Checking in on Cherokee

The latest World Series of Poker Circuit stop over at Harrah’s Cherokee in the western corner of the state just completed its 12-event run yesterday. Found it interesting to see that Daniel Weinman, the Atlanta-based player who took second in the very first WSOP-C at Cherokee (which I helped cover), managed to win the Main Event this time around.

Weinman topped a 1,010-entry field to win the ring and a $280,260 first prize. Back in April 2013 there were 856 entries in the event when Weinman finished runner-up. In April 2014 there were 665 entries in the Main, in December 2014 there were 797, then in April 2015 there were 786, meaning this latest field was the biggest Main Event field so far in the five instances the WSOP-C has come to North Carolina.

I remember Weinman well from two years ago thanks to a funny story involving him and Greg Raymer at that year’s Main Event. I shared that one here in a post titled “Giving Away Chips, Rocks.”

After the 2004 WSOP Main Event champion -- who incidentally lives in Raleigh -- was knocked out in 29th by Weinman, “Fossilman” followed his custom and gave his vanquisher the signed fossil he’d been using as a card protector. After Raymer departed, Weinman said to a friend on the rail “This dude just gave me a rock,” then gave the memento to my buddy Rich with whom I was reporting on the event.

I seem to remember later on Weinman asking Rich for it back over Twitter. In any case it was a funny moment amid what I recall a very entertaining tournament and final table, made so in part because of Weinman’s deep run.

I had actually been eyeing this WSOP-C stop earlier this year, thinking maybe this would be one for which I’d be making the drive up into the mountains myself to take a shot in a prelim. But the Brazil trip ran into the first part of the series and I knew I wouldn’t be up to it after getting back.

The good news is Cherokee has proven popular enough for the WSOP-C to keep putting it on the schedule twice per year, and indeed there’s a return engagement scheduled next April. Something to file away.

Travel Report: 2012-13 WSOP-C Harrah’s Cherokee Main Event, Day 3 -- Expectations

With about 20 players left in the 2012-13 World Series of Poker Circuit Main Event at Harrah’s Cherokee, my blogging partner Rich and I took a look at the remaining field. Quickly we decided upon three of the players as kind of standing out from the others, and agreed that the eventual winner would likely be one of the trio.

The three we chose were all younger (early-to-mid 20s) and had already shown enough competence and skill to distinguish themselves. And having covered so many tourneys between us over the years, we felt we had a decent feel for how this suckers usually go.

When writing about the WSOP-C Foxwoods trip a week ago, I’d mentioned how the eventual winner Kevin “BeL0WaB0Ve” Saul had already stood out well before the final table as the player to beat, and as it happened he’d go on to win. Had kind of a similar feeling this time about the ones we had picked.

As it happened, we were wrong with our guesses. Expectations thwarted, you might say. Kind of like when Rich and I were at Paula Deen's Kitchen a couple of nights before, and Rich found out the vegetable of the day was brussel sprouts.

The field at Cherokee this week likely included a number of first-time tourney players, or at least folks for whom the $1,675 buy-in event represented something special to them after years of home games and (much) lower buy-in tourneys. Such is one of the fun elements of the WSOP-C, namely, the way even the Main Event can bring in players who don’t necessarily participate in the other, higher profile tours or go to the WSOP in Las Vegas.

And I suppose, such is also the cause for the occasional surprise, too, when it comes to the way WSOP-C events sometimes play out.

As it would happen, none of the three we’d pegged would win, although one -- Daniel Weinman -- did finish runner-up. Speaking of Weinman and that Fossilman story from yesterday, Rich told me Weinman tweeted to him today “I forgot to get my rock back,” and it sounds like Rich will be returning it to him at another WSOP-C event stop.

Rather it was John Bowman, a 30-year-old amateur from nearby Hickory, North Carolina who won. Apparently (so we heard afterwards) he’d only played in his first tournament a few days before.

I liked Weinman, but I was still glad for Bowman and his excited buddies afterwards, despite the fact that Bowman sported a Duke shirt. Rich took some winner’s photos, and had me laughing pretty hard when he got everyone to deliver a boisterous “HELL YEAH!” for the camera.

But it was 69-year-old Raymond Weaver that had us raising our eyebrows time after time yesterday. Neither of us had thought he’d have much of a shot on Day 3. But he not only made the final table, he had an especially active first couple of levels that saw him chip up to more than 6 million at a time when no one else had even half that.

Weaver still had a big lead when three-handed began, but soon lost a hand to Bowman in which the latter doubled through Weaver, then quickly slid down before losing the last of his chips to Bowman to land in third.

Weaver definitely exhibited a lot of the familiar signs of older, amateur players, limping and calling a lot and occasionally going into super-tight mode at times when he might’ve been better off remaining aggressive.

But unlike Rick Hensley on Day 2 -- the player who managed to go from first with 201 left to elimination before they’d even gotten down to 150 or so -- Weaver had some good instincts and played relatively well. And his making the final table wasn’t such a fluke, we’d discover, as he already made one other WSOP Circuit Main Event final table last year (at Tunica).

So Bowman and Weaver surprised us, and all in all it was an interesting and entertaining final table to follow and report on, even if we were more than a little distracted by the news from the Boston Marathon from early in the afternoon. Talk about upsetting expectations. Reminded me of covering the Sands Bethlehem tourney back in December on the day of the Newtown shootings. Indeed, much of what I wrote on that day applies again here. Again it felt odd to be locked in that poker tourney cocoon while such terrible things were happening outside of it.

The tourney ended just in time for Rich and I to make it to the Ruth Chris in the casino before they shut their doors, and after rewarding ourselves with late night filets we finally got a decent night’s sleep before I carried him to the Asheville airport this morning. Had a fun visit with PokerGrump and Cardgrrl afterwards, both of whom now live in Asheville, then motored back home.

Am pretty spent after the last spell of traveling and working, but it looks like I’ll get to stay put for a while, perhaps even until June when I’ll head back out to Las Vegas for the WSOP. Was glad to have been there at Cherokee for this event, and from the looks of things the WSOP-C will most certainly be returning after what turned out to be a successful series that exceeded everyone’s expectations.

Travel Report: 2012-13 WSOP-C Harrah’s Cherokee Main Event, Day 2 -- Giving Away Chips, Rocks

Just one day remains in the World Series of Poker Circuit Main Event at Harrah’s Cherokee. After a couple of relatively reasonable noon-to-midnight days for the first two Day 1 flights, we had our marathon session yesterday in order to ensure a reasonable final day today.

There were a total of 856 entrants, from which 201 players made it to Sunday’s Day 2. They managed to play all of the way down to just 11 players yesterday, pushing through 10 one-hour levels then two more 75-minute levels to get there.

Was a long grind, with play starting at noon and not concluding until a quarter to three. Rich and I got there an hour early and left about an hour after play concluded, and there was only a half-hour dinner break in there, too. So we basically stuck close there in the Event Center, eating hot dogs, sandwiches and other snacks at our desk to sustain ourselves throughout the day.

Poker-wise, the quick exit of start-of-day 2 chip leader Rick Hensley was easily the most out-of-the-ordinary aspect of the day. Hensley began Day 2 with more than 400,000 at a time when the average stack was around 85,000. He’d knock out an opponent on the second hand of the day to push up even further to about 460,000, then he somehow managed to lose all of those chips before we even made it to the first break of the day (after two hours).

Hensley’s rise the night before had come almost as quickly, as he’d gone from about 120,000 to 401,400 pretty much during the final hour of play. But he’d gotten those chips by gambling big and hitting several hands in rapid succession, and the same strategy -- which included lots of limp-calling and check-calling, no matter how big the bets -- would fail him to start Day 2.

I came upon one hand in which he’d lost close to half of his stack to an opponent who held pocket aces, eventually learning that he’d called an all-in shove on a 2-3-4 flop holding but 7-6. When he finally busted, he sort of jovially said “Hensley’s out!” before leaving, reporting his own exit before we could. Sort of seemed a little like someone sitting down at a blackjack table, determined to play until he ran out of money, no matter what.

Just one woman made the money -- Claudia Crawford (who finished 36th). Greg Raymer cashed as well, getting knocked out in 29th by Daniel Weinman, one of those who has made it to today and who looks capable of winning the event. As is his custom, Raymer signed and dated the fossil he had been using as a card protector, then gave it to Weinman before leaving. But Weinman didn’t seem overly fazed by the gesture.

“This dude just gave me a rock,” he told a friend on the rail after. He then gave it to Rich.

With 11 left, some of the shorter stacks aren’t too much ahead of what Hensley had at the beginning of play yesterday with 201 left. Unsurprisingly given the makeup of the field, there are a few older players who’ll be making the final table, although again the younger guys who are left -- especially the big chip leader, Hugh Henderson of South Carolina -- have to be the favorites to have the best shot of winning the $250K-plus first prize today.

The ESPN guys have arrived, including Bernard Lee, and so they’ll be live streaming the final table with commentary over on the WSOP site and perhaps ESPN3 (if you can access it). I know the poker world is mostly attuned to Melbourne this morning -- or this evening, in Australia -- as Daniel Negreanu leads the WSOP APAC Main Event final table and appears on the verge of winning. But when that wraps up in a few hours, click on over to PokerNews and/or check out that live stream if you’re curious to see how things play out at Cherokee.