• VIEW PROFILE
•  
• MY PROFILE
  • MANAGE IDENTITY
  • MANAGE BADGES
  • MANAGE COMMENTS
  • MANAGE INTERESTS
  • MANAGE FRIENDS
  • MANAGE TOP FRIENDS
  • MANAGE BLOG
•  
• WINNERS
  • DAILY CASH
  • WEEKLY 5K
  • MONTHLY 30K
•  
• PLAYERS
• BLOGS
• CREATE A BLOG
• COMMUNITY FAQ
•  
• LEADERBOARDS
  • THIS WEEK
    • MONEY WON
    • FIRST PLACE FINISHES
    • FINAL TABLES
    • BOUNTIES
  • THIS MONTH
    • MONEY WON
    • FIRST PLACE FINISHES
    • FINAL TABLES
    • BOUNTIES
  • THIS YEAR
    • MONEY WON
    • FIRST PLACE FINISHES
    • FINAL TABLES
    • BOUNTIES

Part II. Sweating Humberto in the WSOP $40,000 Buy-in

It is true that not all players tend to “Follow the Book” while playing, but I was shocked to see some of the players do things that even I know are not the best to optimize your game. I first noticed Vanessa Rousso making what I feel is a tactical error in Hold’em, when she looked at her cards as she was dealt them, instead of watching the other players for tells and waiting for her turn to bet to first take a look. I cannot really criticize her play, she did hold on long enough to break the Bubble and finish in 27th position. Another thing I extol in my book and which I hear time and time again from professional players is to always observe what is happening at the table, even if you are not in the hand. As her chip stack dwindled to the danger zone, Jennifer Harmon began reading a paperback book. I didn’t get a chance to ask her the title before she was KO’d on the first day. I could also spot serious tells from some of the Internet (I presume by their age and relative anonymity). These ran the Mike Caro gambit from chip fumbling to vivid facial expressions.

As I was walking among poker’s elite, I had one major question on my mind. There is always complaints from the professional players that the Main Event is like a Lottery (Doyle Brunson’s words) To get a feel how the professional players feel, I asked a several of the top professional players if they felt that the Main Event should be a mega buy-in tournament, like this 40th Anniverasary tournament or the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. Event. Not a single professional I talked with was in favor of changing the buy-in to $50,000. T.J. Cloutier said that “The Main Event should stay at $10,000, but a Hold’em Tournament and the H.O.R.S.E. Event should be at $25,000.” Steve Zolotow felt that it should “remain at $10,000 as long as $10,000 remains a large sum.” The most surprising answer was from Phil “Poker Brat” Hellmuth, who has berated the amateur players at the Main Event or years, saying that “the Main Event should remain a $10,000 tournament to let the regular players afford to play.” In the end, the general consensus was to keep the Main Event at its historic $10,000 buy-in, but have a higher buy-in tournament in the $25,000 to $50,000 range to compliment the prestigious H.O.R.S.E. event.
Look for this as a two-hour block on ESPN’s reduced coverage of the 2009 WSOP. Continuing a trend of de-emphasizing tournament poker, ESPN is only covering the $40K, the Champions Invitational, the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. Event and the Main Event this year. Two years ago, nearly every tournament was covered, while last year and this, ESPN reduced the number of events with television coverage as Harrah’s Entertainment expanded the number of tournament events. There was a lot of concern before the tournament that the downturn in the world’s economy would negatively impact on the World Series. Through the first few events, this has not been the case, since nearly every event is smashing previous attendance records.

COMMENTS

POSTED BY:
loosejohnny

Jun 07, 09 05:25 PM

Well once you got a read on the table that your playing, you get bored. So a Pro Reading A Book is really saying, I know what your doing and how your doing it, so I will just only look at my cards now. I think that is what is happening.