Gary Wise from Las Vegas

Living Up To a Low Standard: Another Take to Come on the WSOP Ladies Event

Posted by admin on Jun 9, 2008

I don’t usually feel much pressure when it comes to writing good articles. I mean, I think I do a pretty solid job overall. I have a solid understanding of the languages of poker and English, I can string sentences together, they’re usually juxtaposed nicely… I get the job done, even if it’s a little late sometimes. Today though, I’m staring pressure straight in its manicured nails, its fashionable high-heeled boots and yes, occasionally its cleavage. I’m doing my best to avert my eyes though.

Last year, I wrote an article called ‘1268 Ladies and a Gentleman’ for ESPN. The first half of the article was about Allen Cunningham’s bracelet win; the second part was a scathing but obviously (or so I thought) tongue-in-cheek look at the ladies event. When it got published, people got pissed; one USA Today blogger, apparently unfamiliar with high-brow stylistic devices like sarcasm, called me “A good impression of Peter Griffin writing about poker” and not because Peter Griffin is a satirical character. Of course, it’s not like I didn’t expect it, considering it contained gems like;

“On top of the hugging, I heard all of the following at the tables;

• “You played that really well!”
• “Let’s all introduce ourselves!”
• “Where did you get that dress?”
• “Good luck, all-in!”
• “Three queens! That’s really good!”
• With one out in the deck; “You can still win!”
• Cat-like hissing

… I mean, is this a poker game or a cotillion? Imagine in your mind’s eye, a pudgy, balding, cynical, pompous man in his mid-thirties projectile vomiting. That’s me. Hi!”

**Teehee**

I have to admit, I still get a perverse little tingle when I read that, but a point I made in the aftermath was right on the money if I do say so myself:

“I felt I could write what I did because all things being equal between the sexes, the habits of women are just as susceptible to parody as those of men are, and to not treat them as such would be to suggest they aren’t equal.”

There you have it. Men and women, sharing the table, sharing the exposure to my sharp tongue. Thing is, I haven’t sharpened my tongue towards men in particular. I figure its about time that I rectify that.

After the final table’s done, I’m going to write something about just how stupid male poker players can be in relation to our maleness. I’ll throw in a little something about being one woman against nine guys in a locker room setting and how it feels to be on the receiving end of that (I was today for a brief moment).

Thing is, after the attention last year’s article got, I’ve gotten a lot of knowing looks in anticipation of this year’s. I hope I can live up to the low standard I set in ’07.

Gary Wise
gary@wisheandpoker.com

How not to prop bet: A clinic by example.

Posted by admin on Jun 8, 2008

Consider this a clinic in how not to gamble.

If you aren’t in the industry side of poker, you can’t imagine the chaos in the days leading up to WSOP. The players are all in R&R mode and mostly unreachable, everyone needs this article or that article or to set up a meeting or what have you, we’re all working out our rental situations if we’re coming from outside of Las Vegas…pretty much, every minute of the twenty hours a day you’re awake is occupied by three things at once.

With everything that’s going on, I’ve been caught unprepared on a couple of wagers. You may be asking ‘what that has to do with poker?’ but the reality is that when the object of the game is to win as many dollars as humanly possible, you do so with every means at your disposal; whether you’re holding aces, buying a percentage of a player in a tournament or making some ludicrous wager whose results are beyond your control, you do it.

The first of these came when, on an errand to buy a new audio recorder for interviews, I got a call from Andrew Feldman telling me that The Poker Edge had a last minute cancellation and would I be willing to come on (host Phil Gordon eventually announced “We mostly have you on because we couldn’t find another guest”)? I’m a publicity hog, so I happily agreed, and once on, we got to talking about the different storylines I’m watching coming into this year’s WSOP.

When I mentioned the emergence of Tom Dwan as perhaps the most anticipated rookie in WSOP history (That will likely change in 2010, when Annette Obrestad becomes eligible) host Phil Gordon put me on the spot, asking “What would you put the odds at that Dwan wins a bracelet?” I hadn’t really thought about it and my brain froze up and I blurted out a truly idiotic “um…3-1?” even Dwan, who is uber-confident with math to back it up, couldn’t give himself a better shot than 5-1.

Before I knew what was happening, Phil had a signed, sealed and delivered wager. Hell, I was so caught in the headlights that I didn’t bother to rescind…I mean, how to you refuse a host on his own show? The obvious answer is to say ‘no’, but at that point I was so beside myself for talking like a moron on a mainstream podcast that I wasn’t thinking straight any more. All I can hope for now is that Dwan makes me look like a genius.

Thing is, once I’d regrouped, I made what I think were a series of good enough bets to get what I think was an overall advantage in mine and Phil’s wagers. Phil is a bit of a cynic and I played on that. With regards to the Dwan bet, three lessons to learn from my idiotic example;

1) Don’t bet under duress.
2) Don’t let the other guy get your signature on the contract until you’re sure you want it there.
3) Try to actually think about your wagers before making them.

…all of which can be summed up by the always useful “don’t be a moron”

Here’s the rest of the wagers we made, though you’ll probably have more fun listening to the whole thing at espn;

Allen Cunningham to win a bracelet 5-1 – Allen’s won bracelets in each of the last three years and five years in total in the 2000’s. Are you really going to tell me he’d only win a bracelet once if you played out this WSOP five times? This wager seems especially brilliant now in light of the odds Phil Ivey’s been taking on himself. Ivey’s expressed a similar confidence in Allen, reportedly offering 1.1-1 on one of the tandem taking a tournament this year.

Daniel Negreanu to win a bracelet 13-2
Jesus Ferguson to win a bracelet 13-2
Phil Hellmuth to win a bracelet 13-2
Barry Greenstein to win a bracelet 13-2
Michael Binger to win a bracelet 13-2

Keep in mind, these bets were being made before the series started. When Phil offered me the chance to take any five guys, I didn’t know whether Ivey would be playing much at all. The five I chose were pretty safe picks.

A year ago, Negreanu was taking bets at 5-1, Jesus and Barry were literally multi-tabling live tournaments in their desire to get themselves the jewelry and Binger was tying a WSOP record with eight cashes in one year. Thus far, only Binger has managed so much as a final table finish from this group, but with the odds where they are, I’m still happy with these bets. If any one of them wins a bracelet, I’m close to break-even for the series.

WSOP main event to have 6400 players – over
WSOP main event to have 7000 players – over
$50,000 HORSE event to have 140 players – over

I think its obvious in my writing that I’m pro world series and more or less an optimist, and I don’t like the 400 point drop the US stock market took yesterday, but I still believe in the growth of the main event. Event #2 drawing 3929 players just left me feeling like people aren’t stopping their hobbies, and with the glowing reports that the Series has gotten (Jeffrey Pollack went so far yesterday as to call this ‘the summer of love’) you have to think people will be drawn here. I admit, I set the HORSE event bar a little too high (I think 138 is about right), but I think I should do well here.

My other wagering came in the form of ESPN’s fantasy pool. Each year, Feldman gathers his writers, colleagues and a few pros to put together a fantasy draft for public consumption. This year’s roster was Andrew, Gordon, Lance Bradley, Bernie Lee, Peter Feldman, Gavin Smith, Bill Edler, Mark Seif, Daniel Negreanu, Joe Sebok and Steve “Chops” Preiss. My logic going in said non-Americans would prove valuable since this entire crew is US-based.

The problem was that from May 18-21 I was taking care of last minute travel details, May 21-25 I was in Costa Rica covering the LAPT there, May 25-28, I was recovering and writing like a madman…in other words, I didn’t do a lick of preparation. To make matters worse, I was doing the draft on my shitty cell phone while en route to pick up Bradley from the airport. Where there was construction. On my brain.

In the end, I think I drafted a very solid team, but it would obviously have been better if I’d spend 15 frikkin’ minutes actually looking at who was out there and discerning some order of value. In the end, here’s who I got:

Jesus Ferguson (too early)
Michael Binger (good value pick)
Humberto Brenes (too early…could have waited a round)
David Singer (w00t!*)
Tom Schnieder (too late. What a sick pick)
Alex Kravchenko (about right)
Minh Ly
Daniel Alaei

* I seldom use internet slang like w00t! If I do, you’re safe assuming it’s me mocking people who use internet slang like w00t!

Daniel, who missed the draft, went pseudo-ballistic when he saw the team we drafted him based mostly on the ‘Daniel always drafts Asians’ principal. I’m not going to lie, I had a lot of fun suggesting players like Mao Tse Tung and Buddha. Still, fair is fair, and we let him drop a bunch of players for undrafted free agents. When he dropped Kenny Tran, I scooped him up, replacing Minh.

It’s a solid team. Most of my guys play games other than hold’em and have past WSOP success. Still, in just about every round, there was a pick that made me think ‘shit, I should have taken him.’ That can’t be a good thing.

I just made one last wager last night, by the way. Lance bet me at even odds that john Murphy will win a bracelet by event #10 in 2011. I think he’ll be asleep when he gets blinded off.

OK, time to fess up. The start of this entry was a incomplete article I never got submitted, but it seemed like a fun topic and a shame to let good work go to waste. There you have it, My blog is a receptacle for past failures and the incompleteness of my being. Call it a collection of my flaws. At least though, when my flaws include making wagers without thinking them through, maybe you can learn a thing or two from my stupidity.

I’m skipping the links today because I need to get this up. I’ll include them in my next installment. If you really, really want to read my stuff though, go to worldseriesofpoker.com and you’ll find it. I’ll be here holding my breath.

Gary Wise
gary@wisehandpoker.com

The Meeting of Minds and the Mouth: Only at WSOP

Posted by admin on Jun 6, 2008

In case you haven’t figured it out, the personalities of poker intrigue me a lot more than the cards. That’s not to say that I don’t love the game, that poker isn’t a never-ending-question-without-any-true-answer-keeping-us-in-agony-as-we-try-to-discern-the-true-secrets-of-the-puzzle-that-we-each-like-to-think-exist-despite-evidence-to-the-contrary.

There was a time when I was a solid online player. That time was a four-year period from 2000-2004 in which I played online poker for a living. That was a time when solid was good enough. In the years since, solid was good enough to lose your shirt. When I started into the industry, the plan was for me to write strategy based on those four years experience. I look back now, knowing the people I know and the things I do and find the concept laughable. Back then though, I just felt like there were so many people writing about the strategy of the game and that it was better left to the peeps who’d been doing it for thirty years. That’s why I started carving this little player-profile-and-poker-history niche of mine. That and the fact the personalities were –and still are—absolutely fascinating to me.

I like to describe the collected individuals of poker…or at least, the old poker…as cowboys and gangsters, even though it’s not entirely fair. For a white upper-middle class kid like myself, some of the shenanigans these guys get into escape the realm of possibility. Working with them allows me to live vicariously for a bit each day. During the World Series of Poker, this holds even truer with my position allowing me to stroll between tables and watch the action unfold.

Mike Matusow is one of those characters. The dude is absolutely nuts, absolutely obnoxious and absolutely honest. I’ve interviewed him at least a half-dozen times and he couldn’t guess my name in a hundred tries, but I like him for the simple fact that he doesn’t know anything but the truth. Last year, he and I turned an interview into a shouting match when he, off of his medication and feeling a little bitter and ballistic, went off on Harrah’s about this thing, that thing and the other thing. To tell you how sound his logic was throughout the conversation, he attacked a man in a Mr. Peanut costume about thirty minutes later.

Mike’s been changing of late. He just won his weight loss prop bet with Ted Forrest, in which he had to lose 60lbs in a year. He’d lost six as of January first and the race to the finish line left his body emaciated. I thought maybe that was why he was a little more collected than normal when I interviewed him a few days ago; His body couldn’t handle the lunacy.

Matusow’s been back on the road to strengthening himself since clearing the final weigh-in and I heard him shout from his table some hundred yards away more than once tonight, but the true test came when Jeffrey Pollack entered the room with Harrah’s new owner David Bonderman.

I meet a lot of very, very wealthy people, so shaking hands with Bonderman wasn’t that big of a deal for me, but as the Commissioner (a guy I’m pleased to call a friend, even if our relationship is a professional one) left the stage leading his new boss on a tour of the goings on, Matusow bellowed out “JEFFREY!” and made a beeline. Talk about your potential disasters; if Matusow confused Bonderman for Mr. Peanut the WSOP could have been retired in five minutes.

Before the realization of the potential this meeting held hit Jeffrey’s face, I was calling out to him, asking if I could listen in. I mean, can you blame me? The richest man in the room meeting a guy who thrives on being broke (I think Matusow is one of the best players in the world when he’s broke, mediocre otherwise); the owner of WSOP meeting the most unabashed of all its detractors.

Jeffrey whipped out a finger, pointed it at me and said “No! You stay right there!” the finger guiding me back to my chair where I sat chastised and laughing my ass off. I’m always happy to co-operate and I really wasn’t going to report on it anyways and the way it happened so quickly left me amused.

They had their talk and it was surprisingly civil. That’s because a) Matusow is on his meds and b) he only had good things to say about how the series was going thus far. That’s how smoothly things have been running; the guy who loves to tear the shit out of Harrah’s could only muster the equivalent of a ‘good job’, even going so far as to tell me afterwards that Jeffrey was “a good man. A great man.” I’m still in shock.

Getting back to my original point, this was a fun moment for me because of the personalities involved and the history of their interactions. Mouth and the Commish have had their differences, but here was a well-run event bringing them together under what would have under any other scenario been a beyond-stressful situation. Its nice to see things going well enough to bring even these polar opposites together. At least, it is for this upper-middle class white kid.

On to the links;

- Over on worldseriesofpoker.com, I have an article up on David Singer’s win.

- Also on that website, a look at the overwhelming approval from the players regarding event #8 – $10,000 mixed hold’em world championship.

- The Wise Hand of the Day on PokerListings sees Tom Dwan take a big hit in event #8

- The Wise Hand of the Day on wisehandpoker.com looks at Theo Tran’s second final table appearance of this WSOP.

Keep your aces and kings: How I survived a Phil Ivey staredown

Posted by admin on Jun 6, 2008

I’ve always kept my space with Phil Ivey.

Most pros long for the spotlight, making my approach pretty damn easy. Throw around the letters ‘espn’ once or twice and they get the message; I (or anyone writing columns on espn web space) can give them exposure. In that regard, talking to me is generally a good thing for their careers. Like Chip Reese before him, Phil Ivey is the exception to the rule.

Ivey has no use for celebrity. He makes more money than god and values his privacy. Hell, that desire for privacy maintains and even heightens his mystique. We’ve shared a few momentary conversations over the years and he knows I’d like nothing better than to sit him down and have him chew my ear off for a week or two, but if I’m going to be around for a while, I need to respect the wishes of the guys who want to be left alone. There are plenty waiting to talk if I need someone to take their place.

This all sets the scene for what happened last night. In another solidly positive evolution of the WSOP, the Players Advisory Council came up with the idea for a beautiful eight-game smorgasbord of a tournament that’s being called the$10,000 Mixed Event World Championship. You’ve got the usual HORSE events to go with three more; pot-limit Omaha, nl hold’em and triple draw 2-7. You want to find someone’s weak points? There’s a lot of exploiting to be done here.

Of course, this event put the pros on the scent. Walking through what remained late last night of the 191 player field felt a lot like hanging out in Bobby’s Room. Six-figure bets flew back and forth along with some good natured trash talk and a lot of frustrated looks from players playing their less-familiar games. It was while walking through that I came upon an ongoing exchange between Ivey and Andy Bloch.

It’s been well documented that Ivey’s been taking action right and left on his winning a bracelet. He’s put up $500,000 to Eli Elezra’s $900,000 and estimates are putting the total he has on the line at around $2,000,000. His bet with Eli was that he’d win a bracelet at this year’s World Series of Poker. His bet with Bloch, according to Ivey, is that he’ll win a bracelet this year. Andy has $180,000 to Ivey’s $100,000 that says he won’t.

See the difference?

It’s important to note that letter of the law –not spirit of the bet—plays more often than not far more often in prop bets like this one, which is important since there are bracelet events this year that won’t be happening in Vegas. Bloch’s feeling was that the spirit of the wager was that Ivey would win a bracelet in the 55 event starting in Vegas in May, June and July.

Standing, watching, I couldn’t help but let out a laugh when Andy told me what the dispute was about. The moment I did, Ivey whipped around faster than words can imply and caught me in his sights. For a second, I knew what the wounded caribou feels while looking in the lion’s eyes. “You think that’s funny?”* He asked me ‘What are you laughing at?”

* I’ve seen Goodfellas a few times and know that questions like this one are usually followed by the asker shooting someone in the chest. I’m walking on chinaware at this point.**

** I’ve been reading uber-blogger Joe Posnanski’s blog for a little while. You can blame these little asides on him.

Fortunately, I was having a good night. With the twin first-time wins filed by Erick Lindgren and David Singer, the room’s mood was light and it was infectious. Despite the obvious stoppage of my heart caused by the intimidating barrage hurled at me by the alpha of all alphas, I was feeling creative with a lot of good stuff to work with for my daily 3-6AM write-a-thon and my reflexes were feeling quicker than usual. “I’m not laughing because it’s wrong. I’m laughing because it’s clever.”

Sorry Andy. Kind of threw you under the bus on that one.

The glare dimmed a bit with the realization I wasn’t taking the other side and Phil settled back into berating Andy. He repeated the wording of the bet over and over, keeping the angry façade except when he’d glance over at Barry Greenstein, sitting to Bloch’s right and allow his lips to curl for a micro-second. Over the next hour, Phil used me to try and prove his point by having me ‘verify’ a few points, each one stabbing Bloch a little deeper in the back “It’s a World Series bracelet, right?” “It’s the same year, isn’t it?” “If Harrah’s went broke tomorrow, I’d have to pay up, wouldn’t I?”

I wanted to help, but when Bloch admitted he didn’t remember exactly what Phil had said when they agreed on the bet, it was all over. This is Andy Bloch, the nicest guy in the world, who’s always been giving of his time, who I’m feeling badly for because he just came so close to his first bracelet. Andy Bloch, who fortunately for me was probably wrong this time. I can’t imagine the sheer force of will I’d have had to endure if I’d been forced to take the other side.

Over that hour, Phil insisted he’ll be playing in the ladies’ event, challenged Andy’s manhood (and gamblerhood) by telling the world “This is a guy who’s never bet $200,000 in his life!” and finally, after I admitted I wished I could write about the encounter, he granted his permission. Andy did too. That’s why I’m hacking away now, eighteen hours later, the moment indented on my fragile little mind.

Ivey is a force of nature. I called him the alpha of alphas a few paragraphs up, but that doesn’t quite capture it. It feels like if there was a 10-inch brick wall between he and an object of his desire, he’s walk straight through it. Hell, last night, he was ready to walk straight through me to get to Bloch.

The quilting circle that is the poker community is whispering that Ivey is changing. With these bets as incentive, with his newfound appreciation for charity, there might be some small chance that he’s starting to embrace his birthright. Maybe it’s because with Chip Reese’s passing, Doyle has to eventually pass the torch to someone. Maybe Phil is embracing the idea of that being him…I don’t know. All I do know is that last night, I got a peek into the mind and world of Phil Ivey, one I hadn’t been given access to before now. I’m glad for the moment I got, and that I don’t need to stare back at the table.

On to the links. Today, I’m linking to yesterday’s stuff, with another bog to come later tonight on today’s writings.

- We start with a write-up on Erick Lindgren’s win over at espn.
- We talk with a wealthier, healthier Mike Matusow over at worldseriesofpoker.com
- I got to chat with Scott Clements before he stormed his way to yet another Omaha final table, also at worldseriesofpoker.com.
- The wisehandpoker.com Hand of the Day takes a look at Lindgren’s victory…
- …and so too does the pokerlistings.com Wise Hand of the Day.

Sorry again that I was late in posting this folks. Hope you enjoyed the read. More tonight.

Gary Wise
gary@wisehandpoker.com

My Apologies

Posted by admin on Jun 5, 2008

Hey guys, sorry you’re not getting the full treatment, but its 6:07 and I still have one last article to do. I just wanted to let you know I’ll be doing two posts tomorrow, with one a look at some fun with Phil Ivey tonight. Hope everyone’s been enjoying the coverage,

Gary Wise

Gary@wisehandpoker.com

“Good for poker.”

Posted by admin on Jun 4, 2008

Man, I wanted Chris Ferguson to win tonight.

Amongst the people I’ve been having interesting conversations with at WSOP is Dr. Pauly Mcquire, the twisted, dark, friendly and wise author of what many consider poker’s best regular blog, the Tao of Poker and Dan Michalski, owner of pokerati. Both have mentioned to me their disdain for the term “Good for poker”.

I think a part of the boys’ logic stems from a similar theory to one I have about the establishment of poker as a pastime and the underatanding that games and industries will have their scandals. Referee Tim Donaghy bet on games he officiated and life went on for the NBA; tournament poker should aspire to becoming iconic enough that its Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet scandals will happen. Life and business will go on. “Good for poker” keeps intact the protective shell TV has provided through its black and white exchange of otherwise grey information. This may or may not be a good thing.

Where my opinion differs from these others seems to be in that they’r defining ‘poker’ as the game, while I define ‘poker’ as the industry. When I say “good for poker”, I mean good for the health of poker as a televisable entity, good for the establishment of online poker as a legitimate business and pastime and good for everyone who’s invested their time and money so they might benefit from the constant influx of new money, be it through the fish or ratings. The game is the same one played over the last however many years. That’s not about to change.

Back to Jesus, he was at the final table of World Series of poker event #2 – $1,500 no-limit hold’em. Theo Tran, a good kid with one TV table, was the second-most recognizable name at the table. In other words, Jesus was in a league of his own.  He’d eventually go out in third.

I was cheering for Jesus because a win for him would be ‘good for poker’. I believe that while amateurs winning big tournaments can still be a major story, the continuity of the business routes from familliar ongoing storylines. The occasional Moneymaker is obviously pretty good, but Iultimately want people to latch onto a storyline and follow it for as long a they follow poker. Jesus Ferguson provides us with one of those storylines.

Jesus is by all accounts a very good guy. He’s given back to the game in spades with his part in the creation of FTP’s software, he’s done a fantastic job of branding himself (I asked him tonight while on the subject of branding “Isn’t it amazing what you can do with a hat?” Got a nice laugh out of that one) and is absolutely fantastic with fans. He never resorts to unruly behavior, speaks well in interviews…this guy’s been a great star. Those weren’t the reasons I cheered him on though. Not directly.

Those things all make Jesus a compelling sotry for people to latch onto. He’s a recognizable figure and that means that the longer he’s on the TV, the longer people are going to keep their TVs trained to the show. In turn, that means advertising space will be more effective, more advertising will mean more exposure for the online community and that means more people are coming to the table for the first time.

Put more simply, I wanted jesus to win to keep the fish coming to the table. Without them, the sharks will eat their own collective tail.

Before I get to the links, I want to say you should be checking out the blogroll at the right side of this page. I’m only going to link to quality there, so you shouldn’t go too wrong with yoru clicks. Special thanks to WickedChopsPoker, who gave this space a full-blown, hyperkink in their own blog. oh, and props also to them for Keeley Hazell. On with the links on a somewhat slow day;

- First, the link to the article on Phil Ivey and Eli Elezra I mentiond yesterday.

- Second, the Wise Hand of the Day on wisehandpoker.com com looks at an exhausting day.

- Third,  the Wise Hand of the Day on Pokerlistings looks at Jesus’ elimination hand.

ging to sign off not, can’t really see through my blurred eyes anymore. Hope you’re having a good week,

Gary Wise

gary@wisehandpoker.com

Meet The Press

Posted by admin on Jun 3, 2008

How do I do this to myself? I’m starting to blog at 5:10AM and I’m not really sure how it got this late. Seriously, it was a pretty mundane day at WSOP; no final tables, no massive drama. I didn’t play a hand of poker today, so where did the time go?

For one, it went to some lengthy conversations about the main event final table. Get together a bunch of industry insiders and its almost inevitable at this point. Some are excited for the drama the four month delay will build, some think that it’s an ineffective way to achieve the goals of a PR boost and others still think the collusion issue is too big to ignore.

Me, I’m a fan. I don’t see the collusion as much more of an issue than it has been in the past and I’m not usually a fan of breaking with tradition, but as far as health of the industry goes, I think something drastic had to be tried in order to save us from ratings death and programming removal. Is this it? I’m not really sure, but at this point in time, both in the poker timeline and in the AM, I’m happy to try anything without much resistance.

The big thing I took from that gathering of minds is the fact that part of my enjoyment of WSOP routes from the reunion with the finest journalists in the industry. Talking about the past, present, future, winners, losers, TV, tourneys, cash games, players, executives and everything in between lets me geek out with people I respect and can always learn something from. The interaction inspires me, as should be obvious from my recent output.

Bluff’s Lance Bradley has been a joy to work with. Nolan Dalla of WSOP has always loaned me his mentorship and continues to be an inspiration as the hardest working man in the game. BJ Nemeth provides the technical approach that supports my writer’s license, while Dr. Pauly surpassed my output while having the courage to talk about the darker (and therefore even more romantic0 side of the game. Dan Michalski, Jen Newell, Haley Hinte…these people have dedicated themselves to the game, and sharing the upper perch of the media partition with them provides constant inspiration.

The poker media doesn’t get enough love. It’s a mostly thankless task that doesn’t always pay what it should. Players possessed of ego or recoiling from contact can be difficult to approach, and being able to surpass all that is an underrated skill. These folks give their all to the game, cheesy as that may sound, and while yeah, ‘geeked out’ makes a lot of sense sometimes, it better not be used in a derogatory fashion, because without these people who have dedicated their lives to supplementing the game, the people who have followed the likes of Andy Glazer, Mike Paulle and Max Shapiro before them, there wouldn’t be much worth reading on the Interweb. Thank them the next time you see them recording a card or hacking furiously at a keyboard. You can point a finger and laugh at me though.

Speaking of reading things on the interweb…

In a new ESPN column, I remember last night’s stunning turn of events and note how each of the final four had somehow been previously overlooked;

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/poker/columns/story?columnist=wise_gary&id=3422466

Early in the day, Dewey Tomko and Billy Baxter were amongst the chip leaders. The two classic gamblers had me feeling nostalgic, as you’ll see here;

http://www.worldseriesofpoker.com/news/article.asp?newsID=2046

In the wisehandpoker.com Wised Hand of the Day, we see David Singer maneuver his way into a commanding chip stack here;

http://www.wisehandpoker.com/Handofday/archive/2008-wsop-day-4.php

In the PokerListings Wise hand of the Day, Nenad medic goes down to good buddy David Williams;

http://www.pokerlistings.com/poker-hand-of-the-day_wsop-day-4-no-repeat?show=all

I have one more article about to go up on worldseriesofpoker.com about Phil Ivey’s big bet with Eli Elezra, but frankly, I can’t really keep my eyes open any longer. 5:35. God I’m an idiot. I’m going to bed, as per usual. Nite,

Gary Wise
gary@wisehandpoker.com

Sick of the Hate

Posted by admin on Jun 2, 2008

So, first off, I have to say that was a pretty awesome final table. I mean, is there a better way to start the WSOP than a four-way battle between Andy Bloch, Kathy Liebert, Nenad Medic and Mike Sexton? You have;

- One of the best tournament players in the world, fresh off a 2nd place finish at NBC’s National Heads-Up Poker Championships and a 3rd place finish in Full Tilt’s $25,000 head-up championship looking for his first bracelet with a massive chip lead.

- The winningest female tournament player of all-time

- A 25-year old MMA-looking Canadian (!) who many were calling the best no-limit cash game player in the world ever before this final table made folks pay attention…again.

- One of poker’s truest ambassadors, a man who loved playing so much he set it free to host the WPT.

All four players had won $1,000,000 tournaments before they ever made it to 2008, and they all played some remarkable poker. While I’m obviously pumped that a Canuck won (Canada 1, world 0), I have to feel badly for Andy Bloch, a man who always gives an answer when I have a question, who’s well-liked throughout the industry and who I’d have especially loved to have seen won his first bracelet. The fact he hasn’t was so ludicrous to me that I completely forgot to include him in the article I posted the link to yesterday regarding the best players to have never won jewelry.

Bloch was the victim of some internet vitriol for some questionable plays in the FTP $25K, but nothing like what Kathy has been forced to endure over the years. Smart, sweet, Kathy is a no-bullshit lady whose endured and thrived in a damn tough field for women to do so in. The placing her gives her around $4.7 million in tournament winnings and it’s about time the insecure internet fan boys shut the hell up and showed one hell of a player some respect.

Annie Duke once told me about a choice encounter at a Montana casino. This was in her early playing days and she was still learning the finer points and sitting with a group of more experienced men, she got busted. “Don’t worry honey” one of the brainiacs shrugged “you can go across the street, spread your legs and make it back.” Nice.

The point is to tell you what it’s like for a woman dealing with what’s mostly been a male-dominated industry. Like it’s not tough enough to just win at poker, women have to do it while fighting the pressures of archaic biases, chauvinistic stupidity and the overabundance of testosterone that comes out whenever there’s a woman to impress or something to be fought over. Like guys, seriously, do you not want women appreciating what you do? Personally, I want to see more ladies in our midst since all the men who might be interested are already playing and fish are needed to feed the sharks. Posting crap about strangers isn’t exactly going to help in that regard.

I can’t say I’m that close with Kathy. I’ve been there for a lot of her successes and interviewed her repeatedly and she’s always been nothing but a lady. Where a lot of my bustouts are angry and (excusably) a little classless, she was the opposite after she busted out tonight;

“Most of the players were excellent players. There were only 1 or 2 guys I didn’t know and they were internet geniuses. Obviously it was a very tough final table. I mean, you always want to get first but to come in eighth in chips and move up and get third is pretty good. I knew I had a shot to win it, so it’s bittersweet, but I feel good about the performance.”

No whining, no propping herself up, no defaming opponents. This is the way a professional gives an interview, praising good work on the part of others and showing some great sportsmanship on the way out the door. This isn’t a person deserving of hate. Maybe if the people who express it for her so often were to actually meet the lady, they’d figure out that they’ve been acting like idiots for far too long. Conversely, they may just need to get laid and stop taking out their inadequacies on other people.

Congrats to Nenad, condolences to Andy (though, winning a half-mil isn’t too bad) and congrats and condolences to Kathy. She’s a hell of a player and like she said, 8th to 3rd on this kind of table is a pretty great showing.

I got up a summary of tonight’s final table over at worldseriesofpoker.com. You can find it here;

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showthread.php?p=4428047&highlight=liebert#post4428047

If you don’t know the players who started the day at this final table, you should read the preview I posted prior to the day’s play here;

http://www.worldseriesofpoker.com/news/article.asp?newsID=2041

In today’s wisehandpoker.com Wise hand of the day, I take a quick look back at the three-way hand that knocked Kathy out;

http://www.wisehandpoker.com/Handofday/archive/2008-wsop-day-3.php

in the pokerlistings.com Hand of the day, I look at an earlier hand that could have cost Nenad his tournament with four players left;

http://www.pokerlistings.com/poker-hand-of-the-day_wsop-day-3-a-little-bit-of-luck?show=all

It’s 5:13AM and I still want to write an ESPN feature about this final table. How can I not, you know? Pretty fantastic way to start the series. If you’re interested in showing Kathy some of the support she deserves as a fantastic practitioner of the game, check out her site at www.pokerkat.com/. Thanks as always for reading,

Gary Wise

gary@wisehandpoker.com

“It’s been a long day.”

Posted by admin on Jun 2, 2008

‘I’m at the end of a very long day.’

I’m starting to get the feeling that either a) that should be the name of this blog or b) every installment I write up until July 14th should start that way. Despite my not being full-time on any one gig and having some freedom to enjoy for the first time in a few years, I seem to always be at the Rio and doing five things at once.

For the second day in a row, it was a fairly news-less day due to a remarkably well-run WSOP ship thus far, but I was following a couple of stories closely, namely the absolutely superb final table taking shape in event #1 – $10,000 pot limit world championship and the absolute dismantling of the record for most players in a live non-WSOP main event.

As I write this, it’s 4:48 and the final ten players in the pot-limit are still going. The final nine will be at ESPN’s televised final table, and that means big bucks for everyone but the last man to go. Prospective player agents have been looming for hours and a rep of one site told me they’d have two players at the final table regardless of who makes it, but with chip leader Andy Bloch firmly entrenched at FTP, second-running Mike Sexton a PartyPoker man and Mike Sowers, Chris Bell and Nenad Medic all having their own deals, you have to think there’s going to be some competition for those last few names.

The big sponsorship prizes left on the board are Phil Laak, Kathy Liebert and Patrik Antonius…

Oh man; 4:56AM and John Kabbaj was just eliminated.

Back to that thought, Phil Laak is a likable and familiar figure, though ‘zany’ and ‘player rep’ aren’t always synonymous in the eyes of industry types. Kathy Liebert is a likable lady to talk to, but she’s burned through two sponsorships and some bridges. The real prize here is Antonius, the supermodel-genius with poker balls the size of watermelons. Stars and FTP must be salivating. There’s another game of poker going on here.

Quick story about Patrik; you know those posters on his website with the nickname ‘The Black Lotus’? Last year in the press room, I was hanging out with then-Bluff magazine staffers Chris Vaughn and Matt Brown and then-PokerNews.com video producer Justin Shronk when the subject of my having played on the professional Magic: the Gathering tour back in the day came up. Yeah, I’m a nerd. Go to hell.

Anyways, the three stooges got around to mocking me a little bit and googling at the same time and discovered that the most valuable card in the game was called the Black Lotus. I think it was Shronk who asked “Is the Black Lotus like the Patrik Antonius of Magic?” They thought the question was so hilarious that they agreed to all start referring to Patrik as the Black Lotus in their assorted coverage. Patrik Antonius, this chiseled god who makes women swoon, who is so cool that internet fan boys profess homosexual love for him despite heterosexual leanings, named himself after a Magic card.

That’s the kind of stupid shit that goes on in the media room.

The second story I was watching was the size of event #2, $1,500 no-limit hold’em. Divided into two days, this thing is going to max out at –get this—4,098. The old record for live non-main event tournaments was 3,151, set a year ago. How often does a record in any established competition get bettered by 25%? TV poker may not be in the best shape at the moment, but tournament poker is better than ever.

Since it’s 5:30AM and I’m getting up in 5.5 hours, I should get to the links. I’ve got four articles for you guys to look at today, which makes me wonder how it is I managed to find time to get to the tables and win a few bucks. Yeah, I know, brag post. On to the links;

- I thought so much of how well day one went that I got an article into ESPN about it late last night. You’ll find it right here;

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/poker/columns/story?columnist=wise_gary&id=3420340

- With Patrik Antonius amongst those threatening to take the bracelet in the PLHE championship, I did a pretty basic piece for worldseriesofpoker.com on some of the best-established players to have never won a bracelet. You’ll find it here;

http://www.worldseriesofpoker.com/news/article.asp?newsid=2039

- The PokerListings.com Wise Hand of the Day is a look at a funny hand that happened with ten players left in the PLHE championship;

http://www.pokerlistings.com/poker-hand-of-the-day_wsop-day-2-a-lot-of-money?show=all

- The Wise Hand of the Day on wisehandpoker.com, I look at the final hand of the day’s play;

http://www.wisehandpoker.com/Handofday/archive/2008-wsop-day-2.php

Anyways, its time to hit the sack. Hope you guys enjoy the reading, and keep an eye on that final table over at worldseriesofpoker.com tomorrow. Have a good one.

Gary Wise
gary@wisehandpoker.com

My Favorite Day

Posted by admin on Jun 1, 2008

I think I can say with some certainty that ever since I started covering the World Series of poker back in 2004, day 1 of the event has been my favorite day of the year. It’s the end of the anticipation, the re-igniting of friendships. It proceeds the inevitable grind that WSOP becomes for those of us crazy enough and enamored enough with the game to stay away from the tables long enough to make the event work. It reminds us of why we love the game.

Today, day 1 lived up to expectations. Each year, I seem to know more and more of the guys most of you are accustomed to seeing on television. One of the benefits of my job is unfettered access to the tables and I milked it for all it was worth, dancing through tables, shaking hands and bumping fists, cracking jokes and having them cracked back at me. I’m a little old to be a kid in a candy store, but it was the next best thing.

From the moment the event got under way, highlighted by one hell of a rendition of “Viva, Las Vegas!” courtesy of a marching band, there was a shit-eating grin adorning my face. For all the late nights, the times where the words don’t come, the frustration with scandals, the no-show interviews, this was a genuine moment that made it all worthwhile. The euphoria lasted far longer than I should have ever expected considering I’d gotten around four hours of sleep.

The Bluff party at Tao was great despite my only staying for 75 minutes after a few hands and a Philly cheese steak at the Venetian. I headed back to the Bluff house with worldseriesofpoker.com editor Lance Bradley and worked until Bluff own Eddie Kleid returned to the fold. Once lance crashed, Eddy and I got to talking business. Before I knew it, it was 4:30, I still owed ESPN an article and I was more or less collapsed on my keyboard.

The piece –an interview with ESPN’s Jamie Horowitz that will be posted some time over coming weeks—got mailed in at 5:30AM and I crashed a few minutes later. I’d told Lance to awaken me a few minutes before he was heading to the Rio so I could join him. What I didn’t know was that he wanted to be there by 9:45AM, and I’m paying for it now. I’ve been up for eighteen hours on four hours sleep and I’m not so young that I can really do that any more, so you’re reading the end of one hell of a day.

Despite the general fatigue and the exhaustion of my day 1 afterglow, I managed to get a few articles done and posted. The first was an interview with a man I consider to be one of the most important in the poker industry right now, John Pappas;

http://www.worldseriesofpoker.com/news/article.asp?newsid=2035

Pappas, as I hope you’re going to read, is the president of the Poke Player’s Alliance, perhaps our best shot at getting online poker legalized in the United States. He and I get into the basics of why we need that legalization, what the PPA is doing to make that happen and how you can help. Namely, get your ass out and vote.

Another piece I got up on worldseriesofpoker.com was the first of what will be a daily ritual, ‘Notes From the Floor’, a collection of thoughts and tidbits from the day’s proceedings;

http://www.worldseriesofpoker.com/news/article.asp?newsid=2036

I think BJ Nemeth, who I’ll be quoting a lot throughout the series, was right in his assertion that the lack of news was newsworthy. After last year’s day 1 fiasco, today ran smooth as silk. If you’re a fan of WSOP (and really, I’m not sure why you’d be reading this if you aren’t) this was a very good sign. One hell of a start for the Seth Palansky era.

Finally, I got up a couple of Wise Hand(s) of the Day posted, one over at pokerlistings.com;

http://www.pokerlistings.com/poker-hand-of-the-day_wsop-day-1-escaping-the-royal?show=all

…and one at WiseHandPoker

http://www.wisehandpoker.com/Handofday/archive/2008-wsop-day-1.php

It’s pretty insane to think about being happy when your opponent turns over a royal. What a colossal screw up. I mean, to err is human, but…meh, call it first day jitters. WSOP is a different animal. Yeah, I’m being nice.

Now kiddies, I must sleep, because tomorrow’s going to be a long one. I’m pretty sure we’re going to have a record-setting field since we’re over 3,000 registrants now and the record for live non-main event tournaments is 3,151 players, and we’re going to be getting down to our first final table. Keep a special eye on a WHP favorite Mark Newhouse, who was down to 1,500 chips at one point. I would, but both of mine are closing and I still have one last article to write.

Gary Wise
gary@wisehandpoker.com

maintained by: BJM for Gary Wise