Vegas Poker Blog

Yesterday, the WSOP kicked off with the first bracelet being awarded to dealer Chris Gros in the employees tournament portion. So, were off and running!

Now comes a grueling few weeks so I started wondering how people really prepare themselves to stay the course �if their cards and chips hold out. After the practice and the satellite rounds, what do you do when you finally get to Vegas and are hopefully going to be there for the next six weeks?

Well, hopefully, you landed yourself a pretty decent place to call home during that time. Las Vegas is nothing but hotels so rooms arent at a shortage, but ones where you can be comfortable for weeks is another issue entirely. The primo condos and apartments were snapped up forever ago, and most serious players say its very necessary to be able to get away from The Strip to relax and unwind.

With heat upwards of 105 degrees on many days, many players want to avoid walking any distance at all. So, some prefer hotels, not much getting into their car and a leisurely swim in a pool during off hours. Some play a little golf and others have all sorts of methods of keeping their heads geared and focused. Everything from reading quietly œHarrington on Holdem� seems to be something popular) to the myriads of poker game action going on all over town (the Red Rock is home to a lot of professionals who are no doubt going to be downstairs playing a lot). Some players are walking around watching games trying to work out which players can be pushed around and which ones cant.

While still others are in their rooms connected to their laptops playing online games, and writing daily or weekly blog pieces for sites.

One of the big mistakes, it is said, that online players make when coming to Vegas for WSOP, is not getting out and playing on at least one real table a day �just to prepare and get the feel of it all.

Because WSOP goes on for such a length of time, there are days and hours still left to become prepared and I suspect there are about 6000 different methods being used right now. If I were there, trying to work out how Id be handling it all is sort of a fun fantasy to think about!

Even though Amarillo Slim Preston has four SWOP bracelets, his name seems as synonimous with the tournament and the game as Johnny Moss or any other player. And, rather rightfully so because hes one of the more interesting characters weve had around.

Slim was a real rounder in every sense of the word. He hustled, he made wild propositions, and he networked. He was one of the first to really ˜use television not only promote himself but in a funny way to promote poker. He lived bigger than life wearing $1 gold pieces for buttons, sporting a big cowboy hat and staying skinny as a rail his whole life.

Being a close friend of Benny Binions helped Slim to get into a position to play in the WSOP and after his first win in 1972 ($80,000) he took to the airways. He appeared on talk shows and even in a mainstream movie, and became one of the most colorful people on the circuit from then on. He won his last bracelet in 1990 �so he wasnt all hype. What a combination!

Slim also made it a point to play poker with rather unexpected people �like Richard Nixon, Lyndon Johnson, Larry Flynt and more. He was once kidnapped by Pablo Escabar, the Columbian drug king, who mistook him for a drug dealer. He was just in Columbia to open a casino. He opened a restaurant in South Africa and held his own tournaments in Australia. Likely, theres not been a world-class poker player who got around quite as much as Slim.

Slim doesnt play much poker anymore preferring to spend his time building golf courses and watching his champion cutting horses at work. He got into a bit of trouble with the law and lays a little lower anymore. But when he played there werent many as canny as Amarillo Slim, and there are few who loved the game more than him. He says he loved the camaraderie and the challenge, and most who ever played him or met him genuinely liked the guy.

Theres one Amarillo Slim quote I try never to forget. Hes left us plenty of them, but “Look around the table. If you don’t see a sucker, get up, because you’re the sucker.” is my personal favorite. What a guy!

Television and the WSOP have had quite a history together. Actually, that should be changed to say that the WSOP and ESPN have quite a history together!

The tournament got a pretty short shrift in its early days. CBS would get Jimmy the Greek to narrate a cut together documentary of sorts and it would make the air as a special. This kind of coverage continued off and on through the years until that sports channel upstart, ESPN, took an interest in the game.

ESPN jumped in and from the late 1980s started providing coverage. Those poker addicts amongst us remember those days well, because if you blinked you missed the shows. The first broadcasts were taped delayed hour-long shows that showed only the final. Celebrity announcers like Dick or Chris Van Patten along with the tournament director were talking from the casino floor, and there was no fun stuff like pre-taped player profiles or in-depth analysis. ESPN was making great strides in football and other mainstream sports areas, but poker was lagging behind.

For a couple of years, 2000-2002, The Discovery Channel actually took over broadcasting the final, but it appeared as a delayed taped show and the actual play was interspersed with player interviews and chit chat. Shall we say a bit dull?

When ESPN took it back over in 2003, it was obviously to capitalize on the poker boom. No short shrift this time! Graphics, profiles and an extended two-hour broadcast awaited poker fans.

Since then, they keep extending coverage of tournaments and ramping up the glitz of the both the preliminaries and the final tournament. With worldwide distribution, I think it is easy to give ESPN part of the credit for the continuing poker craze. They recognized the popularity of the game and seized upon the opportunity to gain more viewers. Now besides a lot of tournament coverage and poker shows, they even re-broadcast finals from over the years in their classics series.

Recently, WSOP and ESPN announced that their contracts would extend to 2010 so it means ESPN will expand coverage even more.

This year beginning on July 18^th there will be 32 hours of coverage, or if you want to opt in for the $24.95 live action plan, you can. Sign up and watch live via either your TV. or your computer.

Television and poker have come a long way!!!!!

Along with the title of WSOP champion comes THE BRACELET. So, I went in search of some history on it, and for something as seminal to poker as the WSOP bracelet, you cant find squat on it!

I wanted to know what year the first one was awarded and maybe even what it looked like �no dice, pardon the pun. It seems it was about 1970 at the very beginning of the tournaments, but I cant confirm it. This is the Stanley Cup, the Masters green jacket, the Super Bowl ring, and you cant find the history of it!!!!! Maddening.

What I did find out is that the design this year is new, and its pretty impressive.

The jeweler providing the design (Triton Jewelry) has a whole web page about what the bracelet will consist of so while the WSOP skips any history, at least you can see the new one. I dont mean to slight WSOP because you can find lists of every winner for every year and all sorts of references to the pride in winning a bracelet, but nothing about the poor bracelet.

The new ones are crafted from 14-karat yellow gold, enhanced with full-cut white diamonds. The center plaque is handset with 66 diamonds weighing one-third of a carat and is supported by roughly 35 grams of solid diamond cut rope chain. The champs is even better and will be crafted from 14-karat white and yellow gold, with full-cut white diamonds. The plaque is handset with 170 handpicked diamonds weighing more than six carats. The bracelet’s center features uniquely shaped precious color stones to represent the suit designs - a heart-shaped ruby for the Heart suit, a princess cut-shaped ruby for the Diamond suit, a heart-shaped black sapphire for the Spade suit and three round black diamonds for the Club suit. Roughly, 58 grams of solid diamond cut rope chain support the bracelets plaque.

One cannot over-estimate the value of the bracelet to poker players. Afterall, its the most sought after item in the game and we all, secretly or not, would like to have one.

Sure, its a little garish as jewelry goes but what the hell?

But I still want to know more about the history, so if anyone sees any links that I havent, let us know!!!!!

I SEE DEAD PRESIDENTS 80 MILLION DEAD PRESIDENTS


Can you really conceive it? Do you grasp how much money that is? $80 million in chips up for grabs in one single event. We are talking about 80 million double cheeseburgers off of the value menu at McDonalds. That my friends is a lot of fake beef. That my friends is a lot of fake beef. For anyone that hasnt caught on to what I am talking about, that is the estimated total prize pool for the 2006 WSOP Main Event. Harrahs, the sponsor of the WSOP, has capped the main event with only 8000 seats. Ok, look at that too. They have capped it. That means that they are restricting it to 8000 seats. With the boom in poker, there could easily be more players that simply do not get in because the seats are all filled. And then the œonly 8000 seats œ, 8000 players in the main event is pretty amazing if we go back 10 years. I know in a few smaller land based tournaments and a lot of on line freerolls you see that number of entries and more but we are talking about a $10 thousand buy in.

It is so unbelievable that last night Nikolaus Sheppard was giving me a preview of what TCG-Global has planed for the WSOP this year. They are not only announcing a poker pool in which you can buy a number of a seat and if that player wins you win the pool but they are laying odds on the top players in the world to not even make the final table let alone win. 50 to 1 odds that no top 25 player wins the main event and even on one specific player they are laying 50 to 1 he doesnt make the final table and 100 to 1 he doesnt win the main event if he did. They are not only announcing a poker pool in which you can buy a number of a seat and if that player wins you win the pool but they are laying odds on the top players in the world to not even make the final table let alone win. 50 to 1 odds that no top 25 player wins the main event and even on one specific player they are laying 50 to 1 he doesnt make the final table and 100 to 1 he doesnt win the main event if he did. I wont bore you with the details of the largest prizes in history or the most players in a tourney like this but you have to understand something, each player is in a seat that is valued at $10 thousand. That there are going to be 8000 of them and more than likely over a thousand that will be holding entry fees but can not get in. It is going to be a big show, bigger than ever and I am waiting to see which non network puts it on television live. Im personally think I need to know someone in the pay per view arena because I want in on this. So, hey out there, if you know anything about putting on a pay per view event, call me and lets do the entire main event this year live as it happens. It may sound like I am rambling and being silly but let me tell you, I have been around this event and poker for more years than half the players in the event have been alive and I have been in it religiously not as a week end arm chair œ I play a little œ kind of around. If I had said that there would be 2000 players wanting in let alone 8000 and the entry stayed at 10 grand , a few years ago I would have been told to go home and sleep it off. I am now beginning to wonder if poker isnt going to become a shooting star and burn its self out by moving to big too fast in too many directions. This is going to be an interesting summer in poker so lets all stay tuned and see if blind ambition can really pull you through.

While Benny Binion gets credit for starting the World Series of Poker, its two poker players who should have a lot of the credit as well. After all, the game, which gave WSOP its origins, lasted five marathon months.

Nicholas œNick the Greek� Dandolos was, in 1949, the most famous poker player in the U.S. He was a well-educated player from a well-to-do family, but early on found a love in gambling. He played numbers, he played the horses, and he played poker. Although, he emigrated from Crete to Montreal, he really began his poker career in Chicago with a half million dollar stake hed won betting the horses during one season. Once in Chicago, it was as if he suddenly absorbed the game of poker and all its tricks. The casinos loved him and loved the action he brought to them. Consequently, œNick the Greeks reputation grew and grew and he was ˜the man in poker. Oh, as for the $500,000, Nick lost all that shortly after getting to Chicago �learning the finer points of the game.

Meanwhile, a little more out West, there was a man from Texas who had also amassed a great reputation as a player. Johnny Moss was a street kid who learned to play poker at age 10. He learned all the cheats but he practiced and practiced and practiced. When he decided on a life of poker, he wanted to use no cheats and it wanted it to be an honest job. He maintained that attitude his entire life and is still looked up to as the pinnacle of a gentleman player.

Moss was considered by Binion to be the best player in the world, so when œNick the Greek� approached Binion because he wanted to best Moss, the famous game was arranged in Las Vegas. It was time for the two of them to duke it out at the table with the winner taking the title.

Binions Horseshoe, of course, was the scene of the game, which ended up lasting five long months. They played every variable of poker, only slept during short breaks, and the world was hearing about the two best players going at each other. In the end, it was Moss who took it all. Dandolos left in the end several million dollars lighter.

Dandolos didnt quit playing but by the time he died on Christmas Day in 1966, he was not only considered one of the greatest gamblers in history, he was penniless.

Moss went on to win three WSOP tournaments (70, 71, and 74) and was a living legend until he died in 1997. He maintained his aura of being the quintessential gentleman, and played poker until the day he died. It was said that poker was the only thing that brought a gleam into his tired eyes.

Both of these players own a huge piece of WSOP history. And while Dandolos may have lost the biggest event, neither of them could ever be considered losers.

All over the world there are poker players just itching to get their heart broken at the 2006 WSOP. The odds are against them. Hey, if the odds are 500-1 against a top player, the guy down the block from you has worse ones! Thats a fact. Yet, the World Series of Poker has created such an event with so many avenues to get in that if youre serious about poker, you want your shot.

After all the qualifying, and if you get to Vegas, you still have weeks of playing in front of you. Sound tough? It is. But the great thing about the WSOP is that anything can happen and anyone could win the largest prize for any winner in sport in history �$10 million!

Every poker blog you go to has its picks, but not many of them have a single pick. Its all divided down between men, women, celebrities, and shoulda woulda coulda players too. Theres simply no way to know who will have the skill, the stamina, and the sheer guts to go the distance.

Of course, there are familiar names like Phil Ivey, Phil Hellmuth, œJesus� Ferguson along with the ladies �Kathy Leibert and Jennifer Harmen. Even James Woods, the actor, is given a half way decent chance as hes come up with some terrific wins. Then theres Jennifer Tilly, Ben Affleck and other familiar screen faces.

As ESPN broadcasts the events, well get to know more players and their stories. Some will touch our hearts and others well be happy to see go home. Then there are the guys from Operation Dreamshot, who are all soldiers playing for Wounded Warriors which is a charity for service men and women wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan. Theyve been guaranteed two slots so you know those guys will be playing their hearts out.

Even without color commentary, the WSOP from beginning to end will play itself out like movie �theres intro, the hard fought hands and loads of drama and unless were one of the lucky 6500 entrants, well be soaking up as much as we can on television.

Itll probably be a lot like watching ˜24 every week �except theres a different Jack Bauer all the time.

So, if youre going to be on your way to Vegas as a player, best of luck to you, and if youre going to be watching it with a beer in front of television, you going to see some fine poker and pick up some fine pointers too.

WSOP starts 26 June and ends with the main event on 10 August!

The World Series of Poker seems to have been with us so long that we usually dont think about it origins, but those origins, and its originator, are great poker legends.

We owe the whole thing to a guy by the name of Benny Binion.

Binion was a Dallas character of sorts, and someone who seemed to run just ahead of the law. He served a little time for tax evasion and even murder, but he was completely honest when it came to poker. Like so many true gamblers, he ended up in Las Vegas and eventually started his own casino, The Horseshoe. While the very first World Series of Poker actually took place in the late 1940s, it was Binion who seized on the idea and set off running with it in 1970 from The Horseshoe. He was a tireless promoter and we owe him much for his expert marketing which took poker from seedy backrooms into swank casino gaming rooms.

With the help of Amarillo Slims participation in a 1972 tournament, the World Series of Poker became a well-known and important facet of professional poker playing. The part, which Binion played in all this, is enormous. Casinos hadnt wanted to have poker as a part of their gaming because the cheating was too hard to control. Binion either used some of his street learning or just had innate smarts because he really changed the situation. In his casino, the security increased, he made the casino a much nicer place for people, and made poker a mainstay in the gaming rooms. He got people into playing poker for high stakes in a nice place where they felt they wouldnt be cheated.

Binions marketing ability was brilliant and from a small start in tournament participation, the World Series of Poker has grown into a huge and respected entity.

For an example, in 1982, there were 52 participants and in 2002, there were 7.595!

And, its still growing! There are thousands of players in over 33 competitions a year now.

So, the Texan whose trademark dress was a big Stetson hat and a buffalo hide coat created a lasting gift to poker, and its with good reason theres a huge bronze statue of him in Vegas. Binion died in 1989 so didnt live to see what the Series has become, but he lived long enough to know he was leaving us with something pretty special. And his family continues the quest for all of us avid players.

Thanks, Benny …we owe you!