The Eve of the World Series of Poker
The World Series of Poker begins tomorrow (Sunday) at the Rio with the start of WSOP satellites and live action. Event #1 kicks off at noon on Monday, with a $500 buy-in no-limit hold'em event restricted to casino employees only. Consider that a warmup.
The real fireworks begin on Tuesday, with the first event open to every Tom, Dick, and Harriet (Event #2, $1,500 no-limit hold'em). That's when you can expect the largest field of the tournament (except for the Main Event, of course). Last year, 2,305 players started, and Allen Cunningham was the last man standing to collect the $725,000 first prize.
THE TOURNAMENT OF CHAMPIONS
But before we get to the World Series, we have to get through the third WSOP Tournament of Champions. In 2004, this was a ten-player winner-take-all invitational, with Annie Duke collecting $2 million for first place and Phil Hellmuth walking away with $0 for second.
In 2005, it was a much larger affair, with 114 players battling for the same $2 million prizepool. But the circumstances were much different; the top nine players would get paid ($1 million for first, down to $25,000 for ninth), and most of the players had to earn their way into the tournament.
To qualify, you had to finish among the top 18 at one of the WSOP Circuit events, or reach the final table of the WSOP Main Event. The only other way to get a seat in this prestigious event was to be named Johnny Chan, Doyle Brunson, or Phil Hellmuth, Jr. (They received last-minute sponsor exemptions, creating a bit of controversy.)
If you'd like to read a great recap of last year's, check out my article for Card Player magazine. You can find it here on my blog, and also at CardPlayer.com.
A NEW YEAR, A NEW TOC, WITH A NEW FORMAT --
BUT THE SAME PLAYERS?
BUT THE SAME PLAYERS?
This year, the Tournament of Champions will be limited to 27 players. Nine come from last year's final table (again), 12 earned their way by winning a WSOP Circuit championship event, and six received sponsor exemptions.
The biggest difference in the field is the reduction from the top 18 at each WSOP Circuit stop down to just the championship winner. I like this change, because it more closely resembles a tournament of champions. Also, after last year's controversy, Harrah's has clearly stated all along that a few seats will be kept open for sponsor exemptions.
I also prefer the timing of this year's event. Last year, it fell in early November, and had little connection to the World Series of Poker other than the name and some of the players. Now, it helps bookend the entire seven weeks of the WSOP -- start with the Tournament of Champions, and end with the Main Event.
While I prefer the new format in almost every way, it creates a weird situation where 12 players effectively got a 2-for-1 on their earlier victories. (The nine from last year’s WSOP Main Event, and the first three WSOP Circuit Champions from this season.) If Mike Matusow reaches the final table again, he'll have made more from these post-Main Event freerolls than he did in the Main Event itself.
Finally, the sponsor exemption didn't bother me that much last year, with 3 invites given out in a field of 114 players (2.7% of the field). Yes, they were the winningest players in WSOP history (Johnny Chan and Doyle Brunson with 10 bracelets each, Phil Hellmuth with nine), and they all finished in the top 13. But they were still a very small part of the overall field. This year, with 6 invitees in a field of 27, that percentage has increased an order of magnitude to 28.5% of the field. I realize sponsors are important, and they're technically providing the prizepool. But keep this event a true tournament of champions, and give those sponsors some other perk for their money.
Here’s a list of the players, and how they qualified for the TOC:
WSOP Main Event, Final Table (9 players): Joe Hachem, Steve Dannenmann, John “Tex” Barch, Aaron Kanter, Andrew Black, Scott Lazar, Daniel Bergsdorf, Brad Kondracki, and Mike Matusow.
WSOP Circuit Champions (12 players): Greg Merkow (Tunica), Chris “Jesus” Ferguson (Las Vegas), Vinnie Vinh (Indiana), Thang “Kido” Pham (Las Vegas), Chris Reslock (Atlantic City), Daniel Negreanu (Tunica), Abraham Korotki (Atlantic City), Darrel “Gigabet” Dicken (Rincon), Jeff King (Atlantic City), John Spadavecchia (Las Vegas), Peter Feldman (New Orleans), and Clint Baskin (Lake Tahoe).
Sponsor Exemptions (6 players): Doyle Brunson, Phil Hellmuth, Mike Sexton, Gus Hansen, Mike O’Malley, and Sarah Strom.
CARDPLAYER.COM / POKERWIRE.COM
The media situation has been changing dramatically this year, and I'm still not 100% clear on all the rules and regulations governing credentialed media. Plans are in place, but I'm curious to see how well those plans conform to the reality of the situation down at the Rio.
CardPlayer.com seems to have purchased as many rights as possible to become the official content provider for online WSOP coverage.
And for some reason, CardPlayer.com rolled out a major overhaul to their site less than two weeks before the WSOP. While I have a few issues with their new layout, overall I’d say the redesign is a good thing. But it’s risky to change everything on the eve of the biggest event of the poker year, without any real-world testing for the reporters. I’m sure some people at Card Player will have their fingers crossed during the first few days of the WSOP.
I’ve emailed them about various bugs as I’ve discovered them, and they seem to be hard at work fixing them. Most of the bugs are small but annoying (you know, like bugs). For example, a lot of tournaments are incorrectly listed as having rebuys. Ironically, some events with rebuys are listed as having no rebuys. (Check out this list of events from last year’s WSOP as an example. The $1,000 no-limit event was the rebuy event.)
My favorite “bug” was in the player bios that randomly appear on some pages. Isabelle Mercier’s bio started with the words "Known as the ‘Godfather of Costa Rican Players’ ..." I guess I don’t know Isabelle that well after all.
In reality, she was accidentally attached to Humberto Brenes's bio, and I quickly notified Card Player. They eventually fixed it by removing Isabelle’s profile altogether. (I'll agree that it's better to provide no information than incorrect information, but I'd still like to see a profile for Isabelle. I'll even write it -- for free.)
My biggest complaint with the CardPlayer.com redesign is the fact that I can no longer find the daily event reports for past tournaments -- I can't even find a link for them. If you click on "Event Overview & Results" for a given event, all you get are the final in-the-money results. There are links for multimedia (images and videos), chip counts, live updates, and payout structure, but no event reports. I assume they'll have this fixed soon, because I doubt they paid Harrah's all that money to let other media organizations dominate the market for daily reports.
Pokerwire.com also saw dramatic changes in the past few days, with a long-overdue overhaul of their site. (I love Pokerwire, but their site design was never as good as it could have been.) I just noticed the change tonight, so I haven't had a chance to thoroughly test it out. But I like the cleanliness of it, and hope they will be able to offer a little more content (Tournament recaps? Photographs?) without affecting their bread and butter -- kick ass chip counts with quick and accurate live updates.
Why am I less critical of Pokerwire’s last-minute changes? Because their site is several orders of magnitude simpler than CardPlayer.com. It’s much easier to test and troubleshoot a simple site than it is a complicated one.
By the way, Pokerwire will be posting live updates during the WSOP as part of Full Tilt's package deal with Card Player. The specific information (hand details, chip counts) will be identical to CardPlayer.com, just presented in the Pokerwire format. This is good news for people following the online coverage, because Pokerwire should stay live if CardPlayer goes down unexpectedly (and vice versa).
HOW DO I FIT IN TO ALL THIS?
A lot of people are wondering what I'll be doing for the WSOP this year. To be honest, I'm not quite sure. My motto this year is "Stay Flexible."
I'll be going down to the Rio every day, and for now, I do not have a press pass. That's right, in the true blogging spirit, I'm going to be just another curious spectator with a camera and a notepad.
Even though I plan to blog a recap every day, I doubt I'll be doing straightforward event reports like I did in my Card Player days -- I assume that the major media outlets will have that covered. So I'll be expanding more into the general experience of the WSOP.
I'm still not clear on the rules for general media this year. The PDF guidelines on the official WSOP website suggest that general media outlets will be allowed inside the ropes and be allowed to take photos. But recently, I had it on good authority that would not be the case, and only Card Player's reporters would have that access. (And the Image Masters' photographers, of course.)
Of course, if general media isn’t allowed inside the ropes, what’s the advantage of being credentialed, other than access to the media room? (In its defense, the media room does have wireless internet available.)
Once I get a clear view of the WSOP media landscape, I plan to sign on with one of the poker media outlets or online poker sites looking to provide quality coverage. But until then, I’ll be blogging and freelancing day-by-day.
Wish me luck!
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As always, feel free to leave me comments below.
BJ’s Blog: Eve of the WSOP
Saturday, June 24, 2006
