Kapow!

The picture says it all - our first representative to play in the World Series of Poker this year, ran good and ran deep in last Tuesday's' WSOP Event #12, a $1500 No Limit Hold-em event.

Eric L. found himself accumulating chips early on and kept that momentum going, at the end of day 1 he was one of the chip leaders with over 100,000 in tournament units!  There were just 275 players still alive out of almost 1800 that had started the day, and Eric had a lions share of their chips.

I can't put into words how excited I and the rest of the gang were.  We followed the chip counts with great interest and even got to read through a couple of hands on the official news stream.

This was his biggest pot that was reported on - it was at this point that we all got super pumped.



This was another enjoyable one.

Then as the dinner break came and went on Day 2, Eric texted us to tell us that he was out.  This is how the hand that crippled him went down.

And so that was that.  But what a run!  Eric finished 36th out of nearly 1800 players!  He collected almost $10,000 in prize money, 40% of which will be shared among the other satellite participants. This amounts to almost $500 apiece, a tidy nearly $100 profit for our endeavor!

We are free rolling with Jeff G. who plays a week from Saturday.  Hope you can play and run as well as Eric did Jeff!

Again - a huge congratulations to Eric, you did us proud my man!  What a run!  I've never known anyone who did what you did.  I am super happy, a little bit jealous, but mostly proud that our little game brought the pain to the WSOP!  Bravo!

Hopefully Eric will do a little write up for this blog and the main PSP blog as well.  Can't wait to hear more about the adventure!

Step 2!

Imagine my surprise when I came here this morning and realized - I haven't posted about who is going to the World Series of Poker!

Totally slipped my mind, probably because it isn't me that's going.  Ha.  Ha.


Jeff G. and Eric L. are the deserving representatives who will be carrying the torch for us PSP R2V folks.

Jeff will be at the big dance on the weekend of June 17.

Eric will be playing a $1500 event on June 6, which is a Tuesday!  A first for a PSP rep, I will be eager to hear how the field stacks up against the usual weekend warriors we've dealt with.

In any event we will all be rooting for you fellas!  I know you will make us proud no matter the results - of course, we will be prouder if you bring home some cheddar!

Jeff on the left, Eric in the red on the right, Allen the bubble boy in the blue on the right.

Step 1F

 Our sixth and final step one tournament went out with a bang, nine players showed up for a final chance to earn chips for step two.

 The river was unkind to several early exits, and after that the action got even more intense.  Marc was our bubble  but will still be starting with way more chips than the third-place finisher, that would be me, for step two.

Finishing in second after a brief heads up battle was Andrew who could not overcome Jason's big ass mountain of chips.  Both of our top finishers  are also the chip leader's going into step two.   Here are the final counts, I have been very thorough and very careful to make sure that the calculations are correct. But by all means, everyone of you should look through all of the posts and double check that these totals are correct. Remember only your top four scores count.


Jason - 38K (6)

Andrew - 32 (4)

Jeff - 30K (5)

Marc - 28K (4)

Tony - 26K (5)

Eric T - 20K (4)

Chris - 19K (6)

Allen - 18K (2) (paid for 4)

Eric L - 17K (6)

Jerry - 4K (1) (must pay for 3 more Step 1 entries to receive 16K total for Step 2)


And so there it is, I want to say a big thank you to all of you for participating in this experiment. I know no matter who ends up going to the big dance, we all stand to benefit as there is not one of you that I would not feel comfortable staking.

 As of right now we have just over $3000 in our pool, I am not sure if Jerry is still on board or not, I hope he is  as another $300 will help with travel expenses.

 Looking forward to step number two, next Saturday at 1 PM. We will be playing hour long levels with the exact structure of $1500 World Series of poker bracelet events. We will have a dinner break at six, and if for some reason we are still going after 10 PM, I will put it to an anonymous vote – we can keep playing or we can stop for the night and pick it up on Sunday.  If someone can't make it on Sunday then obviously we keep going.

 Look forward to seeing you all there!

Step 1E

Once again six players gathered round to throw down to earn more chips and maybe a little cheddar on the road to the World Series of Poker in Vegas.

I wasn't first out this time, that was Jeff, but I WAS second out.  Boo.

Eric L. got fairly unlucky more than once and bubbled just shy of bonus chips.

Eric T finished third, earning 6K in chips.

Jason and Marc battled for awhile but in the end Jason's prohibitive chip lead was too much to overcome.

Marc finished second for 8K in chips and $60, Jason got his buy in back plus 12K in chips!


Here are the current chip totals -   (I was wrong last post about Jeff, he only had 3 tournaments under his belt, but now he does have 4)


Jason - 30K (5)

Jeff - 30K (4)

Tony - 26K (4)

Andrew - 24K (3)

Marc - 24K (3)

Eric T - 16K (3)

Eric L - 17K (5)

Chris - 17K (5)

Allen - 14K (1)

Jerry - 12K (1)


Players who have been in 5 tournaments have had their lowest score removed.

Jerry and Allen have had 8K added to their scores, as they only have one more chance to earn chips - in 2 weeks.  If neither can make it, they will begin step two with 18 and 16K respectively.   They will both also owe $300 to play in Step 2.

Our prize pool at this exact moment is - $2400.   Assuming no one drops out we are right on schedule to clear $3000 as we have $900 coming from various players.  $160 will be deducted from that and we will be at $840 + $2400 which is $3240.

Don't miss your last chance to earn chips for Step 2 in two weeks - Friday night at 8pm, April 21.  See you then!

The World Series of Poker MAIN EVENT - Satellite League Info

Our 2017 WSOP Satellite League is winding down - and overall I think it has been and will be a success.  But I would like to implement some changes for the league spanning 2017-2018, changes that will insure that we play a ton more single table tournament poker and that these tournaments will almost always be full.

*******

Starting Saturday, August 5, 2017 - ALL tournaments will run in tandem with our WSOP league.

Everything will remain the same for entry fee and prize pool for all tournaments.

Players will have an OPTION to participate in a race to theWSOP Main Event in 2018.

For these players who want to go for a Main Event seat, it works like this...

SNGs (single table tournaments) -
$60 + $40 entry - $60 to the prize pool for that night, $40 for the WSOP Main Event prize pool.

Saturday night MTTs (multi-table tournaments) - 
$40 + $60 entry - $40 to the prize pool for that night, $60 for the WSOP Main Event prize pool.

One time only re-entry for all tournaments is $60 for SNGs, $40 for MTTs.

For folks who are not interested in the WSOP, absolutely nothing changes for all tournaments.

Let me repeat that.

For folks who are not interested in the WSOP, absolutely nothing changes for all tournaments.


*******

MORE DETAILS

If you are someone who is interested in playing for a seat in the greatest tournament on earth, read on...

The biggest advantage to participating in our WSOP league is that you will get first shot at responding to the Evites.  Evites will be sent first to those who are down with the WSOP.

All tournaments will have the same ONE TIME ONLY re-entry amount for everyone-  if a player is felted before the first break they may re-enter OR if they have a small stack at the first break they may surrender their stack for a fresh one.

BUT - for Main Event League participants - in SNGs $40 of the $60 re-entry goes to WSOP Main Event prize pool, the remaining $20 goes to the prize pool of the evening.  For MTTs the money is split, $20 for the prize pool on the night, $20 goes to the WSOP league.

All players who participate in the WSOP Main Event League must either pay or play a minimum of $1225 worth of entry fees to the league to qualify for Step 2.

Believe it or not, this will happen fairly quickly - even if you only play a minimum of tournaments.

There will likely be 40 or so of these SNGs over the course of a year and maybe a dozen MTTs.

You will reach your goal if you play in only 6 MTTs and 20 PSP SNGs and IF YOU NEVER RE-ENTER.

If you do re-enter, you could potentially play in as few as 12 SNGs.

REMEMBER, if you do well you could potentially win most or all of this money back.  I only count your buy in fees, obviously I don't deduct any money that you win.

Let this sink in -

IF YOU TURN A PROFIT IN THESE TOURNAMENTS YOU WILL BE FREEROLLING YOUR WAY INTO THE MAIN EVENT OF THE WORLD SERIES OF POKER.


*******

If you fall short of qualifying for Step 2, you simply pay the difference.  Which, if you play a bit less than half of all the SNGs, it won't be much at all.

The Step 2 starting stack will be 50K, plus we will be adding bonus chips if you kick butt during the course of the year.

For every SNG you take down you will earn a bonus 5K in chips for Step 2.

For every SNG where you finish in the top 3 you will earn a bonus 2K in chips for Step 2.

For every MTT you take down you will earn a bonus 10K in chips for Step 2.

For every MTT where you finish 4th, 3rd or 2nd you will earn a bonus 5K in chips for Step 2.

There will be a cap of 30,000 bonus chips total that league participants can earn in the SNGs.  So the biggest starting stack anyone can have in Step 2 is 80K.

The Step 2 tournament will be in May of 2018.  Very likely the first or third Saturday at 1pm.  If anyone can't make it we will pool all participants to agree on one date from April through May.

There will VERY LIKELY be a Day 2 of this Step 2 tournament - we will have an hour dinner break at 6pm, and bag and tag at midnight if we are still playing.  Play will resume at noon on Sunday.

Step 2 will have a one time only re-entry of $500 if a player busts before the dinner break.  Re-entry stacks will match whatever a player began the tournament with.

(NOTE: For players who have put in more than 1225 over the course of the year, the extra money will be deducted from the re-entry $500 fee.  If you play say 20 tournaments, and re-enter in say 10 of those, and you play in 10 MTT's you will have put up $1800, so $475 would be deducted from your potential re-entry)

10K plus another 1K for travel expenses will go to first place of Step 2.

This representative (REP) will enter the WSOP Main Event on the entry day of their choice and should they cash, they will share all money paid out to them with the Step 2 participants, 60% for the REP, 40% for the participants.

Any remaining cash in the Step 2 prize pool will go towards rewarding additional WSOP seats at the $1000 level - as many seats as we can give away.

After we award an extra seat or seats, any cash left over will go to travel expenses, divided evenly among seat winners.

If we don't end up giving away another seat besides the Main Event seat, all money in excess of $1225 that players have put in will be fully refunded to them.

Players also have an option of stopping to pay their WSOP fees once they reach $1225.  If they choose to do this they are not eligible for any extra seats that might be rewarded in Step 2.

Step 1D

Only six players this time, once again yours truly found himself finishing short of earning bonus chips. This time Eric L and Jason saw fit to join the club. Then it was Marc, Jeff and Tony remaining, each guaranteed at least 6K in bonus chips.  It was less than an hour later when everyone's chips went in.

Marc had a micro stack so both Jeff and Tony made the call pre-flop.   Tony bet the flop and Jeff check raised all in Tony snap called.

 Jeff had flopped an open ended straight, Tony had spiked a nine for a set. Jeff got there immediately on the turn, Tony re-sucked  out on the river when the board paired. Crazy!

Jeff had a good amount of chips but Tony had a veritable mountain - and so that was that. A double knock out to end the evening.

And so this is where we stand...


Andrew - 24K  (3)

Jason - 22K     (4)*

Jeff - 26K       (4)*

Tony - 26K     (4)*

Eric L - 17K   (4)*

Chris - 17K    (4)*


Marc - 16K    (2)


Eric T. - 10K  (2)

Allen - 6K    (1)

Jerry - 4K     (1)



*Indicates players that are paid in FULL.  All remaining tournaments for these players are free-rolls, including Step 2


Our current prize pool is $2260!  With two Step 1 tournaments remaining, we are assured of clearing $3000 by plenty, assuming no one drops out.


Remember, to qualify for Step 2 you have to pay OR play for 4 Step 1 tournaments.


Our penultimate Step 1 happens Friday night, April 7 at 8pm.  Don't miss out on your chance to accumulate chips for Step 2.  Remember if you fail to play four Step 1 tournaments you still must reach $400 total in entry fees to play in Step 2.   Some of us have already reached our $400 fee, so the next two tournaments are free rolls and for that matter so is Step 2!

Step 1C

9, count them, 9 players showed up this time!  Including TWO brand new recruits, Jerry and Marc!

With the addition of TWO new players this means our prize pool will reach $3360 if no one drops out!  That's two full $1500 seats plus a bit of travel scratch for each representative.  NOICE.

Myself, Eric L., Tony, Jerry, Jason and Andrew finished 'out of the money' for 4K in chips apiece.

Eric T finished third scooping up 6K in chips for Step 2.

Marc and Jeff battled for awhile before chopping the money ($80 each) and getting 10K in chips apiece.

So our standings as of right now are -


Andrew - 24K  (3)

Jason - 18K     (3)

Jeff - 18K       (2)

Tony - 14K     (3)

Eric L - 13K   (3)

Chris - 13K    (3)

Eric T. - 10K  (2)

Marc - 10K    (1)

Allen - 6K    (1)

Jerry - 4K     (1)


Keep in mind, some have played less tournaments than others - noted in the parenthesis,  once people hit 4 tournaments, they can drop a lower score or two if they do better in one or two of the remaining tournaments.  Only the best 4 results will count.

Our next Step 1 is Friday night at 8pm on March 31st.   It's the fourth of six Step 1 tournaments.  Don't miss your chance to grind up some more chips for Step 2!