An Event Like No Other

It’s WSOP eve. There’s a one-day mega-satellite today, then tomorrow at noon the cards will finally be in the air for Event No. 1, the World Championship Pot Limit Hold ‘em event ($10,000 buy-in). Be sure to follow all the action over at Poker News.

The buzz seems to be that only 200-300 or so will be there for that first one, although the numbers could get bumped up a bit since this is one of the few events outside of the Main Event that ESPN has said they plan to televise. (See the full ESPN schedule here.)

I’d certainly expect a lot of big name pros to show up for it, including the “Greatest Texas Hold ‘em Player on the Planet,” Phil Hellmuth. (Who else thinks “self-proclaimed King of Pop” when hearing or reading that?) Which could be interesting given that Ultimate Bet may in fact be releasing today that report on the cheating “scheme” that occurred on the site last year. (So says the Poker King, anyhow.)

I remember last summer writing a post titled “Pins and Needles” just before the WSOP kicked off. At that time, in addition to being eager to see the Series get started, we were also all wondering about that so-called “deadline” for the feds to present their regulations for the UIGEA. (The “270 days” after Bush signed the bill were up near the conclusion of last year’s series.) Here we are a year later, and we still haven’t seen those regulations finalized. One wonders if that’ll continue to be the case a year from now.

Lots else occupying me at the moment, though. I believe we’ll be getting our schedules for the first couple of weeks today, so I’ll be finding what events I’ll be covering. Am definitely growing increasingly excited anticipating the show finally getting underway. Talk about pins and needles . . . .

Find myself running through various analogies in my head, not really knowing if any of them are valid, as I cannot avoid trying to imagine what the whole thing will be like.

A busy restaurant, with every table filled.

A movie set, packed with actors and crew.

A circus, with multiple stages and performances ongoing.

None of those. All of those.

I’ll let you know.