Chris Reslock
Photo: WSOP.com

Today’s Boxscore

Chris Reslock $18,200 – WSOP-C Harrah’s Philly $580 NLH
Chris Reslock $8,820 – WSOP-C Harrah’s Philly $365 NLH
Jae Kyung Sim $98,700 – APPT Cebu Main Event

Chris Reslock is having a good week at the WSOP Circuit series in “Philly”. The Atlantic City regular tied Alex Masek for Circuit victories with his 6th ring on Thursday and then took the overall lead early this morning with his 7th title in the short-field $365 NLH tournament. On top of his seven WSOP-C rings, Reslock also has nine other Circuit final tables on his resume, including two runner-up finishes, and a World Series of Poker bracelet in 2007.

In the online world, Ultimate Poker held it’s first “major” tournament with the regularly scheduled Sunday $10,000 guarantee event. The field hit it’s 200 player cap and the first big winner on the site was “d4heals” for just over $4,000. Meanwhile on PokerStars, “friend of Pokerati” Katie Dozier scored her biggest online title for $10,624 (and a soft drink) in their $30,000 2x-Turbo.

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Tweet of the Day – Good to see Marafioti is staying well grounded heading into his summer at the WSOP including some weird bet with Yevgeniy Timoshenko. Can’t wait for the 2013 version of the Adzizzy Bunny Hop.

People on 2+2 talk about me non stop. I’m the most talked about, hated, + imitated player in the game. #QuietInPerson+JealousOnline! #UMad?

— Matthew Marafioti (@Adzizzy) May 4, 2013

PokerStars Files Suit Against Atlantic Club, Cites “Bad Faith” and Requests TRO – Things are heating up in the PokerStars/Atlantic Club saga with The Rational Group filing suit against the casino after it terminated the sale contract. I’ll leave the legal analysis up to those with bigger brains than myself.

Lock Poker Shadiness 101 – Lock poker did not have the Best Week Ever. Never a big fan on linking up a 2+2 post because I’m afraid it won’t wash it off the Silkwood shower, but this seems to be the most comprehensive list of things going south for Lock Poker, player cashouts, and the pros who support it via Todd Witless and h/t to @Kevmath.

Delaware names vendor for online casino gambling system – With Ultimate Poker leading Nevada into the online poker world first, Delaware picked 888 Holdings to launch that state into the market.

The British poker ace, the ‘perfect’ murder he got away with for 16 years – and how his luck finally ran out – The interesting story of Marcus Bebb-Jones, the UK poker player who enjoyed himself with the occasional hooker and blow, and how he managed to get away with murder for 16 years until he was finally caught.

Speeding through Monaco like a race car – The EPT Grand Final is underway in beautiful Monaco and Sarah Grant takes a close look at the legendary race course for the PokerStars Blog.

Kevin Saul
Photo: Foxwoods / WhoJedi

Today’s Boxscore

Kevin Saul $194,178 – WSOP-C Foxwoods Main Event
Bryan Piccioli $211,575 – WSOP APAC Event #1
Jim Collopy $69,662 – WSOP APAC Event #2

The World Series of Poker brand had themselves a fine time over the last few days on different sides of the globe. Big names, new tournaments, and interesting results. The WSOP APAC is underway in Australia while the WSOP-Circuit at Foxwoods wrapped up their Main Event.

Professional player Brian Piccioli captured the first ever WSOP APAC bracelet in a brand new event, something called the “Accumulator” at the Crown Casino in Melbourne. The tournament took reentry events to the next level, where players could not only enter each of the three starting days but could also play even if they had chips at the end of previous days. Whatever part of their stacks remained after Day 1A/B/C were combined and play continued on Day 2. Piccioli won they event with only his Day C stack after busting both A and B but worked it will for the $211,575 prize and gold bracelet.

Long time professional and former online master Kevin Saul is the latest WSOP Circuit Main Event Champion. There were 615 entrees into the inaugural Foxwoods WSOP-C tournament and Saul made quick work of the final table to pick up his shiny new ring, the near $200k payday, and his entry into the WSOP National Championship coming up in New Orleans.

History could be made later today when the WSOP APAC Mixed Event is played to a winner. Phil Ivey leads the final table with Daniel Negreanu right behind him. Ivey will be trying to capture his 9th WSOP bracelet while Negreanu is looking to break his 5 year bracelet slump to pick up his 5th.

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Tweet of the Day – Just because Hellmuth is halfway around the world in Australia, that doesn’t mean the internets can’t get their little taste of his wrath. Things don’t seem to be going well down under for the 13-time WSOP champion.

Busted 24th: I SO wish I wasn’t completely ANGRY now! Feeling unlucky, and running EVERY SINGLE HAND in my mind over-and-over-and-over…

— phil_hellmuth (@phil_hellmuth) April 9, 2013

Full Tilt Poker Ex-Chief to Plead Guilty – Ray Bitar, poster boy for Black Friday, reached an agreement with the US Attorney General’s office where he’ll pony up $40million but avoid any jail time as he’s in desperate need of a heart transplant. This naturally generated its own share of twitter jokes, mostly in bad taste.

WSOP.com Real Money Poker Beta – Feel like test driving the first legal poker site in the States. Things aren’t quite to the point of the real deal but WSOP is offering up the chance to beta test their software and shake out the bugs. Closer and closer.

East Falmouth man wins $10m in ‘poker’ game – The word poker is encased in well-deserved quotation marks but the headline still caught my eye. The Mass lottery created some bizarre luck of the draw, fake poker game that awarded a $10,000,000 check. You can’t win that kind of money in your local no-skill-to-win 2/4 limit game.

Bet Raise Fold: The Story of Poker – The documentary previously known as BOOM from the minds of Jay Rosenkrantz, Taylor Caby and Ryan Firpo has been renamed and the new trailer is out.

Jonathan Taylor
Photo: WSOP.com

Today’s Boxscore

Jonathan Taylor $138,938 – WSOP-C Lodge Casino Main Event
Allen Kessler $20,859 – WSOP-C Lodge Casino $580 NLHE
Dan Shak $450,000 – PartyPoker Premier League VI
Michael Harris $95,663 – HPT Belterra Casin Main Event

There were plenty of results posted around the world over the weekend with the PartyPoker Premier League VI wrapping up, the Heartland Poker Tour crowning another champion, and the WSOP-C handing out a few more rings.

Dan Shak seems to love the big action, big attention games. He defeated Sam Trickett to capture the PartyPoker Premier League VI title after a few days of play for $450,000. As expected, it was a stacked final table with Antonio Esfandiari, Jonathan Duhamel, Daniel Cates, and actress/poker player Jennifer Tilly. Negreanu made a big splash as he just missed the final table (video can be viewed below).

Jonathan Taylor is the latest World Series of Poker Circuit event winner, his 3rd ring ring of the 2012/2013 series. He topped the other 420 entrees in the tournament for over $138,000. Perhaps only interesting to me, the small buy-in WSOP-C event in Blackhawk, CO drew exactly 150 less entrants than a similar Heartland Poker Tour event held in the same town just a few weeks. Also notable during this WSOP-C stop was the stunning non-min-cash of Allen “Complainsaw” Kessler who won the $580 No Limit Hold’em side event for his 2nd career ring.

Next up for the WSOP-C is a trip to the great Northeast and 12 tournaments at the mammoth Foxwoods Casino.

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Tweet(s) of the Day – Allen Kessler’s humble brag with the Matt Salsberg follow up needle. Good stuff, now where is my Entourage movie?

@allenkessler @wsop You put the ring on Craig’s list yet?

— matt salsberg (@msalsberg) March 26, 2013

Atlantic City’s Revel casino files for bankruptcy – This news isn’t very shocking. The latest, greatest, fresh casino in Atlantic City hasn’t been doing well since it opened. My one and only experience there left me wondering how quickly I could catch a cab to the Borgata. The Chapter 11 filing will help them try to cut debt and stay alive, but we’ve all heard those stories before.

Kane ‘Nascar_1949’ Kalas – Risks and Riches – As a Philly boy, I grew up listening to Harry Kalas call Phillies games but most sports fans probably know him as the “voice” of NFL Films. I had no idea his son has been a professional poker player/degenerate for years. “Friend of Pokerati” Remko Rinkema has a very in depth interview talking about all things gambling and sports.

UK’s online gambling sector worth £2bn in 2012 – An article detailing the size of online gambling in the UK, complete with a numbers for the stats junkies and pretty graphs for those less inclined towards words.

Louisiana To Study Possibility of Online Gaming – Louisiana adds it’s name to the list of states looking to follow in the footsteps of Nevada, New Jersey, and Delaware to pass online poker legislation. The more the merrier.

Emotions run high as poker pro Daniel Negreanu throws all his chips – WATCH THIS VIDEO is how Jesse May would extort you to view the following (I just see the words coming out of his mouth in all caps). Negreanu, the self appointed judge of all things poker etiquette, lost his mind a little when he caught a bad beat during PartyPoker Premier League VI action.

Ray Henson
Photo: WSOP.com

Today’s Boxscore

Reece Lewis £80,000 – WPTN London Main Event
Ray Dehkharghani $235,931 – 2013 Wynn Poker Classic
Ray Henson $16,128 – WSOP-C The Lodge Casino Prelim

The week has finally come to an end with a good number of gambling degenerates from the poker world glued to the television watching, betting, cursing the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament. It’s a fun time of year for those who like to diversify their gambling dollar but not so much for those on Twitter who only endorse messages about things which interest them.

This week saw Ray Henson win his 2nd WSOP-C ring of 2013 at a place called The Lodge in Colorado (not to be confused with the old Pokerati games at The Lodge back during the golden old days). The WSOP-C Main Event is now underway with 3 starting days and a $1,675 buy-in. Also underway is the overly-complicated PartyPoker Premier League VI in London featuring a ton of your favorite players and a super live stream with Kara Scott. The only outcome noticed so far was a bad beat on Daniel Negreanu to send him back to Vegas before the WSOP-APAC.

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Tweet of the Day – You can’t argue with the tongue-in-cheek sentiment. So when/what/where is this Ivey Poker thing going to happen? (h/t @Kevmath)

It seems like IveyPoker and Nevada are in a race to see who can have the largest group of people doing nothing.

— Pokerlolz (@pokerlolz) March 22, 2013

Highway to Hell – An interesting read about old school gambling in Texas along the Jacksboro Highway complete with stories/quotes from Doyle Brunson.

Parx Takes Lead In Monthly Poker Revenue – As an east coast boy I find this pretty shocking. When Pennsylvania began opening casinos and card rooms, everyone shrugged their shoulders saying it would have little impact on the games in AC. I guess they might have been wrong and kudos to Matt Glantz for getting Parx ahead.

Phil Ivey To Captain Team Americas in WSOP Asia-Pacific Caesars Cup – The WSOP Asia Pacific series is just a few weeks away and they’ve announced the captains for the latest effort to make the Caesars Cup something interesting. Phil Ivey (Team Americas), Sam Trickett (Team Europe), and Joe Hachem (Team Asia-Pacific) will now “draft” their teams.

Vertical Rush from PokerStars.com – I’m not exactly sure what I’m watching in this video other than it’s a bunch of people running up 42 floors of some building in London, includes Liv Boeree, and appears to have been recorded using mid-1990’s video technology.

Chris Reslock
Photo: WSOP

Today’s Boxscore

Chris Reslock $25,480 – WSOP-C Caesars NLHE Prelim
Martin Bader £56,000 – GUKPT London Main Event

There were less than 200 entrees into the WSOP Circuit $580 NLHE event at Caesars in Atlantic City, but the final results were worth notice. AC and east coast legend Chris Reslock joined a very small club when he won the tournament and captured his 5th WSOP-C ring. He joins Ari Engel, Kyle Cartwright, Mark Smith, and Kurt Jewel in the 5 ring club and just one victory behind Alexandru Masek. Reslock has one WSOP bracelet as well, in the 2010 $3,000 H.O.R.S.E. tournament, and over $1,000,000 in career tournament earnings.

Also underway this week is the price-reduced WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star tournament, the buy-in reduced from $10,000 to $7,500. It looks like the discount is producing similar results as seen at the Borgata when they dropped their price to draw in more people yet still end up with a larger prizepool. Moon Kim is the defending champion.

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Tweet of the Day – Tournament Director extraordinaire Matt Savage made it “official” with this tweet, the Bay 101 Shooting Star will top attendance and prizepool numbers from last year’s event.

Not too late to jump on a plane and get out to @bay101casino @wpt. Prize pool is bigger than last year already at a smaller buy in $7,500!

— Matt Savage (@SavagePoker) March 5, 2013

Casino Industry Opposes PokerStars’ Bid for New Jersey License – The American Gaming Association doesn’t seem too thrilled with the idea of PokerStars buying the Atlantic Club Casino in AC. The AGA sited PokerStar’s troubles with the DOJ and thinks this should prevent them from buying the old haunt.

PokerStars responds to AGA protest of bid to buy Atlantic Club casino – And PokerStars responds.

Daniel Negreanu & Antonio Esfandiari For Choice Center Las Vegas Scam-Cult – Say it ain’t so Daniel! Someone who uses all his might to shout down all the evil people in the world can’t possibly be a shill for a Las Vegas scam company. It’s just not possible, unless it is. Bryan Micon attempts to piece it all together.

2013 WSOP Registration is open – Avoid those crazy, small buyin, weekend registration lines at this summer’s WSOP by registering for your events early and online. Registration is now open.

Remi Castaignon
Photo: PokerStarsBlog.com

Today’s Boxscore

Remi Castaignon €770,000 – EPT Deauville
Michael Mizrachi $101,267 – WSOP Circuit South Africa
Tyler Patterson $19,080 – 2013 LAPC NLHE Escalator

Big tournaments finished this weekend all over the planet, from Europe to South Africa and across the US. Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi was already having pretty nice results over the last 12 months including a nearly $1.5 million victory in the 2012 WSOP Poker Players Championship. Now he can add WSOP Circuit ring winner to his resume after winning the 116-player Main Event at the Emerald Casino in South Africa.

Remi Castaignon is the latest EPT Champion for what is apparently his first tournament cash ever with a victory in the EPT Deauville Main Event. €770,000 is a fine way to get his first entry on HendonMob and it looks like he cruised to the win after entering the final table with 40% of the chips in play.

The 2013 LAPC continues to chug along with their preliminary events pulling in good numbers for the Savage structured grind. Plenty of big names are making their way to final tables including McLean Karr, Bryan Devonshire, Matt Affleck, and Tyler Patterson who managed a win along with the traditional ugly, 500 pound trophy. Elsewhere in the world, the WPT Seminole Hard Rock will play down to their champion in a few days with Matt Salsberg once again in the running with 36 players remaining.

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Tweet of the Day – Mizrachi wins and Andrew Felman reminded to remind himself that everyone forgets The Grinder. Perhaps people could start giving the man his props now?

I won the Main Event @emeraldpoker@wsoptd @wsopLove you South Africa.Ty every 1.Every 1 Here is Great.Thanks again !!

— Michael Mizrachi (@TheGrinder44) February 10, 2013

In the latest NUTS, I wrote: “@thegrinder44‘s pattern continues. Win huge event, get forgotten in these rankings, win another huge event.”

— Andrew Feldman (@AFeldmanESPN) February 11, 2013

Bally Technologies and Amaya Gaming sign poker content agreement – More reports of Vegas iGaming additions. The race is on and will be interesting to see who comes out ahead.

MGM Resorts Looks To Re-Enter New Jersey In Possible Internet Gaming Move – Gov. Christie takes positive steps towards online poker in NJ and all of a sudden MGM is again interested in Atlantic City.

Poker / By Alex Outhred – Hey, look who has a poker strategy article in the world renown Buffalo News! Good friend, and one of the good guys, Alex Outhred. (Part congrats, part needle, all complimentary)

Zynga’s Shares Rise As Legal US Online Gambling Is Mooted – Any time Forbes or a legitimate publication talks about online gambling, it’s noteworthy. This one is chock full of snark.

$100k in 7 Days! Let’s do this! – Daniel Negreanu is using his platform for a very worthy cause. A refreshing change for him.

Ryan Stevenson
Photo: WSOP.com

Today’s Boxscore

Ryan Stevenson $204,795 – WSOP-C Tunica Main Event
Mervin Chan AU$1,600,000 – Aussie Millions Main Event

The poker world is done for now on one continent and immediately hops over to another one. Mervin Chan was the big winner in the 2013 Aussie Millions Main Event for a nice AU$1.6 million payout after knocking out popular (and fan girl favorite) Patrik Antonius in 3rd place. The field was down a bit from last year but that might have been due to the NHUPC and the smaller buy-in, much closer WSOP-C in Tunica.

While the Aussie Million Main Event attendance was down, the Tunica WSOP-C event drew a devilish 666 players for an uptick from last year. Ryan Stevenson dominated the final table by taking out every player from 6th place on down to win the title, collect over $200,000, and a seat in the National Championship.

The WSOP Circuit isn’t taking any time off as their next series is already underway in South Africa. It will be interesting to see what big names make the trip after spending a few weeks Down Under. The African circuit event will also have to compete with the popular EPT Deauville Main Event which drew 782 players.

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Tweet of the Day – Poor poor Matty, always the victim. Except for win he’s set his phasers to blast and off his meds.

People talk about me, make songs about me, + form false opinions about me, b/c I actually matter to them, and you don’t. The truth hurts!

— Matthew Marafioti (@Adzizzy) February 5, 2013

I love people. I am extremely affected by how much hate + negativity I have received for things that aren’t even true about me. #IWorkSoHard

— Matthew Marafioti (@Adzizzy) February 5, 2013

Nuts: Hot start to ’13 for Selbst, Seiver – ESPN’s Andrew Feldman back with his monthly look at the top players in the game with some of your favorite poker beat writers. I’m a little surprised to see Hellmuth down in the #2 spot but Selbst is also worthy.

The WTO Loads Antigua’s Slingshot – Who knew this little battle was still going on between the U.S. and Antigua. The WTO ruled in Antigua’s favor and now the little Caribbean island is looking to make big noise.

State suspends licenses at several poker rooms – Michigan’s biggest poker room was among those closed after problems with them following charity regulations.

3 young Oklahoma City children left in car while dad played poker, police say – Meanwhile in Oklahoma, a moronic video poker player. No word on WhoJedi and his Caveman Keno addiction.

EPT9 Deauville: Here’s your f***in’ tour! – God bless Kristy Arnett’s little heart.

Baptiste Chavillaz
Photo: WSOP.com

Today’s Boxscore

Baptiste Chavillaz $216,275 – WSOP-C Bicycle Main Event
James Henson $31,021 – WSOP-C Choctaw No Limit Hold’em
Ross Bybee $168,433 – WSOP-C Choctaw NLHE Re-entry
Erin Slaughter $23,660 – WSOP-C Choctaw Tubro
Kevin Eyster $27,573 – WSOP-C Choctaw NLHE 6-Handed

The first WSOP Circuit event of 2013 wrapped up this week with the Bicycle Casino Main Event which drew a nice 721 entrants, up from the 549 last year. Baptiste Chavillaz turned his first ever WSOP-C tournament cash into a $216,275 title and a seat in the National Championship. In almost bigger news, poker reporter/blogger/photographer/tweeter/hair model Jay “WhoJedi” Newnum managed to make it through most of the field to finish an impressive 57th. A close friend was quoted as saying “What a lucksack.” *

On the east coast, the Borgata kicked off their Winter Poker Open festival with a record breaking field. They opened with a $560 re-entry tournament with two starting days and a $1,000,000 guarantee that drew a huge crowd. By the end of registration there were 3,871 entrees which nearly doubled the guarantee. The BWPO continues in balmy, scenic Atlantic City until the WPT televised Main Event starts on the 27th with a $2,000,000 guarantee.

* – Guilty

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Tweet of the Day – After going over the list of players in the National Heads Up Poker Championship, the most obvious omission was Vanessa Selbst. She answered all the questions in one simple tweet.

To answer people’s questions, I was invited to NBC HU but declined. Great tournament but decided to go to Aussie Millions instead this year.

— Vanessa Selbst (@VanessaSelbst) January 18, 2013

NHUPC 2013: Field of 64 announced – And here is the list, nicely typed out by Andrew Feldman. No real big eye raisers here except maybe the presence of Jean-Robert Bellande. He’ll add a little TV flair but at the expense of more deserving players like David “Doc” Sands and others. I like the inclusion of Shaun Deeb, Kyle Julius, Mohsin Charania, and Dan Smith.

The Best Poker Movie Scenes of All-Time – The Poker Archivist(tm) Nolan Dalla put together a great list of poker scenes. Give it a look and then your two cents.

Want This Job? Wear Your Poker Face – Caesars Entertainment running a management recruiting program dressed up as a poker series? Well played.

Sergio García: ‘I am as competitive as possible in anything I do’ – Garcia gave an interview to The Guardian while in the Bahamas for the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure where he talks about poker and competitiveness.