Monday, June 29, 2009 - Gene Bromberg
Even for the Rio during the World Series this stands out as a busy night. Out in the halls there’s a line a hundred yards long to register for tomorrow’s $1,500 No-Limit Hold-Em event (the last of that sort this year) and up in the Rio casino proper there’s a line five times longer for a poolside concert held by the Mexican band Bronco. The $50K H.O.R.S.E. event is down to 31 players (16 cash), the Limit Shootout final table is playing out, and the $3,000 Triple Chance NLHE tournament and the $1,500 Stud/8 event are well into their opening days. Oh, almost forgot, there’s another $1,500 No-Limit event playing down to the final table tonight.
So that’s five tournaments in progress, another filling up as fast as players can fork over their buy-ins, and a standing-room-only concert that’ll no doubt clog the casino the rest of the night. Throw in the usual weekend crowds, the non-stop cash game action, and the spectators jamming the rail by the H.O.R.S.E. tables and it makes for a busy (if still sane) evening.
You might think that this is about as busy a night as we’re likely to see, but chances are this will be the status quo for the next few days. Tomorrow’s $1,500 NLHE event will bring another 2,800 players to the Rio at high noon, and then the $2,500 Deuce-to-Seven Triple Draw event starts at 5pm. The H.O.R.S.E. event will see some of the best poker players in the world playing down to the final table, no doubt in front of scores of spectators. The Triple Chance and Stud/8 tournaments will also be playing down to their final tables as well. Five tournaments at once, it’s enough to make your head spin.
But in one way tomorrow will act as the high-water mark of the 2009 World Series of Poker. After the Deuce-to-Seven event starts tomorrow evening there will be just one bracelet event left–the $5,000 Six-Handed No-Limit Hold-Em–before the Main Event. There will be fewer tournaments in play day-by-day, not more. We’ll start counting down the last few bracelet ceremonies, the last few national anthems that’ll resound through the Amazon Room.
But it’s not like the World Series is ready to strike the tents–far from it. On Thursday the Ante Up for Africa tournament will be held, with a galaxy of sports, entertainment and poker superstars playing in Annie Duke and Don Cheadle’s annual charity tournament for Darfur. And then, the very next day, the Main Event begins. Seems hard to believe that the Main Event starts in less than a week, but if you don’t believe me just check the calendar. Heck, I checked the calendar, no longer trusting my own sense of judgment. Five weeks at the WSOP will do that to you.
If you’d like to see some of what’s gone on those last five weeks, you can check out our WSOP Photo Gallery, which features a lot of the pictures I’ve taken so far (many of which never made it into the blog). And over the next 17 days I think I’ll be adding many, many, many more pictures to the collection.
Tags: 2009 world series of poker, 2009 world series of poker photos, 2009 world series photos, 2009 wsop, 2009 wsop photos, world series of poker, world series of poker photos, WSOP, wsop photos
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Sunday, June 21, 2009 - Gene Bromberg
The $1,500 No-Limit Hold-Em event was nearing the bubble and I ran over to the Brasilia Room with my camera. I knew that both Adam “Roothlus” Levy and Brandon Cantu were still very much alive in the event–in fact, Adam twittered just a few minutes earlier that he’d won a big pot with pocket Kings against A-K that had probably moved him to the head of the chip counts. And as I double-timed through the hallways I looked up at the flatscreen scoreboard on the wall and saw that he spoke the truth:
Levy #1, Cantu #6. And as I walked into the Brasilia Room during hand-for-hand play it seemed that Brandon wasn’t content with his current standing, as I found him stacking a pot as the dealers stood to indicate their table had completed their hand. “OK Brandon, stop bullying,” a player at the table said, advice Cantu didn’t seem inclined to follow.
I stood off to the side as they finished hand-for-hand play (two players busted at the same time and so split the prize money for 270th place) and found Roothlus staring across the table at a player with all his chips in the middle. Roothlus had chips in there too and I saw that his pocket eights were trailing his opponent’s pocket Jacks. The Jacks held up and within seconds of my arrival he’d lost a decent chunk of his stack. “Now they want to take my picture,” he said as I guiltily pointed my camera his way and snapped off a few shots as the hand came to an unhappy end.
According to PokerNews Adam still has around 110K, still putting him within striking distance of the chip lead, and Cantu I think has far more than the 86,600 PokerNews is giving him credit for (he tweeted an hour ago that he had around 135K as the bubble burst). So Adam took a hit, Brandon took a bunch of pots, and both Team UB players are primved to make a deep run in this event.
Tags: 2009 world series of poker, 2009 wsop, Adam "Roothlus" Levy, adam levy, Brandon Cantu, Poker Poker Poker, ub, ultimatebet, ultimatebet world series of poker, world series of poker, world series of poker photographs, world series of poker photos, world series of poker pics, WSOP
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Friday, June 19, 2009 - Gene Bromberg
So far during the WSOP the really big events–the $10,000 World Championship kinda big–have started at 5pm. That gives the heavy hitters a chance to rest up or, quite often, buy into the the early events and either bust or build a stack before the late tournament starts. Starting at 5pm means you’ll be playing until 3am, in the best-case scenario.
The $10,000 Seven-Card Stud Hi/Lo Eight-or-Better (whew) World Championship started at 5pm, and three of Team UB’s pros are in the field, with each following a different path to the Brasilia Room. Annie Duke skipped the $2,000 No-Limit Hold-Em event that started at noon and made her way to the Rio at her leisure:
Phil Hellmuth did play in the $2K event that started at noon, but he was eliminated early on. But as he recently tweeted he worked out, had something to eat, and drank a Diet Mountain Dew. And returned to the Rio ready to scoop some pots:
Michael Binger also played in the $2K event that started at noon…and as of 9pm, he’s still playing in it. He’s also playing in the $10K Stud/8 event. In fact, just minutes after I took this picture Binger leapt out of his seat and started jogging back to the Amazon Room, as the Hold-Em event was returning from dinner break and he had to get back to his stack. It promises/threatens to be another long day for Michael:
There’s a final table playing down on the ESPN Feature Table, the $5K PLO and aforementioned $2K Hold-Em event playing down in the Amazon Room, and the $10K Stud/8 event with all the superstars going on in the Brasilia Room. And this is pretty much a slow night at the World Series of Poker. This is what they consider slow.
Tags: 2009 world series of poker, 2009 wsop. world series of poker, Annie Duke, Michael Binger, Phil Hellmuth, ub, ultimatebet, world series of poker photos, world series of poker pics, WSOP, wsop photos, wsop pics
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Sunday, December 28, 2008 - Gene Bromberg
We’ve almost reached the end of 2008 and this is usually the time when people look back at the past year and remember all that took place. Trouble is that during the holidays most people spend the better part of a week staggering around in a tryptophan coma or an alcoholic stupor. I don’t know about you guys but I’m worried that I’ll have nothing left in the tank for New Year’s Eve. I’m beat. Every day it seems like I’m wolfing down a huge platter laden with ham, turkey, fish, pirogi, and various forms of potatoes. Everyone is breaking out their best cabernet sauvignons and filling the fridge with beers that don’t have the word “Lite” in their name. It’s like they say, too much of anything is bad–even excess.
So looking back at the past twelve months through this boozy haze ain’t easy. Especially if you’d like to be somewhat accurate. Fortunately I lugged my camera around for most of this year and have a few pictures that serve to jog the memory so I can remember just what the hell happened.
This is what the opening day of the 2008 World Series of Poker felt like for me, everything a blur. And only seven weeks to go!
I was covering a different event in the Brasilia Room as Phil Hellmuth was trying to win bracelet #12 in a $1,500 H.O.R.S.E event. I ran over during a break to see what was going on and was confronted by a mob around the outer feature table. Usually there are only a handful of people around that table, but of course Phil knows how to draw a crowd. I held my camera in the air, squeezed the trigger, and hoped I got something good. This picture was taken at 12:30am, by the way, so lots of people thought the best thing to do in Vegas that night was watch Phil play poker.
Annie Duke and Don Cheadle address the crowd during this year’s Ante Up for Africa tournament. I was off that day but of course I went to the Rio hoping to get some photos of the celebrities attending the event. And so were about a thousand other people. I went to the person guarding the main opening and asked to be admitted, and he looked at me like I was something he’d scraped off his shoe and told me no way. I didn’t have the proper media pass, you see. I headed to the media room to see about getting that pass when the guy in line behind me got my attention and whispered that no one was checking passes at the Brasilia Room’s other doors. I opened the door, went inside, and no one bothered me as I took pics to my hearts delight. It just goes to show that it’s never a good idea to ask permission. Do the deed first, THEN ask for permission. Life is much easier that way.
A few pics from the Ante Up for Africa event:
While I wandered around and took photos a quintet of female masseuses were waiting outside the ropes waiting for the tournament to start. They asked which celebrities I’d seen in the crowd and I said, “Well, Matt Damon is…” and all five crowded around me and started pelting me with questions. “Matt Damon! Where? What table? Point!!” I hate Matt Damon.
Ray Romano I like. Why? I was taking a photo and someone came in from my left and nearly got in the shot. “Oh, I’m sorry,” the person said and paused while I snapped the shutter. “No problem,” I said and made room for him to get past. That’s when I saw the polite gentleman in question was Ray Romano. Who could buy and sell me a thousand times over. So I appreciated that.
Team UB’s Scott Ian, wearing one of those so-cool T-shirts that debuted at the WSOP. “I have to GET ONE OF THOSE SHIRTS,” I told myself as I circled Scott and snapped away.
Phil Hellmuth in his natural habitat–sitting at a table during the WSOP Main Event, with film crews in attendance. If I wasn’t sure where Phil was sitting in the Amazon Room, I just looked around for the boom mikes.
The most surreal part about this year’s World Series was seeing Tiffany Michelle, who I worked with the last two years, make her deep run in the Main Event. When play started I said, “Oh, cool, TIffany’s playing in the Main Event” and went back to work. Then she made it past the first few days and suddenly she had a pretty healthy stack. And then on Day 5 or so she wins some huge pots and we started thinking, “Holy crap, she could actually WIN this thing”. Alas, it wasn’t meant to be, as Tiffany finished 17th, which is still pretty freaking incredible. If you saw ESPN’s coverage you probably saw a bit where Tiffany was eating french fries at the table and catching flack from Scott Montgomery and Craig Marquis about it. Ladies and gentlemen, here is a picture of Tiffany Michelle’s fries:
When she finished the floor staff picked up her tray and put it…on the table I was working at. Which gives you an idea of how I rank out there. Anyway, the fries smelled really good, and I was really hungry, and people kept walking by my table and snagging a quick snack. But I held off, in part because at the time Tiffany still had a ton of chips and there was the very real possibility that she’d make the final table and maybe even be the next World Champion, and I was calculating how much I could sell her leftover fries for on eBay. Then I got my self-esteem back in order and had someone take the tray away.
By the time the field was reduced to ten players and one table my work was done, but of course I wasn’t going anywhere until the November Nine was locked in. I found a perch and took a few shots of the final-table play:
We finished up around 4:30am, had a few cocktails afterwards, and I got home around…noon. Before I left Vegas for good I went back to the Rio to cash in a few chips and see what the place looked like now that the Series had wrapped up. The crews didn’t waste any time breaking down the Amazon Room:
Hmm, this seems long enough already and I only posted pics from the WSOP. I think I’ll pause here before delving into the Aruba Poker Classic and whatever else I have in my folders. Because that’s going to be a marathon by itself.
Tags: 2008 world series of poker, 2008 wsop, amazon room, Annie Duke, blog world series of poker, blog wsop, don cheadle, espn, matt damon, Phil Hellmuth, poker blog, poker photographs, poker photos, poker pictures, Poker Poker Poker, ray romano, Scott Ian, Tiffany "Tiffany M" Michelle, tiffany michelle wsop, world series of poker, world series of poker photos, world series of poker pictures, WSOP
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