Well, I say “just like that” and imagine snapping fingers but getting here actually consisted of a 8.5 hour flight from London to Detroit, a semi-mad dash through the airport to barely make out connecting flight after TSA fail saw one overzealous person working in customs and about 16,982 disgruntled people standing in line, then a 5 hour flight from Detroit to Vegas.

We ended up sitting behind Michael Mizrachi’s wife (Donny Mizrachi was on the flight as well) who was stuck in her own travel hell trying to get to the Bellagio in time to see the conclusion of the WPT Championship event — go Marvin! — and was relatively well-behaved, only emitting one massively loud “GOOOOOOOOOO GRINDER!!!” shriek upon landing when she checked her phone and saw he’d tripled up.

And if you ever wondered if Grinder’s wife and family members refer to him as “Grinder” in everyday casual conversation, yes, yes they most definitely do.

Collected our bags and a quick cab ride later and boom, we’re installed in our swank room at the Gold Coast with the following stunning view:

In previous years when out here for the WSOP I stayed on the company dime at the Wynn, Palazzo, and Bellagio, so, umm, yeah, a bit of a step down here at the Gold Coast but hey, we all have to make sacrifices.

But enough about us. WSOP! Today!

It’s a bit of a soft launch as the kickoff event for the 2012 WSOP schedule is the $500 Casino Employees tournament but tomorrow will see the 2012 WSOP get underway in all its epic glory with Event #2, a $1,500 NLHE tournament that will likely draw a very large field.

We’ll be moseying over to Starbucks in a few hours to get set up and chug down that very first venti, which reminds us, as we have a brand new person to thank for buying us a venti!

Poker Radio.tv

So be sure to check out all the poker awesomeness at Poker Radio.tv and check back here later, as we’ll be up and running at Starbucks knocking a bit of the rust off as the 2012 WSOP finally gets underway!

We’re still noodling around with our hand-crafted database of results from 930 WSOP open bracelet events from 1970-2011, with a few longer-term projects in mind but it’s also fun to poke around and pull up some assorted randomness.

As far as the headline stats, we’ve already talked about the $1.4 billion in total prize money awarded, but a few of the other big headline stats are kind of cool as well.

That money was generated by 493,344 total entries across all events we have results for, which equates to the entire country of Luxembourg hitting up the WSOP.

The winners of those events scooped up a hefty $320 million, which is a little more than the GDP of the country of São Tomé and Príncipe and a little less than Tonga’s GDP.

225 players have more than $1 million in lifetime WSOP earnings, with just 31 of those being a WSOP millionaire on the back of winning a single event.

Doyle casts a very long shadow over the entire history of the WSOP

As far as getting max value from your single bracelet win, Jamie Gold is hard to top with $12 million for his one and only bracelet in the 2006 Main Event. On the flip side of the coin is Starla Brodie, who was Doyle Brunson’s partner in the 1979 Mixed Doubles event, winning $4,500 for her one and only WSOP victory.

If you look at average prize money per bracelet for those with 5 or more bracelets, it’s actually Scotty Nguyen that has maxed out the value of his five bracelets won, winning $706,426 per bracelet; Hellmuth has far more bracelets with 11 but only averaged $344,302 per bracelet, with his total bracelet victories worth $3.78 million versus Nguyen’s $3.53 million.

On the other end of that spectrum is Gary “Bones” Berland, who won five bracelets from 1977-1979 but only earned a total of $87,000 from those victories, for an average of $17,400 per bracelet win.

We’ve enjoyed digging a little deeper into WSOP history and stats here while researching articles, to the point that we find ourselves thinking oddball things during the day while waiting for the bus, walking home from grocery shopping, and while typing up more hate mail for Zynga about how INCREDIBLY BUGGY AND FULL OF CRAP DREAM ZOO is, including thoughts such as:

• I wonder how much total prizemoney has been handed out at the WSOP since 1970?
• Why in the world does my wonderful wife continue to put up with me?
• Would sending a box of elephant dung to Zynga headquarters get their attention in regards to Dream Zoo bugs?

We decided to tackle the first item off that list and got to work compiling results from the WSOP, starting in 1970. And we got to 1992 before we said “Good lord, this is a lot of work and will take forever.”

So we posted a job on oDesk and got close to 500 applications in the first hour it was up. If you ever want any clear evidence that the US is doomed due to our pervasive laziness and sense of entitlement, post a data entry job on oDesk and be amazed at how many people with multiple advanced degrees from all sorts of the world will fall over themselves to snap-apply for a data entry job paying them $2/hour.

Thanks to stellar work from my man Prasad, we’ve now got a database of 930 WSOP bracelet events from 1970-2011 to play around with and massage some interesting tidbits from.

Not everything is included as early results are a little hit and miss as far as what’s available via the official WSOP site and Hendon Mob, but what we’ve got is pretty solid, especially from 1980 to the present, and it’s likely 95% accurate and has all the biggish results.

So what’s the damn answer, as far as total prize money awarded at the WSOP from 1970-2011?

$1,415,693,759

$1.4 billion is a lot of cabbage, indeed, and a bit more than I would have guessed, as far as an off-the-cuff swipe at an answer. I probably would have said around $1 billion, just working from a general knowledge that the Main Event alone in recent years has doled out $60-$70 million each year.

As far as things you could buy with around $1.4 billion, here goes:

One B2 Stealth Bomber

6.25 Albert Pujolses

37,037,037 dinner buffets at the Rio

The 2012 WSOP will pretty much smash the record for prize money awarded in a single year that was set in 2011 ($191,999,010), as the new $1 million buy-in One Drop event will kick in a very hefty additional sum of $43 million or so if it caps out, so the 2012 WSOP will be well over the $200 million mark.

Not many people would have predicted Ben Lamb to run roughshod over the field at the 2011 WSOP or that Frank Kassela would take down the 2010 WSOP Player of the Year title.

To be fair, “nowhere” and “dark horse” are pretty subjective terms, as Lamb and Kassela and many other shooting stars at the WSOP were definitely known entities and had been around the poker block; we’re defining “nowhere” and “dark horse” here in a loose sense as someone most poker fans don’t know who and who haven’t yet had big runs on the big stage at the WSOP.

In that unscientific vein, here’s our ten picks for the 2012 WSOP as far as dark horses that have a great shot make some noise this year at the Rio, in no particular order. One big caveat: all of these aren’t confirmed as far as whether they’ll be in Vegas, how many events they’ll play, and so on — our powers of divination are limited.

Better known as “Isildur1″ for his nosebleed stakes online tussles with the world’s top players, Blom has also been popping up more on the live tournament scene of late. And with some success, as he took down the $100K PCA Super High Roller event and had smaller scores at various EPT stops.

He also won two SCOOP events recently and seems to be in good form heading into the WSOP. The only question mark is just how many events he’ll play at the WSOP, as so far he’s only committed to playing the Main.

Rettenmaier has been one of the sick grinders of the European live circuit the last few years, piling up a ton of frequent flyer miles and close to $2 million in lifetime earning in the two years he’s been actively hitting up the tables.

He’s pretty much a NLHE specialist so that might limit his upside at the WSOP but he also recently signed with PartyPoker as a sponsored pro, so he’ll have a little extra motivation to shine and he’s currently one of the chip leaders heading into Day 5 of the WPT Championship, so a big score there could add a nitro boost to his 2012 WSOP.

We have no clue if Bjerkmann even has plans to it up the WSOP but he’s popping up on other similar lists as this and for good reason, as he’s got over $2 million in cashes live and online.

Having watched him personally during much of the late stages of the last WPT Venice event, he also has that good ol’ Scandi edge to him that leads to fearless and crazy play at times — including a propensity for wandering around in slippers and getting day-long massages.

Gimbel won the 2010 PCA at the ripe young age of 19 and has over $3 million in life earnings, as well as winning everything in sight online as well.

He falls squarely in the “Thank Jebus I’m finally 21 and can play in the WSOP, let’s tear this mutha up!” category, with the 2012 WSOP his first crack at the big show. That can cut both ways, as it’s easy to burn out pretty quickly during your first trip to the rodeo but he’s definitely one to watch and will likely play a ton of events.

Nitsche is another youngster who’s finally old enough to swing for the WSOP fences, but he’s definitely been there and done that when it comes to the live poker circuit.

One of the few players to outduel Rettenmaier when it comes to frequent flyer miles, Nitsche has nearly $1.3 million in live earnings and has Hendon Mob flags for cashes in 17 countries, with a chance for a US flag now that he’s finally 21.

Eames has piled up $1.5 million in live cashes but hasn’t done much on US soil, with just $75,000 in WSOP cashes since 2010.

So far 2012 has been a struggle for him but he’s too good a player to keep coming up empty, with the 2012 WSOP possibly his year to finally put together some deep runs.

Wheeler did have a runner-up finish at the 2009 WSOP for a $418,000 score but hasn’t made much noise at the Rio since then. He has, though, been piling up nice cashes on the European circuit since Black Friday and has a knack for putting himself in great shape in the late stages with chips time and time again.

No clue what his plans for the 2012 WSOP are but he could definitely be a force if he makes a run at a lot of events.

Debus may be a bit of a reach here but all he does is win, both online and live, and doesn’t give much away whenever he takes a seat. He’s got FTOPS and WCOOP titles to his credit and close to $600K in live tournament winnings over a fairly limited schedule.

Vedes had a deep run in the 2009 Main Event and a ton of success on the WPT tour (including a win in April at the WPT Seminole Hard Rock Showdown), so calling him a dark horse is a very big stretch.

He’s still chasing that first WSOP bracelet, though, and has never really had a breakthrough performance at the WSOP like he has on the WPT tour. He plays all the games (and plays them well) so unlike a lot of the NLHE specialists listed above he could potentially play a ton of events at the 2012 WSOP.

We’ll toss Gobboboy a bone here, largely because he’s planning on playing a ton of events and he’s another one with plenty of scores over the years — just not any big ones at the WSOP.

He also skews towards the mixed games/Omaha side of the spectrum, so like Vedes he’s a little more well-rounded than some of the other players listed here.

The game has gotten a lot more interesting over the last year with Black Friday and the US government’s crane kick to the face of Full Tilt and PokerStars in April 2011.

Not only did those two sites send a crapload of online qualifiers to the WSOP each year but more importantly they were a vital part in the whole fish > shark > Howard Lederer’s secret Panamanian bank account ecosystem that kept the poker world humming along.

Pretty much everyone expected a dismal turnout for the 2011 WSOP, what with hundreds of millions of dollars in bankrolls tied up at Full Tilt and inaccessible and much more limited ways for players in the US and the world as a whole to do the Moneymaker thing and ship an online satty to play their way to the WSOP.

But a very curious thing happened on the way to the Rio. Attendance wasn’t disappointing at all. Strictly by the numbers, it was actually very good, with a record amount of prize money awarded ($191,999,010) and a record 75,672 entries across the 58 events that were held.

Some doom and gloomers tried to stick to their pessimistic guns, saying “Well, prelim events are pulling good fields but it’s a last gasp attempt at glory, and numbers for the Main will be way down as no one will be able to scrape up the $10K entry” but that didn’t pan out either, as the Main Event drew a very healthy 6,865 entries, making it the third largest field for the Main ever.

So what does all of that mean for the 2012 WSOP? Will we see another big turnout or will the effect of Black Friday be a delayed one, with the effects really felt a year later after a lot of the excess cash in the poker world has been wrung out by a long, dry year with Full Tilt still unable to refund a single solitary dime of player funds held hostage?

Our prediction? About the same as 2011, maybe a little down.

If you look at the turnout for the EPT and WPT (as well as some of the smaller series in Europe such as the UKIPT, GSOP, GUKPT, and Genting events) it’s hard to find much evidence that that the poker world is suffering at the moment or that money is cycling out and not being replaced.

EPT turnout mostly held steady as and while the WPT had some stinkers (cough, WPT Venice, cough) across the board there hasn’t been a huge decline in attendance for events that you can compare apples-to-apples from year to year.

If you are a venti half-empty sort of person, the poor turnout for the $25K WPT Championship that’s currently playing out at the Bellagio could be reason for pause, as 2012 attendance was just 152 players, way off the 2011 mark of 220 runners.

That’s a little worrying, especially if you look at the trend for attendance in WPT events in 2012 and compare events that generally line up as far as location, buy-in, and calendar date:

2011 WPT Venice: 523 entries
2012 WPT Venice: 155 entries

2011 LA Poker Classic: 681 entries
2012 LA Poker Classic: 549 entries

2011 WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star: 415 entries
2012 WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star: 364 entries

2011 WPT Vienna: 555 entries
2012 WPT Vienna: 396 entries

2011 Seminole Hard Rock Showdown: 433 entries
2012 Seminole Hard Rock Showdown: 290 entries

2011 WPT Championship: 220 entries
2012 WPT Championship: 152 entries

That’s fairly dismal (although terrible weather and another WPT event held just a few months earlier in Venice explain away a little of the terrible turnout for the 2012 WPT Venice event) and would likely be a harbinger of lower WSOP turnouts, if viewed in a complete vacuum.

But if you look at the EPT and compare like to like events, the picture isn’t so gloomy:

2011 PCA: 1560 entries
2012 PCA: 1072 entries

2011 EPT Deauville: 891 entries
2012 EPT Deauville: 890 entries

2011 EPT Copenhagen: 449 entries
2012 EPT Copenhagen: 449 entries

2011 EPT Berlin: 773 entries
2012 EPT Berlin: 745 entries

2011 EPT Grand Final Madrid: 686 entries
2012 EPT Grand Final Monte Carlo: 665 entries

The PCA numbers were way off in 2012 for the EPT but that’s only to be expected when you hack off the player pool from the US as Black Friday did, since a disproportionate number of online qualifiers in 2011 and prior years for that event came from the US when compared to the normal mix at all other EPT stops.

Throw in pretty healthy turnouts for HPT and WSOP Circuit events in the US in 2012 and good showings for the smaller European tours and it’s difficult to make any case that attendance for the 2012 WSOP will be down dramatically.

One potential wildcard in the equation — and we hate ourselves for even mentioning it and playing the what if game — is the persistent rumor floating around that PokerStars is in advanced talks with the Department of Justice to buy Full Tilt.

IF (and it’s a huge speculative IF) that does happen and IF it happens very soon (another huge IF) and PokerStars quickly refunds players owed money by Full Tilt as quickly as they refunded their own US players when Black Friday occured (which isn’t speculative at all and would absolutely happen if a deal is worked out), then we could see big turnout increases across the board at the 2012 WSOP.

Many players have at this stage mentally written off the cash stuck in their Full Tilt accounts, so if PokerStars can bang out a deal to buy Full Tilt and that cash is suddenly dumped into players’ bank accounts, well, you better believe a lot of them would either jump on a plane to Vegas or, if already there, take a crack at a ton more events than they otherwise would.

Before you get too excited that’s an EXTREME long shot to be banking on, akin to binking your one or two outer on the river. The powers-that-be at PokerStars have to realize what huge goodwill they’d generate by not just getting a deal done to buy Full Tilt but to also get it down right before the 2012 WSOP, so if they’re negotiating a deal at all they’d absolutely try to get it done by now.

That they haven’t is likely signs that either a deal isn’t in the works at all or that the negotiations are complicated and involved enough that nothing will get done in time to have an impact on the 2012 WSOP turnout.

If you’re pulling for poker in general, then it’s time to cross your fingers and hope that 2012 turns out to be another good year for the World Series of Poker, as the case for legalization in the US of online poker would likely be helped by strong field.

And besides, really, where’s the fun in rooting against the greatest poker show on Earth just to be able to say “Yep, I told you it was going to suck this year”?

Some players are already in Vegas for the $25,000 WPT Championship at the Bellagio, while the crazy SCOOP action has others still grinding online at home before jetting off for the Land of the Free Land of the Place Where We’ll Let You Play Slots All Day Long in a Casino or Bet on Horses or Spend Your Pension Money on Lotto Tickets But Tell You That You Can’t Play Online Poker.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s hard to make any sort of argument that poker is a noble calling or a grand old game that deserves better treatment; if anything it’s the complete opposite, as far too often the more unsavory side of poker is plastered over in an attempt to land more sponsors/generate more rake/get more players to sign up through your affiliate links.

Pauly had a good long run at the WSOP showing you a peek of the soft white underbelly of the poker world via his yearly WSOP blog and his book Lost Vegas and Jesse May definitely doesn’t pull any punches, but it’s hard to find a lot of honest talk anywhere online when it comes to some of the realities of poker, whether online or on the live circuit.

Let me be clear about one thing: THAT IS NOT MY INTENTION AT THE 2012 WSOP! Hear that, powers that be? I love you guys and love the WSOP I’m 100% on board with respecting and abiding by any and all rules. 100%. Lock it up.

But with all signs pointing to me likely easing out of the world of poker as far as a media member, well, there are a few things that I think would be fun to get off my chest. Ten of them, in the ever-so-popular “Top Ten” format.

I’m just guesstimating here but probably 25-50% of the time when you look up “official” results for poker tournaments they don’t reflect how much cash players really walked away with.

All sorts of deals have been cut, even as early as 1972 at the Main Event when Doyle and Puggy basically gifted Amarillo Slim the Main Event title on paper so he could run the publicity angle and they would walk away with more cash.

Most final table deals boil down to money, as far as remaining players agreeing to chop up the prize money in various ways depending on their stack size, skill level, negotiation skills, and tax situation at home as far as how gambling wins are treated.

Deals at the WSOP can be different due to the prestige of winning a bracelet, with some players putting a big premium on that and willing to accept less money if on paper they’re a WSOP bracelet winner.

The EPT is the only big tour that officially condones deal-making and lets players do it openly and reflects that in the results. The WPT lets deals happen but doesn’t officially condone it as far as showing it in results. The WSOP is alone in taking a hard stance on deals, not allowing any open discussion at the table and basically pretending that deals don’t exist and never happen.

The EPT and WPT stance is more realistic, as no matter how much the WSOP hates that deals happen there’s no way to police it or prevent it, as remaining players can always take a stroll on a break and discuss a deal and settle up on their own later.

Deals in and of themselves aren’t bad for poker but organizers and tourney officials worry that the general public would equate deals with cheating and collusion, when in reality they’re just a way for players to smooth out variance in the longer run.

Sorry but no. If you’ve played a lot of online poker at mid to high stakes, you’ve been a victim of cheating and collusion at some point.

If you dangle a big enough carrot (especially a big juicy money carrot) some smart and savvy people will find an edge to grab that carrot. For some players that’s improving their poker game while for others it means outright cheating and/or collusion.

Every online site has some form of cheating or collusion occurring every single day, whether it’s multi-accounting, ghosting, groups or teams collaborating via Skype or IM, or many other variants of cheating. It happens. Every damn day.

What’s ironic is that when most people freak out about cheating at online poker they’re most worried about UB-type scandals where super-users can see hole cards of opponents. Like many people instinctively fear snakes or heights, poker players seem obsessed with the fear or belief that someone can see their hole cards and is acting accordingly.

The irony is that’s the one form of cheating at online poker that is extremely rare and which almost never happens.

Some sites like PokerStars do a good job of detecting collusion and cheating but a small amount still slips through, as we’ve seen in recent years when players unearth ridiculous stats in DoN Sit n Gos and similar formats that could never be achieved in a level game.

The same is true for bots. If you’ve played a lot of poker — especially at micro-stakes — you’ve likely played with a bot. The best bots that are used by smart people who know how to cover their tracks are indistinguishable from a real player so there’s no way to every truly prevent them from taking a seat at the table.

The good news is that the fear of bots is overblown as well, as the best they can currently manage is breakeven/slightly negative play as far as their results, with the real profit to their operators coming from rakeback.

If the idea of playing with breakeven rakeback pros terrifies you, well, maybe its time to take off the tinfoil hat and read a few books or sign up at a training site.

Here’s one of the few of these I actually hesitate to write but I can’t resist; many people who work for online sites don’t play poker, don’t enjoy poker, and are pretty miserable with their job but like the fairly large salary attached to it.

I can’t even begin to count the number of times poker players or poker fans have said something along the lines of “Man, I would love to work for (insert name of big famous online poker site), that’d be my dream job”.

Here’s the problem. With the exception of PokerStars, many of the big online sites would completely go under within a year if they’re weren’t operating in such an insanely profitable business that they can still make money despite incompetence at nearly every level.

Excluding PokerStars, most online sites take pride in the fact that they don’t hire poker people; they do take pride in hiring people with shiny resumes and a long history of working for big global blue chip companies such as Accenture or Coca-Cola.

If you’ve ever cried and wailed and screamed at the heavens “Why can’t you people see that the lobby is an utter piece of shite or that you’re the only fracking site with no late reg option and would it really fracking kill you to add synchronized breaks?” well, there’s a simple answer to all that.

They don’t care. Do. Not. Care.

Because the people calling the shots don’t play poker and, frankly, don’t even really much care for poker players. You’re needy and whine a lot. You’re not as profitable as other divisions and it’s getting damn harder every year to compete with PokerStars for what few of you there are to go around with the US still placing its head firmly in its ass in regards to online poker.

(Lest I sound like a shill for PokerStars I should point out it’s one of the few online sites that I HAVEN’T worked for in some capacity. Come to think of it, maybe if I worked for them I’d have a much lower opinion…)

Most execs for online poker sites are just there for the money and bolt as soon as they get a better offer. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, as that’s true of 95% of executives in the business world, but it explains a lot of angst and frustration from poker players when faced with all the obvious things wrong in the online poker world.

The very few employees/execs that really do love poker and enjoy to play usually get beaten down after a year or two of banging their head against a stony wall of indifference and/or malaise and/or lack of understanding of what makes poker players and gamblers really tick.

Poker is no different than any other professional sport or the movie industry or any endeavor where there’s a lot of money at stake and very visible displays of wealth.

You just never know, unless you know someone really well. And even then they may still be lying to you.

A lot of players you see splashing around in $10K buy-in events (or even bigger) are completely and utterly buried in makeup; they owe other players so much money that they’ll realistically never square up all their debts.

The poker world is a really strange one when it comes to staking and loaning money and swapping percentages. It might be a profitable arrangement for a year or two but suddenly they go through a long dry spell and owe you $200K that they don’t have.

How do you get that back? They might have $50K on hand but even if they agreed to hand you all of that you’re still out $150K and they have no way of ever making that amount of money if you’re not sticking them in this tournament or that tournament, praying they finally bink a big score.

So you keep staking them and the debt keeps mounting. To anyone on the outside looking in, they’re living the holla-balla lifestyle, traveling the world and playing in all the big events but the reality of their financial situation is anything but holla-balla.

There’s also an element of reciprocity, too, that’s unique to the world of poker. If you have friends who trust you with money to loan you can play bigger than you normally would with your bankroll and take more shots; when they need a helping hand in a similar spot they can then lean on you.

It’s hard to get out of that loop even when someone owes you an uncomfortable amount of money, as no one wants to be the asshole who calls markers due when loaning and swapping and staking is an integral part of the lifestyle for a lot of players.

The moral of the story isn’t that all poker players are super rich or all are secretly broke and in huge debt. It’s that you just can’t tell and you shouldn’t assume that because someone had a huge $1.2 million score a few years back and plays in all the big events that they’re flush with cash and living the high life.

You also never know how much of their own action a player actually had when they binked that big score. Chino Rheem’s win in the inaugural event of the ill-fated Epic Poker League was a great example of that. On paper he won a cool $1 million for the win but he was rumored to have only 10% of his action due to massive debts, so he likely only saw a fraction of that big score

Poker often gets a gold star for being one of the few games offered by casinos that can be +EV in the long run. Poker players aren’t idiots like roulette or slots junkies; poker players are smart and calculating, able to beat the system and make wheelbarrows of money.

That’s all true but most poker players are also gamblers, with poker profits often ending up at the blackjack or craps tables or on the Lakers to win in six.

Throw in other typical vices (women, booze, drugs) and the fact that an awful lot of the big poker action each year occurs in Vegas and it’s pretty plain to see that poker isn’t that strange a beast to find alongside other typical pit games in a casino.

The WSOP also puts out a running tally of total prizemoney awarded at each WSOP ($191,999,010 in 2011) and I’ve always wondered how much of that actually went home with winners and how much of it got donated back to the Vegas economy in various legal and illegal ways.

I’d also bet you a fairly biggish sum that if you broke out the prizemoney won by poker pros and the prizemoney won by amateurs at last year’s WSOP and could magically track how much was blown in assorted ways, that the amateurs would actually take home a much higher percentage of their winnings.

There, I said it. And it’s true. He most definitely is prone to blow-ups from time to time but a lot of the “brat-ish” behavior that you see is more from the WWE School of Villains handbook than from any place of real malice.

Let’s just say that his infamous showing of his ass in the H.O.R.S.E. event a few years back is just the tip of the iceberg and leave it at that.

This is obviously pretty subjective but I would guess that if you asked the average poker pro who’s comfortably well off, bankrolled to play whatever they like, and a consistent winner at their profession that maybe 50% would instantly trade it in for guaranteed equal success/opportunities/money in another field.

A lot of that is no fault of poker as the grass is indeed always greener on the other side of the fence. Plenty of rockstars would rather be doctors and plenty of doctors would love to be rockstars.

That’s not my point as much as the fact that making your living from poker can be deadly frustrating and boring at times for many people.

While money is obviously nice (as well as having no alarm clock going off or TPS reports to fill out) moving chips around and extracting money from people less skilled at a largely arbitrary card game doesn’t really led to anything other than, well, moving chips around and extracting money from a largely arbitrary card game.

Add in the inevitable variance and downswing and (for tournament pros) constant time on the road and much of your life spent in airports and hotels, and the life of a poker pro quickly loses its luster for many.

It’s not true for all pros as some absolutely love the game but loads more might very well trade jobs with you in a heartbeat if it were as easy as snapping your fingers and making it so.

This isn’t a slam on PokerNews but more a comment on the whole chip-count side of reporting at big live events like the WSOP.

Until RFID technology gets cheap enough that casinos fork over the cash to put them in all tournament chips with the necessary equipment to scan and record them, you’re NEVER going to get accurate chip count info for big fields like you see at WSOP events, especially in the early going.

As players fall by the wayside and the field gets pared down, you absolutely get good chip counts from PokerNews, so please don’t think I’m saying PokerNew sucks; it doesn’t.

The reality is just that it’s impossible to keep tabs on a field of 1,000+ players, as stacks are constantly moving and most counts are a guesstimate to begin with, as those assigned the thankless task of chip counts are rushing around trying to get counts for a ton of players, rush back to their computer, get them updated, then head back out again to repeat it all over again.

PokerNews pays a lot of money every year to be the official chip count provider of the WSOP so no one really like to talk about this issue, but you shouldn’t put a lot of stock in chip count updates for the first day or two of mos events and you definitely shouldn’t get bent out of shape because so-and-so has the same count they started the day with and they’ve been playing for four hours, etc.

It’s natural to obsess over chip counts (especially for friends and family following along at home) but I’ve always wished we’d all agree on a chip count moratorium until there were 100 players left or so, focusing instead on big hands or other color and general updates on who the overall leaders are, who’s booming, who’s out, and so on.

But everyone loves chip counts so that’s what you get, even if they’re a vague approximation at best and often not updated for hours and only for a select few name players anyway that more people than not are interested in.

Anyone who has anything to do with poker — whether player, casino or online gambling operator, members of the media, you name it — is rooting for online poker to return to the US.

The passage of the UIGEA in 2006 was a huge blow to the industry and Black Friday in 2011 was the finishing blow that finally cut off one of the world’s biggest gambling markets from being able to freely pump money into online poker sites — which in turn helps feed the whole ecosystem worldwide.

Poker still hasn’t truly recovered and while the game is still growing in Europe and Asia there’s been no mad stampede to the felt to make up for the online absence of US players.

There definitely is growing chatter in the US about legalizing online poker and states like Nevada, Illinois, and California are inching closer and closer to legalizing online poker for state residents but the sad truth is no one really knows when US poker players will be back online and slinging chips in full force.

Intra-state offerings for residents would be a step in the right direction but still relatively small potatoes and the player bases would be fragmented, making it hard for any one company or operator to step up and capture a large percentage of the US market for online poker players.

None of that is a terrible thing — as the poker world will like continue to roll on doing good but not great — but unless a federal law is passed to legalize poker we still are likely several years away from any sort of meaningful impact from US online poker players.

Unfortunately for poker fans, the Obama administration has given off zero signs of caring at all about the legalization and taxation of online poker. None, zip, nada. And it’s not one of those issues that he’s waiting to lock up a second term before turning his attention to, so there’s just no impetus from on high to roll back the UIGEA and/or replace it with something new.

If you want to go down in the record books as the ultimate WSOP grinder of 2012 you’ve got your work cut out for you — and you better bring multiple wheelbarrows of cash for buy-ins.

Not only are there 61 official bracelet events on the 2012 WSOP schedule but the new OneDrop charity event comes with a $1 million buy-in, so playing every single event got a lot more expensive than in past years.

Dwan played in an amazing 53 of the 58 events offered in 2011.

If you play every event and take the re-entry option in Event #9 you’re going to need exactly $1,238,500 to play all 61 bracelet events on the 2012 WSOP schedule.

But money won’t be your only obstacle, as you’ll also have to be a casino employee to enter Event #1 and 50 years of age or older to enter Event #29.

If you have any sense of decency and decorum you’ll also need to be female to play in Event #51, but as we’ve seen in recent years that’s not always the case, with ten men entering the Ladies event in 2011 due to their being no hard rule against it.

So if you’re a 50+ year old female and you work in some capacity for a casino and have a spare $1,238,500 lying around, hey, you could make history by playing in every event on the 2012 WSOP schedule!

Click here for more WSOP facts and trivia

I’m pretty proud of the output so far but it’s a little embarrassing as far as the last minute scramble, as it wasn’t like this whole WSOP snuck up on anyone; oh hey, let’s have a huge series of poker tournaments in Vegas and award millions and millions of American currency to the winners!

Dealers get to show off their poker chops in Event #1 on May 27

We’ve got just over a week left now to twiddle our thumbs before the 2012 WSOP kicks off with Event #1 (a $500 buy-in NLHE Casino Employees tournament that’s been the traditional opener the last few years) which still means plenty of time to get ready to rumble — as well as plenty of time to touch on some related topics.

Betting on the WSOP has likely been around since the seven original players — “Amarillo Slim” Preston, Sailor Roberts, Doyle Brunson, Puggy Pearson, Crandell Addington, Carl Cannon, and Johnny Moss set down and played a little poker at Binion’s Horseshoe.

Moss was the winner of that first “Main Event” but it bears about as much resemblance to the Main we all know and love as I do to Brad Pitt (answer — none at all); they simply played a cash game and voted at the end as to who was the best player, with Moss getting the nod.

With that selection of characters bellied up to the table we’d wager that there was plenty of betting on the WSOP going on. And betting on the Yankees game. And betting on what state that hot cocktail waitress was. And betting on whatever other random act of gambling lunacy Slim could concoct — usually after secretly practicing for months.

Poker players love to gamble and gamblers love to play poker. Thus it is written…

Betting on the WSOP has evolved in recent years, with more options now available to both players and fans as online sportsbooks have stepped up to offer a range of poker bets, from picking an outright winner in the Main Event (good luck) to prop bets on how players from certain countries will fair or last-longer bets between two selected players.

Fantasy betting has also become more popular, with contestants picking a slate of players and picking up points throughout the entire WSOP based on their results.

Daniel Negreanu organized a popular $25,000 buy-in fantasy league for last year’s WSOP, which saw Jsson Somerville and Jason Mercier win the contest and scoop up a hefty $225,000.

Ben Lamb's monster WSOP also paid off big for Jason Somerville and Jason Mercier

That league drew 15 entries and players were selected via an auction-style process, with each entry given a set number of points to bid on players to fill out their rosters, which were posted online here.

Somerville and Mercier absolutely mashed the field, as their decision to take a flyer on Ben Lamb and Elky — who both had monster 2011 WSOPs and were selected by no other team — paid off huge.

Negreanu will run the $25K fantasy league again in 2012, so if you’ve got a few bricks of cash burning a hole in your pocket you can get in on the action this year, with the draft slated for May 27 in Vegas.

If you’re working with a slightly smaller gambling roll, a few online sportsbooks already have WSOP betting lines up and running, although you’ll have more choices as we draw closer to the start.

The current betting options at bwin are more than a little LOL, as they just have the following bets available as far as outright winners of the 2012 WSOP Main Event:

Phil Hellmuth (USA) – 41.00
Bertrand Grospellier (FRA) – 51.00
Allen Cunningham (USA) – 51.00
Phil Ivey (USA) – 51.00
Johnny Chan (CHN) – 51.00
Chris Ferguson (USA) – 51.00
Doyle Brunson (USA) – 67.00
Michael Mizrachi (USA) – 67.00
Daniel Negreanu (CAN) – 67.00
Vitaly Lunkin (RUS) – 81.00
Josh Arieh (USA) – 81.00
Steve Billirakis (USA) – 101.00
Jason Mercier (USA) – 101.00
Gus Hansen (DEN) – 101.00
Shawn Buchanen (CAN) – 101.00
Martin Staszko (CZE) – 101.00
Ram Vaswani (ENG) – 101.00
Pius Heinz (GER) – 101.00
Ben Lamb (USA) – 101.00

How they picked that motley assortment of players to post odds for, I do not know, and Chris Ferguson appearing anywhere on there is pretty hilarious, much less at 51. Spelling Shawn Buchanan’s name correctly might also be a nice touch.

If you held a gun to my head and forced me to bet on one of the above lines, I guess I’d plunk my venti money down on Jason Mercier at 101, using the oh-so-scientific approach of “He’s due for a deep run in the Main at some point and hasn’t yet used up his one-time like most folks on the list.”

Let’s get a little important business out of the way right off the bat — ship it baby, another awesome person has stepped up to the plate and bought us a venti!

Want to play online while you play live? Check out www.androidpokersites.com

We also got a venti pledge yesterday from, drumroll please, Andy Bloch himself!

We were already rooting for you, sir, but this takes it up a whole other level.

It’s almost embarrassing to admit but I actually get very excited for the WSOP each year, both as a member of the media and a poker fan in general.

I’ve covered a lot of poker events in a lot of countries but after awhile they all sort of merge into one, as no matter how you slice it or spice it up you pretty much always have 200-1000 people pushing betting discs around for 3-7 days until one player has all of them.

Doyle casts a very long shadow over the entire history of the WSOP

The WSOP is a very different beast; it has history and a heft to it. It means something. It counts.

Run good here and people will remember your name. Run extremely good at the right times and you’ll find yourself on a banner, staring down at a sea of poker players and crushed dreams as they fall, one by one by one, as they collect their things and shuffle out of the Amazon Room.

You can now find WSOP results for every single event since 1970 and I’ve spent the last few days digging around in the very early years, trying to put some context to what for most of us are just exotic sounding names like Lakewood Louie, Fats Morgan, and Bobby Schwing.

Like sifting through genealogy records, they’re now just names in a database but I’m fascinated by the story behind them, how they got there to that point in time when they won a bracelet, and where they ended up.

It’s easy for the Doyle Brunson, Bobby Baldwin, and Chip Reese entries you find in the first decade or so of WSOP results; we all know their story, they’re known entities.

But many of the others, well, who knows. And honestly, we may never know, as after 40+ years some of those early stories are just never going to be remembered or told.

It was actually a very recent nudge that prompted my foray into the dusty, smoky corners of Binion’s in the 1970s, as speculation of the new $1 million OneDrop WSOP event hitting its 48 player cap caused me to think “Man, that’s going to be a rough bubble for someone”, because I’m just that sort of person (the venti is definitely half-empty, not half-full – please buy me another venti).

If it does cap out then that’s roughly $48 million in prize money minus 11.11% for OneDrop, so let’s say a ballpark of $43 million in prizemoney to be awarded.

Using a standard payout structure, it’ll likely look something like this (not exactly, but in the ballpark):

1st – 35.0%

2nd – 25.0%

3rd – 12.5%

4th -10.0%

5th – 7.5%

6th – 5.0%

7th – 5.0%

That means the first player in the money in the OneDrop will cash for a cool $2.2 million, with the bubble boy or girl getting absolutely nothing.

That’s a pretty damn rough bubble.

But will it be the WORST bubble ever at the WSOP? Maybe. Maybe not.

It’ll be the worst bubble ever from a sheer dollars and cents perspective, as far as the gap between finishing on the bubble (and winning no prize money) as opposed to the very next player out who does win cash. And it’ll be the worst bubble in that regard by miles.

But I think you also have to consider that anyone that’s ponying up $1 million to play in the OneDrop event is either very wealthy, a CEO that is doing it as a charitable contribution for a business, an individual pro who can afford the loss, or a pro that’s representing a group of investors who can afford the loss.

There just aren’t many people who can take their seat in a $1 million buy-in event that are materially impacted by finishing on the bubble and missing out on a $2.2 million payday.

So if I’m going to argue that isn’t necessarily the worst bubble in WSOP history, the obvious question is what is?

One thing that popped out to me from the very early years of the WSOP is that the Main Event was winner-take-all until 1978. The biggest field for the Main Event was 34 players in 1977, when Doyle Brunson had the pleasure of scooping up $340,000 all to himself when he took down his second consecutive Main Event title.

Who was the unfortunate bubble boy to Doyle in 1977 who finished runner-up (and effectively bubbled, due to the winner-take-all structure) and walked away with nothing? Gary “Bones” Berland. Or Milo “Slew” Jacobson, depending on who the heck you choose to believe.

The official WSOP results list Milo Jacobson as the 2nd place finisher, which is backed up WSOP media guide the next year. Hendon Mob, though, and other sources lists Jacobson as finishing 3rd, with Bones Berland finishing 2nd that year.

All signs point to Berland being the bubble boy, as it was the apparently the second year that Doyle sealed his main event victory with the mighty 10-2:

Down to heads-up play with the chip lead against Bones Berland, Doyle was dealt the 10-2 again. Unlike the previous year’s final hand, he was up against another trash hand in Berland’s 8-5. Neither hand was suited and neither player showed any strength preflop. The flop came 10-8-5 rainbow, giving Doyle top pair and Berland bottom two pair.

Both players slowplayed their hand and the turn gave Doyle the miracle 2 for a better two pair. This time, Doyle bet out, Berland raised him all-in and, of course, Doyle called. Amazingly, the 10 on the river gave Doyle another full house on the river to win his second consecutive WSOP Main Event with this antithesis of a power hand

What’s odd is that the online excerpt from the media guide for the 1978 WSOP lists this:

MILO “SLEW” JACOBSON
Nobody in Las Vegas had ever heard of Milo Jacobson before he walked into the Horseshoe Casino and counted out $10,000 buy-in money for the Hold-Em championship of the 1977 World Series of Poker.
They still don’t know much about Milo, but it will be a long time before anyone forgets him.
He hails from Sioux Falls, South Dakota. He is retired and plays poker at the local Elks Club.
He enjoys a martini or two for breakfast, and usually keeps a Canadian Club within easy reach while he plays.
He insists he’s encountered tougher poker competition at the Elks Club.
A quiet man standing well over six feet tall and pushing 300 pounds, Milo Jacobson emerged as the Cinderella challenger in ’77 and was the last man out as Doyle “Dolly Doyle” Brunson bested a field of seasoned pros and amateurs for $340,000.
“I’ll be back next year,” he drawled casually, “and probably bring a bus full of the Elks with me. Y’see, I’m considered the worst Hold-Em player in Sioux Falls. When the other fellas find out I came in second for a $340,000 pot, they’ll beat a trail to The Horseshoe Casino.”

Whether it was Berland or Jacobson, a $340,000 bubble is a pretty rough one to take, especially when you adjust for inflation, as $340,000 in 1977 roughly equates to about $1.3 million in 2012 dollars.

That’s within spitting distance of the upcoming OneDrop bubble from a dollars and cents perspective but you have to factor in the emotional/historical impact as well of bubbling a Main Event title, which isn’t really going to exist for the OneDrop event.

Usually a bubble is just missing out on a min-cash; in 1977 bubbling meant missing out on a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to call yourself a Main Event champion.

Jacobson completely disappeared off the WSOP map after 1977 but Berland kept grinding for years after, and coming very close to nailing down that elusive Main Event dream in 1986 when he finished 3rd in the Main Event, with Berry Johnston winning that year.

Another interesting factoid there is that Jesse Alto finished 4th in that same 1986 Main Event, and Alto was the bubble boy in the 1976 Main Event to, you guessed it, Doyle Brunson.

Alto not only missed out on a Main Event title and $220,000 in cash for his own painful bubble but Doyle took him down with the same hand that’d become his namesake hand — and putting on Alto one of the worst beats you’ll ever see, given the circumstances.

Alto raised with As Jh and Doyle (who held a big chiplead) made the call with 10s 2s. Alto banged the Ah Js 10h flop pretty hard and checked it, hoping to get Doyle to bite.

Doyle more than bit, shoving all-in with Alto quickly calling as a 87% favorite to double up and pull close to even with Doyle as far as chips.

The 2c on the turn was one of Doyle’s few runner-runner outs, but Alto was still a 91% percent favorite to win.

Doyle binked the 10d on the river, though, crushing Alto in pretty brutal fashion. Alto never would take down a Main Event title (or even win a bracelet) but he’d make five more Main Event final tables, finishing 5th in 1978, 3rd in 1984, 6th in 1985, 4th in 1986, and 9th in 1988.

When I first started playing online poker back in the Stone Age circa 2001 at Paradise Poker, the biggest most exciting online poker site in all the land, I definitely had big poker dreams; I’d order a free virtual margarita and doughnuts at the Paradise tables and get my LHE grind on, moving up in stakes, planning domination of the poker world.

Marcel Luske: a million Hendon Mob flags but no bracelets.

Like a lot of dreams, reality eventually intervened: well, life intervened. I’m a better writer than poker player and making a little money writing about poker is a lot less stressful than steaming off $5K in one hour at the PartyPoker $30/60 LHE tables (that was a very, very difficult thing to accomplish back in 2003-2004 given the general standard of play but I managed, like a boss).

Even though I play very little these days I have to admit the bracelet dream is still slightly flickering. It’s a completely arbitrary and garish goal but in the end everyone who’s ever played even just a bit of poker wants one, even if they pretend to be too cool to care.

For the vast majority of us it’s perfectly fine to fall short of that dream — I’m 0-2 in WSOP bracelet events but hey, I can live with that — but for others it starts to get painful, especially when their name keeps popping up on lists like this with the blaring headline such as “Best Poker Players to Never Win a Bracelet”.

Patrik Antonius: piles of money and a hot wife but no bracelet.

Seeing your name on that list obviously has its perks, though, sort of like when Lyle Lovett catches shit for playing way out of his looks division when he was with Julia Roberts; the dude has millions of dollars and repeatedly banged the chick from Pretty Woman — indeed, it must really suck to be Lyle Lovett.

But some things are inevitable like the tides and the sun rising and setting, so with no further ado (I swear), here’s my own Top Ten list as far as some of the best players to stalk the poker land who’ll be looking to finally strap on a bracelet at the 2012 WSOP.

One thing to note is I’ve focused on people who’ve been around for quite awhile and left off the Viktor Blom and Tom Dwan and similar young guns who may be very awesome at poker but haven’t been on the scene that long.

Top Ten Poker Players to Never Win a Bracelet

Andy Bloch: He’s come up just shy in 2nd twice at WSOP events but has never snagged a bracelet, with over $3 million in lifetime tournament cashes as well as 20 WSOP cashes.

Patrik Antonius: Over $5 million in cashes (including two $1 million+ scores) in tournaments but nary a WSOP bracelet among them, with his best finish 3rd in a $10K PLO event at the 2007 WSOP.

Chad Brown: An amazing 34 cashes at the WSOP but none of them saw him stack up all the chips, despite coming very close with three runner-up finishes in various events over the years.

Phil Gordon: Nearly $3 million in cashes and 20 WSOP cashes (ignoring the Ante Up for Africa charity events) but he’s yet to strap a bracelet on his wrist, with two 3rd place finishes as close as he’s gotten.

Marcel Luske: From a longevity/true grinder standpoint, it’s kind of amazing that Luske has never won a bracelet. He’s got over 20 WSOP cashes and nearly $4 million in lifetime earnings but hasn’t yet gone the distance in a WSOP event.

Bill Gazes: Gazes is another old-school grinder that has racked up tons of WSOP cashes (a whopping 30 in total) and over $2 million in earnings on the circuit but no bracelet anywhere there since his first WSOP cash back in 1995.

Antanas Guoga: Better known to the poker world as “Tony G”, he’s got 16 WSOP cashes and several final tables but hasn’t yet managed to send every single opponent in a WSOP event off on their bikes.

Michael Binger: Binger barely gets in under our completely arbitrary “no young guns” rule but he’s been chasing bracelets at the WSOP since 2006 and has $7 million in earnings as well as 27 WSOP cashes (headlined by his second WSOP cash ever when he binked $4.1 million in the 2006 Main Event for coming third).

Isaac Haxton: Another who barely sneaks in under the arbitrary young gun cutoff but $4 million in lifetime cashes isn’t too shabby and his 17 WSOP cashes include a runner-up finish in the $40K NLHE event in 2009 for a monster $1.1 million consolation prize.

Jonathan Little: He’s got nearly $5 million in lifetime cashes and a WPT title + WPT Player of the Year on his poker resume but he’s still chasing that WSOP bracelet, with a baker’s dozen of WSOP cashes dating back to 2006.