Could 2008 be the year we see the professional players dominate the WSOP? It could happen. We're only nine days into the WSOP and we've already had two big name winners who both, perhaps ironically, won their first bracelet on the same night.

Erick "E-dog" Lindgren is one of the game's most well-known players. He busted onto the poker scene in the early 2000s by first winning a $3,000 Bellagio Event for a couple grand and then grabbing a couple huge first place finishes at the WPT which got him up to over $1.5 million.

Since then Lindgren has been regular fixture on the poker circuit, whether it's winning huge sums of money in prop bets with people like Gavin Smith and Phil Ivey or appearing on Poker After Dark, NBC Heads-up Challenge and virtually every poker-related TV show.

It's astounding he didn't have a bracelet until last week.

Fortunately for Lindgren, he was able to get the monkey off his back by beating Justin Bonomo in heads-up play at Event 4 Mixed Hold'em.

"I didn't feel it that much," explained Lindgren in an interview, "But when I finally won and put that bracelet on… there's a lot of history in the bracelet and that meant a lot."

Lindgren was definitely the most marquee winner we've had since Erik Seidel won the last tournament before the 2007 Main Event.

Not to be forgotten, fellow Full Tilt pro David Singer also chalked up a WSOP victory on the same night. Singer out-fought the surprisingly resilient Jacobo Fernandez in heads-up play and claimed his own bracelet in Event 3 Pot-Limit Hold'em.

Singer is not nearly as well known as Lindgren but seems to perform better at the highest stakes. Singer made back-to-back final tables at the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. event and considering quality of the field that was no small feat.

Singing happy songs now.

After the victory Singer reflected on what it meant to finally grab some WSOP wrist-candy.

"I'm thrilled," he said in an exit interview. "I couldn't be happier. It has been a long time coming."

A long time, indeed. Singer has been playing since the early 80s so it must have been a huge relief to the high stakes pro.

In addition to these two well-known pros Nenad Medic won his first bracelet in Event 1. Medic is not nearly as big a name as either Singer or Lindgren but is nonetheless known very well by his peers and surprised many by winning the WPT event at Foxwoods in 2006.

Could Gus Hansen be the next to break the no-bracelet curse?

What does all this mean for the 2008 WSOP? Well that remains to be seen but it's important to note that at this time last year was Tom Schneider, who at that point was relatively unknown.

Perhaps the professional players have finally regained the edge they once held over amateur players or maybe it's just a matter of the pros winning a couple more coin flips this year compared to last year. Either way it should be an interesting summer.

Be sure to stay tuned to PokerListings.com for our barrage of content from the WSOP that includes live updates, photos, interviews, blogs, results, videos and plenty of terrible jokes to hold it all together. Or click here to qualify for the WSOP and have us harass you the entire summer!