Burton police believe they know the identity of a man shot and killed during an attempted robbery at the Palace Poke Room on Wednesday morning.
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Burton police believe they know the identity of a man shot and killed during an attempted robbery at the Palace Poke Room on Wednesday morning.
A pair of queens netted Tony Gallo a cool $20,000 on Tuesday at the Naples-Fort Myers Greyhound Track in Bonita Springs.
Wed, Jul 1 2009 03:07:21 Tags : online poker,PokerTime,online poker play,poker promotions STANMORE, ENGLAND, July 01, 2009 /24-7PressRelease/ -- In keeping with the times and setting trends, PokerTime has completely remade both its site and the software employed for online poker play.
With the economy ailing, a group of Jefferson County business owners and residents says it's time for another spin of the wheel on table games.
Big names like Erik Seidel and Huck Seed fell out of contention early leaving an eclectic mix of Erik Sagstrom (known as TheSalmon online), Bach and Hanson.
Hanson and Bach would go on to play to play over six hours of heads-up play in the longest final table in the history of the $50k H.O.R.S.E.
Despite the marathon length of the final table Bach was still ecstatic when he received his WSOP bracelet and the Chip Reese Memorial Trophy.
You can read about Bach's thoughts on the event here.
Here's a look at what else happened on the abbreviated WSOP schedule just days before the Main Event begins:
Event 54 $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em Final Day
Event 54 was the last of the popular $1,500 No-Limit events and it easily sold out on Day 1 with 2,818 entrants.
Although the day began with 28 players it didn't take that long to cut that number down to a tidy final table of nine. Vivek Rajkumar was probably the most well-known player coming into the day but he ended up bowing out in 15th just sixth players short of the final table.
The final table was certainly lacking in big-name poker players but Tony Veckey of Chicago didn't mind as he outlasted everyone to take down a $673,000 prize for first place. The next $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em WSOP event will be played in 2010. Mark your calendars.
Event 55 $2,500 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball Limit Final Table
Event 55 was essentially the opposite of the $1,500 final table as 2-7 Triple Draw Limit is very much a pros' game.
The final table was littered with big names like John Juanda, Blair Rodman, Nam Le and all gunning for a bracelet.
Surprisingly Tom Schneider's wife Julie also made a very deep run in the event and ended up finishing third, which was better than all the pros just mentioned.
In the end it was Big Game regular Abe Mosseri who took it down. Mosseri bested Masayoshi Tanaka in a super-short heads-up match to win a WSOP bracelet and the $165,521 that came with it.
Event 56 $5,000 No-Limit Hold'em/Six-handed Day 2
Day 2 of Event 56 (the last tournament before the Main Event) began with one of the better fields we've seen this year.
Phil Hellmuth, Sorel Mizzi, Justin Bonomo Shannon Shorr and several other well-known players all started with hopes of making another WSOP final table. Unfortunately none of the above players would make it to the final 16 that finished the day.
Instead it's Rory Mathews who will take the chip lead of 1.35 million into Day 3 although Full Tilt Pro Matt Hawrilenko is close behind him with 1.32 million and Peter "Nordberg" Feldman has 1.2 million.
The remaining players will reconvene at 1 p.m. tomorrow with the intention of crowning the last WSOP bracelet winner before the Main Event.
He entered the heads-up match with Tanaka as the short stack, but it took less than an hour for the Big Game veteran to take the victory.
"I play high stakes with all those great players and that really helps," Mosseri said. "That's how I learned to play this game and it really helped me today."
The final four players were a tough draw, with Mosseri and Tanaka joined by John Juanda and Julie Schneider, the wife of two-time bracelet winner Tom Schneider.
Juanda, who has to be considered a favorite in just about any four-player field, made an uncharacteristic mistake that cost him big at the final table.
Engaged in a sizeable pot against Tanaka, Juanda settled on his hand after two draws, while Tanaka took one discard on the final draw.
Juanda tabled his hand, thinking he had a seven-low that was good enough to beat Tanaka's 8-7-6-4-2.
Unfortunately for Juanda, he'd misread his hand, and actually held a 7-6-5-4-3 for the straight. The hand knocked Juanda below 250k in chips and he never recovered.
"Once John Juanda got knocked out I thought it was my tournament," Mosseri said. "I felt that I had control of the table."
Juanda won $44,941 for the fourth-place finish but had to be disappointed with how his tournament ended.
Schneider was the next player to hit the the rail, her short stack not surviving long as the heads-up battle between Tanaka and Mosseri became inevitable. She took home $66,285 for second place.
Tanaka did the deed in eliminating Schneider, giving him a slight chip lead going into heads-up, with 1,019,000 chips to Mosseri's 916,000.
It didn't take long for Mosseri to start taking over, however, and after 20 minutes of heads up play Mosseri had built his stack to 1.27 million to Tanaka's 655k.
Mosseri steamrolled after that, using his skill in what he says is his strongest game.
"Lowball is probably my best game, and the truth is most people don't really play it that well," Mosseri said. "In other tournaments the level of play is way higher."
"It was a lot easier for me to control what was going on. There's a much bigger difference between the skill levels in this tournament compared to a No-Limit Hold'em tournament."
Mosseri takes home $165,521 for the win. His previous best finish at the WSOP came earlier this year, when he finished sixth in the $10k Seven Card Stud Hi-Lo World Championship.
Tanaka wins $102,313 for the runner-up finish.
Despite admitting to having very little experience fighting human beings, Boeree handily defeated her rival over the course of three rounds at Barry's Boxing Center.
"It was way harder than I expected," Boeree told PokerListings.com. "Three rounds is a lot.
"By the end of the second round I was like, 'Are you insane, you want to do another?'"
Boeree punished Castello with a succession of brutal blows, but the Brit was nothing if not gracious following her victory.
"Melissa is just amazing," she said. "I mean, I was hitting her really hard. I wasn't holding back and she kept coming.
"It was so much fun. I'm really tired, but I'm really, really happy I won."
With the win, Boeree earned $1,000 for the Marie Curie Cancer Trust, while $500 will be donated in Castello's name to the Hemophilia Foundation of Southern California.
Beyond the victory for her chosen charity, Boeree cited pride as a key motivational factor.
"Winning was 100% important," she said. "I could not lose.
"I couldn't let my lot down. They were cheering me on and had bets on me so I had to win. There was no other option."
Originally slated to be fought in UFC fighter Wanderlei Silva's personal octagon, the fight attracted the attention of the Nevada State Athletic Commission, necessitating a number of changes to the program.
The fight was moved to Barry's Boxing Center and both Boeree and Castello were given amateur boxing certification as a condition for the Commission sanctioning the event.
Consequently, Boeree now finds herself possessed of a sparkling 1-0 record in the Commission's official register while Castello drops to 0-1.
The PokerListings video crew was on location for the fight shot plenty of footage, including interviews with both fighters. Check out the PokerListings TV section for more coverage.
Bach's reward for enduring 480 hands at the final table is $1,276,802 in cash and ownership of arguably the most prestigious bracelet in the game.
"It hasn't even sunk in yet," said a tired but overjoyed Bach after the win.
"Especially this tournament, Chip Reese's tournament, and it being the best tournament of the whole year. It just means the world."
The win is a breakthrough for Bach, who's made a final table in each of the last five years at the WSOP but wasn't able to earn himself a bracelet until this year.
Bach, who says he played 30-hour sessions regularly earlier in his career, showed that endurance on Day 5.
"Two nights ago, I told (friends) that this is the bracelet I should win," Bach said.
"It's the game that I'm best at, it's the tournament I want to win the most. If I'm going to break through and win one this is the right one."
Bach appeared to be headed for a certain third-place finish at one point when play was three-handed, and he held a woefully short stack at 670k in chips, with Erik Sagstrom at 6.25 million and Hanson at 7.36 million.
Instead of packing up and exiting, however, Bach went on a spectacular comeback stretch, quickly rebuilding his stack to 1.7 million chips just a few hands later.
"I just had to remind myself to keep fighting and play well," Bach said. "I could live with losing if I played my best."
Bach never looked back after that, eventually becoming the chip leader as Sagstrom's fortunes took a wrong turn.
The heads-up finale between Bach and Hanson emerged after Sagstrom went out in third, collecting $522,394 for the third-place finish.
Sagstrom's good friend Gus Hansen was part of an entourage that cheered on the Swedish pro, but it wasn't enough as the cash-game specialist came up just short.
Player of the Year contender Vitaly Lunkin continued his incredible run in the 2009 WSOP, but he also came up just short of his second bracelet of the year, finishing fourth.
After spending parts of Day 5 as the chip leader, Lunkin's fortunes began to fade late in the day, and a Stud-8 hand against Sagstrom proved to be Lunkin's undoing.
The Russian pro cashes out for $368,813 and stays amongst the leaders for Player of the Year and most cash won at the 2009 WSOP.
Four-time bracelet winner Huck Seed was a crowd favorite at the final table, but his chances for a bracelet ended four spots short. Seed's fifth-place finish earns him $276,610.
Ville Wahlbeck continues to breathe down Jeffrey Lisandro's neck in the POY race, and his sixth-place finish puts him at 320 points, just behind Lisandro's 355.
It's been an amazing run for Wahlbeck in events with buy-ins of $10k or more. The Finnish pro took his first bracelet in the $10k Mixed Event World Championship, the first-ever bracelet win for a player from Finland.
He came up just short of another, finishing runner-up in the $10k Deuce-to-Seven Lowball. He finished third in $10k World Championship Seven Card Stud and 13th in $10k World Championship Omaha Hi-Lo.
Wahlbeck has said he's quitting poker after this year, but he's had enormous success at the 2009 WSOP, also taking a 12th place finish in $2,500 Razz.
"I rank this second after the Mixed Event win," said Wahlbeck of the 6th-place finish in $50k H.O.R.S.E.
"In the Mixed Event I wasn't all in a single time during the whole tournament, and it was pretty much the same here. Even though I was the short-stack for a long time, I wasn't all-in until the end.
"So in that sense, I think I have played the best in those two tournaments. Of course I wanted to go all the way and win the bracelet, but if someone had offered me sixth place before the tournament, I obviously would have taken it."
At that point, most of the hate-durrrrs were crying "Busto!" and "just another flash in the pan!"
After a short winning streak, it looked as if Dwan would pull out of his nose dive, only to plummet deeper. At his lowest point, and just 5 months into the year, Dwan had almost reached $4 million in losses.
Partially thanks to his latest session, all of that has turned around.
The last day of June saw Dwan sitting against two of the most feared online poker players in the world:
After some sick calls, and sicker-sized pots, Dwan came out of the PLO session up $700,000. The amounts of the session's top five pots alone add up to over $2 million wagered.
Ivey fared better than Sahamies, only losing $90k to Dwan at the mixed game.
With his latest win in tow, Dwan is now showing an overall profit of over $1.5 million for the year, with no signs of slowing down.
Here are the three largest pots of the session:
The largest pot of the session.
Replay any of the day's largest pots at will on our MarketPulse page.
The final table has turned out to be an epic affair as following the quick bust-outs of Erik Seidel and Chau Giang, the game developed into a massive test of endurance.
Player of the Year contender Ville Wahlbeck was next to fall in 6th and when Huck Seed busted in 5th, it looked as though the tournament was opening up for another POY contender, Vitaly Lunkin.
This proved deceptive though, with the wheels falling off for the deep-stacked Russian in a series of unfortunate hands and his elimination suggested it will be tough to topple triple-bracelet Stud champion Jeffrey Lisandro from the top of the POY rankings.
Three-handed for the bracelet, Erik "The Salmon" Sagstrom was next to bust, also managing to let a dominant chip position slip from his grasp and leaving David Bach and John Hanson heads-up for the title.
As of press time? Still heads-up for the title, making for one of the longest heads-up conflicts, at well over 400 hands, we've witnessed at this year's WSOP.
Bach and Hanson have traded the chip lead several times, with neither seeming capable of delivering the knockout blow despite the escalating blinds.
There has to be a winner though, so make sure to click through to Pokerlistings' live updates for the latest in this titanic face-off.
Meanwhile, here's a round-up of the best of the rest from another fascinating day at the 2009 WSOP.
Event 52 - $3k Triple Chance No Limit Hold'em
With rebuys banished from the 2009 WSOP agenda, the Triple Chance Event was billed as the next best thing with players given three chances to refill their stacks in the opening stages.
854 entered, but today just 16 returned to contend the bracelet. Following a tough final-table battle, Jorg Peisert was the man to take the glory and the $506,800 for first place, seeing off Jason Dewitt in a one-sided and brief heads-up contest.
Event 53 - $1.5k Seven Card Stud-8
The $1.5k Stud-8 played to a winner today and perhaps the most shocking news was that it was not Jeff Lisandro who took the bracelet down - for once the triple 2009 bracelet winner was nowhere to be seen at a WSOP Stud final table.
Instead David Halpern was the man to seal the deal, collecting his first WSOP bracelet as well as the $159,390 first prize.
He saw off a final table containing Chad Brown and Matt Savage before besting William Kohler heads-up in a see-saw battle to take the title.
Event 54 - $1.5k No Limit Hold'em
The last of the $1.5k donkaments played well into the cash spots today as 376 returned to fight for the bracelet.
The original 2,818 runners combined to produce a chunky $3,846,570 prize pool, and a day ram-packed with bust-outs means that just 29 will return to play down to the final table when they reconvene at 1 p.m. tomorrow.
$673,276 is the prize they will all have their eyes on come the resumption as that's what the winner will be paid - along with that coveted WSOP bracelet naturally.
Event 55 - $2.5k Limit Deuce to Seven Triple Draw
Time and again the 2-7 events have proved a big draw for the pros and this was neatly demonstrated once more as the great and the good of poker gathered in the $2.5k 2-7 Triple Draw.
They played from 73 to the final 10 today, and when they take up arms again tomorrow chip-monster Abe Mosseri will be the man to stop with a huge chip lead over the rest of the field.
He can't afford to rest on his laurels though with the assembled talents of Blair Rodman, John Juanda and Nam Le lurking in the wings waiting to pounce should he slip up.
They will return to play to the bracelet at 2.30 p.m. sharp.
Event 56 - $5k Six-handed No Limit Hold'em
The $5k Six-max represents the last opportunity for pros and amateurs to snag a bracelet prior to the Main Event and unsurprisingly a bumper field of 928 paid the requisite monies to give themselves a shot at glory.
The huge attendance resulted in an equally impressive first prize of just over $1 million dollars and when they return to the felt at 2 p.m. tomorrow to play down to the final - or thereabouts - some big names such as Phil Hellmuth and Justin Bonomo will be looking to grab the bracelet and the plaudits.
Tournament Highlights:
Event Headlines -
1. David 'Gunslinger' Bach Wins First WSOP Gold Bracelet
2. 2009 H.O.R.S.E. Championship is Second-Longest Final Table in WSOP History
2. Bach Wins Fourth Annual H.OR.S.E. World Championship
3. Bach Pockets Nearly $1.3 Million -- Second-Highest Cash Prize of 2009 WSOP, So Far
4. Three Non-Gold Bracelet Winners Finish 1-2-3 at Final Table, While Five Former Bracelet Winners Take Spots 4-5-6-7-8.
The Champion --
• The 2009 World Series of Poker $50,000 buy-in H.O.R.S.E. World Champion is David 'Gunslinger' Bach, from Athens, GA.
• Bach was born in Springfield, MO.
• Bach is a 37-year-old professional poker player. Prior to poker player, Bach was a professional bowler.
• Bach earned a college degree in psychology from the University of Georgia.
• Te... Continue reading Event #49 2009 H.O.R.S.E. Championship is Second-Longest Final Table in WSOP History
Colorado casinos are getting ready to raise betting limits, add games and take wagers all night long.
Passers-by are reflected in the closed doors of a casino in downtown Moscow, late Tuesday, June 30, 2009.
Arizona resident and self-styled video poker maverick Rob Singer is out to prove that video poker machines do not play as randomly as the manufacturers of the games claim they do.
The company announced its "Stacked Jacks Go Wild" promotion, which will run throughout the Main Event.
Any player in the Main Event that ends up with four jacks as a final hand will win a Jack Link's prize pack valued at more than $100. All players and hands are eligible for the prize.
"Four-of-a-kind Jacks has always been a good hand," said Jeff LeFever, director of marketing for Jack Link's. "With 'Stacked Jacks Go Wild' it just got better."
"Obviously we're a little biased about the Jack being our favorite card in the deck so we thought it might be fun to sweeten the pot a little and make sure that hand is a winner every time."
While the prize packs are a fun idea, it's unknown how the "Stacked Jacks Go Wild" promotion will impact play in the Main Event.
The addictive nature of Jack Link's Beef Jerky could present some tough choices at the table for players who might be thinking about only concentrating on putting together four jacks, instead of playing optimal No Limit Hold'em strategy.
Poker superstar Daniel Negreanu is one player whose play won't be affected by the promotion.
"I think it's very nice of them and I appreciate the offer, but until they have vegan beef I'll be donating my prize to somebody else," Negreanu said.
It's not exactly an endorsement from Negreanu, but the promotion goes on.
"Competing for the richest prize in sports is serious business, but it is still poker after all, and poker should always be fun," said World Series of Poker vice president Ty Stewart.
"We're glad Jack Link's is celebrating its presenting sponsorship by bringing another layer of excitement to the WSOP tournament floor."
The prize pack goes to any player making quad jacks, even if that player takes a horrendous bad beat and ends up being eliminated from the Main Event.
The "Gunslinger" spent most of Day 4 trading the chip lead back and forth with Erik Sagstrom, who goes into the final table as the chip leader with 3,675,000 chips.
Vitaly Lunkin ended the day second in chips with 2,490,000, while Bach's got the third-highest stack at 2,345,000.
"It's grueling, said Bach. "It takes a lot of focus."
"You have to pay attention to all of the up cards. But it's also enjoyable. I enjoy all of the games so it's a challenge."
Bach is no stranger to final tables at the WSOP. This is his fifth final table appearance, and he's made one final table in each of the last five years at the WSOP.
With a final table that includes Lunkin, internet phenom Sagstrom, eight-time bracelet winner Erik Seidel and four-time bracelet winner Huck Seed, it won't be an easy road for whoever takes the Chip Reese Memorial Award.
"There's still a lot of work to do," Bach said. "I really want to win this."
"This is far and away the best poker tournament in the world. It takes most of the luck out of tournament poker," said Bach.
"In No-Limit no matter how well you play, certain hands can come up where you're just going to go broke."
Spectators crowded the rail to watch the final two tables play down to the final eight.
Bach, Sagstrom and Lunkin were the only players that stayed comfortably ahead of elimination throughout Day 4.
When the final two tables were then re-drawn to one, Mike Wattel and Gus Hansen were barely hanging on.
Wattel's all-star entourage of Mike "The Mouth" Matusow, Shawn Sheikhan and Cyndy Violette wasn't enough to get him to the final table, as Wattel went out in 10th place.
Crowd favorite Gus Hansen was the victim of the final table bubble, his short stack finally evaporating in an Omaha hand against Chau Giang. Hansen takes $123,895 in cash but falls short of the final table appearance.
So the final table is set, with Sagstrom, Lunkin, Bach, John Hanson, Seed, Giang, Seidel and Ville Wahlbeck playing for the bracelet Tuesday.
The Russian pro Lunkin began the WSOP by winning Event #1, the $40k No Limit Hold'em commemorative event, while Wahlbeck is chasing Jeffrey Lisandro for Player of the Year honors.
The final table commences at 2 p.m. Tuesday at the ESPN feature table. Click through to follow all the action in our WSOP Live Update section.
First, Brock Parker (infamous on PokerStars under the handle t_soprano) won a pair by taking down bracelets in back-to-back six-handed Hold'em events.
After winning his first bracelet of 2009, Phil Ivey shocked the poker world by claiming he would win a second in under two weeks. He accepted any bet players were willing to throw at him then made good on his claim, winning his second just 10 days after the first.
If you hadn't heard the name Lisandro before the 2009 WSOP, you've heard it now. Not only was Jeffrey "The Stud King" Lisandro the third player to win a second bracelet in 2009, he became the first to win a third. All three of his bracelets have come from 7-Card variations.
Finally, the latest player to double down was Full Tilt Pro Greg "FBT" Mueller. Mueller, whose nickname is an acronym for "Full Blown Tilt," has managed to keep his tilt under control, making 2009 the year he won both his first and second WSOP bracelets.
The Dominance of the U.S and A
When it comes to the race for bracelets by country, the USA has absolutely decimated the rest of the globe. With 33 won so far, the USA has almost double the number of bracelets than the rest of the world combined.
| Nation | Bracelets |
| United States | 33 |
| Canada | 3 |
| United Kingdom | 3 |
| Australia | 2 |
| Russian Federation | 1 |
| Finland | 1 |
| Sweden | 1 |
| Mexico | 1 |
| Italy | 1 |
| Holland | 1 |
| Hungary | 1 |
| Iran | 1 |
| Germany | 1 |
Note: Last year 19 of the 59 gold bracelet events were won by non-Americans.
Year of the Pro
Most likely due to the increased starting stack sizes and added blind levels, 2009 has seen the poker professionals dominating over the amateurs. Out of the 51 bracelets awarded this year, 37 have been won by professionals and 7 by semi-professionals.
More WSOP 2009 By the Numbers (Note: all following stats exclude event #49):
Most Cashes:
| Darryll Fish | 7 |
| Fabrice Soulier | 6 |
| Jeffrey Lisandro | 6 |
| Daniel Negreanu | 6 |
| Brock Parker | 6 |
| Anthony Cousineau | 6 |
| David Fox | 6 |
| Barry Greenstein | 6 |
| Mitchell Schock | 5 |
| John Monnette | 5 |
| Ville Wahlbeck | 5 |
| Roland DeWolfe | 5 |
| Neil Channing | 5 |
| Nikolay Evdakov | 5 |
| Alexander Kravchenko | 5 |
| Phil Ivey | 5 |
| Robert Mason | 5 |
| Michael Binger | 5 |
| Ken Lennaard | 5 |
| Clark Hamagami | 5 |
Most Final Table Appearances:
| Mark Gregorich | 3 |
| John Juanda | 3 |
| Jeffrey Lidandro | 3 |
| Greg Mueller | 3 |
| Phil Ivey | 3 |
| Ville Wahlbeck | 3 |
Most Events Played:
| Nikolay Evdakov | 33 |
| Nikolay Isra | 32 |
| Jacobo Fernandez | 29 |
| Daniel Negreanu | 28 |
| Andrew Black | 28 |
| Erick Lindgren | 28 |
| Amnon Filippi | 28 |
| Daniel Heimiller | 27 |
| Soheil Shamseddin | 27 |
| Andrew Bloch | 27 |
| Gavin Smith | 27 |
| Tad Jurgens | 26 |
| Frank Kassela | 26 |
| Marco Traniello | 26 |
| Richard Geyer | 26 |
| Michael Binger | 25 |
| Jason Mercier | 25 |
| Chris Bjorin | 25 |
| Shannon Shorr | 25 |
| David Singer | 25 |
| Ryan Hughes | 25 |
| Berry Johnston | 25 |
| Michael Leah | 25 |
Mercier picked up his first World Series of Poker bracelet earlier this summer and now continues his meteoric rise to success by joining forces with one of the biggest names in poker.
"It feels great," Mercier told PokerListings.com. "It feels like it's been a long time coming.
"Over the last fifteen months it's just like each thing I've done I've gotten one step closer. Winning the bracelet I guess was the last thing I needed to do."
As a Team Pro, Mercier will wear the PokerStars logo at many of the world's most prestigious tournaments, including European Poker Tour and WSOP events.
"I'm looking forward to going to Barcelona and London this year," Mercier said. "Before the deal I wasn't sure if I was going to go."
He'll also play online at PokerStars.com, where fans will be able to test their skills against the young hotshot.
"I have to play a certain amount of online hours whereas I wasn't playing online as much over the last six months," he said. "I'm going to have to get back to the online grind."
Mercier told PokerListings the partnership with PokerStars was a natural fit.
"I'm friends with a decent amount of the team pros already and I'm friends with a bunch of people who work for PokerStars, so I'm really looking forward to developing those friendships more as well as travelling and making new friends," he said.
The EPT London High-Roller champ also said he looks forward to the security he gains from the deal, but that he doesn't think it will change much at the tables.
"Maybe more people will know who I am, but as a player I don't think it changes anything about the way that I play or the respect that I get," he said.
PokerStars also announced it has signed Dutch pro Marcel Luske as another new member of Team PokerStars Pro.
You can join Mercier and Luske at PokerStars by signing up for an account via PokerListings.com. Do so here.
Mike is presenting six seminars at the Rio during the World Series of Poker and playing in some of the events.
Poker personality, columnist, and WSOP Media director Nolan Dalla has been introducing Mike and regaled the audience with a tale about Mike from 15 years ago.
Mike was giving a seminar at a restaurant, and as occasionally befalls such events, the audio equipment went on the blink.
Mike usually manages to discover a way to make the most of a bad situation. This time he led the seminar audience outside onto a balcony and climbed on a ledge to address that crowd of poker players.
Wild. Mike is aware that he presents a rather wild image, but imagine the Mad Genius atop a ledge, on a roof, in the moonlight, his hair in its usual disarray, waving his arms about and speaking loudly to his audience. A worried security guard asked Nolan, 'Do you think he's going to jump?' What a sight that must have been!
Today ... Continue reading Lessons From Mike Caro University Of Poker: Old Memories
World Poker Tour Enterprises, Inc. has released the venues and dates for the American stops on the upcoming eighth season of the World Poker Tour.
Taking inspiration from mainstream media and print sources, the blog seeks to provide a photo essay showcasing the highlights of each tournament day at the World Series of Poker.
It's the brainchild of PokerRoad president Joe Sebok, veteran tournament reporter BJ Nemeth and PokerRoad Nation maestro Jeff Holsey.
"We wanted to take the lead of Sports Illustrated and the Boston Globe's Big Picture," Sebok told PokerListings.com.
"It's basically us trying to tell the story of what goes on at the WSOP through these big high-resolution photos."
Nemeth takes the bulk of the pictures, which range from standard tournament fare to human-interest and lifestyle shots.
A recent album focused on pro Daniel Negreanu's charity golf tournament, featuring pros like Scotty Nguyen and Erick Lindgren.
"We're trying to catch the excitement of what goes on at these tournaments as well as outside of them," Sebok said.
According to Sebok, the genesis of the project sprang from Nemeth and Holsey's background in traditional tournament reporting.
"I think the inspiration came from them doing tournament coverage and wanting to do something different and wanting to push the envelope," he said.
Nemeth is understandably proud of his work.
"It takes a long time to shoot, sort, process, upload and caption the best possible photos to tell the story of each day at the World Series of Poker," he recently wrote on Tao of Poker. "But it only takes five minutes to check them out each day."
As with many of PokerRoad's innovations, reactions to the blog have been positive.
"People love it. People absolutely love it," Sebok said. "I think everyone from [WSOP commissioner] Jeffrey Pollack to all of these different players have all told us they love it.
"It's something you can check out to see what's going on day after day."
Check out the PokerRoad Nation Photo Blog and hear PokerListings.com on PokerRoad Radio at PokerRoad.com.
One of the skills of a winning poker player is patience. In cash games if you play maniacally you usually end up losing. In tournaments, though, sometimes patience must take a back seat to naked aggression.
My good friend Aaron played in a home game satellite for a spot in a major, live tournament series. Twenty players began the tournament, and the key was to finish in the top three to advance to the playoffs. The structure was fast. Each player began with T1,000 and the blinds increased every 15 minutes. There were two heats with the top three players from each heat advancing to the playoffs. The playoff had a slower structure, and each player stared with T5,000 and the blinds advancing every 25 minutes.
Unfortunately for Aaron, all he looked at for the first half hour was a steady diet of junk. At a ten-handed, player-dealt table, it can easily take 15 minutes for an orbit. In fact, after two levels only 18 hands were dealt at Aaron's table.
'The price of poker is going up!' as Mike Sexton would say.
Just when you thought that action at the nosebleed tables was already ridiculously high, the stakes have been elevated. Tom 'durrrr' Dwan and Ilari 'Ziigmund' Sahamies engaged in several $3,000-$9,000 heads-up pot-limit Omaha matches. The two normally played with $500-$1,000 blinds, but they agreed to make it at least $9,000 to see the flop. Ziigmund alluded that he wasn't all that comfortable playing so high, but with the lack of available high stakes opponents, he really had no choice.
'I hope I won't do it anymore,' wrote Ziigmund on his blog. 'That's sick, sick big game.'
The swings have been immense. Durrrr won and lost a couple of million dollar sessions during the first week of escalated blinds. Eventually the two were involved in a pot so big that it set a record for largest pot-limit Omaha pot of all time. It was also the second largest pot ever played online. In case you w... Continue reading Higher and Higher
A former royal protection officer accused of a A 3 million betting and property scam has claimed colleagues played poker and traded porn while working at Buckingham Palace.
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Last updated:
July 03, 2009 12:15 AM
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