Starr.
Season 8 of the World Poker Tour concluded Saturday evening with David Williams winning the $25,000 WPT World Championship, defeating Eric Baldwin in heads-up play. Williams collects $1,530,537 for his win, moving him into the top 20 on the all-time tournament earnings list. Shawn Buchanan’s third place finish meant Faraz Jaka became WPT Player of the Year. The full results from the final table:
1 David Williams $1,530,537
2 Eric Baldwin $1,034,715
3 Shawn Buchanan $587,906
4 David Benyamine $329,228
5 Billy Baxter $246,921
6 John O’Shea $199,888
The poker tournament circuit never stops though, as season 6 of the European Poker Tour holds their final tournament the €10,000 Euro Grand Final in Monte Carlo. Live coverage is available over at PokerNews and on the PokerStars Blog.
The longest day of the $25,000 WPT World Championship at the Bellagio took place on Friday, as the remaining 10 players took their sweet time getting down to the televised final table of six. When play finally ended, it was Full Tilt Pro David Benyamine who was the chip leader by just 5,000 chips over David Williams, who eliminated an extremely short stacked Phil Hellmuth in 7th place. Video of that final hand appears below, thanks to a company called All360Poker, which has been filming select tables during the WPT World Championship, including yesterday’s table. It’s a 360-degree camera that shows the entire table, and allows the viewer to click within the image to select a different POV of the action around the table.
[ED NOTE: Video removed because of autoplay]
Here’s how the final six players will be situated when play resumes around 4:30pm PT:
For the third time in seven weeks, a woman has won a major poker tournament. Today, it was UB sponsored pro Liv Boeree the winner of the PokerStars.it EPT San Remo event, officially winning 1,250,000 Euros (about $1.7m US), defeating Jakob Carlsson in heads-up play. Below is a clip of the winning hand:
Meanwhile at the WPT World Championship, Heather Sue Mercer started Day 4 second in chips (1,364,000) with 35 players remaining. The only woman to win a non-ladies WPT event was Van Nguyen’s win at the sorta-open 2008 WPT Invitational. Among other notables remaining when play resumes at noon PT: Shawn Buchanan (1,841,000), Billy Baxter (887,500), Faraz Jaka (856,000), Phil Hellmuth (806,500), David Benyamine (731,000) Carlos Mortensen (586,000) and JJ Liu (495,000). Follow the live updates over at the the World Poker Tour site.
The two major tournament circuits not named The World Series of Poker are currently running at the same time, with vastly different results. First, the $25,000 World Poker Tour World Championship at the Bellagio drew a field of only 195 entrants as registration closed after the conclusion of level 8. This continues the downward trend in the field size of most WPT events the past few years. Two years ago, the field in the WPT W.C was 545 players (won by David Chiu) and 338 last year (won by Yevginey Timoshenko). Only 18 spots will be paid, with the winner earning around $1,500,000. WPT Player of the Year leader Faraz Jaka is the current chip leader with 500,000 in chips. Follow the WPT Live updates here.
Meanwhile, the PokerStars.it EPT San Remo event drew a field of 1,240 entrants paying €5,000, just 24 remain when play resumes Tuesday for day 5. The current chip leader is Allan Bække (3,483,000), winner of the most recent EPT event in Austria, looking to be the first to win a second EPT main event. The other recognizable name to the casual poker enthusiast is Liv Boeree (1,337,000) First prize is a cool €1,250,000, and you can watch live streaming coverage of the final two days (volcano permitting) will be available at www.pokerstars.tv starting at 6am ET or you can follow the live updates over at PokerNews.
Remember back in the poker-boom day when an $85,000 difference in payout seemed to mean so little? Me neither. Anyhow, we’re nearing 5 hours into heads-up, and the average stack is now about 50 big blinds. There’ve been many lead shifts, and for awhile it looked like Lee was getting delirious and about to bite it. But he just doubled up and, by his own report, is “back in the game!”
NOTE: I was gonna make a compare-and-contrast joke about heads-up blind structures with the WPT Championship going on tonight/yesterday … but apparently they had quite the heads-up battle there, too … with Yevgeniy Timoshenko requiring 79 hands to dispose of Ran Azor for the World Championship. (Seriously, is that a record for WPT heads-up battles?)
UPDATE: It’s over. Baldwin wins.
Watch the vid below to see why Pokerati is clearly no ESPN:
I still don’t know who won the WPT World Championship over at the BellagioOK, now I do … I’m too caught up in the main event of the Venetian Deep Stacks … where it really is kinda interesting seeing seasoned pro Doug Lee (wow, remember when a WSOP Circuit event used to pay more than half a million? Me neither!) duking it out with relatively unknown tournament pro Eric Baldwin (“Basebaldy” online). They’ve been playing heads-up for nearly two four hours, with their stacks relatively even and each having more than 70 60 big blinds. Very real poker being played here … with an extra sigh of WSOP buy-in relief going to the winner. ($198k for 1st, $115k for second.)
Such a big game going on in the back corner of the Venetian poker room, and yet so few people seem to have a clue about the action taking place. (Floor staff gave up on calling the hand-for-hand action a couple hours ago.) Meanwhile, the nightly $120 (where Pokerati fave Adam Schacter is still alive with 6 remaining) has more railbirds.
A few interesting tidbits about the Deep Stacks main event:
— The underdog, Baldwin, has a bigger crowd watching, with 4 to 5 viewers, compared to Lee’s 0 to 1.
— Michael Skomac, the winner of February’s Venetian Deep Stacks main event, finished 4th.
— “Known” pros in the money today included Sam Grizzle (23rd) and Michael Mizrachi (16th).
— The (plenty drinky) crew sweating Baldwin includes Cody Slaubaugh (on a tear of late), Adam Geyer from Austin, Justin Young (who finished 8th in the WPT World Championship this weekend), and Shannon Shorr (who finished 5th in the WPT Championship today). Needless to say, these guys are all having a good weekend and month … with nearly $1 million in winnings amongst them … probably more if you include their online tournament results.
It’s always fun running into people unexpectedly … happens regularly here in Vegas and today I noticed Lodge player Jerry Dolan (left) playing in the nightly $120 tourney at the Venetian … and when I went to snap a picture, lo and behold the player seated to his left was Adam Schacter (right), another occasional Lodge player and a final tableist in the 2005 Pokerati Invitational. They didn’t know each other … but would get to know each other in the end, as Schacter busted Dolan in this 129-player event.
Too funny! Small (poker) world. And good luck to Adam, as he’s currently chip leader with 19 players remaining.
Pro Poker, Too
So lots of big action going on in Vegas tonight. We’ve got the WPT World Championship final table at Bellagio (word around here is that somebody won — about $2 million), the Venetian Deep Stacks main event is down to heads-up (Doug Lee vs Vegas local Eric Baldwin — for about $200k), and over on the kiddie tables outside the Venetian poker room we’ve got a Lodge/Pokerati alum fighting to see if he’s got what it takes to take one the whole way (for about $2k). Good night in V-town.
Everybody and their dogma seems to be jumping on the Twitter bandwagon these days. Whether texting your whereabouts will prove to be fad or societal fabric a few years from now remains to be seen. In the meantime …
UPDATE: Interesting … Pollack is with Joan Rivers today in BH (Beverly Hills) … funny coincidence or evil WSOP ratings plot being hatched?
Right now you can follow the final table of the WPT Championship via Twitter, and the activities of their lead reporter, BJ, for a little unintentional real-life behind-the-scenes.
UPDATE: Bertrand ‘Elky’ Grospellier just locked up WPT Player of the Year.
Pauly’s a little bummed I think … because last year Twitter was his semi-secret cybernook where he could relay the real WSOP dirty for his loyalist, most technologically advanced fans … but now this space is anything but “under the radar”.
Pokerati’s on the Twitter train now, too. Still trying to figure it all out — but so far definitely not “good for my poker”.
Feel free to add any peeps in the comments that you think we might-should pay attention to; and/or weigh in on whether or not you think this internet-texting convergence thing is “good for poker” will stick around.
Dr. Pauly joins the mix today … and he and I will be talking about the all-important topic of Celebrity Apprentice. Gary and BJ will be talking about the less important 38 percent drop in field size for the WPT Championship:
Doyle Brunson is on the grid, that’s for sure. In his latest blog post, which I read via Facebook, he tells us he’s really getting into Twitter. Here’s his address if you want to follow him: twitter.com/texdolly
In doing so, you’ll learn why he’s not playing in the WPT Championship, and that Phil Ivey lost $1 million in Bobby’s Room last night.
And then, back to his blog, he explains to all the Teabaggers out there why he thinks they should STFU!
I headed over to my CPA to get my taxes done and ran into a traffic jam. Hundreds of people were blocking the streets having what they called a “tea partyâ€. I think they were protesting the current financial crisis our nation is going through, but some of the signs were ridiculous. “Impeach Obamaâ€, “What comes after trillionsâ€, “Stop spending our money†and other statements blaming our president. For Pete’s sake, let’s give the guy a chance to straighten this mess up. I got a lot of heat for voting for McCain, but I knew when I cast a late vote, John didn’t have a chance to win. I was just being loyal to the Republican Party. But now that the nation has spoken that they wanted Obama, we should all support him.
The Bellagio is gearing up for the start of the 7th Annual Five Star World Poker Classic running March 31 thru April 25. The Five Star is highlighted by the $25,000 buy-in WPT Championship beginning Saturday, April 18.
