Speedyfold Poker Blog

The long road to online poker taxation seems to have started in the USA. Which at face value doesnt sound like a good thing at all, but is actually pretty positive news. For several years now online poker in the USA has had a status that is for all intents and purposes illegal. So when the USA figures out the best way to tax online poker (which there has been initial steps towards) it can officially approve and regulate it. This would mean re-opening the US to fully legal online poker. Now there’s the good news.

It may take time, but the momentum seems sufficient to get there eventually. This is particular good for the likes of Party Poker, the former giant of the online poker world and still a formidable presense. They of all the sites probably have the most to gain as they have a player database of over 10 million American players, who were former players at their site before US regulation.

So it is going to be an interesting year or so ahead, especially with Party Poker waiting in the wings ready to shake up the current status quo.

Day 1 of the WSOP has just concluded and whilst glancing through the names of the chip leaders I noticed the name Dwyen Ringbauer. Not a name I have heard of and it looked a bit unusual. In fact I thought it looked a bit like an anagram. Low-and-beyond it is indeed an anagram of Breadwinner Guy. How very apt. Lets hope he continues to do well and live up to his name.

This year’s WSOP has seen some of the biggest prop bets ever. Not only has there been the Durrrr ones we have already discussed, but Phil Ivey has got some massive ones booked in. Howard Lederer has laid 5 million dollars against him getting 2 bracelets over the course of the next 3 years. Phil Ivey is already half way there after winning Event 37, the $3000 horse event. Following that win Ivey also booked bets running into the millions at 7-1 about him getting a 2nd bracelet this year. eg Phil’s $50,000 to villians $350,000

Phil has also got bets direct with Durrrr over who will get the most bracelets over 2 years. After nearly a great start for Durrrr (finishing 2nd in Event 11) Ivey has lept ahead with that Event 37 win, making it 1-0 to Ivey. Things look like a big uphill struggle now for durrrr, as Ivey is a bit of a bracelet machine given the proper motivation (ie money) and already has a total of 8 lifetime bracelets to his name now. Durrrr is still looking for his first one, but no doubt has the talent to get there.

Bets and talk about bracelets have been frantic of late, with Ivey vs Hellmuth also a lot in the news. Hellmuth has had a couple of deep runs (most recently 7th in a PLO8 event) but no bracelets this year. Most people in the industry seem to think it is only a matter of time before Ivey overtakes Hellmuth, some thinking in less than 5 years. Many are also speculating on Ivey even reaching the dizzy heights of 30 bracelets in his career. He’s sure come a long way since his No Home Jerome days.

This was a pretty interesting hand from the Party Poker Premier League. Luke “FullFlush” Schwartz vs Yevgeniy “Jovial Gent” Timoshenko. FullFlush a minor legend from the cash game tables, and Jovial Gent a legend from tournament play. Although it’s clearly a ballsy play, I do have a small problem with it. The speed of the shove makes the hand look really weak in my opinion. Add that with how he looks afterwards and maybe a call is findable. But how can you possibly call with KJ for so much? Almost impossible in reality.

The last few months have been pretty amazing for female poker players. Liv Boeree hot on the heals of both Vanessa Selbst and Annie Duke. In fact the last 12 months or so has included by far the biggest collection of wins by women ever. Anyone get the feeling they’re taking over? …

In April 2010 Liv Boeree won the EPT San Remo for $1,698,300
In April 2010 Vanessa Selbst won the NAPT Mohegan Sun for $750,000
In March 2010 Annie Duke won the NBC Heads-up winning $500,000
In May 2009 Vanessa Rousso won the High Roller at the EPT Grand Final, winning $749,467
In March 2009 Sandra Naujoks won the EPT Dortmund for $1,159,541

Has Pokerstars got too much of a stranglehold of the poker tour world? It is certainly open to debate. Pokerstars owns and operates numerous live poker tours such as:

EPT - European Poker Tour
NAPT - North American Poker Tour (including the PCA)
LAPT - Latin America Poker Tour
APPT - Asia Pacific Poker Tour
ANZPT - Australia and New Zealand Poker Tour
IPT - Italian Poker Tour
UKIPT - UK and Ireland Poker Tour
RPT - Russian Poker Tour
CSPT - Czech-Slovak Poker Tour

It is an impressive portfolio for sure. But is it too much? We have seen recently the Full Tilt pros not being allowed to play in the NAPT because it is basically heavily promoting the Pokerstars brand.

I would tend to disagree though. It isnt like they’ve been buying up existing poker tours and taking them over. They are new tours, providing some great tournaments for poker players. Their immediate success is a product of the power and pockets of the Pokerstars brand. They have generated field sizes that any fledging tour could only dream of. If some of the major competing brands stop their players playing it is both unfortunate but also fully understandable. On the flip side I doubt Pokerstars will be allowing their main guys to play in any Full Tilt live tours either.

The saving grace to all this is that more well run and reliable live tournaments is a good thing for the average well-rolled poker player, and that the ultimate of all poker tours the WSOP remains unaffected, largely independant and the utlimate unifying tour for every player. In many sports and skill games such as Boxing, Darts, Chess etc there have been major splits at the top basically creating more than 1 world title. Thankfully with Poker this situation doesnt exist and long may that continue

If you are interested in qualifying for any of the above poker tours then signup with a $600 deposit bonus to Pokerstars who have plenty of online satellites available for all the tours

Full Tilt’s ironman rewards scheme must be one of the worst explained I’ve ever seen. How difficult can it be to explain this things in plain English and make them appealing to it’s players. Most poker players are inherently a little lazy when it comes to reading large chunks of text. Lets remember we stare at images and click buttons for most of the day ; Most of us want to glance at something and understand the gist of it within the first paragraph.

Full Tilt’s Ironman explanation though is a long ramble that doesnt really tell you much. What the hell is an Ironman Chip for instance, and how about Ironman Medals? And they have these very vague tables which imply you need to accumulate a certain number of points every day. However it doesnt explicity state that. Then they add more layers like Ironman Plus levels, and the need to opt-in and decide in advance what you want to use the points towards.

Language such as “You could receive bonus medals at the end of the month if you reach at least Bronze status and earn at least 500 points in a day. ”

It is the sort of information page that has just been repeatedly amended over time, and no-one has actually taken the step of sitting back for 2 mins and considering how it looks to “fresh eyes” to the page. I say all this not even really in personal frustration or anything, just more the fact that it such a poor use of an incentive scheme and marketing tool.

There was an interesting thing in the news today. In the UK Annette_15 was being used by Betfair to advertise their site. However there was a complaint. Not only is Annette quite young looking, but it was suggested that her actual screenname “Annette_15″ suggested she is younger than she actually is (she is currently 20 btw).

Whilst reviewing this complaint it was declared that there was in fact a law banning persons below 25 from being used for gambling advertising. Betfair seemed unaware of this law. They have therefore subsequently stated that they wont use Annette_15 again in the UK in any advertising compaigns.

It seems a little harsh considering that Annette won the WSOPE main event in the UK, making her a prime advertising asset. I guess I can see both sides of the argument, and hopefully it wont mean that Annette’s Betfair sponsorship is not renewed.

The WCOOP on PokerStars is well underway. In previous years this has been a tournament series that has got me licking my lips in anticipation. Large field, large buy-in, large stack, long blind levels, etc. OMG what was not to love. However this year’s WCOOP has been somewhat of a disappointment. Gone are virtually all of the 30 min blind levels. The stacks have frequently been a reduced size, and the starting blinds often have come in at a higher level. It is difficult not to think the series has been cheapened somewhat. It just doesnt feel that special.

Lets take tonights $320 HORSE event as a case in point:

There is a regular $33 HORSE tourney on Stars with 3000 starting chips, 12 minute blinds, and first levels of 20/40, 30/60, 40/80, 60/120, and 80/160. Regular, run-of-the-mill, ordinary HORSE tourney.

So, how special was Event 25 of the WCOOP I here you ask? A HORSE event with a $320 buy-in and 1180 entrants? I will tell you how special: 10 min blinds!! 5000 starting chips and first levels of 50/100, 50/100, 60/120, 60/120, and 80/160!!

It is a major disppointment that this has happened to virtually all events. God did I used to love playing this highly skillful series, where you’d still be pitting your wits 17 hours deep. Now it feels like so un-very-special in comparison.

All I can do is pray enough poker players moan in order that Stars re-instates the former glory of this series next year.

PokerStars have introduced a late reg policy for the WHOLE of the first hour of a tournament. At first it seemed like very selective tournaments, but now it appears to have been rolled out to about half of the whole schedule. It produces some very wierd situations, such as playing for 3 hours and finishing lower on the list than someone who lasted 10 minutes. This is because when you bust you simply get allocated the finish position of NO. OF PLAYERS NOW LEFT + 1. At the beginning you might only have 2000 entrants and bust first hand and get placed in 2000th, whereas by the end of the late reg hour there might be 5000 entrants, with 3500 left in, meaning if you bust at that point you get positioned lower (3500th) than the guy who busted the first hand.

It is good from the sense of increased prizepools in your favorite tournaments, and less good if you like an idea of what you are letting yourself in for in terms of field size. I suppose if you’re late it’s also good too (if we take things to the literal max!)

In the picture below you see 13 tournaments with late reg…. most of the screen. Perhaps this is too much, the jury is out.