Parker: World Series of Poker

[Parker]

The 34th annual World Series of Poker concluded last night (actually early this morning), at Binion's Horseshoe in downtown Las Vegas. Several items of interest:

1. The grand prize of $2.5 million was won by a young man named Chris Moneymaker, which has to be the coolest name ever for a gambler.

2. This was Moneymaker's first "live" poker tournament. All his previous poker experience had been online play.

3. In fact, he had qualified for the WSOP via online play. His initial buy-in: $40.

4. This year's $2.5 mil top prize was the biggest ever, and the 839 entrants was also the most ever, a 33% increase over last year.

To paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of Binion's imminent demise are apparently exaggerated.

The event was covered by ESPN2. Live online pay-per-view coverage was also available. As alluded to above, it was possible to qualify for the tournament via online play, a first.

Such cutting edge technology seems especially odd coming from the Horseshoe. :-)

[Parker]

When Moneymaker won the entry into the WSOP final, the Tenessee resident needed cash to finance the trip to Las Vegas, so he sold shares in his potential winnings to his father and a friend.

The friend's name: David Gamble.

Link to LVRJ story below.

WSOP

[Gamesplayer]

We both went through to the finals in the same qualifier, first 3 position gets a seat. He came 1st,me 2nd.

www.pokerstars.com was the site.

You can see his biography on the website as well as mine. I'm Hugefish2888.

It's the toughest site to play in the world, nearly all the higher limit players are world class.

I lost to Barry Greentein, day 1 chipleader, came 400 something maybe next year