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In the $2,500 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Mixed Event – featuring levels that alternate between Limit Hold’em and No Limit Hold’em – nine players came back on Saturday afternoon to determine a champion. Jarred Solomon held a slim lead over Full Tilt Poker’s Gavin Smith when play began, with WSOP Circuit terror Dwyte Pilgrim sitting on the short stack. Starting with Limit Hold’em, the players wasted little time in getting down to business.

1. Gavin Smith (Las Vegas, NV) – $268,238
2. Danny Hannawa (Farmington Hills, MI) – $166,050
3. Timothy Finne (Fanwood, NJ) – $110,324
4. Michael Michnik (Hollywood, FL) – $81,871
5. Jamie Rosen (Las Vegas, NV) – $61,441
6. Jarred Solomon (Johannesburg, South Africa) – $46,562
7. Daniel Idema (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada) – $35,601
8. Dwyte Pilgrim (Brooklyn, NY) – $27,438
9. Mike Santoro (Egg Harbor, NJ) – $21,304

:dirol

The race between New Jersey and California to be the first to allow online gambling (including poker) in their respective states seems to be shaping up as a twist on a classic metaphor.

(Online poker advocates have been watching both states closely, and have speculated that the first state to pass online poker could become a hub for poker Web sites in the U.S.)

Anna Chapman, the woman dubbed "femme fatale" as part of an alleged spy ring, once wanted to start her own online poker room according to reports that surfaced on Wednesday. The striking redhead and self-styled entrepreneur also dabbled in real estate and mused on her Facebook page, "if you can dream, you can become it."

Prosecutors have charged Chapman and 10 other suspects with following orders by Russian intelligence to become "Americanized" enough to infiltrate "policymaking circles" and feed information back to Moscow.

:dirol

Was about time 😁
I watched last Poker Lounge FT...he game 3rd there, after very good start...
Congrats to him any way 😄

The bill, known as SB1485, is slated to authorize the State of California to contract with gambling operators, so that the gambling operators can legally offer online gambling to California residents age 21 and older. According to the bill, California would stand to gain at least 10% of the monthly profits taken in from legal online gambling.

Several tribal groups in California oppose the bill stating that it threatens the business of their federally authorized casinos. The California Nations Indian Gaming Association wrote a letter to Senator Wright expressing opposition to the bill for fear that legalization of online gambling in California would jeopardize jobs in communities where tribes are the largest employers.

Part of the regulation included in the bill is a clause which makes it a misdemeanor to visit unauthorized gambling websites in California. The nonprofit interest group, Poker Players’ Alliance expressed its formal opposing opinion of the bill stating, “Criminalizing harmless recreational conduct that typically takes place in the privacy of one’s home and cannot be practically enforced undermines public respect for all laws.”

Senator Wright agrees that the bill needs to be revised to consider the opposing arguments of the bill, but says that he will continue to push for the legalization of online gambling in California. “The world isn’t standing still while we figure out what to do,” he said recently. “The longer we wait, the more difficult it will become to get that business back to the state as different outlets of gambling become available and more entrenched.”

When the bill is re-introduced into consideration and should the bill be passed into law, California would become the first state in the US to legalize and regulate online gambling.

:dirol

He was #13 in the voting for a seat at this year's WSOP Tournament of Champions, but numerology doesn't mean a thing to Huck Seed, who took the top spot and $500,000 in the biggest freeroll event live poker has seen. Seed made a name for himself in the late 90s and early 2000s with his 1996 WSOP Main Event victory and three other WSOP victories, but this victory assures that the former Caltech basketball star is going to be the talk of the town for some time to come.

No one really expected Seed to make a run for the title: the end of the first day of play saw Mike Matusow in the lead while superstar Daniel Negreanu had the biggest stack at the end of the third day, but some smart play on Seed's part saw him taking half of the $1,000,000 prize pool after a grueling 16-hour marathon on the third day.

"I’m not much of a self-promoter," Seed said about his approach to tournament games. "I just love to play poker. Sometimes, when you love to do something it shows and it produces results."

The runner up was Howard Lederer, a two-time bracelet winner who walked away with $250,000. About the loss, Lederer said "I'm thrilled with the way I played, but I’m very disappointed I did not win. Huck is underrated in terms of poker history. He's playing as well as anyone in the world right now, that’s not named 'Ivey.'"

Others who cashed in the Tournament of Champions included Johnny Chan (3rd for $100,000), Joe Hachem (4th for $25,000), Barry Greenstein (5th for $25,000), Daniel Negreanu (6th for $25,000), Jennifer Harman (7th for $25,000), Annie Duke (8th for $25,000), and T.J. Cloutier (9th for $25,000).

While all the pros are in Vegas, now's a great time for you to play online poker at Bodog Poker

A group of 1,125 card players flocked to Las Vegas for the start of the World Series of Poker main event Monday, each gambling $10,000 on hopes of winning millions at the game's richest no-limit Texas Hold 'em tournament.

The field size beat last year's opening day by nine entrants. That tournament attracted 6,494 players, creating a prize pool of more than $61 million and a top prize of $8.55 million for winner Joe Cada.

Officials for poker's most prestigious event hoped a July 5 start would boost the number of entries, as previous tournaments have included sessions during the Fourth of July holiday. This year's tournament has three more starting days, Tuesday through Thursday.

Greg Raymer, the tournament's winner in 2004, delivered the famous "shuffle up and deal" order as Monday's session began, then was promptly eliminated during the first level of play.

Raymer lost the bulk of his chip stack within the first 10 hands, when he gambled on hitting a flush but missed and lost to three 10s. The loss left him with fewer than 2,000 chips from a starting stack of 30,000.

"Decided to play it aggressively — I was actually pretty sure the guy had two aces," Raymer said. "I thought he'd fold because now it looks so much like I flopped a set, but he actually had the set."

Raymer would have still been behind had his read been correct, but he would have been favored to win because of the possible hands he could draw.

"Since he actually had (three of a kind) I didn't expect him to fold," Raymer said.

Raymer lost the rest of his chips later when his pocket eights couldn't beat an opponent's pocket aces.

"When I got short-stacked, I knew I was going to have a hard time getting people to fold," Raymer said.

Stuart Nitzkin of Northfield, Ill., was the first player eliminated roughly 35 minutes into play, abnormally long for the tournament because of its size. Nitzkin left without speaking to reporters.

Nader Taiym, a 41-year-old liquor store owner from Chicago, said he ended up with most of Nitzkin's stack after two hands because he made a full house then a straight. The opponent lost first with pocket aces, then with pocket kings.

"I was expecting to fold most hands," Taiym said.

Players who make it through the tournament will have to avoid cruel moments that cost them all their chips. Chips don't have monetary value, but a player loses the tournament once his or her stack is gone.

Minimum bets go up every two hours. Players on Monday planned to play nine hours of poker with no breaks.

Mike "The Mouth" Matusow, a three-time gold bracelet winner and fixture on television poker coverage, told his opponents the best strategy early in the tournament is to play conservative.

"I think your best bet to make it to Day 2 is not show up to Day 1," he said.

Despite a federal law banning financial transactions connected to online gambling, millions of people, many in the United States, have figured out ways to bet money on the Internet.

:dirol