WPPA Entrants Improving, Horseshoe Championship on Friday
The WPPA Tournament of Champions continues at the Orleans today with a $1000 Omaha Hi-Lo event. Registration problems have apparently been solved and the turnout was good considering the event. A few well known professionals were observed in the group of 38 entrants. Charlie Shoten was playing well at one of the tables while Richard Brodie, Lion Tales Blog, was building his stack at another. Yesterday’s winner, Dan Heimiller, continued in the action today after he outplayed everyone in the Limit Hold’em event on Wednesday to take home the $7,440 first place money. Greg Fund was second, winning $4,465 in prize money and Max Pescatori received $2,975 for third. The event tomorrow, Friday at noon, will be a No-Limit Hold’em shootout with a $1000 + $40 buy-in. The number of players is expected to show a dramatic increase over the past couple of days.
The WPPA tournaments are designed to favor the better poker players and move the luck factor to a less important role in determining the winners. The blind structure begins low and has small incremental increases allowing the more skilled player to have an opportunity to play a solid “A” game without the worries of becoming short stacked from paying rapidly increasing blinds. The time segments for the different levels of blinds and antes are longer, again an effort to favor the better player. I believe this structure is much better for the game, the players and provides a good image for the sport. It proves that poker is very much the game of skill with luck no longer being the determining factor since it is equally distributed around the tables and drops out of the equation. Yesterday’s final table match offered exactly this situation, lasting into the early evening with the highly skilled final three players using all of their abilities in their efforts to win the contest. The crowd gathered round the table watched some great poker and appreciated the good show from the trio. The highly competitive poker industry needs more tournaments with this blind and time structure. It is good for the game.
Tomorrow, Friday the 1st, sees the first day of Binion’s Ten Days of Hold’em Tournament’s $5,000 Main Event. The players will be competing for the money and the $10,000 seat in the ESOP 2005 Main Event at the Rio and the final WSOP final table at the Horseshoe in downtown Las Vegas. Come play for the seat and an opportunity to become part of history during the next World Series of Poker.
The turn out for the WPPA Tournament today at the Orleans Hotel and Casino here in Las Vegas was light. The $1000 Limit Hold’em attracted 19 players including WPPA founder and Chairman, Louis Asmo (center, red shirt in photo). Felicia Lee was on hand watching over the event so I had an opportunity to visit. She said that a daily noon No-Limit Hold’em event will be scheduled for the remainder of the tournament. The scheduled daily events will begin at 2:00 pm each day. We discussed the possibility that the TV sponsor will fund a daily free roll No-Limit tournament with players competing in the free event for a seat in the WPPA tournament of Champions Main Event. This is contingent on the parties working out the details of the funds transfer to everyone’s satisfaction. I think this is a very innovative and original promotion to generate interest in the newly formed WPPA and hope they can get the free rolls up and running. We also discussed the very low juice (as low as 2%) for the WPPA events and I admit I’m somewhat confused as to why this advantage for the player isn’t of more importance. Remember, it’s your money so keeping more of it in the prize pool is a good thing. I will continue to provide details and progress reports. Thursday offering will be a $1,000 + $40 Omaha Hi-Lo contest.
The entrants for the Horseshoe’s Ten Days of No’Limit Hold’em Tournament attracted an even smaller crowd with 15 entrants paying $3,000 for a seat in today’s event. The final table was in progress and the chip leader was Amir Vahedi, professional poker player and WSOP champion. Amir made the 2003 WSOP Main Event final table and finished 6th in the tournament. He is probably best known as Ben Affleck’s poker tutor and deserves much of the credit for Ben’s first place finish in the California Championship this year. Amir was exhibiting his aggressive, unpredictable style of hold’em play today, much to the chagrin of the other players. His in your face style usually solicits complaints from the other players and today was no exception, so the floor people were kept busy rendering order to the proceedings. I liked Amir’s “Poker is a Sport” sweatshirt. Thursday’s event will be a $1000 No-Limit Hold’em Crapshoot. The first day of the $5,000 Championship Event is Friday.
Tomorrow I should be sufficiently recovered to go to the Orleans and cover the ongoing Inaugural WPPA Championship Tournament. The big tournament began on September 16th and continues through October 12th. I should have some photos, interviews and results after tomorrow's visit. I will try to locate 
With the recently televised 
I got into an interesting conversations with 
If you have a solid read on what your opponent is holding then the lay-downs and re-raises become a far easier decision even if it isn't always a more profitable one. A a little good advice from Chris Ferguson on this subject, "If you're not sure whether to fold or call, fold. If you're not sure whether to call or raise, raise."
Well, quite a week, I discovered a couple of new blogs including 
Nothing really new in the article, apparently a filler, but certainly another take on the world wide poker craze. An interesting stat is the Las Vegas poker industry growth quoted as 33% over the past year. The author, Robert Lusetich, further stated that the other traditional Vegas games have remained relatively unchanged showing little to no growth (not true). The comparison of poker to all things illegal and immoral is not a fair one for the sport. Poker probably has been America’s favorite pastime for a long time and now it has become America’s TV darling. Everyone with a television can watch poker around the clock and dream of the day they are there winning millions in a major tournament. What other leisure time activity offers so much fun and a profit too?
Action all over Vegas this weekend. Satellites for the WPPA at the Orleans begin on Sunday with the first tournament event on Monday. The No-Limit Hold’em tournament at Binion’s Horseshoe is running daily events with another $1,000 Buy-in Ho-Limit Hold’em contest on Saturday. Super Satellites are scheduled every evening at 7:00 pm with a buy-in of $225. The Plaza continues to host the Ultimate Poker Challenge with another tournament this Saturday. All of this plus the regular scheduled offerings of poker tournaments at many of the Las Vegas Casinos. I can’t imagine being involved in the poker industry and living anywhere but Vegas. I can hop in the car and within fifteen minutes be in any of a dozen casino poker rooms. Damn, am I ever the lucky one!
I am typical of most Las Vegas residents and believe that the city is rarely portrayed accurately in the movies. Hopefully, this production will make a serious effort to offer the real Vegas instead of the Hollywood version. The latest TV shows mostly dwell on the stereotyped, negatively conceived characters that make most of us natives head for the channel changer. The rumor says the project will be handled by Insomnia Entertainment, a Las Vegas based film Company. A little research revealed the Chairman and CEO of this production Company is Mr. Breitling (Yes that Breitling, as in Poster and Brietling, owners of the Golden Nugget). I am hoping that Mark Burnett, reality TV giant and producer of the really bad 
Binion’s Horseshoe in downtown Las Vegas held the first of nine tournaments today to open the “Hold’em at the Horseshoe” tournament’s ten day run. All nine of the events are No-Limit Hold’em with today’s event being a $500 buy-in. The field closed with 208 entrants and a prize pool of $95,680. Tomorrow's tournament has a $2,000 buy-in so prize money should show a marked increase. Sunday will see a Ladies only $1,000 buy-in and the final event is a $5,000 buy-in two day championship affair. Each of the daily winners will receive a seat in the Championship event. The best all-around player determined by accumulated points awarded for order of finish in each event will receive a $10,000 seat in the 2005 WSOP Main Event. For additional tournament information call 800.634.6811 ext. 7397 or visit the 
The third season of the WPT, 
I watched the first few minutes of the 
Annie Duke is one of the select professional players in our soon to be released Player Bio Section. She was born in Concord, NH in 1964 and attended Colombia University where she took a double major in English and Psychology. Annie is married to husband Ben and they have four children. The family resides in Las Vegas. Her brother, well known professional player Howard Lederer, taught her the basics of the game and then convinced Annie to play in the 1994 WSOP where she finished 13th in her first event and 3rd in another. She collected more than $70,000 in winnings that first year of play.
The Prof is writing all of the back-end code so expect much in the way of bells, whistles and user friendliness. The section will feature each player’s personal information, a player’s past performance record and photos we have taken of the player. You will have available all of a particular player’s photos we currently have in our galleries simply by clicking on the thumb. A gigantic effort that should debut in the next few days. I have finally sorted the Final Table Challenge photos and they will be available in a separate gallery. Tournament action all over town ensures I will not have much time for playing, sleeping or eating. Managing this blog effort is beyond a full time job (I thought I was retired); but, I will press on so our growing readership will continue to have a direct Las Vegas and Vegas Poker connection.
What about the bots that may be created and operated by those on the other side of the table. The Internet casino employees or even highly placed management and site owners? A few months ago, I was discussing this very topic with an individual that works within the poker industry. I had observed first hand some very suspicious multiple coincidences during play at an online site. I watched a “player” come into the table and make hand after improbable hand then quickly lose all of his bankroll to another newcomer that only played him. The first player quickly left the table once the money was transferred and the second player left in a few more minutes without playing another hand. I theorized that the lucky player was a bot and the second player that took his money was a harvester bot. No one would suspect that anything was really going on after the first “lucky player” also lost all of his winnings (winnings composed of all of the other player’s money) to a third party, in fact, I remember being happy to watch the person no longer make the impossible draws and lose all of his stack. After thinking about the situation, I realized it could be a very slick method of cheating. My insider friend believes that the online casinos would not risk the discovery of doing something so blatant, especially considering the incredible profits the online casinos reap. I think my friend forgot to add in the “greed factor.” I had the unfortunate luck to work for a guy whose wealth is measured with the big “B.” He has more money than most third world countries and yet he would lie, cheat, threaten and even steal from his employees if it represented a financial gain, however small. He had no compassion for anything other than money. Would the casinos run player bots to increase their profits? I already have my opinion. What’s yours?
The Fours Queens Poker Classic completed its 2004 run last night with the final hand of the $5000+150 No-Limit Hold’em event being dealt. Joe Beevers of the 
Poker tournament action continues in downtown Las Vegas at Binion’s Horseshoe later this week with the start of ten days of No-Limit Hold’em events. The first event is a $500 No-limit Hold’em tournament on Thursday, September 23. Daily winners will receive a seat in the $5000 final event on Friday, October 1. More information for this No-Name tournament can be had by calling 1.800.634.6811 ext. 7397 or you may visit the 
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