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2008 WSOP Main Event Day 6 Recap

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 11:18:14 +0100

The penultimate day, well until November at least, saw 79 players return in the No-Limit Main Event with the intention of playing down to the final three tables. Fifty-two players, roughly two-thirds of the field, would have to go before the day was done.

But with the antes being particularly tough, the players tended to drop faster than we thought they would. By the time we got to the $30,000/$60,000 level, the ante was $10,000, which is huge for an event considered the most prestigious tournament in poker.

The beginning of the day was marked with some controversy as Phil Hellmuth's one-orbit ban from tournament director Steve Frezer was surprisingly overturned by Jeffrey Pollack, with the slightly lame excuse that Hellmuth's histrionics were done for entertainment's sake.

It'll be interesting to see how they manage to deal with the next person who causes a load of noise and then says they're entertaining people.

Meanwhile Hellmuth had managed, like the England soccer team, to be incredibly good at missing penalties. Instantly he was involved in the action and managed to almost double up with K-Q on a Q-J-7-5-K board after calling two bets on the flop and turn with the river going check/check.

More slackness emerged when one of the decks was found not to be monochrome. Keith Hawkins was dealt one red card and one blue card. It was more annoying for the initial raiser, Joe Bishop, who ended up having to give up a big hand that he had raised with.

Mark Ketteringham had started the day as chip leader, but was out relatively early on when he got short and pushed his J 8 straight into Gert Andersen's A Q and failed to improve.

Hellmuth also departed, depriving the rail of poker's biggest star. His A Q had a big draw on the turn of a K 4 3 T 2 board, but couldn't outdraw Andrew Rosskamm's pocket jacks. The last former champion in the running here ended up out in 45th place, winning $154,400 for his efforts.

Kido Pham was another of the big names to go out against jacks: he held big slick, but by the turn of the J-T-9-9 board he was drawing dead, and took home the same amount of cash as the Poker Brat. This left Matusow as the last big name still in it, but he was the recipient of an ultra-cooler this deep in the Main Event.

Having reraised pre-flop, he and Paul Snead both checked the A A 5 flop before all the money went in on the 9 turn. Matusow flipped A J, only to find that to his horror, he'd been three-outered by Snead's A 9. No nine or jack came on the river, and a shell-shocked Matusow was a goner.

Craig Marquis finished the day as chip leader with $11,300,000, just ahead of Dennis Phillips with $11,150,000. Poker reporter/player Tiffany Michelle, the last woman in the event, will be sitting in third spot when they come back tomorrow to play down to the final nine before the extended hiatus for the final table.

Will the three of them be there come November? You'll have to tune into our updates tomorrow to find out!

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Phil Hellmuth: Good or Bad for Poker?

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 08:43:12 +0100

No one casts a bigger shadow over poker than Phil Hellmuth. Like him or loathe him, Hellmuth represents practically everything good and bad in poker. The record 11-time bracelet winner draws people to the game, and yet many blame him for being the inspiration for all the loud obnoxious wannabes who turn up on ESPN year after year.

I first saw Phil Hellmuth play back in the late '90s when he came over to the U.K. to play on Late Night Poker, one of the very first shows to use hole cams to show players' cards.

Hellmuth turned up in a suit and was generally friendly with all the other players, occasionally trading banter with mostly old-school British players like the Hendon Mob, Surinder Sunar and Dave Colclough.

Hellmuth ended up winning one of the seasons, for a £50,000 payoff. He appeared confident without ever seeming aloof, and of course there was no doubting his ability in No-Limit Hold'em.

Since the poker boom of the "Moneymaker year," though, Hellmuth has become well known for his constant, eminently quotable diatribes directed mainly at the newbies who've come to the game after having seen Moneymaker's historic victory.

Like many singers and celebrities, Hellmuth has marketed himself as a product - arguable more so than anyone else in the industry.

As does tennis player Roger Federer, he has his own personalized logo. It's his "trademark" to enter an event late and more recently to turn up in a specific style - last year there was the rally crash and the 11 models, and this year he came dressed similarly to General Patton.

This, plus his tirades, seems to make him more akin to a WWE star than a poker player. The problem is, no one seems to take him seriously anymore; in fact, his actions could be viewed as hurting poker.

When he gets into one of his rants, then sure, the cameras lap it up and some viewers at home get a giggle out of it, but for every nine spectators who laugh at his antics, there's always one guy who'll decide that acting loudly and obnoxiously is the best way for him to get 15 minutes of fame, and will proceed to do so at the next WSOP.

And for those who might want to get into poker, how can it continue to grow when its biggest star is seen to get upset and act like a spoiled child over the turn of a card?

Even so, there are always some signs that Hellmuth can win and lose with great class, like when he placed third in the H.O.R.S.E. event this year: there was no kicking or screaming, just a handshake and a good luck wish for the remaining players. No doubt this high-place finish clearly meant a lot to him, especially in a mixed event - it's well-known that the other games aren't his forte compared to Hold'em.

But the Hold'em players are catching up, or at least, the online players are moving across to live poker with great success, meaning the fields of the big-buy-in events are getting tougher. Hellmuth doesn't have the greatest record against the very top players, such as in High Stakes Poker. Perhaps he still thinks he can fold a small +EV spot for an even bigger +EV spot later on, but against the very top players, his edge, if any, is minimal.

With the constant swarm of new Internet kids coming through every day now, though, we may eventually reach a point where poker doesn't need Hellmuth as much as Hellmuth needs poker, which is clearly not the case at the moment. But the monosyllabic nature of so many of these kids, who say next to nothing and win pots nonstop, means that Hellmuth will likely never become a relic.

If only he could continue to entertain and yet treat some of his fellow pros with a bit more class.

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Lights! Camera! Inaction!

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 07:54:14 +0100

At the Main Event, more so than even the other WSOP bracelet tournaments, it's not unusual to see ESPN camera crews dashing around the Amazon and Brasilia rooms as though their lives depended on it. The problem is, poker as a spectator sport is generally pretty dull.

Now, I don't want anyone shouting "Blasphemy!!" from the church spire and directing the local lynching mob to my location. The fact of the matter is that, well, some of this filming seems quite odd to me.

One of the most common sights in the Main Event is camera crews fishing around the pool of a table with the long rod ... I mean microphone, hoping to reel in some sort of catch of the day which they can then fillet, and sell to the public. The hitch is, many of the top poker players (with obvious exceptions) are incredibly quiet and focused people who simply don't talk that much!

Often I see players like Allen Cunningham or Erik Seidel with a TV crew crouching behind them like a pack of hyenas on the prowl. Seriously, you could put a boom mike in front of Allen Cunningham and he's like a camel in the desert - he can go days without uttering a single sentence.

Perhaps we are loathe to admit it, but the antics of Hellmuth, Matusow et al. are each a minor oasis in what is in fact a quiet, calm, focused room. They don't often break other players' concentration, but at least they provide a respite from the monotony of playing.

Poker is just long and boring much of the time. Most players are only going to be playing between 20% and 30% of their hands, if that.

Therefore it's rather baffling that the TV crews will camp by Doyle Brunson when he's not even short-stacked, waiting for him to say something pertinent, like handing down tasks to his disciples, when it's pretty clear that he's, well, kinda busy.

You could argue that these players, with the wealth and power they've gained, should be able to handle the disadvantages that a certain form of faux-celebritydom has brought them, but some players not used to the media scrutiny are cracking under the pressure.

Yesterday we saw 2007 Main Event finalist Phillip Hilm seemingly crack under the pressure of all the media attention, making what some people would call a questionable call with 4-3 after his opponent had reraised all-in on the turn. Hilm, with almost 30 members of the media recording his every move, facial tic and furrowed brow, called in a position where, in a quiet room, he'd likely fold every time.

The other major issue with the cameras, is that since the year of Moneymaker, the attraction of poker has become huge. Fields are rife with people either dressed up or afflicted with the idea that being the loudest, most obnoxious person in the room will get them their 15 seconds of fame to dance around like an idiot.

The problem with such a modus operandi is that it actually works. A couple of days ago, a guy bawled from the top of his lungs that he was all-in and how great he was and demanded the cameras turned up to watch him. Sure enough, they did as told, and he got a little period of being filmed where he sat, pretty much good as gold, another happy puppy getting its belly rubbed.

These examples are the two extremes that are due to the presence of filming, I'm not saying the filming isn't necessary; it's just that the consistent focus on certain well-known players and the propensity to follow total idiots is not going to help poker.

The best way to solve this is to find a happy medium. Home in on key hands, and keep the bread and circus to a minimum, using it with a light touch just to spice up the proceedings. This might be harder work, but it would surely be more rewarding for poker fans viewing the footage, and less damaging to those with 10 large on the line.

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2008 WSOP Day 36 Recap

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 13:16:33 +0100

After the excitement of opening day, the number of runners dipped for Day 1b of the Main Event, no doubt due to aftereffects of the July 4th celebrations.

Whether this will help or hinder the event over the weekend, however, remains to be seen.

After 1,297 players turned up yesterday, reporters kept a keen eye on the total number of players, which at the moment is unofficially around the 5,500 mark. The Main Event, though, will need two days of 2,000 players or more though if it is to surpass last year's mark of 6,358 players, which itself was down on the previous year.

Last year's champion - a person who's been as difficult to find over the last 12 months as Waldo or Carmen Sandiego - Jerry Yang announced the famous words, "Shuffle up and deal" to great applause from the crowds of watching people who were as likely here sheltering from the 110-degree temperatures outside as they were for the poker.

Jamie Gold was among those playing today. He received an early boost when his table played for a period of time during the first level with blinds at $25/$50, as opposed to every other table in the tournament where they were $50/$100.

Ted Forrest was the earliest pro to exit; he got all-in with deuces on a A Q 2 board against K J, only to see his opponent to catch the T on the turn, with Forrest unable to house up on the river.

Daniel Negreanu was another player who left early, falling to the set-over-set curse that claims so many players. No doubt it was equally disappointing for many of the public on the rail who had come to see people like himself and Patrik Antonius see if they could catch themselves a few fish.

Speaking of the latter, he was incredibly dominant at his table all day and quickly managed to amass himself an $80,000 stack fairly early on before losing a healthy chunk of it later on in the day. He'd flopped a set of deuces only to run into a flopped set of kings with all the money getting in the middle by the river. Unlike Negreanu and Forrest though, he managed to make it through to Day 2.

Erick Lindgren celebrated his winning of the Player of the Year title by having a very solid day on the feature TV table, while Robert Mizrachi did even better, finishing fourth in chips with $131,000, but behind the chip leader Ben Sarnoff who had $165,000.

Another player who perhaps slipped quietly underneath the radar of many of the railers was Canadian Marc Karam.

Last year's EPT Monte Carlo runner-up finished with $113,000, having made a number of excellent calls and plays, including one big sweat where he called off half his stack with J J against A 7 on a 6 4 3 board and managed to avoid all 15 outs twice.

It was especially sweet since Karam had dropped about half his stack in the opening half hour and had no doubt been thinking it probably wasn't going to be his day.

By Main Event standards, this was a relatively quiet day. Saturday and Sunday are expected to be much more action-packed, though, with an estimated 4,000 players still to come through the doors, including Phil Ivey, Phil Hellmuth and the legend himself, Doyle Brunson. PokerListings will be there with all the action all the way to the wire, so make sure you join us!

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2008 WSOP Day 35 Recap

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 12:30:56 +0100

It was the beginning of the end, or maybe the end of the beginning, but either way it certainly wasn't the middle part, that's for sure.

Today, the real deal started with Event 54, the $10,000 No-Limit Hold'em World Championship tournament, won by Jerry Yang last year.

With Jamie Gold's deal-based troubles a couple of years ago and Yang's conspicuous absence from the poker circuit over the last year, poker really needs someone with Greg Raymer or Joe Hachem's clout to step forward and help out an industry hamstrung by the UIGEA and the state of the U.S. economy, among other things.

A lot of eyes, especially those of Harrah's, were on the number of runners for today's event, in the hope that there might possibly be a significant increase in runners that would provide some much-needed positive press for the Main Event.

More players signed up than for last year's Day 1a, but with a total of 1,297 runners starting today, it was only an increase of 10 heads, which means there will most likely be a similar number of runners to last year.

The day started with Wayne Newton opening the proceedings announcing "Shuffle up and deal" and Everest Poker cushions adorning each and every chair. Of course with so many players in the tournament, many of them fairly inexperienced, it was only a matter of time before someone managed to get their whole stack in incredibly early and depart just as fast.

It didn't take long. On a 6-3-2 two players got it all-in; their hands were, naturally, 6-6 and 5-4 ...

No; I'm kidding, it was never going to be anything that good. They held A-A and J-J, having quickly managed to put their whole stacks at risk with just one pair. The jacks, though, managed to spike a third knave, leaving the other player with nothing more than the shortest WSOP anecdote he'll ever be able to tell.

There were early bust-outs among the pros as well, Tom "durrrr" Dwan being one of them, which means he can go back to four-tabling online for around 200 times the buy-in spread over those tables. Newly braceleted David Beyamine was another early casualty (perhaps they had a high-stakes cash game planned online?). He was joined on the rail later on by his better half, Erica Schoenberg, who didn't have the best of days.

Chad Brown also didn't manage to make it through, and last year's runner-up Tuan Lam started off strongly, only to bust in the early evening.

With so many runners, you could be forgiven for wondering why some players had decided to enter this event. On a K 7 3 J 7, Woody Deck called an all-in with A A and was shown A-7 by his opponent. The latter thought he had won and celebrated in delight, only to be booted from the table after being told that trips does not actually beat a flush.

In another crazy hand, Justin Phillips would not stop laughing and shouting for the two hours that followed him making a royal flush against quads. Yes, if anything was going to show how daft and silly poker could get, it would have to be this hand.

The day ended with Mark Garner as the chip lead with over $205,000 in chips, but Brandon Adams was close behind in second place with $170,000. Further down the list was Kido Pham and Mark Vos, both also sitting at over $100,000, as well as Jon "PearlJammer" Turner, who had also made it above that mark.

Tomorrow, we'll be starting it all over again with, we suspect, a similar amount of entries, with the numbers likely to increase during the weekend. Therefore join us once more when we battle through another 1,000-player field to bring your all the juiciest of news from this year's Main Event!

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Winners and Losers of the WSOP

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 06:33:30 +0100

Today sees the completion of the final two preliminary events before the Main Event begins tomorrow, and winners of the last $1,500 No-Limit event and the $1,500 Limit Shootout have already been determined.

Every article you've read has probably mentioned how this year is "The Year Of The Pro," but who were the real winners and losers over the course of the last few weeks?

Winners

Pros. It can't be denied that the big-name pros had an exceptional year. Erick Lindgren, David Singer, Kenny Tran, J.C Tran, David Benyamine and John Phan all picked up their first bracelets, while Daniel Negreanu, Mike Matusow, Layne Flack, Scotty Nguyen and Barry Greenstein all added to their haul.

And these were just the names that your reasonably knowledgeable poker fan would know; many more of the other bracelet winners were regular pros whom people are less liable to have heard of.

On top of this, you had a whole host of players make one of the top three places in many events, from Ted Forrest's second place in the Limit Omaha Hi-Lo Split event, to Chris Ferguson getting a third place in the first $1,500 event and then second in the $5,000 Stud-8 event.

Full Tilt and PokerStars. It's been a great series for two of the biggest online sites who've regularly been able to flash shots on their software of the beaming smiles of bracelet winners. Full Tilt made the early running with wins for Nenad Medic, Erick Lindgren and David Singer but PokerStars chipped in soon enough, with Daniel Negreanu, Barry Greenstein and Dario Minieri all taking home a bracelet as well.

Both sites will be more than satisfied with how everything has gone so far, but no doubt they'll be hoping that one of their guys will take down the big one. The benefits to any poker site of one of their pros winning the Main Event would be huge.

People Making It Deep. Unlike last year's final, the additional levels that have been inserted later on in the tournament have really made a difference. The $5,000 Six-Handed event was a real battle this year, unlike in the previous year where Bill Edler won by realizing the final had to be played like a turbo sit-and-go.

People Who Like Hold'em. If you like Hold'em, this WSOP had enough for you. Around 60% of events this year were Hold'em, in a variety of forms.

People Who Found the Miranda Soup and Noodle Kitchen. Tucked in around the corner away from all the stands and business, the soup and noodle kitchen served the best food to the few people who managed to make the effort to find it.

The Germans. Three bracelets for the Germans this year and all-in non-Hold'em events - certainly not bad for a country with only a few established top-tier pros. Jens Voertmann, Sebastian Ruthenberg and Martin Klaser all added their names of a fairly short list of Deutschland-derived bracelet winners.

Losers

Players Who Like the Stud Games. If you're a Stud fan, you weren't going to find too many games this year. There was just one solitary Razz event this time, with only a couple of Stud Hi and Stud-8 events being played as well. If you preferred one specific version of Stud, you were going to be in trouble since there had been an increase of H.O.R.S.E. events, seemingly at the cost of Stud.

Internet Stars. Apart from Phil "OMGClayAitken" Galfond, the top tiers of Internet players like "durrrr" and "Gobboboy" have not managed to bag the bracelet during the Series, or even come that close. Scott "SCTrojans" Freeman came close in the second $1,000 Rebuy, but could only manage third. No doubt this failure will be met with a little bit of satisfaction from some of the live pros, who might well have feared the Internet kids usurping their territory. It seems that this year though, they've staved off the threat, for the moment.

People Playing the Smaller Events Only. With a smaller amount of chips, people playing the $1,500 and $2,000 side events are really not experiencing proper poker unless they make it deep into the event. And due to the size of these fields and the high amount of luck factored into them, this makes it hard to see most people getting their money's worth from the smaller events.

People at the Rio Wanting Food After 3 a.m. The Rio has to be one of the only casinos in Vegas where there is nowhere to get food between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m. The Poker Kitchen shuts at 3 a.m., and then you're stuck with having to go across to the Gold Coast or ordering room service, with the latter usually taking an hour to be delivered. At least give us something next year for when that tournament or cash game finishes extra late ...

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Lowest of the Low: Small-Buy-In Tournaments Part 2

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 13:58:28 +0100

So there I was; it was the second tournament of that same night, and if you read the first part, I was hoping it was going to go way better than that.

To recap, I had busted out in what can be described as record time during the $100 event at the Orleans, but those competitions are not exactly decided on skill.

They require luck, lots and lots of blind luck. A saying we have in the U.K. about soccer is that, "The best team wins the Premiership, but the luckiest team wins the FA Cup." It's the same with these tournaments - you might be a good player, but you better be a lucky one too.

A friend of mine, Jen Mason, had also dropped by to play these two events. She's a good player and could clearly see the masses of value swarming around the refurbished poker room. Although around 250 people had played the earlier event, only a third of these had hung around long enough to stay and give this "second-chance" tournament a whack.

I reached my table. Surveying the lay of the land, I had three women sitting to my right and mainly elderly men sitting to my left, so it did not look as though there would be too much craziness early on. The structure was similar to the other tournament except this time we'd only get $4,000 in chips instead of the previous $5,000.

I picked up Q Q from UTG+1 and bumped it up to $150. The lady in the small blind called, with everyone else folding.

The flop came out A T 8, not a great one, but at least I had the Q, which was an out. The lady checked to me and I decided to check behind; I reasoned she wouldn't pass an ace to me but would probably fold most other hands.

If she had an ace and check-raised (a dangerous move here, but you can't ever predict what people will do at the smallest buy-in levels), I'd have to fold. I decided to check behind and then see what she would do on the turn.

The turn brought the A, which was a good card, as it made it less likely she held one, but she fired out $200 into the $325 pot. I called, thinking my queens were probably good, as she might be betting the ten now that the board had paired.

The river then paired the ten, coming T, and she checked. I thought about what I could bet and decided very little was paying me off.

I checked behind and she showed K J. A queen on the river would have been nice! A few hands later UTG raised to $125 and got two callers, and I called the extra $75 with J 8.

The flop came down A T 9, giving me a flush with a straight flush redraw. Decent start.

I decided to lead out for $300 - if UTG had any sort of decent ace with a strong club as kicker, he might raise me then and there. Any ace would at least be forced to call the flop bet, while someone holding the K would not be getting out of the way. UTG called my bet and the other two players folded.

On the turn the A appeared. Now I really hoped he was holding an ace, as he might well want to get his whole stack in there and then.

I bet $900 but again, he just called. If he had an ace, he was doing well to lose the minimum. The river was a 3 and now I made a value bet of $1,625. He quickly folded, saying that he had K Q and had been chasing. Unlike the last tournament, this one had gone pretty well.

I picked up a few blinds against the tighter older gentleman who called my raise from the big blind a couple of times but always check-folded to my bet on the flop.

The table was then broken and I was moved tables literally for seconds. However, it was just in time to see two $10,000 stacks go to war with aces and queens respectively.

"Unlucky man," I ventured to the gentleman sitting with just shrapnel left as the lady across the table eagerly lapped up the chips like a kitten over a fallen saucer of milk.

"I should've just flat-called; then I could've folded on the flop."

"But the flop came 6-2-2, that would be really hard to get away from, especially with this structure," I said.

"No, if she'd bet the flop, I could've folded easily."

Faced with that honest sincerity and belief in something that I could never have done, I was glad to be moved tables once again, and fortuitously to the left of what looked to be the biggest stack of the tournament.

After a couple of rounds of not picking up any cards, the guy two to my right limped for $200 when I picked up pocket tens. I raised to $750 before the button gave me a cold hard stare. He thought about reraising but then ended up just flat-calling. The big blind called too after some debate and that brought the limper in as well.

I prayed for a real low board, else I was done with the hand, but the dealer threw out J T 7 to give me a set.

The big blind thought and thought, fiddling with his chips, looking as though he wanted to bet but wasn't sure if he should. He ended up checking, as did the original limper.

The action was on me, and there was obviously no way I could slow-play this hand, but at the same time I wouldn't be folding should anyone come over the top. I had about $6,000 behind and there was $3,100 in the pot.

I bet $1,800 to show that I still enough chips to fold if someone raised me. With the texture of the flop I really felt that someone would have hit it hard enough to go the whole way with A-J, K-Q or something along those lines.

The button glared at me and counted his chips, then folded, seemingly disgusted with himself. The big blind passed too after counting out half his stack which he would've had to call off. With no fold equity, he gave up what he later said was K-Q.

The limper folded also. The big blind muttered how he wished had bet the flop because then he would've been priced in, and he asked to see the turn despite the hand being over.

The dealer acquiesced and showed the T, which would've made me quads. But never mind; I had picked up a fair number of chips in the hand. Of course then, the blinds increased rapidly with oversized antes coming in, and I managed to do a lot of my chips in one hand trying to blind-steal.

I picked up T 8 from the hijack and with the blinds $200/$400 with a $50 ante, I raised to $1,100. The button, the same player who called when I held tens before, again gave me the long stare before making the call.

The flop was raggy, coming 9 5 2. I fired out about $1,600, leaving myself about $4,800 behind with him having me well covered. He thought for a moment before raising me another $2,000. Marvellous.

I gave up the hand and was left nursing a short stack, and began the merry dance of looking for spots, praying for walks and hoping I didn't get called. Eventually I got up to $6,600, hoping for some respite, only to see the level to go up.

But not from $300/$600 ($75) to $400/$800 ($75), but straight up to $500/$1,000 ($100). Eeek.

I came back from the break with my six big blinds with one hand to go before the big blind hit me. I was determined to shove all but the worst cards.

I looked down and saw something that looked like heaven and yet it was only A T. I moved in and awaited the inevitable, like a man on death row.

The man sitting opposite me asked for a count before shoving all-in for his paltry, but still bigger than mine, stack of about $8,000. Everyone else folded and I was thinking I was drawing to three outs, until he flipped over K Q.

My surprise was tempered by the T 9 8 flop, which meant any paint was good for him. The Q got him there on the turn and the J river made the straight.

We were still a table or two away from the money so I wasn't disheartened, but as someone who spends a fair amount of time playing decently structured tournaments on PokerStars and Full Tilt, it really becomes a case of whether it's more worthwhile playing badly structured tournaments with really bad players or better structured competitions online with much better players.

I'm of two minds, but I think I'll still make the trip to the Orleans the next Friday I have off.

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Lowest of the Low: Small-Buy-In Tournaments

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 09:25:34 +0100

For most people, it's a dream to play the WSOP. But for those who stump up the cash to play the side events, they might find themselves not getting their money's worth.

Last year, Harrah's made the decision to double the starting stacks for all competitions. Then they doubled the blinds also. And took some levels out too.

Last year's final tables were nothing more than crapshoots and bore more resemblance to a PokerStars turbo sit-and-go than to honorable battles for a bracelet. After all the complaints and moaning, this year, the levels have all been put back in at the later stages of the tournaments and this has allowed for some excellent finals, so credit to Harrah's for doing this.

For those of us who can't afford the big buy-ins to these events, the Venetian, Caesars and Binions offer cheaper alternatives with usually better structures. But for those of us who have to work and only have the odd day off, there are still some occasionally good places to find poker where we too can (almost) experience decent poker tournaments.

Planet Hollywood and the Sahara both run reasonably priced tournaments for around $60 with $4,000 or $5,000 worth of chips, but my own personal favorite place to play is the Orleans, which was completely refurbished this year with big comfy chairs and brand-new poker tables.

Generally they do an $80 tournament every night with $4,000 chips and a 20-minute clock, but on the Friday, the tournament features a $105 buy-in with $5,000 chips and half-hour clock after the first few levels. This structure attracts the sharks and the fish alike and and means that the tournaments regularly boast prize pools of over $20,000 a night.

The other night I was lucky enough to have time off to take a whack at this tournament. I'm not really a cash-game player, so the chance of a reasonably priced tournament that would only last one day was a compelling reason to go.

With the WSOP in full swing, the room itself was packed with not a single table to spare, while the waiting lists were huge for both tournament and cash games.

I managed to snag a seat, but unfortunately it was the 10-seat, which, like most poker players, I hate because you cannot see much of seats 1 and 2. This was doubly bad because there was a very attractive girl in seat 1.

But I digress - after just a couple of hands I found pocket kings after the player opposite me sitting in UTG+1 raised pre-flop to $300 with the guy to my right calling.

I reraised to $1,200 and after everyone else folded, both players called. I was going to move all-in on most flops, thinking that one of them had to call if they caught anything on the flop or were holding any sort of reasonable pair.

Of course, that plan went out the window once the dealer put down a A J T flop, pretty much the worst possible flop for me to see.

Sure, I had a gut-shot, but that oasis quickly became a mirage when the first player checked and the second led out for $1,200. I gave up the hand and the original raiser quickly moved all-in. The guy to my right agonized for a while - he'd put half his chips in this pot and then ended up folding for the other half, showing the A as he mucked. The original raiser showed T T.

So not exactly a great start, doing a quarter of my stack within a few minutes, but recoverable enough.

A level later the "tens" guy raised to $400 after a loose-passive woman limped under the gun. I called this time with eights, the woman folded and we were heads-up. The flop came out K T 3, not a great flop. "Tens" didn't look happy either but nevertheless fired out $400 again, which seemed weak-ish.

I decided just to call; I didn't want to turn my hand into a bluff and I actually felt I was still ahead. The turn was the 9 and he checked to me. Now I felt I was good against a smaller pair or an A-x hand. This wasn't enough reason to bet, though, so I checked behind. To my chagrin the A came on the river, but Tens checked once more and so did I have.

"Errr, you must be good, I just have a ten."

I mucked as he turned over ten-six offsuit. Tens was kicking my ass.

I was down to $3,000 with blinds becoming $75/$150. I picked eights again and raised to $450 in mid-position; the loose-passive woman called from the big blind. She been limping into many pots but was playing very tight after the flop - a couple of hands previously she had folded kings face up on the turn of a 5-7-8-T board after another player raised her on the flop and moved in on the turn.

The flop appeared Q 7 6. She studied it for a second and then picked a few of the $25 chips, placed them on the $100 chips, then placed those on her remaining $500 chips and moved all-in for about three and a half times the pot. I thought for about 20 seconds. She couldn't be on a draw, could she?

I then realized I was probably thinking too much; I wasn't good, and should get on with the next hand. I felt somewhat vindicated a bit later when she limped UTG (again) and Tens limped behind her and they saw an 8-7-4 flop.

She did the same trick again and moved all-in for around twice the pot. This time Tens called, and everyone else folded. She turned over K-8 and he flipped 9-6, she held and doubled up.

"Figured I'd take a shot," said Tens.

Soon after I was down to $2,200 with the blinds now reaching the end of the $100/$200 level. Tens limped from the cut-off with a stack of about $8,000 and I was in the small blind. I looked at one card; it was the A.

I moved in and the big blind folded. Tens gave me a frowning look, as if to say, "How dare you try and stop me from seeing a flop?"

He decided he was going to see it anyway, and quickly called me. I looked at my other card - it was the 8 - and he showed K J. The dealer dealt out a T 9 8 flop to tease me, before dropping the 7 for pure amusement.

Naturally the A came on the river, just like in any film involving poker. I'd made the dead man's hand, of course, but it was no good.

Tens was apathetic about the outcome. "Sorry bud, but you've been running bad all day" was his unique outlook on the situation. I left the table but then saw there was a second tournament that started in a couple of hours, but that's another story ...

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Top 5 PLO Tournament Tips

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 06:45:00 +0100

One of the prestige events, the $10,000 pot-limit Omaha, which has been around for a fair few years now, begins tomorrow. It's the premium Omaha event of the year, and was won last year by Robert Mizrachi, beating Rene Mouritsen heads up, it also included a final table with Doyle Brunson and Patrick Antonius (the latter actually making a Royal Flush in one hand against Mizrachi).

Last year, there were 314 players, and the year before, when Lee Watkinson took the bracelet, there were only 218 players. Due to the explosion of PLO, mostly online, I'd expect this to increase again, perhaps maybe breaking the 400-player mark. In the meantime, I thought I'd lay out a few PLO tournament pointers:

Nit It Up

For a PLO freezeout, you can't gamble, now that sounds inherently stupid, but this is not a rebuy tournament. Every time you place chips into the pot, you bring yourself closer to tournament oblivion, but the crux is that PLO is a flop game and you're just going to have to see some flops, just make sure you're holding good cards and not trap hands.

Hand Selection

Avoid anything with a dangler, Q-J-T-5, 9-8-7-2, you need all four cards in working order, otherwise it's like turning up in your car to a Nascar race with one flat tyre. Avoid overplaying any A-A-x-x hands also, people when they re-raise you will naturally put your on this hand, and when playing any big pair, be prepared to give it up when you don't improve on the flop. This means you'll be folding overpairs A LOT, but that's just standard for PLO.

The best way to look at big pairs that do not come with any helpful cards like A-A-6-2 or Q-Q-7-5, is to play them for set-value at best, if at all. Most flops, you should be dumping them, especially in multi-way pots, heads-up you can take shots at the safer flops such as holding K-K-x-x on a Q-7-2 rainbow board, but again, be prepared to give up the hand if you are raised.

Draw To The Nuts Only!

In a 6-max cash game, you can just about get away with making low-ends of the straight, weaker flushes but in a full-ring tournament, this just can't be done. You want the nut-draw pretty much all the time, and early on, even if you flop a big wrap with flush draw you don't particularly want get all your stack as quick as you can. If you're drawing against top set, you're still only the better side of a coinflip at best, and if the board pairs on the turn, you're often going to be drawing dead by then.

It's that simple. If you don't have the nuts or aren't drawing to the nuts then get out the pot. Stay away from the idiot ends of the straight draw or chasing the 5-high flush draws, as you'll only ever go broke in the long term. When you pick up good hands, play them aggressively, and if the board kills your hand, as it invariably will from time to time, then without a redraw, give up because your hand won't be good.

No Slowplaying

Slowplaying is a great trappy way of picking up extra money against overly aggressive players in no-limit hold'em, but you just don't need to do that in Omaha. There's so many scare cards out there, that you should generally just keep betting while you have the best hand. Say, you're holding 7-7-x-x and the flop comes 7-5-5. In hold'em, you might slowplay that hand, but in PLO there is no need to.

A person will have to call at least one bet with a 5 and may pay you off more if they make a smaller house. Also, if you slowplay and a card bigger than a 7 comes off, it might make a bigger house for someone else and there will be very little you will be able to do in getting away from that. If no-one calls, then it was unlikely you were getting any more money from the hand anyway.

Trap Hands

I've mentioned before how often people go broke playing A-A-x-x, the best way to avoid doing this is that if you can't get 1/3 or more of your stack preflop with aces then don't re-raise. Also a disguised flopped set of aces are usually profitable since people will assume you'd re-raise preflop with them.

Other trap hands are ones like A-K-Q-J, it's a good hand, but you don't want to get into a raising war with it, you're usually dominated and in serious problems. Hands like K-Q-J-T or 9-8-7-6 are much better since you will know where you stand post-flop and won't ever be in too bad shape vs aces.

The most difficult situations to avoid though are when you flop an underful, that is, the bottom house such as holding 7-6-6-5 and the flop coming T-T-6. These hands have to be played very cautiously if deep-stacked, (if you or your opponent is short, you should just get it all-in quickly). And generally, if your opponent raises on the river against a bet from you, you generally should always be passing there as you're never good.

Hopefully, if you're following our PLO coverage and are an Omaha novice, then these pointers should help you out somewhat.

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My Picks for the Main Event

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 11:41:28 +0100

The Main Event approacheth, and in light of that, I've started to think about who I'd pick to take it down.

Given that there will be several thousand entries, it's extremely unlikely that any of these players will win and quite possible that none will even make the money.

Having said all that, I've chosen five players I think would come out extremely profitable, if they played the Main Event over a decent sample size. (This is actually one of the reasons why a friend of mine, a successful professional player, won't play the Main Event: he recognizes that he would be +EV against the field but believes that a sample size over a lifetime is just too small for you to ever see that profit.)

I decided not to pick too many of the most obvious names, simply because that would become boring. Also, I've tried not to solely focus on online or live players, but instead incorporate a mix of both.

5) Dag Martin Mikkelsen: "dmmikkel" was one of the chip leaders after the Day 1's last year. He's your typical Norwegian - fearless, aggressive, looks about 12. But he went very deep in what was his first-ever Main Event, eventually finishing 42nd, which shows a lot of promise. If he gets chips again, expect the same outcome, or better.

4) John "Razor" Phan: The man is in form, so he has to be someone to pick. He already has two bracelets this year, and wants more. When interviewed after winning his bracelet, he stated that nothing would mean more to him than winning the Main Event at the World Series, and for a man who loves to gamble, that's a statement you can really bet on.

3) Scott "SCTrojans" Freeman: Another one of the online crowd, like Mikkelsen he went deep in the Main Event last year, eventually finishing 19th. His online record is excellent with wins in the PokerStars $200 rebuy and having won the $1,000 event on Full Tilt also. We also haven't seen online players make many big runs yet in any of the competitions, so sooner or later this should really happen ...

2) Bill Edler: At the start of last year most people probably wouldn't have known who Bill Edler was, but then he went on probably the rush to end all rushes. He won the $5,000 six-max event at the 2007 WSOP, came 33rd in the Main Event, won a WPT, final-tabled in a second and bubbled the final of a third. He's not really had anything much to shout about in 2008, but surely it's only a matter of time. He's also one of the nicest guys on the circuit.

1) Allen Cunningham: The easiest pick I'll ever have to make. While Ivey, Negreanu and Lindgren get all the headlines, Allen Cunningham trundles quietly along with no one watching. He's already won a circuit event this year over at Caesar's and made the final of the Mixed Pot-Limit Hold'em/Omaha event, plus cashed a couple more times. The real reason though that he's my pick is that he's just incredibly consistent and rarely makes any rash plays. Of my five picks, I would definitely back Cunningham to make the most money.

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Race for the Prize!

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 07:42:20 +0100

The Player of the Year race is usually a pretty intense thing, but this year more than most, it could well go right down to the wire.

The POY is a prestigious title, despite its only having been in existence since 2004. Plus, you'll get a gigantic picture of yourself affixed to the wall, which will look pretty cool ... if you can see it behind all the advertising, that is.

In 2004, Daniel Negreanu was the first POY, picking up one bracelet and six cashes, as well as five final tables.

This year he's already picked up a bracelet and made the final of the PLO $5,000 w/Buy a Bracelet, I mean w/Rebuys, as well as just missing the Stud final table and cashing in one of the low-buy-in donkaments.

Can Kid Poker become the first two-time Champion? It's certainly possible, as he's currently in fifth place, but he'll most likely need to win at least one more bracelet or final-table a couple more times.

The other former POYs, Allen Cunningham, Jeff Madsen and Tom Schneider, are further away from challenging for the title and would have to really pull out something special if they were to gain any ground on the leaders.

Ahead of Negreanu currently are three well-known heavyweights and one relatively unknown player. Erick Lindgren finally got his first bracelet and was no doubt teased by all his friends over what took him so long. He also came fourth in the 2-7 Single Draw and bubbled the final of a Limit event too. There's still the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. set to start tomorrow, and if he busts that, there's the $5,000 six-max event the day after, an event in which he finished second to a then-unknown Jeff Madsen in 2006.

Above him in the current rankings by a mere five points is Barry Greenstein, after winning this year's solitary Razz event combined with a third in the 2-7 Draw, plus cashes in the Stud-8 and two No-Limit cashes.

All this suggests that Greenstein's biggest advantage is that he can play any game and go deep in it. In fact, it's only the Omaha variant that he hasn't actually cashed in this year. With two H.O.R.S.E. events to come, as well as another Stud event, it's probably a given that he'll cash a few more times yet. The question is, how big will those cashes be?

Second in the rankings at the moment is another familiar Big Game player, David Benyamine. He's another member of the "bracelet newly acquired" club. He's made three final tables and won one, and his other cash was basically a bubble from the $10,000 Stud event.

With his form, you could expect him to be one of the favorites for the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E., and as he is near our current leader, his advantage more than any of the others is that he just needs a single cash to lead the rankings as long as the man in front of him fails to cash again.

So who is the current leader? Well at the moment, it's a man called Jacobo Fernandez. Surprisingly, he has not yet won a bracelet this year, (the last two POY winners, Madsen and Schneider, both won two in a year), but he has made three final tables where he's finished second, third and fourth.

On top of this, he's managed to cash a couple of other times as well and clearly is an excellent player on a good run. His current lead over Benyamine is only two points, but they are both around 30 points ahead of Greenstein.

However, unlike the name pros below him, it's unlikely (though not inconceivable) that he will buy in for the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. event, though of course that's just mere speculation on my part. Also, this isn't necessarily a disadvantage because it will allow him to take shots at many of the smaller tournaments while the $50,000 "prestige" event goes on for four days.

These five are definitely the ones I would pick for the shortlist. What's scary though is that you could now win two bracelets and cash a further few times and yet you still wouldn't be at the top of the leaderboard.

John Phan, at the time of writing this, is in almost such a position, but if he were to win, or someone like Theo Tran, Alexander Kostritsyn or Ted Forrest were to get their hands on a bracelet, then no doubt you'd have to add them to that pack of front-runners.

If all this talk of bracelet-winning intrigues you, or you'd like a chance to take a shot at the POY award, then your best bet is to build up your bankroll first.

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Time to Value Bet Thin ...

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 18:38:03 +0100

Another day, another donkament, but I think I've discovered the most important part of getting through those early stages of the $1,500 and $2,000 events, where the fields are fresh and full of fish.

With only $3,000 starting chips for a $1,500 event, you have to really pull things out of the hat early on. Now a lot of good players have tried to get busy very early on, with some mixed success, but the problem lies in the fact that sooner or later their superaggression will run them into a calling station who will pick up a vast chunk of their chips.

There's a certain tendency, even amongst really good players, to try and bluff people. Even when they know the calling station won't fold, their ego gets involved and they decide in their heads, "I am the one: I will be the man to bluff the unbluffable!"

Of course this never works, and the patient tortoise-like player eventually gets all their chips by solidly betting the near-nuts or something and being called down by third pair.

Other people have an equally finite modus operandi based on "If you don't get the cards, you won't get the chips!" To a certain degree, it's true, but the fact of the matter is that in these smaller-buy-in, low starting-stack tournaments, you need to value bet your hands incredibly thin.

Simply put, it's not enough to be value betting one pair, medium kicker on the river with position. You need to bet second and maybe third pair comfortably, sometimes out of position. This maximization of pots is most likely the only way you'll be able accumulate a stack without too many cards early on.

This situation becomes, to a certain degree, as easy against good players as it is against bad ones. Players will happily throw in a stack of their chips, thinking that this "top online pro" is simply trying to bluff them.

At the same time, even top pros will struggle against an unknown quantity's thin river value bets.

With some players, the "hero call" is incredibly popular, as they see the rest of the table practically swooning at their "incredible" call that no one else could make since they assign you a narrow range and the hands they don't think you'll bet suddenly become incredibly profitable.

In Event 2, with around three tables left, there was a hand with a board showing something along the lines of J-9-7-J-x. James Akenhead, who finished second, bet the turn and the river against the aggressive Theo Tran.

Tran himself said "You have a jack or nothing" before making the call. Akenhead showed him 9-5 offsuit and Tran mucked.

This is a good example of two good players playing a hand, and one player betting his hand thinly enough that the other can only expect to see a monster hand or a bluff, when in fact the other player has simply value bet second pair incredibly thinly.

Due to all these factors, I think the people who really will have an edge early on in these tournaments are not the generalized group of pros in particular, but the heads-up cash-game specialists. These are the players who make a living from value betting third pair, or even king-high, if they think it's a profitable move. Therefore, they're the people most likely to get the maximum value from their hands when they bet.

For this reason, it's no surprise that many of the pros in these tournaments who end up winning events or making the final are well-known for their cash-game prowess.

The people who will fire every street with K-Q on a K-Q-2-T-9 board after their opponent has check-called all the way, still trying to extract value from a weaker two pair or even just a king, are the people who will make it deep in these competitions in the long run.

With the bigger fields, you're more likely to get loose-passive play than tight-passive play, and you should adjust accordingly. Just don't be afraid to lose a pot once in a while when it doesn't go your way. In the long term, these "risky bets" should turn out to be among your most profitable.

So, if you're going to be here playing the smaller events, especially the Hold'em, then you need to maximize any holdings you have. Bet really thin, second pair, third pair even if you think you can, because unless you get a real rush of cards, you're going to need more than the average amount of luck.

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WSOP Day 23 Recap

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 11:56:13 +0100

For a man occasionally known as 'Degenyamine' to the poker faithful, it would surprise many that, for a guy who plays as much poker as the former French tennis player, he never had managed to win a bracelet.

David Benyamine has been a constant fixture on the highest stakes games on Full Tilt winning and losing huge virtually every day. Even since the start of the world series, he has not let up and continues to play for a few hours despite having played for almost a full day beforehand.

He was just one of a number of pros who made a heavyweight final for the new $10,000 Omaha Hi/Lo split event, the rest of the table included what was almost a who's who of poker, with Toto Leonidas, David Chiu, Ram Vaswani and Mike Matusow, the latter looking for his second bracelet this year, it what is widely considered to be his best game.

Tony Ma was the first player out, he was all-in on a T 7 3 4 board with 8 5 4 3 and up agaist Toto Leonidas' A 9 8 2, the only card he could hit was the 6 which would give him the high half but the A on the river gave him a better low, but Leonidas' live deuce played.

David Chiu and Ram Vaswani went out next, both falling to Greg Jamison, while Eugene Katchalov was knocked out by Jason Gray. After Jamison knocked out Matusow, David Benyamine began to assert his domination, taking out first Toto Leonidas, then Gray to leave himself with a virtually unassailable 3:1 chip lead against Jamison.

This heads up did not last too long either, Benyamine pounded away at the shorter stack, eventually taking him out with Q-T-T-3 against K-Q-6-2 after the board ran out J-T-9-J-3 giving the house and the bracelet to the Frenchman.

In the other event, it was another European victory, as Jesper Hougaard from Denmark crushed all before him with a typically aggressive Scandinavian performance, punishing weakness whenever it was spotted and extracting maximum value from his good hands. Oh and he had a decent chunk of luck too.

Hougaard started off as the chip leader, with himself and Cody Slaugbaugh gradually picking off the rest of the field one at a time. The Dane did get lucky during the short-handed play, first knocking out Danny Wong with A 5 against K K when he flopped a flush, then soon after, he busted former Main Event finalist Aaron Kanter with K-J vs Q-Q, catching a king on the river.

Truly, he was blessed and with a 7:1 chip, surely it was just a matter of time? Not so, as Slaughbaugh doubled up the very first hand and began to quickly pick apart the Scandie's game. But then, just as the American had taken a 2:1 lead, a dinner break began and the players were given an hour to recoup.

When Hougaard returned from the break, he was a different man, and began to aggressively 3-bet his opponent into submission, gradually regaining his lost chips and, crucially, the chip lead. Eventually Cody decided not to be pushed around any more and committed himself with A-T, only to find Hougaard had re-raised him this time with a monster pair of queens.

The flop was a dream for the Swede coming Q-8-2 before a 5 on the turn meant the bracelet was his, while the obligatory ace on the river was meaningless.

Elsewhere, there was a long final table bubble in the $2,000 Pot-limit hold'em event, eventually though, Bejamin Zamani was the unlucky man, while Jan Von Halle, Lee Watkinson and Ben Roberts all made their way to the final.

In the $1,500 No-limit hold'em, over 2,700 players turned up, including PokerListings own Martin Derbyshire and Ed Sevillano. Martin managed to make the money, albeit short but Ed unluckily busted about half-way through the day. Mike Zukler leads the way with $110,000 but Barry Greenstein and Bill Gazes are also going well.

Check back tomorrow and we'll have full updates on these two events. Alternatively, you can always get yourself here to the Rio instead!

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The Belly Of The Beast! What To Do On A Day Off?

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 13:11:37 +0100

The other night I took a dark and twisted journey, to a place where few dare to tread, a journey so terrifying you wouldn't believe it if I told you, and if I did give you the details, your mind would simply be destroyed by the maddening implications of what would be unleashed.

Therefore, with that in mind, instead I think it's best if I tell you something else. A tale of equal importance, mind you.

It's all about what I did on my day off.

No, seriously.

It's a sojourn into solitude, comes with a plethora of poker, but will hopefully will provide a distracting detour from the domination the WSOP has.

Generally, the day off can often only feel like a half day, this is due to the fact that whoever has the day off, will end up being on the night shift the day before. This, plus the fact the PL team basically adheres to the motto, 'First ones in, last ones out' (like we're secretly some sort of elite army unit) in our efforts to cover everything, means that it's not usual for us to get up at around 3 or 4pm on our day off.

With this in mind, and having constantly covered poker, I had an irritating itch that could only be scratched by some time to play live myself. With that in mind, I headed away from the Rio and it's loudness, to the relative tranquillity of the Orleans.

The Orleans is basically away from everything in Vegas, but it does have a nicely refurbished poker room and tournaments that are not terribly structured. The only downside to all this is there are not too many tourists, and generally the quality of players is pretty good, and better than just about anywhere on the strip.

I bought into the tournament, and with an hour to kill or so, sat in a $1/$2 game going to waste time. I probably had sat down at the wrong table if I was planning to try and make money, as everyone at the table seemed to have at least double the max buy-in ($300 is the max). Simply put, I decided I was going play hands for value, there was nothing worse than losing a couple of hundred bucks just before I started playing a tournament. Truly, I was about to evoke the spirit of Owen 'NittyMcGritty' Laukkanen...

A lot of the pots were limped but everyone always seemed to over-bet on the flop, great, all that was needed now was a hand. After missing a few flops and dropping about $50, there was a multiway pot and I checked my option in the big blind holding 8 6. The flop came up potentially good, but tricky J-8-6 rainbow.

With six of us in the pot, the small blind immediately came out with a pot-sized bet for $12, slowplaying was immediately out of the question. I bumped it up to $35 and everyone but the small blind folded. He made the call before checking to me on the potentially ugly 7 which appeared on the turn.

I had about $120 left and the pot was $94, I decided to bet $60, I reasoned he wouldn't have fired on the flop with T-9 versus five other players and there was plenty hands I was beating. Plus even if he did have top pair, he may still well call with strong top pair hands like A-J, K-J Q-J, plus smaller jacks (J-T and J-9) have picked up a straight draw.

To my surprise he just flat-called me, rather that setting me in, surely he knew I was now committed? While I was thinking what he could possibly have, the dealer put down a king on the river, not a great card, but all it mean was that if he had K-J, he'd got me in the end and would set me in. Fortunately though, he checked, position is such great thing, and it allowed me to move in, where he groaned and called with A-J.

So I doubled up and honed my NLHE skills just in time for the tournament, which was about to begin, now lets see how everyone likes a taste of 'British Steel' mwahahaha. But then three particular things became aware to me, which left me in what I'd like to call, 'a big pile of poop.'

It wasn't a no-limit hold'em tournament.

I'd gone to the Orleans on a Thursday.

Tournaments on a Thursday are always Omaha Eight or Better.

Now I'm not against limit games per se, but they do tend to be incredibly mechanical to play, even at the best of times, make it PLO8 and now I'm interested! Anyway, to cut a long story short, I went out after about an hour and a half, not many stories in that itself, just another tournament that didn't work out.

Having been daft enough to sign up for a tournament where I didn't even know what the game was, I decided I'd be better amongst my own ilk, the tourists on the strip, whose idea of poker is only what they've seen on ESPN's "Degree Action All-in Moment". The MGM provides a lot of tables and I decided to slip into this maelstrom of action.

With all the stuff going on at the Rio, it's quite easy, if you're a decent player to fleece the tourists along the Strip instead, place like MGM, Imperial Palace, etc are full of people just itching to get in there and gamble.

I re-raised preflop to $40 with aces after a serial punisher of the limpers had tried to steal, one guy cold called from the small blind after everyone else had folded. I checked behind him on the 2-2-4 flop, but when he checked the 5 turn as well, I felt inclined to bet and he folded K-J face up to me, in a, 'I know you've got nothing but I'm making a strong fold' kind of way.

I'd almost doubled my buy-in for the night, busting a guy with the nut flush against top pair and taking the odd pot here and there, before on the last I was about to play, I managed to pick-up kings and then proceeded to re-raise preflop before doing it all on a non-descript 8-2-3 board, right bang into top set. I ended up about $100 for the day after taking away tournament buy-in, so at least there was some profit.

I slumped into a cab with before two random drunk people behind me said, "Oh are you going to the Rio? Can we come??!" Too tired to argue, I moved into the front seat where the slurred noises and cackles from the back-seat were only slightly less irritating than the techno-dance music that was pulsating from the driver's above average-sized speakers.

There's a lot of money being played for at the Rio, but if you cannot stomach their limits, then, "There's gold in them thar hills!"

And when I say hills, I mean the Strip.

Obviously.

As good as all these smaller tournaments are at Binions, the Venetian, the Golden Nugget and Caesar's, there's cash games galore for practically anyone, because once you're here, even the smallest bankrolled player could end up making some money with good fundamental skills and correct game selection. It really is that simple.

Just remember to leave the poker table one hand before you were planning to leave the poker table, it might make all the difference!

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WSOP Day 20 Recap

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 08:50:32 +0100

There was only one final table today, and centre to that was the minute pixie figure of Dario Minieri. The Italian youngster first broke onto the scene at the Baden EPT a couple of years ago, when he finished third in a tournament that was eventually won by Thang Duc Nguyen.

But Minieri had been the star during the event, his style was just so different, so much more aggressive, even more than the Danes, Norwegians and especially the Swedes. His re-raising range preflop was basically any two cards and he began to accumulate a vast quantity of chips without ever having to even see a flop, let alone a showdown.

Since then, he came third in the San Remo EPT, another event where he looked to be coasting to the title, only to lose a coinflip to the eventual winner Jason Mercier, who had re-raised preflop with A-3, and Minieri had slowplayed his queens perfectly, only to be felted by a rivered flush.

Between these two events Minieri became a fully-fledged member of Team Pokerstars, but has, crucially, never picked up that bracelet to truly establish himself as a star.

In the event itself, Stuart Markshak was an early bustee after he tried to squeeze with Q-J but came royally unstuck against Justin Filtz who was holding pocket kings and that quickly left us with five. John O'Shea was next to go, making a big move on a A-5-2 board with 4-2 but, not being able to hold out against Seth Fischer's A-9.

Dario would bust out Kevin Song in 4th, before we saw some incredibly sick outdraws in the 3-handed game. First, on A T 2 board, Justin Filtz was all-in with 5 3 against Dario's Q J and somehow manage to catch his unlikely saviour card, the 4 and avoided a diamond to stay in.

Filtz however would suffer a beat equally horrendous, when he was all-in with aces against Seth Fischer's ace king. Filtz cheered with delight as he saw the spot he was in, but that brought the wrath of the poker gods, as the board came out K-J-9-K-J giving Fischer a house and eliminating Filtz in 3rd.

Heads-up continued this sickness, as Dario, by this point, faced a 2:1 deficit in chips but managed to get it all preflop with 4 3 against Fischer's kings. Dario must have liked the J 8 2 flop, but when he caught the 4 and then the 4 to complete a big suck-out, he already had one eye on the bracelet.

The diminutive Italian finally got hold the bracelet when his queens held against Fischer's K-T and he became the second Italian bracelet winner inside of a week, after Max Pescatori's earlier triumph in the mixed pot-limit hold'em/omaha.

Elsewhere, today was the very first day of the WSOP, where neither event that was starting was in fact a hold'em event. The $1,500 PLO saw a staggering amounth of rebuys, 1,350 in total, as players needed to scratch that gambling itch. Daniel Makowsky finished the day as chip leader, with just shy of $400,000, Jerrod 'Ron Burgundy' Ankenman, Thomas Wahlroos, Ted Forrest and Layne Flack are all in the top ten chip counts as well.

The other event which began today was the much more quiet and reserved $1,500 Stud-Hi event, which tended to attract the more thoughtful and less inclined to gamble players. By the end of play, Ali Barbieri was the chip leader, with Bryan Devonshire and Chip Jett also thereabouts. Chad Brown manage to make the upper echelons as well, earlier he'd got all-in with trip aces against quad threes only to catch his miracle case ace on the river to stay alive!

In the two ongoing events, Jose Luis Velador dominated the no-limit event, finishing the day with $2,000,000 going into the final table, way ahead of every other player on the table, in what looks to be a big battle of the unknowns.

The 7-card stud hi/lo had a long and drawn out day, Steve Sung and Sebastian Ruthenberg were vying for the chip lead but towards the end of the day, Annie Duke took over that coveted position, while Marcel Luske swung from almost being out to being chip leader throughout the day.

Eventually, Howard Lederer would surprisingly turn out to be the final table bubble boy, but that still left a strong final table.

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Please Let'em Go: Too Much Hold'em?

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 14:03:48 +0100

A few years ago, Daniel Negreanu jokingly renamed the WSOP "The World Series Of Hold'em," as the structure leaned heavily to this variant.

It's a shame that in 2008 Hold'em dominates the Series as much as ever, because after all, everyone just wants to see the "coin flip" of ace-king against pocket queens. And I use the word "coin flip" lightly, because it's not even a coin flip; it's 57-43 in favor of the queens and closer to being a 3-2 than a true 50-50.

But I'm going off on a tangent here. The point is that this year, out of the 55 events being played, 34 of them will be forms of Hold'em.

If you want to split hairs and take out events that are necessities, and remove the Main Event, the ladies', the seniors' and the casino employees' (unfairly shoved to the back end of the Series as an afterthought), that's still 30 events out of 51 which are Hold'em variants - almost 60%.

Now, I'm not declaring that Hold'em isn't the most popular form of the game. It obviously is. I'm simply questioning why the Series still has to be based so strongly on one game.

The fact is that today, June 18, with us more than halfway through the Series, is the first day on which neither starting event has the word "Hold'em" in its title.

So what should take Hold'em's place? For a start (and I cannot deny my bias here), there should be more Omaha events, as at the moment there are only four. Two of those are w/rebuys and the third is the $10,000 event, meaning that for the average tourist or journeyperson player, there's effectively only one chance they'll be able to try this game at the Series.

At the moment, most PLO online is now played in the six-max format, and it's fair to say that Harrah's really missed out on this one. Omaha is already a gambler's game but in the six-max format, the risk increases tenfold. That alone means that more Omaha could bring many, many more punters into the hallways of the Rio.

At the same time, while there's only one PLO8 event at the moment, it's harder to argue the merits of increasing the number of these tournaments.

First, PLO8 really isn't a tournament game.

Second, Limit Omaha Eight is already much more popular at the moment, and an increase in tournaments of that type would be much more welcomed by the average player coming in, who's less likely to understand the rules of Pot-Limit.

Standalone Stud variants suffer even more than Omaha, being hidden in the mixed and H.O.R.S.E. events. For those who just want to play one of the Stud games, you're literally given five chances: two Stud Hi's, two Stud Eights and just a single solitary tournament of Razz.

Again, it would be nice to see an increase in this genre of event, just to give people a chance to try out something new. If it doesn't work (like the tent, or this year's final-table delay), then it can always be changed back.

The crux of my argument is this: Harrah's is advocating the final-table delay as a way of trying to stir up interest in the Series among people who don't watch poker.

But maybe the reason people are losing interest in watching poker on TV is that they've been bombarded for the last few years with exactly the same situation time and again - "This guy has a pair, and [insert pro's name here] has two overcards. Who'll win this race?"

And poker hasn't exactly burst into the true mainstream because of blanket HE coverage, has it?

I can't deny that there are many other things that also need to be sorted out if poker is to break out of its semi-niche area. But presenting other events as being equally as interesting as the all-powerful Hold'em (and in some cases arguably more) will allow people to at least familiarize themselves with the other games and possibly discover one that's more to their liking.

The WSOP and Harrah's don't even have to make serious cutbacks in Hold'em events. Simply removing five HE events and adding a couple of PLO and Stud games would balance out the variants on offer significantly.

It would also make the "World Series of Poker" brand a more representative one, because Hold'em would no longer dominate the schedule; instead, other variants would get exposure as well.

By giving most other events equal billing with the $10,000 Championship events, Harrah's is taking a step in the right direction, bestowing more importance on events that were previously left to rot. A further balancing of the tournament variants would simply be the next step on this road.

Even if that were to happen, though, getting non-HE Championship events filmed may prove more difficult.

Of the events that have played out so far, practically all the "feature" table events shown have been the Hold'em ones, with other events being more or less snubbed. Neither the $10,000 Mixed Event nor the $10,000 Stud were shown on the feature table despite their fantastic lineups, and I suspect many of the other lesser-known events will not make into that little arena in the corner of the Amazon Room.

Can Harrah's and ESPN find their altruistic side for the welfare of poker itself? One hopes so.

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Waging War - Prop Bets!

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 06:43:53 +0100

The rage in Vegas has nothing to do with poker at all this summer. It's all about the prop bets. At the start of the series, we saw two much slimmer people than usual, Sorrel Mizzi and Roland De Wolfe had a $25k weight loss bet, though it seemed Mizzi was the one taking it the more seriously, and he easily won.

An even bigger bet though, was that of Mike Matusow weight loss bet worth $100k, 'The Mouth' had bet Ted Forrest $100,000 that he could lose 50lbs before the start of the world series and then shocked onlookers by turning up as thin as you have ever seen him.

But, as always, Phil Ivey is the one making the headlines as he has several big bets going on at the moment. The first was a bet with many pros that he would win a bracelet this year, he's not yet made a final table, the closest was his result in the $10,000 7-card stud event where he could only finish 9th, bubbling the final table.

The big one though, is his rumoured $2 million bet on the LA Lakers to win the basketball series against the Boston Celtics, at the time of writing, Boston are 3-2 in a best of 7 match and Ivey is really being made to sweat.

One of the major spectacles earlier in the week, was during one of the earlier matches, Ivey managed to get someone to switch one of the tournament clocks over to the game during the $10,000 Stud event.

During this game he then showed probably more emotion in the hour or so of that match, than he has over his entire poker career, the usual stoic concentrated look had been replaced by a man that looked like he was truly living and dying with every two or three-pointer that either team hit.

This got me into looking up other proposition bets, which from reading, tend to go from the slightly bizarre to the craftily ludicrous, from Ted Forrest's ability to drink ten beers in half an hour to Huck Seed's athletic prowess that has been bet upon many times over.

But where to begin? You would have to go back to the old school hustlers of the early years when Johnny Moss was given 15/1 odds by another gambler to beat up a huge guy in a bar (who had no idea of the bet), with the condition that Moss could get the first shot in. Two weeks in hospital later with numerous broken bones, Moss said, "Fifteen to one was too good to pass up."

More recently, Huck Seed seems to be the man involved in all the most interesting prop bets, the 1996 WSOP champion has managed to win a bet that required him to shoot four rounds of under 100 on a golf course in one hot summer day using just the five iron, sand wedge and putter.

He learnt to do a standing backflip to take $10,000 off Howard Lederer, whilst losing bets, first, not to shave for a year (a family funeral meant he had to). Then when Phil Helmuth bet he couldn't stand in the ocean with water up to his shoulders for eighteen hours, Huck could only manage three, costing him $50,000.

So why are these sort of bets common between players? The most obvious explanation is that the poker lifestyle isn't really gambling to them, it's more of a job, and these bets are just their version of our bets on horses and football, albeit a little more colourful perhaps.

The latest rivalry in the prop betting stakes is the Gavin Smith vs Joe Sebok one. Last year at the World Series, the two agreed on a points system for all the Hold'Em side events, and the one with the fewest points would be forced to wear superhero costumes for time spent in the Main Event. Eventually, Joe Sebok would turn up in a Robin costume from Batman & Robin.

This competition has continued between the two, to the point of a last longer at the LA Poker Classic, where the first one out was forced to get a tattoo of the other's initials on their, ahem, posterior. Personally I think I'd rather lose the superhero one than this one. Either way, Gavin Smith now has J.S tattooed somewhere he won't forget...

It's not purely the domain of the Americans though now. It was in the latter stages of the Warsaw EPT in '07 when I discovered Johnny Lodden, renowned Scandie, had made a 'last longer bet' with one of his fellow players. Surely, you would say, there is nothing inherently unusual about that within itself?

Well, quite, but here the wager was not about money, no instead, the loser of this bet would suffer a non-monetary kind of humiliation. The terms of this bet were that the man knocked out first would be forced... to work in a grocers for a day back home, and the outcome after a couple of tournament days? Suffice to say, you can probably find pictures of Mr Lodden in an apron of the Norwegian equivalent of Walmart somewhere.

Of course Erick Lindgren's winning of his golf prop bet against Gavin Smith and Phil Ivey, is another that will go down as the stuff of legend. An event that was filmed and almost completely overshadowed the $50,000 HORSE event that Freddy Deeb won, whilst leaving 'E-Dog' around $350,000 richer.

Although we haven't seen anything quite so decadent yet, but that last bet was a spur of the moment thing based purely on Lindgren's exit from the previously mentioned HORSE event, and we've yet to reach half-way in the 2008 WSOP. So all takes is a few beers and a couple of mad ideas...

Of course, if you want to be the one making these crazy bets, then you'll probably need to be here to do it!.

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2008 WSOP - Day 15 Recap!

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 17:39:44 +0100

Another day, another two bracelets won, but they were taken down in incredibly different circumstances. The events today on offer were the $5,000 NL event, last year won by James Mackey, and the $3,000 HORSE, an event for those who aren't quite interested in stumping up the cash for it's $50,000 big brother.

In the $5,000 NL event, Scott Seiver came into the tournament with a dominating chip lead, nearly three time as much as his nearest rival. He quickly demolished the other Scott at the table, with a classic 57-43 battle with Seiver holding the queens against Scott Freeman's A K, the latter though flopped a flush draw to become favourite, but bricked out when he needed it the most.

General craziness would follow when Adam Geyer got all-in with nines against Seiver's aces, flopping a nine in the process only to be rivered by a third bullet hitting the river for a good old fashioned re-suck.

And just in case you found that hand to be pretty boring then Anders Henriksson's exit might be a little case of deja vu for you. He got it all-in with nines on a K-8-9 board against Ben Sprenger's aces, but, you guessed it, there was yet another case of the Barry Greenstein special, the ace on the river!

Seiver meanwhile continued his domination, knocking out Chuck Sklar with A-A vs A-K, while he then dispensed with Rajesh Vohra thanks to winning a coinflip, before knocking out Jacob Fernandez with A-8 vs K-K, having already got him all-in multiple times.

Dave Seidman, the only player who'd really been able to challenge Seiver at any point, hit a flush to knock out Sprenger, but ultimately failed to stop Scott Seiver, when the latter flopped top pair against Dave's second pair to ultimately seal bracelet victory.

In the other final, a star-studded line-up took part in an action packed HORSE event that saw the lead swap multiple times. Going into the event, Hoyt Corkins was the chip leader, but not by much.

Many people's favourite for the bracelet, Jennifer Harman, was first out, she lost two big hands to Doug Ganger, first in the O8, and then in the Razz, where Ganger's seven-low was good enough to knock her out. Rostislav Tsodikov quickly followed her in the stud-hi game, his nines coming unstuck against Jan Voertmann's pair of queens.

Full Tilt Pro Steve Zolotow was out next, he had a pair of nines all-in on fourth street against Hoyt Corkins four-flush in the stud, the cowboy caught the A on the river to bust his opponent. In the same round, Jared Davis also went out, running smack bang into Voertmann's trip aces.

Hoyt himself would be the next out, he got involved in a big pot with K-Q vs Marcel Luske's A-9, a lot of money going in preflop and the rest on the A-K-T flop with Hoyt failing to hit the paint he needed. Luske then had probably the most rollercoaster-esque finish to a tournament, you could ever imagine.

He went from chip leader to having just a couple of big bets left, to getting back up into the thick of things, only to go out in the stud with nines, (what was it about nines losing today?!) when Jens Voertmann, caught, yes once again, an ace on the river to leave Voertmann heads-up against Doug Ganger.

Voertmann eventually triumphed, making jacks and fives against Ganger's nines and eights to scoop the first bracelet of the series for Europe and of course, the added bonus of all that money!

In the other events, the two that played down to the final table today were the $2,500 PLO/PLHE which has become dominated by five time bracelet winner Allen Cunningham, who will be a heavy favourite tomorrow. In the other event, the $2,000 NL, Blair Hinkle, the brother of event 2 winner Grant Hinkle, will go into the final table second in chips, for what could make an already happy family even more ecstatic.

Meanwhile, in the events that started today, the Razz finished with Barry Greenstein on top, with David Levi and Vanessa Rousso not too far behind.

But most of the eyes were focused on the $10,000 heads up championship, Chris Ferguson, the favourite in many people's eyes, managed to make it to round 3, but there lost to fellow Full Tilt player Andy Black.

Players who did make it through the day included Sammy Farha, as well as bracelet winners Gavin Griffin and Vanessa Selbst, though the pick of tomorrow's heads up matches looks to be the battle between Erick Lindgren and Kenny Tran.

Meanwhile, look out for the sheer madness of tomorrow, it's the $5,000 PLO rebuy. Expect them to be having to sweep up the money from the floor...

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Four-Card Fun! All About Omaha

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 15:28:06 +0100

With the first pure Pot-Limit Omaha event starting on Tuesday, it's time to take another look at what is certainly the fastest-growing form of poker. Omaha is simply manna from heaven for many gamblers - the action is fast and always very loose.

So if you're sick of doing holdin' and foldin', with two cards not enough, and want to perhaps spice up your life a little, then maybe Omaha is the game for you.

And on that note, here are a few pointers:

Remember, you're using four cards and you have to use two from your hands. Don't be like the guy from the $5,000 PLO rebuy last year: he held three hearts in his hand, saw two among the community cards and thought he had a flush. An expensive mistake.

Just because a hand looks like a combination of two hands you'd always play in Hold'em doesn't make it a good Omaha hand. Hands like Q J 6 5 need to be junked, and junked fast.

Aces. More people go broke playing aces badly than anyone will ever know. When playing cash, you should prepared to raise pre-flop, then check/fold a lot of the time post-flop. In tournaments, raising them pre-flop at all is a debatable move when in a freezeout or after the rebuy period is over.

If you're holding a hand like A A 6 2, you really don't have much. The best you can hope for is to either get most of your chips (generally 50% of your stack or more) in pre-flop, preferably heads-up, so that you cannot pass after the flop.

Alternatively, you can just flat-call, hoping to hit a disguised set of aces that middle (and even bottom sets) will find difficult to get away from.

When reraising aces pre-flop, reraise other hands as well; otherwise people will read you like a book. The best hands to do this with are rundowns like T-9-8-7 or K-Q-J-T, as they play pretty well against aces (though for obvious reasons A-K-Q-J does not).

By mixing it up a little, you will be able to scoop big pots when people think their two pairs are good when you've actually flopped the nut straight.

When it isn't getting your aces cracked, many people instead go broke with baby flushes. It cannot be stressed enough that Omaha is a game of nuts. You either need them, or need to be drawing to them. (Though there is a lot more six-max PLO online then there used to be and the near-nut draw is often good enough these days. But I digress - I'll save that for another blog ... )

I'm not saying you shouldn't play those excellent smaller-suited rundowns like 7 6 5 4 but don't rely on the flush draw to necessarily be an out when heads-up, and almost assume beyond a doubt that in a multiway pot they are not outs. Back-door flushes are usually safer, but again, exercise caution if the betting gets a little heavy.

Like a game of Roshambo, sets, wraps (larger-than-normal straight draws) and flush draws all have an enemy they'd rather not face.

For example, you might not believe it, but say you were holding 9-9-x-x on a 9-8-2 rainbow board, you'd imagine you would be a favorite, right? But if I was holding J-T-7-6 for a full wrap, I'd actually be the slight favorite!

Now, let's remove your 9-9-x-x, make two of the cards on the previously mentioned flop diamonds, and instead just give you A K 5 4 with the nut flush draw and nothing else versus my same wrap. Who is the favorite now? Well you might not believe it, but ace-high is actually around 60% to win!

For me, this is one of the most important things to learn about Omaha, and that is the dominance of the flush draw over the wrap. True, the wrap is strong against a set, and the set is the favorite against a flush draw.

But it's the first of these three that I think is the most important. If you want to go to war with a wrap, and the board isn't rainbow, you'd better bring a flush draw with you.

In tournaments, probably even more so than in cash, you want that flush draw to preferably be the nut draw, because you just cannot replace those vital tournament chips like you could in cash.

Good luck trying out this popular form of poker, but remember, sometimes you're just going to have to get it in good and hope your hand holds up!

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A Brief History of the Last 10 WSOP Main Event Winners

info@www.Pokerlistings.com — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 16:01:01 +0100

So, the Main Event doesn't actually kick off until a few weeks from now, but like us, surely you're wondering, what happened to the last few guys who won this event? Did they continue to flourish, or did the WSOP Main Event turn out to be some kind of poisoned chalice?

Back in 1998, Scotty Nguyen was the probably one of the most colourful champions we've ever seen. Since then though, he has had numerous good results, the highlights being a 2006 WPT win beating Michael Mizrachi heads-up, and three other WSOP bracelets, one in '97 and two more in 2001, all in Omaha variants.

Following on Scotty's heels, Noel Furlong was the next winner of the Main Event. He's not had quite the success Nguyen has, but has been happily running tournaments in Ireland rather than playing them, with a couple of wins in Irish events since his bracelet haul back in 1999.

After the Irishman comes the legendary Chris "Jesus" Ferguson and his prolonged battle with a true legend of the game, T.J. Cloutier. Cloutier was grinding Ferguson down throughout and Ferguson soon realized he was not going to able to combat his opponent's style. Therefore, the only way he could prevail was to get it in with a big hand and hope that he could run good.

Eventually, this is exactly what happened as Ferguson would get it all-in with A-9 against Cloutier's A-Q, spiking a nine to make him the World Champion.

Since then, Ferguson has won three more bracelets (in addition to the one he'd garnered prior to becoming World Champion) and has become a staple of Full Tilt Poker. Most recently, he won the National Heads-Up tournament as well as finishing third in the largest non-Main Event field ever in the second event of the 2008 WSOP. Since his Main Event win, it seems he has gone from strength to strength.

After "Jesus" comes another legend of the game, Carlos Mortensen, who just may turn out to be the only man ever to win the WSOP Main Event and the WPT Grand Final at the Bellagio, which would be a stunning accomplishment. Mortensen's 2001 win was over Dewey Tomko, where he picked up a cool $1.5 million dollars for defeating 612 other poker pros.

Between his WSOP ME win and the Grand Final of the WPT, Mortensen has also managed to snare another WSOP bracelet and another WPT title, as well as numerous cashes in too many events to mention.

Next on the list is Robert Varkonyi, the winner of 2002. Varkonyi defeated the British pro Julian Gardner heads-up to win his title, though since then he's never quite had the results to back up this dream win. He has had a few cashes in small tournaments, but only managed his second-ever WSOP cash when he made the money in the 2007 Main Event.

Then comes Chris Moneymaker, a man who arguably revolutionized poker when he won the 2003 Main Event against the veteran Sammy Farha. Moneymaker's story inspired millions to take up the game and is one of the main factors behind poker's boom over the last five years or so.

While Moneymaker's win was huge for himself and poker fans everywhere, since then he has not been able to follow through with more wins. He did manage a second place in a WPT event to Phil Gordon the year following his Main Event victory, but since then the cashes have been few and far between.

In 2004, Greg Raymer took up Moneymaker's mantle by becoming the next Main Event Champion, defeating what was a record-breaking field. A friendly and affable chap, Raymer quickly became popular with fans due to his easy-going demeanor.

But since his win, he has failed to win another bracelet, despite numerous final-table cashes in WSOP events. In fact, Raymer's best achievement, since his win, is arguably the 25th place he managed in the Main Event the following year, having beaten the vast majority of the 5,000+ runners.

That field was eventually bested by Joe Hachem, an Australian who has since cemented his reputation as a top player by winning a WPT event in 2006, as well as cashing not only in multiple WSOP side events, but in EPT donkaments too. Certainly his record makes him a worthy winner, though no doubt another bracelet would solidify an already pretty strong reputation.

After Hachem comes the man who beat the biggest field of them all. If Chris Moneymaker's success and perfect surname had been one of the causes of poker's boom, then Jamie Gold's win at the 2006 Main Event could've been the one to take it to the next level.

However, the arguments and controversy that surrounded his victory marred a great triumph by a man who dominated the final like no one has ever done before or since.

In the wake of his astonishing win, Gold has met with little success. He managed a couple of cashes in the 2007 WSOP and the Main Event of the WSOPE, but very little else. Certainly it remains to be seen if he can build up a set of regular results à la Hachem or Mortensen.

Finally, last year's champion, Jerry Yang. To say he's something of an enigma would be a massive understatement. He has only cashed in one tournament since that fabled victory, a small $1k event at Binion's in late 2007.

Other than that, Yang has almost dropped off the poker radar like no other winner before him. Therefore, it's very hard to add much more than that!

This year, it is extremely likely that Harrah's will be crowning a new champion, and what the poker world needs right now is a champion. With the UIGEA enforced and the presidential elections only around the corner, like it or not, the Main Event winner will essentially become the mouthpiece for poker in general.

Therefore it's vital that whoever wins the event recognize their responsibility to the poker world.

Because like it or not, whoever wins the Main Event this year will become the owner, not only of a beautiful bracelet, but also of one of the most powerful voices in poker, and you can never have too many articulate players defending the game they love.

Related Article: WSOP champions: Where are they now, Part 10

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